Pearl awoke to the campfire's last few crackles and ticks of the morning. It had been a week since she arrived in this strange world, the strings around her shoulder now loosened to reveal the scar in place of the wound.  She got up out of her bed and woolen tent, crushing out the rest of the fire as to not waste too much wood on nothing.  There wasn't much of the green part of the forest left, so she wanted to take as little of it as possible. 

After the big storm cleared and Pearl recovered from her head injury, she and Tilly found a small clearing in the greenery and decided to set up a camp in it.  From there, they were able to make safe trips to the swamp to farm for fish and water whenever they needed.  Additionally, Pearl had fished up a bow on one occasion, but it was near broken and in desperate need of repair.

Just as she stomped the campfire out, Tilly walked up to her with her tail wrapped around the handle of an empty bucket, dragging it along with her.  She gave the wolf a pat on the head.

"Thanks Till," said Pearl, taking the bucket into her own hands.  "You comin' with?"

Tilly wagged her tail and took a stance at Pearl's side. 

"Alright, c'mon," Pearl said as she started to make her way towards the swamp, planning to pick up more water for their supply.

In whatever free time Pearl had to think thoughts, she still continued to question what she did and didn't know.  She came from another world and abandoned her friends to escape a threat, that she was sure of, but who exactly was she?  Was she a great explorer who everyone looked up to and respected, or was she more like the garbage lady who mothers would point out to their children as a bad example?  Did her friends even like her?  Maybe there was a reason she abandoned them, but then again, she figured she'd be smarter than to let other people push her around for that long.  She was above emotional standards, wasn't she? Surely she was, the thought of relying on people who hated her alone made her sick to her stomach.

The worst part of it all wasn't even thinking about what it was like back home, or more rather how it could've been back home. It was thinking about where she would even go. What if the threat that drove her out was still there? What if, in the case that they were near and dear to her, her friends had already perished to this threat or ran away to another world like she did and had no way of getting back?  What would her goal be then?

She sighed, kneeling on the ground just before the waters of the swamp. The water was as murky and waste filled as ever, but it was nothing a little boiling over fire couldn't get rid of.

"I dunno Tilly," Pearl said, dipping and filling the iron bucket with water. "I want to get back home, I really do, but I'm not even sure where home is... or if home even exists anymore. I guess I just... want to feel like I belong? Does that make sense to you?"

"It makes sense to me,"

The sudden and unwarranted voice from behind her made Pearl scramble to her feet, but in doing so slipped on the damp soil and fell into the water. Keeping her eyes shut as to avoid whatever junk could get in them, she did her best to swim back up to the surface as quickly as possible. A hand grabbed her as she reached the top, helping to pull her out of the water which, in the moment, she gladly accepted.

"Ooh my goodness, I didn't mean to scare you like that Pearl!" The stranger apologized as Pearl shook the excess water off of her body. Just as she began to question what was going on, Tilly barked and snapped at the person's hand, not so much hurting him as she was warning him to back off. Finally, Pearl wiped the icky water out of her eyes and looked up at the man standing before her.

The wide brimmed sun hat he had on ironically covered none of his brunette hair, the somewhat long locks in otherwise short hair tangling with each other as if they've went unbrushed and unkempt for weeks. The hat almost covered the grey tabby cat ears poking out of his head, in fact, his entire half cat build reminded Pearl of herself for a moment, his legs also being that of a white and grey tabby with a matching striped tail flowing behind him. There was close to nothing covering his upper body, only a strap to a reddish-brown bag that was hanging off of his back and a very short cape-like garment connected by a cat charm that had dull but noticeably green eyes and otherwise matched his half cat patterns.  This left most of his human skin exposed, revealing dozens upon dozens of scars littering his body like the destruction littering the swamp. His fingers were riddled with little cat scratches, and so was some of his right arm, but the majority of the scars were much bigger than those, most notably the giant burn-like scar running across the whole left half of his human body.  On the untouched side of his face, at least as untouched as it could get with this man apparently, there was another mark across his right eye, though it was his left half that had the red tinted and presumably blind eye compared to the right's perfectly healthy chocolate brown iris, as well as a smaller mark going across the bridge of his nose and a longer mark stretching from the right side of his upper chest all the way to just above his lip on the left, one of the few areas of his left side that wasn't covered in the aforementioned burn scar.

Pearl was already beginning to grow concerned at Tilly's reaction to the man, but something under his hat caught the sun's glare for just a moment, managing to catch Pearl's attention as well.

Right behind his ear was a golden feather, the same golden feather Pearl knew was in her bag back at her camp. The same golden feather that she swore to never return in the assumption that it belonged to a killer.

Pearl's demeanor did a full 180 to match her companion's.

"...I feel like I'm in danger-" said the man, his ears hardly having the time to fold backwards before Pearl took out her axe and lunged at him, both of them tumbling further onto the grass and away from the water. Her axe was pressed against a scar that ran across the front half of his neck, and she wasn't afraid to reopen that wound if she had to.

"WOAH WOAH HANG ON-"  The man tried to reason, but stopped himself from talking when an annoyed meow emerged from his backside. A cat slid out from underneath him, dawning the same fur patterns as the man's half feline side. It looked like a standard house cat, safe for the shorter snout and vibrant green eyes, which Pearl noticed matched the cat charm the man had on his cloth.

Pearl didn't keep her attention on it for long, going right back to staring the man beneath her down, but he was still looking at the cat, which made Pearl think he was just stupid for a moment. He gave a sigh of relief.

"Jellie, hang on a minute sweetie, I'm trying not to get myself killed," said he.  The name made Pearl think that she herself was stupid, turning her head back over to the cat.  Now where had she heard that name before?

"Hey, could ya keep your cat in your boat?"  Pearl jokingly scolded, not actually minding the feline invading her personal space.  "Jellie's going to smush me flatter than a pancake if you keep letting her think I'm a sidewalk,"

"You're the guy from the boat..." muttered Pearl, trying to keep the statement to herself, but with her face so close to his, of course the man heard it.

"The what now?"  He asked in confusion.  Pearl quickly went back to her toughened state, though this time she had no plans of actually hurting him. 

"Who are you, how'd you get here, and how the hell am I gonna get back home?"  Pearl asked, one question after the other. 

"Woah woah woah, slow down a minute, I mean I know I don't do this a whole lot, but c'mon!"  He said, a playful smile creeping onto his face.  "Don't pull a grandma on me Pearl, I'm not a totally new person just because I'm a few inches taller,"

"I'm not here to joke with you!"  Pearl growled, pressing the axe against him as a reminder of its dangerously close placement to his throat.  "Answer.  Me."

Now he finally caught on to the seriousness of the situation.  His eyes widened in horror, but he still tried to maintain his innocent and friendly composure.  "C'mon!  It's me, Scar!  One of your hermit buddies straight from the Boatem hole?  ...Pearl?"

Scar? Hermit? Boatem? The questions flooded Pearl's brain quicker than she could block it up, a typhoon of anxiety crossing along with it to drown her in panic. But by some miracle of the buoyant driftwood that was her sheer will, she clung onto the surface tension and breathed the fresh air of confidence mixed with some of the frustration she needed to push forward.

"Pearl, seriously, are you ok?" asked Scar. "If this is this because of the whole portal thing, I promise I was gonna follow you the whole time!"

"Alright, that's enough!" Pearl shouted. If her axe weren't already right against his throat, she would've pressed it further. "I've been here for a week, I don't know you, I barely know who I am, and I'd appreciate it if you quit talking to me like I do! You wanna talk to me in riddles, I'll talk to you with my axe lodged between your eyes!  Now answer me goddangit!"

Scar seemed far beyond shocked at her sudden outburst, his fluffy ears pressing against the rim of his had as they folded backwards on him.  "You... don't remember anything?"

"No!"  Pearl reiterated. 

"Ok!  Ok, this is fine... wwwwe can sort this out in a way that doesn't involve a sharp weapon anywhere inside me," Scar insisted, attempting to push back the axe by the handle.  Pearl immediately resisted it.

"Ooor maybe just near me is fine," he backtracked, showing his empty hands in the air as a sign of peace, "whatever makes you feel comfortable,"

Jellie meowed from beside the two.  Scar turned to her for another moment.

"I know Jellie, I'm trying to be nice here," said he.

"You talk to your cat?"  Pearl asked.

"You don't talk to your wolf?"  Scar retaliated.  "Which, by the way, is something you should definitely do because it's staring at Jellie and I don't like it,"

Pearl turned to see that Scar was right; Tilly was indeed staring at the cat like something was wrong and it was personal.  Pearl hesitated for a second, but the humanity in her stood up for the feline.  She whistled at her companion.

"Back down Till, Jellie's not a problem," she ordered.  Tilly seemed as hesitant as Pearl was a second ago, but she listened to her owner nonetheless and took a few steps back.

"Now, how do you expect me to believe you right off the bat about... whatever it was you said earlier?" Pearl questioned. Scar chuckled.

"Honestly, out of anyone here, I'm not expecting you to at all," he admitted, "but, if you really want me to try, you said something about me being in a boat. We always used to ride boats together, so that means you remember something at least!"

Pearl thought for a moment. If she were any closer to a cartoon, a lightbulb would've popped out over her head.

"What's the song?" Pearl asked.

"Oh, you mean our Sea Song!" exclaimed Scar, his ears flowing back to the front of him in an elated manner.

"My singing voice isn't as smooth as it used to be ever since this appeared-" Scar pointed to the scar across his neck "-but I'm sure it'll sound close enough,"

And as he cleared his throat, it was like the sound of the heavens opened up and flew into Pearl's ears. Not because he sounded good, which, honestly, he was pretty decent all things considered, but because this was the first time in a while where she recognized something. Where it wasn't a feeling of deja vu, but rather nostalgia.

You could tell everybody
The sea is for anybody
But be sure to tell nobody
That this is all I need...

She knew him.

Not faintly remembered. 

Knew.