There was a soft patter along the tree that I was sitting against, so faint that most would likely miss it. But I was alerted to it, expecting to hear something nearby, straining for any sound around me. I looked back up and saw it - a faint flicker of brown and gray above me, flashing between leaves and branches above my head.

The small creature paused in a clear stretch of branch, and I got my first clear view of it. It looked almost like an atarin. Small, brown and gray coat with a tiny head and miniscule, nimble quasi-hands. But where an atarin would have a fork in its thin tail, this thing had a bushy tail that danced back and forth as it's liquid brown eyes darted around, taking in everything.

Squirrel. An unbidden memory came to me, the echo of a voice I could almost remember. Alright to eat, but not a lot of meat on them. Unless you can catch them by surprise, they aren't worth the effort. The words, the voice, were accompanied by a flare of pain in my temples, and I reached up to grab my head as my head ached. panicfearstartlementshockfearurgency

By the time the swell of pain eased and I could see clearly, the… squirrel, was gone. I let out a slight groan and shook my head. That was the clearest flash of memory I had recovered from my old life, at least while I was awake. If that was going to be how all of the memories I got back were going to come, I would much prefer to not get any more. I could go without that pain.

Especially since I had no idea what had triggered that echo - if I stumbled across something like that while I was doing something precarious or dangerous, then I ran the risk of getting seriously hurt. The pain had passed pretty quickly, but in the moment it had been disorienting.

I sighed and dropped my head back against the tree, letting my hand drop to the grassy dirt by my sides. My fingers dug into the slightly damp soil, releasing a faint whiff of raw earth. Even that wasn't quite right, the scent was somehow richer than anything I was familiar with. Like the smell of the dirt in the air was thicker in some indescribable way. I closed my eyes, sun and shadows dancing against my eyelids as the light filtered through the branches and leaves above me.