Central Animal Records

We'd had Loki for only a short time. Just long enough to get all his vaccinations sorted, get him de-sexed, micro-chipped and collared with id and bells to warn away the birds. He was a cute little Tabby with bluish/grey eyes, a fluffy mane and long, long tail. He was my son's best little mate, in the habit of attacking without warning and taking over a lap with imperious ownership. He was a feisty little guy and we loved him to bits.
Just before dinner one night we were letting the old girl (an creaky British blue), outside for a wee. He followed and promptly disappeared. We looked everywhere we could think, even prying open the nearby storm drain, walked the streets calling him for two weeks, ran ads and rang all the vets and shelters. After three months we gave up on ever seeing him again. My son was quietly devastated. After six months he asked if we could give a home to a kitten that friends were going to take to the pound and we inherited Pyxis; named after the compass as a talisman against loss.
Six weeks later, during a major heat-wave, we received a call from the Animal Welfare Centre - "We think we have your cat. Someone found him on the side of the road, terribly dehydrated; he is very lucky to be alive." We rushed to the shelter and discovered a beautiful, BIG Tabby with gorgeous emerald green eyes waiting for us. Was he ours? He was huge, not the cute little guy that we had lost. And so wary that it took a lot of coaxing and blooding of my son to get him to come forward. What a fierce, feral thing we had in front of us! Try to touch and he hiss, spit and scratched out. We felt so bad for him. Was he ours? Hidden under a tangled mane was a tattered collar with bells, but all the id had gone.
We whispered our old endearments, "Loki? Hey fuzz head, hey little guy...", managed somehow to squeeze him into the cat cage and made our way home with him yowling and pooing all over the place in 46 degree heat.
It took quite a while for him to let us touch or pet him. Even now his social skills are pretty awful; where another cat might curl around your leg and purr a request for food or an outdoor wee, Loki will nip your leg or hiss and spit. When he deigns curl up on your lap it's "hands off!" or he'll go through the roof. He is back, fiercely protective of Pyxus, inclined to "raid" the kitchen between meals and we love him.
Thank goodness we micro-chipped him because we would never have recognised him and doubt he would ever have been successfully re-homed. He became a massive, manly, mysterious cat with "issues".

[Since Loki has a "no photos please" attitude our image is of Pyxis]