Afternoon Heat [Open]

It was just so hot. Brightkit lay sprawled in a small patch of shade. Her mom and the other kits had all been sleeping off the worst of the afternoon heat in the nursery but she's not sleepy! After her constant fidgeting and dramatic sighs, Patchclaw finally snapped and told her if she wasn't going to stay still and sleep then she could go play in the camp. Brightkit had started off determined to play but no one seemed to be out and about in the camp, and it was just too hot. From her sprawled position, she halfheartedly batted at a dead sprig of pine needles near her face. She was just so bored. It's no fun playing all by yourself.

Sunpaw had just finished clearing out the moss from the elder’s den when he spotted the calico kit laying off to one side in the center of camp. He recognized all too well the dull gleam of boredom in her green eyes. She must have been lonely now that he had been made an apprentice-- none of the other kits seemed to share the ceaseless energy that Brightkit and Sunpaw had. With a mrrow of amusement, he trotted over to his former denmate. “Hey, Brightkit! Why so glum?” He asked as he flopped down across from her, licking a ginger paw to bring it up over one of his ears.

Brightkit perked up as she caught sight of Sunpaw's bright fur."Oh, hi Sunpaw!" She sighed at his question, "It's too hot and everyone is so boring. Mom kicked me out of the Nursery because everyone else is sleeping and she said if I wasn't going to sleep I had to go somewhere else. And I'm not tired! She flicked her stumpy tail in annoyance. "I tried to play out here, but that's no fun by myself and it's just so hot. And if I go back inside mom's gonna make me take a nap." Brightkit grumbled, flopping her head back to the ground.

Blizzardpaw had been resting under the shade of the medicine cat den that day, trying to cool down a bit. It was in days like these she wished her coat wasn’t as fluffy. She found herself starting to doze off as the sound of a nearby conversation reached her ears, causing her ice blue eyes to open and her ears to turn towards the source of said noise.

She blinked a couple times before her gaze got lost for a second or two, one of her round ears dropping lightly as she thought carefully. As if some kind of light bulb had suddenly gone off in her head, she quickly got up and walked into the den, starting to carefully look between the abundant piles of herbs her and Mistedsong had managed to gather. Newleaf and Greenleaf had been exceptionally kind to the clan after the harsh Leafbare, that was for sure. It took her some time of looking around before finding what she was looking for.

A big, dark beetle trying to hide and eat their supplies. These hard buggers were a real pain on the neck at times, that is for sure, but in this specific moment, she was glad that they simply couldn’t get rid of them all no matter how hard they tried. She snatched the bug before it could get away, carrying it carefully between her teeth without harming or crushing it, walking out from the den and towards the kit and apprentice.

“If you don’t want to sleep, then why not burn off that energy?” She tried to speak as clearly as possible, but not being able to fully open her mouth made it sound like she had a weird lisp “You want to be a great warrior someday, right? I might only be a Medicine Cat apprentice, but even I know the importance of hunting, so…” She finally released the startled bug before Brightkit, the bug immediately trying to run away from the cats “Try to practice with this!”

Sunpaw looked up just in time to see Blizzardpaw headed towards them— his bright eyes quickly fixated on the beetle gently clasped between the medicine cat’s teeth. His whiskers twitched as he listened to her, and as she released the beetle, he leapt to his paws with an excited yowl. “Blizzardpaw, you’re a genius!” He crowed, his fluffy tail lashing from side to side. He turned to Brightkit and gave her an encouraging nod. “Come on, Brightkit! Just like this!” He dropped down into the hunting crouch he’d spent most of yesterday practicing and trained wide eyes on the scurrying insect, letting himself get fully engaged in the new game.

Brightkit immediately perked up again at Blizzardpaw's approach. She stared at the shiny black thing in the other cat's mouth in confusion, whiskers twitching. At the apprentice's words her eyes widened, "Yeah! I'm going to be the best warrior!"
Her focus quickly shifted to Sunpaw as he went into a hunting crouch. She clumsily mimicked him, stance unbalanced and tail sticking straight up, lashing wildly in excitement. "Like this?"
As she spoke, she crawled towards the beetle, looking very much like a bug herself as she wobbled forward. Paws jutting out awkwardly as she attempted to sneak up on the beetle.