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Description
The whole time she’d been here, she’d been fighting them. For months that were bleeding into years, she’d fought.

Endlessly. Defiantly. Refusing to ever give up the hope that she would see her family again.

Oh she’d learned fast to be clever about it- she had goodwill, earned from the cats that called her kin, and she’d quickly calculated that squandering it to hurt anyone who had the audacity to treat her like property would only earn her a stint in the cages, maybe even the coliseum if she was really stupid, and she couldn’t afford to be. Not anymore.

Mama Sia. Papa Udi. Azalea. Ravi. Jarred. They were all waiting for her, and she had to stay alive long enough to meet them again. She had to.

And sometimes, surviving meant capitulating.

She’d been born into the Bounty Hunter faction. Both her grandparents had been long-serving elites with distinguished careers; her grandmother had led them, for crying out loud. Both Jubilee and Ronald had reputations as honorable, hard working, capable Hunters, and Charisma was blazing her way straight to the elites, and following in her family’s footsteps.

Serenity had known from the first step she took back into the city that she would never raise a paw against a member of the empires in the city’s name again.

But they’d noticed, was the thing, and where she once very well might have been branded a traitor and punished as one by an unamused elite-

-there were other options now, available to her. At the discretion of an owner not quite ready to throw away such a strong, well-bred and well-built cat.

If she dared to take them, that is.

Because no, she didn’t want to be a Bounty Hunter, the very thought made her feel sick- but turning to the life of a city cat? A pet? It meant yielding all over again, to the wishes of individuals she didn’t trust that didn’t care what she wanted.

It felt quite a lot like giving up, really.

But what other choice did she have anymore? She’d resisted taming for so, so long- nearly two years now! She’d burned every bridge she had in this city, with all the cats that called her blood, and she was not one whisker closer to getting home.

The suspicious looks had not stopped. Her guard had not left. The freedom had never come. And Serenity just wanted to go home, so badly that she felt like she could die from it, sometimes, and the only thing holding back from running until she got there was the knowledge of what would happen if she failed.

How much more tightly she’d be guarded, if she did something stupid.

What would you do to go back?

Anything.

So when the human slipped a collar around her neck, and tugged her away from the Bounty Hunter quarters, she only lifted her lip in a brief flash of disdain, and followed. No growling, no snarling, no tugging.

Her escort was gone, and so were her expectations and all it had cost her was her dignity. And weighed against her wish, what did it matter?

Someday, I’ll bust my way out of here, and I’ll never look back.

---

Time to tag this mess.
From right to left-

CanaryBlu for Hyacinth and Finch
Wolvereaux for Matea
ARTARISI for Odessa
Me for Sirius (who is not impressed by Odessa's bragging)
Whispering-Spirit for Deimos
and Echo-Love111 for Ozias

(7 clean edged fullbodies with shading + 1 partial clean edged partial body with shading = 31 EP, + 1 clean edged shaded background with depth = 35 Ep, 500 words = 37 EP)

Description
The whole time she’d been here, she’d been fighting them. For months that were bleeding into years, she’d fought.

Endlessly. Defiantly. Refusing to ever give up the hope that she would see her family again.

Oh she’d learned fast to be clever about it- she had goodwill, earned from the cats that called her kin, and she’d quickly calculated that squandering it to hurt anyone who had the audacity to treat her like property would only earn her a stint in the cages, maybe even the coliseum if she was really stupid, and she couldn’t afford to be. Not anymore.

Mama Sia. Papa Udi. Azalea. Ravi. Jarred. They were all waiting for her, and she had to stay alive long enough to meet them again. She had to.

And sometimes, surviving meant capitulating.

She’d been born into the Bounty Hunter faction. Both her grandparents had been long-serving elites with distinguished careers; her grandmother had led them, for crying out loud. Both Jubilee and Ronald had reputations as honorable, hard working, capable Hunters, and Charisma was blazing her way straight to the elites, and following in her family’s footsteps.

Serenity had known from the first step she took back into the city that she would never raise a paw against a member of the empires in the city’s name again.

But they’d noticed, was the thing, and where she once very well might have been branded a traitor and punished as one by an unamused elite-

-there were other options now, available to her. At the discretion of an owner not quite ready to throw away such a strong, well-bred and well-built cat.

If she dared to take them, that is.

Because no, she didn’t want to be a Bounty Hunter, the very thought made her feel sick- but turning to the life of a city cat? A pet? It meant yielding all over again, to the wishes of individuals she didn’t trust that didn’t care what she wanted.

It felt quite a lot like giving up, really.

But what other choice did she have anymore? She’d resisted taming for so, so long- nearly two years now! She’d burned every bridge she had in this city, with all the cats that called her blood, and she was not one whisker closer to getting home.

The suspicious looks had not stopped. Her guard had not left. The freedom had never come. And Serenity just wanted to go home, so badly that she felt like she could die from it, sometimes, and the only thing holding back from running until she got there was the knowledge of what would happen if she failed.

How much more tightly she’d be guarded, if she did something stupid.

What would you do to go back?

Anything.

So when the human slipped a collar around her neck, and tugged her away from the Bounty Hunter quarters, she only lifted her lip in a brief flash of disdain, and followed. No growling, no snarling, no tugging.

Her escort was gone, and so were her expectations and all it had cost her was her dignity. And weighed against her wish, what did it matter?

Someday, I’ll bust my way out of here, and I’ll never look back.

---

Time to tag this mess.
From right to left-

CanaryBlu for Hyacinth and Finch
Wolvereaux for Matea
ARTARISI for Odessa
Me for Sirius (who is not impressed by Odessa's bragging)
Whispering-Spirit for Deimos
and Echo-Love111 for Ozias

(7 clean edged fullbodies with shading + 1 partial clean edged partial body with shading = 31 EP, + 1 clean edged shaded background with depth = 35 Ep, 500 words = 37 EP)