i can’t say midnight as a villain would be better or worse but it would definitely be more interesting and i think would tie pot and oots together in a fascinating way. her motivations would be pretty clear and sympathetic considering the clans forced the badgers from their home. was her stopping leaf and crow from eloping an attempt to prevent the three’s birth, knowing they would be fated to apprehend her? would make a lot more sense why she gave so much information to sol and why he returned in oots. could potentially elaborate on her relationship to rock and the clans and provide a much clearer reason for incorporating jay’s time travel/the backstory of the ancients. was the lake also the ancestral home of the badgers, did the two groups once live there as intertwined neighbors? is midnight to the badgers what rock is to the clans? what’s her relationship with starclan? imagine if warrior cats was good
she helped the cats on the journey, perhaps all she wanted was to bring back the clans to their original home, so that the twin groups could be reunited around the lake they once shared. but these aren’t the ancients, the cats she knew from that distant past—these are the clans, unrecognizable in their bloodthirst and their insatiable hunger for territory and control. she brought these cats back to once again stand side by side in peace and companionship—spiritually connected by the tunnels and the lake and the moonpool—only to look on in horror as they killed and chased out her brethren. she made a grave mistake, and only seeks to undo the harm she caused.
