The tom padded towards the camp, two mice dangling from his jaws. His onyx fur was almost black; allowing him to disappear into darkness when needed. His canary yellow eyes seemed to glow with pride with his catch today. The tom was recently made a warrior, a mark on his shoulder proved he was, indeed, a warrior; the mark was a dandelion colored canary imprint, made of smashed dandelion and some herb or something that kept it from washing away easily.
The four clans in this area had a different way of showing what 'rank' a cat it; marks on their shoulders. A kit is an imprint of a mouse, any color the kit chooses. The apprentice imprint is a rabbit. A warrior imprint is any herb, animal, or anything the cat desirers, same for the elders, except their imprint is a duller color (example: a vibrant blue will turn to a duller, darker blue). While the leader imprint is a star.
The clan of the tom was called Earthclan, named after the founder, Earth, and for the fact the clan is actually underground. The tom soon arrived at a tree with a bush in front of it at around sunhigh. He got on his belly and crawled into the bush, which hid the hole that went under the tree's roots.
Under the ground, a system of tunnels stretched ahead of him. Only Earthclan cats knew how to get around and where it was located, making it easy to defend. He was in the main burrow, which could fit six full grown badgers with room still available. Around the burrow were a total of seven other tunnels, leading to the sleeping hollows and the freshkill.
From the entrance on the other side of the burrow lead to the freshkill burrow. The tunnel to its left was the nursery. Next to the nursery was the apprentice den, followed by the warrior den. On the right of the freshkill was, in order, the elder den, leader den, and the medicine cat den.
"Pitch!" A yowl sounded from the medicine cat den as a warm stone colored tom appeared. On his left front leg and back right leg had a weird, warm-brown stone color on the shoulder, mid-led, paw, and whole tail.
Pitch nodded to him as I headed to the freshkill tunnel, which was a fox length long, dropped off the mice, and went back to where his best friend waited. "You doing ok?" the stone colored cat asked with a tilt of his head and Pitch replied "Yup! How is the herb thing going, Stone?" The blue eyes of the smaller tom lit up and he chirped "Great! I love it as a medicine cat!"
Stone's imprint was a dark grey flower; him being a medicine cat. Oh, medicine cats have different imprints. Kits have a blade of grass imprint, apprentices have fern as an imprint, and the medicine cats have the same as warriors, though usually has an herb as an imprint.
Even though 'Stone' sounds like a name for the brave or tough, Stone was the polar opposite. Stone prefers to heal, and is almost as cowardly as a mouse. He is easily scared and never fights, even in a life or death situation. Also, Stone is skinny compared to Pitch, who had broad shoulders and a boulder like body that could break a tree trunk if he had enough speed and momentum.
Stone, with a flick of an ear and nuzzle on his friends cheek, he meowed "Let's go get some freshkill." Pitch snorted in amusement before pointing out "Sometimes I'm surprised you're so skinny!" as the duo headed to the freshkill tunnel.
After grabbing a finch for Stone and a squirrel for Pitch, the duo went back to the main area and sat down close to the medicine cat den.
Not long after they say down, a she-cat with pure white fur with a cloud color that was placed on the center of her throat in what looked to be a tiny star like shape with the top 'point' heading up and stopping right below her head. An imprint of a grey daisy rested on her shoulder.
"Hey you two!" the she-cat chirped around a bird in her mouse and Stone replied shyly "H-hi Cloud…" as the she-cat sat down and quickly scarfed down her prey. "How are you?" They didn't see Cloud long ago, sometime before sunup when they woke up to see Cloud off for dawn patrol.
"How did you're dawn patrol go?" Pitch asked and Cloud replied "Not good… Cats from both Forestclan and Oceanclan were fighting at their border." Forestclan was the group of cats who live above ground in the forest, while the Oceanclan cats lived on the sandy beach.
Stone made a quizzical face and asked "Why are those two always fighting?" "I'm not sure…" Cloud replied. Thing is, Oceanclan has been causing trouble, mostly with Forestclan lately. No cat is sure on why Oceanclan is stirring up trouble, but as far as they knew, Duskclan was siding with Oceanclan on whatever their argument is, Earthclan doesn't know because they don't want to get involved.
"I hope it stops soon…" mewled Stone, who shivered at the thought of a possible battle that could force their clan in with it. Pitch snickered before meowing "Stone, even if a battle broke out, you wouldn't be fighting." "But I'll worry about you guys…" Stone murmured sadly, his ears flat on his head in sadness.
Cloud shrugged before pointing out "They might stop fighting before anything bad happens." Pitch nodded in agreement before nuzzling Stone and meowed "There's no need to worry, Stone!" The scrawny runt sighed in defeat before nodded as the three finished eating and debated on what to do.