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Post by Ashfall on Apr 4, 2017 20:04:13 GMT -6
TreeClan was getting too loud. It seemed like everyone was getting far too caught up in who was born where and who they were aligned with. Ashpaw just didn't want them to fight anymore. He didn't want anyone to get hurt. With tensions rising, though, it kept on seeming more and more like somebody would.
It was night when he slipped out of camp. He missed the stars. He missed the days when he was a kit, and he could look up at them without worrying about anything else. Without worrying about the clan falling apart around him. So he searched for them. Towards FireClan, the familiar trees became more sparse, and the sky became more open. Even after so many moons, the stars were still there, waiting for him. And no matter what happened to the clan, even when it was all over, they'd still be there.
Knowing that helped calm him down a little. He settled on a few of the rocks on TreeClan's side of the border and watched. That is, until he heard the sound of somebody else approaching. "H-hello?" he called out, suddenly somewhat afraid. What if it was a FireClanner? Or, worse, somebody from his own clan?
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 5, 2017 22:23:09 GMT -6
Willowspirit was feeling constantly torn between gleeful that she was a warrior, and terrified that she now had an apprentice. It looked like fear was winning, as the silver she-cat was skinny to her bones, with ragged fur, hollow eyes, and wounds that were healing quite poorly. She'd never gotten treatment for her fight with Mudclaw, or Almondfire, or Almondfire again, and with the way she was taking care of herself, the injuries were only worsening.
Unable to sleep, as usual, Willowspirit found herself wandering towards the TreeClan border. She wasn't sure why, but she'd always felt more comfortable around the trees than in the open. It felt safer.
In the darkness, Willowspirit could just barley make out a cat on the edge of the border, a TreeClan cat. She approached the voice cautiously, her claws unsheathed and two-colored eyes narrowed.
"What are you doing here?" She asked warily, not quite hostile, but far from friendly.
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 5, 2017 22:38:24 GMT -6
Ashpaw let out a startled yelp once he heard the voice of another cat, practically falling off his rock. It wasn't a voice or a scent he recognizd, and the sound had come from the other side. Must have been a FireClanner- and she did not sound very happy.
"Stargazing!" he answered, practically squeaking. It took him a moment to gather his wits once more, and he cleared his throat. "I- I mean- I didn't mean to get so close to the border, but it's easier to see the sky out here. Y'know, because of all the...trees." He smiled somewhat nervously, then wondered if the FireClan warrior could even see it.
"I promise I didn't cross," he rambled on. "Or if I did, I didn't mean to, I was just-" It was at that moment that he realized that she didn't really have a good reason to be out there, either. "Waaaaiiit. Why are you out here?" he asked, tipping his head to the side. He tried to keep his voice from sounding accusatory- he was only curious, and didn't want her to take it the wrong way.
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 5, 2017 22:55:20 GMT -6
Willowspirit could appreciate wanting to look at the stars, most of the time she found them to be beautiful. Now, they just made her feel small and vulnerable. It was overwhelming, all the open space in FireClan. There was nowhere for her to hide, and the only sound came from far-away bird calls, or rustling grass if the wind was blowing.
"You didn't cross the border, don't worry." Willowspirit found herself somewhat calmed down in the face of the nervous TreeClan apprentice, though anxiety was still biting at the back of her mind.
She flicked her tail, growing somewhat uncomfortable as the topic of conversation shifted to her. "I couldn't sleep. I don't know why I came here, though, I was just wandering around."
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 5, 2017 23:28:16 GMT -6
He was glad she didn't really seem mad at him anymore. Maybe still a little wary, but he didn't think he'd have to worry about her suddenly attacking him. Weird that he was less likely to be attacked by a FireClanner than one of his own clanmates, given recent events. Just his luck.
"Yeah...I guess I've been having nights like that, too," he admitted, in a spurt of unexpected sincerity. Weirdly enough he found it easier speaking like this. If he said the wrong thing to a TreeClanner these days, it could end with one of them clawing him- but somebody outside of it all, outside of the clan, couldn't really do much. Well- not without crossing the border. He was quiet for a moment, looking up at the stars, then at the FireClan warrior.
"I'm Ashpaw," he introduced himself. He couldn't see the harm in giving out his name here. "How are things in FireClan?"
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 7, 2017 16:44:49 GMT -6
Willowspirit didn't really know the rules for talking to cat from another clan. She knew that her own clan had to be put first, but what she didn't know was exactly where that line was drawn. Friendly conversation sounded alright, though, as long as she didn't give away any huge FireClan secrets.
Hearing the younger cat talk, it seemed like he had his own problems, though Willowspirit had no idea what they could be, and she certainly didn't know how she could comfort him. She looked down at the ground, gently scuffing a paw against the cool earth.
"I'm Willowspirit." She introduced herself, still unused to her warrior name. "Things in FireClan are, uh.. Overall good. How's TreeClan?"
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 7, 2017 17:27:16 GMT -6
Ashpaw made a bit of a face when she turned his question back on him. He didn't want to say too much- it would probably be frowned upon by most of the clan for him to admit that there was trouble in TreeClan. It could lead others to assume that TreeClan was currently weak. And while Ashpaw didn't believe that Willowshine would say anything, and he didn't want to believe that FireClan would try to take advantage of that, he knew he had to be careful.
"Well...I suppose we've been better," he admitted. "But there's lots of prey returning to the forest now that newleaf has begun!" Putting a positive spin on things that were awful was one of his specialties. "So there's that!" He was quiet for a moment.
"What's FireClan like?" he asked, somewhat out of nowhere. "What do you do when there's rain if you don't have a lot of trees?"
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 7, 2017 17:53:56 GMT -6
Willowspirit didn't think that her personal problems had any effect on FireClan on a whole, but perhaps they did. Besides herself, there were a lot of her clan-mates getting into nasty fights, and it was mostly cats that Willowspirit knew. The heavily wounded she-cat had no idea if in-fighting was such a common thing in other clans though.
She nodded slowly, not entirely believing that things were great in TreeClan. "That's good." She nodded, not telling Ashpaw that he didn't seem to believe his own words.
"What do you mean, 'what do we do'?" Willowspirit frowned, tilting her head to the side. "We just get wet, it isn't that big of a deal. What do TreeClan cats do?" Again, she flipped the question back on him.
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 7, 2017 20:05:10 GMT -6
"Well- I mean- most of us just try to hide from it," Ashpaw stumbled over his words for a moment. "Which is easier with all the trees, I was thinking." He hoped he hadn't offended her by asking. "Personally- I actually really like the rain, but even I don't want to be in it long enough to get sick, y'know?"
"Wait- do you guys climb trees?" he asked, brightening up again. "Sorry- I'm just really curious. I've never met a FireClanner before..."
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 7, 2017 20:13:14 GMT -6
"I suppose, if the rain ever got to be really bad, we have a few places that we could shelter." Willowspirit said thoughtfully. She didn't know why she was doing so well with talking to this cat, perhaps it was because he didn't know what a terrible cat she was, and they were just talking about mundane things.
Willowspirit looked at the trees beyond the border, longing in her eyes. "The only trees we have are too scraggly and small to be climbed.. So, no, we don't climb." She looked down at the ground, unwilling to admit how much she disliked the wide open spaces of FireClan territory.
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 7, 2017 20:42:09 GMT -6
For a second, Ashpaw followed her gaze to the territory behind him, getting a sense that the FireClan warrior was looking at them almost mournfully. "Oh...then what else do you do for fun?" he asked, trying to distract her from that and move on to more postive things about her clan. "Do you guys have any other games?" [ omg i dont know why these are so short im so sorry ]
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 7, 2017 21:06:04 GMT -6
Willowspirit shrugged, suddenly feeling a lot less open. "We run a lot." She mumbled. As far as she knew, all that FireClan cats did was chase rabbits and get in fights with each other. Willowspirit couldn't imagine what it was like for a fully grown cat to be happy enough that they did things for sheer sake of enjoyment.
((honestly same ;A;))
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 8, 2017 1:41:10 GMT -6
Ashpaw frowned slightly, finding it a little more difficult to keep the conversation going in a positive direction. Maybe he should have expected that- both of them were bound to be a little tense and closed off...they were from different clans, after all, and there was only so much they could tell each other without going too far. "Well...what's your favorite place to go, then?" he asked next. "In TreeClan we have this tree they call the Sky Tree- they say that a cat lives on the top of it but nobody's ever seen it before. I like it for the view. But there's also a stream that sounds nice if you just want to listen to it to calm down."
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Post by Willowspirit on Apr 8, 2017 9:44:30 GMT -6
"Oh, that sounds very nice." Willowspirit commented, envisioning the whole thing in her mind. When Ashpaw asked about her, she was slightly relieved as she knew exactly what place to talk about. "Well, there's this place in the territory, it's something two-legs made and then abandoned." Willowspirit started, struggling to describe the graveyard.
"It's filled with flat stones sticking out of the ground, and it's filled with fog and overgrown plants. My friend and I found this little hidden spot between one of the stones, and we go there whenever we want to be alone."
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Post by Ashfall on Apr 8, 2017 16:57:13 GMT -6
"Oh, wow," Ashpaw breathed when Willowspirit described the graveyard. "That sounds kind of cool! I wish I could go there someday." There were a lot of places cats always talked about that he wanted to visit. Dspite everything, though, he couldn't really imagine leaving TreeClan, even now.
"We have an old twoleg...thing...too," he meowed, not exactly sure how to describe it. "It's kind of like a shack but it's made out of stone and the inside is....strange. Or- stranger than usual. I've been there once- but there were a lot of tunnels and I didn't want to get lost in 'em." Though most were afraid of twolegs, and Ashpaw was too, he couldn't deny that some of the things they built were rather fascinating.
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