Maisy approached the hotel, padding silently through the snow. She could sense the domain ahead and an instinctual part of her wanted to turn around and leave, since she already had a domain and wasn't interested in this one. She pushed past the feeling, stepping to the threshold.

She sniffed the air, her heightened senses giving her a vivid picture of what to expect. There was only one being here, all other scents having faded to almost nothingness long ago. Silence filled the building as heavily as the darkness did, but Maisy was no stranger to darkness. She stepped inside.

She paused just inside the door, body low and tense, every sense on high alert. She knew from experience that the ruler of this domain would have felt her presence, even more so since Maisy was a domain owner herself. Whoever lived here would feel the intrusion through the deepest part of their soul.

She waited, her only motion a soft swishing of her tail as the tip flipped back and forth. A human might think the building was empty and proceed inward, but she knew different. There may not be any signs now, but there would be.

CRACK.

A thick sheet of ice cracked in the room just beyond this one and something crawled clumsily out of a dirty pool. It shook itself, looked around in confusion, its gaze passing over Maisy multiple times in the process. It was small, barely tall enough to reach Maisy's underbelly, but Maisy read the thick muscles and bones in its movement. It reminded her of a heavily muscled, slightly malformed pig. And it was wearing something human…

Lady Tutu's brain finally registered the signals from her eyes and her head snapped around, locking onto Maisy. She ran towards, then through, the wall, exploding into the lobby amidst a shower of wood and sheetrock. She bounced left, then right, sometimes turning in a circle, other times lurching forwards a few steps before bouncing back again.

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Maisy flicked her tail and ears in a signal that said she understood. She wanted Maisy to leave and this was the only warning she'd give.

Maisy met Lady Tutu's eyes in a steady, domineering gaze, ears flat against her head.

Lady Tutu saw the response and understood. No more communication was needed. She charged forwards, her claws throwing chunks of carpet and concrete in a fantail behind her.

Maisy barely had time to react as she leaned backwards and swiped at the furious ball. She connected and Lady Tutu went flying across the room and through the wall. Maisy licked her paw reflexively, trying to soothe the pain of hitting what felt like a solid block of metal. Realizing what she was doing she stopped and leapt to the other side of the room. There was no time for pain - the noises in the other room had changed and Maisy needed to be ready. The wall exploded again and Lady Tutu slammed into Maisy like a cannonball, her teeth tearing past even her enhanced fur to dig deep gouges in her flesh as the two of them flew over furniture that had long since accepted its fate.

Fights between beasts, even sentient ones, never took long, and this was no exception. If either of the combatants had known of or cared about time they would have been aware that the fight for dominance only took about 30 minutes.

They didn't care, though. There was nothing on their minds except the satisfaction of a battle well-fought and the comfort of knowing their places in the hierarchy of power.

Maisy padded through the snow, refusing to acknowledge her injuries - not even allowing a limp from her broken paw to show. Next to her Lady Tutu bounced happily along, tongue dragging absently through the snow. Every living thing within earshot had fled, but if any had been left they may have been amused by the drastic differences between the two. A Siamese cat the size of an adult tiger moved through the night like a shadow, smooth and fluid. Next to her a ball of mottled fur and uneven teeth bounced from left to right as it walked, seemingly having forgotten that the front and rear legs were supposed to alternate, not the left and right.

Behind them there was a cacophony of cracks as the hotel fell to the ground in a massive pile of timber bones and broken sheetrock skin.

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