It appeared in a cave, as it would have wanted if it had any real capacity to ‘want’. Things would have been inconvenient if it had appeared anywhere else, but it could probably manage. At least, it thought so.

Where most creatures were blind in the level of darkness surrounding the cathid, its massive eye captured even the faintest traces of light. Where that wasn’t sufficient, a friendly, bioluminescent bacteria residing in the fluid that lubricates its eye generated just enough light for it to make out a small space in front of it. The cathid also primarily ate dead things. Hunting those was relatively safe from the cathid’s perspective. Dead things tend not to eat you back.

All in all, the cathid was very proud of how well suited for its environment it was.

The only issue was that this world was so new that nothing had really gotten the chance to die yet, and the cathid was hungry. It had wandered the caves for hours, trying to find food and get a grasp of its new home. The fruit of its labor was only a few bites of some small wall plants and a bit of water from the moist cave walls.

Though the cathid cared little for the day/night cycles of the outside, it did get tired, especially when it was hungry. And it was hungry.

It found a small indentation to curl up in and passed into worried unconsciousness. It could not go on forever without real food.

Some time later, the scratching of some of its fellow creatures shuffling across the floor woke the cathid. It held very still, doing its best to avoid being noticed. The fellow creatures were not all nice. The cathid avoided all of them, just in case.

The creatures appeared to be heading toward a specific destination, however, and while the cathid didn’t like interacting with fellow creatures, it did like the food they left behind when they hunted.

So it followed.

The cathid watched, skulking in the safe darkness, as the creatures succeeded in providing a meal for it, but not in the way those creatures probably wanted.

The cathid cared little for the combat, but the predator that took its fellow creatures on was quite formidable. It managed to take a lot of damage without succumbing itself. This was slightly displeasing to the cathid because such a creature would have much more food in it than its fellows could possibly want, so there would be plenty for the cathid.

The cathid did not expect the predator to ignore the food left by the creatures that attacked it. The predator seemed to care nothing for them.

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The cathid, however, did.

Once the predator left the cave, the cathid took its chance to dig into its less fortunate fellows. So great was its desire to eat that it did not notice the predator come back into the cave and step in its way.

The cathid did not blame the predator for then protecting its food, and quickly scurried off rather than risk further damage. It did not need food badly enough to die for it.

The cathid would, however, risk continuing to watch.

The predator huddled up and stopped moving after a few more minutes, appearing to have gone to its own unconsciousness. It had, however, left the pile of food untouched. It wondered why the predator had protected the food once but not then eaten it. Perhaps it was left for the cathid?

Confident in its understanding of the situation, the cathid crawled over and dug into the fresh food. It ate until it was satisfied.

Then it ate more.

It stopped when it hurt to move.

The cave was cold, too close to the outside and too far from the heat of the home. The cathid went to leave through the hole it entered through, but was surprised to find it could not lift its food laden body to the hole anymore.

The cathid became alarmed! And if it had any capacity to believe it had inferior intelligence to anything else, now would be a strong point of evidence in its mind. However, it did not, which was part of the reason it decided that, rather than waste the food by throwing it up, that it would curl up on the predator. The predator was very warm, and this pleased the satisfied cathid. It quickly fell into unconsciousness, far less worried than before.

----

The cathid did not understand the predator very well. The predator was clearly afraid of something, but the cathid could not figure out what. What could possibly cause fear in something that could get beaten so much and still live? Nothing the cathid wanted anything to do with. The cathid *did* know that the predator could possibly continue leaving food in its wake, which would be a good thing if the cathid was nearby. The cathid decided to follow the predator, and fortunately for it, the predator allowed the cathid to ride on it!

The cathid felt very safe being protected by the predator.

It tried to help as best it could. The predator could fight, but it could not climb very well.

The cathid could. The cathid helped.

---

The bright, painful ball in the above had only gotten more painful as they descended. The cathid didn’t like it very much. Too much light was much worse than too little. The cathid knew this.

But, the predator interrupted its suffering by asking a strange question. The cathid barely understood its meaning, but the cathid knew the predator would protect it, so it agreed.

The cathid did not understand what happened next. It felt that it had lost a part of itself, but that what had replaced it was something greater. Better.

The cathid had changed, but understanding had come with it. Understanding of the predator, understanding of itself.

The predator had seemed angry with this one, but the it passed quickly.

This cathid could communicate with the predator now. It could explain. It was happy about that. The predator asked some difficult questions that this cathid couldn’t answer. It was sad about that.

This cathid resolved to help as best it could. Perhaps this cathid could grow further with the help of the predator. It just needed to prove its use.