Stagheart arrived in Sleepy Thicket with Amberflare, pausing to catch his breath from the jog over. He scented the air, his piercing blue eyes narrowing a bit in concentration. He did his best to shrug off the lingering chill in the air he always seemed to feel in this place, and especially as the graves were moved, it felt more... eerie. Maybe that was just the kithood stories getting to him yet again, the spooky ones his fellow young apprentices had liked to spread around as well back in the day.

"Alright... seems there's some prey trails headed that-a-way," he mused, flicking his tail towards the east. "Then some over here. I'll head this way." Then he flicked his tail to the west. "We catch as much as we can, 'n meet back here at sunhigh. Don't want Stormstar waitin' too long. Good huntin'," he wished, giving Amberflare a curt nod, as if confirming the assignment. Then he was off, doing his best to pick out a single good trail amidst the mixture of prey scents and fresh leaf-litter as the orange, brown, red, and yellow leaves littered the forest floor.

Hmm... he detected the scent of a vole up ahead. Dropping into a crouch, Stagheart prowled through the bushes, coming up on the small critter. Alright, with a wriggle of his haunches, the lumbering tom launched into the air and...!

[ Roll: 17: Success! ]

Gotcha! His claws successfully snagged the vole and he flung it down to stun it before nipping its neck, quickly finishing the job. He scraped some leaves over the prey to hide for now, continuing his journey through.

Stagheart heard a robin nearby after that, and began following the sound... and soon found his bounty. Dropping into his typical hunter's crouch, the warrior slunk along through shadows and branches until..!


[ Roll: 9 | Fail! ]


Starsdangit. He'd never been the most graceful hunter. With his stocky stature, Stag ended up rustling some leaves, sending the bird flying away. Grumbling to himself (and all the more grateful that no one was watching him), he continued on, not letting it deter him.

It wasn't too long before Stagheart had picked up the trail of a second vole, doing his best to recover from his most recent fumble. With the sunrays filtering in through the multi-colored trees, he did his best to ease his tense muscles. If only hunting came as naturally to the large tom as fighting; but at least he'd seen enough leaf-bares by now to know a thing or two about tracking and technique. Every catch was precious, especially as the weather started to cool.

Finally, he saw the vole up ahead. Slinking along the undergrowth, Stagheart eventually came within pouncing distance, standing still for a moment to gauge the small creature's movements. Within a few heartbeats, it paused to grab a seed off the grass, nibbling it; now was his chance. Wriggling his haunches, he built up power in his back legs, and...

[ Roll: 19 | Success! ]

A near perfect catch! He seamlessly glided through the air, only alerting the vole for a half-second before he slammed his paw down to stun it and prevent its hasty escape. With a careful nip of the neck, it was over. Silently thanking StarClan for its life and the ability to feed his Clan, Stagheart decided to carry the creature in his jaws on the way back.

...And on the way, he'd spotted a squirrel as well. In line with Amberflare's thinking, he amusedly considered how his Clan wasn't always fond of the fluffy-tailed vermin, often playing them off as ThunderClan prey. Of course, this was only social and dissipated the moment they needed anything to feed their hungry bellies in leaf-bare. It didn't stop him from quietly setting the vole down and slinking his way through the undergrowth, towards the squirrel.

[ Roll: 16 | Success! ]

Oh, yeah. Three pieces down. Stagheart had successfully jumped and snagged the tail of the fleeing critter, yanking it back towards him and performing the killing bite. Satisfied, the tom padded with the two pieces of prey in his jaws, headed towards where he'd buried the last vole. With his prey altogether, he started to pad back to their meeting place, when... a mouse scurried right past his paws.

[ Roll: 1 | Natural Failure! ]

In what was supposed to be an instinctive flash of claws to snag the critter, Stagheart's hurried reaction (a bit off balance by the weight of three pieces of prey in his jaws) made him stagger, and in a moment he'd lost his balance, dropping his prey in the process. All the while the mouse had gleefully scampered into the shadows of some tree roots, disappearing from sight. It let out a squeak as it went, almost like mocking laughter to the tom's ears.

The duality of his near-perfect catch from earlier to this excuse of an attempt was nearly comical, if he weren't so frustrated. "Ahh... ya darn fool," he groaned to himself.

Letting out a huff of annoyance, the warrior quickly scrambled to his paws, pelt burning like fire. No one saw that... right? Nope, he was all alone. Well, their meeting spot was close by, but the odds that Amberflare had been looking perfectly to where he'd been through the trees to see such a blunder were low. Right? Mhm. No one saw it. Nope. Just him and StarClan (he could practically hear his father sneering mockingly at him now).

Recovering from his initial self-embarrassment, the battle-hardened tom forced his stoic expression back to normal, though the tips of his ears still burned. Finally approaching Amberflare, he glanced down at her catches, giving a nod of approval. Her covering of the sloppy kill was luckily glossed over and unnoticed, because he was a bit too distracted by mentally cursing himself for his rare clumsiness. And found himself trying to assess the pretty she-cat's face for a moment, as if registering if she'd seen that or not. Surely not. Right? Why did everything feel so hot?

"Ah... nice catches," he noted casually, nodding his head with his tone gruffer than usual, blissfully pretending the possibility was actually impossible. The scarred tabby only seemed a bit distracted, but was otherwise just his typical self. "Looks like we got a good haul. Let's get goin' back." Picking up his prey, and trying not to remember the way he'd let himself fall to the forest floor like some newborn kit, he led their way back to camp.