It wasn't that the he envied the girl. He didn't. It was the fact that she thought she was tempting him by coming to his private place. Her actions only annoyed him more than was his usual state of mind. As his gaze followed her swift strokes, she cut through the water with long lean arms and legs built for water, and he considered what he would do if she were bold enough to come ashore. Ramedo would chase her through the forest, nipping at her heels and then drive her back to her watery home. That would teach her not to mess with him.

Growing bored of watching, Ramedo tossed away his fruit and shifted completely to his cheetah form. He leaped with the natural grace of the feline and landed softly on the dirt. As he strolled toward the beach, he turned over in his mind what he would say. Something insulting, he thought. A comment about the hideous gills at her slender neck or webbing between her fingers and toes. No, he'd used that before, numerous times. It had failed to get a rise out of her.

"What are you doing here in my space?" he demanded. Clever, Ramedo, he grumped silently.

"Your space?" Wide, blue-green eyes blinked at him from the water. "I don't see your name anywhere." She glanced around as if looking for a sign indicating he owned the area.

Ramedo gave a low rumble in his throat. He wracked his brain for some new insult, but nothing snappy materialized. Finally, he gave up thinking about it and turned to walk away.

"Wait," she called.

He looked back. The water dweller was wading out of the deeper water to come on shore. He bared his teeth and swished his tail against his side. The girl stopped, a nervous look on her face. Ramedo was happy that he could at least intimidate her in his cat form.

"I-I wanted to talk to you," she announced.

"Your kind has nothing to say to my kind." Again, Ramedo turned to go.

"There's land beyond this sea."

That made him pause. Ramedo didn't turn around, but he waited, ears pricked to pick up her sounds. Right now, he knew she was splashing water on herself. Water dwellers couldn't stay outside the water long. Her blue skin would be drying fast, and soon she would immerse her body again. Despite himself, he was curious to know what she was going to say. "What are you talking about?"

"Come closer to the water and I will tell you."

Ramedo rounded on her. He growled low in his throat and crouched so that his head was close to the ground and his back arched. His tail swished back and forth in the air as he watched her back away slowly. "You know I can't do that."

She nodded. "I only meant close enough so that I don't have to yell when I go deeper again. The air..."

Against his better judgment, Ramedo stepped closer to the water's edge. He watched the liquid that matched her eyes very carefully. Not a drop should touch his fur. Besides, he didn't want to be in the same substance as the water dwellers. Common sense told him he should not dislike them so severely, certainly not because they were a different species. But he hated this world and its endless water. He missed his home so badly. Each night he fought back tears as he thought of all he had lost--his grandma and his cousins, but most of all, Lauki, his girlfriend.

"Are you listening?" The girl interrupted his thoughts.

He frowned at her. "You haven't said anything interesting yet."

Suddenly, the girl squeaked and fell backward into the water. She rolled several times, wetting her body from head to toe. Ramedo watched, wondering if her mind had snapped. After several minutes, she sat up but kept her lower body immersed. She picked up the conversation as if she had not just had a fit. "Why do you hate us so much?"

Ramedo rolled his eyes and looked away. "I don't hate you, water dweller."

He saw her point an accusing finger at him from the corner of his eye, or she would have if her fingers weren't all stuck together so that none moved without the others. "See, right there, calling me water dweller instead of by my name tells me you don't like me."

"If I knew your name, I would use it," he snapped. "Now tell me quickly what you have to say. I don't have all day to waste."

A smile broke out on her face. He had to give it to her people. They tended toward being sunny even when things weren't going so well, or maybe that was a ruse designed to trick the Tanchees, the race of shape-shifting cheetahs. Ramedo admitted to himself that he had a suspicious nature, made more so in the last three years while trapped here, but he wasn't going to tell her that.

The girl lay back in the water, kicking out her feet and waving her arms. Her grin was turned toward the double sun in the sky--two orbs, yet not overly hot. Not in this dense forest he and his people occupied on a small patch of land. It was cooler here on Hydra, unlike his home planet. Now there had been toasty days spent lazing beneath fronds the size of his entire body. How he missed it desperately.

"My name is Aduri," she finally told him. "And I know the location of land bigger than you can ever imagine. Everyone has said that this island your people occupy is all that is above water level on Hydra, but that's not true. There is another, much, much bigger and full of lush vegetation and animals you can hunt for food."

This last part she said with distaste. Ramedo almost laughed. The water dwellers ate only seaweed and other plant life in the ocean. They didn't even take advantage of the delicious fish down there, which he thought was insane.

A rush of water coated Ramedo's paws. He leaped backward and growled as he shook the water from his fur. Casting Aduri a cold look, he turned his back on her and strolled away to a tree. If she wanted to share anything more, let her come to his territory, dry ground. Not for a moment did he believe what she said. There was no other land on this forsaken planet. Given their cramped conditions, he could dream all day and night for it, but it just wasn't so.