Good Morning from the Shadows [closed]

Frogpaw - or Frog, as she preferred to be called - was restless. The sun was still likely several moments away from peering over the horizon, but the young gray apprentice had already been awake for what felt like days rolling and readjusting in her nest to try to get comfortable. She was grateful for the return of the sun, but the Clans had been without it for so long that her sleeping schedule was still all kinds of messed up. Frog wondered if other Clanmates were having that problem, too, but all of the apprentices in the den were sleeping away beside her. Finally fed up, the she-cat rose from her nest with an exasperated sigh and stomped out. If I'm gonna be awake, I'm gonna be productive... and my mentor's going to do his job! she thought.

Frog stamped towards the warriors' den; for a heartbeat she considered shouting Asterspark's name into the dark den, but she thought better of it as she realized how many warriors she might wake up pre-dawn. Instead, she crept inside to look for her mentor's familiar coat. Once she found him, she gave him a nudge and hissed, "Asterspark! I'm bored, take me hunting!"

With a startled snort, Asterspark abruptly woke from his haunted dreams to see a dark silhouette with piercing green eyes staring at him in the darkness. He quickly leaped up to his paws, claws unsheathing, until he was able to grip his bearings long enough to recognize his apprentice. Huffing irritably, Asterspark collapsed back down into his nest and curled up. "Sheesh, kit, don't spook me like that. It's too early to be up anyway, just wait 'til dawn and I'll probably get up. Maybe." With a yawn, he closed his eyes and almost immediately fell back asleep, snoring softly.

For a moment, Frog was pleased that Asterspark got up right away at her request. When he sank back down, however, and muttered something about waiting until dawn, she narrowed her eyes to glare at the lazy tom, lashing her tail with irritation. She nudged him harder and said, "I'm not a kit, I'm your apprentice. I'm up, so train me." Frog's paws worked excitedly at the ground and said slyly, "If I leave camp to hunt and wind up in trouble, Scorchstar's going to blame you for not disciplining me better."

Tail flicking irritably, Asterspark opened his heterochromic eyes again and glanced up tiredly at Frogpaw. He huffed, then slowly rose from his nest again and stretched out his spine and legs before stepping out into the cold leaf-fall air. He fluffed up his short fur and shivered. "Great StarClan, it's too cold to train now... Can't you just wait until sunhigh or somethin'? If you really need somethin' else to do, I could just make ya get moss or somethin'." He knew Frogpaw wouldn't accept that, so he didn't even wait for her to answer. Padding fully out of the den, he groggily led his apprentice out of camp and into the marshy pine forest.

"Alright," the tom meowed around a wide yawn, "whatcha wanna do first, kit?"

Frog let out a triumphant trill as Asterspark stood from his nest, this time stretching. The apprentice quickly turned and exited the den, waiting for him to follow her out. When he appeared, muttering about makimg her catch moss, she just glared at him, but he had already padded past her and out of the camp into the forest. She followed eagerly, bitter expression switched onto to contentment and alertness as she listened to and scented her surroundings eagerly. At his question, Frog replied hopefully, "We're not on a hunting patrol - we can eat if we catch something, right?"

Asterspark's tail flicked again. "Technically, we aren't on a proper hunting patrol, but consider this: I know how to hunt already, so I can afford to eat what I catch, but you don't know the first thing about hunting real prey. What if you catch only one piece of fresh-kill the entire trip, but you mess up your other attempts, and you had already eaten your prey? Then you'd have nothing else to bring to camp. So in your case, no, sorry, kit."

Frog met her mentor's gaze defiantly for half a moment. She wanted to say "I wouldn't mess up my other attempts" but unfortunately she knew he was right; she'd been an apprentice for less than a quarter moon by this point. She certainly couldn't say that he was wrong, but it stung and infuriated her to hear. Instead, the apprentice puffed out her chest and replied, "Fine, then show me how to hunt. If I catch three pieces of prey, can I eat the fourth one?" Maybe she could bargain her way to breakfast.

”Yeah, sure, why not, I don’t care,” Asterspark mumbled with a dismissive flick of his tail. He stopped once they reached the marshes and stretched out briefly before settling down on his belly, laying down. ”Right, then, off ya go.”

Frog glared at her mentor at his dismissiveness but trotted along at his pace while they traveled to their destination. Once they reached the marshes, however, Frog found her mentor laying on the ground and stretching out, sending her off. She stared at him, stupefied for a moment, then let out a groan of frustration. "You are the worst in the mornings," Frog grumbled at him before turning around and stalking off.

After stomping for a few moments Frog realized she'd scare off any prey nearby if she kept it up, so she muttered "Lazy furball" and slowed down, slipping through the underbrush and hopefully away from her mentor's (probably closed) eyes. She spotted a fat vole and crouched quickly to begin stalking it. Perhaps the vole was as lazy as her mentor, for she pounced on it easily.

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

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'Hunting Dice' : 1

Asterspark flicked his tail as he watched his apprentice catch his first piece of prey, and a storm of jealousy began rising within him. He hadn't been lucky enough to catch anything on his first try when he was an apprentice.

...Poppyheart sure was, though.

That thought began dousing his envious emotions with that of sorrow. Poppyheart had been so proud and so happy when he had told him of his very first catch. Was he ever going to see his brother so happy again? And would that happiness ever be directed at him?

He growled softly and shook his head, forcing the memories to the back of his mind. He didn't want to think about that now. He snorted softly when his eyes met with Frogpaw's; it was clear she was awaiting some sort of appraise, albeit impatiently. With a roll of his eyes, he turned his head away grumpily. "Don't get so full of yourself, kit. Anyone could've made that catch. If you really wanna impress me, you gotta do better than that. How about catchin' a rabbit? If you manage to pull that off, I'll even letcha eat it. Maybe."

Holding the vole in her mouth, Frog's flaming eyes searched Asterspark's for any sign of approval, but he only seemed frustrated and annoyed. The feeling's mutual, she thought irritably, her gray tail-tip lashing as her mentor turned away. How did I end up with the most useless mentor? Frog wondered again as she listened to her mentor's challenge. She set the vole down underneath the edge of a bush. "Oh, sure, I'll get right on hunting with your expert wisdom," the apprentice replied tartly, but his offer to let her eat it was tempting enough. Besides, any excuse to get away from his bad attitude was worth it.

Frog whipped around and stalked away from Asterspark, hoping he wouldn't follow; all the prey would smell his rotten mood for miles. Rabbits would be closer to the WindClan border, probably, since they were known for being WindClan's prey, and so the apprentice adjusted her path towards the borders she'd been shown and hoped for the best. Sure enough the landscape became a little more open and sparse, and Frog began to feel a little exposed. Still, she wanted to prove to Asterspark that she didn't need him or his approval.

A strange sound caught the gray apprentice's attention and she quickly dropped to a crouch, trying to seek out the source of the noise. Some warriors had caught rabbit before, and so she knew vaguely what it smelled like - had she found one? Frog's cold green eyes caught sight of a fluffy bobbing tail on a pale gray-brown body and felt her heart beat faster with excitement both at having found one and with joy at the thought of the challenge ahead of her.

All I need to do is catch this, Frog thought determinedly, and I'll be able to tell Asterspark that I don't even need him! ... And I can eat breakfast, too! Slowly she prowled forward, her dark fur blending well into the few remaining shadows, but after her third step she watched the creature's large ears swivel in her direction. The rabbit froze, twitching whiskers and thumping sides barely visible, and Frog thought, Oh, duh - with such big ears it can hear me. So I need to...

Without another instant's hesitation, Frog launched herself as far as she could across the clearing, shooting for the rabbit with all her speed. In a panic and on unfamiliar territory, the rabbit scrambled the wrong way into Frog's eagerly waiting claws. She hooked it and sunk her teeth in with a victorious snarl, feeling proud when it went limp underneath her. Frog crouched and began to dig in.

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

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'Hunting Dice' : 1