I think people often underestimate the animal mind
It’s not like they have discrete thoughts in words, but animals form friendships even across species in the wild. It’s not abnormal for one animal to partner up with another - with an imbalance in size/strength the smaller one often will scout out prey and the larger one will give them scraps. Sometimes equals will share territory and even raise kittens/cubs together, taking turns babysitting.
With less abundant food, that’s certainly got to be more rare now, but we’ve seen it happen, even captured it at length on video
Cats are going to have all sorts of ideas about our relationship, from a parent to a big predator friend to a giant clueless kitten. Or, maybe just another predator sharing space, or sometimes they totally discard their instincts and live by human rules
It’s not so dissimilar from what we’d think if an alien took us as a pet and we didn’t try to put a label on it - every relationship is unique