i don't wanna be the one that's left behind

When things began to calm down (not by much, just a little, but she thought it was the best they'd get for now) in WindClan, Thalia left Pyrik - whose shadow she'd been hiding in, and she was quite grateful he'd allowed her to do so - and slipped out of the camp. She would have dashed away, but her fox-skin was already loose on her shoulders, and the last thing she wanted was for it to fall off the rest of the way - then she'd have to carefully drag it out of the WindClan cats' camp, and probably get one of the Pelt Wards to clean it for her. She didn't want to be a bother to them when it was perfectly avoidable, so she took a normal pace.

As an Asylum cat, she was afforded a freedom that their new WindClan family was not: the safety of solitude, for she could leave their camp to do as she liked while other cats handled the things that needed doing. She wanted to be alone, for the moment - maybe later she would take Roe up on his offer to talk, or approach one of the other cats she knew. Maybe - if she felt safe enough to approach the WindClan cats again - she'd even try to get to know Lilacpaw, who'd seemed nice enough, a little better.

As it was, though, she needed to think. And to think, she needed to be alone - or at least away from the crowded camp, where all she could feel was the glares of the WindClan cats and all she could hear was their echoing words. She had to reflect on what had happened tonight, to figure out how she could do better.

She'd tried to keep quiet, to remain undetected at first; but when Theron and Roe had shared their stories she felt driven to share her own, and she supposed she ought to have known better. She was younger, more inexperienced - and while she could defend herself against tooth and claw, had killed the fox whose fur she hid beneath with her own four paws, she was far less capable of defending against sharp words. They stuck to her like brambles, sunk into her mind until she couldn't shake them.

Her worst-case scenario had come to pass: her pelt had fallen to reveal the tears streaking down her face, to show them that she was the weak one; the Nightstriker who couldn't keep her cool in the face of a few harsh words, who couldn't even keep her pelt on straight.

But even that wasn't the worst part. No.

Because Captain Theron had noticed; and she was sure she'd disappointed her captain. She'd been selected to be a Nightstriker - Theron had seen something in her, something she couldn't even see in herself; Theron thought she had what it took to be good at this - and she had failed in her first real test: she'd failed to keep herself calm and collected, and - while this wasn't any sort of order she'd received, just something she'd tried to do for her own sake - she'd failed to keep her face hidden.

She didn't want to get left behind by her peers, didn't want to spend the rest of her life as the weak link of the Nightstrikers. Thinking of the cats she'd grown up with, the other younger Asylum cats, she thought about how she didn't want to be left behind as they moved on and grew stronger, more experienced. But in that moment, it felt like she didn't have a choice: the world would move on with our without her, and she had to chase after them or risk them fading out of sight.

She took a deep breath. It would be okay, she reminded herself - she wasn't alone; she was never alone. She had her family, and she knew that she could always count on the other Asylum cats. In time, everything would be okay, and everything would make sense. She'd had one rough day, this wasn't going to be the end of the world.

For now, she took in the territory that would be her home for the time being - really seeing it for the first time. It was grassland, stretching further than she could see, and far too open for her liking. It was too easy to be noticed, for a cat whose life was stalking the shadows. The only appeal she could see to this way of living was the sky, clear and easy to see with nothing to block the view. The stars were quite pretty, after all.

But it wasn't enough to make her like it. They didn't even sleep in proper dens in WindClan, though their leader had mentioned burrows - she supposed she'd make her nest in one of those, for what small amount of cover it might provide, but she'd miss the cover of a proper den as well as the knowledge that she was in good company.

As she thought about making her nest, she felt herself growing tired. The rush of her first real interaction with outsiders was wearing off, it seemed, revealing just how much the ordeal had exhausted her. Slowly - though she wanted to keep her distance, she knew she had to go back eventually - she started to make her way back to where she started, wondering how long it would take to find an acceptable place to fall asleep.