Life 3:9

A warm wind blew through the Riverclan territory promising a quick return of New Leaf. Already the flooded river was receding, meaning soon Riverclan would be able to fully retake their flooded camp. Food had been a little scarce since the flood, but Riverclan was managing off what ground prey they could find. The water was even low enough to cross into Sunningrocks, provided that the one crossing in question didn't linger too long in the still freezing water.

Mudfur and Snakepaw were out gathering some herbs this warm morning. Most of the snow had melted revealing the still yellow grass beneath. Every once and a while, Snakepaw would pause and dig out the tiniest bit of herb that managed to breach the surface. This of course annoyed Mudfur. To him, digging out such a pitiful amount was a waste.

"Why do you keep doing that? You're getting barely enough to treat a kit?" Mudfur queried.

"Every little bit helps. A single maw full of catmint is a world of difference from no herb at all." Snakepaw answered, ignoring Mudfur's protest.

"Our time could be better utilized finding a bigger patch than picking all of the two leaves this patch has managed." Mudfur responded.

Snakepaw flicked his tail dismissively. "If that's what you think you should do, then do it. I'll just keep up what I'm doing."

Mudfur couldn't help flicking his tail angrily at that. He couldn't just ditch Snakepaw to go herb collecting his way. Snakepaw was technically too young of an apprentice to be left out on his own. "You know, you are really frustrating." Mudfur commented with a huff.

"I'm not trying to be, honest. This is just the way I've always done it. It is what my first healer teacher taught. Of course, we lived in the mountains, so finding any amount of herbs was a good day. She was brilliant when it came to medicines. She also taught me the most fundamental ways to understand our ancestors." Snakepaw answered, getting distracted from his herb gathering.

This got Mudfur curious. "And what are these fundamentals you speak of?" He asked.

"Well, the one that we often miss nowadays is that sometimes the best sign of who should be selected for something like being the deputy or being a medicine cat apprentice is simply that someone is willing to take the position at all. I know this sounds odd because there's literally no interference from Starclan, but that's the catch. Starclan or our ancestors aren't stopping it or giving any hint that it isn't against their wishes. Another major one is that our ancestors, no matter how they present themselves, are not all knowing. They're just as flawed as any cat. Sure they can get some visions and hints to the future, but they're just that, hints. They don't know what the future holds, so they trust our judgement and ability to take care of ourselves. They'll step in if they think it is important, but mostly they let us make the call since it's our lives to live." Snakepaw lectured.

Mudfur couldn't help but sit at Snakepaw's statements. "Are you saying that Starclan didn't even know about the flood they warned us of?"

Snakepaw shook his head. "No. They knew. Starclan is a massive collection of cats who each have a lifetime of experience. In the case of the natural world, things tend to happen in patterns. They're predictable if you've been around long enough to see it. This coincides with these visions and hints. They probably got a rough hint that water would fall and rise drastically. Given the season at the time, they figured out the fall referred to a storm, a blizzard in this case, and the water rising was the river. Thus, they had a more clear message to send us. Sometimes that get visions or hints that are obvious, but other times they have to puzzle it just as much as us, sending us the raw vision in hopes we can somehow make sense of it when they could not. It's a fairly lengthy process that has had more than a few fights between Starclan medicine cats about how to interpret a vision." Snakepaw couldn't help giggling to himself. "Honestly, the medicine cats up there fight more than the warriors."

"You make it sound like their prophecies aren't all that accurate." Mudfur rebutted.

"That's because they aren't. They're just really well-educated guesses. Most of the time, they are right, but there have been exceptions. I'm sure no one in Starclan anticipated the murders of Mapleshade after giving that medicine cat a sign that her kits were half clan. In all likeliness, they were attempting to avoid the event by letting them know early, accidentally triggering what they meant to avoid. Happens a lot more often than you'd think. Anyways, what I'm trying to get across is that even with all the hints and visions they get, they don't know the absolute future. Why? Because the future isn't something immutable. It changes with every one of our actions. I should know. I've broken a fair few prophecies in my many lives simply because I deemed them stupid or suicidal for someone else." Snakepaw answered sharply. "Really hate those ones. Anyone who says someone is fated to martyr themselves is either a moron or talking about me."

Snakepaw's dark humor smacked Mudfur out of his contemplations. "You seriously had to joke about dying, didn't you?"

"Had to do it. There's not enough time in the day for us to wallow on the nature of the universe and finish our herb gathering. I'm sure Silverstream will be real pissed when we get back late since she's on much weaker stuff now and is starting to go through those pregnancy emotional swings." Snakepaw replied.

"Oh no. She's already a menace enough when she gets those cramps. I am not looking forward to seeing her when she's on an emotional swing and got the cramps. Think you can deal with her Snakepaw.?" Mudfur jokingly asked.

"At least it'll likely be a quick death when she bites out my throat. Kidding aside, you may want to be on standby in case she does get violent. I've died to a pregnant molly's mood swing rage before. It was honestly impressive how quick she killed me. One moment I mention that she was bloated like an overfed mosquito and the next I'm in Starclan. I'm still unsure how she did that." Snakepaw mewed jovially before taking off for the next herb patch.