The Old Cat

The old cat, worn out, blind and crippled, decided to lay down for a while under the eaves of the hospital. The smells of the urban jungle he was used to were different this time.

Something undefined seemed to hang in the air, something unrecognizable to the domain of the feline mind but quite specific to his instinct. Who was telling him to run, to run somewhere outside the city of fallen angels, expelled from the neon paradise by decree of the government.

He would have done that if he were young and strong, at a time when he was fear and trembling for local rivals, the father of dozens of kittens. But he was nothing anymore... and all he could do was find a dry place and lie down.

Licking his paws, deaf as he was, he did not attach particular importance to the fierce sound, the sound of the approaching shock wave of the hundred-kiloton bomb that had just exploded over the city.

And if he had known what it was about, it would have been too late. He never liked people who stepped on his tail and hit him with stones when he rummaged through garbage cans. As if garbage had any value to people... And it was better that it was limited to the cat's range of perception, at least he wouldn't be terrified by man, the pinnacle of evolution, who decided to drop a tactical nuclear bomb on members of his own species. Only a shadow remained where the old cat had stood. A shadow of a cat on the wall, with all ears and tail, a phenomenon of radioactive radiation that immortalized his presence on Earth. Too bad no one was left to see it.

And the cat continued on, as in Hugo Pratt's stories - to a cat paradise where there was an abundance of sparrows, fish, milk... and of course mice, neatly sorted and fresh, to the delight of the departed cat's soul. His expression took on a satisfied grimace that crossed his crooked lip. He recognized a few cats in the distance that he hadn't seen in a long time.

That shouldn't have surprised him. Because all cats go to heaven.

(Roger Mortis 033)