Moarpls: "Being Alone," an answer to a question

Sometime in September, I posted Two by Two, a fae apoc story set in a travelling show. clare_dragonfly asked:

"As usual though I want more context ;) Why did Anaca allow herself to be caught? (Or if she didn't want to, how did they catch her?)"

This is a partial answer to this, from Anaca's point of view.

I’d gotten used to hiding, but I never really got used to being alone.

When my Change had come, I’d been just past my fourteenth birthday, and the world had been mad with wild gods in the skies. My bones had twisted, my thumbs vanished, my tail grew, while I hid in my closet and tried not to scream. When it was over, I looked something like a rabbit, and something like a deer, and only like a human in the silhouette.

A long time past, that, and, that time, my family and I had managed to flee before the lynch mob came to get me. Anything strange was suspect, and I was definitely strange.
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Worldbuilding: Population Bottlenecks, Founder Effect

ysabetwordsmith posted an interesting discussion on population bottlenecks.

While the article is rather interesting ("North America was populated by no more than 70 people 14,000 years ago, claims stunning new DNA research"), I find the links to Minimum Viable Population and Population Bottleneck more interesting.

World-building-wise, when discussing the exodus that landed people on Reiassan (as well as in contemplating the blue-haired McAliens in Vas' World), I've had to keep in mind such concepts to be sure the populations are viable. But the Founder Effect gives me some fun grist for my mill...