Username: ☁Lady Raincloud☁
Name: Persimmon
Gender: tom
Age: 38
Rank: loner
Clan:
Lighthouse Prompt:
Persimmon sat among the roses. It was a clear day out; he stared up at the sun with squinted eyes for a moment, before gazing at the vast expanse of blue that went beyond it. Blinking his eyes after such stress from the blaze above him, he stood up, turned, and walked back towards home. The weather was such a change from how it had been for so long now; rain. Cold. Damp. Through out it all, on some misadventure than began with hunting, he'd been kept away from his family for a few days. He was excited to see his family again, and smell the familiar scent of the abandoned shed they dwelt in, and hear the local pigeons cooing. Such thoughts danced merrily in his head as he went back.
But he began to be unnerved by the silence. He'd been traveling through a pretty woodland with birds chirping around him, but as he neared the more familiar lands of his family's territory, it occurred to him it was getting quieter, and quieter. He shrugged it off; the trees wee clearing. Birds were more likely to sit and sing in the crowded tress, perhaps. Or perhaps it was the absence of wind as opposed to the days before? During the storms, where he'd found himself stranded in the caves, the wind had howled like gigantic wolf. It had frightened him; he'd never heard wind quite like that before in his short life.
The walk went on for what seemed like forever, especially with the sun now beating down on him, and the trees gone. There seemed to be less trees than he remembered up ahead, and as he neared the location he noticed at least one tree was quite uprooted. Then he saw another- and a few more. He would have gone to investigate, but he saw some men from the nearby town gathering bunches of branches and wood and carting them off, and he didn't want to deal with humans just then.
Muttering a 'what on earth happened' to himself, the tom nervously picked up his pace. The destruction got worse in some parts, but he was relieved to see some trees had made it. Had men done this? Or something else.
He skidded to a stop as he reached the clearing- well, it was far more than a clearing now, with the trees either down or partially bald- that the shed had been in. There was nothing there; well, that wasn't quite true. There was a fallen branch, and a lot of fallen leaves, and a bit of the shed, awkwardly tumbled over, and scattered about the landscape. But the structure- his home- was gone!
He searched for his kin for hours that day, but not a trace remained; he was relieved when he found no one dead- but then again, he didn't find anyone alive either. He searched for his feline neighbors, even the unfriendly ones, to ask what had happened, what had gone wrong; and it was days before he finally found the elderly city cat named Clover he'd only spoken to once.
"Big storm." Clover said, dramatically. "I haven't seen such a storm in ages! The wind sounded like-"
"Please, tell me what happened, just straight out with it!" Persimmon interrupted.
"Fine, fine; it was a tornado. Or something like it. Big windstorm! Cleared out a few trees, but thank all that's good most everyone is alright that I know. Didn't really come into the city."
Persimmon had never heard of such an event. He asked if cats could survive these tornadoes; Clover only shrugged and say, perhaps. Time would tell if he'd ever see his scattered kin again, dead or alive.
The tom decided to try and find other familiar faces he knew, cats he'd known as a kit who lived several miles away. He couldn't bare to be alone, he wasn't used to it. It would be hood to see old friends, and then, maybe, find some help to search for his kin there.
When he arrived to the barn where his friends lived, Stick, a cat who he'd played with as a kit, greeted him warmly. Persimmon sat down and told him everything; the storm. The trees downed. The missing kin.
In his dismal speech he muttered about how happy they had been the days before the storm. How lovely life was. And, staring up at the clear blue sky he whispered in a soft voice, finishing his tale.
"To think... that that was the last time I ever saw them."
