The next morning, the black feline, Paddy, rubbed his paws against his face and felt colder than he had when he fell asleep. It was then he realised that his new friend Jessica had disappeared, and a sad aura overwhelmed him; he was already missing his new friend.

Paddy sniffed the air around him and could still smell her familiar scent of honey and azaleas. He looked down beside him to find a small paper bag and a note attached to it. He read the letter, only to see she'd written it in a language he did not understand.

Confused as to why she had written a note in a different language, he picked up his shipmate's bag he had been looking after and stood up to rejoin his crew. Dr Jude Hunter would probably know what the note read; he was quite intelligent.

Suddenly remembering that he had ditched his crew yesterday, he swallowed nervously. As captain of the Hunter Pirates, this behaviour of Paddy's was unlike him. He was going to be in trouble with his first mate.

His ship, the Paw, wasn't too far from the beach, and it only took a five-minute walk along the hot sand to the port to reach where the vessel had docked. Immediately, a shadow from the deck above hovered over him.

"Where have you been, Paddy?" Jude's cold voice spoke out to him. Paddy had been right: his first mate was angry with him. "You know I don't like it when you disappear without telling me. And who were you running away with yesterday?"

Paddy looked up to find Jude stood on the deck, his arms folded and a dark aura surrounding his eyes. Stood behind him were his two quartermasters, fraternal twins Saskia and Pedro, who were trying to be intimidating with their arms folded over their white hoodies, but were failing in comparison to the Dark Physician.

Paddy immediately apologised to his crew, knowing full well he had been in the wrong. Jude jumped down from the deck of the ship onto the harbour below. The feline handed him a piece of paper, and the Physician read it to himself.

Jude found it unusual that Paddy's friend wrote the note in the Honey Tribe Language. The Honey Tribe race was from Hive Island, the same island where the Feline Tribe were from, which explained why she wrote in that particular language. Whoever this person was believed that Paddy would understand the note, but what she didn't know was that Paddy hadn't been with his Feline Tribe since he was a kitten. He'd never had a chance to learn the Honey Tribe's language.

As a physician, Jude made sure to speak the common tongue of most known languages throughout the world, the Honey Tribe language being one of them. Hive Island would hopefully be one of his destinations in the future so he could speak to the locals and collect some rare herbs from their island and learn of their medicine. The Honey Tribe hardly ever got sick and seemed to live longer than was average. Jude speculated it had something to do with the honey they made there.

Jude looked back at his captain, who eagerly awaited for him to read the note.

"It says, 'Thank you for lunch yesterday and for your company last night. I've gone to get us some breakfast. I will meet you back here at nine o'clock, so don't wander off too far, Jessica Red. P.S: I left you some honey-flavoured sweets. Enjoy.'"

Jude raised an eyebrow, a smirk playing on his lips. "If you were on a date, Captain, all you had to do was say so."

Saskia and Pedro's jaws both flung open. "A date?!" they chorused.

What's a date? Paddy thought.

Jude saw the confusion on his Captain's innocent face and sighed.

"Let's meet up with your lady friend and find out what's going on."

He took his bag back from the feline and placed the strap over his shoulder. He had gone too long without his medical tools and felt vulnerable without them. After all, they weren't just for use on his patients; they were also his weapons against his enemies.

They both walked back over towards the beach, Paddy munching away on the delicious hard boiled sweets Jessica had given him. They eventually returned to the spot where Paddy had stayed the night. There was fresh food laid out on a picnic blanket along with a brown leather pack, a rapier sword, and a scattering of clothes.

Jude picked up the purple lace bra from the sand and lifted an eyebrow at the feline. Was Captain Paddy truly as innocent as everyone believed him to be?

Jude looked around for a girl, most likely naked based on the sight of the clothes sprawled out everywhere. However, there was no naked girl in sight. Though he would never admit it, nor would he emotionally show it, he was disappointed, but his face was as stoic as ever.

They both heard a splash in the distance and looked over towards the sea to find a girl diving from the rocks. She surfaced and swam to the shore. Jude watched as a girl walked out onto the beach wringing out her long, crimson hair.

She had a pair of black goggles hanging loosely from around her neck and wore a flattering, long-sleeved black swimsuit with a red floral print. She had a net filled with sea mussels attached to her left hip and a hunter's knife on her right hip.

Paddy watched his first mate closely and sensed something odd about him. Jude looked at the girl in deep thought, and Paddy could see a slight, hardly noticeable redness on his best friend's cheeks that instantly disappeared, and for a split second his had looked soft. Soon enough, his usual cold exterior had returned.

Jessica froze upon seeing another person with Paddy. She noticed he wore the same Hunter logo as the feline. However, instead of the stitched black paw on the mint-green hoodie, it was a white paw on a black hoodie. She assumed he could only be another member of the Hunter Pirates.

She instantly didn't trust him, not for a second, mostly because of the cold, sharp look in his steel-blue eyes that darkly wandered over her like he was going to dissect her. He gave off an altogether dark feeling, and his hooded face made her feel intimidated.

Her heart raced as she looked between Paddy and the other man, debating what to do next. She was only in her swimsuit, and she wanted to get changed into her dry clothes but feared they would notice the branded mark on her back. She frowned when she saw her purple lace bra in the man's hand. A red blush graced her cheeks.

Jude looked down at his hand, forgetting he was still holding the piece of lingerie. He felt his cheeks heat up from the situation he had found himself in.

"It's not what it looks like..."

She snatched the garment from his hand and slapped him hard across the cheek sending his head flying to the side and leaving a red handprint mark on his face.

It wasn't often Jude let such an act pass over him without some form of repercussion, but considering he'd landed himself in this mess, just this once, he decided to let her off. Jude had to admit that she had quite the arm; his cheek still stung from the impact, and his skin felt sore and tender to the touch. He shot his head back at Jessica and glared at her.

He watched as she quickly gathered up her clothing and hid behind an outcrop of rocks. Moments later, she popped back out wearing a long-sleeved purple crop top with white suspenders over her shoulders and attached to her black booty shorts, knee-high socks, and a pair of worn out combat boots that looked like they had been thrown on. She reattached her hunter's knife to her right hip and attached her rapier sword to her left. Finally, she pulled her white beanie and a pair of goggles onto her head, the same ones she'd had around her neck earlier.

Jude's line of sight unintentionally trailed down to her bare midriff area; her bronze skin looked smooth, soft, and silky. His blush graced his cheeks once again, which he quickly hid by pulling his black hood down to hide his features from view. He didn't understand why he was blushing around this girl all the time.

The girl faced Paddy and hugged him, completely ignoring Jude as she cuddled the feline with affection. The back of her purple crop top raised as she clutched the cat, revealing the bottom of what looked like a circular tattoo between her shoulder blades.

The two of them sat down on their picnic blanket and started to eat while chatting away. Jude sighed and sat down next to his captain. Jessica glared at him; she had pretty eyes, he thought, but at that moment, they were deadly looking.

She consistently glared at him until he finally gave up and found somewhere else to sit on the beach, finding a rock to lean his head against and snooze, leaving the two to have their little breakfast date. He hoped it wouldn't be too long; he had other stuff to do that required his captain's assistance.

As he snoozed, his mind wondered about the girl. She didn't look like a member of the Honey Tribe; he was remembering the note she had written in their language for Paddy. For starters, her hair was red. Honey Tribe members all had raven hair, and they didn't usually integrate with outsiders.

There was also the problem of her name, Jessica. The Honey Tribe named themselves after flowers, plants, and trees, o she couldn't be a member of the tribe; it didn't make sense.

However, she did have the famous honey-gold eyes and bronze skin and spoke the language, based on the note he had read. But what would she be doing here? The Honey Tribe never left their kingdom, as they were a country independent from the government. They feared to step out, as they were a rare tribe; their prices at slave houses were higher than most human slaves due to their beauty.

Was that why she was here? Was she an escaped slave? he thought. She was clearly hiding something on her back, probably the branded mark of the master who once owned her. He couldn't deny the fact that she was beautiful, very much so compared to other women he had been with and had seen during his travels as a pirate. However, something about her was off.

He looked at the time on his watch. It was past lunchtime, and he had jobs to do. He walked over to the pair.

"Paddy, time to go!"

Jessica stopped stroking the feline, and squinted from the sunlight as she stared up at the tall man with dark blue hair.

How dare he interfere?

There was something dark about the man, and she didn't like it. She stood up and tugged on the feline's arms as an indication to stay with her.

"I'd appreciate it if you would give back my Captain." Jude's eyebrow twitched in annoyance with the girl.

Jessica only blinked at him with a blank expression.

Captain? Jessica was confused.

Paddy couldn't be the captain of the Hunter Pirates unless the navy was mistaken and Paddy was, in fact, the captain and not Jude. That made more sense, considering their pirate flag was a paw. Jessica once again gazed over the tall man.

She pondered who this man could be. Who had the nerve to speak to their captain in such a way, unless he was the Dark Physician, Dr Jude Hunter. She looked down at the medical bag held tightly in his hand.

She'd always imagined Dr Jude Hunter to be a scary-looking old man wearing a long white lab coat splattered in blood with a mad look in his eyes and grey hair spiralling off in all directions, like a mad scientist hunched over his screaming victims. She depicted him as always wearing a medical mask and a head mirror covering his face, not the tall, beautiful specimen stood before her with dark midnight blue hair; handsome, defined features, high cheekbones, and a daring smirk. Instead of the white lab coat she expected to find Jude in, he instead wore a black hoodie, jeans, and sneakers, he looked no older than nineteen.

However, it was strange for such a notorious pirate known for his cruel and sadistic behaviour to be a part of a crew with a captain as cute and cuddly as Paddy. Or was Jude just like every other sadistic villain that liked to have a pet cat on their lap to stroke?

Jude had become irritated by the girl's keeping ahold of Paddy, who at times could be very naive and easily placed trust in others. He looked seventeen but at times had the mentality of a kitten. Paddy was someone Jude always had to be sharp with; the feline could easily be manipulated.

"Time to go!" Jude ordered his captain.

"Coming." The feline attempted to spring over to his first mate but was yanked back by Jessica.

"You don't have to do what that asshole of a man says." She spoke in the Honey Tribe language, expecting Paddy to understand, not realising he had no idea what she was saying to him, whereas the Physician's brow twitched, understanding every word she had said. He didn't like being insulted, and he especially didn't like being called an asshole.

"Far from home aren't you?" he replied in her language, his tone harsh and direct.

Shocked, as it was rare for pirates to speak her language, and if they did, it only meant they wanted to kidnap her and sell her as a slave, Jessica dropped the feline's arm and sprinted off in the direction of the port town. Her behaviour confused Jude. She was fast, too fast for him to stop her.

Paddy picked up her brown leather pack and the rest of the belongings she'd had left behind and frowned sadly when his new friend ran away.

She was scared of his first mate, but why?