A ball of anxiety that is into many fandoms especially Supernatural; I also like Marvel, DC, Voltron, Flash, Pokémon, HP FMA/Fmab,Hetalia ext. I am a Multi shipper for the most part.
Rookstar led the way out of camp and towards the hedge that blocked off the moor from farmland. Brick and Firestar separately occupied themselves in the silence. Brick sniffed at a patch of grass that was more green than gold or cocked his head when brush erupted with a startled rabbit sprinting away from them. Firestar stared straight ahead and wrenched his mind away from trying to bring bile to his throat as pale blue eyes followed him through the grass.
When they reached the hedge, Rookstar stopped and swiveled his ears, leaning his head in close to the usual open part of the bush that cats could slip through. He listened for a long moment, eyes narrowed, before looking back at the younger toms.
“They’re all in the Barn,” he murmured. “Firestar, you and I will go around by the road. Brick, wait until we’re out of your sight to step through and call attention to yourself. The corn is difficult to run through, but it’ll provide protection. Get back to the hedge quickly and head back to camp.”
There was no time wasted for even a nod; Rookstar turned and loped to the right, and Firestar had to hurry after him. He threw one glance back at Brick peering through the hedge and then picked up his pace into a run. His legs were working overtime just to keep up with Rookstar at half-speed.
“Keep silent,” Rookstar whispered.
The hedge ended as a wire fence began, and shortly they reached the road. The front of the Barn, and the house it sat beside, was backed up a little to allow space for a gravel patch with various cars and human creations lounging in random spots, like guards that had fallen asleep on the job. The doorway on this side of the Barn was wide open; from here Firestar could see a gaggle of rough-looking cats talking to each other and eating whatever mice or rats they had found that night.
Rookstar signaled with his tail and the leaders stopped where they were, hidden behind a rusting hunk of metal that could have once been called a car. Both of their ears perked forward and they crouched, prepared to run.
“I’m just saying, maybe she could come here too,” someone said. “We’ve got the space.”
“There’s no point,” a sour voice replied. “It’s too late for her and everyone else there. And you know she won’t leave.”
“And we need all this food for ourselves,” a molly added.
“You think this Barn will run out any time soon?”
“I mean—”
The voice stopped. All noise in the Barn did. Firestar dared to poke his head out just enough to catch sight of a crowd of cats all staring at something on the other side.
Rookstar did the same, then tapped Firestar with his tail and cantered across the open space in a half-crouch. Firestar followed him, reaching the other side just as he faintly heard Brick say, “Is this where y’all have been?”
Stay safe, Firestar tried to think in Brick’s direction. You’ve done enough risky things for the Clans.
He didn’t say this aloud. Neither leader spoke until they had passed the house as well and were on their way towards an unfamiliar cluster of plants that could have been small trees as easily as large shrubs.
“You’ll let me do the talking to whoever we find there,” Rookstar said to Firestar, volume normal again. “These folks speak Fang.”
“I don’t know any of that,” Firestar admitted. “I just know the one or two words dogs speak.”
“Mm.” Rookstar’s ears perked. “You said one when we were handing that last dog, didn’t you? Didn’t recognize the word.”
“I did, yeah, but it was just ‘no’.”
“Did enough for just one word.” Rookstar’s snake-long tail curled, and if Firestar could read him better, he would have guessed the look the senior gave him to be approving. But Rookstar said nothing more, just trotted alongside the road with Firestar hurrying behind him on much, much shorter legs.
Rookstar entered the maze of shrub-trees, weaving through it with the expertise Firestar would have walking around in ThunderClan’s forest. The grass was barely present, oddly short and almost all yellow, prickling Firestar’s pawpads. The shrub-trees’ leafage wasn’t much more welcoming, but it gave way a lot easier than most of the bushes in the forest. The smell of the road quickly disappeared, with a new scent that Firestar couldn’t really identify clogging his nose. It was sharp and pungent, and it leaked out of every plant with an intensity that bordered on unpleasant.
Rookstar slowed and stopped as they emerged onto a broad circle of flat, open land. Firestar stepped up beside him, sniffing. He caught sight of long white things dropped here and there, and flinched when he realized they were bones.
“Folks eat here,” Rookstar said. “There’s a rule to clean up the meat so the place doesn’t smell like rotting flesh. Still, bones sometimes get left behind.”
“Oh.” Firestar wilted. “So… this is where you take cats’ bodies.”
Rookstar nodded.
Almost immediately, the image of a pile of corpses from the battle cheerfully plastered itself in front of Firestar’s eyes. He shook his head hard to get rid of it, his stomach churning even so.
Rookstar hadn’t turned his own head, but his eyes slid Firestar’s way.
“Most think we’re monsters for this,” he said after a pause. “We think burying bodies in a territory full of tunnels is a poor idea.”
“I don’t think you’re monsters,” Firestar said quickly. “I mean, it is unsettling, a little, but… we all have our ways of taking care of dead cats.”
Rookstar hummed. “We make friends and put meat to good use this way. All of us contribute to keeping WindClan safe and informed in the end.”
An unpleasant idea struck Firestar. “Even kittens?”
“Even kittens,” Rookstar said solemnly.
Firestar’s mouth unconsciously went into a grimace, but he said nothing. He wondered about the queens who knowingly gave up their dead children to be devoured by a weasel or fox. He couldn’t imagine being okay with it himself, but WindClan cats were born knowing what would happen to them when they died. Maybe it was easier to swallow then.
A long silence followed, both toms sitting down at some point and listening to the world around them. Firestar’s exhaustion caught up to him and he had to fight not to drift off where he sat. As the moon started to sink, a familiar, somewhat dusty smell reached Firestar’s nose. Before he could name it, a pair of shadows appeared overhead. Firestar flinched on instinct at the recognizable silhouette, but kept as still as he could as two brown-brindled, massive owls landed across from the cats, their wingflaps entirely silent. Their round, violently orange eyes narrowed as they landed on Firestar.
Then Rookstar spoke. And immediately, Firestar was lost. His words were calm and clear, but hit the air with a sharp cutoff or a sound that was alien coming from a feline. It sounded nothing like the language Firestar knew—which, of course, he realized, silently scolding himself. Rookstar’s speaking Fang. No kidding, I wouldn’t understand it.
The owls cocked their heads alarmingly far to the side, and one of them spoke back in a low, soft voice that kicked up high and loud right at the end of whatever sentence they had spoken. The other chirruped and squinted at Firestar, to which Rookstar made a surprisingly deep sound that could have rattled the ground if it was any louder. The owls then looked at each other, then back to Rookstar and blinked twice in unison.
Rookstar didn’t look at Firestar’s undoubtedly curious face when he said to him, “These two are friends of WindClan. I just told them you’re a friend, too.” He paused, then added, “Here’s a word to know. Kolot. Say that now.”
“Kolot,” Firestar repeated, the sound alien in his mouth. He muttered it to himself, trying to get the sharpness of Kol right.
“Good,” Rookstar said. “That’s Fang for ‘cousin’. Your best way to stay friendly with a strange predator. Call them that, they’ll know you mean no harm.” He said something else just as odd-sounding to the owls. Firestar caught ‘kolot’ in there somewhere.
One owl hooted and shook out its feathers. Though its face didn’t change, it did sound a little amused. It regarded Firestar with less contempt in its eyes than he’d perceived before. Firestar bowed his head respectfully, hoping that wasn’t a rude gesture to an owl.
“I’ll tell them about the Barn cats,” Rookstar said.
“Make sure they know not to go after Barley once this is taken care of,” Firestar said quickly. “I don’t want him to be hurt.”
Rookstar lowered his chin before speaking to the owls again. He said something that made the owls straighten up a bit with surprised blinks. The larger owl’s voice would have been oddly soothing had Firestar not spent a lifetime listening to owl calls and being warned that a cat his size would be easy prey for them. It was hard to fully enjoy a conversation one couldn’t understand with strange predators on the other side of it.
Still, Firestar stood patiently, listening as best he could, trying to think of things the owls might need to know. One idea struck him, and he waited for a pause in the conversation to tell Rookstar, “Those cats have a queen with kits. Please let them know not to harm her or them.”
Rookstar nodded and continued talking to the owls. The chatter went on long enough that Firestar could watch stars begin to fade out of the sky, before Rookstar rumbled a gentle-sounding string of words that the owls repeated in unison and perfect imitation.
“Uta e kolot,” the smaller owl said, looking at Firestar.
Firestar didn’t know what to say back, so he just repeated, “Uta e kolot.”
To his relief, the owl gave him a warm look before bobbing its head to Rookstar and spreading its massive, broad wings, its partner following. The pair of them took off in silence, the wind from their flapping rustling Firestar’s fur.
“What did I say to them?” he asked once the owls were gone.
“‘You are cousin’,” Rookstar replied. “Polite way to end a conversation and make friends. Let’s go.”
“Did we get what we came for?” Firestar asked, turning and following Rookstar back the way they’d come.
Rookstar walked more slowly now. “We did. They’ll be plucking one cat a night until the gang’s small enough for us to confront. We’ll be watching the Barn for that.”
“They’re not going to take any of the kits, are they?”
“No.” Rookstar’s tail lifted over his back. “Remember that they’ve got chicks themselves. Makes them a little more sympathetic to other animals.”
“Good.” Firestar sighed in relief, and quieter, “...Good.”
Their return trip was more casual, but passed in less time. They only paused at the Barn’s door, checking to make sure they weren’t being watched.
Firestar tilted his head at the various furry mounds in spots scattered around the interior. It wasn’t exactly cold, but even ThunderClan had slept clustered together when they’d stayed there, and they were never far away from each other at home. These cats were very distant from each other, all tightly curled up with fur flared, like they were waiting even in their sleep for something to wake them up and pull them into a fight.
“I wonder if they’re even friends,” he whispered to Rookstar.
Rookstar grunted. “Probably not. You know how rogues are.”
Firestar waited until they had crossed the open space and were safely out of earshot before angrily responding, “I do. It kills me that no one else does.”
Rookstar didn’t say anything to that, but he gazed at Firestar with an unreadable expression for a long moment. He turned and continued on, his tail and ears very still.
When they made it to the fence, they turned around its corner to see a cat waiting for them by the hedge’s starting point. It wasn’t hard to recognize Brick as he stood and met them halfway.
“How did the distraction go?” Firestar asked, the three of them trotting now for WindClan’s camp.
Brick curled his tail. “They were baffled that I’m still alive. ‘Course, Jumper and Hoot wanted to kill me, but that corn is hard for a cat their size to get through. Ended up getting back over to the hedge without a problem.” He looked at Rookstar. “And your friends are in on the plan, I hope?”
Rookstar grunted.
“They’re leaving the kits and queen alone, at least,” Firestar said to Brick. “The rest is up to them.”
“That’ll work.” Brick squinted one eye at Firestar in amusement. “And I’ll wager you had no idea what was being said?”
“Rookstar had to translate,” Firestar said sheepishly. “But I learned a Fang word! Kolot. Cousin.”
“And is that useful, or…”
“I guess that’s the way to refer to someone if you want to be friendly.”
“Alright.” Brick paused. “Would’ve been useful for those dogs, I imagine.”
“No,” Rookstar said, bordering on sharp. “You can’t trust a dog. Especially not one that’s tasted blood.”
Brick sighed. “I guess that would’ve been too easy. I’m just glad those beasts stayed out of town.” He paused, then added quietly, “Not that it’s good that y’all suffered under them, of course.”
Rookstar’s ears went back, and he looked full on at Brick. “Blackstar said once, before all of this, that you Aulmir cats were waiting for trouble to find us. That was when the dogs showed up.”
Brick nodded. “We’d overheard from wanderers that there was a pack of dogs that showed up somewhere out the way you two went. Around that time, Bone was gathering forces that’d end up becoming the Blood, and he told all of us that y’all were in their trajectory and we wouldn’t have to worry about dealing with the Clans in the future if we just kept to ourselves and let the dogs tear you apart.”
“Which one was Bone?”
“That oversized white-and-black fellow with the big belly.” Brick sighed, sounding disappointed. “None of us expected that it’d be the town that would fall apart. Guess we didn’t think y’all are as organized as you are. Work together as well as you do.”
“They still cost us a lot of ThunderClan,” Firestar said, fighting a shiver of grief and old fear. “If we hadn’t been lucky enough for them all to die, one by one, we could’ve been completely decimated.”
Brick’s expression was bordering on mournful, his voice softer as he looked ahead. “Cloudnose told me about his brother and mother. That’s a nightmare I don’t think even Scourge could have bested.”
“It’s over now,” Rookstar said quietly. “We’re alive. They’re not.”
“I suppose that’s the way to look at it.” Brick’s eyes went to Firestar. “Not that ThunderClan seems to know that.”
Rookstar’s ears lifted, but he said nothing.
“We did have a cat dying every couple of days, it seemed like,” Firestar said. “You can forgive them for being a little anxious.”
“I can,” Brick replied. “I imagine those cats in the Barn will be pretty anxious themselves, for a very similar reason.”
Firestar’s tail tapped the ground as he walked. “I wish we didn’t have to do this. I’m not so sure we do. They seemed peaceful, sleeping when we went by. I hate to give them the same experience ThunderClan had.”
“They were sleeping?” Brick blinked in surprise. “So soon after chasing me off, too. Well, I suppose they’re appreciating the peace that living in that Barn gives them. No cats to fight, plenty of food. They’re probably sleeping most of their days away.”
“Not for long,” Rookstar said flatly.
Firestar’s eyes went to the grass he walked on. He said nothing more.
From the Nashville Zoo’s fb page! Here’s the petition, please please please take a moment to add your name (even if you’re not from Nashville!). If you are from Tennessee, contact your representatives and make it clear that the people do not want this data center. This is an AZA accredited zoo which is home to several species of critically endangered animals, we NEED to protect it. Make your voice heard!
Datacenters raise the temperature around them by several degrees. This would absolutely negatively impact the more sensitive residents of the zoo. Also just because a noise isn't audible to humans doesn't mean that animals won't hear it. Constant noise pollution can drive people crazy, let alone our furry, feathery and scaly friends!
TIL the reason you don’t find much Lyme’s Disease in California is not because we don’t have Ticks, or Lyme Disease Vectors; but rather: because the Western Fence Lizard (if you live anywhere in California this is your regular Garden Variety Lizard) has adapted a passive immune response that makes their blood lethal to Lyme Disease Bacteria. Any Tick that feeds on one gets its gut cleansed of Lyme Disease as a side effect.
There is a new vaccine going into Phase 3 trials from Valneva and Pfizer as well as a monoclonal antibody-based prophylactic treatment being researched at UMass!
Sign-ups for this year's Batfam Big Bang are open!!
Once you sign up, please make sure your tumblr messages are open so that we can get you the discord link. If you don't get a message from us within a week of signing up, shoot us an ask!!
Waaaaaaiiiiiiittttt for it!!!!!! As in 24 hours you will have your hands on the most amazing and wonderful Psych zine and merch! You know that's right!
I finished the second emotional act (of three) for these two! Over two hundred pages in, the ultimate slow burn, I swear. Here's a little snippet in honor of this milestone!
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Her breathing is still doing the thing where it won't quite go all the way down her esophagus.
She focuses on the dolly instead. The boxes. Four stacked high. KITCHEN — misc. was scrawled across the top one in black marker. Below that: DISCS — Fragile. Her eyes tracked lower to a second KITCHEN — Fragile, before finally landing on the heavy base at the bottom: ELECTRONICS — Fragile.
A memory of when she'd moved into her last apartment, the one she'd been living in for four years comes to mind, unbidden. She'd labeled boxes with a red marker that had been running out of ink, the letters slightly faded on each.
She'd been listening to a podcast when she was packing. One hosted by two co-stars from a childhood show she'd watched religiously, even through moves across the country. It was a show with actual magic and high stakes, centering around a brother and sister who shared a strange, intense energy — an energy explained years later when she learned the actors had ended up dating and getting married.
She'd eaten cold pad thai out of the container while she worked, because she hadn't wanted to dirty a bowl she'd just washed.
That was a normal day. There were normal days, once.
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