Team Mouse!

Well, today was the day the mouse traps in our attic were scheduled to be inspected by The Man From the Council – or The Mouse Man, as he shall henceforth be known. Or maybe The Evil Mouse Killing Man, Enemy of Mice All Over the Land? Maybe that would be better?

From this you will gather than I am rooting for the mice here. Mice, I am ON YOUR SIDE! I’m having the ‘Team Mouse!’ t-shirts printed up as we speak. On Saturday morning, as I lay drifting in and out of sleep, I heard the little critters resume their scratching above my head. It was horrible. They were up there, happily eating my clothes, and not realising they were but moments from certain death! How could I lie there and do nothing, while all mousekind was at risk? How will I look Mickey in the eye next time I go to the Magic Kingdom, HOW?

Well, readers, I did nothing. But only because Terry was there at the time, and Terry is firmly on Team Man-From-the-Council. But I felt bad about those mice. And I still feel bad about them, even although….

*drumroll*

…THEY MAY NOT ACTUALLY BE MICE!

“Hmm,” said the man from the council, scratching his head after his inspection of our attic.  (At least, I’d imagine he was scratching his head. I don’t actually KNOW this for sure, on account of how I was still in my dressing gown when he arrived, and was listening to this conversation from the office, with my ear pressed against the door, and a hysterical Rubinman in my arms. Rubin hates the Mouse Man. I think it’s safe to say that he is also on Team Mouse.) “It’s strange,” said Mouse Man. “There are mouse droppings up there… but there are no mice in the traps. Which is unusual. We would normally expect to have a few of them by now. And the funny thing is…”

I pressed my ear even closer to the door. There was a FUNNY thing about the mice in the attic? Awesome!

“The funny thing is, whatever it is up there…”

WAIT! “Whatever it is up there“? We’re dealing with a “Whatever” now, rather than a mouse? GOD.

“…has eaten a hole in the top of one of the traps, but hasn’t taken the bait. We’d normally associate that with a much bigger animal.”

A MUCH BIGGER ANIMAL! Like a vampire, you mean? Or an International Man of Mystery, say?

“There’s definitely SOMETHING up there,” concluded Mouse Man cheerfully. “We just need to find out what it is!” And with that he headed off to murder mice somewhere else.

So. As I see it, there are a couple of options:

1. It’s a huge, mutant mouse, which is too big to get into the trap. Good for it. You go, Mutant Mouseman!

2. There are ordinary mice up there. But there is ALSO some kind of other, dastardly creature which eats mice for breakfast. Not so keen on this option, actually.

3.  Yeah, it’s NIGEL. And his months, nay, years, of living on the run have made him feral, so not only is he eating my clothes, he’s ALSO eating my mice. And when he finally tires of that – or eats all the mice in all the world – he will descend… and EAT OUR BRAINS.

Either that or we just have some particularly clever mice. Hmm.