Cloud

The glass container snapped against the facility floor, sending an experimental mixture into the sewers and out to sea. It mutated within the fish, jumped to the dock cats, and eventually reached the humans. By the time the world noticed, the transformation was unavoidable. In an apartment overlooking the city, the man known as "Final Fantasy Island" felt the fever take hold. He didn't panic; he was a man of logic and systems. He watched the news turn to static, waiting for the new operating system to install. When he woke, his apartment felt cavernous. In the mirror stood a Sichuan Jianzhou—a stone-grey cat with a powerful build and a unique "four-ear" silhouette. The virus hadn't given him a choice; it had simply manifested his heritage into a feline shell. He stepped onto the fire escape. Below, the city was a mess. Some cats shrieked in terror—the Catified, humans who couldn't handle the change. Others prowled aimlessly—the regular cats who had no idea the world had shifted. Cloud looked at the humming power lines and the few humans barricading doors. They were the necessity. If the grid died, human technology and civilization died with it.