Mosspaw's first hunting patrol

[Goldenstar]

Mosspaw was excited. Her muscles rippled beneath her dapple-grey/brown pelt with anticipation. She was going on her first hunting patrol!

She had gone over all of her moves - The Crouching Tiger, the Brazen Bird's eye view, all of them! She had also reviewed the 'best ways to catch' moves - best way to catch a squirrel, mouse, vole, rabbit, and pigeon.

She was sitting in the Light Clan camp, waiting for the warriors going on patrol to collect a few more cats to come with. Her friend, a newly-made warrior Wildfur, sat beside her.

Apparently the tip of her tail was twitching becuse before she knew it, Wildfur had pounced on it.

She yowled in surprise, then patted him with her paw, claws sheathed, of course. Then he leaped at her, trying to land on her stomach. He overshot, and went toppling over her head. At the last moment, she leapt up after him.

They tumbled over and over, taking a playful nip here, a sheathed swat there, and the occasional meroew of happiness.

They were still playing when the deputy, a golden-colored light tabby named Goldenlight, came over to them and said sternly, "Wildfur! Are you still a kit? Playing on the ground?" Her stern face softened, and she took a playful swipe at him. "By the way, I want you to come hunting with us. Mosspaw, have you gone over all of your moves?"

"Yes, Goldenlight." she replied. She was overjoyed. Her first hunting patrol, and her best friend was coming with her!

Goldenlight left them to sort out a couple of kits who were disobeying their exasperated care-taker.

Mosspaw turned to Wildfur. "So you're coming too! Have you practiced everything?" The tip of her tail was twitching back and forth again.

Wildfur looked amused. Then he took on an air and said, "When you've been on as many hunts as I have, you don't need to practice." Mosspaw was surprised by this snobbish attitude, he wasn't usually like that, until his semi-dignified face broke into a grin.

"C'mon. Let's go over there and practice our moves together. We can help each other."

Mosspaw smiled. THAT was more like the Wildfur she knew.

As she was bounding over, she reflected on how strange it was that she, the shyest, most mousey cat in camp became best friends with the most outgoing cat in Lightclan. Luck, she supposed.

"Are you going to take all day?" called Wildfur from the place they had picked, a small grassy mound with ferns growing around it.

"Sorry!" She said as she came over the wall of ferns.

"No matter." said Wildfur. "Ok, how about you pretend to be the prey and I'll be me, the cat?"

"Sounds good. But there's a problem."

"What?"

"I know you're coming."

Wildfur thought about that for a moment, then said, without blinking once, "Pretend you don't know that. Be the mouse!"

She crouched down in the grass, pretending to nibble on half an acorn she found there.

"Uh, actually, you don't have to be THAT mouse-like. Do you know where that's been?"

She grinned. "Just getting in character, Wildfur!"

He seemed to accept that and crouched into his favorite mouse-hunting position - haunches and shoulders nearly touching the ground, tail straight out the back, head down and ears erect, catching every movement.

Mosspaw started humming a silly tune she made up as she went, pretending she was a mouse minding their own buisness.

Wildfur grinned, and...pounced!

Mosspelt was taken by surprise, for he was a good hunter, but she recovered from her shock and batted him off her back.

"OK, it's my turn now!" She merowed happily, and Wildfur closed his eyes and started humming a silly tune of his own.

She was just getting ready to crouch down when they heard a call from Goldenlight, who was organising the hunt.

Wildfur jumped up, motioning her to follow with his head. "Let's go!"

She followed him.

[Goldenstar]

Goldenlight took them out near TwinTrees, the two elms that had grown together in funny loops and twirls. Mosspaw sniffed the air for a scent.

Squirrel!

Unfortunately, one of the cats who had teased her for her shyness was following her, trying to find out which way she thought the squirrel was. He was trying to take advantage of her nose!

He was a very new warior, just a season or two older than herself, and it seemed that he didn't know that she was a terrible hunter.

Seeing as she would never catch the squirrel this way, she preended she saw something in the underbrush and dropped to a crouch, fixing her gaze on nothing in particular.

The bullycat got the idea and did the same thing, but closer.

She made it seem like she was going to pounce, and he did before her.

There was a merrr of annoyance as he discovered that there was nothing beneath the brush. By then, Mosspaw had quickly and quietly darted away to another location, where the bullycat wouldn't be able to find her before she made her kill.

She had hidden behind a large oak, where she thought the smell was the strongest, and carefully and slowly sniffed around it.

Aha! The scent was strongest on the North side! The squirrell had been here only minutes ago.

So quick you would have had to know she was going to do it to catch her in action, she whipped her head up to look into the branches of the tree.

She scoured the branches, looking or anything that might signat the squirell...

There! A fuzzy red tail dissapeared into a hole in the side of the tree.

Mosspaw fought dismay. How was she supposed to catch it all the way up there?

She shifted back and forth, thring to think of a solution.

Her claw hit a leaf, quietly, however, but it was enough to spark an idea.

Her claws! Of course! She would cmimb the tree!

Slowly but surely she made her way up the tre, claws unsheathed and poking into the bark.

She was almost there when the squirrell's head darted out.

She shrunk as close as she could into the tree, hoping it hadn't seen her.

It hadn't. The head slowly retreated back into the hole, and Mosspaw unattacted herself from the tree and started her way up again.

Finally! At the top, trying to keep her ears below the edge of the hole, so the squirrell wouldn't see them.

With a grunt, she launched herself up and over the shallow wall of the hole, to find the squirrell and two tiny squirrell babies huddling to each other.

She was inside the hole, and she could pounce right now and get them all, it would be easy as they had no place to hide, but she couldn't.

Seeing the softly whimpering babies was too much. With a sigh, she admitted defeat and left the squirrells alone. Maybe someday, someday, when the squirrells had fully grown, somecat would get them for freshkill, so maybe her clan would eat them eventually. But she couldn't make herself kill them all, or even just the mother, or without their mother the babies would surely die. They were too young to fend for themselves.

She bit her lip and turned to face the door to the outside.

And promptly drew back as she saw the ground so far below her.

The irony of it all almost made her laugh.


Evenutally she figured out that she could use her claws again, and came down the tree.

She sniffed around a little while longer, but the scent of squirrell was too strong and covered any other smells, so she moved to somewhere else.

Eventually, she caught ahold of the scent of a vole and quickly located and killed it. So at least she had freshkill.

She proudly brought it back to the LightClan camp with the other cats. Her first freshkill!

Feeling happy as she laid it on the fresh kill pile, Mosspaw located Wildfur and told him all about the squirrells.

He smiled. "Boy, have I a story to tell you..."




Goldenlight - to be continued, but not right now 'cuz my fingers are all worn out!

[Goldenstar]

Wildfur batted playfully at her tail as she sat down and prepared to listen.

"I was looking for fresh-kill, obviously, and smelt mouse! It was fresh, too, so I thought I would go and try for it. So I followed my nose, around everything and anything in my path, until I came to this tiny little hole in the ground. I wasn't sure how to get the mouse if it were in there, so I was about to give up and investigate a vole-scent when I heard this scrabbling noise."

At this, Wildfur made a curious scratching sound with his paws, in what was probably an attempt to re-create what he had heard. Mosspaw giggles; she couldn't imagine what on earth he was trying to porvey.

Wildfur gave up and continued. "And I was curious, so I lookd over, really slowly just in case it had come out again. It hadn't."

"Then I realised that if I could hear the mouse crawling about under the soil, it must not be far beneath me! So I waited again, and waited some more, until I heard it again."

Wildfur mimed listening to the ground. Mosspaw giggled again; Wildfur was not a very good actor.

"So the second I heard it, I pounced on that spot and used my claws to rip it up! After only a little while, I got to the place that I had heard the scrabblings. The mouse had been scared away, but there was something else in the little house that I had uncovered..."

This time he paused on purpose. He knew her well enough that she would near die waiting for what was to come next.

"There was a little pink thing, wriggling in a nest! Like a bird! But there was only one. I supposed it was the mouse's child, and I watched. I wanted to see what would happen next, you see."

This time Wildfur waited for almost a minute, enjoying every moment of Mospaw's agitated anticipation.

"This mouse, not exactly plump, though, so not great eating, came out of a tunnel-hole on the left and quick as a whip ran toward her baby, picked it up, and left again! I'm guessing that she had moved the other mice-babes somewhere else, in a safer place, the second she heard me, but couldn't carry the last one and so had to come back to it. How's that?"

Wildfur proudly sat, waiting for her responce.

"That was such a neat story! I guess New-leaf is birthing season for prey, huh?"

Wildfur chuckled, then surprised her by saying, "I wouldn't know. I made it up."

Mosspaw smiled reluctantly. That was part of Wildfur's personality!


Goldenlight, or, should I say, Mosspaw and Wildfur.