Pet Memorial

Gleaming Guardian by Hazim

Hi, I'm Zircon. I'm the son of Chizu (which means cheese), with me are 3 other siblings: Opal, Jade, and Baby. As you might have expected, yes, Baby's the favorite child. Anyways, I'm the eldest of my siblings. I don't want to sound like I'm bragging but I'm a pretty big cat. And, let's just say that I was a bit of a playboy during my teenage years but we don't want to talk about that. Also, I'm the king of the house!

I love all my siblings so much although they're kind of rude sometimes, especially to Mr. Owner. They like being clingy when he's doing his work, despite being well aware of that he's busy. I get it, having Mr. Owner's attention and affection is the best thing in the world, but we've got to respect his privacy! ...Sometimes.

We were a small but happy family. And for a while, I believed we'd grow old without nothing big happening to us. When one day, a new member was suddenly added to the family. His name was Karin, like the white cat from Dragon Ball. He was a really big cat. His white fur was thick and fluffy. He was just as clingy as everyone else. Naturally, he started to get the attention of everyone. Even Mr. Owner!

I could tell Mr. Owner and his family likes him. I won't lie, I was a tad bit jealous but I was willing to make things work out between us and the fluffy giant. But the problem here was that he was VERY selfish. He kept marking his territory everywhere in the house! Even, Mr. Grandad agreed with me. Both me and Mr. Grandad always got angry at him; so, it led to me and Karin fighting a lot. At one point, it even got to where I accidentally hurt Mr. Owner in the heat of the moment... I'm sorry, I didn't mean to! My 2 female siblings seemed to really like him though. It made me worry about Jade and Opal, and their standard.

I thought to myself, 'Well then, I guess it's up to me and my brother, Baby, against that big giant'.

And let's suppose that it wasn't quite a pretty sight whenever I was with Karin. The next few (cat) years had been rough. Blood, fur, pee, even poo. Yeah, it wasn't a sight to see. Our fights became common happenings, but Mr. Owner always separated us before it got too dangerous. I guess they wanted us to get along together, but I never see it ever happening. Well... until that happened.

One day, an unfamiliar 'bigshot' cat from a nearby territory wanted to claim Mr. Owner's home as their property. Normally, it would just be a fight between me and Karin for Mr. Owner's area. But this guy... he was an outsider. Neither me nor Karin liked the thought of him intruding our home.

The big bully, Robin, was as big as Karin but more menacing. Maybe because he was fatter and Karin was thin, despite his thick fur. However, this cat was pure fat and muscles. We decided to team up and beat him up, so we agreed to a temporary truce before going back to our normal routine. It was smooth sailing from there. Or so we thought.

Turned out Robin had brought a few friends with him. And when I say 'a few', I meant a lot. It was safe to say that we lost. But by this point, me and big ol' Whitey were old and very, very stubborn. So we thought 'If they want a war, we'll give them one'. After that, the whole family banded together to hold them off. The fight lasted a long time- days, weeks, the only time we stopped was when Mr. Owner or Mrs. Neighbour stopped us (bless their hearts).

The fight was always ended with a draw. But sometime near the end, we recruited many more teammates due to our family getting bigger. No, actually it was thanks to Karin. I guess he really is a playboy. Anyways, eventually, we were on the verge of winning! We saw the light at the end, finally.

Alas, one of their cats struck a heavy blow on me before they surrendered. However, the pain I felt was nothing to the relief we all felt when we finally reclaimed our territory. Things were finally looking up. We had a family, bigger than it ever was. And Karin did help to protect our territory right until the very end. I respect him, I consider him a brother now.

He may be older than me but I still consider myself the eldest brother regardless. And as the eldest, it's hard to admit, but I'll miss them. I won't say any goodbyes, I don't want to ruin the festive mood. I just hope Mr. Owner doesn't miss me too much. I've taught my brothers and sisters all that I could. Knowing them, they'll do just fine. They have Karin with them.

It's been an awesome life.

...I'm going to miss you all.

Thank you. For everything.

In loving memory of Zircon, the guardian angel.