[scottermite]

Username:
Clan link(s): the Fuller-Haast
MYO/Items using: UC lore waiver
➥ Obtained how? lore
Gender: male
Coat Description: fawn-based light amber mackerel tabby
Edits:
NR - shorthair
scars
expression edit
weight edits
torn ear
C - longer tail
rounded ears
UC - full heterochromia
medium fur edits
muzzle edits
shaded fullbody here; i drew it and decided i might as well type out what i have for his story so far and it ended up exceeding wordcount, lol :^P YAY earnhardt is here. my sweet thing who i have been thinking about for like a month.


Miller had a strong sense of fairness, or rather unfairness, which was something Earnhardt came to understand while stalking his runt brother through dark forests and the bush at dusk.
When they were kits, the time Earnhardt spent watching- be that the birds, the skinks and geckos, his mother, his siblings- he didn't have much to think about, and what he did philosophize about was mostly his three brothers.
Miller's plight and his were intertwined, thought Earnhardt, coyly proud of their shared lackluster abilities and place at the bottom of the totem pole. But Miller would surely not agree. Miller was the only one quite scorned like him, the only one so cursed by god; so said he at a night camp he did not notice Earnhardt was watching. Miller neglected to mention any of his brothers to the hulking black-and-white tom he spoke to (and Earnhardt could tell the tom was a darn poor listener in comparison to himself, but either way Miller seems allergic to companionship).
Shayne Jr., named after their absent father. Or was it, their absent grandfather...? It had been a like-father like-son situation, that would not leave Shayne Jr. himself unscathed. The strongest, the tallest, the prodigal son; Miller had a fervent dislike for him, which he would voice to Earnhardt as he was the only one who would entertain him.
John, oh, poor John... he was the favourite of their mother, and he found himself underneath the shallow, rippling pond, and what a struggle he threw. Miller had to hold him down with might he did not possess, so taken by threat of consequence and rage. Earnhardt should know, too.
He was there. Yes, watching in cowardice, Earnhardt saw it happen; he laid tense and taut and beside himself, observing from the interior of a low-lying bush next to a fence. There was nothing he could do (apart from save John and fight off Miller, who was smaller and weaker than him). There was a wildness in Miller's eyes, a stark raving anger that bore a hole straight through Earnhardt's chest and robbed him of all agency for sheer fright at the beast before him that once was his brother.

After John, they dropped like flies. First he, of course, and then Miller's banishment to find himself elsewhere, and then Shayne Jr., gone without a trace only a few moons later. He was acting strangely before he left... rambling aimlessly and unintelligibly, under his breath so Earnhardt couldn't quite understand him. Perhaps that was on purpose, Earnhardt can hardly imagine the things he might have been thinking then.

Earnhardt, the dutiful watcher, found himself without his subjects of rumination. Sure, the birds still hollered, the geckos still skittered across the ground, all the creatures not able to notice him as he came upon them; but he was a listless shell. He stopped going on his walks to the edge of the forest, mimicking the passage of the unfriendly but ultimately good-natured brother he once thought he had in Miller; tracing the edge of the dirt road off the farm, pausing and unable to unstick his mind from imagining both his living (?) brothers' aching paws on the endless gravel... the cracking, thickening skin of their paw pads. He instead spent his time by his mother's side, now having grown to more than half her size and quickly approaching, flattening the fur she couldn't reach with her own tongue now she was older.

Earnhardt is stuck between something and other. He feels little other than dread and unease, still looking, but no longer with a curiosity; that driving force is replaced by a mortifying anxiety. Was Miller's work unfinished? Would he find their great big brother and find a way to kill him, too? Would he find his way back to the farm and enact his revenge upon their poor, frail mother? Worst of all, what fate might Earnhardt himself meet if he found himself cornered by Miller, all alone? He couldn't discount any possibility.
He couldn't have Miller know where he was, that was the first thing. But he didn't take the well-travelled gravel as his way out; he immersed himself in the dense bush surrounding the farm, which all his brothers were far too coy to ever explore with him as kits (injuring himself horribly on the steel fence; which was so insolent as to bite him as he passed over), and promptly lost himself in it.
He learned, though. As any living, breathing creature would, when he has no other choice. He began to hunt and kill things, invoking his angry brother's spirit and feeling sick every time he did. He figured out through trial and error which vegetation would be kind to his stomach, and which decidedly would not. He hid from everything and watched the great nothingness of all the creatures who paid him no mind, and the even more aloof dome above everything that is, with thousands of thoughtless eyes that could never see him below the foliage.

Moons in the sky spin and darken before paling again, several times over, as he goes around in circles and slowly begins to recognize the true nature of his aimless walking. Landmarks emerge from the noise of green and brown.
He gets used to not speaking. He gets used to not listening for any voice but far-away chatter of groups of wildcats or loners, to skirt wide around them, to wherever he's going.

He catches a scent. It's a humid and cold morning; sweat clings to the skin and then chills him when the wind passes through beneath the cover of the trees. It is this wind which delivers him this scent; this suspicious scent, which under layers of sensory dirt is vaguely familiar. When that long-gone thrill of curiosity, of want, of desire to pontificate and understand is returned to him, he is at attention and knows for once where next he will go.
He stalks undetected, closer and closer still, until a clearing comes into view from behind the cover of thick, ancient trunks clothed in velvet moss.
His heart thumps nearly out of his rib cage and his stomach is heavy with sickness and fear. He peeks with wide eyes at a blond-furred cat, who's pelt alone strikes him with intense nausea. And what else would he find, but a runt? An indignant, complaining runt, forever ungrateful for anything which might bless him? Surely he was blessed for the fact he found company, with his voice still shrill like a kitten, and temperament not far off either.
Earnhardt laid for hours, listening to the group speak, and especially his estranged brother, who he hadn't seen in too many moons he hadn't counted while all alone. His heart calmed until it was slow again, and his claws eventually receded into his paws.
He can't gauge the effect the murder had on him, but it hadn't made him stronger. He was still the same stroppy brat, and this softens Earnhardt's heart.

Now Earnhardt's found a way to go, he hasn't stopped following.

(1180/1000 words)

[winx]

This kitty will be #039M! Pre-emptively added to archive

We're currently discussing what the best coat description would be for this bab. Will get back with you when we find what fits best!

[winx]

Okay I think after some discussion we decided on… fawn-based light amber mackerel tabby. It isn’t completely accurate to that coloration due to the shade of the tabby markings, but it’ll create the closest kits if you ever want to use them for nursery breedings in the future. (:

[scottermite]

@winx awesome, thank you so much o7 i really appreciate your help :,^3 perhaps next time i ought to just reference a photo for a more straightforward coat description lol @_@