WindClan Medicine Cat's Den

[MangofDoom]

╔ Poppysong ═ ✱
╚ windclan warrior║nb they/them║20 moons║tags; @Alchemist Kitsune

═ ═ ═

Poppysong’s skin feels as if it is on fire. Any little bump to their leg shoots unbelievable pain up their leg, echoing around their bones.

“Hello-?” Poppysong calls, their voice cracking, tears brimming their eyes. Their leg, which is hung in the air, is twisted, crudely wrapped in leaves and cobwebs. It’s obvious to anyone with medical knowledge that they wrapped it themself.

Yet, Poppysong stands just before the entrance, staring at the ground. They keep flinching, hesitating, nearly putting their paw over the border, but each time they stop. They close their eyes. It’s going to be fine. It’ll be fine. No one’s died since… Leafspot.

Pushing any thoughts out of their mine, Poppysong steps into the medicine cat den, eyes closed, trying desperately not to think about how small it is. How little air there is in here.

[GoldenRavenWings]

Mistyfalls walked into the den, supporting Thriftfall with her shoulder. Lightningstorm. Some dumb shadowclan cat attacked him and me and Birdpaw here were patrolling there. Seems to be permanent but ofcourse I’m not sure. She glanced anxiously back at a worried Birdpaw. @Katiethewolfchild @Spookez. @Alchemist Kitsune

[Spookez.]

Thriftfall

❖--- 28-moon-old Windclan Warrior. ---❖

By the time he got to the medicine den, he was calmed down. He had already gotten used to not being able to see. Leaning on Mistyfalls helped. But he did hold a forever grudge against whoever that was who did this to him. Just thinking of the cocky Shadowclan warrior made him want to scream.

Taking another gulp of air, he was blasted with the familiar scent of the comfy medicine den. To think he used to be scared of this place. Didn't a medicine cat get exiled for poisoning herbs? Cowtuft was it? The herb supply would be low due to the large number of herbs that had to be removed... (Due to the poisoning,) He sighed. This would be a long visit.

@Ravenswings @Katiethewolfchild |

[Alchemist Kitsune]

| Lightningstorm |
Flock Together [Tier 3] - Inactive

---

A small purr escaped the petite healer, blinking gratefully at the young kit. It seemed that even in the darkest of times, there would always be at least somebody looking out for her. It was an admitted boost to her bruised spirit. Lightningstorm had simply been so overworked lately, it was all she could do to stay standing. To not collapse in a mess of anxiety and frustration, the lack of sleep getting to her. She just didn't have the time to afford such moments of selfish thinking. It felt as if the moment she stopped working on this plague, she wouldn't be able to focus again. That whatever was going on would keep escalating. Just... a nasty feeling in the pit of her stomach that refused to go away.

Glows visit seemed to have been helpful for more than just glow. She had helped settle glows concerns after glows nightmare, yes, but glow had also rekindled that flame. The one to let her keep going. The one that reminded her that it was for cats like glow that she kept going, making sure she lost none of her clanmates along the way. Or at least... save as many as she could. Loss was inevitable. You learned that easy in this path of life. It was easy to get lost in it. Forget the brighter moments. Like a kind kit wanting to make sure the no bad monsters would take their medicine cat away.

"Hmmm. You do have a point, love. Should best be staying over, make sure nobody needs me in the dead of night. I'll accompany you back to the nursery, though. Keep those nasty hawks well away together. What say you?" the spotted healer purred, dipping her head as she attempted to give Mintkit a small lick on glows head.

---

@Partypooper [Mintkit]
| Seeing as how this started before Cowtuft was exiled and back when Mint was an itty bitty kitty, I think it would be safe to finish it here? Feel free to contact me again at some point for another roleplay between the two if you'd like - once I catch up with the medicine cat den responses - though, and have Mint have a finisher here as well! This was a really cute roleplay between the two! I don't get a lot of those for Lightning. Thank you. |

[19796]

@Estelte is taking tinykit in @Alchemist Kitsune


OUCH! TinyKit yowled being carried in, bleeding from his belly a bit

[Alchemist Kitsune]

| Lightningstorm |
Flock Together [Tier 3] - Inactive

---

Things were chaotic of late. No more deaths that she was aware of, but that did not mean Lightningstorm could get careless. She had gone out for a breath of fresh air. Hoping to find a certain, cute tabby in the process. Unfortunately, it seemed her self proclaimed nemesis was nowhere to be seen, so after a quick vole, it was back to work... or so she had thought.

Dark nose wrinkling with curiosity, the spotted healer's ears perked up, head tilting at the sight of a kit just... alone at the den's entrance. She considered saying hello, but even as she opened her maw to speak, the lithe calico couldn't help but notice something was... different. The kit's walking seemed random. As if completely unaware of their surroundings. Could Cowtuft be right? Could there really be a plague? Was this kit experiencing confusion from illness?

"Hey there, love? Can I help you?" Lightningstorm called out to the little one, struggling for a moment to remember their name... and promptly feeling embarrassed once she remembered...

You'd think Cowkit would be an easy enough name to commit to memory? Still, as far as she knew, this kit was fairly new to the clan, and with everything that had been going on the past few moons, she wasn't familiar with them. Perhaps Cowtuft was? Maybe the kit had simply come to ask for her mentor, curious to meet the giant they shared a name with and was confused when they hadn't found him? The medicine den could be a little tricky to navigate through, after all.

---

@Kass [Cowkit]
| Sorry with how long this took to get to! I was uncertain how to proceed with this as Cowtuft was technically still in the clan when this was posted and he was still the head medicine cat! I'll be treating it as if it happened in the past before Cowtuft's exile to keep it concurrent to the timeline set originally, but assume that Cowtuft is out of the camp for some reason during this visit? I'm assuming Lightningstorm will slowly notice Cowkit isn't responding and she'll be bringing them up to Twilightstar so she can choose what to do with them while Cowtuft arrives and then timeskip from there? |

[Alchemist Kitsune]

| Lightningstorm |
Flock Together [Tier 3] - Inactive

---

Ice seemed to freeze up the healer's veins at the leader's words, dread taking over her. Surely... surely Twilightstar wasn't even entertaining the thought that Cowtuft had... No, no that wasn't right! That couldn't be right! She needed Twilightstar to be the voice of reason, not fall down a pit of paranoia and delusions like she was in the verge of right now. She needed someone more knowledgeable to scoff at the mere idea. To satiate the fact that it was ludicrous to even consider the possibility that WindClan's resident goofball of a medicine cat could resort to something so dark as... No. It wasn't true. She simply wouldn't allow it!

The order caught her attention as she felt her sanity grasping away from her once more, and in a moment she did as she was told, taking a deep breath that rattled within her, doing little to soothe her wounded soul. She had to calm down, however. It was a must. WindClanners' lives were at stake. What was a medicine cat if not the one who was meant to avoid all of this? Stars... Oh, why couldn't she have bumped into Cowtuft first? Surely he would have explained the meaning of this! Let her know there was nothing to worry about! Instead it was up to her to make sense of the completed picture, and try as much as she wanted, she wasn't fond of what she saw.

"This way," she mewed hurriedly, rushing back into the den, leading Twilightstar to the scene of her discovery... and praying against hope that somehow the lilac she-cat would be able to see something she had missed, find some clue as to who the real culprit could be behind this mess... because it wasn't her mentor... it just couldn't be.

---

@Moonraven [Twilightstar]
| Sort of let this drop after the event sort of sprung on us ahead of schedule, but felt bad that we never got to finish this as Lightning and Twilight never really get to interact! I know this is well over, so feel free to ignore it, but if you want to do a closer with Twilightstar seeing the berries and where they are hidden before the riots started in the clearing I'm good with that. |

[Alchemist Kitsune]

| Lightningstorm |
Flock Together [Tier 3] - Inactive

---

A voice echoed loudly throughout the empty medicine cat's den, instantly giving the skinny feline a headache. When had she last spoken to another cat? Probably when she'd sent out patrols... Other than that, she had kept mostly to herself, and it showed. Her usually sleek, short fur was ruffled up, once lapis blue hues dull and sunken, only the light of suspicion in them as she pointedly glared upwards, her hackles raising by instinct before she settled herself. The scent of blood was in the air, meaning that the warrior who called her now had banged herself up pretty roughly, a fact that the hare brain decided to summarize with the eloquence of a angry badger. With some effort, the medicine cat exited the herb storage - a place she rarely left as she kept a close guard, ignoring it only when the pangs of hunger were too severe and she found herself forced to leave the camp and hunt for a meal - and met up with her patient.

She recognized the she-cat at once. Unlike her predecessor, Lightningstorm made a point to remember every face. She committed everyone to memory. Ever since she had helped bury a warrior whose name she had not known... she had witnessed the death of another whose identity had remained a mystery until much later... she had made it a point to know everyone. Remember every face and every name. Because they were her clan, and she would always know what ailed each and every one of them and never let them suffer. Not if she could help it. How naive she'd been when she'd come to such decisions. Bright eyed, full of pride in her job and her clan... she wondered if she would have made the same choices if she'd known she was nothing more than a prisoner waiting to be executed on a moment of caprice when she was younger. Probably... Despite her need for logic and reason, she never could escape her needlessly emotional commitment to helping... even if the cats she helped would be the death of her sooner rather than later.

A quick survey of Nighthail let her know that she was indeed in need of being patched up, and she had to fight back the urge to ask her if there was anything else she wished to add to her already extensive, well worded diagnosis. Just because she would have joked around and teased these cats before it didn't mean she could do so anymore. They had made it clear she was not their friend, only their servant. Not a part of the clan, merely one tolerated to stick to the fringes of it as long as she did her job, and even then her life would be forfeit on a whim. To hell with facts and evidence. It was the loudest of voices who triumphed over reality, after all, no matter how idiotic the words spouted were.

"I'll go gather the herbs. Stay here," she mewed in an automatic, unfeeling voice as she turned around, heading back the way she'd come from.

There weren't a lot of herbs in their stores. Twilightstar had sent for patrols as had she, but true to form, the cats of WindClan didn't care. Any sentiment they held towards loyalty and clan unity was a farce carried only when they could use it to feel the blood running down their claws. When it came down to it the clan was a pathetic mess filled with nothing but narcissistic cats in need of a reality check. She would have assumed this was the reason that StarClan had cared less when so many had fallen prey to whatever traitorous arse had decided to poison their herbs, effectively leaving them weakened for leafbare in the process. But then... StarClan itself had already tried to help her, had started doing so since Cowtuft had left - the rats - so that threw that theory straight across the border line. And despite the efforts of WindClan as a whole to dig their own graves, a paltry few did bring what sparse medicine they could find, helping a clan that frankly hadn't a clue how lucky they were to have them.

It didn't take long for Lightningstorm to find what she sought. Marigold to combat potential infection. Cobwebs to keep the poultice in place and avoid the flow of blood. And her cleaning moss. A tool she had picked up at one point to clear out injuries before applying medication to them and had somehow stuck around with it.

Reaching Nighthail once more, the medicine cat dropped her tools, picking a smooth rock she kept by the flowing stream within the den - frosted now but not frozen over - and began her work, wetting the moss before approaching the dark warrior, attempting to clear the injuries while checking for any potentially broken ribs or internal bruising. It seemed the warrior had been lucky as far as bones went, and content with the cleanliness of the wounds, the lithe calico turned to the marigold, stomping it gently over the moist rock until a poultice was well made, smearing it gently over the tears covering her body before wrapping them up, remaining silent as she worked. The wounds were extensive. No doubt painful, as well. Unfortunately, while she could keep infection at bay, there was nothing she could do for the pain. Not for now, in any case. Perhaps she would venture out in search of herbs herself soon. If she could afford to leave her den unattended. Risk losing the precious few she already had to more poison. At least she knew what she was looking for now... but while she was certain no cat would suffer from the poison itself, the loss of the medicine would be devastating all the same.

"Leave the cobwebs on for a few days, and stay on nest rest while those seal. If that's all, we are done here," Lightningstorm mewed, staring blankly at the warrior before she padded away, back to her wad of moss so she could resume her guard over the scarce herb stores available to the clan.

---

@furrensic [Nighthail]
| Pain medication hasn't arrived yet at the clan, but I figured there was enough back in the storage by now to begin tending some of the patients. Unless Nighthail needs something else, she should be back in good health in a few days as long as she gets a good rest. |

[Alchemist Kitsune]

| Lightningstorm |
Flock Together [Tier 3] - Inactive

---

Dainty paws pounded the ground, lungs burning as the sound of cackling and derisive hoots of malicious glee surrounded the fleeing calico. She could hear one of the voices cry out how they'd found her, murderous blood lust clear in the androgynous voice. Tears of fear stung at the corner of the healer's eyes as she realized her fate had caught up with her. She didn't even know what had happened. She'd been out, hunting for a meal. Her arrival at the camp had been met with beady, black eyes glittering in her direction as the cry for action was crowed. And then they were upon her. Like a clowder of rats they surrounded her. Would have killed her in an instant if her speed hadn't been up to par. Why, oh why hadn't she left with Cowtuft?

She didn't see it. The small break on the ground. She fell and skidded across the fiery fields... which she just now realized were void of snow. Coughing as the smoke filled her lungs - had it been this way when she'd been fleeing before - she saw them. The long shadows of those who'd been hunting her, a wide, manic grin on the featureless leader as others approached. Lightningstorm blinked, uncertain why she couldn't recognize her assailants, yet all she could see was those eyes that belonged on no cat's face. Those sharp, jagged, pointed teeth. Smiles made of fangs and nothing else.

Nowhere to Lightningstorm run. Able I would ask Face for last words... but we all know Trouble it always ends in screams.

Pupils little more than slits now, the healer looked at her would be murderers, and realized with horror how they looked down at her, licking their whiskers and drooling with insatiable hunger. Their speech pattern confused her, as well. Words that did not seem to belong to their threats kept popping up without rhyme or reason, sounding very far away. The catlike figures before her seemed to be ignorant as to this other voice, the one that kept cropping up even as they approached in silence, only fits of giggles escaping the shadowy forms. Lifting herself gingerly, attempting to find a way out, it was over. At the leader's command - dig in - they all pounced, ripping into her as their prediction became reality and it ended in nothing more than screams...

Lapis blue hues opened wide as she felt the burning in her throat, her voice echoing across the empty tunnels of the underground den. Rapid, shallow breathing soon followed, her scream dying out as she realized she was safe. It had been a dream... Of course it had been. She hadn't had such a terrible one in a while. Usually she was haunted by the ghosts of her past. Never by the threats of her future. A part of her wondered if it had been a sign from StarClan itself of what awaited her, but she quickly dismissed the idea. They might have sent her herbs once, but that had been a simple threat. It would be a cold day in greenleaf when the gray-pelts decided to contact her in any helpful way.

The emptiness of her den suffocating her as she struggled for air, the lithe calico raised herself, knowing full well she would sleep no more. She hadn't intended to sleep in the first place. Must have dozed off while guarding the herb stores. A mistake she couldn't afford again. Not if she hoped to catch whatever rat had poisoned the herbs in the first place.

Feeling hunger clawing at her gut, Lightningstorm shuddered, remembering all too well the hunger present in the otherwise blank, rat like eyes. She needed to get out. Leave the den for some time. The camp. Be by herself to feel a moment of safety before returning to her prison once again. Or... so had been the plan. In her desperation she hadn't made sense of it before. The voice that had intermingled with theirs.

Eyes narrowed with suspicion as she saw Softsong at the den's entrance, the scent of herbs mixed with the stench of blood. Blinking in the darkened den, the healer's gaze landed on her patient's, only to find the culprit of the iron-y scent filling the enclosed space. Claw marks ran down the she-cat's face. Whoever had struck at her had done so viciously. A strike like that to the face was meant to send a message. What clan had she angered? The herbs she brought with her provided a clue, at the very least. With the shortage of herbs across the moors, it was very possible the warrior had trespassed to get what she wanted... and in the process turned into a cat that needed the very herbs she brought. Despite herself, the medicine cat found she was not so gone with hunger that she couldn't appreciate the irony.

And then the warrior began speaking. Greeting her... and... explaining the situation. Some of the words, however, were familiar. She'd heard these before. The voice intermingled with theirs. Stars... maybe StarClan had been trying to send her a sign after all. Or maybe hunger made her prophetic. Who knew? Whatever it had been, it certainly wasn't important, and the spotted lass found herself padding forward. Carefully. Ready to run at the first sign of an attack.

"You got tossed about by a kittypet? Or are the rogues getting callous round there? Be useful to know before I go sending patrols next. Don't want new apprentices meeting up cats that are willing to shred another like that over a few flowers they more than likely have no clue are any use," Lightningstorm mewed, studying the gray cat's face carefully, mindful of how deep the wounds ran, wanting to ensure the facial wound was the only thing to worry about.

"Any pain? Bruising that you can feel? Burning sting on the scratches? I'm grateful for the herbs... but with leaf-bare upon us and the herb stores... Can't just go making a poultice to cover every potential base proper like I normally would. Mmm... Is this something you've had used on yourself for medicine 'fore?" the healer asked, her gaze shifting from Softsong's injury towards the herbs, confusedly pawing at a particularly tall looking herb she'd never seen before. Despite the yellow flower, she was certain it had never been among the herbs discussed with her mentor - former... - during her apprenticeship... nor any time following up and leading to the poisonings.

---

@lesbianism [Softsong]

[RoboPrism]

Hollowfoot trodded into the earthy-scented den, his fur standing on edge. If these clawmarks scarred he would always remember from where they came each time he glanced in a puddle. Feeling anxious, he looked around for the she-cat.
I don't want to bother her if I can help it. I can't let her know too much either. I do not wish ill on her, but hopefully she is too busy to linger on me.
@Alchemist Kitsune