I was never really a regular warrior.

Clack. Clack. Clack.

"Heatherstreak! Stop with your chirping, you're scaring the prey away," Sleetclaw sneered, his eyes blazed in anger. The wind rustled through the patrol's fur as buds shivered and snapped off their twigs in the trees above.

Heatherstreak saw the senior warrior's glare, and stopped clicking her tongue. She liked the noise that she made and it helped with the emptiness in the air, though it either scared the prey or bothered other's concentration. She moved slowly into the the hunter's crouch. Almost of its own accord, her tail began lightly slapping the heather. The noise of her hitting them made Sleetclaw and Heronpaw look back at her with stern and exasperated eyes.

"Heatherstreak! You're acting like an apprentice! Stop! You're a warrior now, so act like it!" Sleetclaw hissed.

Heronpaw paddled away with a small smirk on her muzzle. Heatherstreak lowered her ears, ashamed and embarrassed, but tried to keep it still nevertheless. She attempted to concentrate on the task at paw. The light brown tabby tried to look into the bushes, sniffed the air, and targeted. Using all her might she leaped, a noise made her look away. She was watched behind her as the apprentices talked to their mentors. Within a few moments, she plummeted straight into a bush. Leaves got into her fur and the branches poked her paws.

"Heatherstreak! Are you okay?" Rookface meowed from behind Sleetclaw.

"Rookface, don't pity this young warrior. In fact she doesn't even deserve to be a warrior." Sleetclaw meowed as he stepped in front of the brown tabby she-cat.

"Doesn't even deserve to be a warrior." Heatherstreak burned those words into her head. Her body ached, her paws were sore, and tail was bleeding slightly. Her blue eyes started to flood and blocked her vision. She pushed on a branch and propelled herself backwards onto the cold grassy ground. She rubbed her eyes, transferring the substance onto her paws.

"Heatherstreak!" Rookface called out, the black furred she-cat dashed towards Heatherstreak through Sleetclaw's "blockage" and helped her get up. Sleetclaw snorted, whipped his tail around and vacated the clearing. Heatherstreak could see the two apprentices in the distance snickering at her mistake.

"If Heatherstreak can be a warrior, then I can be one too because I'm so much better than her." Heronpaw praised herself. She held her head up high as if she were gaining her warrior name.

Grousefang gave her a nudge with his paw, "With that kind of attitude, you will never become a warrior."

Heronpaw closed her muzzle and mumbled, "Sorry, Grousefang." With a swift turn she began to depart.

Heatherstreak got up, onto her paws only to see her former mentor, Sleetclaw has already gone to follow the others.

I failed you, Swiftstorm. She commenced to linger over the dead tom, who mentored her after the situation with Sleetclaw.

"Heatherstreak, you've never really focused on anything. You couldn't focus while hunting, training practice, and you always wandered off somewhere. Put yourself together," Rookface suggested.

"I can't, Rookface. I've been like this since I was born and I...can't change the habits," Heatherstreak sighed, "I'm useless."

Heatherstreak started to follow the other cats back into camp, with no prey grasping in her mouth. Grousefang, his apprentice, Lichenpaw, and Heronpaw all donated their share to the fresh-kill pile. Heatherstreak looked around and noticed that a few warriors were missing Duskfoot, Elmpaw, and two others. She made her way to the fresh-kill when she saw a shadow loom over her in the sky.

"Maybe I can redeem myself for catching that!" Heatherstreak thought in her mind and without hestitation she started to chase after the prey.

Faint noises came from the WindClan camp. Heatherstreak felt as if she was swirling in a misty cloud. She kept chasing and chasing. The feel of happiness and cats praising her for catching the creature were in her mind. She wasn't going to let them down, not this time.

I have to get to the end. I must accomplish my task.

»»-------------¤--------------««

"Heatherstreak!" Buzzardpelt yowled.

Heatherstreak sighed, she knew she made a mistake and was going to be assigned an apprentice's job once again.

"Yes, Buzzardpelt?" Heatherstreak meowed, as she found where the deputy was located and made her way there.

"What happened recently? You've been slacking in hunting." Buzzardpelt asked.

Heatherstreak mumbled, too embarrassed to speak in front of the clearing, "I...can't focus."

Buzzardpelt nodded, "Perhaps another time go practice a bit more, I could supervise you and see the mistakes you are accidentally doing, then you may be able to catch some rabbits, not butterflies."

Heatherstreak winced, Buzzardpelt had just brought up her recent mistake and the light brown she-cat wasn't too fond of him to do that in the clearing. Heatherstreak looked around nervously, she didn't want anyone else to hear their conversation after what happened with Falconflight that same day.

Buzzardpelt continued to talk, his voice a little softer than before, "Heatherstreak, can you please take care of the elders for the rest of today?"

Heatherstreak didn't notice that the deputy replying from before. Heatherstreak hesitated a bit. She wanted to ask Buzzardpelt to repeat what he said, but saw the golden tom's hazel eyes staring back at her, she nodded and proceeded to go to the den hidden behind the bushes and next to the one tree, the one that Kestrelstar stands on to make her announcements. She was correct that Buzzardpelt assigned her to tend to the elders again. Heatherstreak looked to the right and saw some elders sleeping, while others were grooming themselves, or sharing tongues.

"Flintpatch and Specklestone, may I clean your bedding?" Heatherstreak asked quietly, trying her best not to wake up the sleeping elders.

"Sure," Specklestone meowed, "just make sure not to trend on the others."

Heatherstreak nodded and looked at the other awake elder, Flintpatch. She turned around and tried to avoid glances with the warrior. Heatherstreak grumbled, it wasn't the first time that she had been tending to the elders after her warrior's ceremony. She ignored the fact that Flintpatch didn't want to see her and continued on her work. She grabbed the used moss and pushed it outside. She then moved them into the clearing where the sun shone over them.

Heatherstreak started to grasp some of the moss that she had picked from the leader's tree and set up some nests for the elders. She silently made some nests out of moss by ripping pieces and bunching them up and stretching them into nests. Unconsciously, Heatherstreak has been using her left claws and was scratching the old moss, making a loud scratching noise. Moments after making some of the nests, a dark gray tom interrupted Heatherstreak with his grumbling.

"I just wanted to take a nap," the gray tom hissed, as he left the den and curled up outside by the ferns.

"Graytail gets really annoyed when he's wakened up from his sleep," Specklestone chuckled.

Heatherstreak dropped all of the moss, the damp green fluffy substance landed onto the crusty rocky ground. Her instinct was to run away or to leave from the problem once and for all.

"It's already sun-down and I think I should go prepare for any early patrols tomorrow," Heatherstreak nervously meowed as she ran away in a heartbeat.

Why am I like this? Why can't I just be normal?

»»-------------¤--------------««

Heatherstreak made her way to the leader's den knowing that she would be lectured by the Kestrelstar.

"Greetings Kestrelstar," Heatherstreak meowed politely, she knew that their leader was very harsh with others.

"Heatherstreak, from what I gathered from your clanmates, you, were the only one who couldn't catch a single piece of prey this week," Kestrelstar replied, emphasizing the "you" to only single out Heatherstreak.

"Sorry, Kestrelstar, it's been really hard to focus on any tasks I've been assigned to, I don't know what to do..." She replied with a slightly disappointed tone.

"Sorry catches no prey," Kestrelstar hissed, she waved her tail viciously and she raised her back as if she was going to pounce on the young warrior.

"I know it doesn't!" Heatherstreak retorted and made her way to the entrance of the den.

Heatherstreak knew that WindClan's leader just told a well-known quote to all the clan. It was only told to the ones who they saw improvement in their apprentices and gave them the motivation to try and do better. That made a negative impact on Heatherstreak. She knew that she couldn't improve and certainly couldn't move on.

After their little talk, she left the leader's den to grab some water by a small stream that ran through their territory. The she-cat lapped some droplets up and looked at her reflection. There were some murmuring and some talking near her.

She looked up to see a patrol start to leave the campsite. Duskfoot, Plumtail, Falconflight, Coppernose, and Duskfoot's apprentice, Elmpaw were about to make their way to the exit of the camp to go by the gorge that was located near the RiverClan border. She trusted that they'll be fine, despite the fact that RiverClan and WindClan had been at each other's tails for a few moons.

Heatherstreak pranced to the hunting ground and looked around. She knew that at this time there shouldn't be any hunting patrols until Sunhigh. Heatherstreak took what Buzzardpelt said to heart and started to practice. She practiced staring at the ground for a few minutes trying not to look away. Then as she proceeded, she looked up to try and find scents of any wandering prey.

A slight scent of a rabbit drifted in the air, going around the bushes and into Heatherstreak's small pink nose. She quickly shifted into a hunting position and was going to strike at any given moment.

Concentrate, focus, no distractions.

She heard a rustling from behind the dirtplace. She leaped into the air, unsheathed her claws, and started to brace for impact. With a pounce, she landed and clawed a mere falling leaf.

"Fox-dung, I didn't catch any prey," Heatherstreak muttered.

But that didn't force her to give up on her task. She tried once again, got into the same formation and tried to slow down her tail. She clawed the soil from time to time. The moisture from the soil touched her paw and it felt as if it calmed her whole mind. She tried to focus on the task. Out of the mist, she heard a faint cry.

"Help! Help!" A small warrior shouted his voice echoed around the camp.

Heatherstreak dashed towards the sound, her paws ached, but she continued to run. She made it to the clearing where she saw a bunch of warriors including Kestrelstar and Buzzardpelt. Every cat was in shock; it was Duskfoot's border patrol.

No cat knew that they'd be injured and even some of them were missing. A few of the warriors, including Sleetclaw and the apprentices, rushed to help the fallen warriors. Honeyface and another part of the warriors split up to tend to the others.

Heatherstreak dashed over to help Duskfoot, but a lot of cats already crowded the senior warriors and the medicine cat. Heatherstreak ran over to help Plumtail, whose fur was all ruffled and there were small scratches.

Plumtail eventually got onto her paws and three warriors tried to bring her back to the camp. Heatherstreak was in the front and accidentally slapped the warrior behind her.

"Heatherstreak!" Frostcloud meowed, "Please stop hitting me with your tail."

"I'm so sorry, I'll go ahead of you and set up some nests for the medicine cat," Heatherstreak replied.

"Thanks, Heatherstreak," Frostcloud replied as she tried to carry Plumtail back to camp.

I did it again, I messed up.

»»-------------¤--------------««

Kestrelstar leaped onto the center tree and started to yowl an announcement, "All WindClan cats who can run fast to catch rabbits meet here for a clan meeting."

The warriors rampaged to the single tree, above stood their leader looking among them. Heatherstreak turned towards the leader and left the medicine cat's den. Most of the warriors on the patrol were recovering now.

Heatherstreak sat down with the others and listened to what Kestrelstar had to say. She looked around and started to whack her tail onto the ground, softly. She was glad that Kestrelstar was loud enough to project her voice so it would override her tail hitting the ground repeatedly.

"RiverClan has tried to take over our territory once again, we are strong WindClan members, we won't fall to their act. Us, as WindClan, will stay strong against their lapping tides. We will all stand as one. Now, we will go to the Gathering, don't provoke any arguments. I will speak to Minnowstar and force them to stay off our borders." Kestrelstar spoke almost loud enough for all the clans to hear.

WindClan cats cheered loudly almost as if they were yelling at RiverClan to stay in their own territory. Kestrelstar has already stepped down to order the warriors to follow her to Fourtrees. Heatherstreak looked in the direction of Fourtrees and the cats making their way.

Something major was going to happen and every cat knew it.