The Clan Renaissance

An Alternate Universe Warriors Roleplay

They’d crossed the thunderpath not too long ago, but yet Loon was still a panting mess. Why was running across the hard stone pavement so consuming? She felt like she’d been running from wolves the whole day, her lungs about to collapse from how hard she pushed herself. But at least she and her brother were safe. She glanced over to check Ducky, relieved to see him in one piece. 

“I think we should take a break here,” said Loon. They were some ways away from the thunderpath, now safely in the protection of underbrush that marked the edge of the forest. At least here, there wouldn’t be any monsters prowling around. They had the chance to breathe. And so Loon drew in a long breath.

The past few days had been spent wandering the marshland with Ducky. It was gloomier with all the pine trees covering the sun, and made more glum by the presence of a cloudy sky. If there was anything she learned from that expedition, it was that she never wanted to go there again. It reminded her of the rivers she grew up in, but the ground was soggier, and the air was rife with mosquitoes. She couldn’t imagine any cat willing living there.

“I’m glad we’re out of that marsh,” she said, licking her paw and wiping it against her face. “With how dark it was, I thought it was night, half the time!”

Loon laughed, lashing her tail against the grass. “There’s interesting cats anywhere you go; not only in the marsh. You just have to keep an eye for them.”

She sighed squinting through the sun’s glare, heat wrapping around her pelt too tightly for confort. She hated how muddy the marsh was, but at least the mud kept her fur cool. Here, there was little protection from the sun, aside from the thick canopy of trees. As much as she liked forests, she wanted to get away from the darkness of towering trees.

It wasn’t hard to decide on their next destination, especially with Ducky’s comment about the water. Oohhhh, a nice, cold bath would help with their struggles. As she started to indulge in the thought, she halted herself, remembering what happened with the otters on that fateful pond. “Ducky, do you think it’s time we pay a visit to the old pond? We could see what’s happened since we left.”

“Well—! I won’t need your help with that,” said Loon. She flushed at Ducky’s mention of a “special someone”, shrinking slightly in her pelt. Her thoughts briefly flashed back to a charming rogue they met while traveling—not that she would ever see them again. It was a few moons ago since she last saw them, and they had probably moved on with their life. She never told Ducky about them though, knowing how much he’d tease her for that.

Then Ducky responded to her question of returning to their old home.
Her spirits sunk. Though the old pond was a source of bad memories for the both of them, she wanted to return and pay homage to their parents. She hadn’t told Ducky about this either, but since they went out on their own journey, she found herself aching to return. Not because of the emotional attachment to that place, but for the sake of closure.

And maybe, just maybe, she wasn’t ready to move on without her parents.

But hearing the sorrowful tinge to Ducky’s tongue, Loon knew he wasn’t ready to go back. Not yet. She forced a smile on her lips on nudged him playfully in the shoulder. “And where do you suppose we’ll find this pond of yours?”

And there he was—the Ducky she was familiar with. She laughed as he flopped around in the grass, the sound echoing freely through her chest, the first time in a while. And Ducky looked so goofy, flailing around like a fish on a land. Loon had to break the news to him. Solemnly shaking her head and holding back a smile, she said, “You look like a fish, Goosey.”

As the breeze shook the trees around them, the sun started sinking down, its rays trailing behind in a glorious blaze of light, painting the whole sky in an orange haze. It was at this time that Loon became acutely aware of how hard the sun beat against her dark fur, warming the pelt past her comfort. She glanced over at her brother and hoped he was finished making a decision.

Then at last, Ducky started in a direction, walking with such confidence and certainty—maybe too much so—that it sowing doubt in Loon’s mind. She cautiously padded after him, her brows arching up. “Are you sure you know where you’re going? Because if we get lost here, I’m blaming you.”

“Definitely don’t try to fly,” said Loon, half-jokingly as she overheard Ducky’s thoughts. She shook her head, trying her best to picture her brother as a bird but to no avail. The most he’d be able to fly is a good three flaps, and that was being charitable. “You’d make a horrible goose, what with your poor sense of direction! And have you seen how far geese flocks travel? You wouldn’t last very long.”

Despite her doubts about where Ducky was going, she relented and followed him, unwilling to spark another pointless argument about where to go. They had that discussion yesterday, and Loon wasn’t in the mood to repeat it. Though, Ducky spun around to face her and attempt to ease her uncertainties with an odd comment about him being a fish.

Drooping her ears, she scrunched up her nose. “Ducky. The last time we relied on your ‘instincts’, we ended up in a badger den, and were lucky to have our pelts in one piece. Please tell me that you know where we’re headed.”

She narrowed her eyes, catching Ducky’s close almost-encounter with the protruding root. She flicked her head at his paw and kept her stance firm, indicating that she wasn’t going to quit harping on Ducky. “I saw that,” she warned.

Oh, poor Ducky. He was always so clumsy. She worried for how he would survive on his own sometimes, as if he’d trip over a big root and fall straight to the bottom of a gorge because he wasn’t looking around carefully. Actually, Loon worried about this a lot—what he did when she wasn’t around, where he went. They were both adults now, and she knew Ducky was capable of himself. But the fears never went away.

She trailed behind him, observing her brother’s strange peculiarities when it came to tracking. She wondered why he couldn’t just swivel his ears around, why he had to make a show out of listening. Frankly, she didn’t know what he was even *listening* for. There was nothing at the bottom at the ravine, she had noted when she peered down from the top. Only rocks and pain, as far as she could tell. She was about to warn Ducky to move his feet from the edge, when he was suddenly in the air, as if his paws were searching for ground to settle on… and instead found nothing beneath.

Her heart stopped.

Ducky was rolling down the side of the ravine.

She swooped in with the speed of an osprey, gripping Ducky by the scruff of his neck, the way her mother used to do to them when they were very young. She dug her front paws into the dirt of the ravine, unsheathing her claws to keep herself from sliding down as well. Then, with as much strength as she could, she tried pulling Ducky away from the ravine and back to the ground.

“Ducky! You have to be more careful!” she hissed, still reeling from the panic. In a softer voice, she asked, “Are you okay?”

Her tongue clicked like tut tut tut. Then she gave him the biggest, nastiest stink eye until the brunt of her anger cooled off and she was able to speak without a hitch in her voice. “Well, at least you’re in one piece, but… Ducky, I can’t save you all the time. Someday, you might be alone and a falcon might swoop in from above, pull you to the sky, and take you away and I won’t be there to help you!”

Her haunches rose, anticipating a potential challenge from Ducky. “Of course, that’s an extreme example, but you get the point!”

She sighed, shaking her head as she thought of what to do next. At least for now, she couldn’t trust Ducky to lead the way. Not if it meant he would fall down another ravine, and would Loon be as quick to save him?

“We should go. Maybe we could head to…” Her hind legs pushed herself up so that she was standing on two feet. She took the vantage point to figure which direction to go. Her eyes lit up when she saw a vast sea of greenery. “Let’s go to the forest. Maybe we’ll find some good prey there, and if there’s water around, maybe swim a bit?”