As The Thrush Sings (for thrushkit and ebonykit mainly, but open!)

Thrushkit’s paws touched cold grass as she left the nursery, whiskers twitching as the cold air embraced her. Her eyes stared across the camp, looking for something to do. Tallrock loomed above, an endeavor she dared not touch yet. Her stout frame was still too small to approach such a large rock, let alone attempt to climb it. She laid down in the grass, bored- midday provided nothing to do as the warriors and apprentices were busy attending to their duties. The elders were napping in the sun, despite the otherwise intrusive cloudiness. She soon heard pawsteps behind her, and her ears flicked to the noise, still considering the rock standing before her.

This day had been rather…uninteresting so far. Everyone seemed to be too tired or too busy to play or chat. She had even tried again to sneak out of camp out of boredom, but the gorse surrounding the camo kept getting tangled in her fur, not allowing her to move quickly, even less quietly, and the warriors guarding the entrance to camp had the eyes of highly trained hawks, catching her and forcing her back into camp.

The white and black kit sighed as the rested inside the nursery, trying to think on something else she could do to pass the time, before some noise caused her ears to perk up and her unfocused eyes to quickly look for the source of the sound. Yellow eyes soon landed on the small figure of Thrushkit as she left the nursery, probably also bored.

Ebonykit was not the stealthiest to cats….yet. She had to work on that. Yet that didn’t stop her from her attempt at surprising the younger kit.

She followed as silently as possible, trying her best to not be noticed, even if her paws still caused the frost layer that covered the ground under her to crunch lightly. She got closer…closer….she wigged her hips a bit as her muscles tensed….and she pounced.

“THRUSHKIT!!!!” Just as her yowl came to an end, she fell on the other kit a bit clumsily. Her intention being just to startle her, not harm her….

With some laughter, she rolled off her “What are you doooooing? Are you planning to climb the Tallrock?”.

Fernpaw was grooming her brown fur as she watched ebony sneak really badly up on a new kit she has never seen. Hmmm I wonder what going on over there.. She though as she licked her paw to clean her face.

Thrushkit squeaked, all of the air in her lungs exiting her at once as Ebonykit pounced. She turned over, not registering what was going on until all four of her paws touched the ground and she felt secure. Processing the giggling kitten, she gave a small laugh that turned into giggles in return, embarrassed by her easy defeat to the other kit. "Well," she began, the last of her giggles escaping her, "I wasn't gonna climb it... Just thinking. Well... Actually. Do you think we can?" She pondered, glancing up at the rock which blocked out the sun even more than the clouds. "I want to see what the camp looks like from up there, don't you?"
She noticed Fernpaw in the corner of her eyes, and with slight apprehension she flicked her tail towards the apprentice, before flicking it back, an invitation. Hopefully Fernpaw, being an apprentice and all, will be okay with this, I don't know if it's allowed or not. Maybe we can make it into a game?

“Wondering if we can would mean I ever considered the option of us not being able to in the first place, you know?” Ebonykit’s words came out as a mix of laughter and a meow as she basically bounced towards the tall rock and looked up, tail twitching from side to side excitedly, her ears perked up…even the supposed second set of ears she had that often dragged attention towards her.

The Tallrock really looked way bigger up-close…

She licked her lips with a thoughtful expression as she scanned the surface of the rock, trying to guess what would be the best way to climb it.

She lowered her body, muscles tense as she focused on a small ledge she thought she could reach, as she already guessed she was too small to climb all the way up with a single leap. Just like before pouncing on Thrushkit, her hip wiggled a bit as she prepared herself…

And then she jumped.

Her claws gripped the irregular surface of the rock, and this was met with a triumphant meow from the tiny kit “See?! We definitely ca-” The sound of claws sliding on the rock soon made itself present, as the ledge she thought safe ended up being smoother than expected, failing to give her the required grip.

“Woah. Whoa! WHOA!”

Her back legs scratched against the rock in a panic and her front paws struggled to find a grip, but in the end, the rock proved to be too smooth, and she slid off it, falling.

Fernpaw watched the kit give her an invitation so started to get to her paws when she noticed ebonykit run towards the high rock and jumped. She watched as the kit landed but then started falling. Fernpaw quickly ran and caught ebonykit before she hit the ground and broke something. She gently set ebony kit down the looked at her with a disappointing look. “What were you thinking!? You could have gotten seriously hurt if I wasn’t there!” she hissed at her little friend.


(LONGEST POST :D)

Thrushkit squeaked with delight at Ebonykit's words, nodding her head. After she ran away, she pounced towards her, standing just below the rock to watch her newfound friend. As Ebonykit scaled a few feet up the rock, she pressed her paws to it, finding it to be oddly smooth in comparison to its appreance. The many moons of warriors climbing upon it must have made it like this.
She glanced up at her friend, who meowed some inaudible words before sliding down, all before she could squeak out a warning. She jumped out of the way quickly, knowing the kitten tumbling down the rock would knock her over, despite her first instinct to help. Quickly though, the apprentice had intercepted the kit.
"Woah! Nice save, Fernpaw, that could have been really bad. You okay Ebonykit?" She mewled frantically, a little dazed. "I suppose Tallrock might've been too big of an enemy for today, huh? Sorry for scaring you like that Fernpaw..." she replied in response to the apprentices chastising, ears pinned back.

Ebonykit’s eyes were tightly closed, the world around her had somehow slowed down to the point where the short fall felt like she had been falling for way longer than possible. Her teeth were clenched and her ears flat against her skull as she braced herself for impact…

But it never came.

She slowly opened an eye, only to find herself being tightly held by Fernpaw. When she was safely lowered to the ground she barely reacted, her body locked up thanks to the shock and looking like a deer on headlight as she fell over and tried to remember how in the territories legs and paws worked to get back up. All the while her fur stood on end, making her look like a tiny ball of black and white fluff.

When the apprentice started to scold her, she lowered her gaze and crouched, as if trying to appear even smaller than she already was “I thought we could climb the rock…like grown-ups do….” She looked away, kneading at the ground.

Her attention then turned to Thrushkit, giving her a tiny smile in an attempt to reassure her “I’m ok, don’t worry, it takes more than that to bring me down!” She tried to sound as confident as before “This is why I prefer digging over climbing, though…”.

Fernpaw sighed and then licked ebonykit to calm her down. “Just please don’t scare me like that again ok.” she said after grooming ebonykit. “That goes for you too thrushkit.” she mewed staring at them both.

Thrushkit accepted the chastising from the older cat. “I understand, I’m sorry”. Hearing Ebonykit’s words, however, her ears perked up. “Digging? Like the tunnelers? Isn’t that dangerous though?” The kit’s claws flexed, and she pondered the idea despite her initial fear. She tentatively gave the ground beneath her a scratch, debating whether or not she should attempt to dig, too.

Ebonykit lowered her ears each time she was licked. While it did work to calm her down at first, she soon started to grow annoyed by it, not really feeling like being mothered by the apprentice…but feeling a bit too guilty to tell them off due to the reasoning behind said act.

Once Patchpaw finally stopped, she couldn’t help but smile with relief, looking up at her as she made the little request “I’ll try…” She wasn’t sure she could promise anything, all things considered, but agreeing to at least try should be good enough, right?

Her attention was soon snatched by Thrushkit’s inquiry, to which she purred and her tail raised again with pride, looking at her with eyes full of unspoken dreams “Yes! Like tunnelers! And I guess it can be dangerous, but isn’t the life of a moor runner dangerous in its own way too? They have to deal with predators, invading cats, border fights….”.

(Yes Patchpaw is now a girl...Nah fern is bi so doesn’t matter lmao)

Fernpaw sat down and watched as the kits talked.

Thrushkit's ears perked up as her clanmate spoke. Her initial curiosity skyrocketed as her fellow kit explained. "We can do that? I thought... Well, I don't know what I thought. It sounds so... Exciting..." She purred, eyes alight.
She turned to Fernpaw. "Oh, Fernpaw, can you take us? I want to try and so does Ebonykit!" She bounced on her paws, tail flicking crazily, anxious to dig. Her claws flexed over and over, at once terrified and feeling like she had to do this new thing.

Ebonykit’s ears perked up as well as she then turned to look at Fernpaw “Would you really be able to take us to the tunnels?” The amount of times she had tried to go into the tunnels before was so high, she had lost count long ago. Every single time she did, she was turned down and forced back into the nursery after a warrior gave her the already old speech of ‘Its too dangerous for a kit’.

She never had considered the idea of asking an apprentice for help before…maybe this was their chance to explore those dark underground paths that extended under all the territories and were WindClan’s most extensive, useful and secret possession.

“Nope.” was all she said.

(Le plain and simple no)