Odd. Kestrelpaw wondered what it’d be like if she had to stay in here. With the leader. Oh no, did that mean she’d have to be on her best behavior all the time?? No thank you! She’d rather stay in the apprentice’s den — and soon, the warrior’s den. She wondered if warriors stayed up half the night whispering to each other like some apprentices did. She wondered if she was still not allowed to smack her denmates upside the head for being noisy at night. Probably not, since they were all bound to be older than her.
Wait! She could sleep near Mountaintalon now! Put her nest right next to his! It’d be the best! Unless someone’s nest was already near Papa’s, then she’d have to evict them. Anyway… Kestrelpaw’s gaze latched onto Wolfhive’s paw as it batted hers, and the apprentice whipped it away out of instinct… and then a moment later she was attempting to smack his paw back repeatedly.
As she sat listening to the group, Redhawk slightly flinched and blinked in surprise as Spiderthroat came to sit next to her. He lifted her paw and inspected it, while the hornet sat there with wide eyes. "U-Um, sss-sort of. SSS-Springlight a-and Lightningsss-storm helped at t-the gathering, and after SSS-Springlight said t-that t-there wasn't much sss-she could do t-to fix... it." Swallowing her nerves back down, she glancing at her twisted, mangled paw. "It d-doesn't hurt t-too bad," she lied, right through her teeth, trying to ignore the way her other paw was kneading the ground out of anxiety.
Out of the corner of her eye she caught sight of Mudhound's paw reaching out to her, and she wantd to wimper at the sight. She tossed them a grateful glance and a half-smile, though stayed seated beside Spiderthroat. She didn't dare want to move from where the deputy was inspecting her paw because this was it; this was the deputy seeing how bad her paw really was, and then telling Bumblestar, and then her getting kicked out of the hornet group on her behind.
"I-I can be apart of t-the b-b-bait patrol." She had offered without even thinking about it, lifting her yellow-green gaze towards Bumblestar. It made the most sense, after all. Red was clearly injured, what with her twisted paw, and the owl would see her as an easy snack. And plus, if she got carried off... it wouldn't be the worst thing. She was practically useless now after getting smushed into the ground by that bolder to help Crowpaw - a thought she had to stop before it derailed her face like it had before. "Um, t-that way I'm... doing sss-something useful..."
Morningpaw hadn't really expected it to be that easy. Though its not like he knew the leader very well, and certainly not well enough to know how name switching works with her... or with any cat that is. He just expected it to be harder than 'I hate my name, lemme change it.' Though that's enough complaining, the next part was also something he didn't really think about even though it was very obvious and he should've... he just didn't. If not Morningpaw... than who was he? The apprentice blinked... and paused. He opened his mouth to speak a couple times but every time he just didn't know what he would even suggest. Man, wasn't this the leader's thing? Picking out names for her clan and stuff... It's like a warrior name kind of, just throw anything random at him and stuff.
The apprentice eventually slowly shook his head, "I didn't think that far ahead. I just want Morningpaw gone. Or anything that is similar to that is a no as well... like I don't know, Nightpaw or Dawnpaw... or something. I want something new... different." He looked away awkwardly not really feeling all too confident like he usually is. Or rather how he usually acts, he never really feels all too confident but that was pretty normal for apprentices, it basically came with the rank. Didn't make it any less annoying, especially when he showed his slight insecurity ( can you call it that? ) in front of the leader of his damn clan of all cats. "Just anything I guess."
Of course it would be up to her. Bumblestar furrowed her brow, leaning forward to peer at him more closely. "If you aren't sure, I can't really help you. I can do warrior names just fine - it's the mid-training changes that trip me up."
She curled her tail around her flank. "How about this. You're close to being done with your training, right? Nearing your ceremony? I can think of something by then and work it into your warrior ceremony. 'N if you don't like it, you can come up with something else 'n let me know."
Bumblestar settled down again with a sniff and met Hollowkit's frown with one of her own. He definitely wasn't leaving, but at least this was a question she could actually answer, considering she was there for that.
"It's not easy, I can tell you that much," she started, "especially when you're tryin' to basically rebuild up from nothing. A sinkhole took out our old camp when I was deputy. The leader at the time, Thrushstar, had to basically be pushed into doing anything with this one once it was found, 'n then he just up 'n vanished, so I took over.
"Cats weren't really happy about that. I made some unpopular changes right off the bat - demoted the medicine cats 'cause they weren't doing their jobs, told everybody I wasn't taking no for an answer 'n that they could leave if they didn't like it, but I guess some cats were more focused on complainin' about the changes than actually taking me up on my offer." She curled her tail around her flank. "I've had to make a lotta choices, some easy enough 'n some a lot harder. But it's worth it now that we've taken back our spot in the forest. Cats like you have a real home to grow up in, we actually look after each other like a real Clan now... it's worth the tough decisions."
Oh... she'd done all that?? That was pretty cool, then! Hollowkit hadn't really thought a whole lot about his leader's accomplishments outside of the fact that one day his stories would be greater than hers.
"So when I rule the forest I'll just have to be better than that," he says out loud, and then immediately stiffens because she wasn't supposed to know about his plans!"I mean-! Um- You heard nothin', I didn't just say that." He tells Bumblestar, a glare on his face and shoulders hunched defensively. No one was supposed to know of this plan until he was ready to begin!! And, really, Bumblestar had nothing to fear, because it wasn't like Hollowkit was going to kill her, he was simply going to replace her and every other leader. Then everyone would have to like him.
Re: ThunderClan Leader's Den
