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It looked like it was going to rain that night.
The scent of petrichor reached the nostrils of that white-furred (now gray) cat. He was wandering aimlessly through those streets, his paws sore from walking, but it hadn’t always been that way.
He used to have an owner, a truly kind man who adopted him when he was a helpless kitten born without his right eye. The man’s warm hands gently picked him up and stroked him. He adopted him, cared for him, and loved him more than anyone—he’d even given him a name: Mega Ambler, or “Meam” for short—and had also given him an eye patch as a gift to cover his missing eye.
Not a single day with him was boring. He wasn’t the most docile cat at first, but with a lot of patience and hard work, he had gone from being a cat who didn’t want to sleep alone and who scratched absolutely everything to becoming calm at three years old. He was always waiting—and would even sleep in his little bed near the door—for his owner to return from work.
That man was the only thing he knew; he was his whole world, and Mega Ambler was the same to him. His happiness—his everything— he would sometimes stretch out across his owner’s shoulders and then curl up around his neck, until he grew up and reluctantly had to stop doing so.
One day, the man got up as usual—always at six in the morning. He got ready for work, filled his bowl with water and food, and petted the cat’s head in farewell before leaving. Mega Ambler waited patiently for him to return… but that day would be different from the others because he didn’t come back.
A sense of unease coursed through every part of his little body, but he tried to calm himself as he forced himself to sleep. Tomorrow will be different, he thought before closing his eyes.
Oh, it wasn’t like that.
Luckily, he had learned how to open the drawers where his food was kept and could get it out of the bag by tearing it open with his teeth. After that, he kept waiting all day and into the evening, and he realized it had gotten dark from the shadows stretching across the floor. He didn’t want to be alone.
He didn’t come back that day, or the next. On the fourth day, he heard the sound of keys turning in the lock—it alerted him—so he jumped down from the kitchen counter where the bag of food was just as the door opened. A bunch of strangers came in carrying boxes. Mega Ambler hid in a corner so they wouldn’t see him. Finally, a woman came in, also carrying a box, with her back to him, and began to—put things away? What were they doing?
The woman noticed him when she turned around, and that’s when he recognized her. It was his owner’s sister, a charming woman who used to stop by from time to time to talk to her brother and bring him treats.
“You can’t do this all the time—you’re going to spoil him.”
“It’s not like it’s every day—don’t overreact. Right, Meam?”
They’d get into arguments that never went anywhere, only to end up giving a prize to Mega Ambler, who purred contentedly while winking at his brother. Now that angelic face was in front of him again; she took a deep breath before dropping everything on the floor, then covering her face and sobbing.
What did all that mean?
She uncovered her face and motioned for him to come closer, sensing that the cat might get stressed if she approached him, having noticed how many people were invading his space. Mega Ambler came over, and when he reached the woman, she took him in her arms; thick tears streamed down her face. Mega Ambler placed a paw on her cheek, and the tears began to flow even faster. That pitiful look almost made his fur stand on end.
“I’m so sorry, Meam,” she said, breaking down in tears. Right then, as they were hauling the belongings out of the house and the woman’s sobs made his little heart realize that his owner would never return. No more warm hugs, no more laying next to him—nothing…
She carried him in her arms to the door, noticing that the room had been emptied, and closed the door that no one else from that family would ever open again. He spent a few days with the woman, but unfortunately she didn’t have enough patience to keep him, so she had decided to put him up for adoption. Wasn’t he enough? Maybe he’d scratched a visitor who tried to remove his eye patch and bitten her a couple of times, but that didn’t mean anything.
The cage on the table was a constant reminder that he didn’t know whose hands he would end up in; it seemed to haunt him every time he closed his eyes, as he tossed and turned nervously, trying to sleep. Living constantly with the knowledge that his time there was running out made him think, and, unable to take it anymore, he pushed a window open just wide enough to squeeze through and fled one night.
It wasn’t easy—how far could a house cat really go? The streets were cold and hostile, and the days and nights all seemed the same to him. Someone had kicked him after he accidentally wandered too close; he fought some rats for food (rummaging through the trash with disgust), and the rats gave his ass handed back to him. In his defense, he didn’t know rats that big even existed.
But it hadn’t all been bad; he’d met many other friendly little animals along the way. A police dog who was very brave despite his small size, a golden retriever wearing a silly little hat who lived at a fire station where Mega Ambler had hidden out for a while—they’d shared so much, and the dog even looked at him with teary, defeated eyes when he had to leave. A cimarrón dog who was supposed to be guarding a store but would run off every time he heard loud music coming from a speaker, and a kitten dyed purple—because his owners thought it was funny—that would only come near him to dig his little claws playfully into his back.
Mega Ambler snapped back to reality when thin raindrops began to fall from the sky, so he quickened his pace until he was under a roof; the drizzle grew heavier and the sky grew darker by the minute. He sat down, settling in, realizing he’d be there for quite a while.
“Evening.”
Mega Ambler looked from side to side to figure out where that sound was coming from, but there were no humans or animals out there in the rain. He twitched his ears, realizing the voice was coming from above; he looked up and found someone staring right at him—a bat smiling down at him, hanging from a beam on the ceiling.
Mega Ambler made a move to run away, but the curtain of rain falling from the ceiling where he stood prevented him from doing so. The bat rubbed itself with its own arms before spreading its wings to glide down toward the cat. Mega Ambler moved a little away from it to keep his distance, but looking at it up close, the bat had dark fur that seemed to reflect the streetlights and particularly pink eyes.
"Huh, the weather was pretty bad today, huh?" the bat began the conversation, folding its wings around its body. Mega Ambler was a little hesitant to respond, but since the rain didn't seem like it would stop anytime soon, he figured he might as well kill some time.
"Yeah, I guess…" It wasn’t as if Mega Ambler was the most talkative, but that didn’t stop the bat, who, realizing this, decided to fill the silence itself. Mega Ambler curled up where he was, content to listen and occasionally responded to the chatty little creature. A few moments later the sound of the rain faded away.
“Oh, I forgot to introduce myself. My name is Bloodwing… I forgot to ask your name… what’s yours?” he proclaimed, placing one of his hands over his chest and having the decency to look embarrassed by his last remark.
“My name is Mega Ambler” said the cat, his tail swaying lazily.
"The rain's stopped. To be honest, I ended up here by accident, and I have a place to go back to. I like you, so if you want, I'll take you with me."
"Take me? How— Hey! What are you doing!?"
Bloodwing took flight as he stretched his legs, approaching Mega Ambler and lifting the cat up with him without any trouble at all.
"I’d recommend you hold on tight," Bloodwing said, lowering his head and smiling innocently at Mega Ambler.
"But where!?"
Mega Ambler kept screaming the whole way until Bloodwing reached the entrance to the alley where he lived and set him down on the ground before flying back up higher. He looked ahead, where it was darker, while twitching his ears.
"Wait here a moment. I’ll be right back.” He flew off into the darkness, and a few seconds later, some screeches were heard, followed by a commotion, and two bats flew out of there in a panic. Bloodwing returned, baring his fangs before softening his expression.
“You can go in now.”
Mega Ambler entered the alley—it wasn’t anything special, but he wouldn’t have any problem staying there.
From then on, everything turned out better than he’d expected. Bloodwing brought him food (after a lot of trial and error) and things to make him more comfortable (like a small cushion that served as his bed); there was even a moment when he asked Bloodwing where he got those things, and Bloodwing just smiled. A few days later, he’d taken Mega Ambler to a river so he could wash all the grime off himself.
“So you have white fur… it really suits you,” Bloodwing said, his eyes sparkling and patting him with his fingers. In his other hand he has Mega Ambler's wet patch, waiting for the cloth to dry to put it in its place.
Mega Ambler, on the other hand, groomed him whenever he could as a sign of trust; sometimes Bloodwing would lie down on the cat's back and cover him with his wings. It was great, but in a way, something was building up inside Mega Ambler, and one day he had asked him
“Why are you doing all this? It’s not that I don’t like it, but…”
Bloodwing, who was chewing on a cockroach, raised a wing to signal that he should let him finish and swallowed his food.
“Easy—I thought you needed some company. We all need one sometimes” He moved closer and rubbed Mega Ambler’s snout against his own. Mega Ambler returned the gesture while purring, a warmth flooding his chest.
He never knew where his owner was, but he hoped he was happy for him and for what he had accomplished