179 An Encounter Amid Resistance ? (1/2)
Sun Meng ambled down an alley, the three ragdoll cats trailing behind her. They were jumping and weaving around each other, seemingly in good spirits.
Her brows furrowed when she took another look at the map displayed on her phone.
”Hmm, this cafe is more elusive than I thought. My beloved Lizzie, where on earth could you be?” she thought.
Caesar observed her with interest.
”Have you noticed yet?” he asked his companions as he licked his nose.
”Noticed what?” Diana responded.
”That Sun Meng is terrible with directions. She's lost. We're never going to be able to find our destination,” Catherine replied through gritted teeth.
”We've been walking forever,” Caesar added, raising his paws so he could look at the pads beneath them, ”My pink and beautiful soles are now black and sooty. I can't even bring myself to lick them clean. If we keep going, I'm going to get blisters soon.”
As the ragdoll family continued lamenting their fate, a dozen men dressed in black suddenly appeared. They swiftly blocked both ends of the narrow alley that they were in, leaving them trapped.
The groove between Sun Meng's eyebrows deepened as she stared down the apostle officers standing in their way.
”That was fast. I guess you found me,” she sighed.
”Sun Meng, I think you've had quite enough fun. It's time to go,” one of the officers said.
”We can't just bring her back to the station. She has a lot to answer for. She's wrecked havoc in our city,” another officer chimed in, shaking his head.
The men did not bring her discomfort or fear. Sun Meng remained perfectly composed, her face expressionless.
Quietly, she said, ”Zhuangzi never knew if he dreamt he was a butterfly or if he was a butterfly dreaming of being a man. You know this story. It's impossible to tell dreams and reality apart. So how can you believe things you've never seen or heard for yourselves to be real?”
These words instantly heightened the tension in the alley. A tinge of fear could be seen on the faces of the apostle officers, but they rushed towards the girl, shouting, ”Fire!”
The men closed in on Sun Meng and the ragdoll cats, each firing his tranquilizer gun at them.
*
Mere minutes later, Sun Meng emerged from the narrow alley. She was again studying her phone carefully, an inscrutable expression on her face. The three cats followed after her.
It was as if the officers never cornered them at all.
Their path, however, was once again blocked, this time by a middle-aged woman. She chuckled as Sun Meng slowed down.
”You're good, aren't you? Really good. Those apostle officers are weaklings, but to fight and win them by yourself is quite the feat. No wonder the authorities are so keen to catch you,” she said.
Sun Meng did not respond. Instead, she narrowed her eyes. This seemed to remove all expressions from the woman's face. Her face grew slack and her body limp. She had been forced into a dream state.
”Idiot,” Sun Meng muttered, ”Caesar, erase her memory.”
Caesar slunk forward, then leaped gracefully across the woman's shoulder. When his paw touched her head, her memory of what happened in the last 24 hours was gone.
This was how Sun Meng always defeated her opponents. This was how the three cats' powers worked together.
Catherine, the mother, was able to put people to sleep with one look. This power had a wide reach, but it only induced light sleep in its victims. They would wake up with the smallest of stirs.
This is where Catherine's daughter, Diana's, powers came in handy. Like Catherine, she could also unleash her powers just by looking at the subject. Her ability was to drag her victims into a deep dream state. She could even keep them there forever if she wanted to, leaving them in a permanent vegetative state. This was the fate that befell every person they met in the cat cafes they have been to.
As for Caesar, the father, his power was to destroy memories when he touched a person's head. He could only erase memories from up to 24 hours ago. Anything beyond that was safe from his reach.