Chapter Text
It was a sunny day at Buckington valley.
The warm sun rays in the morning were lighting up the top of the dense forest that covered almost the whole place, only “disturbed” sometimes by some small random shadow casted by a few cloud.
The valley once used to be nearly an attraction for fanatics of hiking, since there was not a singular paved road in the near.
The only “thing” enough similar to a street, was a small path that crossed the forest, leading to what us “Two legs” can call a building made out of bricks.
It was hard to tell what that structure used to be once, because the weather had corrupted inevitabily a big part of the building.
More than half of the roof had felt down, there were enormous holes inside all the walls (and one of them had nearly all gone down) and the ivy was blooming everywhere.
Due to its minuscule size and the weird presence of a first floor, all that could be told was that it was probably built to be a mini farm, where keeps cows warm and safe while the farms was transferring them closer to the civilization.
Or someone brave enough had tried to refugee like a hermit in that wild place.
In any case, in the current situation, only small animals like lizards, bugs and maybe rats could live inside those broken walls.
And we all know that were are certain preys, their predators will choose to live nearby them… and we all know that cats eat rats… and there were many cats! Mostly kittens, running, hiding and playing all around the abandoned building, that was everything but abandoned, since they were living there too.
“Magpiestaaaar! Arnicakit is playing ufair again!” a black short furred kit starter yelling. A big, dark grey and white she-cat paused to reorganize the freshkill pile and turned the head around, in the direction of where she heard the scream.
The small black tom was in the middle of the grass field that surrounded the old building, shaking the tail nervously, looking at a bush not too far from him “I know you’re there! I already busted you!”
“What’s going on sweetie?” Magpiestar asked
“Arnica is cheating! We were playing hide and seek and I found were she is hiding, but she won’t come out”
Magpie sighted “you two are almost six moon olds. You should be the ones that teach younger kits how to behave..”
“But where is the fun if we repeat the same game everyday?” Arnicakit ranted, coming out of the bush
“You simply don’t wanna admit you sucks at this game and that’s why I always f…”
“Shut up Rookkit! Its not true!”
Magpiestar tried to calm down the two arguing kits. After all, taking care of all your clan mates is the duty of a leader.
Though, it’s difficult with 15 more kittens, when you are the only adult cat. Something can always be missed…
The decaying building was places on a small piece of land, no bigger than 700 mq. and it was surrounded almost completely by a deep river, one of the many that crossed Buckington.
Only a really thin piece of land linked the colony with the rest of the valley.
Unfortunately, it was interrupted by a tree log, that felt who knows went, right in the middle of the passages. Nothing that an athletic creature such as a cat could not jump over it, but it sure blocked the sight to all the smaller creatures and it signed the colony borders.
In that particular day, if anyone wanted to escape the noise coming from the building, they just need to take a few footsteps, since it seems that there were not sign of lives near the trunk.
But the peace was suddenly interrupted by a small, orange fur ball, coming a bit too close to the “forbidden zone”. The she-kit, not older than two and half moons, stopped right in front of the trunk, looking at the top of it, in hoping that she could reach it.
“I wonder… I wonder how is on the other side...”
“Well.. Magpiestar said there are snakes, foxes and badgers...”
Two other kits followed her path, and stopped right behind her. The first one, a thin white and silver tom, looked calm and relaxed but he was still careful to the surrounding environment.
“I have never seen a badger before. How do you think they look like?” The ginger kit was trembling by curiosity, still trying to find a way to climb that log.
“As far as I know, they are huge, with long claws, and they have a bad smell…”
“And Magpie said they seems very calm outside but they can be very aggressive…” Finally the she kit found a solution: infact only the top part of the log was actually blocking the path and there were a few thic branches that let an escape way to the other side, but the holes were hidden in the dense grass so they were hard to notice.
The she-kit took a running start… “wait Emberkit, you know what Magpiestar said”
“I don’t want to cross the path, Heronkit. I just want to take a look on the other side.” and so the kitten jumped on the lower branch, grabbing it with her tiny claws and press her back limbs on a piece of wood right below it, to not fall. Heronkit followed her, still carefull but not scared.
The other kitten did the same.
They couldn’t see much, but the loud noises and chirps of the birds and the tall tops of the trees we enough to keep the kittens behind that branch
”Do you really think the forest over this log can be so dangerous like Magpiestar said?”
“Why wouldn’t it?”
“Nah… I don’t think so…”
Both Ember and Heron turned their head surprised to their companion, a black a white tom with always a bored expression.
“Are you imply that Magpie would lie to us, Nightkit? Have you seen a badger by yourself?” the she kit was almost astonished at the other kit’s comment. Nigthkit didn’t reply to her and turned his head to the other side.
There was a small pause.
Suddenly, Ember esclaimed “Hey! What do you think our warrior name will be, once we are promoted? I wish my name will be something bold like Emberstrike or Emb…”
But the two toms weren’t paying attention to her.
Suddendly, Heron passed over Ember and tried to climb a bit further.
“I wonder… how life may be outside here…”
Suddenly a loud meowing attracted the trio.
Two certain kittens older than them were probably arguing again.
“We've come too far! it’s time to come back”