camp I USED TOO MANY COLORS | prompt


⋆。゚☁︎。⋆。 ゚☾ ゚。⋆ The sun was out, snow gone, moor-birds were singing. Slateheart took it upon himself to go on a little solo hunting mission, just like old times - now, without the pressures of the past. He had never felt so.. free.

His hunting trip was successful for just one cat; he had managed to catch two rabbits, albeit not as plump as he would have liked, but it would suffice for now. Anything was better than nothing with all these kits overrunning their camp. He dipped his head to a cat sitting near the gorse wall's entrance on his way in, who gave him a puzzled look in response. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the nest, he'd think, making nothing of it.

But on his way to the fresh-kill pile, he could feel another pair of eyes burning into his fur. Someone else had given him a bright smile. Now, his ears began to burn, and he kept his head down and eyes forward as he approached the fresh-kill pile. Why's everyone looking at me like that?

Finally, Slateheart lifted his head and surveyed the camp once - looking from the cat who smiled at him, to the one who stared at him, and finally the camp guard who had given him a puzzled look. "What? Never seen rabbits before? Come on, now," he scorned, shaking his head. How annoying. Sitting down next to the fresh-kill pile, Slateheart bent his head to swipe a nervous tongue over his back - and that's when he finally saw what everyone had been staring at. Somehow, somewhere on his patrol, he had picked up a plethora of flowers; wildflowers of every shape and color tangled into his black fur, like colorful stars on a night sky. "Oh. Great." Slateheart ducked his head sheepishly. How.. embarrassing.

With burning ears, the flower-adorned warrior and all his decorations approached the nearest cat, greeting them with a cautious clear of his throat. "Hey, uh.." he began, swiveling his tattered ear back to point towards his pelt. "Could you, uh, help me get these off? ..Please?" It hurt his stoic nature to ask for help for such a silly task - it hurt his pride that he had unknowingly collected so many flowers anyway. He felt like he looked.. sappy and happy-go-lucky. But if he had to pick every petal and leaf out of his fur by himself, he'd be up all night.


  • OOC - any cat can be the one he's approaching!
    ⊱✿⊰ It seems your character has gotten some wildflowers tangled in their fur while out on patrol or playing in camp! Do they leave them or ask someone for help getting them out?
  • slate-ref.png
  • SLATEHEART he/him, moor-runner of windclan, 19 moons.
    a short-furred black tom with low white markings and green eyes.
    son of LYNXTOOTH xx ADELAIDE // brother to GRAVELSNAP, ASHPAW
    peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / / underline and tag when attacking
    penned by ixora@.ixora on discord, feel free to dm for plots.

 
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After such an eventful leaf-bare for WindClan, Dimmingsun thinks anything is possible. The moor is in full bloom, nature making quite a colorful statement about its very presence; a welcome entrance in sharp contrast to the much darker past few moons. And of course, if anything is possible, then who is he to question Slateheart's new decor?

He is probably amongst the lesser enthusiastic cats when it comes to the season's change, Dimmingsun thinks. Black pelt, guarded, not one for easy-going smiles. A few of their Clanmates had already taken note of the nice array of flowers caught in that fur, and judging by his reactions, Dimmingsun thinks better than to join their very public opinions on the matter. Not that he is given much of a chance to - Slateheart comes closer and closer still.

"Oh?" Dimmingsun's mouth curls into a smile, now free to let amusement show in his eyes. Slateheart had asked, so very nicely, so it's only fair. "Don't tell me you don't like it? It fits so well."

Despite his sarcasm-dipped words, Dimmingsun begins to gingerly paw through the other's flank, plucking out petals and leaves. Now that it's all here in camp, might as well use them for something useful. "I think that rabbit was very keen on dressin' you up. Did it make you follow it into a flowerfield or what?"




 

Featherpaw, of course, did not offer help to Slateheart- Dimmingsun was doing it, so why bother?His ears were folded back in embarrassment, tipping her off that his... adornment wasn't intentional, at least. Thankfully. What a horrendous waste of precious time that would have been! Catching a rabbit and deciding to reward yourself by covering yourself in flowers would have been utterly ridiculous... he supposed it was telling that it was unintentional, given the slapdash, thoughtless placement of all of those blooms.

"Yes, it's quite impressive." Featherpaw followed on from Dimmingsun, voice dipped in a way that made it clear she was not impressed at all. The tunnel-vision that must've stopped Slateheart from noticing was impressive in perhaps the worst way possible- how had he managed it?

Well... he supposed there were worse things to be distracted by than catching rabbits. Featherpaw narrowed his eyes. "Maybe we can find a b-buh... b-b-buh... b-better use for these." A thoughtful murmur... but he didn't reall have anything in mind, except for maybe weaving them in someone's fur properly, and that wasn't very useful, was it?
✦ penned by pin
 
➴➴ Gravelsnap and Slateheart’s relationship may have once become nonexistent, but the black-patched warrior has begun to seek their brother out in times of rest. When they spot Slateheart returning from a patrol with various flora strewn through his fur, looking as though he’s rolled in a field of blossoming flowers instead of hunting. From the looks of it, though, Slateheart doesn’t notice at first that he’s covered in them—he seems preoccupied with the rewards of a fruitful hunt, a couple of rabbits for their clanmates to feast on. When Slateheart finally notices the flowery mess of his fur, Gravelsnap has to disguise their laugh with a cough. Their brother looks a bit ridiculous like this, more like a RiverClanner than the WindClan warrior that he is. The tom asks for help, so Gravelsnap is quick to join Dimmingsun and Featherpaw at his side.

"I’ll help," they offer, reaching out with a paw to snag one of the flowers out of their brother’s dark pelt. Featherpaw speaks of finding a better use for the blooms, and Hazel eyes shift to focus on the younger cat. "Do you think Wolfsong could use these?" The flowers don’t appear to be of any medicinal use, but they have seen the clan’s healers use all kinds of plants before.
 

⋆。゚☁︎。⋆。 ゚☾ ゚。⋆ He expected Dimmingsun's teasing remark. Though he didn't know the calico personally yet, Slateheart knew enough about their outgoing personality. Always cheerful and optimistic he seemed, just what WindClan needed in his trying times. Slateheart wasn't sure how well he could synchronize with such a cat, in all his socially awkward and gloomy glory.

Dimmingsun said the flowers fit, and Featherpaw followed up with a remark on it's impressiveness. "You think so?" the colorful warrior replied, seeming to brighten for just a moment, until it dawned on him that they were both speaking sarcastically. "Oh." Gone with the wind, his hope was. What was he even hopeful for in that moment? Something to make the accidental flowers seem purposeful? Dare he wonder, a compliment? When has he ever felt hopeful for a compliment? StarClan, the Clans' changes were really getting to him, huh?

Dimmingsun began to untangle the flowers from his fur, shortly after followed by Gravelsnap. He wasn't adverse to his brother joining them, of course - he was starting to enjoy the company of Gravelsnap again, after all. Just wished it wasn't in his moment of humility. In the meantime, Slateheart ducked his chin and started to nip at a few petals intertwined on the white marking of his chest. Once, one of the cats tugged at his fur too hard, prompting a brief wince, but nothing more. It would be easy work, he hoped - this would soon be done with, and he could hide away in his nest to sulk a days' worth of embarrassment away. Dimmingsun inquired about the rabbit, another joke, he gathered. Was he supposed to joke back? "Yeah, uh.. I guess it did." Slateheart's response was dry, but hey, the guy was trying - he even offered a nervous smile!

Next was the question of what they would do with these flowers. Any of them that weren't ripped away with a few strands of fur, anyway, as he feared a couple of them might have. "If Wolfsong doesn't want them, I'm sure the kits would." Slateheart could guess a few of the kits would enjoy such a gift, Blizzardkit especially. They could find a use for anything.



  • SLATEHEART he/him, moor-runner of windclan, 19 moons.
    a short-furred black tom with low white markings and green eyes.
    son of LYNXTOOTH xx ADELAIDE // brother to GRAVELSNAP, ASHPAW
    peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / / underline and tag when attacking
    penned by ixora@.ixora on discord, feel free to dm for plots.

 
AS HE RAISED HIS FIST BEFORE HE SPOKE — It was sort of ironic, how Rattleheart peered from his own flower-decorated nest at Slateheart and watched how the moor runner lowly asked for someone to help him get the flowers out of his pelt. He had spent a couple of hours out days ago in the fields, plucking up as many intact wildflowers as he could in order to decorate his and Venomstrike's shared nest with them - he adored how they smelled, and thought the pops of color against the moss were a pleasant greeting each night. Had it not been for his own issues with pollen and its side effects, the tunneler probably would've tried to decorate his own pelt with them, though he knew they weren't likely to stick long. The tunnels weren't exactly forgiving in how their walls stripped away any pelt decoration he tried to enjoy.

By comparison, Slateheart seemed like he very much did not want to be involved with newleaf's sudden burst of color and warmth. Not unless he was focused on how it was related to prey, that is.

Though unlike the sarcastic mutters of both Dimmingsun and Featherpaw, Rattleheart pulled himself up from his nest with a warm purr of genuine greeting rumbling throughout his chest. "Well even if some people don't think so, I think they suited your pelt rather well. Like little starbursts of color against the black." His tail flicked lightly against Slateheart's coat, a sort of funhouse mirror reversal of his own pelt of mostly white. One had to figure that the younger tom was suffering far more under the newleaf sunlight, as his pelt would soak it up without pause. "I think they might be better off with the kits for now, though. Those don't really smell like the medicine den." Or at least what he could remember of it, considering with each day he grew further from his temporary stay within Wolfsong's den. The scarring on his chest had very nearly faded into nothing but a soft pink in a sea of white, his coat beginning to cover the jagged lines that Bluefrost had cut into him.

That did give the tunneler a bit of an idea, though. Maybe he could collect wildflowers just to cover the scars that littered his body, the skin beneath his pelt far from unmarred but also not covered with damage either. It would be nice to change the wounds into a sight decorated and beautiful, rather than a burden he carried with him until Venomstrike could gently nuzzle his self-consciousness away.


  • 75034712_8183RsjuzqJmQXv.png
    longhaired black and white tom with pale green eyes
    49 moons old; ages the 1st every month
    afab; uses he/she/they pronouns
    homosexual homoromantic; mated to venomstrike
    sibling to scorchstreak, lizardbounce, and rabbitclaw
    currently mentoring downypaw
    somewhat difficult to befriend; wary but kind
    "speech", thoughts, attacking
    peaceful powerplay allowed
    all opinions are ic
 
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Dimmingsun makes way for Gravelsnap, shifting so they could easily access Slateheart's fur. He listens to the others as he works; gentle as he parts the black, unwilling to accidentally hurt a Clanmate with an unseen thorn.

"Oh?" It's not the sun that warms his pelt - Dimmingsun feels hot with a bit of shame and guilt, apparently having misplaced Slateheart's displeasure. He had assumed the wish to get rid of the flowers as soon as possible was out of a simple dislike of such colorful things found anywhere but their rightful place in the ground. Rattleheart assures Slateheart, precisely after his voice drops from a bit of hope to something akin to grueling acceptance.

Dimmingsun clears his throat, puts a paw to it for emphasis. "I mean, don't let me stop you. Maybe if we place them in a more orderly fashion and not so wildly, you'll look even better." He prays to StarClan it doesn't sound like desperate backpedaling.

An idea makes his face brighten; a way to save the situation. "Or instead of kits..." he murmurs as he looks for a specific color amongst Slateheart's fur. A white little thing, simple and unassuming - perfect for the behind of Dimmingsun's ear. He pats it into strands of golden-brown, hoping it'll stick for more than a few heartbeats.