LOST IN THE CITADEL. training gone wrong

[QUIETSTREAM.]

"up."

with a hushed huff, quiet pushed themself on their paws. her eyes are filled with exhaustion. hours. hours of this. hours of frustrated tones and failures, over and over again. she wanted big. she wanted cicada. she wanted anyone else to be here. but they weren't. it was just them, and their mentor who made sure to remind them every chance they got who was in charge.

"this is pathetic! of all the cats I needed to train, it had to be you"

her mentor snorts, eyes blazing as he peers down at her trembling form. they are trying their best, but when it came to their fight or flight... all quiet knew how to do was freeze.

"you are a mouse-brained quivering fool! shaking and whining and whimpering is going to get one of your fellow forest mates killed! is that what you want?! huh!? answer me!"

he hissed, making quiet tumble backwards, covering their face with their paws. they're sorry. they want to do more. they want to be better. but they can't fight. they just can't do it.

"I said get up!"

with a snarl, her mentor grabs roughly into her scruff, pulling her up onto her paws, before simply tossing her to the side. whimpering, they pull themselves back up, claws pushing into the forest floor, tail curling around their leg for some sort of comfort. their eyes closed, as they didn't want to look at him anymore. they wanted to go home.

"tch. I don't know why I even try. clean yourself up and head back to camp. you can sulk there."

and with that, she was left alone. they couldn't reach some of their wounds, but they cleaned up most of them. it wasn't terribly bad. nothing needed that much attention. she was just a little shook up. they took in a deep breath, trying to calm themselves before heading back to camp, tail tapping slightly on the ground, as they searched for someone they knew. mainly, big.
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[ WISH YOU WERE GAY ]​

 

[Cloudpaw .]

✵ ღ ☾ I'LL LET YOU DOWN - Unfortunately, Cloudy herself was no foreigner to abrasive words, especially from an authority figure. She hadn’t been on the receiving end in some time, and while she was grateful for that, the stern yelling was hard to miss as she attempted to hunt from nearby.
Instinctively, she felt herself flinch, looking up from the ground and into the sparse tree-line from where the violent demands had been spewing.
Mindlessly she began to wander in that direction, feeling her heart chip a bit at the sight of a beaten-down Quiet, and silently falling into stride with her as her mind put the vague pieces together. ❝ Something needs to be done about cats like him. ❞ She hummed lightly from where she walked.
Thorns in his nest, poison ivy in his food, an unfortunate fall…
The imagery of each popped into her mind, but you wouldn’t be able to tell with how her gaze began to dance alongside the moth that drifted by. ❝ Did you know that bullies often project? All of his faults and incapabilities fall onto you, as unfortunate as it is, it just means he’s as useful as a bloated toad, and he’s threatened by your potential.❞ Cloudy mused on, though typically not the one to speak, it would have felt wrong to let Quiet limp home by their lonesome, and besides, the snowy molly only spoke the truth, still though, she’d love to be around to watched Quiet grow a spine and take their rightful revenge.
❝ Speech. ❞

IF YOU LET ME TOO CLOSE​

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[hitch]

in character   out of character   character tags   reference

• 
  
  
  ── Roseal has very vague memories of a mentor figure. He has flashes of a patient voice and, simultaneously, something...fiercely hurt, the kind of anger that only a stinging wound causes. It doesn't bother him very much, though he knows that having many similarly blurred memories isn't necessarily a sign of past health. He's managed to get this far without any issues at least, but he wonders whether he'll survive this steadily snowballing mess that is a territorial dispute.
  
  He's mostly here in the marsh now that he's left the pines behind, waiting for these cats to reach a point where they openly challenge his presence. When that day comes, he'll have to move on. Until then, he'll try to be as slight a burden as possible and far less meddlesome.
  
  But it's difficult to stay true to that when he finds the pair of young felines, one of them clearly battered and in pain. The uninjured child mentions a bully, yet Roseal doesn't think another cat in their age-group was responsible for this. Not unless they're some overgrown kid fully matured already.
  
  Fully aware that he's a stranger to them both and likely not a comforting face, Roseal keeps a careful distance, however much he'd like to try and soothe. "Do you want me to find someone to help you? Someone you trust?" He intends to track the scent that lingers in their bruises. These sorts of wounds on a child are not fucking acceptable. "You could stop and rest while I do."
  

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•  
• n/a​
•  
• ──── surr'oseal'isme (roseal). he/him pronouns. roamer; goes where he pleases.
  ──── approximately thirty-eight months old; not entirely certain of his own age.
  ──── single & uninterested in any romantic attachments; possibly open for flings.
  ──── very tall, scarred albino with sharply-peaked ears and a bobbed, scruffy tail.​
•  
• 
  
  

 

[CICADASTAR]

− ♱ ABOUT : his ribs still ache, tender to the touch and rippling with pain like the dull edge of a razorblade — grating. he can move a little easier now after being assigned to his nest for some much - needed time lying on his rear doing nothing, letting those fleabitten kittypets climb their way over his home’s pine, smearing it with their pathetic scent. he’d been fuming in his cotton - lined moss for hours, curled tail flicking out aside him before making his ultimate decision to hunt again. he may as well, and it wasn’t as if the blue silver tabby had cracked a rib . . he could deal with the tenderness of bruises, however mottled in healing they were. cicada had drug his sorry pelt from the ground and stretched, arching his back with low groan. he was sore. his long limbs ached with stress, biting hunger leaving them buzzing and too - light , vision bubbling black around the edges . . he begins to think maybe it was best not to push himself any further. guilt gnaws at him, icy luminaries fixating on the feeble fresh kill pile.

he was hungry . . he couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a kill, stomach shrunken with the lack of enough meat. he wasn’t sure if he could process a full rat at this point, even as small as what remained were. still he moves forward, delicately snatching a small rodent from the outermost corner of the pile. if he couldn’t eat it himself, he would find someone who would help him.

he wonders if quiet had eaten.

it’s about the time he’s heading towards the youths den when he catches their scent, black nostrils flaring and — he smells blood. blood. not much of it, but enough to send his heart racing, rodent corpse falling from his agape jaws as he whips his way forward. he can’t see them yet, the images in his mind dance like firescape ; images of those degenerate pets and their ever - increasing hunger, stupidity and numbers. the way they’d fought within the pine only days ago, where he’d poised his fangs over one of their owns throat. would they come for revenge? did quiet face the brunt of a war they didn’t deserve? was it his fault? he shoves past roseal with a force to nearly knock both of their too - tall figures off balance in the process.

“ liebling, what happened? merciful forest helfen sie mir, where are you hurt? “ frantic, his vocals slipped into thick, sloping rasps, circling the child twice before attempting to use his mottled body to shield her, curled tail coming to circle at their front so he could lower his head and attempt to rasp his tongue roughly over the back of his neck and skull as if to find before she could answer for themself, effectively caging them close to his middle should she allow it. it’s amidst this frantic licking that cloudy’s words process, large audits shooting back up from their place pinned against the slope of his skull and head pivoting around to face the alabaster molly, lamenting about bullies, “ you know who did this? give me a name. “ he spats, teeth baring, fury rolling off his bristling fur in waves, ” this was no bully — this is assault. i’ll have their pelt lining my nest, i swear it. “

out of character information translations

• − CICADA ; he / him, roughly thirty two months old, marsh group member
  − tall black smoke tortie chimera with icecap eyes and curly fur, homosexual
  − speaks with a german accent, attack in #171717, penned by antlers
  
  
• helfen sie mir: help me
  liebling: darling

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[TWILIGHTFALL]

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╰☆☆ She loves the colony Briar has built, the home she's curated, but Twilight must admit there are still some among them who do not deserve the security. Brash cats, cats who would kill for nothing, bullies. The dappled queen is more likely to forgive a child a transgression, but an attack against a child? She sets her jaw grimly as she approaches the small crowd that has gathered around poor Quiet.

She doesn't know the child well, but she reminds Twilight of her own son. Shy, watchful, a hint of something wounded within them. Such a combination makes one susceptible to being a victim, and she's seen it firsthand.

She waves her tail at Cicada, gives him a stern look through pale eyes. Best not to make things worse, she thinks, though she can't say she does not appreciate the tom's zealousness. Quiet needs a friend who can protect her. The queen gives Roseal a similar look, communicating cautious gratefulness. Any adult who is ally to a child is a friend of hers.

Finally, Twilight sets her gaze upon Cloudy and Quiet. "She's right," the black and white femme murmurs to the injured kit. She would reach out to gently nose the fur at Quiet's shoulders. "If this happens again, you must tell someone, my dear. Look at everyone who cares for you. We would not let this stand by." She brushes her tail tip against Cloudy's flank. Perhaps not as meek as her Ash, or as Quiet, but a silent type all the same. Twilight is proud of her for attempting to comfort Quiet.​

—PENNED BY MARQUETTE.​