NO ABSOLUTES / leechpaw

[SHADEPAW]

It had been awfully easy for Shadepaw to slip into the shadows, to cling to his namesake for the past couple of months. When his sister departed, so had he, in a way. Quieted down, started staring into the distance more, focusing mostly on what Lilacfur had to teach him. He curled inward, like the pill bugs that played in the leaf litter of the pines. Then Chilledstar died. Then Lilacfur lost her eye. All that shook her out of her stupor. Her heart still beat, she still had her paws set on marsh-earth, still had her family and almost everything a cat could ever want within a matter of tail-lengths.

The centipede in front of her had none of that because it was a centipede. It was also dead, which did not help.

Lying outside the apprentices' den in a pool of sunlight, Shadepaw half-heartedly stretched out a long limb and batted at it. She had not killed it, but no one had claimed it, so it was hers to play with. She caught motion at the corner of her eye, near the mouth of the apprentices' den. She didn't turn her head, but chirped to whoever was near, "You ever wonder what it would be like to be a bug? Like, everything'd be so large, you could have so many legs..." And die so easily, but she didn't say that, just breathed out giggles.

[ @leechpaw ]

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[leechpaw]

As it leaves the den, having just awoken, Leechpaw isn't really feeling up to doing much. Its hips are hurting more than usual today, and even just walking outside is a chore, so when it hears a voice directing words at it, it almost wants to groan. That is, until it registers what's being said, and its mood instantly changes, eyes lighting up with glee. "Yeah!" it agrees immediately, plopping itself down next to Shadepaw, legs splayed out behind it as it makes itself comfortable, nose hovering just above the dead centipede. "I've always wanted to be a bug," it continues, lips peeled back from its teeth in an excited little grin.

It gently pokes the centipede, trying to turn it to look at the other side of it, see it from a new angle. "All those legs, and y'would get to be so crunchy on the outside! 'f you're lucky y'wouldn't even be squished too easy if y'have a hard enough shell aroundj'a! And, and, and then, then there's the fact that they can eat whatever they want! Y'wouldn't get sick from eating prey that's started to rot, which means y'could keep it around 'n study it for longer! And then when you know everything y'wanna know or y'get bored or somethin' like that, you can just eat it!"​

 

[SHADEPAW]

Shadepaw had assumed that she would get a half-reply from a peer on their way in or out of the den, eager to move on to their next task, but what she got instead made her half sit up. She turned to Leechpaw, whiskers twitching. Leechpaw was... dug out from the soil, like her, and was a sunlit sky flinging its colors out. It was apparently a bug connoisseur, too. She mimicked her fellow apprentice's posture, leaning forward and dipping her head lower to inspect the centipede. He giggled at Leechpaw's enthusiasm as a torrent of thoughts burst from its lips. Many legs, crunchy outside, hard shell, safe-rot-eating capabilities. ShadowClan didn't usually have enough prey to rot, but when the weather started warming and the frogs had been abundant, some had gone bad. He hadn't seen the effects so much as smelled them.

Shadepaw wrinkled his nose at the memory, eyed Leechpaw with a new curiosity. "Why study it?" He asked, clinging on to what felt like the beginning of a new thread of knowledge. A heartbeat and, gears turning, he added on to the list of bug abilities, "You could also explore everywhere we can't 'cause we're too big. Like... in moss, and around tree bark, and under rocks. You can go under the ground, even, if you're the right type of bug." Shadepaw himself was no bug connoisseur, but he knew that there were different types, at least. The many-legged ones, like the centipedes in front of them, the fluttering butterflies and moths, the little black ants that did seem to love rot, shiny beetles, the underground-dwelling worms... "Hey, what kind would you want to be?"​