This is Rimworld. Here, the Pacific Ocean covers most of the planet. And the world is the Pacific Rim.
Welcome to Alaska...in the spring. Alas, even in the spring, it can get chilly here...
These are the Aleutian Islands. This is one of the bigger ones. In the night, an interaction within the black market went wrong. It produced one victim, and one intended victim...one who didn't mean to get away...as much as she probably would've loved to.
She lies in the middle of the island, in the buff. She's surrounded by a drying puddle of high-tech amniotic fluid. Her hair is raven, long, and wet. Her entire body is still covered with the same fluid, in spite of the time that's passed.
She opens her eyes, and gasps her first breaths. She blinks, and takes her first glimpse of the world.
She reacts to everything. She doesn't know what anything is. She doesn't know what she is, or who she is. She doesn't know anyone.
She gets up, on her hands and knees, and slithers around. All around, she sees birds. She sees how they stand on their two hind limbs...
She tries this herself. She falls over, several times.
Nearby, a grizzly lumbers towards her. It's spotted her scent. She smells good. She smells scared.
XX falls over, and acknowledges the furry beast. She doesn't know how to react. She doesn't know what it's here for. She doesn't know why it moves, or why it looks at her...
Her pulse races. Her heart thunders, in her busty chest...
The bear runs away, as if frightened by a loud noise. Time passes. XX's heart rate slows. The birds that she's scared off aren't exactly quick to return to her presence.
She gives the biped thing another try. At long last, she takes three steps forward, and smiles. And, she falls over again.
Above, she sees the birds fly. She tries to herself...but can't. She sighs, brushes herself off, and looks into the trees, with a menacing stare. Somehow, she WILL match their flight...
Still in the buff, she wanders around the island. The amniotic fluid on her isn't quite dry yet...but it's getting there.
She stands on the shore, and looks out. Across the straits, she can see other lands. The Aleutians aren't very far apart...
She watches, as terns and auks dive-bomb the water, and snatch up fish, as they go along. At one point, a bald eagle does.
Curious about this, XX gets an urge. She closes her eyes, and feels for the fish, in the straits. She finds one. She smiles, and deliberately dupes it into swimming ashore, and beaching itself.
It's a black cod. XX might've saved it from two predators, from out there: the sperm whale, and the fellow human...mainly the sperm whale...as much as most humans wish they could match the sperm whale's cod-catching ability.
XX tries to handle the fish...but can't. Its body is covered in mucus.
Exasperated, XX finds a tree branch, to spear the fish with. She runs it through its chest, and waits for it to die.
She watches it stop moving. As it does, she shivers. Somehow, the fish's death has made her feel colder. It scares her more than she's been...which is a big deal...
She looks around. She sees a bald eagle ripping a fish to pieces, while eating it.
XX shrugs, throws away the branch, reaches into the fish's carcass, and pulls out something that feels soft, and smells good. She puts it in her mouth, and chews it. And she swallows it. All at once, she feels more relaxed than before.
Pleased with her success, she causes several more black cod to beach. She cuts out all of their hearts, and eats what she wants of them. There are SO many parts of the black cod that are easy for her to eat...
In the straits, she sees otters swim. She looks out across the straits, and gets an idea...
She wades into the sea, and vanishes. She stays down for a long time. If there were a lifeguard on duty out here, he'd dive in after her, merely out of concern.
Out of breath, XX breaches, and gasps...just as she did before. She splashes down, surfaces her head, moves her limbs, and begins making her way to shore...
When her ears go under, she hears strange singing. She wouldn't believe, yet, that that music comes from whales. She hasn't seen a whale yet. She'll be glad she had, when she finally does...
She makes it to the other shore, without a scratch. She's more tired than before, but...that was fun. She laughs, and makes her first vocalizations.
Here and there, bald eagles dive-bomb ptarmigans, and make off with them. Copying this, XX dupes a ptarmigan into walking right up to her, picks him up, and snaps off his head.
She digs her hands into the ptarmigan's flesh, pulls out its entrails, and eats them raw. Here, she learns that bird flesh is a lot warmer than fish flesh, once slain. She thinks she enjoys bird flesh more...
The sun sets. XX sits under a tree, and shivers. In the night, bears growl, and wolves howl. Owls hoot. While XX isn't sure why, she shivers more, because of this.
Somewhere out there, in the wild world, the rest of her species thrives. She'll be glad when she meets them. And yet, many of them might not welcome her...at first. Or at all, whenever she's unlucky.
A few, still, might try to kill her. One has already died trying to do so. He may be the first, but he won't likely be the last. XX still has NO idea how much she's worth...