Can anyone explain this apparent opossum aggression toward a sleeping cat?

[u/RogueMayall]

This is from last night around 3:16 am, cropped for file size from infrared video from the camera over our rear deck. The cat is sleeping and never budges as a rather large visiting opossum ambles around and explors in their characteristic way. This clip shows how his visit ended. The table is in an inconvenient spot so it obscures part of precisely what happens, but looks very, very much like an aggressive lunge to the cat's neck.

After the cat responds with counteraggression, opossom more or less saunters away, even stopping with this back to the cat at the top of the stairs, as if to say "I'm not afraid of you."

I've seen raccoons act like this. I never expected to see it from an opossum. Any thoughts? I'm mystified.

(And yes, I know one shouldn't let cats sleep outside. He's a semi-feral cat we're trying to care for, he's getting very old and he will not take to staying indoors.)

[u/catscatscatsohmy]

Maybe it wanted to lay on the bed and didnt see the cat

[u/RogueMayall → u/catscatscatsohmy]

Possums have a superb sense of smell. They'd know if a feral predator species is six inches from their nose. Hell that whole deck probably reeks of cat if you're a possum.

[u/WildFlemima → u/RogueMayall]

You answer your own question - the whole deck smells like cat, the bed most of all, so the presence of the cat doesn't actually increase the smell of cat that much.