Pax was cold, it was raining hard and he was huddled inside a discarded box, shivering violently, the wrinkles of his skin bunched up as he hunched and tried to keep warm, wrapping his tail around himself he closed his eyes against the violence of the weather and lost himself in his memories.

At first life was dark but warm, and smelled of milk, his mother, his siblings but also other cats. His days were repetitive until one day the dark world outside seemed to start to get brighter, his eyes began to open. It took a while but eventually he could see, each day was still pretty much the same, warmth and motherly love, playing with his brother and sisters in the room they seemed to be hidden away in and humans played little in his life until now, Shuffling feet and the smell of age as the elderly human came in often, checking him and siblings over but even this wasn't that unpleasant, if you could ignore the smell, the cloying, choking smell of many cats kept together and not regularly cleaned however he knew no different so thought this was how things just... were. However it wasn't long before he and his siblings began to sneeze like the other cats in the room outside of the little cupboard he and his siblings had been born in. They got sicker, the sneezing turned to a constant running nose in all but his only brother and himself however they did have rather itchy eyes, but then his brother suddenly sickened and died within days, their mother did all she could but his brother had always been small, very small, then Pax's eyes began to close up again, but he still felt safe, if very under the weather, he had never met a bad cat, not a bad human hand, the human that looked in on them once a day was gentle if a little shaky, but even that hand started to smell sickly itself,

Then came the days when the elderly human didn't come to see them, didn,t come to feed them. By then they were weaned and Pax's mother was no longer able to give them milk and she and Pax's sisters bellies gnawed with hunger. They hunted the room, Pax and his sisters exploring every inch, every nook and cranny as their mother by then had gotten sick too, Pax was the only one that could smell a thing, his sisters noses long since clogged up with mucus but there was little, if anything to be found at all which Pax would give to his sisters and his mother first.

One day, perhaps a few days, a week, more perhaps, Pax didn't know, a new human smell entered the house, much bigger and heavier feet clumped about, grumbling away in what they passed off as speech, booming and it hurt Pax's ears "Gawd it stinks" Pax hid at the voice despite the fact he was so very hungry but the clumpy feet soon vanished, hurriedly with what seemed like a startled yell and the sounds of vomiting, Pax knew those sounds even if they WERE slightly different from the way cats sounded. More heavy footfalls returned the next day, accompanying them were more footfalls, and flashing blue lights from the dirty window. "Bloody 'ell, th' old biddy went and died in 'her chair" was heard faintly from the rooms below. Pax and his siblings, as well as the other cats in the room until this point, had been miaowing, crying for the humans to feed them but at the sounds, the siren and the lights, they scattered when feet came up the stairs, so different they were from the gentle slippered steps they were used to.

The door opened and humans... humans with nets began to move about, cats dashed about, too terrified to even talk to each other at this point, they began climbing walls, almost literally, leaping, hissing and spitting and causing mayhem. Pax's mother was desperately ill and Pax hid beside her and his sisters who were the only real lethargic ones in the room "Pax, my darling boy, your eyes are sore i know my darling one but you must get out, don't let the humans catch you, get out, be in the world, our human has gone, she won't be coming back and i don't trust these ones" she hurriedly told him "we can't go with you my love, i need to stay here with your sisters, they are very sick" Pax's heart broke, he couldn't speak but he headbutted his mother, giving a tiny, broken purr as she licked his eyes, trying to clear them of whatever mucus was there but she fell back, exhausted, starved and sick Pax knew his mother wouldn't make it outside. He closed his eyes, cuddled his sisters one last time before the cupboard was opened and in the chaos Pax sped forwards, leapt sideways to avoid a net and out through the legs of another human coming into the room. "Shut the bloody door! Cats're escapin'" came the yell following Pax down the stairs, running up a wall at speed and launching himself over the head of a female human, right out into the street and away, he didn't have time to think about anything, he was just running and running, escaping the scary humans, escaping the hunger..... Much later he'd stopped down an alley, away from any sign of humans locally, it had begun to rain, shocking the furless kitten because he had never experienced it before, instinct leading him to a shelter, albeit a somewhat shoddy one.

Pax sneezed and tried to open his eyes properly, wiping his face against his paw, the rain had one thing going for him, it seemed to be clearing his eyes a little, the wetness better than a dry mother's tongue. He sneezed again, huddling up as the entrance of the box sagged in the rain. He wondered then, what had happened to his sisters and his mother, the humans that were catching them hadn't smelled bad, just new and strange and scary, sighing Pax closed his eyes, no... he couldn't have stayed, his mother told him to leave, to be free but Pax had never felt so alone, despite the fact it smelled better out here...mostly... He should try and sleep but he was shivering too much, his heart ached, he hoped that the sneeze had been because of the rain and not that he was getting sick like his mother and sisters, he hoped they were alright but in his heart of hearts, deep down, he knew they were gone, maybe forever, he never expected to see them again in any case. It took some time but he fell asleep, crying and alone.