A Missing Cricket (c)

Dandelionflight padded through the golden forest, stopping to sniff the nearby trees every few steps. She hadn’t been able to find Cricketpaw when she went to get him for training. No one else had seemed to remember him leaving when she asked the cats in camp.

Dandelionflight had decided to wait a bit and see if he showed up, but he hadn’t after she waited for what seemed like forever. A feeling of anxiety seemed to way her down as she scanned the forest for any sign of his tabby pelt. She continued to search through the crunching piles of leaves for a sign of her missing apprentice, when she suddenly caught scent of him on the wind. “Cricketpaw!” She yowled, hoping he was nearby.

From off in the distance, the tom swore he could hear his name carry over the wind. Cricketpaw's ear flicked, turning to try to trace the source of the sound. He pulled away from the group and trotted in the direction of the voice. There was a tabby pelt below that he picked up quickly from the trees above. The dark-striped apprentice leaped over, bouncing from branch to branch, he stopped short above Dandelionflight. A friendly smile was painted across his features as he recognized the warrior who was his mentor, "Dandelionflight! Hello! What are you doing out here?"

Cricketpaw’s reply shocked Dandelionflight, and she stood there looking at him for a few heartbeats. When she finally came back to her senses, she meowed, “I’ve been looking for you! We were supposed to have training this morning and I couldn’t find you!” While she was slightly angry, Dandelionflight was also very relieved that Cricketpaw was okay. She had feared that he ran off somewhere and got himself hurt. Finding out that Cricketpaw was okay had caused the thought of where had been to slip out of her mind, but she suddenly remembered and meowed, “Where were you?” He didn’t seem to have been hurt, so at least it wasn’t anywhere that bad.