My wife and I fostered a semi-feral pregnant cat once. After her kittens were old enough for adoption, we kept the mother cat. She didn't really get along with our other cats though. So while we were on vacation and one of our neighbors was pet-sitting, she snuck out the door and disappeared. My wife decided we should cut our vacation short to go home and try to find her. After we got back, and a couple hours of searching, we figured she was just gone. Wife was distraught, but finally managed to fall asleep. At about 2 am, I hear this terrified meowing coming from outside. Figured out that it was our missing cat and she was hiding under our car. Convinced her to come back into the house using cat treats as bait. Took the cat into our bedroom and woke up the wife to show her the cat was back. To this day, the cat won't leave our room unless under extreme duress (i.e. someone vacuuming). I think she realized that night just how good she has it as an indoor cat.
That kitty's got a clipped ear, so at some point, he was a humanless cat. He was Trap/Neuter/Returned- they clip the ear like that before they release them so that they know they don't have to do that one again.
Cats are only considered partially domesticated, and they basically domesticated themselves. They naturally decided to live near human settlements to prey on mice/etc that went after people's grain.
In comparison, dogs are conaidered fully domesticated, and we're domesticated by humans.
