A Half-Baked Life (Tamberlane Webcomic, Human!SI)

It was… morning. Right?

I couldn't tell due to how deep in the woods I found out myself to be, with trees covering most of the sky and allowing barely any illumination to follow.

I could 'feel' the humidity and the cold pressing against my clothes, causing me to shudder as I was forced out of my odd slumber and… to face reality itself.

After all, this wasn't home. Nope, we never had a forest like this one.

Stretching up for a moment to get some of that soreness out of the system, I looked around to see or hear anything that could help me to find someone or something. The mere idea of a deserted forest was frightening as it was, even more when, as I started to take some steps forward, I realized something didn't feel right.

My head was hurting, not enough to call it a migraine, but enough to feel like this was not natural. Likewise, my balance was off as I kept on walking forward. My body did feel fine, but it was like… like something was missing.

I couldn't remember something important, something very important at that. I just knew that it used to be there, it had value for me, and now it was gone. I struggled to remember what it was, but that seemed to just worsen my headache, forcing me to close my eyes and trip on some branches.

Luckily for me, I caught myself mid-fall and softly landed on my chin without busting it. That would have been unpleasant for many reasons, first being that it would have been deadly for me and… second, it spared the giggling baby crawling on the left side from being subjected to a sudden death scene trauma.

"Ouch."

Groaning, I frowned at the last bit. A baby. A little cute thing that had dark-brown hair, tan skin and some of the most beautiful green eyes I have ever seen.

"Owhie?" The little one said, mimicking the groan and then approaching me slowly. "Wowowowoow?"

I snorted, offered a tiny smile and knelt down to the tiny one's height. Blinking, the toddler reached out for me and I picked it up in my arms. A little giggle came through as I tilted them left and right and then landed a little kiss on their forehead.

"What's your name, cutie?"

The toddler opened their mouth but-

WHAK!

Hm?

THUD!

We both turned to the source of those noises, seeing that from one of the nearby upper sections something was falling down to the ground beside us.

CRAK!

Actually, it looked like an animal of sorts. Pink-furred and…

Whump!

Batty. Like, a legit pink-furred bat-girl.

For a moment, the bat-like thing looked close to fall asleep due to the fall but-

"AAAAGGGHHH!" She exclaimed, clearly panicking at our sight and then pausing as her leg looked quite fucked up. "OWOWOWOW MY LEG!"

"Awawawa?" The toddler in my arms asked and I fixed them better in my hold.

"I think she's hurting, kiddo."

"S-Stay back, Ghosts! I don't- I don't want to hurt you?"

I frowned, turning back to the bat-girl.

"Miss… what?"

"Y-You two," She said, pointing fingers at us. "You two are g-ghosts."

"...No?" I replied flatly, glancing at the toddler and being quite sure this little thing was also very alive to me. "Quite sure we are not."

There was a lengthy pause as I said that, the bat-girl taking a moment to gauge us both as we stared back at her.

"So… you are not ghosts."

"Nope."

"And that means that… ouch, you are not going to kill me?"

"You have not done much to warrant that kind of reaction, miss," I remarked, walking up to her and crouching down to her level. She was tensing at the situation, but held her heart still as I looked into her blue eyes. "Plus, I am kind of unsure where I am and you are the first potential guide I found in this place. Lil' one here is the first thing I found actually."

Her gaze shifted to the little one and her eyes widened. "Is that… a kit?"

I blinked at the terminology employed, but since I was talking with an anthropomorphic bat, I guess that's one way to put it.

"Yup."

"The kit is… the kit is not yours?"

"I just found them while I was walking around, kind of tripped on some branches and there they were," I hummed quietly, seeing how the bat-girl had reached out to… caress the child's hair, causing the toddler to giggle happily. "So… is that proof enough?"

A slow nod came from the girl.

"Now, my name is John. What's yours?"

"Belfry."

I nodded and-

"Tamberlane!"

I almost jumped in surprise as the toddler just exclaimed that clear word.

"T-Tamberlane?" Belfry repeated. "Is that your name?"

The child nodded, smiling widely as they were cuddled between us. Right as we were sitting with one another, it started to rain quite heavily. Belfry reacted instinctively, raising an arm and spreading her batty wing over our heads as we waited for… well, something. Or someone.

"BELFRY!" A loud voice called from above, right by the edge of where Belfry had fallen from. "ARE YOU OKAY?"

"We're fine!" She replied loudly.

"We? Who's we?" The guy flashing a lamp asked, I couldn't see much of his features since the sky had gotten dark surprisingly fast.

"Me, John, and Tamberlane… I mean– the ghosts."

"Are there really ghosts?"

I sighed and decided to speak up. "We already proved that we are quite alive and well, good sir. I am but just a wanderer that got lost and ended up finding an abandoned child in the woods before stumbling on Belfry."

"A-An abandoned child?!" The voice barked in shock, and then another one snorted.

"It could be a wild animal."

"I-It's not a wild animal! It's cold and scared and hurt and hungry," Belfry rebuked strongly. "And abandoned!"

"Either abandoned or neglected, pick the worst but the situation is the same," I added with a louder tone. "And while I understand that you may have some doubts, I am quite devoid of means to cause trouble, and Tamberlane can barely talk. It's raining, the kid is going to get sick or worse."

I could tell that there was some hesitation, but my words seemed to affect Belfry a lot as she was tightly holding Tamberlane at this point.

"Please! Don't let my kit die!"

That was an interesting development but…

I saw a rope coming down and I guess that was going to be good for us.

As good as it could get as I came to realize I just found myself in a world where there's lots of anthro animals.

AN

This is going to get sugarishingly sweet!