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Hircelu Durdi sighed as he cleaned up the two newborn cats. A large brown feline had just given birth to her first two children ever, and although Agasian cats had small litters, this was one of the smallest yet. His daughter Amini took the kittens from him when they were clean, and Hircelu went to attend to the mother.
Hircelu had been breeding Agasian cats for about forty years now. It was almost a science, and he had to spend all his energy to keep up with the cats, monitor their transformations, and feed and care for them. It was truly a life's work.
Agasian cats were not like normal cats. Hircelu's grandmother had once told him that over a thousand or so years ago, an experimental wizard who lived in the small wizarding town of Agasate had decided to cross human intelligence with a cat's body. He had been successful. Perhaps a little too successful.
After a while, the cats began hurting themselves because their bodies weren't suited for the things human minds thought. For instance, a cat had the human desire to fly, but they couldn't very well build an airplane. And sometimes the cats' magical abilities would get them in trouble - a wizard mind in a cat's body could cause drastic things to happen, since the cat would be unable to hold a wand in order to channel their power.
Consequently, the science of Agasian cat breeding was designed.
Since the cats had human intelligence, they weren't all geniuses. But the average human intelligence, if not extraordinary for a human, would be quite extraordinary for a cat. Agasian cat breeders would keep the cats of average human intelligence in their cat form and train the cats to become good and loyal pets, to understand the language of the people to whom they would eventually be sold, and to recognize magic.
The more intelligent cats, the ones who were in the greatest danger of hurting themselves, would be transfigured into a relative human state. The human state would maintain certain characteristics of the cat (hair color, eye color, etc.), but would be able to speak, use a wand, and move around like a normal witch or wizard. They were usually given to an orphanage or adopted by a friend of the breeder.
Agasian cats needed to be transformed into their human state before they were three months old, or else they wouldn't be able to cope with the change. Therefore, the more intelligent ones would have to be picked out at an early stage. About half the cats showed magical powers at the age of one month. Those cats would be put in a maze and the first half of them that finished would be deemed "too smart for their own good," and the breeder would transform them into human babies.
Amini entered the room just as Hircelu had finished with the mother cat, which was now sleeping.
"The two newborns are in chamber six…one is a boy, the other's a girl. They're numbers 42 and 43. There were only two?"
"Yes, I know, it was a small litter. The mother's doing fine. Have you fed those in chamber three yet? They looked quite hungry yesterday…"
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*one month later* .
"Amini! Where's 43?! I haven't seen her any- oh! Here she is! Did you get 24? Ow! Where's 24?! If 39 scratches me one more time…!"
"Calm down, Dad. 24's here, I already put her at the start of the maze. They're all in there…I'll go over to the finish line, you can let them begin anytime now…"
Hircelu opened the tiny door to the maze and all the cats sprang out at once, eager to finish as soon as possible. Hircelu smiled to himself. It was amzing how fast those cats learned… And already, half of them would be turned into humans… And they'd ge to live with a new family…
Amini let out a cry of delight. Cat #24 had already finished! That must have been some kind of record. 43 was getting along very well too, and she was pretty close to finishing, but many of the other cats were having some trouble. 30 and 39 kept bumping into each other, and then getting into a huge fight, which lost them a lot of time. 27 was going around in circles, and looked very confused. 42 was planning his way out, but he was moving extremely slow, and Amini doubted that he'd be able to finish before five others.
By now, both 24, 43, and 35 had completed the maze. 30 had finally escaped 39, and was racing towards the finish line as though she smelt it, but kept hitting walls. Finally, she made it. 42 had apparently figured a way out, but he was slinking along at a leisurely pace, and 27 was catching up on him…passed him…crossed the finish line… Amini applauded the last winner and the maze vanished in a puff of smoke. The other five cats who participated in the competition ran over to their friends and began to play with them.
Hircelu strode over to where Amini was sitting, and grinned at her. "So who were the lucky winners?"
"Let's see…24 finished in first, then 43, 35, 30, and 27."
"The transformation will take place tomorrow morning, 9 o'clock…I already have a couple of interested families…"
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*the next day* .
Five one-month-old babies were crying quite loudly after leaving their cat state. Five disappointed cats who had just received names were sulking around chamber six, not knowing quite what to do. Five people waited outside, two of them looking curiously at the other three. What a day for fives, it seemed.
Hircelu warily opened the door to his home and welcomed the two curious people inside. For a wizard home, this room looked surprisingly simple. A small table and a few chairs had been placed in the center of the room. There was no lamp, but the open windows filled the room with sunlight. A fireplace took up one of the walls and there was a bowl of colored powder near it. But all in all, the decorations were quite plain.
Hircelu greeted his Muggle friends warmly. They didn't know he was a wizard, but they did know that he ran some sort of adoption center. They had been wanting a child for so long, and Hircelu had offered them one of the ones he took care of. The Muggle couple had aggreed, and they were here to adopt their child. Hircelu ran through some paperwork with them, and then he and Amini brought out the children.
"They don't have names yet," Hircelu explained, "because I figured the parents would want to name their own children. They're so young anyway - it wouldn't really matter."
"We only want one," said Elanna Granger. "A girl? Oh, that one is so cute! Andy- look at her! I'd love to call her my daughter!"
Andy smiled at his wife, and nodded his assent. "We'd like to take that one- you know what Elanna? I think we should call her Hermione. Hermione Marie Granger."
"Marie?! Oh, come on, I could pick a better middle name than that! Like Ann! Would Ann work? I think-" Hircelu handed Hermione to Elanna, and Hermione started to cry again. Elanna smiled at him and said, "I think she likes me!"
Andy thanked Hircelu, and Elanna took Hermione's tiny hand and made it wave good-bye. Hermione squealed and proceeded to squeeze Elanna's hand in a deathgrip. Elanna let out a little scream, Andy started laughing, and Hircelu beckoned the next couple in, glad that cat #43 would have a wonderful life.
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*thirteen years later*
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Crookshanks didn't like people very much. When he had been very little, he'd had a lot of friends and a sister. Then, one fateful day, his sister and many of his friends left, and he'd been put into rigorous training on how to become a proper pet, recognize words, and recognize magic. After that, he'd been put in a cage and shipped off to a dark store with a bunch of strange animals. Humans had occasionally come in and poked at him, and he'd snapped back. They would look at him in disgust, and then ingnore him. After a couple of years, he'd been packed up again and brought to another strange store. He returned to sulking around and snapping at people. But then one day, three people entered the store. One with messy black hair and glasses, one with bright read hair and freckles, and one - one girl with bushy brown hair and brown eyes.
Crookshanks stared. He shook himself. He even dunked his furry head in water to clear it up a bit. That girl seemed very familiar. But he couldn't place her. And the strangest thing was that he didn't sense her to be human - but cat. The red-head was talking to what Crookshanks knew as the store-keeper. He turned his attention to them, and immediatrly his fur stood on end. That boy had what looked like a rat - but again, he didn't sense it as a rat. He sensed it as a human. And that human smelled of dark magic. Crookshanks growled and jumped off of his perch onto the "rat". He began hissing and spitting furiously at it.
"NO, CROOKSHANKS, NO!" the storekeeper screamed as Crookshanks pounced on the "rat", which slipped right through her fingers and headed towards the door.
Crookshanks was about to follow it, but then he caught sight of the girl, and his anger disappeared. He purred. He hadn't purred in almost thirteen years.
The girl smiled at him and picked him up. He let her stroke him, and then she put him back on the counter. The girl then told the store keeper that she was going to take him, and she got out a little pouch full of shiny round things.
Crookshanks purred again. Even though he didn't know why, he liked this girl very much. Cat #42 had finally found a home.
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*four years later*
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"Hermione! This is impossible!"
Ron Weasley looked extremely annoyed at himself. He glared at his wand, and turned Hermione back into a human. He and his class were learning how to turn humans into animals, and he had been trying for the last fifteen minutes to turn Hermione into a snowy white cat, as the assignment had indicated. Only, his cat was always brown.
Hermione looked severely over at him. "We've been doing Coloring Charms since fifth year! You knew how to do them back then, why not today?"
"I dunno…it's like you're fur's so happy being brown that it doesn't want to turn white! Here - Harry, you try it!
Harry, who had successfully turned Seamus into a white cat, walked over to them and performed the same spells on Hermione. She turned into a brown cat. He repeated the Coloring Charm. She stayed brown. Harry frowned, and turned her back into a human.
"Ron's right," he said. "I can't do it either, and I didn't have any trouble with Seamus."
"You know what, Hermione?" said Ron, "I reckon that you were a cat in a previous life or something! And so when we tried to turn you into a cat, your subconscious mind remembered that life, and it won't budge from that other cat that you used to be! And so when-"
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*The End*
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A/N - Hope you liked it. I think it has a really cool premise, although I don't think it would really happen in the stories. I could have written it a little better, I know, but I wanted to get it done quickly, because I was really in the mood to write once I thought of the idea. Please be a nice person and write a review, or I'll put a sign on you that says "I am Scabbers, hear me squeak!" and set Crookshanks on you. Or not. But I'd like to hear your comments and *constructive* criticism! Thanks!
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