Whispering Wetlands

[Ian]

Badgerscar grunted an affirmative at her question about leaf-bare and began to show her how to mark the borders. "It's worse on your paws when it snows, but right now it's the breeze that's making it bad. If there's no breeze it's easier to keep warm."

@TheNyanCatMinecart (sorry it's short)

[TheNyanCatMinecart]

~ IVYPAW ~

Ivypaw blinked at her mentor's response. She'd heard the word "snow" before - uttered between cats, in the names of cats. But she had never been told what exactly it was. All that she knew was that it was cold and came with leaf-bare, and based on assumptions from the cats who often held the name, it was either gray, white, or otherwise pale-colored. Still shivering, she forced herself to speed up, moving her legs to get her blood flowing. At times, she practiced a couple of her paw swipes, both the one that went across - which she had mastered - and the one which went directly down, that Badgerscar had showed her. Her paw swiped against the frozen ground as she did so, and it did help to warm her up a little.

"What's snow?" she asked her mentor curiously. "I know it comes with leaf-bare, but what is it?" Ivypaw hoped that the question didn't sound stupid. But she was young, and still learning. This was the phase of her life where she might have to ask odd questions. Once she was past this... she'd be a warrior, a strong warrior, more hardened and serious. Ivypaw couldn't wait to serve ShadowClan to the best of her abilities. "And how do we mark this border?" Badgerscar hadn't shown her yet.

[A Wolf]

@Rani @Ravensong

"Patrol, patrol, patrol" Hawkshade gleefully and with a wide grin on her face dialogued to herself as she lead her patrol towards the border. The two toms she was assigned with didn't seem all too talkative, Red hadn't spoken yet, and if she hadn't heard him say things before she would have guessed the boy was mute, and Elm seemed all diplomatic and proper and what she was sure others would call "mannered" or whatever, but what in her book as called being a plank of wood. To be fair many in her clan were just as interesting as wood, so maybe he was just average.

"Ah, the good ol' Windclan border." she smiled as said border came into view before glancing back at the others and smirking. "I do wounder if fate has any bunny-prey in store for us." She hadn't really gotten to hunt cats in a while at she missed the oh so sweet taste of blood in her jaws. "If we do find any im calling dibs on both snapping their throat AND getting them for lunch!" These two were talking life WAAAAAAAY too seriously, even judging by the little she had seen. "Any now I bet they'll say either something really boring or really dump" That was usually how things went, she said something, they overreacted, huffed something or were just very... flat. Yes, flat, that was a good word to describe them with.

[Pitou]

@A Wolf @Rani

**Elmshadow**

Elmshadow slipped out of camp, following behind Hawkshade. The she-cat's energy struck him as annoyingly similar to Cougarivy's, though this one was...he couldn't quite place his paw on it. There was something immature about her that he didn't get as much from Cougarivy. Maybe for one, it was her incessant talking in places where it had no use. His eye brow lifted in the slightest disturbance of his usual indifference. If she was hoping to come upon any Windclanners out then she'd do well to keep her mouth shut. In any case, Elmshadow was not hopeful that they would come across any; something must be going on in their camp with their scent markers stale and having missed the last gathering. After their not-so-distant loss against Shadowclan and whatever else was currently going on with them to keep them from the gathering, he didn't expect them to be keen on a confrontation with an admittedly relatively strong Shadowclan patrol.

[Rani]

Hawkshade was increasingly getting on his nerves with her inane prattling and Redshrike was left increasingly wonder how she'd made it to warrior without being killed for sheer annoyance. Honestly if this drivel was the product of Shadestorms mentoring abilities his cousin was more pathetic and useless then he thought. So while his face was entirely blank inside he was dreaming of chewing through the molly's throat to tear out her vocal cords manually and he was almost completely certain Elmshadow was thinking the same.



And he thought that patrolling on the windclan border would be fun. No rabbits to be seen but a blabbermouth and.... were those geese?



Yes pausing to mark the border Redshrike pursed his muzzle in thought seeing juuuuust the edge of a distinctive tail feather and internally grinned. He knew just what to do with this. So completely silently the toms tail curled to warn Elmshadow off rounding the corner but said nothing to warn the patrol lead ahead. Let the pest walk straight into a flock of geese for her sins, he would stay and mark the border that lacked ganders.

@Ravensong @A Wolf

[A Wolf]

@Rani @Ravensong

"Oh, wow, would you look at that, I was right, what a great surprise..." Yup, her patrolmates were very much very boring. But oh, that would effect what names they got from her. She might just call Elm wood-head, maybe Rad over there..... .... no she wouldn't come up with anything fitting at the moment, maybe just grump-grin? She would have to think about that further.

She stopped to mark the border at one place and was about to move on as an odd, quacking sound reached her. Her pointy ears pricked up and the sharp amber eyes she had been named for searched around. "Geese..." did it have to be geese. They were just sitting, walking and picking in on the ground. Urgh, the looked like fat balls of feathered. But Hawkshade knew very well their beaks and wings, and the amount of them could be a problem if not handled correctly.

She opened her mouth, with the intention to let wood-head and grim-grin know... the ladder of the two stood in a place where he should have been able to see the large birds already. "Was he hoping I would walk right into them...?"She grinned slightly to herself, beginning to like the tom more and more. Anyway. "Well sadly we'll have to deal with those I suppose." she mewed and flickered her tail. "I do believe they if we all charge at once from the same direction and make enough noise they should get scared and just fly away." The fat birds weren't all that smart, and she could easily see the bird flap away, screaming and quacking.

[Pitou]

@A Wolf @Rani

**Elmshadow**

From the corner of his eye, he caught the flick of Redshrike's warning as Elmshadow stopped to mark the base of a large pine. He stopped walking as he spotted the mass of feathered birds grazing along the border. He met Redshrike's eye then looked to Hawkshade, quickly picking up on Redshrike's intentions. He rolled his eyes but the she-cat's mouth would just as soon scare off the flock of geese as anything else.

To a mildly surprising sense of slight disappointment, he noticed Hawkshade picked up on the flock and stopped walking. He studied the flock as Hawkshade voiced her plan. It was sensible enough. Though bringing one home for the freshkill pile would be ideal. A goose could feed many cats and, between the three of them, it shouldn't be too hefty a task, if done right, but how to ensure they are only taking on one? He bowed his head just slightly to acknowledge her idea. "Geese aren't easily spooked, have some caution. We go in hard and aggressive but keep aware of how close you get. They can turn quickly and they're not to be underestimated. But we should also keep an eye out for any stragglers. If two or three of us can catch one of them away from the rest, it'll be a nice addition to the freshkill pile. But don't risk serious injury for it. I wouldn't want to be the one to use up Bounceberry's stock this close to leafbare over a bird."

[Rani]

Aw he didnt get to see Hawkshade being defurred by a bunch of snappy geese, such a shame. Still they did need to deal with the birds and Redshrikes ears perked up at the idea of catching one of the fat creatures to eat. He was hungry (he was always hungry). So for the added benifut of potentially catching one he finally spoke up.


"It may be more worthwhile to launch a sneak attack instead of a charge. If they see us running at them they may decide to ralley and fight back instead of fleeing, should be ambush them they'll likely fall prey to instincts and run. Or well fly in this case but the point stands, lets not give them room to realize they could harm us if they wished."


From there it'd be simpler to take down the straggler.

@Ravensong @A Wolf

[A Wolf]

Hawkshade's long tail twitched back and forth in annoyance as she listened to the two toms and their dump opinions. Toms were pretty useless in her opinion, couldn't just everyone be a molly. These two in particular seemed to think as much with their stomachs as with their no-existent brains. But while she usually had plenty of energy to spend on arguments and debates about any given topic, Grim-grin and wood-head were really draining her like a mushrooms on a tree.

"UUUUGH FIIIINE we'll do the BORING option instead and launch a sneak attack and kill one or whatever." But she wasn't gonna eat some dump fat bird. While others went hunting she would return to this border and try to find a little threat for herself. Cats, they tasted oh so much better then birds did. She didn't get her special snack often since the bunnies were starting to shy away from the border more and more.

Dropping her negativity she looked around for a good goose-victim. "Maybe that one" she mewed and waved to a goose who has picking in the ground, probably the one closest o them. The excitement of the hunt already getting on to her she crouched down and narrowed her eyes at they prey. "I'll just go for it's throat real quick and you tow can come and help if it manages to survive it someone my fangs" IF, because she knew her sharp teeth and long claws were reliable when it came to hunting and fighting, and she was itching to draw some blood.

@Rani @Ravensong

[Pitou]

@Rani @A Wolf

**Elmshadow**

The large tom nodded at Redshrike's idea. "We can use the shadow of the trees to get fairly close before they notice us. An aggressive surprise attack could send them flying before they have a chance to check what's attacking them, don't give them the chance to decide whether we're fighting or not."

He switched his gaze to Hawkshade, not holding his breath for a rational comment. She did not disappoint. But she pointed out a fairly secluded goose near them. He nodded, but then she followed it up with a more expected comment. There was a part of him that wanted to just let her go for it, she was the patrol lead after all, they were supposed to follow her. But he sighed lowly. "As much as I believe in letting cats discover their own mistakes, it'd be irresponsible to so blatantly risk injury when you have a whole patrol with you. I'm sure if the three of us ambush that lone goose the rest will flee from the commotion."

Elmshadow started moving through the shadows towards the geese, slowly at first to let his patrol mates put in any suggestions about how they'd be going about it.