oh, great master of plants [closed]

Snakepaw was bored and Rookfire was busy. Some cat had told him to attend to the elders, which he did for a bit, before wandering off in pursuit of mousebile. Admittedly, the mousebile thing had been so long ago that he had forgotten about it. By avoiding other cats, slipping through shadows, in and out of dens... he avoided any cat potentially looking for him. It was also in the apprentice's favor that few cats were looking for him. Given how early in the day it was, the elders were still rather sleepy. The thought of being so old and useless made him uncomfortable - it was why he hated elder duties so much. Well, that that he specifically wanted to be useful, he simply wanted to do what he wanted to do. And right now, that was to seek out Fuzzypaw. Surely, his brother would have interesting plants sitting around that stuffy sick den.

He slid through, sticking close to the walls. Once he found the neat little stacks of herbs, Snakepaw fell to his side and flipped on his back. Fuzzypaw was there, he'd seen him, but chose not to speak until he was comfortable. Once looking at the neat bundles upside down, he flicked a claw over one, "Sure got a lot of stuff in here, Fuzzypaw. Is any of it good to eat? Probably tastes different from prey too, huh?" He didn't wait for a response, with a flick of his paw, Snakepaw was already chomping down on one of the dried leaves. Bits of the foliage fell from the sides of upside-down maw and his nose screwed up. For as bitter and unsavory as the leaf was, Snakepaw was committed and swallowed down the whole thing.

Fuzzypaw was doing his best to learn his herbs. Basilbloom was in the nursery doing checkups while he stayed back and sorted their stock. He was embarrassed to admit, but he would sometimes wake up at night and look at the stacks, because it was a lot of memorization, something Fuzzypaw wasn’t good at. He hoped Basilbloom was proud of him…

“Tansy,” he meowed as he was making stacks.

“Chervil.”
“Burdock roots.”
“Catmint.”
He scrunched his face as he glanced at a new herb, a yellow flower. Rats’ tails, what was this one again..?
“Uh… Stars… Uh…?”
He scrunched his face as he strained his brain. It was either coltsfoot or a dandelion, but they looked a lot alike.
“Coltsfoot!”

He heard something behind him, shuffling into the den. Fuzzypaw’s ears swiveled to the sound, turning to face it.

“Hey Basil—”
The fluffy brown tom looked up. “Oh, Snakepaw!”

He wasn’t fast enough; his brother took a big bite of burdock root.

“Snakepaw, no! That’s for rat bites, it can make you sick!”

He stared at his brother, mouth open. Basilbloom was going to kill him.

At the panic that welled up from his brother, Snakepaw only really twitched an ear. It would make him sick, huh? Well, he could take it. He pressed his shoulders further into the dirt, getting more comfortable as he twisted to look at Fuzzypaw, "It can't be too bad, right? Besides, good to know how this stuff works. Might help you learn or something." The justification was rather weak and illogical but that spoke of his indifference more than anything. Something occurred to him from this upside-down spot on the ground and he blinked up at his brother, "I might as well stay here then just so you make sure I don't die or anything. How long do you think it'll take to make me sick?" Alright, he was flipping onto his side, claws delicately seeking out more herbs. If he was going to be stuck here, he wanted to be entertained at least.

Fuzzypaw scrunched his face at Snakepaw’s weak defense. “You can’t just eat any plant or berry, Snakepaw…”

“Take a snooze in my nest,” Fuzzypaw replied, hoping he could stop him from eating the herbs. “With any luck, you won’t get sick, but eating it can make you throw up.”

The tom’s fluffy tail flicked in irritation as he tried to put the piles back where they belonged.

“How’s your apprenticeship going?”

"Well, where's the fun in that..." Snakepaw let out an exaggerated sigh, shrugging slightly. He understood that it was something that he wanted to do, even if it was something he was not supposed to do, and that simple rationale was enough for him. Usually, the tom was wholly unaffected by the desires of others and yet he found himself complying with the orders. Fuzzypaw always seemed a step away from having a bee up his nose. With any other cat, that would have caused a broad grin across his maw. Exasperation was one thing but for some reason he'd never particularly relished in his kin's anger, unlike with others around him.

His stomach didn't seem too upset yet. Instead, his piercing yellow gaze stared at the dried stacks of plants in longing for more. Snakepaw's tail lashed as the desire to chomp down on more of them burned in his belly. Instead, he began to pick at the edge of the nest with his claws. The motions were tiny and precise - distracting. He heard Fuzzypaw's question and meowed, "Alright I guess. I like to chase down rats. Rookfire says not to get lost in the marshes but it sounds fun. I'll probably do that sometime."

Chasing rats hardly seemed entertaining to Fuzzypaw, but it was nice to see his brother excited about something.

“The marsh is really wet and slippery, you’d probably get all muddy.”

Fuzzypaw did not inherit the sleek fur that Snakepaw had, instead he was bushy, almost cloud-like, with no control with it whatsoever.

“It’s great to get moss, though, and the nests always need more of that.”