Sometimes An Enemy Becomes A Friend (Closed for Rainbow)

Blizzardpaw padded into what once was her clan’s territory. She had been born and raised in the abandoned barn, and knowing that this place could had been her home…it just made her feel a bit awkward. She, however, wasn’t mad t SkyClan or RiverClan for chasing out her clan away from here before she was born, even if her clan apparently did. She didn’t know the reason behind their actions, but they probably had good motives behind them. Maybe they were desperate for prey? Maybe they needed a kind of herb that only grew in ThunderClan’s territory? Many reason behind their actions popped in her mind, one right after the other, she just didn’t want to believe what her angry clanmates said about them doing it because they were a bunch of foxhearted cats.

Clearpaw was out hunting-- it was an activity that he wasn't very fond of lately, after discovering four baby birds in a nest not too long ago. He had been attacked by the birds' mother and fallen from the tree, and an argument with his brother had ensued. Ever since then, he couldn't help but remember the babies every time he hunted a piece of prey. Did this little animal have babies? If he killed it, would the babies die, too?
As a result of this, he hadn't been bringing in much fresh-kill lately. As such, he had been sent out to hunt for the whole day, and he wouldn't be allowed to eat unless he brought in enough for the elders, queens, and medicine cats. He picked up a scent aside from prey, however, as he walked through what used to be Thunderclan territory... It was a scent he wasn't very familiar with. It smelled a bit like Thunderclan, but not quite what he had smelled on his first trip into the clan's former territory. It was actually fresh... He dropped down into a crouch, quietly gliding through the undergrowth, following the scent until he saw a smallish she-cat. She looked to be an apprentice as well, and she smelled strongly of Thunderclan, but also of hay, which he knew the scent of from the twoleg farm on the edge of Riverclan territory.
What was she doing here? He was burning with curiosity. Was she looking for something in particular? A missing cat, prey, an herb? Had she been sent to scout whether or not they could reclaim their territory? Surely they wouldn't send an apprentice for such a task, though...
He was so lost in his own thoughts that the form of his crouch became quite sloppy, and he stepped on a twig which cracked under his paw.

The white apprentice took a deep breath of the forest air, wondering if her clan would ever be able to return and, if that happened, if she would be able to get used to living here instead of the barn, she really hoped so, even if it was to help her older clanmates to relax. She didn’t liked to see them hating other clans for what happened some moons ago, she understood that fight couldn’t be evaded forever, but the clans weren’t supposed to hate each other like this…or at least that was how she felt.

She would had kept wondering about things like this if the cracking noise f a twig didn’t forced her back to the real world, making her perk up her ears and look towards the directing from where the noise came from “Hum…hello?” She took a couple of steps to get closer to the source of the noise, body tense in case that it was a fox or something between those lines.

Her worried expression was soon replaced with relief when she noticed the cat crouched between the grass, his black and white fur standing out against the green grass. She could tell he wasn’t of her own clan, but at least she could try to talk to another cat “Are you a SkyClan or RiverClan cat?” She wanted to know what she was dealing with right now, she knew that those two clans now shared this territory and if this cat was from one of those two clans she would try to convince him that she was just passing through, not wanting to fight.

Clearpaw nodded slowly, standing up and looking at her with curiosity in his round eyes. "Yeah, I'm from Riverclan." He mewed-- no need to tell this stranger that this might not be the case for much longer. "You're from Thunderclan, right?" He mewed, "What are you doing here?" Since he didn't feel a whole lot of clan loyalty, the thought of Thunderclan coming to invade and reclaim their territory wasn't bothersome to him. He would worry for his family and friends (though Cloudpaw may be his only one of those), but the thought of losing this bit of territory didn't matter to him. "Is Thunderclan coming to take their territory back?"

Ok, so she was talking to a RiverClan cat…luckily for her the cat didn’t appeared to be hostile, so maybe hiving a small chat wouldn’t be that hard after all. His question did took her off-guard, she knew that several cats of her clan wanted the territory back, but she wasn’t sure if they were planning to take it back anytime soon “Hum…I’m not sure to be honest. I just came here to explore a bit, I had heard so much of this territory thanks to my clanmates but I never had managed to see it by myself until now” She looked at the trees, at the forest, it was very different from the territory surrounding the barn “Mind if I ask your name? Mine’s Blizzardpaw”.

Clearpaw nodded. He could understand her curiosity, so he wasn't about to fault her for that. After all, he let his curiosity get the better of him sometimes, too. "My name is Clearpaw." He mewed, sitting down, since it didn't seem as though this cat was going to be a threat, "Nice to meet you!" He knew that clan cats weren't supposed to make friends outside of their own clan, but his lack of clan loyalty, and possible plans to run away, still lay at the back of his mind, telling him that it didn't matter if Blizzardpaw was from Thunderclan. Besides, maybe they wouldn't even become friends, who knew? Having a talk wasn't hurting anyone. "Well, is it as good as you imagined?" He asked, tilting his head, "Where does Thunderclan live right now? Is everyone okay? Can your medicine cats find the herbs they need?" As he spoke that line of questions, his eyes didn't blink.

Blizzardpaw took another look around “Well, there are more trees than I expected” She wasn’t lying, the territory around the abandoned farm did have trees, but being so close to the moor, it was obvious that the trees would be a lot less than the actual woods and consequently the young apprentice wasn’t expecting there to be so many of them “We live in a barn, past WindClan territory, we are ok, but most of the older warriors are a bit…bitter with the fact of living in a barn instead of the place where they were born and raised. And about the medicine cats, I heard that their supplies are running out not long ago and may need to ask to other medicine cats for help, so I’m not sure if they are finding all the herbs they need” She tried to tell as much as she knew, but even she had trouble to be up to date with everything what was going on in her clan at the moment.

“I really don’t want to be rude or anything, but you know why SkyClan and RiverClan claimed this territory for themselves? I had heard several explanations from my clanmates, but I think that they are tainted by their anger” She had hears stories of how ThunderClan had been chased away, but all of them described the RiverClan and SkyClan warriors as fox-hearted cats that attacked with little to no provocation and wouldn’t spare any cat in the clan, there had to be another side to the story, it wasn’t possible that all the cats from those two clans were evil enough to do something like that.

Clearpaw shook his head with an apologetic expression. "I haven't heard anything." He admitted; he felt bad that he didn't have an answer for her, since she had given such good answers to his questions. He hadn't heard many cats talking about why Thunderclan was driven out, partially because he was often too distracted to listen in on conversations like that. "In my opinion, it was pretty unfair that two clans teamed up on one." He admitted; he hadn't dared say that to his clanmates, but that was how he felt.

Blizzardpaw nodded, understanding. She was of the curious kind and if something managed to catch her attention, she would be asking all over the place until she got the answer to it, and if she didn’t got it that way she would go by herself to get it, reason why she liked to explore so much and to why she even came to this place on the first place. However, not all cats were like her and that was a good thing, since that was what made this world so interesting, but at the same time would block her from the answer she was looking for, so she would need to keep looking.

“I think it was a bit unfair too, but maybe they did it because they wouldn’t had been able to achieve such thing by themselves and were afraid of failure” She shared the point of view of Clearpaw, it was an unfair battle, but the reason behind such action probably had an explanation too. Another question to add to the growing pile that she would need to ask later “Well, you know why I’m here, but I don’t know why you’re here, are you on a patrol or you wanted to explore just like me?”.

Clearpaw shrugged. "Well, I'm supposed to be hunting." He admitted, "I could have hunted back across the river, but... I just wanted to be alone, I didn't want my clan-mates bothering me." He thought for a moment, wondering how much to confide in this cat who he had just met. "They make fun of me, sometimes." He admitted, deciding to leave it there for the time being, "I think everyone thinks I'm kind of weird, so I just wanted to be alone for a bit."

The white apprentice titled her head a bit with the tom’s words “Why would anyone in a clan make fun of a clanmate?” This was unknown territory to her, back in her clan she never was made fun of, nor had noticed anyone making fun of anyone else. And the few times that may happen it was all just a game that ended in laughs. Then again she had to remind herself that she was talking to a RiverClan cat, maybe in his clan things were different “You really shouldn’t let that kind of things to bother you, after all, being weird means that you’re different, unique!” Blizzardpaw purred at Clearpaw, giving him a big smile.

Clearpaw did feel comforted by her words, but he couldn't help thinking that they sounded awfully similar to what Toadkit had said to him before they fought over the fate of the baby birds he had found. Blizzardpaw was a cat he had just met, how was he to know she wouldn't go back on her words just like he did? "Thank you." He mewed, nodding slowly; he couldn't let his relationship with Toadpaw plague his other, new relationships. "Hey," He mewed suddenly, "how about, when I go back to my clan, I find out about why they decided to join with Skyclan and chase Thunderclan out? Then we can meet again, and I can tell you about it."

Blizzardpaw smiled with the other apprentice’s words, she really liked the idea. She would be able to get the answers she wanted and would be able to see her new friend once more “I think that’s a really cool idea! Should we meet again here after you get the answers? Or we can meet at the Gathering, if you’re going of course” She was clearly happy with Clearpaw ideas, and who knows? Maybe next time they met she would be able to tell him a couple more things. She would need to ask Dreamleaf and Stonepaw about their herb gathering trips to give him a better answer about how the medicine cats were doing?

Clearpaw didn't know if he would be going to the gathering-- honestly, with his lack of fresh-kill and the fact that he lagged behind other apprentices in fighting, he doubted it. "Let's meet again here." He suggested, "I don't think I'll be going to the next gathering, so how about we meet here in..." He thought for a moment, wondering how long to wait. After all, he didn't want Blizzardpaw getting into trouble! "One moon?" He asked-- it seemed like a long time, but he wasn't sure what else to suggest. "Or half a moon." He added.

Blizzardpaw thought for a couple of seconds while shuffling her paws, meeting way too soon would clearly get them caught and they would get in trouble with their respective clans for it, or even with the other clan, and the last thing that she wanted was to add more fuel to the fire causing the hatred between the two clans, however, a full moon would be a bit too long for her to wait “After one half-moon, at sunhigh?”.