April 2021 Medicine Cat Meeting

Beechface wearily made the last scramble up to the entrance of mothermouth, head and tail drooping. After the events of the gathering, her mother's retirement and Copperfox dying in his sleep, the last thing she felt like doing was taking the long trip to highstones. She wanted to interact with Spiderquill even less, and she definitely didn't want to deal with foolish Windclanners that would support a fellow medicine cat lying to her face. The anger had mostly faded however, now the medicine cat just looked worn.

Beechface sat, gaze turned toward the forest. She was lost in her own thoughts for the moment, and had been the first one to arrive. Her tail tip flicked in muted impatience. Why were the others chronically late? Couldn't they just get this over with quickly for once?

Nervous once again. Though this time it was a little different. A medicine cat gathering where he could be scrutinized more, and had to make a good impression for Daisybloom. There weren't numerous cats here this time. He couldn't just sit back and watch as everything went on, he would have to interact with everyone. Hopefully they could keep the drama away this time.. Most likely not knowing how it went at the gathering.

The white tom climbed up the last few steps, seeing just the Skyclan medicine cat there. Just the two of them? It was a little bit of a relief considering it was less to deal with. The large white tom dipped his head slightly to the older medicine cat. "Hello." He greeted, before moving off to the side to wait on the others. Silently thanking Mossbloom in his head for teaching him the path to the highstones.

A black tuxedo took the trek to Highstones, for the first time alone. It was... strange. And during the trip there, he felt a little lonely. Of course, he had good relations with many of the medicine cats - besides Dennis, who probably didn't like him when the ShadowClan medicine cat had condemned him for lying. Noticing the other medicine cats there, he smirked at them both. He hoped to have friendly relations with Beechface, of course, and he saw Dovefrost as a friend. Giving an acknowledging nod to Beechface, he turned to Dovefrost. "Hey, Dovefrost! How's training with Daisybloom going?"

Beechface spotted two cats approaching, and sighed quietly. She recognized Rookfire, and remembered he'd spoken up at the gathering, as well. The large white tom smelled of Thunderclan- Daisybloom's apprentice, Mossbloom had said. The Thunderclanners seemed a decent sort, and while she was wary of Rookfire on principle, she didn't have the energy for her usual harshness today.

"Hello Rookfire, Dovefrost." She mewed as they neared, tone betraying how tired she felt. At least Spiderquill and Softbreeze weren't here, yet.

Dovefrost didn't like this silence. It wasn't really comfortable to him, so he was thankful when Rookfire arrived. "Training is going. I'm certainly not the fastest at learning the herbs." He was getting there though, he was certainly ahead of when he first started, but he couldn't help but wonder if Starclan really made the right choice. "How is Shadowclan? And Skyclan?" He added, glancing at Beechface with his green eyes. "If you want to talk about it that is." He didn't want to push any boundaries. He was just an apprentice to all of them after all.

"I wasn't, either. You'll learn them all in time but... it's definitely a lot to take in." Beechface mewed in response to Dovefrost. She sympathized with not being the quickest at learning herbs. And there were times where she still felt like she'd have been better able to serve her clan as a warrior.

His question about how Skyclan was doing caught her by surprise. Beechface knew she wasn't the most subtle cat, so she figured that he'd likely noticed her weariness. There was hesitation as she debated answering, but what she had to say couldn't possibly make Skyclan look worse. At least the Thunderclan medicine cats seemed like decent enough cats. Neither of them had lied to her about something important, at least. And if Dawnhawk was skulking Skyclan's borders, there was nothing stopping him from doing the same to any of the other clans, either. They might as well be warned.

"We're still dealing with the wounded and sick from Asylum's treatment of the captured clanmates. And my mother was attacked by a former clanmate... my... littermate... who sided with them. She had to retire due to injury." Beechface sighed wearily, ears flicking back against her skull, claws flexing against the stone beneath them. "Dawnhawk is a white and gold tom, blue eyes. Skilled fighter, and doesn't give a rat's tail about the clans or innocents." Even saying his name felt vile. Her gaze returned to gazing at the clan territory down below as they waited for the other medicine cats to arrive.

After clawing his way up to highstones, Smallbean finally arrived at mothermouth, setting his gaze on the other medicine cats. He was beginning to feel better about the medicine cat meetings, this time he wasn't nearly as nervous as he was before, but he still couldn't ignore the heavy feeling in the pit of his stomach. Slowly padding up to the group, he greeted them with a small dip of his head to avoid interrupting their conversation. Although, after the gathering he wasn't too sure that he even wanted to join their conversations. If he were invited to talk, he wouldn't deny, but for now he would quietly sit and mind his own business.

Dennis was procrastinating, and had been since Sunhigh. Nerves and intense guilt fired on all cylinders from the moment it got dark to now. Ivystar had all but kicked him in the rear to get him to finally leave camp, and possibly the only thing keeping him from taking an hour-long detour to avoid the conversation stage of the meeting was the presence of his clan's deputy by his shoulder. He meandered as much as he could get away with, but for all his seemingly clueless demeanour Dennis was sure that Loonwhisper would soon catch on if he kept stalling. He wasn't deputy for nothing.

With a heavy sigh and a noticeable tremble, Dennis finally reached his destination. He looked at the gathering crowd, for a split second considering joining the conversation (or apologising, while he was here), but one look at Beechface quelled any such wants. Giving a nod to the other medicine cats and a pained smile to his chaperone, he speed-walked into Mothermouth and all but ran towards the Moonstone. He lay down, trying to settle his swirling thoughts, and pressed his nose against the stone as he had tens of times before.

The member 'Snickerdoodle' has done the following action : Dices roll

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'StarClan Revelation' :

Beechface said nothing further as Spiderquill showed up and promptly vanished into mothermouth. It was a relief that she didn't have to struggle for something that wasn't unfriendly to say, and she merely shrugged at the other medicine cats.

"Let's get this over with, then." Getting to her paws, Beechface turned, following the Riverclanner to the moonstone and settling on the opposite side from him.

Beechface blinked open her eyes to see a starry figure in front of her. The figure wasn't someone she recognized, with a dark tabby pelt splashed with white. Before Beechface could say a word, the Starclanner spoke, voice surprisingly gravelly. "Very close, blood ties disrupted by starry foliage grow stronger with each day. Be mindful of the connections that grow with careful grooming."

"What-" Beechface started to ask what the figure had meant, but the stranger was already fading, leaving Beechface alone in the starry landscape she'd found herself in. She pondered the message, tail twitching as she tried to figure out the meaning of the words. Blood ties had to be relating to a family of some sort... Disrupted by starry foliage?

Connections that grow with careful grooming... Grooming? Beechface's eyes narrowed, tail continuing to flick back and forth. What sort of connection would be fostered by cleaning herself? Beechface continued to think on it. That couldn't be right. Connections between cats could grow by their words, their actions... Maybe that's what it meant. But then, what was the starry foliage disrupting whatever these blood ties were? And the unfamiliar Starclanner had said it was "very close." Something to do with Skyclan, or just something that would happen soon?

Beechface thought of the cats she knew. Most of Skyclan was family, which would fit the blood ties, and not every cat in the clan had a good relationship with one another. The mention of the starry foliage stuck out to her, however. Starry foliage... Starclan? The code keeping cats apart? These blood ties were growing stronger each day, or so the Starclanner said...

Maybe it wasn't Skyclan at all, then. None of the cats Beechface could think of seemed to be getting closer to each other, and were only drifting further apart instead. But the prophecy said that they were growing closer... Drifting away from one family member to become closer with another, maybe?

Her head swam with possibilities. Some made more sense than others... But the cryptic wording left the medicine cat unsure of herself. She needed to think on this.

The member 'kjSage' has done the following action : Dices roll

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#1 'StarClan Revelation' :


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#2 'Effect Dice' : 3

Rookfire gave Dovefrost a curt nod. "It's a slow learning curve at first, but eventually you'll be at a point when you've learn more and more about it." After Dovefrost asked him and Beechface a question, the SkyClan medicine cat spoke first. Immediately after, she gave the two toms a warning about this tom named Dawnhawk. "I'll keep an eye out for him," Rookfire ended up saying, waiting for a few heartbeats to see if Beechface had any more to say. When the answer seemed to be no, Rookfire answered Dovefrost's question. "ShadowClan's recovering well after the Asylum. We gained many warriors and apprentices over the past couple moons, and Murkystrike's close to 100% again. It didn't hurt that with the season of Newleaf comes more prey and therefore more fresh-kill to feed our growing number of cats."

After the other medicine cats went into Mothermouth, Rookfire decided to do the same. Walking down the winding path to the Moonstone, he decided to make some small talk with his friends. "Hey Dovefrost, if you ever need any help with herbs, I'm always open to share with you what I know." Eventually, the black tuxedo settled down near the glowing rock and touched his nose to it as he had done before.

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"Shrouded in shadows, the waters ripple and twist to reveal the shores that lie underneath. Beware getting sucked into the depths."

That was the message Rookfire received from the stars. He didn't know what it meant at the moment, but he'd figure it out later.

(i have no muse to write anything better so this is what you guys get)

The member 'Mamenchisaurus' has done the following action : Dices roll

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#1 'StarClan Revelation' :


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#2 'Effect Dice' : 1