Lizard type creatures are diabolically known for the tough, jerky meat under their smooth scales.
The trick to skinning a lizard type is to find the hole or tear that was made from killing it, and then
tear the scaly skin from there with a knife or any kind of tearing tool. The skin should peel off like
a prom dress, except for on the chest. The skin seems to hold onto the rib cage very tightly.
Between it and the bone and muscle is a thick, complicated system of tendons clinging tightly.
Some try and clear this out with a knife, but it's a straining task, especially with a larger lizard.
Some prefer to hang the dead lizard on a horizontal pole or stick above some boiling water. The
steam from the water loosens the tendons and makes the skin easier to peel.

When cooking the lizard, use a boiling pot of water (If you used it to loosen the skin, then you
should keep the water boiling afterwards). Cleave the meat into smaller bits as best as you can to
fit it all into the pot. It is recommended that you leave the hands, feet and head out, unless you are
willing to remove all of the uneatable parts, such as the claws and teeth. If one would care not to
eat the lizard-type's genitalia, they might find it complicated, especially since it is hard to tell the
males from the females. It is suggested to hole out the entire groin area, considering that the male
lizards conceal their penis within a hole in that area. Using this method, one wouldn't be pressed
to distinguish between the two genders.

The meat was ready, and smelt just like you would expect lizard meat to smell, especially coming
from a lizard like Joe. The cat-girl fished the small, meaty strips of Joe the Kretin from the pot of
boiling water with a long, metallic spoon that she kept in her travel pack. The meat was rather
odorous, but that was expected from such a slimy creature. She poured it into a wooden bowel
sitting on a large granite boulder. Every recognizable aspect of the predator was completely gone
now, as these little gray strips were the only bits left of him. She let the bowel of Joe soup cool off
and went to put out the fire under the pot.

This cat like creature laid back onto the grassy field. This was a relaxing green plain that was
beyond the abusive climate of the jungle. She didn't have to carry Joe's body very far, for the
green field was only a bit more than two miles from where she found Joe trying to be a hunter.
She looked into the blue sky and let out a deep breath. Silence wrapped the field and blue coveted
the tranquil air. It had been so long since she was an actual cat, yet that was always how she
pictured herself, as a small brown cat just surviving. And why not? She felt that it was important
for any creature to remember where they came from in this odd world.

The choice of getting spliced was hard for the young cat to make. Her family was a puritan family.
They didn't believe in splicing, and that one should be proud of their genetic code. They didn't
even have speech elements imbedded into their codes, and still spoke in generic and
uncomplicated codes. Meow softly for affection, harshly for scorn, high for hungry, a whine for
when in heat, a scream for pain, and a purr when happy or in pleasure. This was how simple
communication could be.

The old abandoned farm was always a great place to grow up. Her grandparents would tell her all
the time of how the providers just one day stopped moving. They left behind an entire farm of
things which were once considered tools and vehicles, but could now be used for homes and
playgrounds. It was perfect. All of the various animals helped to keep the place going by either
hunting for rodents, small birds and bugs or by harvesting food and farming. This was all very
difficult without opposable thumbs, advanced communication, and other conveniences that
splicing could offer, but they made it okay.

Everything was metaphorically perfect. As wonderful as only a child can convince herself that it
was. The yellow corn fields; the waving wheat; the shadows of the butterflies; the blood. Bad
memories. Memories of the first time she saw Joe.

Back then, Joe was only a snake, slithering with the same mannerism that he walked with. He
belonged to a kid from the villa. When all of the masters, the providers died, some of the creatures
would begin traveling. Scavengers and predators, two polar extremes but both just looking for
food.

That's when the monkeys came.

The monkeys were test animals for various experiments on the genetic structure of living
organisms, and how they can be mixed and matched. They found the basic fundamentals of human
intelligence and communications. They found the basic fundamentals to various animal traits like
extreme speed or weather resistance. Through these monkeys, not naive to what was going on,
man could unlock many of the staggering problems of human existence. They unlocked the
staggeringly large door of genetics. Now, every living thing could potentially be anything that it
could ever desire. But one day, all of the providers, the masters, the humans just laid down and
died. The animals all guessed that the humans felt that they had gone too far, that the advances
that they made were too much for even them to handle, and that continuing would seem
gratuitous after that discovery. This frame of thought always seemed odd to her, but the bottom
line was that they were all gone, and were never going back.

Splicing. Splicing came from the monkeys. They were observant little primates. They were
administered so many different kinds of gene altering chemicals, that they observantly learned to
administer them to others. They even learned how to make them themselves. Animals were, more
and more, splicing themselves with various helpful human traits. The monkeys had gone on the
road with their gift. Monkeys in armani suits could be seen strutting through the country with
derby hats and brief cases. They sold splices to any animal that would donate new and rare genetic
information. Now there was circulating currency, but accommodating every species was tough.

Animals could no longer be attributed to one race. They were all so genetically different, that
when they were spliced into a new creature, they were told to come up with a name for it. When
the girl first met Joe, he wasn't a Kretin. There was no such thing as a Kretin. He was a snake,
and he killed the girl's family. He killed anything that was small enough for the coward to eat.
When it was all over, the small brown kitten only had one brother, who was too sick to harvest.
Nothing shined anymore to the small animal. Joe left no bodies to be buried of his victims, but one
day the kitten's brother died. She would have to bury him.

The kitten didn't want to be alone. The kitten didn't want to be the survivor. The kitten didn't
want to die.

She would see Joe again, when she left the farm to try and find food after the livestock had all
died. She saw him crawling along the grass one day while eating some grass as a last resort. She
didn't move. She didn't even breathe. She wanted revenge, but not when she was inhibited by
such torturous hunger. The snake saw her, and spoke. ‘I remember you.'

He spoke, and as the kitten ran, he gave chase. She bounded and leaped through the tall, view-
clouding reeds with those haunting words ringing in her ears.

‘I remember you.'

‘I remember you.'

‘I remember you.'

Now, as she lay in the field, in the present, thinking about this four legged image which always
represented what was real, running through the grass to escape a natural predator which was
somehow yelling at her, the rest of the story flowed through her head like water.

She scampered up a tree after she was sure that her vile pursuer had left her for the time. She
lowered herself onto a rounded branch, perfectly suitable for sleeping. The night fell over her like
the tide, and she found herself falling into a pleasant, dreamless sleep.

It seemed like a second of unconsciousness passed when the small cat was awakened. The trees
were rustling frantically like the applause from a large crowd. Her head darted back and forth,
right to left, trying to find the source of all of this sleep corrupting ruckus. Wind whistled in her
ears, followed by a hollow thump. She turned her head to the source of this new noise to find a
monkey in a business suit chewing.

The briefcase in his hand seemed ominous, for the small cat knew nothing of the splicing. Joe's
ability to speak seemed to be an unexplainable anomaly, but this was downright unnatural. This
monkey, a creature which the cat had never seen before just stood there chewing. Every wag of
his jaw seemed to only be translated into waiting. Waiting for a reply, anything for the cat to
prove her intelligence. His suit was originally tailored for a human, but was obviously manipulated
by the monkey himself, for the seems were ripped and sown back together in odd places.

The monkey cocked his head at the small animal, and a great sphere of pink gun ballooned from
his lips in front of her face. The cat pawed it, and it deflated, resting on the monkey's lips. He was
not too happy with this, letting his annoyance hang on his brow as if pulled by weights. He
opened his mouth to speak, but then took a moment to comprehend the cat in front of him, who
was now playfully pawing at the remnants of gum on her paw. "Will you be needing any
assistance?" Asked the monkey, in a thick English accent.

"Meow." Said the cat.

"Yes, well, it seems to be a good thing that I came along, doesn't it?" The monkey kept his
professional disposition and opened his briefcase. He began to rummage around in his things. "It's
always so unfortunate to see such a young girl with so much potential on the bottom of the
evolutionary ladder while everyone around her is rising above." He pulled out a long syringe from
the case.

The cat was suddenly very frightened, either because of the long syringe, or because this monkey
was talking. Either way it was very odd. She seemed so helpless, they were so high up in that tree
that the fear of falling was possibly greater than the fear of being stuck with that needle. Besides,
the way the monkey was acting, it almost felt as if he was doing her a favor.

The monkey reached after the cat, grabbing her by the scruff of her neck. The cat yelped in
disagreement. In spite of her inaudible complaints, the monkey laid her across his upper arm and
stuck her in the stomach area with the needle. It only stung for a moment for the cat, but in an
instant the pain didn't matter.

All of a sudden everything started making some sort of higher sense. Nothing was "just because"
anymore. Her brain began to seem more and more unfulfilled, and curiosity flared up. Suddenly
there was so much more to be known. As if the walls of her mind had just gotten wider, and there
was much more space to fill.

"There, that was a complimentary heightened intelligence and speech genetic modifier." The
monkey said, closing his case after putting the syringe back inside. "It's been made to work at a
hyper-accelerated pace, so you should feel the effects already working."

The cat looked at her paw, an icon now holding so much more meaning than ever before. She
looked out into the moon, full to the brim.

"Thank you." She said.

"So," the monkey started, "now that you can speak, and think on a higher plane, tell me your
name."

She searched her mind for something like a name. Something so distinguishable as herself that her
parents or owner could have given her. Something that could define her. Something for her, and
her only. She found nothing.

"I don't think I have one." She said, still very surprised of the speech coming from her own
mouth.

"Well, we must ratify that then, mustn't we?" He responded. "Do you have any ideas."

The cat searched her brain. Something. Anything.

"Something lovely. Something nice. Perhaps something sad." The monkey in the suit said.
"Perhaps something happy. Something sad? Lonely? Or maybe just something content."

"What do people call me now? They must refer to me as something."

"Just cat, usually"

"Then... Cat. If that's what people would call me now, then it sounds alright to me."

"Well then, you will be cat." He brushed himself off and tipped his hat. "Thank you for your
cooperation, and have a wonderful day." He leaped backwards out of the tree, into the cold,
uncertain night."

Now, the cat girl lay in this field, still thinking upon those old days of shattering simplicity, when
she walked on four instead of two, and a paw meant so much more than a hand.