Sleeping Player (Project Chrysalis Book 3)

on the worst island.
“Interesting. I wonder how that will impact them. A chimerologist with delayed development and a guy who thinks he’s a cat.”
***
Her and her cat
LJ thought of himself as a very independent cat. He didn’t care about the rest of the world—all he wanted to do was live quietly and peacefully. He could sniff out whenever his neighbors were coming near him, so that enabled him to make sure he avoided their company. If there was one thing he knew, it was that humans were cruel, humans were evil, and humans were to be avoided.
He also knew that he’d been born just recently, and that you get knowledge by thinking about things. The first thought he remembered having was: “Being a cat is a good deal. Everybody loves and pets you.” LJ realized that practically the second he found himself in this world. He was given a new skin, and something inside told him he had to change it in order to make himself into a real cat. He drew on whiskers, made himself ears, and put together some cat paws. The problem was the tail. LJ knew how to make it, the problem being that the things on his paws itched when he tried.
The previous day during his hunt, somebody had tried to attack him and steal his prey. Death to thieves and marauders! His body reacted faster than his mind could, and the thief paid with his life for trying to steal the fish.
The mean lady showed up every morning and evening. She was always tense, always wanting something. LJ couldn’t stand that—people like her were the worst. Always around to ask for something, they never give you anything in return. After the battle with the thief, she yelled at LJ. He had a hard time understanding why protecting his prey was a bad thing.
Ultimately, they sent the cat to another house. There were fewer humans there, though they were much more dangerous. They moved differently, felt different, even thought differently. On the second day, he had to run away from two of them as they chased him around the whole island.
On the third day after the move, LJ was treated to a fish for the first time. Not just one, in fact—the kind girl shared her meal with him and even petted him. But then some mean people walking by decided to attack her. LJ always repaid good with good, so he killed four of them even though his bracelet started itching after the first one. The girl killed two more, and that was when the poor cat woke up at home, completely alone. He didn’t want to eat; he wanted to yowl at the top of his lungs. The kind girl was gone. By that evening, however, she found LJ’s home and fed the cat some fish. LJ was happy to see that there were kind people in such a terrible world. Tears streamed down his face. His heart ached, and his head hurt, though LJ didn’t know why that was. And he didn’t want to remember. There was a great pain hidden deep down, and he didn’t like getting that close to it.
The poor cat slept twelve hours a day, though he still never felt rested. As he relaxed, all he could do was doze fitfully with endless nightmares. All his dreams in that world were colored red; all his mind understood was pain. He was always running away from ten red people who called him, whispering in his ear, though LJ could feel how painful the words they used were when he listened to them. Always, he ran around an endless field of battle where everything was covered in blood. Giants stood on the battlefield and at the center of all his pain—they were the ones LJ spent his dreams running away from. Every time he got close to one of them, the voice of the bloody ten sounded louder, flooding his consciousness with pain. The cat couldn’t sleep. Even after the one-eyed slumber he suffered through, he awoke in tears.
The girl’s name was Milisandra. She was good and kind. Every morning, she fed LJ fish, and then they walked around the island together. LJ understood everything she said, though he never replied. Cats don’t talk, whispered an inner voice. That same voice told him that animals don’t understand dreams, though they do sense the moods and emotions of other people. When an animal likes a human, it shares their emotions. They share grief and happiness, and keep humans company when they’re relaxing. They help people when they’re hurting, feed them when they’re sad. LJ was great at understanding people, which was why he gave them his attention and love when he liked them. Only Milisandra had been kind to him, however; all the other humans were mean and weak. LJ understood people better than they understood themselves, in fact. He understood that people get angry with and attack each other because of their own weaknesses, trying to convince themselves of their own value. Humans are so weak, so stupid, so incapable of understanding that the path they take demands constant victims. And it only offers temporary respite from their self-condemnation in return. It was painful for the cat to live on the same island as them. They were weak, they caused him pain in his heart, they brought tears to his eyes, and only Milisandra saved LJ from the endless hurt. She was a ray of sunlight in a kingdom of cold, weak people.
Milisandra invited him to go for a walk to the island’s highest point. The day had just begun, and that meant Alice had already come, so he didn’t have to worry about their walk getting interrupted by the portal.
Three men came out of nowhere to attack him and Milisandra, right at the foothills of the mountain. The strongest warrior came after LJ—he clearly understood which