Brightgaze's eyes narrowed as a grey tom with a white patch on his chest and three paws walked into the clearing. Growing less hostile and more curious, she forced her fur to lie flat.
"It's fine, a lot has happened in such a short time, sorry." she said carefully. "What are you doing here?"
Holly gazed at the small crown with a heavy heart. They had lost so many lives, one of them being her father. Her and her mother were all that remained of her small family. Her mother had never been the same ever since her father's death, she was always quieter and snappy, but she knew it was because she was inwardly grieving. Holly found it harder and harder to remain her normally happy and cheerful nature given their loss.
Yet as the man's speech came to an end, she felt a small flame of hope that she thought had long been gone ignite to life. What he spoke was true. The king has done nothing to lend a hand to his now dying people, because of him, many lives had been lost.
"Holly! Get back here!" she flinched as her mother stomped up to her. "Stay away from those people." Her mother thought it would be best for their family if they kept an ordinance of neutrality and wait out the troubles. She said that if we stay out of conflict everything would turn out okay. But that wasn't the case, now father was gone and they had no home and hardly any food.
But hearing this man's speech made her think that they could resolve the matter if everyone would unite and take over the king. Though she knew not how this could be done, he was a man of great power and doing so would not be easy. But her hopes weakened when no one appeared to be willing to step up and agree with him. The crown exchanged shocked and surprised whispers but nothing else. Letting out a long sigh, she was about to turn back when a voice stopped her.
"Well spoken! I can't seem to find any fault in that."
Holly turned around in surprise as a young man walked up to the front of the crowd. She stared expectingly at the crowd, hoping to see people agree but they just stood silent, as if waiting to see what will happen.
"That boy is crazy" her mother scolded. "Over throwing the king, that's not possible"
"But mother, with enough support it could be possible."
Her mother glared at her as if she was going to whack her upside the head. But she held her ground to any punishments that may follow.
"I think that if we help, we just might stand a chance." she continued without waiting for an answer. That said she took a step towards the front of the crowd. But suddenly she felt her mother's had grab her wrist and hold with an iron grip.
"Don't you dare, I have had enough of this nonsense, your coming with me right now!" she said sternly.
"Where mother? We have no home left, but if we could just give this man a chance we could change all of that. For us and for these people, we could live better lives in a better and more peaceful kingdom. Don't you want that?"
"We can't have these people living on false hope." she practically yelled out.
"But it's better than none at all. If we go, we can help encourage others to follow. What would dad want you to do?"
Sadness suddenly sprang into her mother's eyes, but anger came quickly after. She studied at Holly for a few moments, not saying anything. She then closed her eyes for a long while, her next words came out in a whisper. "If you want to put all your hope and trust into something that cannot be done, then so be it." she said while releasing her hold. "But I most certainly will not."
To Holly, this was the worst sort of punishment her mother could ever give her. Her mother was staring at her as if daring her to make a choice. Holly was about to argue, to convince her that supporting the man was the right thing to do, but nothing came out. With a great amount of courage, she took a step away from her mother and allowed her old cheerfulness to shine through as she gave a small nod. "I love you mother, I help make our lives happy again, promise." she spoke despite the situation.
That said, Holly forced herself to the front of the crowd, her hope growing with every step until it was shining through. Finally she stopped herself where she could be seen and heard.
"My name is Holly, and I wish to join you as well. I may not seem like much, but I will do whatever it takes to make this be possible, for my family and for everyone else!"
Despite her shock at being followed, Brightgaze lowered her head in sorrow. "I was traveling with my family, but we got attacked by a badger. It killed my mother and father, and it's all my fault. I should have fought harder, But they wanted me to run and I made the cowardly choice of listening." she explained sadly before letting out a wail of grief and sorrow.
"I ran instead of trying to save them."
Brightgaze nodded trying to convince herself that he was right. Slowly she managed to control her sadness, though she knew there will always be an empty place in her heart where her parents should have been.
"But you said you saw a bright light, I didn't see anything."
Hmm, she thought to herself. That couldn't have been a sign, could it? she asked in her head.
"Hey, for the trouble may I know you name?" she said while changing the subject.
She nodded "Brightgaze"
"I don't know. My mother was a rouge and my father was from a large group of cats, clans he called them. That's where I got my name.
I don't know much about them but he told me of cats that live on in the afterlife with stars in their pelts, starclan I think he called them." she said to the grey tom.
"He also told me that they tend to send signs to help benefit the lives of others. That's what my parents were hoping for. We were searching for a better place to live, to start a clan even. But without them, that's not an option anymore" she said while fighting back tears.
Brightgaze tilted her head to the side in confusion.
"Well it's not that simple. We have to forge a good camp and search for cats who would be willing to join, and the likelihood of that is very small. Not many cats like the idea of living together in a group." she explained.
"We don't even know a good place to allow connection with starclan. My father's clan had a moon stone but we are too far from it here to travel. Then there's the matter of finding a medicine cat, deputy, and leader even."
"Yet you seem so certain of yourself."
Nib's saying towards her before she fled rang in her head as she and Fracshyn flew back towards town, the firechimp in hand. "Am I really that useless?" she asked herself. Her only response a single wolf-like eye staring back up at her. She gave a long sigh. I know he just did that to save me, she thought. But I could have done something, I could have helped.
An irritated chatter broke Ganrax from her thoughts. She glanced down at the firechimp who was turning its head left and right in irritation. Poor thing, it's probably not used to being airborne.
"Fracshyn, lets land." she yelled.
He barked in response and landed at the back of town near the wall to prevent from drawing much attention. Ganrax slowly slid off of him, being careful not to scare the red chimp that clung to her. Fracshyn stared at the animal with curiosity, sniffing the air once and a while to be sure they weren't followed. Ganrax gave an amused smile before crouching on the ground.
"Here little guy, I'm sure you miss the ground already." she said to it. But the firechimp didn't move from it's perch on her arm, and gazed up at her nervously. "If you say so." she sighed, allowing the firechimp to stay where it was.
I hope Nib's okay, she thought. I shouldn't have listened to him an stayed to help.
Frachsyn suddenly reared on his hind legs and snarled loudly, sniffing at the air. ""Frachsyn! What's wrong boy?!" The firechimp let out another chatter and leaped off her arm and onto Fracshyn's back who landed back onto all fours. Sensing something was wrong, Ganrax got into a battle ready stance and focused on any vibrations in the ground. Her eyes widened in dismay as the man that attacked Nib back in the forest walked up to them. Oh no, she thought in fear. Had Nib lost?
"Why hello there young one." he spoke.
"What have you done with Nib?!"
"Nothing at all really, just wanted to see how much off a challenge he would be. Quite the worthy opponent he was. I was actually heading back to someone, but now here you are, and what could possible be more fun than to see how powerful you are?"
Her eyes widened in disbealife. "Please, I don't want any trouble."
Instead of replying he gazed at her injured wrist. " Such a shame to find a handicapped bender, a broken bender is hardly one at all. Normally I would have known better if it weren't for your friend's outburst back there."
Not giving Ganrax a chance to reply, He sent a ball of fire hurtling in her direction. She had barely enough time to dodge as it went sailing past her. Fracshyn let out an angry roar, his claws scraping the stone ground. "Fracshyn stay back!" she shouted while dodging more of his attacks. "I don't want you to get hurt!"
But at that exact moment she had accidentally let her guard down and the man grabbed a fist sized rock and threw it hard at her hurt wrist. It hit right on target and she couldn't help but cry out in pain. With her other hand, she sent several chunk of rocks soaring at him, but he dodged them like they were nothing. Ignoring the petty laughter that followed, Ganrax sent sand hovering over them like a cloud with a flick of her wrist. Smirking, she closed her eyes and focused on the man's vibrations. Her foot jerking to the side, she raised a wall of rocks to her right and she heard many of them hit home, a pained grunt soon followed. Opening her eyes, she lowered her arms and allowed the sand to return to the ground. But the man wasn't there, And Ganrax stood clutching her wrist alone, the two animals at her side gazing about in confusion.
"Sadly no. I'm not even from here, Me and my family traveled for days, I don't even know where I am anymore."
"sounds good." she said while smiling.
"I suppose forging the camp is our first step, I've seen a couple of rocks around here. If we can find something sturdy that may hold, I could forge some dens out of them. My father taught me, said it would be useful if we found a good place to make a clan." she finished while unable to hide the sadness in her eyes.
Out character: good idea, though I have no idea where my good friends went, I will ask them about it though, so them being a part of this is a maybe.
"I think that's a great idea." she said while getting to her feet. "And once we have that taken care of, why don't we use those trees to our advantage. We could gather some brambles and forge some sort of wall to protect it, provided an entrance of course." she said while flicking her tail to the edge of the clearing.
"Honestly, I have no idea. Perhaps starclan will send us a sign or something. It's our best bet." She said.
"But we'll seek that later, how about you help me gather some of the branches scattered about the trees, hmm?"
She nodded and walked off and began grabbing whatever she could find. Hauling them with her teeth, she began to work with the first rock. Skybreeze came back with thick branches and thick brambles as well.
"Okay" she started while gazing at the pile they had going. "What we have to do first is make a frame out of the bramble, afterwards we could use the branches and leaves to allow cover but be sure to leave room for an entrance. Sound good?"
Holly smiled brightly at his friendliness. "I'm Holly, pleasure to meet you Anvial."
"Surprised I was actually accepted into this, in return I will make the best of my abilities." she finished with a slight bow. After saying this, Holly couldn't help but eye some of the weapons that could be seen in the distance. Even more so one in particular, the dual blades. She had seen them be used sometimes by the king's soldiers, they fascinated her more than any other weapon she had ever seen. She had even tried using them once, though she was still badly in need of practice.
As much as she glowed on the inside at the thought of mastering the use of such a weapon, she knew it could not be done. She realized long ago that no matter the person, animal, plant even, she could not kill. She had tried several times in the past to help her mother cut down plants or to help her father hunt, but every time, it always ended the same. The second she would be ready to cut down that tree, or when she was in just the right range to shoot down that rabbit, she could never bring herself to do what had to be done. She would drop her ax or her gun, and walk away while telling the living thing how sorry she was about almost killing it. She wanted to help her family, but she was more useless than a single drop of water against a forest fire.
Inwardly sighing sadly, she forced herself to look away from the weapon that seemingly stood out against all the rest. But as usual, she hid her inward feeling behind a bright and cheerful expression.
She then looked expectingly at the cloaked man beside her, wanting to hear his name as well.
"K, well judging by the size of this rock, it would look like it would make a good warrior's den and that smaller rock could be the apprentice's den." She said before turning to the grey tabby. " You think you can forge that one on your own?"
Bright gaze turned to the rock he had been working on, she imidietly felt impressed. The den was perfect in size and shape and there was not a crack to be seen. "You did very well" she praised. "Couldn't have done it better myself."
Out of Character: Actually feel free to pop in now even, just make it good! :)
Right now my cat, Brightgaze, and Skybreeze are working on making a new clan!!! Look forward to your posts!
Ganrax clutched her freshly injured wrist in pain, though she silently thanked that the only other injury given was small burn on her arm that was just above her splinted wrist. That man really knew how to use a person's weakness to his advantage. Fracshyn followed her quietly at her side, his head down and tail in between his legs. She then raised her head and to her relief spotted Nib walking up to her.
"Hey Ganrax! Took you longer to get here than I thou-" He cut ad been off when he noticed her pained and tired expression. The firechimp let out a monkey-like chatter before leaping onto Nib's arm. "Ganrax, what happened?"
"The man from before, he came after us, I thought he defeated you." she explained.
"Are you okay?"
She managed to nod and forced herself to remove her other hand from her wrist. "I'm fine, he didn't even stay to finish the battle. He was there one minute and the next he was gone, I held my own just fine." She said in hopes he didn't find out how much pain she was really in. The last thing we need is him spending all his time dealing with my careless injuries, it will only make me more useless than I already am, she thought bitterly. Fracshyn looked up to her in question as if saying "Your not fine, why not tell him that" but she silently told him to dismiss the subject.
"He must have given you the slip too if he got to me in such a short time, it's as if he had no intent on having a full on fight. Wonder what he's up to." she said to Nib.
"However" she continued while sending him a warning glance. "Be sure to watch your tongue next time, your revealing of my injury almost cost me the battle since it practically serves as a temporary weakness." she said sternly.
"That said" she finished while softening her expression. "Are you alright?"
Wolverine was instantly distracted from his late night training when the emergency alarm went off. Knowing someone was in the building who shouldn't, he instinctively drew out his blades and moved silently but quickly to the location of the intruder. To make matters worse, the others were out which meant no backup if the culprit proved to be dangerous.
A shadow near the kitchen sent Wolverine in said direction, bracing himself for a possible threat. But what he saw surprised him. It was a young girl searching through the food supply, quickly taking a few things here and there.
How had she gotten past most of our securities, he thought to himself, and more importantly, why did she need to steal food? Knowing he had to stop her nonetheless, he stood up and blocked her only escape just as she was about to leave.
"What do you think your doing?"
