Tarnished Pride (open, Muddythorn needed)

Mountainpaw limped back towards camp. He had just fought Starlingflare at the border and had gotten beaten very severally.

This was completely humiliating for him, usually mountainpaw would not ask for help and would even be a jerk if someone offered help to him under normal situations. But as much as he was a jerk Mountainpaw was not completely stupid he knew he was close to death if he didn't get some immediate assistance.

He was exhausted and he wasn't sure if he could make it back. He shivered as he lost more and more of his blood from the many open wounds covering his body and the cold wind blew through the trees.

His vision blurred as he got near to camp... He was so close

Help! Please help meeee he called out in a raspy voice. He whimpered in pain as he tried to keep moving forward. The world started to spin and get fuzzy. No no no dont pass out he though desperately.

He took a few more steps before darkness covered his entire vision and he fainted very close to the camp entrance.

“Oh my stars!” Dawnfeather bounded over, dropping the quail she’d painstakingly selected. “Mountainpaw? Mountainpaw? Muddythorn!” She called, flicking her tail. ”Mountainpaw, can you hear me? Try to stay awake- I know it hurts- spiderwebs, poppy seeds, Muddy?”

She carefully licked at some of the tom’s wounds, waiting for her older brother to appear with what was needed. The apprentice had lost a lot of blood- but she was confident in Muddy’s abilities. After all, he’d healed her when she’d been in a worse place.

“It’s too cold-“ Very gently, sure to not get dirt or snow in the tom’s wounds, she grabbed his scruff and began moving him towards the medicine den.

Shouts from just outside camp made Muddythorn hurry out of his den, tripping on a few piles he had made. Dawnfeather, dragging and unconscious apprentice, was making her way across camp. "Dawn! Wait, don't move him, I'll bring what I need." He knew his sister was being as careful as possible, but this was the same warrior who had managed to get her wounds covered in mud. Better to be safe than sorry. He couldn't do any form of diagnosis from a distance, even if he could see that far, but he could definitely pick up that all too familiar scent of blood, and see a flash of red on Mountainpaw's normally undisrupted grey pelt.

He brought the basics, what he usually used on cases like these; if he needed anything extra, he could send Dawn back to his den, she could identify a lot of the herbs from their hunts together. Cobwebs to seal the wound, marigold and oak leaf to stop the infection and chamomile to try and keep him from fainting again. He ran to where the other two waited, herbs clutched in his jaws. "Can you try and get him to eat this," Muddythorn said, pushing the little white flowers of chamomile towards his sister. "We won't give him and poppy seeds, they'll just make him drowsier and it'll be better for him to be awake. Even if it might hurt a bit more." He explained whilst he got the oak and marigold ready to chew up.

Maybe if he got an apprentice like his mother had kept mentioning, he wouldn't have to use his warrior sister as an assistant, but for now she was happy to help, and if anything he just needed an extra set of paws. Get an apprentice then, I'm sure we'll have someone in the clan who wants to, he could practically hear Primroselight saying that now. Or that voice was just his voice of reason, which for some unknown reason sounded just like his mother. 

The poultice was ready, so he gently spread it on Mountainpaw's worse wounds. With smaller scratches, he could just keep an eye on them so they didn't get infected. Now the medicine cat closed them with cobwebs, until the grey apprentice looked as if he'd ran through the home of the largest spider imaginable. Only after did he remember how short he was on herbs, but if he couldn't use them for cases like this, what was the point in having them?

"Hey, Mountainpaw? Can you hear me?" He said, a soft paw on the tom's head. Luckily he didn't have a fever, so nothing was infected yet. It appeared nothing was broken, so he added, "Can we try and move you to my den? It'll be warmer there, but if anything hurts too much just let me know and we can stop."

Mountainpaw awoke, he could hear a commotion going on but everything was so fuzzy. He felt someone dragging him along and could tell by the voice it was Dawnfeather. He slipped in and out of consciousness for a bit.

Shortly later he could feel Muddythorn tending to his wounds. The expertise of the medicine cat quickly stopped his wounds from bleeding.

What was that? Muddythorn was trying to ask him something. He couldn't make it out all the way but he got enough to know they wanted to move him to the med den.

He nodded slowly and shakily got to his feet he leaned pretty heavily on Muddythorn and Dawnfeather as he got up.

Half walking and half getting supported by his clanmates Mountainpaw made it into camp. Oh this is embarrassing everyone's gonna see I just got absolutely destroyed in a fight. he thought to himself.

Finally he was in the med den. Muddythorn was right it was way warmer in here out of the wind and cold.

Mountianpaw collapsed into a patient nest. He was exhausted Thunderclan's gonna pay for this he said angerly.

He quickly dozed off into a deep sleep.

Dawnfeather nodded as Muddythorn ran up, breathing a sigh of relief. Muddy would know what to do- Muddy always knew what to do. Flowers? She didn’t waste time recalling what they were, instead gently prompting the prone tom to eat them. “Oooh, okay!” Muddy always had an explanation, and it always made sense, even to her.

Oh, he was alright enough to walk, even if the two siblings ended up half-carrying him. He almost-stumbled into a nest, and just as Dawnfeather was laying her tail across her brother’s back and congratulating him on what a great job he’d done, the apprentice spoke one last time.

“ThunderClan? Don’t they- don’t they have Newtspring’s ma? And Spottedfrog and Bearflower-“ the list continued in her head, but she ignored it- “Is Mountainpaw alright?” She suddenly asked, noting how he’d gone limp. ”He’s a nice cat at heart, really Muddy!” She thought. Maybe.