Warrior Cat Clans 2 (WCC2 aka Classic) is a roleplay site inspired by the Warrior series by Erin Hunter. Whether you are a fan of the books or new to the Warrior cats world, WCC2 offers a diverse environment with over a decade’s worth of lore for you - and your characters - to explore. Join us today and become a part of our ongoing story!
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It had been a while since Phantomfox had been witness to her brother's corpse floating down the river. She was still deeply glad that it was him that was with her that day, but it had made things a little difficult for her. After all, every time she looked his direction, the image of her brother flashed through her mind. This had caused a slight distance in their relationship, something that Aspenstar deeply resented. She was frustrated with herself; why couldn't she put it behind her? He was her best friend, and he'd been there for her in her initial phases of grief. She owed him more than she could ever make up.
She knew she had to put all of that aside today, though. No matter how much the wound was still raw, she needed him. She was starting to suspect that he needed her, too. Although she had kept a slight distance, she had been made explicitly aware that something was troubling the tom. He had been... different since his son and mate had entered NightClan. She couldn't blame him, really. His son was sick, and there was an adjustment time when cohabitating. Still, she had to check in, just check to make sure he was okay.
When he approached her, she offered him a half smile. "You look like you've just crawled out of a sewer," she teased gently, concern wavering in her mismatched gaze.
Life was not the sunshine and rainbows Phantomfox dumbly hoped it would be. His and Rosethorn's romance was not a conventional one, that was for certain, having met on adverse terms, and he was no stranger to how every step of their journey had been tumultuous, difficult, and downright impossible sometimes, but he'd always hoped beyond hope that their perseverance would have granted them some leniency at some point. But it seemed like no matter what challenges they overcame, the torment never ended, and now they had five children to mourn while their last living child fought every day for his life, meanwhile he watched the light die from his mate's eyes with each day. Slowly, that hope was slipping away.
He didn't mean to draw away from Aspenstar in the process, especially not when her brother's death was still relatively fresh and there was a mounting discord between she and her siblings, but she'd already been drifting away and he had no energy left in him to chase, not when the world sat on his shoulders.
So it startled him when she approached him in his quiet spot. Phantomfox enjoyed his little pocket of peace in the shadows of camp; it was far enough away from his clanmates going through the motions, but he could keenly watch Rosethorn and Foxkit in the nursery from his vantage point. "I can't say you look any better," he snarked in return. "Your pelt looks like all those tarantulas live in it."
"If you don't want to become friends with my paw as I whack you upside the head, I recommend you don't joke about something as truly horrendous as that." There was a little less mirth in her voice than was normally there when she talked to Phantomfox, but that was something that he would probably expect. They both bore a new weight on their shoulders, and even though Aspenstar wanted to desperately pretend that her life was smooth sailing, the weight was something she just couldn't shake. Maybe her time as leader had aged her, turned her from a naive but talented warrior to a leader hardened to the world. She didn't really think so, though. Deep down, she knew that she felt this way because she'd never dealt with anything like this before.
She sighed slightly, before sitting down next to him. Her tail wrapped around her paws, although it twitched slightly at its very tip. Normally, she would have asked if she could join him. Today, though, she took the initiative to sit down whether he wanted her to or not. They needed to talk, and she didn't want to give him an out to the conversation by allowing him to tell her to go away.
"Sorry that I haven't been.... super great lately," she meowed, her gaze focused on some spot in the distance. "You deserve more than that right now." She let out an awkward cough, before finally letting her gaze once again settle on her friend. "So, what's on your mind?"
The lack of vibrancy was not lost on him, but it didn't surprise him. He had a sense that their strained friendship of late might play into that, but he opted to chalk it up to the transitional periods they were both experiencing, sharing different losses in their lives. What did shock him was how she settled in beside him without an offer, something distinctly out of character for the leader, who did her best to be polite even in their interactions, but all that expressed that was a raised eyebrow. "I think I'm well acquainted with your smacks," he rumbled as he weighed what he wanted to disclose to her. The hesitation was new for them too; normally, he could speak freely to Aspenstar, but with the distance between them...
"You've been dealing with your own demons lately too. I think we've both just been overwhelmed." He glanced back at the nursery, ensuring his family was still safely tucked away. "Mostly worried about Rosethorn adapting to being here. She's not doing well, especially when Foxkit has his bouts." A cough from their tiny son was enough to cause her distress for the rest of the night, no matter what Phantomfox did to alleviate it. Of course, there were other things haunting him,, but to distract himself from that, he shifted the conversation. "How is your family dealing with everything?"
"Well watch it, or you'll just have to become more familiar with them," she joked. She could sense is hesitation, and deep down, there was a part of her that was destroyed by it. When had life become so difficult? Where was the easiness that had been characteristic of their relationship? A part of her wondered if it was gone forever, although she really couldn't bare to think of that. No, they would restrengthen their bond, they just each going through it right now, right?
"Overwhelmed is a good way to put it," she meowed with a flick of her tail. Her gaze followed his to the nursery. Currently the only queen in the nursery, it was not a secret that the former SummerClan deputy was going through it. There was a part of Aspenstar, a part deeply tucked away, that blamed Rosethorn for part of the distance between them. Although it was completely irrational, the childish part of her was bitter that she now resided within the camp. That part of her was small, though. The majority of Aspenstar was deeply relieved that Rosethorn had decided to join Phantomfox in NightClan. It made things... easier. No more tense conversations with Ratstar about kitten custody, and she was comforted by the idea of her friend's family being reunited, even if it was a challenging reunion at first.
"I've been meaning to ask you about her," she meowed, glancing back to Phantomfox. "I am sorry to hear that she isn't doing very well. What she is experiencing is completely valid, but I can only imagine the compound effect of loss and displacement. Is there anything I can do to help allieviate some of her stress? Your stress?"
She then sighed. His question was loaded, and there wasn't a clear answer to it. "They're coping as best as they can. Pinesimmer hates me even more than normal, Maplevow is pissed, I haven't seen my parents in a week." She shrugged. "Such is life, I guess. Nice diversion, by the way." She finished her meow with a raise of her own eyebrow. After she paused for a moment, she smiled slightly. "Did you think I was too dumb to notice? Have a little more faith in me, Phantom my friend."
He saw the pain cross her expression at how he hesitated, but drawing more attention to it was something neither of them wanted. Instead, he smiled. "I appreciate you asking that," he said in the most earnest way he could, clearly a little uncomfortable with the show of appreciation, and quickly refocused onto answering her question. It meant more to Phantomfox than he would ever properly be able to convey to Aspenstar that she wanted to bridge the gap between herself and Rosethorn, and by doing so it meant his mate would immerse easier into the clan for them to see her gain their leader's blessing. She'd been welcomed by Aspenstar, but everyone had kept their distance from the grieving queen, to his dismay. "It's been a difficult adjustment for her. I'm the only support she has here, but I can't be there all the time like her sister could have been, since they would have shared the nursery. It would be nice for her to have someone to...confide in other than myself. Rosethorn is a social cat, though you'll have trouble finding that cat right now. I think the first step would be getting her out of camp for once. I can hardly get her to leave Foxkit's side." He knew the motherly concern was natural, compounded by the pervasive worry that an outside force would steal their last surviving child from them, but he worried for her seclusion, watching as his love turned away from the cat she once was.
He sighed deeply and drew a chocolate paw up to scratch his nose, listening as his friend both answered his own question and called him out on his attempt at diverting the topic, which caused him to smirk. "I was hoping you'd let it slide," he replied, "but I had been meaning to ask anyway. If you need someone to...take care of Pinesimmer, I have a lot of pent up anger that's itching for a release." She wouldn't accept that offer, even if she did appear to consider it, but it would at least cause her to laugh, breaking some of the tension between them.
She nodded at his thanks, drawing no more attention to it than she needed to. That was a part of the complex relationship between the two cats. Sometimes, things happened between them, and it was best to just move forward. She then nodded again at his idea. "If she is open to it, I would love to take her out and get to know her a little more. Bridge some of the gap between the life she knew and the life she has to build." She had a feeling that once NightClan cats saw that she was comfortable with Rosethorn, they would become more comfortable too. She then took a moment to think. If she was hard to get away from Foxkit... "Will you do me a favor? Tomorrow afternoon, before the rest of NightClan wakes up, meet us in the nursery. If you are there to take care of him, I may be able to convince her to come with me."
"Yeah, well, keep hoping, Phanty my friend," she meowed with an amused look to her friend. She then laughed out loud at his offer. "Between you and I, he definitely needs to be taken care of," she admitted. "We're still on thin ice since I may or may not have exiled him. Not that he... listened to the exile. God, it would have been nice if he had." She didn't really mean it. She didn't really want her brother gone, but the headache he was causing her was getting more and more severe every day. "Things have got to settle soon, right?"
"I can do that. I'll have Violetglass handle the guard tomorrow," he rumbled. Admittedly, he didn't find himself with much free time anymore between observing their new prospective guard members, his regular duties, and helping Rosethorn adjust, so he was excited for a day just to himself and his son, to relax and play. "You should take her by the river. SummerClan has plenty of water sources, and one of the places we would go between here and SummerClan was a quiet brook in a meadow. That's where Rosethorn told me she was pregnant." The memory was so, so sweet, flooding him from head to toe, but a surge of sadness caught him before he could swallow it back down, his thoughts reeling back to everything that came after. What had almost been a full, thriving family was a distant dream he kept chasing in his sleep.
Pulling free, he twitched an ear at the new moniker. "Phanty?" He raised a brow but didn't press on it more than that, rather smiling thinly. "I think you may be the only leader who can exile someone and that same someone decide they won't be exiled." He'd have liked to see Pinesimmer try that with him. "Eventually, it will settle. Everything," he said, almost seeming to be trying to convince himself of the same.
"Good choice," she meowed. Of course, all of her loyal guard were qualified to lead the troops for an evening, but Violetglass was the most experienced, perhaps even more experienced in this than Phantomfox, as she had been member of the Black Hand far before joining Aspenstar's guard. "Speaking of guard, you understand that you don't have to run around like a chicken with his head cut off, right? If you ever need an evening to yourself, or with Foxkit, or whatever, just deliver the orders to the guard and then take some time." There was slight concern in her voice; Phantomfox was going to run himself into the ground if he wasn't careful.
At his suggestion, she nodded. "There's a quiet spot where the rivers connect. Very few ever head up that way, so I think it would be a good choice," she decided with a nod.
"Phanty." She repeated endearingly. "You got a problem with that?" She let out a chuckle, before shuddering. "I think so too," she meowed with a sheepish look on her face. "Not really sure how to handle that one, honestly. It destroys the validity of my commands if I let him stay, but getting him to leave is probably more trouble than it's worth."
"I know," he murmured, "but it makes me feel better to do the jobs myself. Violetglass is more than capable for anything I throw at her, but I like the work, the rush. It makes me feel like I'm in control of something." Still, he appreciated the sentiment being passed between them, knowing that even if his ancestors no longer had his back, his friend did.
He swept his tail closer around his paws, mulling over what she said. "Pinesimmer could just disappear, you know. The guard exists for a reason, and I'm sure I'm not the only one willing," the tom added, thinking of how many enemies the tom in question had in the clan simply due to his loveable personality. Even besides the cats in the guard, who he seemed extra inclined to harass, there were few cats in NightClan that didn't dislike the leader's brother.
"I get it," she meowed in agreement. "It's nice to keep your paws busy." She hadn't been keeping her paws busy as of late, and perhaps that was why she was about to crumble under the weight of the world. Maybe she just needed a project... Yet, doing anything but laying down and never leaving her nest...
Her lips twitched up again, almost perking up at the idea. "I'm sure I could ask just about anyone," she agreed with a roll of her eyes. "Maybe the whole clan could line up and beat him up one by one. Eventually it's gotta kill him, right?"
She let out a sigh, glancing towards the entrance. "Want to go out? I've heard that a small community of loners have settled not too far outside of the territory, and I've been meaning to check it out. Might be a nice distraction?"
