As I wake, I smell the musty otters^ first. I barely notice the salt anymore. The otters have a pungent, reassuringly mammalian scent. Being in the middle of the pile is a surround-smell experience. There are 3. They are Pack for my Soil parent. Tail-beasts seem to keep other creatures around, not cultivating them as provision, but for Pack, as mock-pups and enjoyment. They are wriggly beasts and they are, as are of-World otters, not intelligent. They are a physical comfort in den, but they are not companions. They are fun to play with. They know games of-World like bite-fight. I enjoy being around them. Now I den with other beings again, I realise how much I missed the simple content that comes from a warm back against your own.

I slip from between them and go to the water chute. The fresh water I release tastes of pollen; the seasons out there are changing. They never change in here. I do not miss it, but I think of the research I could be doing on land. Mustn’t let it get in the way of my research in the big-saltwater, where I now live. I am happy here.

Dark Provider will come and provision us soon. The first few nights, when I was changing, I was ravenous all the time. My appetite has receded but I still am ready for two provisions a night, every night. I have found I really enjoy fish. There are so many diverse flavours available. I like the oily ones most. I am certainly Wilderness-ready with a thick layer of fat under my coat. I have always been bony so it was a surprise. It means I can be underwater for many degrees^ every night, as I am, without getting too cold. My feet have changed too. I have extra skin between my toes. I find it much easier to steer underwater now. I have problems sinking at times, but I can swim better than any dog has.

I watch the otters stretch and groom. I groom alone, but I get so much pleasure from watching them groom one another. Dark Provider comes in and deposits a selection of fish and salt-snakes and we jump in. I select what I want and take it away to my corner. The otters are small but they are vicious when they want to be. My muzzle still stings when I get in the water from my scraps with them, before I developed this system. I eat my provision and wait for Soil Parent to come for me. She and Pack Guider^ (while I may not understand tail-beasts, I am certain she is the tail-beast Pack Guider) normally collect me soon after provision.

We have been improving our contact-communication. She doesn’t just send me Pack now. We have communication for: ( provision, air, water, den, go, stop, take, release (bladder or bowels), important, sleep, wake, wait, no, yes, sadness ) and ( happiness ). We seem to understand each other better every day. I look forward to telling her my story one day. We will, eventually, have the words for me to explain what happened. And what I want to do next. Pack Guider goes to a variety of different caves and water-wilds each day. Soil Parent goes with her everywhere and I go with Soil Parent. I have already seen and smelled so many things I could never explain to another dog. When I am of Service-age, I will present all my findings to tail-beasts or dogs, or any other animal happy to listen, except otters.

A familiar mouth-tail breaks out of the water and I slide in. I can now see and, almost, smell as well as I could in air in a hunting degree. My hearing is distorted. I couldn’t understand another dog’s vocalisations in the water, but I can hear a huge variety of life. If I ever get time to, I will collect data about sound too. We go to the water-vine patch that grows near the entrance to the den. While I am much faster than I was, I am not able to keep up with the two tail-beasts, and Pack Guider often becomes annoyed (I am sure that is what that shade of dark with spiky skin means). Soil Parent and I have standardised how we use the vine as a tether. I let my body become long and sleek, so I cut through the water. Sometimes, if Pack Guider is entertaining herself or dozing in front of den, Soil Parent and I race around the area. I get bombarded with smells as we whoosh about. It is my favourite thing to do.

We are visiting the cliff face that smells fascinating. They spend a lot of time here. Pack Guider often smells cross when I try to investigate the cliff so I do my best to mimic Soil Parent. I float back as Soil Parent does while Pack Guider’s mouth-tails wrap round each other. I take a breathing break. Soil Parent starts to approach stones protruding from the cliff-face and touches them. I approach to observe, I know Pack Guider does not like me touching anything on this cliff. Pack Guider smells indignant and Soil Parent leads me away from the cliff face,

( Wait. )

When I return from my breath, Soil Parent is floating the end of the water-vine towards me. I take it between my teeth and we are whooshing off to the Rise. There are some quiet caverns where Pack Guider and Soil Parent sometimes rest for degrees at a time as the night-Sun-pup’s light trickles down to them. It seems right that in this World where everything seems opposite from World, they are active mostly from Set to Rise, but they have no consensus of when or how long they sleep. We are close enough for me to smell the usual crevices. I detect a tiny hint of something I have never smelled before. Without warning, Soil Parent and Pack Guider rush out over the water-forest . There is urgency to their movement and speed. I have no choice but to tuck my legs in, close my eyes and open my nose.

There is a stripy fish in the forest below, swimming in its den-plant. It is releasing spicy toxins into the water. The tail-beasts are definitely eager to arrive wherever we are going or to do whatever they will do, when we arrive. The chemical signal is tinging everything. I don’t understand it, but I know it must be important.

I feel a waft of colder water reach me within my thickening fur. The scentscape shifts. It is less busy, more subtle and more… huge. We are travelling away from the water-forest. I have never left the water-forest before. I can smell the depth of the water and the cold of it is frightening. I do not open my eyes. Even if I had the courage to try and look at this, I could not open my eyes at this speed. I will have to breathe in the next 10 cents^. I barely need air since I changed, but I still need it every 50 cents or so. I have never tested how long I would be able to hold it. I do not want to test it tonight.

I tug the vine as well as I am capable, jerking it with my teeth, changing the tension by swimming a hard as I can towards her or splaying my legs. I feel her shortening the vine, pulling me to her mouth-tails. Soil Parent does not slow at all. She places a tail-mouth on my nose, once she can reach. I send her panic and

( Air. ) She sends me calm but then,

( Important. ) and a feeling of rushing along until it is light and then dark again. I send her fear and sadness, trying to explain that I can’t do that. Now I am close to her body, the pressure on my face has lessened. I heave my eyes open. She looks to Pack Guider who continues to travel at speed.

She looks at me intensely, she sends me strongly,

( Take den. ) and Pack. Then suddenly, they are accelerating away from me and I am getting slower and slower. As soon as I can, I speed to the surface and take several large lungfuls of air and pant with my chin above the surface for a few cents. The night never gets darker than a hunting-degree on World. In the air, I can very slightly smell land from what I think might be South^. Since my change, I swim better underwater, but still smell better in air. We only travelled for about 40 cents from the water-forest, even if it was at tail-beast speed. I am sure I can find my way back to den from anywhere above the water-forest. On the surface, that distance might take me all night.

I duck back below the surface and smell a chemical message from Soil Parent. It is not for me, maybe for Pack Guider or as a marker. I am not sure. It spreads through the water, making it hard to discern our trail to this point. I am not sure which way we were facing before. I draw scents from the water. I cannot smell the water-forest. I can smell Soil Parent in two directions and her message permeating everything. Well, here is a test in tracking! On the surface I can smell land. I will see if land lines up with Soil Parent’s path. If it does, I will travel underwater in that direction and then check against the surface when I breathe so that I travel fast enough to not lose the trail. Even Inquisitive Set himself would find this a challenge. Time to prove myself the greatest scent-scientist on Salt-World.

It is after Rise. I have been swimming longer than I thought I would need to cover the distance we travelled last night. The trail is difficult to follow. It is deeper than I thought we travelled and, then strangely higher in other places. I have checked in and, some land is slightly closer, but I don’t seem able to progress as much as this amount of swimming would imply. I am exhausted and thirsty. I float for a while on the surface gently keeping my nose above water. A gust of wind brings a stronger smell of land. As I get the brief taste, I know it is not the land that curves round the water-forest like a den. The den-land has a strong smell of ferns, flowers and tall trees, with the underlying clamour of animal life and death. This smell is a little spot of land, surrounded by the big-saltwater with some small trees and shrubs. There is bird life but no animal life.

What an idiot! Inquisitive Set would not have made such a basic mistake. Well, at least there is somewhere to rest a while and try to figure out what to do next. I could make it my land-spot if I can learn to catch birds. I paddle at the surface to keep my orientation until I eventually know I am comfortably within nose-shot^. I can hear the birds screaming at each other. Their oily reek is unmistakable. No breeze could confuse me now. I do small bursts underwater, surfacing frequently. I get to pebbles and drag myself onto land, away from the waterline.

My limbs feel strange and heavy after water carrying me for so long. My legs are all screaming at me from the degrees of hard slog. Sandy grit clings to the skin between my toes and rubs in the folds. I slump down and laboriously groom. My mouth perpetually tastes of salt from grooming myself after degrees in saltwater. I start to try to figure out what I should do from here. I can’t hear any signs of den-land but there is a slight smell of den-land from the Rise point of the land-spot. I must rest if I am to make that kind of journey. I crawl under a scrubby bush and have a nap. As I fall asleep, I think of the little, soft, bodies of the otters pressing against mine, warming on contact.