Bye-Bye Berries (short story)
Webstripe was far away enough that the Streamlands in which he resided in were no longer in view. The hot steam that formed within it faded away, and he fluffed out his striped coat against the chill of the rest of the Dark Forest, glaring at the sky as a rise in wind pinched at his skin.
It would only be a short trip to the border to fetch minnows and back, or it would be if the distance from his land to the border wasn’t practically sixteen Clan territories apart. Then the wind, blowing from behind his back, stopped. Webstripe was relieved until he felt something furry press against him. “Hello little Web.”
Webstripe didn’t move, just barely gulped. “Uhm. Hello Bristleblaze.”
“Heard you got another cat knocked up.”
“Oh, did I?” Webstripe’s heart sped. Whenever cats started conversations like that, it never ended well for Webstripe. And Bristleblaze was huge!
“A lonely one,” Bristleblaze grunted. “Who probably didn’t mention that she’s my friend.”
Oh no. Oh no oh no. Webstripe took a step away, slowly and praying that it wouldn’t be noticed. But while he was watching Bristleblaze over his shoulder, a cold paw touched his own, outstretched one, and his head snapped back to meet Avery.
“Mine too,” the ginger-and-white tom said.
Webstripe looked at one then the other, then repeated again. “She-cats come to me, alright? They want kits!--Ahh!”
Bristleblaze had dug his claws into Webstripe’s tail “They also tend to want a loving mate and father to their kits,” he spoke calmly, but the tone of a snarl rolled off of his tongue just the same as if it had rumbled through his throat.
Webstripe’s fear and defensiveness grew. He bristled. “What do you want me to do? Cats have urges! They choose to come to me!”
“For love, not a hit-it and quit-it,” Avery grunted.
A paw slammed down harder onto Webstripe’s tail. He screeched, and instinctively jumped, but couldn’t go anywhere. Before he could complain or try to fight back, Avery had moved forward and placed his claws on Webstripe’s lower belly. “You’re right,” he said dangerously. “Some cats do come to you. Sometimes they do it because they don’t care, or you’re nothing more than a method of getting kits, but sometimes–most of the time, I think, you trick them.”
“You know what he’s talking about, so shut up,” Bristleblaze cut in.
Webstripe snapped his jaws shut.
“You say that you don’t, but you do. You allow them to fall for you. You do things with them and don’t even warn them that you won’t stick around if something happens. You don’t even break it to them gently. You just leave. You do it all the time. Do you enjoy it? Hurting them? Breaking their hearts?”
But they didn’t really want him to speak. Bristleblaze cuffed his ear roughly, making it ring.
“So how about a deal?” Avery suggested. “You stick to toms and she-cats who have made it clear that they don’t want you to stick around if anything happens. And if we find out that another she-cat got knocked up thinking that their mate would be there to support them–” he dug his claws in deeper–”It’s bye-bye berries.”
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--Wrote it more seriously than I normally write joke stories!
--Avery and Bristle belong to @ambitiousauthor
--Web belongs to @starfalcon555
--The baby-maker has to fight with the nut-slayer at some point, right? And we can’t just get rid of all babies for Web. That’s his whole thing. But this seems reasonable, right? Hopefully he won’t do something stupid, right?
