She was tired and hungry. Her paws ached. There was dirt matted in her fur, and no matter how much she groomed herself, she couldn’t get a bristly bit of thistle out of her tail.

Tail... paws... Where had those thoughts come from?

I’m Carrie. I had an accident. There were lights coming at me, she thought, desperate to cling to what she could remember.

And then it all faded away again. Once more there were only the sounds of the forest, and the sharp scent that bit in her nose and made her afraid.

Predator, it said.

Carrie couldn’t say how she knew; she only knew that she had to be silent, so that it wouldn’t find her.

Here, on the thick branch of a tree she’d reached by jumping off a rock, she at last felt a little safer. Nothing would be able to reach her here. She’d be able to see anyone or anything that approached from her vantage point.

At last, she slept.

In her sleep, her paws twitched. She dreamed of strange things: mice squirming beneath her paws. Birds flying teasingly close, only to swoop up out of reach. She dreamed of warm fur, and the comfort of a pillow in a windowsill while snow fell outside.

When she woke, it was afternoon. The sun had found her branch and warmed her fur. For the first time in what felt like a long, long time, her heart was no longer racing with panic.

Carefully, she scented the air.

The air smelled safe. There was only the scent of pine cones, damp moss and the breeze of cool air that came from the mountains and brought pictures of glaciers and quiet, blue lakes with it.

Carrie stood. She was hungry and thirsty. She sniffed at the trunk of the tree that had sheltered her. Then, with effortless elegance, she jumped to the rock that jutted up from the ground far below.

Again she scented the air, turning her head back and forth as her ears twitched.

No sound but the scuffling of mice on the other side of the small clearing, hiding in the underbrush.

The distant scent of danger that had whispered of sharp teeth and claws meant to rend was gone.

She shook herself, pleased by the warmth of the sun on her fur. Then she sauntered towards where more rocks rose from the ground. Slowly, she climbed the mound until she came to a hollow that was still filled with rainwater.

She lapped at the water greedily, her ears still scanning for any sound out of the ordinary. When she was finished, she climbed further up. The rocks smelled promising. They smelled like tiny paws, and from the little holes in between rocks, she could hear distracting noises—the chittering sounds of mice hiding in the labyrinth of tiny tunnels.

If she was patient, sooner or later one of them would be foolish enough to come out, and then—

But I don’t want mice. I want pizza, she thought, confused.

For a moment, she remembered her home. There was still takeout in the fridge from that new Chinese place down the street, wasn’t there?

She rose, her nose twitching, trying to find out where she was—but there were only towering rocks and trees all around her.

She was in a forest. There were no houses, no streets, no signs to tell her where she was.

My phone... where is my car?

She turned, her whiskers quivering.

Whiskers...? What is going on?

Then the dream rose up and overwhelmed her once more.

In the distance, there was the sudden crash of thunder. The cool mountain air was now loaded with the scent of ozone. It was bitter and acrid, and it made her fur bristle.

She’d almost decided to jump back up into the tree for safety when there was another crash of thunder—and then the wind turned. It brought a new scent with it that made her heart pound with sudden terror.

Predator, it said.

Teeth, claws, anger. Danger!

She couldn’t think. Once more instinct had taken over. She could only run.

But this time, her flight came to an abrupt stop. Rising out from the copse of trees before here, a bear came bursting into the clearing. He had dark fur, and his mouth was filled with sharp teeth.

He smelled like danger and claws, and also like...

Cream and sunshine and her fur being brushed on a lazy winter morning...

Where had that thought come from?

It made no sense. Even now, her heart was pounding with terror at the sight before her—but all the same, a part of her had frozen.

There was something familiar in the vision before her. Something that, as crazy as it sounded, made her want to walk up to the bear and rub her head against his body to mark him with her scent.

The bear opened his jaw. His tongue was lolling out. He didn’t move; he was just staring at her.

A part of Carrie was terrified. A different part of her was relieved.

We’ve been found, it seemed to whisper. At last!

It was as if there were different beings warring inside her head.

Everything was strange. Even the information her eyes and her nose gave her were completely unfamiliar. Everything was so much sharper, and she noticed all these details she’d never seen before.

It was too much. It was all too much. It made her head hurt so fiercely that she wanted to cry. She wanted to curl up in her bed and draw the curtains and sleep for a week.

I just want it to stop, she thought in despair. Please, please, someone make this stop...

That was when the bear came forward.

Once again, instinct made her want to run to the closest, highest place she could find—but this time her instincts were sluggish. Her body didn’t quite obey her commands as she decided to flee.

Mid-jump, something inside her seemed to shatter. For a moment, so many feelings came rushing down at her that it felt like a storm of sharp hail, battering her mind until she broke down beneath the overload.

Suddenly, she had hands and feet again. Suddenly, her body was no longer that of a tiny, fierce hunter, but had all the womanly curves she was used to.

I’m human, she thought with weary surprise. My name’s Carrie and I’m human.

Then she lost consciousness, her naked body toppling down from the mound of rocks.