First months

Now that I have explained my current situation, let me tell my story from the beginning. Let me tell you how my story started, why I am how I am, and where I am from.

I was born about five years ago. It happened in a zoo somewhere. I have not located my birthplace yet, but the first weeks of my life I was as happy as can be. I had two brothers and three sisters. My mother was a beautiful leopard. She was very protective over us, but still very caring and loving. My memories about this time are hazy, but I remember the warmth and the love.

When I started realizing things more, I knew I was different. For starters, all my siblings and my mother were spotted. They had yellow coats with black spots. I am completely black. I didn't know if my coloring is the reason or what, but I am very different from an average leopard. And people coming to see the cute cubs in the zoo noticed it too.

I can remember how on one night we heard noises coming from the place where we got our food. Mother got us to go to safety, inside the den. She stayed at the door of the den and tried to protect us. I heard her growling, hissing, warning the people that came in. They didn't care. We heard a noise, and suddenly mother stopped. She fell down. The people that came in dragged her out and started reaching for us. I was in the back; all my siblings were in front of me. We watched in horror when people dragged everyone out, one by one. I was the last one in. I curled up and hissed. They didn't care. I scratched and bit, but they dragged me out too. I saw my mother lying there, motionless. My siblings were there too, next to mother. They were horrified. I was too. The person holding me grabbed me by the neck, showed me to others, and stuffed me in a small cage. I screamed, but in vain.

After being separated from my mother and siblings my life was weird. I was brought to some apparently wealthy and powerful person. He kept me in a cage, fed me and took care of me. My life seemed to have changed to this. I was some kind of pet.

This went on for a few months. I started realizing more and more about myself. I saw things the person taking care of me apparently didn't  I saw this bluish world co-existing with the physical world. The bluish world had different patterns, and it wasn't still at all times. I saw people surrounded by light-blue auras. I also saw strange shaped auras flying around every once in a while. They didn't exist in the physical world. The people walking around didn't see the auras.

A few times some auras came into my cage. I warned them to not to come any closer, but they didn't listen. I attacked one of them, and the aura disappeared. After that the auras stayed further away.

I started getting used to this life. I started understanding what people spoke. They spoke English. I started realizing that my life was going to be like this forever. I wasn't very happy with it. The cage I was kept in was a bit small. I could walk around and stretch my muscles, but the problem was that I couldn't run. The cage in the zoo was at least ten times bigger than the one I was living in.

I was unhappy with my life. I had grown a lot since I was in the zoo. I was stronger and faster. It didn't matter. I listened carefully; I understood people and knew what they were planning. They rarely talked about me. I was a pet, or more like a decoration. A status-symbol. I still knew I was different from other living things, but I didn't yet know how different.