Life had sucked once. Knot didn't like that it threatened to suck again.
It felt as if it'd been too long since she'd been curled up within a boat, warmed only by the magic of Twolegs and surrounded by her cherished ones. Though everything dearest remained, she could not deny the pinch of the cold whenever she was alone, nor the way her stomach guiltily growled when Garnet and the others didn't return with food. She'd done her best catching starved rats and birds that had not seen the little feline coming, but to Knot, it wasn't enough. Like water in an abandoned pond, they were stagnating, and that little voice in the back of her mind she'd often tried to push back threatened to return to the surface.
'We're not going to die... we're not going to die...'
The residual damp upon her fur promised to chill the tabby to her bones if she broke her twelve-moon swimming abstinence so, with as much care as her paws could muster, she navigated the rickety fenders until she'd reached the dock again. Within her jaws was a small skeleton of a fish, its head missing but its fins still present enough to tell the she-cat that once, this thing had been food. There was no smell to the thing other than the tang of brine, the lack of sulfuric stench told Knot that another creature had picked it clean first.
She decided it must've been a gull, and gnarled claws escaped their sheaths at the thought of such a long-term nemesis once again getting a victory over her kin. Expletives threatened to dance upon her tongue until she saw movement out the corner of her eye and forced a crooked smile upon her muzzle. "Weren't me, much as credit'd be nice," she purred, heartbeat thrumming in her ears. The Shipyard cats were... new, somewhat, though many had been there longer than she had. She could not claim to know them well, any true bonds severed by a superficial layer of cordiality. It was for the best. Who was to say they would not turn on her first when even the scraps ran out?
"Want it? Things get desperate, might be nice to have a snack, yeah? Even if it's all... crunchy."
It felt as if it'd been too long since she'd been curled up within a boat, warmed only by the magic of Twolegs and surrounded by her cherished ones. Though everything dearest remained, she could not deny the pinch of the cold whenever she was alone, nor the way her stomach guiltily growled when Garnet and the others didn't return with food. She'd done her best catching starved rats and birds that had not seen the little feline coming, but to Knot, it wasn't enough. Like water in an abandoned pond, they were stagnating, and that little voice in the back of her mind she'd often tried to push back threatened to return to the surface.
'We're not going to die... we're not going to die...'
The residual damp upon her fur promised to chill the tabby to her bones if she broke her twelve-moon swimming abstinence so, with as much care as her paws could muster, she navigated the rickety fenders until she'd reached the dock again. Within her jaws was a small skeleton of a fish, its head missing but its fins still present enough to tell the she-cat that once, this thing had been food. There was no smell to the thing other than the tang of brine, the lack of sulfuric stench told Knot that another creature had picked it clean first.
She decided it must've been a gull, and gnarled claws escaped their sheaths at the thought of such a long-term nemesis once again getting a victory over her kin. Expletives threatened to dance upon her tongue until she saw movement out the corner of her eye and forced a crooked smile upon her muzzle. "Weren't me, much as credit'd be nice," she purred, heartbeat thrumming in her ears. The Shipyard cats were... new, somewhat, though many had been there longer than she had. She could not claim to know them well, any true bonds severed by a superficial layer of cordiality. It was for the best. Who was to say they would not turn on her first when even the scraps ran out?
"Want it? Things get desperate, might be nice to have a snack, yeah? Even if it's all... crunchy."