stick em up [o]

Speckled white toes drew to a stop a hair's length from the SkyClan border. There was no physical barrier here... no fence or wall or stone to bar his path, and yet... Wolf couldn't help the way the hairs on the back of his neck stood at attention, or the rapid thrumming of his heartbeat as it quickened well past its normal pace. Nor could he curb the instinct that was screaming at him to turn back, to seek unoccupied territory... but... this was his territory, or so at least that's what he'd been told, and he trusted that information with every fiber of his being. This border was here to keep out enemies, and strangers... but Wolf was neither of those things, he was simply returning home, and so no one bearing the scent of SkyClan could hurt him. Besides, he'd been here before, walked every tail-length of the border Twolegplace shared with SkyClan at his father's side. He had no reason to be concerned. Wolf's hackles dropped, and he snorted, shaking his head to clear any notion that what he was doing was wrong or even dangerous.

SkyClan doesn't make a habit of attacking helpless kits, Sunfire had told him. He remembered that part vividly, because it had hurt his feelings. Wolf wasn't helpless, he'd been training to fight since the day he could stand on all four paws! Not that he would have dared utter that challenge aloud, any more than he could have been bothered to remember the part where Sunfire had told him to wait at the border for someone to come find him.  

Instead, he would just prove his father wrong. He would make it all the way to camp, and demand they allow him in... he could see now how impressed the older tom would be at his daring. Yellow gaze glittering with determination, Wolf lifted a paw, staring at it for a moment before quickly and forcefully slamming it down on the other side of the border. There, he froze, ears slick to the sides of his head, eyes darting about as if expecting some wail to go up in the night, a signal that he was here, trespassing.

Nothing.

Emboldened, the tom kit strode forward, silver-brown coat shining under the glow of the half-moon. Another pause, as he flicked his nose this way and that, trying to orient himself. Wolf had been told much about SkyClan's territory... how there were tall trees, good for climbing, dense thickets with plentiful prey... and a safe, walled camp right in the heart of the territory. That's where he had to go - the camp. That's where SkyClan would be. The only issue was, how to find it. He knew the basic layout of the territories - the river separated SkyClan from RiverClan, and ThunderClan was on the other side of SkyClan's territory, so that meant, whichever direction he went, as long as it wasn't Twolegplace or the river, he'd stay in the right area. And the camp couldn't be that hard to find, right?

...

Wolf didn't know how long it had been, but with the sky growing paler by the minute, it had to be close to dawn. The first hour, the kit had been filled with determination... and every hour past that one had drained that determination until it was as low to the ground as his drooping tail. He was exhausted, he was hungry, but most importantly he was lost. The tom sighed and fell to his haunches, shoulders slumped. How was he supposed to be a good SkyClan warrior if he couldn't even find the camp? Dark-tipped ears flicked towards the sound of crunching leaves underfoot. Had Sunfire come to find him? Or was it a fox? A badger? He'd been warned about the possibilities of encountering a predator. The marbled tom stood tall - or, at least as tall as a barely apprentice aged kit could - and whipped around to face the source of the noise, claws out and ready to fight, whatever he found there.

Snowpaw, true to his name, was as white as snow without a single marking to break up his outline. He'd inherited Falconmoon's fiery azure gaze, yet was as light and quiet on his feet as a breeze. He'd been out with a warrior that was not his mentor when he was told to stay behind, as a scent o a badger had caught the attention of the patrol. Snowpaw rarely spoke, so he nodded, and watched as the patrol left without him. He was a phenomenal climber and may as well have been a bird with his ability to practically glide through trees. His patrol knew that if he needed to escape danger, he could, and he would be fine. The pale tom sat there for several moments, waiting, silently listening to the world around him. He was carefully scenting even the slightest breeze in the hopes that he'd pick up on it's message from afar. How had his patrol fared? Was the badger found?

That wasn't the message that the wind brought him at all... but it told the story of another intruder... one that smelled of lands from beyond. Spinning his head in the direction the breeze had traveled from, his ears were pricked forward and his eyes widened, taking in as much detail of his pine-filled, rocky landscape as possible. The tom was an alabaster statue for several more heartbeats, straining to hear; Straining to see. Nothing. The breeze hadn't changed direction though, and the more he scented it, the more he realized something: This intruder did not smell of an adult. A tom, yes, but not the heavy, musky scent that adults had. This realization made him blink, and made him more curious than he was fearful. He hadn't been truly fearful at all really, but had been tense.

His muscles relaxed. The quiet apprentice made up his mind and climbed the nearest tree. All that he left behind were faint claw marks as he ascended, ones that were shallow enough they could easily be mistaken for squirrel claws. Practically floating from branch to branch in practiced silence, he made his way to where he thought the scent was originating. He was fairly calm for a time, until he actually spotted the intruder. A flash of adrenaline. A slip of the paw. Bark fell around the other tom, causing a distraction that could have been mistaken for pawsteps. Albeit unintentional, that is exactly what it did.

Snowpaw stopped on a branch above and to the right of the intruder. He took in the other tom's appearance, surprised that he looked even younger than Snowpaw himself was. His adrenaline died down swiftly, and instead was replaced with compassion and concern.

"Are you lost?" A voice came from the branches above. A soft voice... and despite his name... a warm voice as well. He still didn't want to come down from the trees though, just in case this was some sort of clever trap.

He was stiff as a board for several long heartbeats, nose furiously sniffing to see if he could put a scent to the noise, but there were so many scents here, all together, and on top of each other, and he could hardly make heads or tails of it all. When a moment had passed, and no threat presented itself, Wolf began to relax. Maybe it had been a mouse, or a bird. The kit sank to his belly, ready to continue lamenting over his misfortune, when a quiet, concerned voice from above asked him if he was lost.

Wolf blinked, tipping his head back. Wide yellow eyes regarded Snowpaw with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion. "No, of course I'm not lost," he lied, as tough as he could despite the stubbornly lingering kit-squeak still clinging to his voice. He rose and put his forepaws against the base of the tree, calling up and making no attempt to be stealthy: "Who are you? Are you from SkyClan? I need you to take me to your camp, now!" He was demanding, but not unkind, and he returned the tom's blue-eyed stare with one of his own. The sympathy in the other tom's gaze made Wolf self-conscious, and he didn't like it, but... he also didn't want to wander around for another half-day before he found the camp, and if that meant allowing someone to dote on him, he'd suffer the indignity, for just a little while.

Snowpaw didn't know what to make of the kit. The lie was obvious, but he made no move to call the other tom out. Once he began to speak again, Snowpaw's fur fluffed out as anxiety struck him. "Climb up here with me. There is a badger in this area and I don't want to attract it." He glanced around quickly as if it were about to come flying out of some void nearby. He'd always been cautious, and he never did learn how to trust that everything would be fine.

"I am Snowpaw of Skyclan, yes, but what business do you have with us and how do you know who we are?" Again, the caution. It was so deeply rooted in him he didn't know that he would ever be free of it. "Even if you are a kit, I can't just take you to camp just because you asked." Yes he could, but he wasn't about to with more information first.

Blinking, up at the white tom, Wolf frowned. A badger? He flicked his glance left, then right, and didn't see anything, but Snowpaw's words had been enough to make his hackles prickle uncomfortably again. "I'm not afraid of a badger!" he hissed unconvincingly, but nevertheless it was only a second later that he was clawing his way up the tree. There, he balanced on the branch with little effort, finally face-to-face with the other tom as he introduced himself.

Wolf leaned in probably a little too closely to be considered polite, his pink and gray splotched nose twitching as he drew in Snowpaw's scent. Definitely SkyClan. The mottled tom sank back on his haunches, head tilted slightly to one side. "Snowpaw," he tested the name aloud. So he was an apprentice, like Wolf would be soon no doubt. He just had to get to camp first.

"Well, Snowpaw, I'm Wolf." His father had called him Wolfkit at first, but had dropped the latter half of the name once he'd started training. He'd just been Wolf since then, and would be until he had his apprentice ceremony. "My dad told me 'find SkyClan and stay there until I come back'." he tried his best to deepen the timbre of his voice to match Sunfire's as he quoted, but it ended up only sounding silly.

"He'll be here soon, too! I just wanted to make sure I beat him to camp, cuz if I don't he's-" the young tom paused and frowned, picturing his father's disappointed expression. "He'll be sore at me for taking so long to find it." He lied again, wondering if he would have had more luck just waiting by the border.

Snowpaw felt relief as the other tom climbed up to him. What startled him slightly was the... closeness as he inhaled Snowpaw's scent. The pure white tom made a face, but wiped it away quickly. Before he could say anything, the other tom was talking again. Now he was saying things that were... intriguing.

"Just Wolf? Our leader is named Wolfstar..." And at the mention of his father... Snowpaw's eyes narrowed, both suspicious and curious. "Was your dad... an exile? I don't recall hearing about one but I don't imagine exiled cats get mentioned much. What's his name?" And again, Snowpaw avoided talking about where the camp was. He still wasn't sure, still wasn't convinced.

He actually glanced around them, scented the air as it changed... he still didn't detect anyone besides them. Maybe he was paranoid... maybe there was no trap... But caution never hurt.

The young tom nodded at Snowpaw's words, ready to confirm that he had, in fact, been named after the leader, when the apprentice suggested that his father was an exile. Hot yellow eyes narrowed on the white tom, and his tail lashed. Sunfire, an exile. What a ridiculous statement. "Uh, no," Wolf scoffed, blinking indignantly at him. "My father is a great SkyClan warrior!"

"If you won't help me, I'll just find the camp myself!" He snapped. The young tom gave Snowpaw the most scathing look he could muster - which is to say, not very - and began climbing backwards down the tree, muttering under his breath. Why even bother interrupting, if he wasn't going to be helpful? Annoyed, Wolf started off in a random direction... not very stealthily.