On the day he's apprenticed, the air is made of lightning. Everything crackles in excitement. His fur. His breath. His littermate's frantic whispers.
As the leader gives them mentors, he starts to worry. Mediocre warriors for them, what if he doesn't get a good mentor either?
A cat content with the minimum won't make him into a great warrior.
But when his time comes, and she comes up to meet him, all his worries leave in a sigh of relief.
She's a great warrior. Fierce. Unyielding.
(But why doesn't she look happy? Aren't warriors happy when they get an apprentice?)
The first training session, they go walking around the territory.
The crackle of lightning is gone, replaced with stony silence.
It doesn't last long, though. He talks enough for both of them.
"Is that the rock pile? Oh, gross, I bet that's a border marker. Those other cats are stinky . Oh! that's where we gather, isn't it…"
He continues on, rambling away until a sharp cuff to the muzzle silences him.
"Quiet. Starclan gave you two ears and one mouth. Mind how you use them."
His muzzle stings, but he's excited again.
He's got the wisest mentor in the clan.
After a few sessions, his sibling's mentors aren't shaping up. He almost feels bad for them, they're at such a disadvantage.
He's glad he has a mentor as smart as he does. He makes so many mistakes, without her to correct them he'd be a floundering mess.
(She makes that clear.)
Repremeds come in sharp blows and sharper words, reminding him every time he feels the ache of a bruise not to do it again.
His littermates make the same mistakes over and over, it seems. In their shared session, their mentors hardly used any discipline.
(But neither had his.)
The next training session is the one he's looked forward to the most.
Battle training.
The first move is simple. Strike out with your front paw, claws out.
She demonstrates once, then tells him to try it on her. He does, not even missing as she sits still. His claws are sheathed, and he doesn't hit as hard as he could have.
As he purrs, a paw darts out towards his shoulder. There's a sting, and then a flash of red.
(Why weren't her claws sheathed?)
He looks at her in shock, but she just shrugs.
"Better learn to dodge."
"Hey, why are you bleeding?" a warrior asks.
"I messed up," He murmurs, the embarrassment coming back. Why would he rub it in?
He looks confused. "Trip into a briar?"
(Is he cruel, or just stupid?)
"Didn't learn to dodge fast enough."
Confused look stays plastered on his muzzle.
(Must not have had a good mentor.)
"Which one of the other apprentices didn't sheathe their claws? I'll talk to their mentor."
To the overly curious warrior: "No one."
Under his breath: "They don't get experience is important."
"Come on. Lets take you to the medicine den before it gets infected."
It doesn't get easier. Every day is a new move, and every mistake gets a sharp rebuke, normally in the form of the aforementioned move.
He's torn. On one paw, his mentor is right when he says experiencing the move helps him understand. He's becoming a fierce warrior who knows just how to use his claws.
But the other mentors also have a point. The scratches do hurt, and the medicine cat is getting tired of treating him.
(But she says that's the price you pay to be a warrior, and he knows she wouldn't lie to him.
...Would she?)
He fails his assessment.
He does everything he can, fighting viciously and hunting rapidly.
But he loses a fight and doesn't catch that shrew.
(And he keeps his claws sheathed.)
So it's not enough. When the leader asks if he's ready to become a warrior, she looks him in the eyes and says no. He's failed. Her. The clan. Himself.
(So what if his heart's breaking, you don't get what you don't earn.)
As he yowls her littermate's new names, he feels
(-brokenstupidinadequate-)
disappointed.
But he'll come back stronger next time.
(But could he?)
It doesn't matter. He has to.
He knows he deserves the punishment, but it still hurts.
It's a battle, real this time. Everything he knows, thrown at at him at once, littered with insults.
He's made a fool of herself, more importantly, her. He's ruined everything, made her look horrible.
(How could he have failed? She taught her, but he failed her. He couldn't manage to do something so simple as catch prey and fight off his own clanmate.)
"Worthless," She pants, pinning him to the ground.
"Please, I tried so hard…"
A cuff to the muzzle silences him.
Silently, air becomes lightning and he shatters.
Some people statter in violent bursts that matched the word, lashing out with tooth and claw.
It would have been better if he had.
He shattered silently, inwardly. Everything collapsed as he realized:
She's serious. She's not trying to make me better, she's trying to tear me down. She hates me. She thinks I'm worthless. She thinks I ruined her…
The little signs came back to him. The other mentor's sheathed claws. The strange looks at his wounds. The something missing in her gaze.
Why is it always her? Why doesn't anyone else come back injured? Why didn't she pass me? Why doesn't hse worry about me at all whywhywhywhy-
He finally came to the one conclusion, hidden from him for so long.
She was wrong.
He wasn't a fool, she hadn't ruined anything, and he wasn't worthless.
She wasn't just wrong, there was something wrong with him.
The shards of his eyes focused enough to see she was still above him, cuffing and clawing and yowling, but he couldn't feel it. His senses shattered with the rest of him.
But somehow, he has to redo himself. He has to get away, from this despicable thing.
He comes together with the force of a storm, going from limp to a cyclone of claws and screams quickly enough to startle her.
He can't defeat him, he can hardly even hurt her. But he can squirm away, and he can run, towards the camp and his littermates and his mother and all the warriors that are right.
He's not even sure she's following. It'd be mousebrained to follow him into camp looking like this.
(wisest mentor in the clans) some still-shattered part of his mind hisses. He screams back, out loud:
"Stop it!"
(like he should have, that first walk around the territories.)
When he bursts into camp, he can feel the eyes on her. The medicine cat can see that it's not like those other times, he actually wants help. He thinks that one warrior, always so concerned, finally has his answer.
And he thinks that his mother shatters, just a little bit.
But when the leader runs up, demanding to know the attacker's identity, he speaks.
Every word that went (unsaid), everything unseen and unexplained, falls out until he's woven a fairly understandable story.
The pieces are finally coming together.
AN/ This story has a bit of a story behind it.
I first started it on new years day, and I had some grand ideas for it. It was going to be a oneshot written in drabbles, and it was going to be Deep (with a capital D). (Also, I had just finished Wintergirls and was apparently determine to rip off as many stylistic quirks as possible.)
Of course, I got it done and looked it over. The ending sucked, and it seemed so pretentious and stereotypical. (Back then, protagonist and antagonist were the opposite gender and it never broke into prose at the end.)
A couple months late, I came and thought it wasn't that bad. I flipped the gender, re-wrote, and formatted with a purpose: The beginning is in a strict, restricted format with the end breaking free. I re-wrote the ending, and promptly forgot about all of it.
Of course, this DID inspire Wilted. I saw the potential in this thing, and considered exploring the relationship between abusive mentor and deluded apprentice. It grew from third to first person, and I switched from the apprentices POV to the mentors. Of course, it grew like crazy and now we have a 15,00 word mess woven from angst and darkness.
But, back to the point. I found this today, edited, and here we are. Should it have stayed dead, or are you glad I refound it?
Let me know!