...And I'm leaving behind no one... [semi-open]

Rainstrike didn't know how long it took her.

Bit by bit, little by little, she hauled Mistwalker through the forest. It probably would have been better for her to carry him, for certain less strain on him, but the older warrior was much too heavy for her to pick up, much less shoulder all the way back to the ThunderClan camp. And she couldn't risk leaving him to go get help lest the badger return to finish the job without her there to protect him. By the time the gorse tunnel came into view, every muscle in her body was screaming for relief, nearly all her claws were torn and bloody from the effort it took to grip the ground and pull Mistwalker along, but she was so close. She couldn't give up now. She wouldn't. "Please, hold on," she begged, heart clenching at the sight of blood trickling from her father's mouth. But it bubbled, and that gave her some hope. There was breath in him still. There was life in him still.

"HELP!" she screeched, hoping to attract whatever cat was on guard duty at the entrance. "HELP!"

Rainstrike screamed and yowled at the top of her lungs, until her throat was raw and she could no longer make a sound. And then she latched back on to Mistwalker and started dragging again.

Oakstar’s head shot up at the yowl for help. The scrawny mouse he had finally allowed himself to eat between his paws as he rose from the covered section near his den to the middle of camp. His amber eyes widened in shock and horror at what he saw.

Rainstrike… and… starclan no.

"MISTWALKER!" His yowl broke through the frosty air as he raced over to the recently named warrior, pressing his dark tabby pelt against his silver tabby son’s. His head pressed closely to Mistwalker as he licked at Mistwalker’s forehead to comfort the tom for a moment. "Get Mossbloom!" He ordered, to any cat around him that would listen as he pressed his body closer, lowering so that some of Mistwalker’s weight could be distributed onto his own back.

"What happened?" He turned to Rainstrike. It was hard for him to tell if his granddaughter was alright beneath the blood of his son… starclan, his poor son. His heart ached to see his kin in such pain as he tried to carefully pad towards the medicine den. The beating of the tom’s heart as he carried him the only insurance that he was alive. For now.

Yowls for help had pulled Mossbloom from the herb stores, and Oakstar's yowl brought her sprinting from the medicine den, bounding through the drifts of snow as fast as her size would allow her. Skidding to a stop near the two, her eyes widened as she took in the sight, and all of the blood. Her ears lowered as she looked between Rainstrike and Mistwalker, but the faintest rattling sound and the way the blood was flowing revealed that he was still alive. "Get him to my den, now. I'll be able to look at him more there." Dashing away, Mossbloom focused on packing down the snow to form a decent trail to the medicine den, before pushing some of the nests of moss together to lay Mistwalker on and a couple more for Rainstrike. Hopefully she had avoided the worst of the injuries.... 

Moments like this Mossbloom really wondered if she ought to take on an apprentice finally. 

Slipping into her herb stores, she cursed the fact that it was leafbare. Her stores were so low... And this would be no small task. Filling a leaf with catchweed, goldenrod, the last of her horsetail, some wild garlic, and a shriveled up poppy flower, she exited the crack in the wall to the main portion of her den. Setting the herbs down, she took the moss from her own nest to replace one of the fresh ones, and began to make the new nest into strips for the wounds. As the Rainstrike and Oakstar entered with Mistwalker, she directed them to the two nests. "Oakstar, start helping me clean around his wounds. Rainstrike, start cleaning your own wounds so I know where to go after I get Mistwalker stabilized."

First, she checked by his nose, yes, he was still breathing. He was, however, unconscious. That was somewhat of a relief, at least he wouldn't feel anything quite yet. As quickly as she carefully could, she set to work cleaning away some of the blood, finding the worst injuries and pressing moss to them to stop the bleeding. Once the larger injuries had been discovered and the bleeding had slowed, she set to work making a poultice of goldenrod and horsetail. This was gingerly placed in the wounds, covered with the catchweed, and then rubbed over with the wild garlic. Hopefully the combination would stop any infections... That was the last thing they needed. Finally, after what felt like moons, Mistwalkers wounds were carefully wrapped with cobwebs and she stepped back to take a deep breath before turning to Rainstrike.

"What happened?" She asked as she approached, looking for Rainstrike's injuries. Hopefully they wouldn't be as bad, or as numerous as her father's. The strange rattling noise from Mistwalker persisted, and she looked over to notice with a jolt the odd way his shoulder and side was laying. She winced and looked to Oakstar for a heartbeat before she looked back to Rainstrike. "Was he bitten by the shoulder and ribs?...." Her voice trailed off, concern and worry apparent in her mew. Those wounds were not easy ones to fix, and would take a huge amount of work and care... If that were the case, Mistwalker had a long road ahead of him.

Oakstar's appearance, and his subsequent calls for aid, were enough for Rainstrike to finally let herself stop. She gently lowered Mistwalker's head to the snow, releasing his scruff and falling heavily to her haunches. Her head hung low, breath in ragged gasps as her grandfather rained attention over his son's prone form, sorrow and worry coming off him in waves. He demanded answers, but the young warrior couldn't bring herself to provide any. How was she supposed to tell him that she had managed to remain unscathed, while Mistwalker was breaths away from sharing tongues with StarClan?

Thankfully, Mossbloom showed up then, taking charge and moving everyone to her den. Rainstrike backed into a corner, eyes on the ground, the leader and medicine cat's words buzzing in her ears like a hundred angry bees. None of them stood out, until Mossbloom spoke her name, and she faded back into reality, enough to blink twice, slowly, at the medicine cat as if the question didn't make sense. "I... I... I'm not injured," she whispered. Rainstrike twisted her paw around, flexing her ragged claws. Her paws were so numb she didn't even feel the pain, though whether it was from cold or shock wasn't certain. "He... he..." Seemingly unable to form a coherent sentence, Rainstrike took a shuddering breath. "Badger."