Staring into the void ahead—at shapes that might be trees, might be grass—might be nothing at all.
This is…
Outside.
Her heart pounded in her eartips.
She’d never been outside before. Not once. Not since the fathers brought her home, tiny and covered in highway dust. She’d watched it through the windows, with her nose pressed to the glass.
This wasn’t like that outside of those windows. That outside had color. Had sky. Had a warm glow that made perfect napping spots in the windowsills.
This had… nothing.
Just empty black, stretching forever. There were no streetlights. No moon. No other light except for what little leaked from the tunnel behind her, and even that seemed too embarrassed to shine far.
Solstice lifted her paw to step forward.
Her leg locked.
What if I get lost?
She tried again. Her body refused.
But the mice went out there.
She forced her paw down past the threshold. The ground felt wrong—present but hollow, like stepping on carpet that wasn’t quite attached to the floor. She yanked her paw back to the safety of the stone.
Her breathing came faster.
What if there’s no food? Where would food even come from in a place like this? The fathers always put food in bowls. Always. Twice a day. What if the fathers can’t find me out there?
She paced along the tunnel’s edge. Six steps one way. Turn. Six steps back. Her tail lashed behind her.
—Observe—
No bowls.
Just… darkness.
She peered into the darkness again, trying to see farther, trying to spot anything that looked familiar or safe or real.
The mice went out there. They must know where they’re going. They must know where the food is.
Nothing. Just dark shapes that could be anything out there.
Her claws extended, scraping against stone.
But what if they don’t know? What if they’re lost too? Or if something’s out there? Something that eats mice? Something that eats—cats?
Her tail hit the ground.
—No—
She let out her pent-up breath.
She was being ridiculous. She was a cat. Cats were hunters. Cats don’t stand in doorways having big feelings about the dark. Cats go anywhere they want. To the very top of the closet—absolutely. Into the smallest box—every time. Inside the under-couch—daily.
Cats definitely go outside.
And so do I.
She stepped forward. Both front paws on the not-quite-grass now.
It felt wrong under her pads. Not soft. Not springy. Just… there. Present but hollow.
Her heart hammered so hard she thought it might escape her chest and run deeper into the tunnel without her.
She lowered her head and bit a blade.
It tore between her teeth, like that cheap colored paper the fathers threw straight into the metal can almost daily. The kind that didn’t taste good. Dry. Flavorless. Wrong.
She spat it out.
It’s fine. This is fine. Just following the mice. That’s all. Follow the mice, find whatever they’re finding, figure out—
She looked back.
Behind her, the tunnel was fading. Not gone yet, but becoming translucent. Ghostly. Like it was deciding whether to stay or disappear entirely.
Panic spiked through her chest.
No. NO. Don’t go.
She stepped back inside, her other paw half raised—
The tunnel faded more. Less solid. More ghost.
I can’t get lost. I need—I need to be able to get back.
She stood frozen between two impossible choices: forward into the void, or backward to a tunnel that was vanishing anyway.
The mice knew what they were doing. The mice went forward. Cats follow mice.
She repeated it like a prayer.
Cats follow mice. Cats follow mice.
She stepped forward again. Then another step. And another.
—Don’t look back—
She looked back anyway.
Gone.
The tunnel was just… gone. Not even an empty space where it had been. Just more colorless grass and tree-shapes and oppressive darkness pressing in from all sides.
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“No no no no—” The words tumbled out. “Come back. I didn’t—I wasn’t ready—”
She ran to where the tunnel should be and pawed at the nothing. Tried to feel for the stone that was no longer there.
“FATHER?” Her voice cracked. “Bearded Father, I can’t find—the door is gone. The door is GONE.”
Silence swallowed her words.
“PLEASE.” She yowled louder now, desperately. “I want to go home. I want to go INSIDE. This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have—”
Something moved in the darkness.
Solstice froze mid-cry, ears swiveling toward the sound.
Quiet. So quiet she almost missed it. Like fabric brushing against bark.
—Something’s there—
Her tail flicked left—confirming.
Something heard me.
Her fur started to rise.
Something heard me and now it’s—
A rustling sound came again. Closer. From her left.
Solstice bolted.
She ran without direction, without plan, just away from the sound and into the darkness. Her paws barely touched the not-grass. Her tail streamed behind her.
—Faster—
The tree-shapes blurred past.
I must go faster. Find somewhere safe. Find—
Movement flickered at the edge of her vision.
She veered right, leaping over roots she couldn’t quite see. Her shoulder slammed into something solid—a tree—and she ricocheted off, but still ran.
—There. That tree ahead—
She stared at the forest, looking for that tree.
—The big one—
She spotted it—a tree-thing that looked more solid than the others, with branches low enough to reach.
—Climb. Get high—
Solstice launched herself at it.
—Get SAFE—
Her claws found purchase—thank the fathers, THANK them—and she scrambled up the trunk. Branch to branch to branch until she was high enough that nothing could follow. High enough to be—
“Running.”
The voice came from everywhere and nowhere.
Solstice pressed herself flat against the branch, panting, eyes wide.
“Always running.” The voice circled her, moving through the air itself. “The new ones run so beautifully. Like they’ve never gone hungry.”
A face appeared in the trunk beside her.
Not carved into it. Not emerging from it. Inside it—like the bark had gone transparent, revealing something watching from within.
Just a face. No body. Glowing faintly.
Wrong. Like staring into a lantern and seeing a skull instead of flame.
Feline. Black fur. Yellow glowing eyes.
That was the only color in all of this colorless place.
And those eyes were grinning the way a shadow smiles when the light goes out.
“GET AWAY FROM ME!”
Solstice threw herself off the branch, twisting mid-air, landing hard. Her paws hit wrong—one folded under her—and she stumbled, then pushed herself upright and ran harder.
“Oh, good,” the voice sang out behind her, delighted. “More fleeing. Adds such a delightful flavor to the harvest.”
The glowing face appeared in a tree ahead of her.
Solstice veered left without thinking.
Those yellow eyes then moved through the grass at her feet—large, grinning, watching her every move. And then—
Kakakakakak. Kakakakakak.
A sound like teeth chattering in a skull, like a bird caught in a throat that never learned to sing. Sharp. Rattling. Hungry.
Terror flooded through her. She leaped over those eyes—the color of a sulfur match struck in an abandoned mine—brilliant, drowning in firedamp, and about to go boom. Solstice’s lungs burned. Her legs shook. But she never slowed.
That face found her again and again—trees, grass, stones—always ahead, always grinning so wide her eyes became knives. Solstice veered and dodged and leaped, but couldn’t escape it.
—Faster. Faster. Don’t stop. Don’t—
And finally, those cursed eyes were inside a dry leaf that tumbled from above—always gazing at her, flipping edge over edge, unblinking.
Solstice didn’t think.
She leaped.
Caught that leaf mid-air between her teeth and bit down hard.
CRUNCH.
Kept running, the leaf crunching between her teeth as her paws hit the ground, destroying it with all the fury and terror swirling in her mind.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
She went to swallow—her throat moved. Empty.
Nothing. There was nothing to swallow. The leaf was just… gone.
But something spread through her body—barely noticeable, like a single drop of water in an empty well.
Kakakakakak
She finally understood, finally recognized what it was—a hunting chirp. But this was corrupted—not luring prey in, but claiming it: I see you. I taste you. You’re already mine.
That sound followed. Circling, driving her, always away from—but what? She didn’t know. She just ran. Her paws pounded the hollow ground. She launched herself over a low bush—
WHAM!
A rock on the far side. She slammed chest-first into it, crashed back through the foliage, and collapsed, gasping.
Her tail tapped against her. Then harder. Insistent.
—Get up. GET UP—
She rolled to her feet, staggered—
—It’s right over there—
Movement in the shadows behind.
She fled.
Before she’d gone ten bounds, her good paw caught on a root. She went down hard, rolled, and got up again. Her front leg throbbed. She ran anyway—limping, stumbling, but moving.
Ahead, she ran into a massive wall of roots breaking through the earth, with a small gap beneath one section. An opening. A path to the other side.
—Through. Get through. Keep running—
That’s pretty small, but I’m small too. I can fit.
Solstice dove for it without further hesitation.
CRACK.
Her head slammed into a root. The gap was smaller than she’d thought. Stars exploded across her vision.
She backed out of the gap, stumbling.
Footsteps.
—Right there. Too close—
Solstice spun around. Swaying. Her vision blurred.
A shape materialized from the darkness. Solid. Real.
It was a black tortoiseshell with gold spots and those burning yellow eyes like canary feathers in a coal mine after the singing stopped.
Older than Solstice. Longer. Thin in a way that spoke of hunger, not neglect—a body that had learned to carry hunger like armor.
The two stood five tail-lengths apart, as the stranger’s jaw dropped open—too wide, unhinging like a snake’s—and their throat convulsed.
Kakakakakak
The sound rattled from deep in their chest, mechanical and wet at once. Ribs expanded and contracted, visible beneath too-thin skin, like bellows pumping air through a broken instrument. Those eyes strobed with each syllable—bright, dim, bright, dim—like a dying light struggling to stay lit. Their whole body seemed to vibrate with it.
The grin never faltered.
I can’t run.
Solstice backed up. One step. Two. Her haunches hit the tree roots.
—Trapped—
The older cat padded closer. Slow. Unhurried.
I can’t climb. Can’t—
—FIGHT—
Something shifted in Solstice’s chest. Something primal and old and born of pure desperation. Her back arched. Her fur exploded outward—tail, spine, everything puffing up to make her bigger, scarier, more dangerous than she was.
She hissed. Long and loud and vicious.
The tortoiseshell paused.
Solstice’s lips pulled back, revealing her teeth. Her paw rose—air-batting and striking at nothing—to show how quickly she could attack.
“KhIIIIsss-FUCK-Mrreww!”
The sound tore from her throat—half hiss, half yowl, pure threat.
They took another step closer to Solstice.
A memory flashed—bright and sharp.
Highway noise. Loud. Too loud. Giant shapes looming over her. Hands reaching down.
She’d been so small. So scared.
She’d hissed, spat, and made herself as dangerous as her tiny body could manage.
The giants had backed away.
It had worked.
THWAP!
Her tail hit her hard, right behind the ears. The impact carried urgent meaning.
—SPIT—
Without thinking, without understanding, her body remembered.
She lunged forward half a step—a tiny bounce—and as her paws hit the ground, something launched from between her teeth—not just saliva, something more—flying through the air.
It glowed.
The older cat flinched back a step.
The glowing spit hit their shoulder. Where it made contact, the air shimmered—like heat rising off stone, like something burning that shouldn’t be able to burn.
The black cat backed away. It worked!
The glow faded. Dissipated. Gone.
Those yellow eyes studied their own shoulder. Then Solstice.
“That… stung.” Almost surprised. “Did not expect that from a house cat.”
The voice was dry as old bones rattling in a sack, rough from disuse, sharp from necessity. Female. Like hers.
“Interesting.”
They began to pace. Side to side along the arc in front of Solstice. Blocking any escape.
Solstice turned with her, keeping her face toward the threat, keeping her paws ready, keeping—
“Never hunted.” The tortoiseshell’s gaze traveled over her.
“Never fought.”
They continued to pace in the other direction.
“Indoor cat.”
Their gaze was now fixed on Solstice’s still unsheathed claws.
“Soft paws.”
The older cat stopped pacing. Sat. Stared.
Solstice’s breathing came in ragged gasps. Her legs shook. Her fur was still puffed, but her energy was draining fast.
She couldn’t hold this.
Couldn’t keep the aggression up much longer.
I am seeking feedback. Please take a moment to answer the following questions, or share anything else you'd like. Thank you.
- Did the chase sequence (the grinning face appearing in trees/grass/leaves) feel tense and immersive—or did it start to blur together after a while?
- When Solstice bit the leaf and crunched it—did that moment feel satisfying (a turning point) or confusing (what just happened)?
- At any point did you feel genuinely afraid for her—not just observing fear, but feeling it in your gut? If so, where?