Broken Code

Chapter 21

"I swear if you hit me with that mossball one more time!" Lilackit chirped, pouncing on her brother Cloudkit.

"Hey it was an accident!" Sootkit jumped up, defending his snowy brother.

"Rawr!" Lilackit pounced onto Sootkit and the two rustled in the dusty camp, Cloudkit jumping in as well.

Rainpaw twitched her whiskers at the kits, remembering when she and Ashpaw used to play back many moons ago. How long ago that seemed. Before their parents died, before they were apprentices with responsibilities, before the prophecy. Rainpaw sighed, running a paw over her grey and silver head.

"You ok?" Brokenpaw's voice echoed from the back of the medicine den.

Rainpaw nodded and padded back inside. "Yeah, just thinking."

"About Ashpaw?"

She nodded.

Brokenpaw gave a curt nod and went back to batting a mossball back and forth between his paws. His paw had healed nicely since the battle with Grassclan and he was going to be able to be on full apprentice duties within the next quarter moon. He still had a tiny limp when he walked around but he was slowly healing. Rainpaw and Flowerwhisker had given him a few exercises to do to help strengthen his ligaments and tendons.

Rainpaw padded into the back of the medicine den just as Sootkit came running inside.

"Hi there Sootkit. Are you alright?" She purred softly.

The dark grey kit shook his little head. "I stepped on a thorn!!" He wailed, putting his paw in the air to show the medicine cat apprentice. Rainpaw twitched her whiskers a little.

"It's alright Sootkit. I'll get it all fixed up for you ok?"

The little kit nodded, his eyes full of fear.

"Ready... 1,2, 3!" On three, Rainpaw grabbed the thorn with her teeth and yanked it out of Sootkit's paw.

"Ow!" He winced as blood swelled up to the surface of his rosy pink pad. Rainpaw grabbed a bundle of cobweb and placed it on top of his paw. Then she pressed down on it hard to stop the bleeding.

Sootkit looked around the medicine den. "So is this where you sleep?" He asked Rainpaw.

The silver furred apprentice purred and nodded her stary head. "Yup. I practically live in here." She admitted with a small giggle.

"But I live in the apprentice's den. I'm just here right now because I broke my paw." Brokenpaw chimed in.

Sootkit nodded and licked his paw as Rainpaw pulled away the bloody cobweb. "Thank you Rainpaw." He licked her shoulder and then ran off out of the medicine den to continue his play.

"Yay you're back!!" Lilackit and Cloudkit ran over to him and their voices chimed throughout the camp.

Rainpaw smiled and turned back to Brokenpaw. "I feel like I'm still so young, like I'm not even a full medicine cat yet, but I still feel old compared to those kits."

Brokenpaw nodded his jet black head. "I agree. I'm almost about to become a warrior but then this happened." He frowned at his paw. "But yeah, I do feel old sometimes and I'm still an apprentice."

"And I feel like I've experienced so much... my parents dying... Ashpaw.. you know..." She shuffled her paws. "Sorry I'm not trying to make things somber I just.."

"No yeah yeah I get it." Brokenpaw sat up in his makeshift nest. "Sometimes I feel as if I have to fulfill my father's footsteps. I mean, he's Jayscratch. He's done everything. I'm sure if anything were to happen to our leadership he would be the next deputy. And... I don't know.. I just feel like I'm just average..."