camp IN AUTUMN DAYS -- polite escape attempt

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When something catches Finchkit's attention, there are no half-measures - whatever she'd been doing before is quickly forgotten, left behind as she moves onto bigger and brighter things, and today is no exception. It had started innocently enough, entertaining herself somewhere near the nursery as a patrol returns to camp laden with - well, not exactly laden, but bearing at least a piece or two of prey. In particular, a mouse left near the bottom of the pile seems to call to her, stomach grumbling in response, and she's getting ready to pounce when something from the discussion she'd largely been tuning out in favor of the strangely haunting ache of her insides catches her attention. Something something, nice weather, sun-lit moors, no signs of trouble this time - nothing like being in camp, she thinks, and suddenly her plans (which, admittedly, were nonexistent up until this point) have changed, even the mouse left abandoned in her haste for discovery. Even if there hadn't been much detail involved, it's like she can already picture how lovely it must look upon the moorlands today; any day, really, but it tugs especially at her at that moment.

Everybody knows you can't go out until you're an apprentice, with your mentor showing you all the cool new things hiding out there, but really, it shouldn't be that much of a problem - I mean, she was basically already an apprentice, anyways; just needed the formal name and she'd be good to go! Really, Sootstar should just go ahead and promote her straight to a warrior - her worm-wrangling and question-asking skills were already highly developed, after all - but that's all besides the point. The real point is, she doesn't see why she needs to stay in camp when she really, REALLY wants to see how the sun catches on the grass outside, to see just how vast WindClan territory stretches. Of course, she's not going to just waltz straight on out, even if her paws itch to run; no, she was going to be clever about this, and then they'd have to let her go, on account of how clever and well-mannered and ready to listen she is! Approaching the gorse tunnel on light paws, she stops just inside the entrance, trying to peek her head out to see if she could sneak a glimpse outside the tunnel, though when her presence is noticed she snaps to attention, standing up straight and putting on her most polite face.

"Hi! Good morning!" she greets, rocking slightly on her paws, smile turning saccharine as she tries not to ruin the moment by sneaking another peek past the cat standing before them. "How are you doing today? Are you having any fun?" At this point, it's becoming clear that she's practically vibrating with energy, so Finchkit decides to drop the niceties and lay out the situation as she sees it. "I have a - a, uh - I wanna see outside of camp, 'cause I heard that it was really nice out today, and I know I'm not 'sposed to go out on my own, but I thought if somebody was there to take me it would be okay. I'll ask my mama and everything, and it'll be all good. So, please can I look outside, just for a little bit?" Stopping to take a breath, she beams up at the cat blocking her way, deeply proud of her little rambling speech. Surely they'd have to listen and let her go on a field trip - she'd said please and everything, after all! It doesn't even occur to her that she might be denied, so deeply engrossed in her visions of the sun-lit moors just beyond her paws - whatever she thought sun-lit moors were, anyways.​
  • OOC: Feel free to have your character be the cat she approached ^^​
  • Untitled358_20230906125307.png
  • EEHinuI.png
    - Finch Finchkit
    - She/her (AFAB)
    - 2 moons
    - Loner Kit of WindClan
    - Hearty & scruffy chocolate lynx point with splashes of white and bright blue eyes
    - Art by Jay & base by googaoo respectively! <33
    - Minor powerplay allowed!
    - Penned by Hijinks​
 
tags

Oh no. Oh no no no. If Finchkit was going to go out on an adventure, then so was Harekit. No way was he going to sit around and let an opportunity like this pass him by! The boy wraps a charming grin across his maw as he trots over to the scene, flashing his fellow kitten of WindClan a smile.

"I'd like to go out, too!" Harekit exclaims cheerily. Perhaps they'd fight a fox! Or... an eagle! Then he'd kill it, and be made a Warrior on the spot. It was a flawless plan.
 
Violetheart was just coming off of a patrol when he was confronted by the last thing that he'd ever expected to be confronted by: a kitten full of energy. Perhaps one of the toughest enemies that anyone could ever face. He blinked slowly, looking down at the small kit before him, taking in and processing all of her rambling words - and while he was listening, another kit joined forces with her. Truly a strong force. But Violetheart had trained for situations like these, and he was sure that he could apply himself and win the battle.
"I've been having as much fun as I can, yes. Seems as though you're having much more fun than I am, now." He commented wryly, looking between the first kit and the second. "You want to explore outside? What's out there to explore, hm?" Violetheart asked innocently.
 
When she noticed Finchkit was suddenly not close to her anymore, Heathkit had panicked. The tiny ball of fluff expanded to twice her normal size as she searched around the camp for her sister's dust-tipped form. The thudding of paws signaled to her that a patrol was returning—soon she would smell freshly-caught prey and her stomach almost rumbled on command. But first—Finchkit!

Heathkit whimpered as her search continued to lead her in vain until she finally turned eyes to where the entrance of the camp lay. No kit had ever dared to go so far, so she had never thought to look there. And suddenly her chest warmed and her throat rumbled with a purr when she recognized Finchkit flanked by another tabby kit and being approached by one of the warriors who smelt of the world beyond the camp.

Heathkit scrambled to her paws to race after her sister, eyes bright with relief as she attempted to bump her head affectionately into Finchkit's shoulder, and then nod back to the nursery, her eyes carefully tracking what the warrior would do. What was out there anyway? Was it something Finchkit knew and she did not?

 
Bluepaw has little interest in Brightshine’s kits. She’d assumed as her mother had when the tortoiseshell queen had trudged back to camp with her kin, a kit swinging from each of their jaws. Like the others, they’d turned traitor, had run off to find the other detestable defectors and exiles. That the cheerful she-cat had returned—and with her children—had been a subdued surprise for the gray tunneler, but she still watches each of the four kits with a weary, judgmental eye. Perhaps being raised in WindClan and being apprenticed to WindClan warriors with true and loyal hearts will counter any traitorous blood thick in their veins.

She watches two of them approach Violetheart at the edge of their camp, followed by Harekit. The little tabby has no traitor’s blood—he’s WindClan-born and bred. She pads over to her Clanmate and sits, tail tucking around her paws. Disengaged green eyes flick from Finchkit, to Heathkit, to Harekit. Violetheart asks them what is outside of interest, and Heathkit oddly says nothing, only butting her blue-eyed face against her sister’s shoulder. Odd.

Bluepaw studies the pure white kit for a moment before her attention shifts to the striped pair. “I will tell you what is outside. Rogues.” She blinks. “The moors are no place for kits right now. Rogues are attacking cats and stealing prey. Who knows what they would do to such tiny kits.” She has no doubts a rogue would eat a kit just like a fox. That is what a lack of belief in StarClan or the warrior code does to cats—it turns them into savages, in her eyes.


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  • bluekit . bluepaw
    — she/her, apprentice of windclan
    — bisexual ; single
    — long-haired blue she-cat with white and green eyes
    — “speech”, thoughts, attack
    — penned by Marquette
    — art by Meg
 
Finchkit's gone. And then Heathkit's gone. Soooo, she should be gone too! Pink-kit follows after her pure white sibling, slowing to assess the scene when she sees Harekit there too with some older cats. Apparently Finchkit is asking them something, but Pink-kit isn't really paying attention to what. Heathkit does this silly thing where she bumps Finchkit's shoulder with her head and it's so silly that Pink-kit promptly does the same to Heathkit with a happy mewl, butting her head against her" Ooh, are we going outside? " Pink-kit asks wonderingly. Good, because she was gonna bust out of here herself anyways after she had a few more days to formulate her brilliant escape plan ( So far it consisted of: running ).

Violetheart asks what's even outside, and Pink-kit gives them a suspicious look. Was this guy dumb, or what? " Aren't you supposed to know that? " she points out. Was he a tunneler? Maybe that's why he was soo stupid. Pink-kit is about to enact her master plan in advanced when a grey lady comes to say something about rogues. " What's a rogue? " Pink-kit asks. Rogues are attacking cats and stealing prey Huh. " Nooo. Can't you make them go away? "

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  • NOTE: SHE IS A FEVER COAT BABY!
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  • ( I MISS YOU, IT'S MAGIC! ) PINK-KIT KIT OF WINDCLAN. DAUGHTER TO BRIGHTSHINE & HEAVY SNOW. SISTER TO HEATHKIT, DOWNYKIT, & FINCHKIT.
    —— SHE / HER; UNOPPOSED TO THE USE OF OTHERS
    —— CURRENTLY 2 MOONS OLD. AGES EVERY 16TH

    A tiny, longhaired calico she - kit with yellow eyes, ringed blue around her pupils (sectoral heterochromia). While you can clearly see her flame markings on her face, the rest of her body is currently covered by a grey fever - coating. Though the whites of her are still very much visible. Pink-kit bounces around WindClan without a care in the world! Her emotions are big, and she makes little effort to regulate them, resulting in both her usually cheerful disposition, as well as making her prone to sudden bouts of extreme anger or sadness. Rarely seen without a smile!
    HEAVY IC OPINIONS! Pink-kit is a very irrational and childish character!​
 
Morningsong spots the youngest additions to the family by the entrance to camp, and his hear cant help but skip a beat. Trying to escape camp and explore is nothing new for kits to try and do, but it's far more dangerous out there than before. On top of hawks, foxes, holes, badgers and snakes, theres rogues! Who knows what they'll do to them! What if they EAT THEM!! He quickly trots over in time to hear Bluepaw speak, and for once, he doesn't have any inward judgement to simmer on.

"Bluepaw is absolutely right! There are rogues out there! They could hurt you!" He frets. Pinkkit asks what a rogue is, and he figures that's understandable. "Rogues are lawless cats who live outside the clans. They care not for our borders." He explains. "They don't usually have good intentions when coming here."

Oh, he wishes he could make them go away. They're stealing their prey, attacking their already weakened cats, putting his family in danger... But Windclan simply isn't strong enough to deter them completely. A fact that he dares not say out loud, lest he face the fury of someones wounded pride.

"We're doing our best! They're no match for Windclan, after all." He says with a smile. He wants to believe he's right. Surely they wont be run off the moors by...By fleabitten mongrels, right? His anxiety is simply clouding his thoughts with negativity.​
 
╭──── ⋅ ⋅ ──── 。・゚゚・ ─── ☀︎ ─── ・゚゚・。 ──── ⋅ ⋅ ────╮
Bolstered by the appearance of reinforcements, Finchkit offers a sunny smile to each of her fellow kits that appear in turn, starting with Harekit, who oh-so-graciously backs her up, and luckily it seems he's caught on to her approach, too. The warrior that they had begun to crowd around asks what's outside to explore, and she nearly bursts right on the spot, puffing up and eyes going wide. It's like Pink-kit steals the words right out from inside her, so instead she opts to list all the things she knows are outside of camp, and probably more, too, - "All kinds of things! There's - there's the grass - er, the moors - tunnels, I think, rabbits and stuff, other Clans, and it's all big and stuff and I bet there's even more I don't even know about yet -"

As she's rattling off just about anything she can think of, a nudge from her sister is what finally cuts her off, a purr rising to take its place as Finchkit turns to face Heathkit, who still won't say anything, though it's pretty clear what she's trying to say. "Do you wanna explore, too?" she asks, tilting her head in Heathkit's direction and then motioning towards the gorse tunnel that lies ahead. Surely she would - who wouldn't, really, when so many mysteries lie so close to their reach? It's not enough to wait until apprenticeship, she doesn't think, not when the ache of adventure is so strong; she wants to see it all now, and later, and forever. In the meantime, though, she brushes back against Heathkit's side, returning the gesture in kind, perhaps in a show of sisterly love or perhaps an attempt to get yet another ally on her side for the outing that she's certainly is inevitable at this point.

More arrive, and though Violetheart had humored them, he hadn't exactly given them any answers; Bluepaw, however, doesn't hold back, giving them not quite the taste of adventure she'd been expecting, but adventure nonetheless. Rogues? It's not a term that she's heard before, and clearly Pink-kit is vexed by it as well, though Finchkit focuses equally in on the 'attacking cats and stealing prey' part as she does the unfamiliar word. Morningsong, too, adds on to the description of just how dangerous the outside world is right now, though rather than deter her, it only makes the kitten's curiosity burn even brighter. "You mean they just - come over and take our stuff? How come we haven't stopped 'em yet? How'd they even get here, anyways? If we ran into any, I'd make them give us all the prey back!" The conviction in her words is a naive one, but clear to see all the same as the proud tilt of her chin as she envisions going outside for the first time and returning victorious against such a bunch of scoundrels.​
  • OOC: --​
  • Untitled358_20230906125307.png
  • EEHinuI.png
    - Finch Finchkit
    - She/her (AFAB)
    - 2 moons
    - Loner Kit of WindClan
    - Hearty & scruffy chocolate lynx point with splashes of white and bright blue eyes
    - Art by Jay & base by googaoo respectively! <33
    - Minor powerplay allowed!
    - Penned by Hijinks​
 
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  • 01_10_rumblepaw.png

    rumblepaw | tags
    — they/them ; moor-runner apprentice of windclan. mentored by brindlecloud.
    — lanky black-and-white point with blue eyes. butterfly accessory.
    "speech" ; thoughts
    — art by mercibun
    — penned by mercibun. @ me in any official tabbytales discord for plots.
    4d5460.png
"That enthusiasm'll serve you well when you learn to run the moors, Finchkit." Rumblepaw lingers towards the back of the crowd, a lanky spectre who seems to curl in on themself somewhat as eyes turn in their direction. Even the friendly look they offer Finchkit is lukewarm; tired and wan, but earnest. They haven't been themself since Badgermoon deserted the Clan with Curlewnose in tow, and though Sootstar had promised they wouldn't be treated any differently for his crimes, it's hard to ignore the looks of distaste that Snakehiss fixes them with when he thinks they aren't looking. For the kits, ordinarily, the blue-eyed apprentice puts on a brave face, but the rogues' interference has done a number on their open curiosity. "It's too dangerous right now, though- some of them are almost as fierce as Sootstar herself."