Please don't modify or put the story on a site without my permission. Thanks.

Go to episode : 1 2 3 4

---

Episode 1

 Ever since he’d been old enough to count his own spots, Jadeus the leopard had noticed that two of his spots were missing.  Well, at least it looked that way.  Although there was no set number of spots that a leopard must have, they are evenly spread over their fur, for the most part.  And he noticed that on either side of his chest, there was an area with no spot.  As puzzling as this was, it didn’t really bother him.  What bothered him was that he had just been orphaned.  His parents were both killed by something.  No one would tell him what it was, though.  So he had to imagine it.
Which was pretty easy, anyway.  He was a wise cat, even though only two years old at the time.  Only one cat in the world had more insight than he, and that was Matuko.  No one was even sure that Matuko existed.  Anyway, no one knew where to find him, if he did.  Jade, as most creatures called him, made up his mind to find Matuko, or die trying.  Unfortunately, the latter was highly likely.
 So he set out one day.  Just walking wherever his instincts told him to go.  But Jade was having a streak of bad luck that summer.  It started to rain only just after he left.  Afraid of what the other cats called “water sickness”, he waited for lulls in the downpour to run through the clearings.  As he was running across one such clearing, lightning flashed and he closed his eyes against the glare.  Suddenly, he hit something.  His first thought was that he’d run into a tree he hadn’t seen.  When he opened his eyes, he saw that it wasn’t a tree.  It was another cat.  The other cat muttered something about “these stupid trees” and opened its eyes, too.  For a moment the two just looked at each other in the rain.  Then the thunder ripped through the sky, jolting them back to reality.
 “Who are you?”  Jade inquired of the other felinoid.
 “Funny, I was about to ask the same of you,” It replied.
 Jade looked the other cat over.  He quickly decided that it was a panther, or rather a pantheress, and that it was wet.  Those were the only features he could note in the driving rain.
 Apparently, that was all she could see, too, for she suggested that they get out of the rain.  Jade nodded his approval, and they slunk under a large tree with huge leaves.  Listening to the rain hitting the canopy of foliage above his head, Jade took in all the details of the pantheress.  She was black, as he’d seen in many of the other panthers that he’d seen from the shelter of a nearby bush or plant some times before.  She had very faint spots, though, as if she was part something else, too.  This he hadn’t ever seen before, but then, he’d never been this close to one before.  Especially a female.  He suddenly realized this fact and took a step back.  It was almost scary.
 She looked him over and then into his eyes.  He noted to himself that her eyes were a golden-brown, like many other cats of just about any species, but there was something different about hers.  Again, it was probably common, and he just didn’t know it, having never seen close-up before.  Except that no other cat had flecks of silver in their eyes.  Whenever she moved her head just a little, some flecks disappeared and others appeared.  While very amusing, it was somewhat curious.  Suddenly, she broke the ice between them and said; “Now, with no rain in the way, I’ll ask you again.  What is your name?”
 For a moment, Jade forgot the answer.  He was too busy contemplating the silver in her eyes.  Then he found it again.  “My name?  Oh, right, my name.  It’s Jade.  Well, actually it’s Jadeus, but everyone calls me Jade.”
 She nodded.  “A very wonderful name.  Unlike mine.  It’s Tarpaka.  But, like you, I have a nickname as well.  Everyone calls me Tarp.”  She looked at the ground, obviously ashamed at her title.
 Jade shook his head.  “No, actually, I rather like that name.  Sort of, I don’t know, mysterious.  Like your parents were-”
 “Odd?  Strange?  Demented?”  She supplied.
 He shook his head.  “No, more like, insightful.”
 She looked at him with an odd expression for a moment, then suddenly burst out in laughter.  She fell over and rolled back and forth, spasming in mirth.  Jade was irked somewhat by this and said, “What?  I’m serious!”
 She fell over on one side and looked at him.  She still had tears in her eyes.  “You’re kidding, right?  I mean, insightful?  Of what?  That they’d be killed by a bunch of evil whatevers?  I mean, come on.”  She snickered every once in a while, still attempting to recover from the assault of giggles that had seized her.
 Jade was taken aback.  “Your parents were killed, too?  Do you know what killed them?”
 She stopped giggling.  “What do you mean, ‘too’?  Were your parents killed?”  Jade nodded.  Tarpaka looked at the ground again.  “Oh.  Sorry.”
 He shook his head.  “No, that’s ok.  I’m over it.  And I assume by your giddiness that you are as well.”  He smirked.
 She smiled again.  “Well, it did happen quite a while ago.  And no one would tell me how they died, so I just forgot about it.  I mean, why worry?”
 He nodded.  “Exactly.  If you don’t even know what-” He stopped short, processing what she had just said in his mind.  “You don’t know what got your parents either?”
 “No, don’t you?”
 Jade shook his head slowly.  “No…no one would ever tell me.  Apparently it was too terrifying to talk about.”
 “Hey, do you think it was the same thing that got both sets?”
 Jade shrugged his furry shoulders.  “Maybe.”
 Suddenly Tarpaka tackled him.  “Bananas in a bunch!” She exclaimed happily.
 He shoved her off of him and stood up.  “Yeah, I guess we are, aren’t we?”
 She nodded, grinning.  “Hey, the rain stopped.  You wanna come with me?”
 He looked over his shoulder.  “I don’t know.  I’m supposed to be looking for Matuko.”
 “Hey, so am I.  I want to find out if he knows what got my parents.  Maybe you can ask him what happened to yours.  By the way, what were you going for?”
 “I was going to ask him if he knows why I’m missing some spots.”
 She looked at him oddly.  “Missing some spots?  How can you tell?”
 He showed her.  “See?  There’s a space there with no spot.  On both sides, too.”
 She nodded, putting a claw to the tan areas on the side of his chest.  “Yeah, I see.”
 “Anyway, we should probably get going.  Knowing my luck, it’ll start hailing soon.”
 “Mine, too.”
 They started out again, walking along and asking any creature that might know about Matuko’s whereabouts.  Looking over at Tarpaka, Jade realized that perhaps his luck was changing.
 

Episode 2

 They searched for three days and nights, and nobody seemed to have any clue whatsoever about Matuko.  Every creature the pair met either had never heard of him, thought that he was just a myth, or just didn’t know where he lived.  They were considering giving up one night when they heard a sound coming from the underbrush.
Tarpaka looked over towards the sound, fear in her silvery eyes.  Jade padded cautiously over to it and stuck his head in defiantly.  A pair of gray eyes stared back.  Jade shrieked and fell back onto Tarpaka, who also shrieked and took off into the nearest tree.  Jade followed suit into a different tree, and they both looked down into the clearing.
For a few moments, nothing moved.  There were no sounds.  It seemed as if they entire rain forest had been scared silent by the encounter.  Then a tawny head flecked with black spots appeared out of the brush.  A lean body followed, and finally a skinny whipping tail slid out of the leaves.  Jade looked at the intruder in the clearing for a moment, then looked through the leaves at Tarpaka, in the next tree over.  She looked as though she was considering pouncing upon the cat, but after catching her attention with a thrown piece of fruit, he advised her otherwise.
The tawny feline beneath them walked around the clearing, searching for them, then he looked up.  Jade knew that he wouldn’t see Tarpaka, since she was black, but Jade’s golden fur would give him away in the dead of the night like this.  Jade decided to take the risk of making friends with their intruder.
He leaped down from the tree, landing silently behind the other cat, which was looking into Tarpaka’s tree.  Then he sneaked up to him and whispered softly into his ear, “We’re coming for you…”
The other cat considered this for a moment, then decided that he didn’t want “them” coming after him, and, after a frenzied rush of fur, ended up in a tree himself.  This was all too much for poor Tarpaka, who started to snicker from her perch.  Then she laughed, and finally she could no longer hold her position and fell gracelessly out of the tree.  This scene caused Jade to start laughing, and he pounced upon his new friend, and for the moment, they forgot all about the fearful feline up in the tree.
As they lay giggling next to each other, the other cat jumped out of his tree and came over to them.  Jade knew that he should probably worry about this new cat, but since Tarpaka’s body heat was soothing him almost into sleep, he decided that he could probably leave him alone.
Then the other cat spoke: “You’d better be really good friends, or you’re gonna have some explaining to do.”  He smiled.
Jade looked up at him.  “Yeah, we’re friends.  By the way, who are you?”
“Me?  I’m Tatius.”
Jade smiled.  “I’m Jade.  And this is Tarpaka.”
“Tarp for short,” she reminded him.
Jade nodded from the ground.  “Right.  Tarp for short.”
Tatius tilted his head.  “And you are a…?”
Jade sat up on his haunches.  “I’m a leopard.  Tarp’s a pantheress.  And you are?”
Tatius drew himself up proudly: “I’m a jagular.”
Tarpaka looked at him oddly.  “A what?”
“A jagular.”
“You mean a jaguar.”
Tatius tilted his head again.  “Well, yeah, but jagular sounds better.  Besides, what’s a jaguar with gray eyes?”
“What do you mean?”
“Jaguars have green eyes.  Mine are gray, as Jade here probably saw.”  Jade nodded.  “So I don’t think I should be referred to as a real jaguar.  You understand.”
“Well, not really, but whatever makes you happy, I guess.”
Jade interrupted.  “I hate to stop this rousing conversation, but the moon is starting to come out, and we don’t want to be tired tomorrow.”  He looked at Tarpaka.  “Especially if we have any hopes of finding Matuko.”
“Matuko?”  Tatius looked at Jade with a quizzical expression.
Jade nodded.  “We’re hoping to find Matuko so we can ask him-  Well, so we can ask him something.”
Tatius lay down and rested his chin on his paws.  “Ask him what?”
“Well, I’m asking why I’m missing some spots.”
“Missing spots?  Where?  How can you tell?”  Exasperated, Jade showed him.   “Ah.  Ok, I see.”
“And Tarp’s asking him what happened to her parents.  And I decided that since she was going to, I would as well.”
“What do you mean, ‘happened to your parents’?  What happened?”
Tarpaka spoke up for the first time during the conversation.  “They were killed by evil somethings.  But either no one knows or they just won’t tell us.  It’s kind of creepy.”
“Oh.  Well, I’ve got nothing better to do.  I may as well follow you.”
“By the way, do you know where Matuko is?”  Jade inquired.
Tatius shook his head.  “No, but I think I might know who would.  He’s a freaky little colorful bird who knows everyone in the rainforest.  Besides, I wanna know why my eyes are gray, and also what happened to my parents.  Don’t be surprised, but I think the three of us are pretty much in the same boat.”
“Great!  At least it’s a lead.”  Tarpaka smiled at him.  “That’s more than we’ve had this entire expedition.”
Jade felt a twinge of jealousy at Tarpaka’s friendly smile at their new travel companion.  He wasn’t sure why, he’d only known her for a day or so.  He couldn’t be too attached to her yet, could he?  He had sort of noticed that he wanted to spend more time around females lately, which was puzzling, but since all the rest of his life had been puzzling lately, it didn’t bother him too much.
Tarpaka lay down next to Tatius and nestled closer to him.  Jade figured that she was just trying to keep warm in the somewhat chilling  Amazon evening, but again, Jade felt perturbed by her actions, and he lay down on her other side and snuggled closer to her.  He thought about life for a moment, then fell asleep, lulled by her consistent purring.
As they slept, a bird flew overhead, noting the odd scene in the clearing below.  Three creatures of different subspecies, of the same original species.  A jaguar, separated from the other two by size, a panther, by color, and a leopard, the original.  Three cats normally kept apart from each other by their families, brought together by a common factor:  They were all different from the others of their kind who claimed to support them.  Shunned together, they had met with the same desire for knowledge about their oddities.  Travelling to a common destination, each with abilities to equal the others’.  Together they would find Matuko, and if they died, they died together.
 

Episode 3

 Jadeus looked around him.  He knew this place.  He’d been in this clearing many times before.  It was his home.  The tree where he and his parents used to live.  Except that it was on fire.
He felt his breath catch in his throat as he saw his parents trying to get across the clearing to him.  Suddenly, a wall of fire erupted in their path.  They backed up a few steps, fear in their eyes.
Then, without warning, Something hit the ground behind them.  A shadow about twice as tall as his father was long.  His parents turned around and his mother cried out in fear.  Jade tried to go to them, but the fire held him back.  He called out to his father, who turned and yelled at him to run away and save himself.  Jade yelled back that he would do no such thing, but before his father could respond, his voice was drowned out by an inhuman howl.  Then it started to laugh.  Jade knew that it was the shadow laughing, a terrible sound.
Then the shadow raised an arm and a ball of lightning appeared at its fingertips.  “Nooo!”  Jade cried out, as the shadow pointed its finger at his parents and, still laughing maniacally, sent the fatal power towards them.
“Nooo!”  Jade cried out again as the energy hit both of his parents simultaneously.  They jolted from the incredible power surging through their bodies, and then fell silent.  Their troubles were over in an instant.  But Jade stood there, still confronting the awful shadow-demon.
Then it spoke.  “Foolish cat!  To stay and defy your father’s last wish for you to escape!  You know you have no power over me!  I could kill you instantly!  But I will give you the chance to escape, anyway.  What?  Still here?  Fool!  You shall meet the same fate of your parents!  Unless, of course,”  it snarled sarcastically, “you want to use all your wisdom to try and compromise or something?  So, what will it be?  Are you going to die honorably with no resistance?  Or will you let me enjoy killing you slowly and painfully as you fight to survive?”
“Never!”  Jade cried furiously as he dove over the wall of flames.  Suddenly, just as he was about to attack his parents’ murderer, his body was paralyzed in mid-air.  The shadow remained dark, even as the flames licked closer and closer, as if it was designed to absorb all light from the air around it.
“I shall enjoy watching you slowly burn to death from the sky!”  It called out cruelly.  Then it unfolded its wings and took off.
Jade waited for the flames to overtake him, seething from anger and despair.  He struggled, but he remained paralyzed.  The shadow’s laughter still rang in his ears, torturing his ears and his soul.  The flames slowly licked towards him, the heat getting more intense as the moon slid across the sky, the last sight that Jade could enjoy before his burned body shut down and he died.
 

Episode 4

 Jade awoke, his body soaked with sweat, gasping for breath.  His chest hurt, and his head was pounding.  His ears still rang with the awful shadow’s laughter.  He clapped his paws over his ears to try to block out the noise, but it was inside his head.  He sighed and lay down, waiting for the laughter to subside.  Then, when it had, he sat up, and walked across the clearing, sitting down just underneath a tree.
 He closed his eyes as tears of fear dripped out of them.  He remembered that nightmare.  He’d had it before.  It never, ever lost its sting.  He watched his parents die over and over in his mind’s eye, just trying to forget the awful scene.  Then he watched the flames overtake his body, again and again.
But one thing caught his attention, this time.  He’d never noticed that the shadow had wings before.  Much less that it really shouldn’t, considering it also had arms and legs.  He puzzled over this for a moment.  How was that possible?
Then his thoughts were interrupted as he heard someone whisper into his ear, “Hey, what’re you doing up?”
He took off, into the tree.  He ended up on a branch, relatively low to the ground.  He looked down to see who had mumbled into his ear.  Tarpaka was on the ground, rolling with barely contained laughter.
He welcomed this laughter, even though it was his antics that had spawned it.  At least it wasn’t the shadow laughing.  This time it was someone he knew.  He let himself breathe again and jumped down from the tree.  Unfortunately, he didn’t judge his distance correctly, and he hit the ground before he expected to, smashing his jaw into the dirt.  This only made Tarpaka laugh harder, and now unable to keep it in, she started to giggle softly, then to snicker, and finally ended up laughing as she usually did.  When she finally calmed down enough to  talk, she explained why she’d started laughing in the first place.  “You noticed how you were a couple of body lengths up in that tree?  Well, you got there without touching the trunk.  You just, took off!  Up into the tree!  It was sooo funny!”  She exploded in laughter again.
This time, not even Tatius could sleep through it.  He yawned and stood up, walking over to where Tarpaka lay rolling back and forth with mirth, and Jade standing over her, shaking his head.  “Now what’s going on?”  He asked, knowingly.
Jade continued shaking his head slowly.  “I apparently am quite the cuckoo bird.  She thinks that half the things I do are funny.”
“And…why…shouldn’t…I?”  She asked, taking gasping breaths between each  two words.
Jade stood over her, looking straight down into her eyes.  “Well, I can’t be that amusing, can I?”
She made a feeble attempt to keep from laughing by clapping her paws over her mouth.
“I’ll take that as a yes.  Anyway, we should probably calm down and get back to sleep.  We do have a long way to go tomorrow.”
“Speaking of,” Tatius interrupted, “why were you up in the first place?”
Tarpaka had recovered.  “Yeah, that’s a good question.  I got up to go to take a piss, and when I got back, you were under that tree.”
Jade looked at her suspiciously.  “But you were there when I got up.  When did you go?”
“Ok, so I was in sort of a hurry and must not have noticed that you were gone when I got up.  But that still doesn’t answer the original question.”
Jade shifted uncomfortably.  “Well, it’s kind of a long story…”
“And we’ve got all night.”  Tarpaka interjected.  She set her chin on her paws and waited.
“Ok, it’s like this. Ever since my parents died, I’ve been having these nightmares.  And they’re always a little more detailed.
 

To be continued !

---