The air was getting pretty freaking cold, as if Leafbare was making up for lost time. It was quite unpleasant, at least compared to what the weather was before.

Sandkit wasn't as active, Dustkit hardly wanted to try and bite my tail, Ravenkit was pretty much the same. A mixture of boredom and not wanting to do much because of the cold had taken to trying to invade the nursery. I was uncertain if having more cats in the nursery would be better or worse, as I huddled next to my sister in an attempt to limit any kind of cold gotten cough or other such illness.

Well, we didn't have much of a choice on the matter of a fuller nursery. Willowpelt was going to give birth any day now. I still sucked at keeping track of time, not helped by mother and father keeping both me and Sandkit locked up in the nursery with wavering moments of 'do whatever,' so counting days was hard among the sameness of kittenhood. If my crap math was right we were probably over a moon old. Maybe two, god forbid it be three, but I couldn't discount that sort of failure on my part. It was a little hard to put things properly into my mind calendar. I was sure there were things I could have used to keep count, like gatherings, but we were nursery bound more often than not.

The day of Willowpelt's kitting was getting nearer, and I had a sneaking suspicion as to who was going to be born, what with who made up our gaggle of kittens already. No idea who the father was though. I didn't know much about cat marriage, and I didn't think the lore did either. I was keeping an eye out too, a deep urge of wanting to know, not yet sated.
Overall, being confined to the nursery during the cold was an odd experience. Dustkit and Ravenkit regularly interacted with me and Sandkit. Kinda hard not to, but still. We didn't have much to talk about, being kits with no life experience and all, but we made attempts at half hearted moss ball games between the times the queens would tell us stories.
We got the prerequisite 'Inter clan love bad' talk accompanied with the story of Mapleshade. Now, don't get me wrong, from what I knew, Mapleshade was quite unhinged and evil, but boy did neither clan even attempt to stop it from happening. Like, there's the Tigerclaw's of the world who go down dark paths due to unassuming acts or none at all, and then there's turning your back on a cat going 'Oh, no, I hope no cat I have wronged comes back for revenge!'

At least they talked about how it was wrong of Thunderclan to throw the kits out as well, because you know, someone breaking the code obviously calls for breaking the code. And far be it for me to speak ill of a medicine cat, but god he was stupid. Secrets shouldn't be handled so carelessly, that's how you get unhinged revenge maniacs. Or break relatively innocent cats emotionally or mentally. Secrets are locked away for a reason, are a valuable currency and a devastating weapon. To hear a cat got killed for being careless and telling a secret, which resulted only in negative results, wouldn't draw a tear from my eyes.

And then the day came not long after, the day which Willowpelt gave birth. Luckily it was a mercifully sunny day so all kittens were thrown out so Spottedleaf could do her job. The oddest thing was, unlike father or Fuzzypelt, whoever the sire was, they were not present. The obvious answer could have been that the father simply died before I was born, but my inner seeker refused that. Except no one was giving off proper father vibes. Granted that could have been because Dustkit and Sandkit were doing their damnedest to bring me into a game of 'pretend to kill each other,' so my research probably wasn't the cleanest.

Darkstripe took a bit of an interest in the nursery that day, Runningwind came by once, and I could have sworn Whitestorm snuck more than one glance the nursery's way. Personally, there was no way the father was Darkstripe. He was like a gremlin, but unlovable. Runningwind I was unsure about, I barely remembered what he was like in the books and just couldn't get a read on that guy. He seemed decently plain from our, what, one real interaction. Whitestorm was a definite maybe. Maybe. He seemed to radiate some sort of pride from the glances I caught.

As I turned my gaze around the camp, in search of dark knowledge, almost as dark as the clouds that began to cover the sky, Dustkit played dirty. He bit my tail. Once again missing my fledgling fluff and biting right into the flesh. Welp, it was kitten killing time again. I turned on Dustkit and bowled him over. He tried to defeat me, but he failed as we tumbled about the front of the nursery. It wasn't that surprising, Sandkit had a hard time beating me when I decided to indulge her violence, with Dustkit being younger and having never play fought me before, he never stood a chance.

The play fight was quick, and somehow ended with me smooshing his face into the dirt. "I have won. Muaha."

I then returned to my cat watching. From behind me I heard Dustkit, confused and wobbly. "What just happened?" Victory, small cat. Victory.

Sadly my cat watching was cut short as Spottedleaf exited the nursery and was greeted by Brindleface and Robinwing. So, while I tried to see if any cat took exceptional interest in these events, Sandkit was dragging me to the nursery to greet our new denmate. I didn't resist, but neither did I make it easy on her.

We got in, and Willowpelt looked tired, but happy. Mother and Robinwing let us kits crowd about, but not get too close to the fledgling kitten, small and dark gray.

Sandkit got a bit closer and turned to Willowpelt. "Have ya named them yet?"

Willowpelt looked at Sandkit, smiling for a moment, before turning to her kit. "Yes. He will be named Graykit."

Hah, called it. But, now I had to deal with making sure four very important kits didn't get killed.

I turned to look out the nursery entrance, the once sunny enough day had become overcast and shadowed. Turning back to the three grown kits and one just born, I felt keeping them from dying would be easier said than done.

A few days passed without incident. Days were pretty samey, which was turning into the norm. Dustkit and Sandkit were the main cause of movement, Ravenkit seemed like he wanted to fade into the nursery wall. But, then something shocked me.

Rosetail came to the nursery. Not to visit, to stay.

Apparently I was fucking blind, because Spottedleaf had wanted Rosetail in the nursery almost a full moon ago.

Robinwing looked to the orange tailed queen as the nursery was in one if its quiet moments, allowing for Queen gossip. "Rosetail, why did you avoid coming to stay in the nursery for so long?"

I pretended to not perk up as much as I did, eager to hear what Rosetail had to say, as well as not wanting to disturb Sandkit, who laid her head on my back for a nap.
Rosetail flicked her tail over her paws, her ears twitching lightly. "Well… Leafbare is here now. The nursery was already so full and prey is getting so scarce, I just felt it was unfair of me to put even more of a strain on the clan."

Willowpelt laid her own tail across Rosetail's back with a friendly expression. "Don't worry about a thing, Rosetail. We won't judge you, and you're kits are as good as ours, you know."

That seemed to put Rosetail at ease, tension, that I hadn't noticed, leaving her body to a more relaxed state. "Thank you. I-I think Redtail understood." She chuckled, "I hope he knows I noticed he kept putting me only on hunting patrols. Just wish he would have actually spoken to me about it, but I do appreciate it."

Brindleface meowed in mirth as well. "That does sound like him. If he gets an idea in his head that he think will help and thinks it isn't too big, he'll just go ahead and do it. Just the way he is."

They talked, only the barest fear of leafbare upon their words, but I was practically frozen. I didn't let it show, acting like a simple kitten trying to rest, but my mind blazed with fear.
There were no other apprentices after Graykit. Wasn't he a relatively new apprentice when Rusty finally joined the clan? And then no new apprentices were named until Gray and Fire became warriors. Either way, it was only Sandpaw, Ravenpaw, Dustpaw and Graypaw who were apprentices until Cinderpaw and Brackenpaw were named. Something was going to happen. I didn't like it, but I doubted there was anything I could do. I could have been a full warrior and I probably wouldn't be able to do anything. The weight of the world I found myself in slowly made itself known to me in that small, insignificant moment.

I was almost ashamed at how normalized being a cat had become. The days were blending, just like when I was human, when being a different species in a, presumably, different world should have been more noteworthy. I briefly pondered if it was a problem unique to me or not. On a happier note, Graykit grew well. He had energy to match Sandkit and Dustkit once a few weeks passed. This did not help the crowding issue.

I watched as I laid lazily next to Ravenkit who seemed a bit worried about being dragged into the playful violence that played out in front of us. Sandkit once again won a play fight tussle against Graykit, but that didn't deter him at all. He just shook the moss from his pelt and was ready to play once more.

He turned to me and did a little dance of excitement. "Shiningkit! Shiningkit! Play with me, you be a Shadowclan warrior, and I'll be Thunderclan!"

I narrowed my eyes at the kit. "Why do I have to be the Shadowclan warrior?"

"You just give off the feeling of a shadowclan warrior." He shrugged, hardly losing his energy. "Schemey and slinky."

Oh, now that hurt. And didn't make sense. He hadn't even met a Shadowclan cat yet. "You're gonna eat those words." But, right as I got up Graykit charged at me with a smile.
I let him initiate. He was an overeager kit, so I figured it wasn't going to be that hard. As he collided with me I heard Ravenkit squeak from the sudden nearby violence. Graykit's inertia led us paw over tail, but after a single roll I dug my hind paws into the moss covered nursery floor and Graykit's over excitement caused him to slip. As punishment for saying I had a Shadowclan vibe I took a big bite of his already too fluffy fur and gave it a light yank.

He squealed, but happily and playfully kicked at me. "He-e-ey! Stop it!"

I spat out a bit of his fur and shook my head. "You're gonna become a fluff monster, you know."

He rolled over and looked at me with bright happy eyes. "The fluffiest!"

It was times like that, that reminded me, that no, simple happiness was not odd, enjoyment of the mundane was quite normal. I was a near alien monster hiding inside the skin of a child of a different species while holding about a decade of their lives within my mind. Moments like that, that made me ponder once more if it all was a blessing or a curse, and then a blessing or curse for who? The wrong human in my same position would have wreaked havoc on these poor souls.

I swallowed my melancholy and smiled at the kitten. "The fluffiest."

Days weren't just getting colder anymore, days were getting fucking frigid.

That's what made the commotion of lots of cats going about all the odder. I was intrigued and made my way just outside the nursery, hearing the rustle of moss of my kit gang following after me.

I glanced about the camp, and it seemed like every single cat was out and about. "What's the stir?"

Mother came along with us and chuckled. "It's a Gathering night." She said, pointing her head towards the moon, which was quite full.

I blinked in confusion. I most definitely had been alive for enough time for this to have happened once before, but only then did it hit me that I did not notice a Gathering night yet.

"How come I didn't notice the last one?" I asked mother.

Sandkit yawned and bumped into me, deigning to answer in mother's stead. "You slept through it all. Mom made me not wake you."

That only increased my confusion. Was- was I a heavy sleeper? Well, I did have the occasional business meetings with a dream skeleton, who was also me, I'd be shocked if I wasn't a bit more inclined to the world of dreams.

All in all, a decent amount of cats seemed to be preparing to leave, I didn't really feel confident in guesstimating what percentage of the clan was going. I wanted to claim my memory was perfect and said most of the clan goes as a show of power.

I decided to inquire, as the inquisitive kitten I was pretending to be. "Is much of the clan gonna go?" I asked Brindleface.

She nodded in return. "A fair amount. Redtail said Bluestar wants to leave more warriors back than usual, considering the nursery is so full. He said she had trouble balancing the amount of warriors to take though."

Robinwing followed us it seemed, as she spoke next. "I can't blame her. I can't recall the last time the nursery was so full. Taking enough warriors to the gathering to keep up appearances while properly protecting the camp is a task I don't envy Bluestar for having."

I turned back to face the cats beginning to leave through the tunnel, off on their way to the gathering proper. I pondered what would be spoken of, what posturing would happen, announcements made. It didn't help that my expectations to gatherings were probably warped some, what with all the shown ones in the books being important or dramatic to some degree.

With a tilt of my head and the two mothers brushing us kittens back into the warmth of the nursery, I wondered if anything important would happen tonight.

Apparently my drawing attention to the gathering infused the kittens with a lust for gathering knowledge, as they all wanted to hear the super exciting details, the declarations of war! Idiot kits, it would probably just be a round up of a new apprentice made a warrior, an elder died to sickness, we scented an eldritch horror in our territory.

I briefly pondered the existence of clan cat big foot when the commotion of returning cats sounded from outside. Sandkit and Dustkit tried to head to the entrance, but the respective mother's made sure they stayed put. We'd get told when we'd get told.

And, oh, were we told. Father soon after came to visit, visibly tired, which, hey, it was cold and late, who could blame him? As soon as he entered every kit, even Ravenkit, was bombarding the poor deputy with eager questions. Did anyone fight, did another clan insult Thunderclan.

The mother's and Redtail hushed the kittens. "No, no fights broke out. You would have seen Starclan shutting that down from this nursery." He looked conflicted for a moment, but spoke on. "Shadowclan has a new leader."

The fuck?

My confusion was shared, but not from the same root. They were confused and shocked at the sudden leader replacement. I was confused because I must have missed something in the immediate past of the early books.

Well, there was only one jackass who could be filling that role if a Shadowclan leader died. Brokenstar had taken control. Unless the universe decides my barley stable safety net of knowledge is too much and a different cat sits the Shadow throne. Early Blackstar would probably be pretty bad.

"Raggedstar died, and now Brokenstar leads Shadowclan." Redtail continued, beyond my mental wonderings.

Hah, take that fate, only I get to break you. Which is terrifying, but I'll burn that bridge when it comes flying at me.

The queens seemed quite interested and began to gossip, the kits were asking questions to Redtail. I simply sat there, but I felt the need to fit in a little, so I looked up to Father and asked above the noise, "Is Brokenstar gonna be a good leader?"

Redtail looked away and thought over my question before looking at me directly. "I can only hope, he was deputy for a reason, and while he postured a bit, he's a new leader and needed to appear strong." For a split second I could have sworn he looked troubled, "But, only time will tell if he's a good leader for his clan."

Or a good leader for the forest. I had to force down a scowl. Bastard was going to end up in the Dark Forest as a general. Barring a miracle, so many terrible, yet important, things were going to happen because of him. I wracked my memory and felt that Brokenstar was single handedly responsible for or elevated every negative event that happened in the forest to a degree. Thinking on the future always hurt, but with so much foresight things were only harder, and things were gonna get lost through the trees if I wasn't careful.

Letting the noise of the nursery wash over me, I didn't know what I felt. It honestly felt like anything that interrupted my meager normalcy threw me into shock. I forced down a smile that tried to plaster on my muzzle. A cruel smile it would have been, because Brokenstar would get his. I would make sure of that. No matter the ripples and waves my existence causes, that bastard would die, one way or another.

Frigid days were as frozen as ever. It provided a bit of amusement once Graykit noticed his breath was visible, and Sandkit drug me into reveling in the phenomena alongside the rest of the kits.

One thing I noticed, as I sat outside the nursery among the kits breathing heavily in a game of 'Who has the most breath' or something, was I quite liked the not so subtle sting of the cold against my pelt. It made me feel somewhat alive, the cabin like feeling of cold and warmth. Sorta like a weather version of sweet and salty. A delicate mixture of weather that provided an interesting atmosphere.

I half heartedly joined in, if only to sate my sister's semi adorable whining that I was just watching. Half heartedly because I wanted to revel in the near mythical feeling of the cold. The world had that kind of tone to it. Dark skies casting a blue tint to the land, the kind of cold that existed only when freezing began without snow. If I weren't in a story book, I would have said I was in a story book.

The joys of breathing cold air and letting out plumes of fake clouds could only distract kittens for so long however. Eventually Dustkit grew bored of the game. "Can we go to the elders?" He asked me and Sandkit it seemed.

Sandkit seemed just as confused as me but capitalized on it faster than I. "That sounds good. Warmth and a story!" Aaaand she led a charge towards the elders' den.

Rolling my eyes, I flew after her, leaving the protests of the others behind us as the two of us got there way before they did. I even took a bit of pride in the fact I beat Sandkit there despite her headstart. She seemed playfully annoyed, what gently bashing me with her shoulder, but what can I say? I am speed.

Halftail greeted us as the rest of the kit pack piled into the elder's den. "And what are you kits doing about on this cold day?"

Honestly, being in the elder's den was sorta calming. The elders themselves were mostly not grouchy when we dropped by, but I bet that would slip a bit once we became apprentices and the kitten cuteness wore off.

Ravenkit, surprisingly, was the one to answer. "Looking for a story and shelter from the cold."

Dappletail looked at us warmly before turning to the other elders. "Well, you heard the kit. What sort of story do you think would be fitting?"

Halftail nodded is head lightly in thought. "Hmm, well, it isn't really a story, but I think the kits might find it interesting." He shifted for a moment and cleared his throat, "With things so nippy now, I am reminded of Riverclan."

I didn't know where he was going with that start, and if the looks of confusion on my fellow audience kits. "You see kits," He continued, "Riverclan, much as it's name, relies on the river for their food, even if I don't understand it. But, when leafbare comes along, and if it gets cold enough, the river itself can freeze over."

That brought noises of awe from the kits. Even if none of us had seen the river for ourselves, stories and osmosis gave us an image of an unstoppable dangerous aspect of nature, so I understood their amazement there.

"It goes to show, leafbare, the cold itself is one of the most dangerous predators in this forest. Whether it be us of Thunderclan, hunting in the forest, Windclan upon the moors or Shadowclan among the pines, the cold of leafbare is harsh and unforgiving. The cold drives prey underground, makes them thin or outright kills. But Riverclan, usually their river could feed their clan even into leafbare, unless it freezes over. Why, when the river freezes, I'd say Riverclan are worse off than any of the clans."

That left the kits at a bit of a loss, to be honest. It wasn't really a story, but it was informative, and dare I say, 'humanizing' to the other clans.

We stayed with the elders for a bit long until Graykit got bored and wandered off, only to squeal in excitement and called to us "Hey! Hey! Somethin' weird is falling from the sky!"

The fuck? I eloquently thought to myself.

That got the attention of the rest of the kits and Dappletail. We kits charged out while the elder stretched lightly to follow after us. As we burst from the elders den we saw Graykit bouncing about, batting at falling flakes of white. Oh, sweet kitty jesus it was snowing. That probably wasn't good.

Once more my fellow kits were enraptured by the new phenomena and I did my best to mimic them. Luckily Sandkit seemed a bit distracted, so I didn't feel like I absolutely had to bounce about like Graykit.

By that point Dappletail plodded out and looked about, seeming happy to see the kits entertained, but I could tell she wasn't happy at what the snow foreshadowed for the forest.

"Yup, that's snow." She said, "You bunch should probably get to the nursery soon. No telling how much it will snow and we don't need you kits getting sick, okay?"Her words were enough to get a general response from the kits. Graykit and Dustkit excitedly chasing about the white specks that began to gather on the ground, while Ravenkit shadowed them.

I was about to follow them myself when Sandkit spoke, "Hey…" I was a little off put by her tone, but I turned to face her, flicking my ears. "I've been thinking…"

Again, she trailed off, like she was uncertain of how she wanted to say whatever it was, and whatever it was must have been something because her tail waved agitatedly back and forth. I tilted my head a bit and prompted her. "And? What have you been thinking?"

"We should go hunt."

I damn near hurt my neck with the double take I did. Where the hell did this come from? "What?"

She turned to me, hissing under her breath. "What Halftail said, what Rosetail said, I just can't stand back and do nothing. I want to do something, I have to do something! For the clan, for the nursery… what if Rosetail's kits go hungry?"

Taken aback, I blinked rapidly, not quite sure how to take it. Heading out to hunt as kits was definitely a bad idea, and gave me deja vu to boot, but… the distress on my sister's face and in her voice hit me hard. The sentiment of wanting to feed the clan was honorable, at the very least. "Okay, how're we gonna get out without being seen?"

It was Sandkit's turn to be taken aback, apparently having not seen me agreeing so readily. She caught herself and cast her gaze across the camp. "Look," she pointed with her tail, where Whitestorm and Runningwind seemed to have enough snow and went to the warrior's den. "The snow will distract everyone. We can slip out… Somewhere, catch a mouse each, get back before anyone notices and add them to the freshkill pile. It will be like we never left."

That was a blatant lie, but if my sister was going to do something stupid, I was going to be by her side. I nodded and shifted my eyes to the camp wall. Graykit and Dustkit were getting into a scuffle away from the nursery, and I jerked my head to the nursery itself. "Let's look behind the nursery. Might be a gap we can squeeze through.

My sister held a look of pure joy and nodded enthusiastically. We made our way towards the nursery, not really stalking amid our sneaky plans this time. No one was really about, more focused on the oncoming snow. With one last glance to make sure we weren't witnessed, we ducked behind the nursery and seriously inspected the vegetation that made up the camp defense.

As I searched I heard a soft hiss and turned to see Sandkit gesturing in front of her. I bound over and almost didn't see it at first, but hidden amongst the branches was the barest space that a cat small enough, or determined enough, could slip through. With one final glance between us, anticipation, fear and myriad other such emotions playing across our features, we dove through the hidden way out. We moved as quietly as our not so elegant kitten limbs allowed us, not speaking a word, almost refusing to breathe as we took in the new world laid before us.

Once we were far enough away I felt I could safely breathe, I looked around, noting the fall of the snow, coming down more and more. "We need to make this quick."

"That is the plan." She said, uncertainty coming with her bravado. "And we are basically apprentices already."

I blinked, the weight of our kitten adventure evaporating as I just had to rain on her parade. "Well, no, I may suck at telling time, but we're a good few moons out from that."

Sandkit shook, whether from the cold or annoyance I couldn't tell. "Let's just shut up and hunt."

Welp. No time for regrets. The hunt was on.

—

The clan was in a frenzy. Redtail dashed from nook to cranny, much as many other warriors and even elders were doing. It was just a simple day, a little muddied by the first snow, only for Brindleface to ask the kits where her daughters were and find the kits confused, only then noticing how long their friends had been quiet, when the call was raised.

With a rough shake of his head, he ran to Whitestorm and Runningwind. "They're not in the camp!"

"But where could they have gone? We would have seen them leave through the tunnel." Whitestorm noted.

Runningwind shook his pelt in aggravation. "That doesn't matter. They must have found some way out. We would have heard something take both of them."

Redtail was both angry and thankful for Runningwind's input. The idea a predator couldn't have taken them both was comforting. The idea they left into a coming snowstorm by their own will was not. "Whitestorm, round up some warriors, split off into pairs of two and scan the forest. Runningwind! With me!"

Orders given, Runningwind ran alongside his deputy while Whitestorm charged to spread the word. In no time at all the two toms burst from the gorse tunnel and charged into the forest.

Redtail could hardly tell how long he and Runningwind were out in the brewing storm. Slowly, as they searched and looked and called, their vision was getting worse. A monstrous storm of cold and snow was right in front of them.

The tortoiseshell deputy whipped around, looking for any sign of his lost kits when he heard Runningwind call to him. "Redtail! We can't stay out here for much longer!"

Even out among the cold the words still made his blood boil. He rounded on his clanmate with a snarl. "I will not leave my daughters out in this storm!" As his anger took hold Runningwind back pedaled, a look of, not quite fear, but apprehension on his muzzle. Redtail sighed, his features softening. "I won't order you to stay out here. But I'm not leaving my kits in this blizzard."

Without waiting for an answer Redtail bound further into his search, adamant in his conviction. Not long after he heard paw steps to his side and glanced to see the lithe tabby keeping pace. "No order needed, Redtail."

For whatever reason, Redtail felt touched in the moment, and simply nodded and returned his focus ahead of him, back to the search. He felt a little less cold with such good company on the precipice of disaster they ran across.