A Plan Full of Ill Intentions [Closed Hunting Patrol for the SC Mini-Plot]

OOC: Remember that, according to the plot, your cats won’t be able to spot Owlstrike while he watches over them or swap the prey.

Some days had passed since he was banished from ShadowClan, and his rage wouldn’t stop growing since then. Owlstrike had returned to the Carrionplace not long after he left the camp, remembering the ill rats he had found on his last patrol as a member of the shady clan. He had been looking around for those since then and feeding on healthy rats, which in a mix of good and bad luck were way more common than the ill ones. He almost became a victim of a rat nest on his search not long ago and managed to only come out with minor scratches and bites thanks to good luck.

He was aware that the prey was becoming scarce around the territory, and sooner than later a patrol would need to visit the Carrionplace to take some prey back to camp and keep the clan feed. And so…he waited. He had some couple of freshly killed ill rats hidden on a relatively safe spot, and the few he had found but couldn’t catch for whatever reason were chased away to avoid the patrol finding out of their existence.

And then, his waiting finally paid off. He saw a small patrol walk into the Carrionplace, and though he was way too far to tell who was in it he knew it would be enough, he just had to stay hidden, and wait for the ShadowClan cats to bury their prey to gather more to swap the healthy prey for ill one. He knew they wouldn’t notice, he had made sure to get rid of any evident sign of the illness on the rats he had hunted after all. He wasn’t a medicine cat, but he thought his work was good enough.

Darkpaw ran ahead of Mousefang and his father, Mudfoot. The Leaf-Bare was affecting all the clans and Shadowclan we're heading to Carrionplace to hunt for rats. She pranced around in excitement after arriving and asked his father, "Can we hunt the rats now?"

Mudfoot chuckled at Darkpaw's enthusiasm. "Of course, but be careful," he warned the younger cat. "Never be alone when hunting them and make sure they don't smell too rotten," the last thing he wanted was the apprentice to get injured during a hunt.

OOC: Darkpaw's a she.

The black apprentice sniffed the air for rats scents and located one under a bush. The rat leaped towards Darkpaw and she swatted the rat with surprise. I thought prey don't attack back! The rat once again charged at her and she clawed at the attacker. "It's so big!" She yowled while she lashed out again, claws unsheathed.

OOC: I'm confused by your first post, Grey. You've referred to Mudfoot as 'his' father by accident, it seems.

IC: "Careful, they're fighters." Mousefang meowed blandly, watching the younger cat tussle with her prey. He didn't like having to chase after carrion and rats to support the clan, and in his opinion it was far too early in the season to bother with this rotten place. Disregarding Mudfoot's warning, he peeled off from the group and stalked through the trash, the disgusting scent covering any traces of potential prey. Mousefang's nose was too sensitive to deal with this kind of rubbish. We could always take from WindClan. They're too weak and wrapped up with RiverClan to oppose us. Why are we wasting time here? He didn't dare voice his opinions out loud. Mudfoot was in good with the leader and wasn't the kind of cat you should utter anything disrespectful to. A growl caught in his throat and his claws unsheathed. The tail of a rat whipped back and forth barely a few mouse-lengths before him.

Owlstrike looked at the patrol, hiding behind the piles of rubbish with a couple of his recently-killed ill rats hanging from his mouth as he held them by their tails, careful to not even swallow a single drop of their blood by accident.

He avoided the area of the rat nest in which he had fell before, a zone he didn’t had that much of a trouble to remember and spot after he had to rush out with several rats almost biting his tail. He looked at the scratches and bites that were barely healing. He never thought that what he would miss the most about being in a clan was to have a medicine cat around…he was just glad to see that his wounds didn’t get infected and the fur was growing back on the zones the rats attacked him, hopefully this wouldn’t leave noticeable scars.

Shaking off these thoughts, he went on with his quest, getting closer to the cats and waiting for one of them to kill and bury their prey to look for more and be able to swap the rats.

Darkpaw bit the rat's neck when it turned around. The rat fell down on the ground while the curious apprentice poked at the rat a few times. "I think I killed this one" She said as blood splattered the ground.

OOC: Oops, sorry. My bad. I'm not really good at English since I'm in Taiwan so I'm learnin'

Glad to see the apprentice catch on so quickly, Mudfoot slipped under the fence and started looking for his own prey. Soon enough, the tom found a rat that wasn't with its friends and stalked it for a few moments before lunging and making a clean kill. The taste of rat wasn't something he wanted to taste all the time, but every so often he'd be able to bear with it. Crawling under the fence, he met back up with the patrol and buried his prey. When he was done, he went back to under the fence to grab some more.

Mousefang grimaced as he carried the rat by its tail, stepping over sharp shards of some reflective material lying about haphazardly. A small stream of blood poured from his white forepaw where he had been bit and scratched a few times, but otherwise he was uninjured. It was always a risk to confront these ugly things. Following Mudfoot, Mousefang ducked under the fence and found a separate place to bury his prey. He paused to lick his wound and clean up blood from his claws and moved on, knowing that they would need to gather plenty of rats to feed the clan but that they had to be careful not to over-hunt the area.

Darkpaw struggled to carry the rat, it was quite big for her size. She carried over to where yet buried their food and dug another hole out. "It's heavy" Half-panting. "Let's move on!" I wanna fight another rat!

Owlstrike waited patiently until all the cats left their rats to hunt down more, rushing to the place where they had them buried and swapping the healthy rat with an ill one, trying to make it look like if the place was never touched before retreating before they could return. He had to rush back and forth between the places he had the rats hidden in, as there was a maximum amount of rats she could carry at the same time and leaving all those together in the same place wouldn’t be wise. Plus, as soon as a rat stopped smelling fresh or showed any signs of getting old he had to bury it somewhere the cats wouldn’t dare to bury their own for whatever reason. After all, if their freshly killed rat suddenly looked old at all it could raise suspicion between them.

Padding back to where the patrol had met, Mudfoot carried his most recent piece of prey that he'd caught. Dropping it at his paws, he let out a yawn, a bit tired from all the rat chasing. "Ready to go back to camp?" he asked Darkpaw, looking over to the apprentice. The she-cat seemed to be doing great with her hunting skills and he was glad to be on a patrol with her. Licking the sour tasting blood from his paws, Mudfoot waited for the rest of the patrol to arrive.

Mousefang's ears pricked, picking up a few syllables from Mudfoot as the distance between the two grew longer. The newest warrior was picking farther beyond the closest scrapheaps after finding no prey in the area he had been stalking earlier. He was unfamiliar with the area, and repeatedly stopped to clean the blood from his front paw before continuing on. He didn't know rats, so he wasn't sure if blood attracted them or not. The tabby scanned the area with his green eyes, distinct in his family line, and stopped still when they caught an odd sight. Blood splatters, perhaps only a few sunrises old, made a chilling pathway towards an especially foul-smelling pile of rubbish. A small patch of fur of indistinguishable color cluttered a little clearing, and beyond the concerning sight Mousefang could see the glassy eyes of dozens of rats staring out at him from their hidden hovels. Fur raising, the tomcat began to back away in fear. He made slow movements and when he could no longer see the reflections, he turned and feld full speed back towards the patrol. "Let's go! It's dangerous here!" Mousefang panted, wondering how close he came to being carrion himself.

OOc: Sorry, too late.

Darkpaw nodded to his Father and padded towards the camp.

Owlstrike quickly rushed to leave and hide once more as soon as he overheard that they were leaving, as he was currently standing in the path the cats would need to take to leave, the mud near the place where he was hiding making his escape kinda sloppy by luckily successful right in time as he his between the carrion. He knew he was going to stink for some days after this, but his plan was working and that was more than enough for him to not mind.

OOC: You can now post plot topics with your cats sick after eating the ill rats. The master-thread for the plot will be created soon and I'll PM you and all the other to-be-sick cats when I post it.