I am a white, short hair, tabby cat with a gray tail and large gray spots on my back and head. The gray spot that covers my face forms a perfect Halloween mask with black lines running back from the corners of my eyes. It helps me look fierce.

   I need all the help I can get.

* * *

   He shakes me and pets me and pats me on the head. "Come one kitten," Bob says singing the words at me and laughs. "Time to get to work. Gotta earn your keep. What you gonna do, sleep all day?"

   I open one eye and look at him. "Yes. That's exactly what I'm going to do," I think. He scratches under my chin. I stretch my neck out.

   "I bet you'd let me go back to sleep if I scratched you a real good one," I think. But the neck rub does feel good, so I don't.

   "Honey," Judi's voice comes from the bathroom. "You better get in the shower before all the hot water's gone."

   Bob heads into the bathroom.

   I settle back down on my cushion on the back of the couch to catch some shut eye.

   Last night was a very long night.

   My two humans, if they only knew what I go through for them.

* * *

   When the lights go out, is when my work begins.

   I lay with them on their bed. They hug and cuddle and pat me and sometimes I think they are going to kill me with so much love. They are such big clumsy things that they could hurt me by accident. But that's the chance I take.

   They are my humans and I protect them from the things of the night, even if they don't know I do it.

   I protect them because of their warm glow. The soft golden glow that they give off when they are holding me on their laps or when they are holding each other. That warm golden glow is precious in this world. That kind of glow is hard to find.

   I know this because I was once on the streets fighting for my survival.

   Everything that is alive has a glow.

   The dogs that chased me had a fierce red glow. That glow meant death to me. Other cats usually had an electric purple glow when they saw me. That glow meant this place is mine. You stay out.

   The golden glow that Bob and Judi have for me is special. It appeared the first time they saw me at the shelter and has never left, although it took me a long time before I had the golden glow for them.

   The golden glow that they have for me, I would die to keep.

   They are my humans. I will protect them.

* * *

   The lights are out and their breathing becomes regular in the rhythm of rest. Their glow changes ever so slightly. Little flashes of color move through their glow, pinks, greens, yellows, and blues.

   I know this means they are now moving into the land of dreams.

   That is what draws the others.

   The things of the night.

   Are they spirits, or demons or ghosts? I do not know. I only know I can see them and my humans can not.

   They come in through the doors and windows and I have to keep them away. If they get inside of my humans when they are unprotected, when they are in the land of dreams, they could hurt my people by making them feel bad things and making them believe the bad feelings come from inside.

   I hear the first noise in the living room and race in there flying over the carpet.

   It is standing in front of the door. It is so huge it fills the entire doorway with its bulk. It is green and slimy and looks like a walking on two legs decaying seven foot tall iguana lizard.

   I stand in front of it and bristled my back hairs and stick my tail straight up to look bigger (although with a thing this large, I doubt it'll make any difference) and hiss at it with as much menace as I can manage.

   It looks down at me. Its glow is black, painful death itself.

   "Out of my way little thing," It spits at me. Its forked tongue licks the air. "I will have these two human souls for my dinner tonight."

   I know the meaning of fear then. I wonder at that moment if the gray patches on my face and back have changed and match the white of the rest of my fur. For I am truly stone white terrified of the thing that stands in front of the door.

   Despite my fear, I attack. I leap through the air, claws bared, slicing at the ugly thing before me.

   My claws do not bite into flesh, but they do bite into something. It falls back and there us a tear on its chest. Something black spews out like a vapor into the air and the iguana thing screams.

   The iguana thing lashes back and I dodge.

   Cats are fast and I'm one of the fastest and I know something else.

   The warm golden glow gives me strength. I am mighty. I am stronger than this thing that feeds on fear and pain.

   I am Patty, the mighty cat!!!

   I leap into it and tear at its ankles. When it bends over, I leap for its face, tearing and shredding.

   It falls backward, back through the door and shouts a blood curdling challenge at me, "I'll be back little kitten. I'll rip your claws out, then rip you up!"

   I lay over on the floor panting.

   This time I was lucky. He didn't even get me with one swipe of his claw and he didn't smack me with his tail like he did last week and he didn't even spit that acid stuff like he did one other time.

   This time it ……was too easy.

   I raced into the bedroom to see the two black bat things with big glowing red eyes and a rotting grayish green glow coming through the window.

   They are heading straight toward my humans.

   "Get away from them," I yell with my thoughts and they can hear my thoughts just as easily as I can hear theirs.

   They laugh at me. "Nana nana nanaaaaa na, you can't catch us," They shout together at me.

   One thing you should never do is laugh at a cat. I don't mind it if Judi or Bob does it because they are playing with me. But when these ugly bat things laugh at me, I see red, and not just the red from their glowing eyes either.

   Them laughing at me, made me mad.

   I flew through the air with claws in motion.

   I leaped right over Bob and Judi and take one of the bat things to the floor with me on my first pounce.

   It squealed as I held it with my claws and when I bit down on its neck a foul smelling icy cold blast of liquid is what I felt. Then the thing vanished right from underneath me.

   The other bat thing is flying around the ceiling and just as I finish with his friend he makes a dive toward Judi.

   I move like the Cat Flash and fly through the air and tackle it just before the bat thing reaches Judi's open snoring mouth.

   "You should have known better than to tangle with me!" I think-shout at the bat thing beneath me as it struggles. "Tell the rest of your buddies about me," I say to it and one bite to its neck sends it back to wherever it came from.

   "Wha…. What was that?" Judi's sleepy voice asks.

   "Nothing, maybe a car outside," Bob mumbles in his half asleep voice. He rolls over and loudly breaks wind.

   I know it will be safe in here now. Even if I couldn't keep the bad things away all night, Bob's wind would.

   I walk up carefully over my humans and lie down on Judi's pillow over the top of her head and keep watch till dawn.

* * *

The next day

   Bob shakes me and pets me and pats me on the head. "Come on kitten, gotta get up," He says.

   Why do I put up with this?

   Later, Judi opens a can of tuna. The aroma fills the entire house. Before I even know where I'm at, I'm at her feet making the, "Oh that smells just too good," sound.

   She gives me the can and I eat it in ecstasy.

   Bob comes up as I eat and pats me on the head and rubs my back. Judi stands over us and watches. The warm golden glow covers us all. I feel good.

   My humans.