Username: Sha the Sheep
Clan: Clan of the Sea BreezeQuest Number: 1
Response:"I will be remembered as a leader, in times of great distress. The cats who were under my care shall always be well fed and content. My era shall be seen as one of safety and prosperity, and I shall be known for guiding and keeping my clan safe through any disasters that may befall us. In the generations to come, I shall be
remembered."
But that is not what happened.
Is it?
{wake up}
Word Count: 75
Quest Number: 2
Response:
One wonders if all these dens are entirely naturally occurring,
and if not, where the cats who made them have gone.Quest Number: 3
Response:The late midday sun hung high over the island, bathing the volcano's slopes in its golden light. Barely a cloud hung in the bright blue skies, beyond wisps of white high in the atmosphere. This early in greenleaf, temperatures were still fairly mild, and everything on the island seemed peaceful and still.
The illusion was broken by the figures of two cats, climbing a well worn track up the volcano's slopes to the upper meadow. The one in the lead was the larger of the two, a long-furred blue lynx point who sped up the slopes, bounding from rock to rock. His companion, a rosetted tabby, trailed further behind, pawsteps dragging over the grass. Eventually, the leading cat seemed to notice his companion dragging behind, and skidded to a halt to spare the other cat a glance over his shoulder.
"What's wrong, Sage Brush?" he mewed. "You usually have more spring in your step than this."
Sage Brush seemed to start, as though shaken from his thoughts, before shaking his head dismissively. "Just… some things on my mind."
"Oh?" For a moment, the other tom looked concerned; then, something seemed to dawn on him, and a wry grin spread on his face.
"Does it, perhaps, have anything to do with a certain healer back home~?"
"You don't have to put it like
that," Sage Brush scowled, tucking his head to lick down his chest fur. "And… no. It's not about Thyme Forest."
"What is it, then?"
Sage Brush doesn't answer for a very long time, staring into the distance with a glazed over look in his eyes. Eventually, the other tom seems to give up on getting an answer from him and turns back around, starting back along the path.
"There's a storm brewing. It's just on the horizon."
The blue tom scowled as he stopped in his tracks once more, casting an imploring look over his shoulder. "Oh, Sage Brush, don't say
that. You've never been wrong about storms coming, but it's such a beautiful day out now. Why must you herald its end? Can't we enjoy it just a bit longer?" He paused, new turning hopeful. "Besides, maybe it won't be that bad, right? It
is such a beautiful day. Can't hurt to get a little wet, right?" he said with a chuckle.
Sage Brush took a sudden step back, shaking his head wildly. "No," he said, voice slightly hoarse, "no. It's… it's different this time." He tilted his muzzle towards the skies, his brow furrowing. "Something isn't right. A storm is brewing, different from before. A storm is brewing - but it's not brewing here. Something is coming. Stay out of the water. Something is…"
With a sharp inhale, he cut himself off, shaking his head. "I must speak to the stars directly," he said, turning back to the other tom. "Whatever it is they're trying to tell me this time - it's just not getting through properly down here in the waking world. I'll have to go to the Moon's Crater."
There's a long pause as the other tom seems to process this information. A worried shadow crosses his face. "Oh, Sage Brush," he says, finally shaking his head; his tone is forcefully light and playful. "What ever shall I do in your absence?"
Sage Brush chuckled. "Just because you haven't been leader long doesn't mean you were born yesterday," he mewed, smile evident in his voice.
"You'll be fine, Cloud Burst."
--
He had walked Sage Brush to the volcano's tunnels yesterday afternoon. The midday sun was shining again, and still the tom had not reemerged.
Cloud Burst scowls up at a cloudless sky. Some storm they were getting. It hadn't rained at all since their sage had disappeared, not even a drop.
Thyme Forest steps up beside him, dropping a bird from the fresh kill pile near his feet. "Still no sign of Sage Brush?" they ask, worry creeping into their voice. Cloud Burst shakes his head. The healer sighs.
"Scouts are saying there's dark clouds to the south. He could still be right about the storm," they say as they crouch down to eat. They push the bird closer to him, an invitation to join them. He doesn't take it. They sigh again.
"This isn't like him," they say, staring at the volcano's tunnels. Cloud Burst follows their gaze.
"No," he says. "It isn't. I'm going to go check on him."
Thyme Forest blinks at him, confused and perhaps alarmed. "Good luck," they tell his disappearing back as he rushes off into the tunnels, deeper and deeper into the volcano.
--
What he finds is horrifying. There, at the center of the Moon's Crater, lays Sage Brush - dead. There has been blood spilled in their most sacred of places, and to Cloud Burst's eye the injuries could not have been caused by any cat or natural predator he knows.
But perhaps in death the sage was able to bridge the gap between the stars and the living cats, for at once Cloud Burst knows with a dread and certainty that Sage Brush had been right: a storm
had been coming yesterday, and it had already hit.
Their clan was simply awaiting the consequences.
He turns away from his dead best friend, and launches himself away through the tunnels, bounding like the wind, faster than he's ever gone before. Outside, the skies have gone gray, and those in camp huddle under shelter in anticipation of a storm. On the shores, a group of scouts are investigating the cove, wondering where all the water has gone. No one understands what it will mean for them. Inside the volcano, Cloud Burst knows none of this - only that he is the last beacon, the last messenger in a desperate relay to bring the clan news.
He bursts from the volcano tunnel just above the clan, all eyes on him in an instant, wondering what he's about to say, about where Sage Brush is.
"GET OUT OF THE WATER!" he yowls. "GET AWAY FROM THE-"
But it was too late.
--
It was a calm day. Until it wasn't. Cats who'd always been feral, who'd lived several years and witnessed many storms, recognized it as one of the worst kinds, the ones where they'd hunker down in the most secure place they could find, as high up and as far from the sea as they could; the kind of storm that turned anything loose into a weapon, branches, shingles, trash cans. The cats who had, at some point, been kittypets knew what it was called: a hurricane.
A storm is coming, Sage Brush had told Heatherstar. As he herded frightened and wet cats into the volcano, taking tunnels that led them up and up, Heatherstar thinks miserably to himself that he hadn't expected the storm to be so literal.
Word Count: 1136