The snow around Delta was stained red. The dog she'd met a few days ago stood proudly over the limp form of Shadow. Delta could hear yowls of rage from her friends. A human gently picked up Shadow and took her inside, while another dragged the reluctant dog by his collar. Ebony's human took him to his house. Suki and Misty gloomily turned to head home, leaving Delta alone with Jade. Jade's voice split the silence. "Delta, Delta wake up." Delta opened her eyes and lifted her head. The blurry shape of Jade came into view. It was only a dream. Relief washed over Delta and she smiled at her friend. "Bad dream?" Jade asked. "Yeah, thanks for waking me up." "You looked sad. But also, guess what today is! Just kidding, you don't get to guess. It's the first of December!" Jade quickly changed the topic. Delta's mind was still foggy from her dream. "And that's important, why?" "Because that means I'm one year old today! I'm officially an adult! I heard it from Suki. Well come on, let's go hunting. Irony's gonna teach both of us if you're willing to come."

Delta licked her fur, trying to get it to lie flat, and nodded.

"It was just a dream." she whispered to herself as Jade ran ahead to find Irony. "Not the future. The dog I met was friendly, he would never do that."

She jumped and her fur fluffed up again as Irony spoke from behind her. "I wouldn't be too sure. Your mom seemed friendly enough at first. And didn't you say you put your piece of quartz under your side of the blanket?"

Delta forced her fur to lie flat and her ears to do the opposite. "It can't be real, I refuse to let it be real. Let's just go hunting, maybe it'll get my mind off the dream."

"Good luck with that." Irony said, turning around to lead the way into the forest she'd lived in for the past years.

"Now, Jade, how about you show Delta the hunting crouch I showed you?"

Delta dropped down in the crouch she'd been taught for sneaking up on cats.

"I said Jade." Irony snickered, "That's better for sneaking up on cats than prey."

She stepped forward to correct Delta's position.

Delta quickly memorised how the pose felt and straightened up.

She got lost in thought as Irony continued showing them how to hunt, automatically following the instructions just as she had when she was a kitten learning to fight. Was it always going to be this way? Just following instructions and perfectly replicating them? Would she always just be doing the same thing she'd done in the fortress? Was anyone even that different from Nova after all?

"So," Said Jade, snapping Delta out of her thoughts and making her jump. "Jumpy today are we? Wanna tell me about your dream?"

Delta forced her fur to lie flat once more. "Yeah ok, talking about things gets them out of my head when they've been circling for a while."

Jade didn't reply, her full attention was on listening, not responding.

"I was in Shadow's yard with everyone else, and we were all fighting a dog I thought was friendly. Then the dog grabbed Shadow and the humans arrived to put a stop to the fighting when she fell into the snow. She wasn't moving! And then the humans took everyone home, the only ones left in the yard were you and me before you woke me up."

"Well, it could've been the future, but it sounds a bit unrealistic. Nobody could just pick Shadow up like that without getting a facefull of claws, and she'd just get right back up when she was dropped."

"Unless she had already been weakened to a point where she couldn't fight back." Delta's voice was almost a whisper.

"That would never happen! Not with us fighting by her side."

"But what if our efforts only make it harder for her to fight? What if she's too busy protecting us to save herself?"

"Maybe we can prevent it from happening, if it is real at all. It's all the way in the future." Jade reasoned, but Delta could see that she was already unsure.

"You can't change a future that's already been seen." Delta warned with a shaky voice. She fought to keep herself from crying. "I'm sorry, now I've made you sad and scared too."

"No you haven't, stop worrying." Jade pressed close to her friend. "You're right, it was probably just a dream."

"This is sweet but if you want breakfast you need to actually do some hunting." Irony interrupted, leaping down from a tree where she'd caught a crow.

"Right." Delta got shakily to her paws. She had calmed down now, slightly, but she still couldn't shake her fears. Especially of following orders.

All these 'what ifs' and questions circled in her mind as she tracked a mouse. But she forced herself to concentrate on the prey she was going to catch.

What if she failed? Would Irony be disappointed? Would she have to try again or could she share with Jade? What if Jade didn't catch anything? Would they both have to keep trying until they caught something, freezing their paws and tails off? Or would Irony just share some of her crow with them? Did Irony expect them to catch their own prey from this day on?

The mouse popped its head out of the snow for a moment, just long enough for Delta to see where it was, and for it to see where Delta was.

She sprang forward, claws extended, suddenly unsure whether she liked the idea of hunting.

Just as she was about to land, the mouse darted out from its hiding place, and all she got was a mouthfull of snow.

Delta didn't bother chasing after the mouse. If murder was wrong then why was she expected to murder a mouse?

She didn't move. She couldn't remember where she'd been told to meet Jade and Irony when they were done hunting, and she didn't want to face them without prey. What if they were disappointed in her? What if she got punished? No, she wouldn't be punished, that was only something Nova had done. What would happen when she told them she didn't want to eat another mouse in her life?

Irony jumped out of a tree behind her. "Are you going to accept defeat and continue hunting, or stand around until your paws freeze to the ground?"

Delta turned to face her. "I don't want to do either! I mean, I accept defeat. But I don't want to keep hunting."

Irony stepped closer and sat down. "Why not?"

"Mice are alive too. Wouldn't killing a mouse count as murder? Why do I have to murder a mouse?"

Irony shook her head. "Mice exist to be eaten. And if nobody ate mice, they'd overrun the forest. They'd eat all the plants until there were no plants left, and then they'd all starve because there'd be no more of the plants they eat. Think of hunting as doing the plants a favor."

"Oh-" Delta couldn't think of what to say. "Ok."

"Now," said Irony, standing up. "Let's continue hunting. Besides, cats aren't made for eating anything other than meat. You couldn't be vegetarian even if you wanted to."

When they caught up with Jade, Delta was feeling much better about hunting. She was carrying two mice, one she'd caught with Irony's help, and one she'd caught all by herself. Irony had helped her track the first one and quietly directed her on hunting it.

Jade had a bluejay. Delta always thought jays were pretty rare, but she knew they stuck around throughout the winter in the city. She admired Jade's hunting skills, catching a bird seemed so hard.

As they headed back to the alley, Delta spotted Misty and broke off from the group. Misty was acting strange and Delta wanted to find out why.

Misty crouched close to the ground, feeling out every pawstep with her whiskers.

"Why are you walking around as if you're blind?" Delta asked.

Misty scoffed. "I'm not walking like a blind cat, I'm walking like a cat who's been relying on sight too much for too long. My owners took my collar off to give me a bath and they misplaced it. My powers give me perfect vision, even better than whatever the animal with the best eyesight you can think of is. So now that I'm not wearing my collar I need to re-adjust."

"Hm." Squeaked Delta dismissively, turning back to rejoin Jade and Irony.

"Oh hey there you are, Delta." Jade's face seemed to light up as she spotted Delta returning to the alley. "Hey I was just thinking, Suki says the humans give out presents around this time, so what if we give all our friends presents. Could you help me gather supplies? I'll need new tape, the flood ruined the last of what I had."

Delta nodded absently.