Icestar's Afterlife Training

[nocturnal]

Another dream. He didn't want another dream. He wanted quiet, silent rest; was that too much to ask for? When was the last time he slept a dreamless sleep? Before they had moved to the new camp, that's when. He didn't like their new camp, the gorge. It reminded him too much of the thunder. Those felines loved their gorges.

Where was he this time? Who was calling? Was it his weasel of a mentor who wanted to torture him for a bit longer? Perhaps another secret meeting with a few questionable-souled felines? He wasn't sure which of the two he would prefer this night. Neither, if he had the choice.

The warrior felt his body solidify. As a living creature visiting the land of the dead, it was a strange feeling; he supposed that he had grown used to it in the last pawful of moons. Once he was fully drawn into the realm, he glanced around. He saw ice. What?

There was never ice the wicked forest. The only time he had ever seen a hint of ice was when... well. He wasn't alone. Scenting the air, the large tom discovered the taste of pine and shadows... and ice, if course. Couldn't forget the scent of ice.

He walked around a bit. Eventually, he decided to take the initiative: follow the scent trail. When a feline showed in the mind, they rarely appeared right where they were meant to be. Exploration was often required.

It didn't take long at all for the large warrior to reach his destination. Just as he appeared, the former leader began speaking. He listened, somewhat, but moreover, he observed. Nothing had changed with the black feline since the last time they met. Her territory seemed larger, though. Grander. A den had been constructed off in the distance, and some other things, too.

Talonstone directed his attention to the word, now. Did he really wish to grow in strength? Of course. Power meant everything. It protected. Even the weakest felines had power: willpower. Determination. Or else, they had no point of living, which meant that they should be dead. Not just weak, but dead.

The words sounded false to him. The words themselves, they reminded him of something that a trickmaster would say. With tone included, though, and the aura of the speaker, the words seemed harsher. More realistic. And what he already knew made them truly believable.

Perhaps, the frosty warrior mused, this wouldn't be such a bad night. Things could be much worse, after all

[Elementals]

~Foggybrook of SHC~

Foggybrook woke up or what she thought was waking up. Shouldn't she be in the warrior's den? Maybe this was a dream, an interesting dream. She looked around to see other cats from her clan. Wait a minute. How does one travel into another cat's dream? Foggybrook turned to hear Icestar's voice. The molly bounced as she knew that they were merely stuck in a slumber. Wait, does that mean she was stuck in a slumber? She wasn't too sure.

"HIIIIII!" she mewed to the former leader.

{ @punkscape }
_________
~Peacepaw of SHC~

Peacepaw opened his eyes to an unfamiliar place. Was he dreaming? He was supposed to be in the apprentice den. Wait, was this a lucid dream where he could control his thoughts? He tried making a rock roll with his mind before flicking himself. Ouch, that actually hurts. The tom walked over then got nearly startled by the sound of Icestar's voice. Was.. this Starclan? Icestar answered his question. Okay then...

[Pepperkins]

Windstrike
[ @punkscape ]

'Here we go again...'

The thin calico sighed in slight irritation as he made his way carefully through the dimly lit landscape. If he fell asleep and ended up here one more time he was taking off someone's head. Snickering at the thought, Windstrike padded into the clearing curiously, glancing around as he finally noticed all the felines gathered. Oh Starclan, was Dawnstar up to her shenanigans again? It was only now that the tom realized how this place didn't seem as... sisnister as the place he was before. And surely this dump wasn't Starclan... Oh, he was probably dead, makes sense. Rolling his eyes, he padded towards the felines, realizing that it was completely Shadowclan here this time.

He took note of that as he finally spotted the feline he had heard speaking when he approached. This wasn't Dawnstar, that was for sure, perhaps his theory about being dead was right. Then again... Windstrike leaned forward a bit, eyes widening slightly as he recognized Shadowclan's former leader Icestar. He personally had never interacted with her, but he knew enough to know she gave birth to that wreck that led them now. Grumbling silently, he half-heartedly listened to her ramble on, what was with cats and all the talking, examing her with mild interest. She was just as strange as this territory, while she had stars in her pelt like he had heard Starclan cats did, they weren't very noticeable unless you actually looked.

His brow raised slightly, looking back up to listen as he heard something about training. She wasn't going to have them training these apprentices like Dawnstar was she? That was annoying enough, especially with Braveheart being a nuisance he couldn't get rid of fast enough. No, something about being trained, fighting? Now that he didn't mind a much. His smirk slipped back onto his face slowly as he looked down to examine his claws. This almost made him glad he sharpened his claws earlier today. While he had o interest in "an era of training in the shadows of night," or anything to do with Icestar in general, he'd take a chance to stretch his skills anytime.

[vellichor]

// @punkscape

Buzzardpaw
________

The young apprentice had had trouble falling asleep in the recent weeks, his dreams plagued by angry screeches and talons. He almost feared the warm embrace of sleep. Almost. This night, the exhausted tom had fallen quickly to sleep. However, instead of the usual thundering of wings that accompanied him, he awoke in... well, somewhere. It didn't take long for the apprentice to figure out that this wasn't normal. He saw Clanmates, some looking about as confused as he felt. And then he heard it.

Or rather, her.

Icestar stood before him, looking even stronger in death than she had in life. This was... yeah. This was definitely a dream. Or one of those StarClan vision things, but probably a dream. He wasn't a big "StarClan" nut. Anyway. Training, huh? Oh... okay. Yeah, okay. As much as he didn't quite like to admit it, this could be better than training with Doetuft. After all, Icestar wasn't blind.

[pidgeon]

Icestar stared proudly into the crowd she'd gathered. It wasn't quite as many as she'd hoped, but it would do for now. It was a reasonable portion of ShadowClan. She allowed herself to feel that pride once more as cats bowed their head in greeting to her, just as in life. Oh, how she missed commanding her Clan. She wasn't sure whether to be surprised or not that Dawnstar was not here. Of course, with Dawnstar being leader now, she likely thought there wasn't any more for her to learn. She would be wrong.

Icestar's orange gaze met each and every one of the crowd's stares individually, thankful that most of them were silent. She didn't particularly like small talk. She glowered at Crowpaw and his blatantly obvious question.
"Yes, I am Icestar, Dawnstar's mother and mentor," she answered gruffly.

She was interested to see her adopted niece Duskpaw, without either of her siblings. Perhaps she judged the kid too soon; maybe she did have the guts needed to be a warrior.

She gave a nod to Talonstone when he appeared. She had an ounce of favoritism towards that tom--she thought he'd make a loyal deputy to Dawnstar at one point, if her daughter would bother to listen to her.

She decided to ignore Foggybrook's outburst. Seems that young warrior hadn't changed a bit. It was now time to begin.

"I am going to start by putting you all in pairs," she bellowed into the snowy clearing. "Talonstone [ @bmkmb ], you will be with me. You will help me demonstrate moves for the group.

Buzzardpaw [ @elysian ], you will be paired with Sparrowpaw [ @Goldensnail ].

Fadedpaw [ @Creeped Out ], you will be with Stempaw [ @Zesty Mango ].

Brackenpaw [ @Peril ], you will pair with Crowpaw [ @Dovey the Present ].

Windstrike [ @Pepperkins ], you will be with Ghosttail [ @MrChristmastheAJ ].

Foxpaw [ @Foxsnarl ], you will be with Peacepaw [ @Elementals ].

Adderfang [ @Rani ], you will be with Foggybrook [ @Elementals ]. I hope you can tolerate it.

Rumblepaw [ @Slushie ], you will be with Darkpaw [ @S t a r ].

And Duskpaw [ @Shimm ], I'm pairing you with Burningspark [ @Pluto ]." With everyone assigned, the former leader gave them all a chance to find their partners and for Talonstone to come up to her.

"Some of the moves I will be teaching you are ones you may have seen in life, and some will be entirely new to you. The moves are advanced, and I will not be holding back for any stragglers, so you'd better pay attention. Am I understood?"

[S t a r]

This would be.. interesting. Training? In.. wait, where were they anyways? This was so bizarre. Training with Icestar?? Darkpaw could barely even wrap her head around all this. They were dreaming, so how could they learn? Also, WHERE WERE THEY?? This didn't look like Starclan, though, she wouldn't know because she'd never seen it. But from what she heard of Starclan, Icestar kind of looked like a Starclan cat, but not completely. And this.. wasn't what she imagined Starclan to look like. The apprentice just stood there confused until she realized what she was supposed to be doing. "O-Oh! Uhm.." She looked around, unsure of who Rumblepaw was. She hadn't met them. So she would just have to guess. She saw a cat that she assumed was Rumblepaw and walked up to them, "Uhm.. Are you Rumblepaw?" She was just nervous, she disliked getting names wrong. Darkpaw really hoped this was Rumblepaw, she didn't want to embarrass herself already.

( @Slushie )

[Rani]

Hm of course she was paired with a younger warrior, Adderfang had hoped she would be learning something for a change rather than in her constant teaching role. Ah well she was never going to take it out on Foggybrook and be cruel, the young warrior didn't deserve it but she wasn't going to go easy in the slightest. The large warrior gave a shallow nod at the orders and padded over to Foggybrook letting out a calm "Greetings" with her normal blank expression before sitting next to the warrior and settling in to wait for Icestar (or was it Iceheart now) to continue. If Foggybrook wanted to talk they would have to start up the conversation. Hopefully she could still learn something from this.
@Elementals

[MrAJtheAJ]

Ghosttail

...........................................

Ghosttail sniffed at his paw before padding over to Windstrike. It troubled him to be here, but he really wasn't complaining. Nonetheless, he thought it was destiny to have arrived where his old leader was. Then again, she died when he was an apprentice. Oh well. The past is the past. He greeted Windstrike with a solemn nod and a huff that obviously meant "hi".

@Pepperkins

[JusticeRabbit]

Fadedpaw smiled. As long as she learned she would learn great from her idol. This would be fun.... She would get to meet Stempaw... She had never used battle moves before...
@Zesty Mango

[nocturnal]

// @punkscape

Surprisingly enough, there were less chattering squirrels attending this secret meeting compared to the one in the wicked forest. The frosty warrior would think it to be the other way around since Dawnstar acted more violent than her predecessor, but apparently not. Perhaps most, if not all, of all the felines here appeared through their own consent, and with an actual goal in mind rather than having nothing to do.

He took the time during the small break between instructions to note down who else stood in the clearing, then redirected his attention back to the speaker as the introduction started up again, but the second he heard his name, his mind paused for a moment. So... he wouldn't be learning anything new? Demonstrating. Hopefully, that didn't equivalate to being used as living practice stone. Thankfully, that possibility seemed unlikely.

As the crowd split while felines met with their training partners, Talonstone walked over to his former leader and dipped his head ever-so-slightly in respectful greeting. He wasn't about to pretend that they were equals despite where he stood, though he regarded her curiously. Did the ebony feline know that he'd been trained by darkness? After their first encounter in the Everdusk, he wouldn't be alarmed if she knew the truth.

He suddenly came to realize that he would need to demonstrate moves that he might not know himself. Now, the large warrior had already mastered a healthy variety of skills. Said skills ranged from traditional thundercat tactics to advanced shadowcat maneuvers, along with some outsider-based tricks, illegal blows that no star-aligned cats should know, and a few things he'd noticed while sparring with otherclanners. However, Talonstone hadn't seen it all, and there was bound to be something that he had yet to learn since Icestar planned on teaching lesser-known moves. Should that be the case, then he would need to either improvise or master the move within the first attempt. The latter wouldn't be impossible, especially if the move turned out to be similar to one he was already aware of - only, it would likely turn out as an unnecessary hassle.

Knowing that, the frosty warrior found it perfectly reasonable for him to ask - quietly so that the trainees wouldn't hear over the hushed arena, "May I know which moves you are planning on teaching in advance?" Though different felines referred to certain moves by different names, it would still allow him a basic idea of their agenda.