private mister fear

[SMOKESTAR]

He was an eerily quiet cat despite his size, moving like a shadow and all but invisible in certain lighting beneath the canopy of tree branches above. While Smokethroat preferred the river for his hunts, if he simply fished every day he felt he’d lose his edge and grow rusty in his hunting technique; so begrudgingly he had gone out into the forest. It was probably not his wisest decision to go alone, with the sound of rumbling thunder and the scent of something unnatural edging across their borders, but he felt confident enough in his sensibility and awareness to not find someone else. And yes, perhaps, he also was not up to socializing. It was a tiring affair, how other cats just did it so naturally and near constantly was beyond him. He’d never been much of a talker in his life, but he had hoped with some practice it would just fall upon him like a second pelt; but no. He was still struggling, still fumbling his words and unsure how to direct and carry a conversation. The dark tom was irritable as he walked, tail lashing, annoyed at himself and his own inability to just act normal. Just be like the other cats. It wasn’t hard, it looked effortless from his perspective but every time he tried to speak he talked so slow, dragged it out, lapsed off in thought; he must look like an idiot.
A sharp dart of brown caught his eye midstep, the shadow of a warrior twisted his body around in a pivot to lunge after the unmistakable shape of a mouse slipping across his path and his teeth snapped at the air seconds before he went face first into the side of a tree as the vermin alluded him through a well-placed hole.
Smokethroat did not pull back, did not recoil in pain despite the soreness of his nose. Instead he went limp, let himself sink to the ground and lay there with his face pressed to the pine-scented bark.
“...unfortunate…” He grumbled, voice muffled and annoyed.

@willowroot




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[willowroot]

( ♬ ) if he is a shadow, she is the moonlight. they are both bolstered by darkness and raised on stealth, their bodies slinking through the reeds and tall grasses of their kingdom with ease and grace. she is of a smaller frame than him, but no less impressive with her tall, wiry body. thus she stalks after him, amusement dappling her fern hued gaze as she observes from afar the rippling muscles as they bunch and relax through his stoic gait. she's followed him for no specific reason other than boredom, and perhaps a sinking feeling that whatever is rumbling on the horizon could be more than thunder. either way, she witnesses the disastrous attempt with twitching whiskers and a small pang of pity. missing a mouse is never fun, especially when it's right in front of you.

slinking over to the grumbling tom, they nudge him with a paw, head tipped. "having a bit of a moment, lead warrior?" the words are spoken with amusement but no negativity. something in the pose that the dark tom has taken urges willowroot to copy it, and so they do. sinking down on their paws, they settle beside the man, pushing their nose into the earth. "what are we doing, then?" ​

( THE LIGHT YOU GAVE ME )

 

[SMOKESTAR]

He could not tell you how long he might have laid there face first in the dirt in defeat if a paw hadn't nudged him suddenly and he might have lashed out in annoyanced were it not for the familiar voice that swiftly followed.
"I am perhaps..." He drolled, voice muffled because he refused to lift his head just yet, "..perhaps having a poor day." There was a lot going on currently, for a cat who had lived strictly in solitude for so long it was overwhelming in ways he was not accustomed to dealing with. Were it a foe he would fight them, sink claw and teeth into the obstacle to remove it, but the less tangible things around him were much harder to sort out. While Smokethroat did not get up, he did turn his head enough to watch the burnt and umber queen settle down onto the earthen surface under them to mimic is posture and pose with far more grace than he had had in doing it. Was he being teased again, he felt like he was teased quite often in this clan and could never actually tell when someone was doing it anymore. Clayfur, he knew, teased him constantly for being so standoffish and antisocial.
Still, he answered he question in such a matter-of-fact and straight forward manner it only really emphasized how correct the other tom was in his assumptions that Smoke might be, in polite terms, a stick in the mud. "I WAS hunting. Now I am..." What was he doing? He supposed the most obvious answer was the correct one, "...sulking. I haven't missed a mouse like that since I was a kit."
But then again, only until recently did he have more on his mind than simple survival and indifference. The dark tom huffed a sigh, blowing bits of dirt and debris from the sudden exhalation before a thought struck him. She sure had shown up surprisingly fast.
"...were you following me?"


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