Pearpaw's feet burned as she walked along with Mangopaw, Ivypaw, Petalblaze, and Orcamask. They were walking alongside each other, feeling the heat of the white sand below.

"Petalblaze, could we please go hunting?" Ivypaw begged. "It's so hot." Pearpaw stifled a groan. She was bad at hunting. Patrolling was so much easier, even if they did have to endure the long stretches of burning sand.

"Look on the bright side, Ivypaw!" Orcamask said. "We have sea wind, and there are some trees up ahead for shade." She motioned towards the small patch.

Pearpaw's friend sighed. "I guess, Orcamask." She trotted ahead, her tail lifted.

Petalblaze looked at Orcamask. "We are reaching the end of the patrol, and we need prey. After all, Dawnrise needs to feed her kits. Pearpaw, Mangopaw, Ivypaw, you should try hunting in the Grass Patch."

Mangopaw nodded vigorously. "Yes, Petalblaze," she replied. "Pearpaw, last one to the Patch is a Pincer Crab!" She ran along the sand, paws flinging up clouds of tan.

"And it'll be you!" She shouted back, speeding along the border. Running was her specialty. She let her body relax, feeling her paws graze the sand. Tensing up wouldn't work on loose sand, but Mangopaw couldn't do it.

As the three apprentices reached the grass, they began to hunt, looking for mice and lizards.

They had teamed up to kill a rodent-like thing that Ivypaw called a "shrew," and Mangopaw had found a small mouse. Ivypaw had caught a couple lizards and was standing by their buried catch.

"What's next?" Pearpaw asked, washing her paw pads. Dirt was horrible compared to sand; she was glad it was only a small part of TideClan's territory.

Mangopaw's eyes sparkled. "Well," she began, eyes lighting up, "Why don't we do a hunting competition? We could see who can hunt the more before, let's say, sundown." She trotted around her sister and Ivypaw.

Ivypaw's eyes shimmered. "What are the boundaries?" She asked, interested. "Can we hunt on the sands?"

The orange tabby hopped around the small dirt patch. "Not this time," she replied. "Only in the Grass Patch. Small area, sure, but there's prey."

Pearpaw was confused at this. How was this dry, palmless land prey-filled? There was nothing besides a few mice and lizards. It was hardly the size of TideClan's camp. "You're on!" She said out loud, ears turning and mouth open. Mouse over there, is that a lizard? Smells decent, might go for that. But Mangopaw might, too. Ivypaw would try to please Rosewish. I'll go for the mouse. I can beat Mangopaw, but not Ivypaw.

"Three, two, one!" Mangopaw called. She darted closer to the sand, mouth opening to taste for prey.

Ivypaw immediately slipped between a few shrubs, following the lizard's scent.

The mouse escaped across the border...Mangopaw never said we couldn't cross it. What's the worst that would happen? The last rogues were here were before we were born. She headed across the scent line, which she noticed wasn't marked. Pearpaw tasted the air again to find where the mouse was hiding. In that tiny bush. She crouched down and stalked forward.

Pinpointing the prey once more, she leapt onto the bush and bit down onto the brown mouse. "Aha!" She yowled, at the same time as Mangopaw's cry of "Ah!"

Pearpaw jerked up. "Mangopaw?!" She called. "Where are you?" She leapt across the border, mouse in her jaws. A muffled shout from under the ground told her that Mangopaw had somehow gotten under the earth. "How did you get there?" She said frantically.

Ivypaw joined her, another lizard swinging in her jaws. "What happened?" She said, her voice muffled behind the mouse.

"It's a tunnel!" Mangopaw yowled back. "Don't dig! It's interesting down here, the entrance is over there! By the weird green tuft with the red starfish."

Pearpaw nodded and ran over to the leafy tuft. As she fell, she called, "It's called a plant."

Ivypaw looked through the hole where Pearpaw had fallen to. "I'll get help." Without waiting for a response, she ran back to camp.

Mangopaw purred as her sister approached. "Come on," she said, walking down the dark tunnel.Pearpaw caught up to her sister, uncertain. "Mangopaw, what if we find something bad? Like a rabbit? Those creatures are terrifying."

The orange tabby's eyes shone in the darkness. "Rabbits! Mom says that rabbits are small, not like what Blossomleap says. We can eat them, Pearpaw! Let's explore." She trotted along the tunnel, Pearpaw following.

"You know, tunnels have other creatures," she replies. "Even if they're hardly seen."

Mangopaw sighed dramatically. "Pearpaw, those "other creatures" are probably rats. Those large mice. We can eat those, too! Imagine who we could save with these tunnels. If there's a tsunami, we can get our clan out to the Grasslands without traveling above ground. Imagine how much we can do with these tunnels!" She began to run, far enough for Pearpaw to be unable to see her.

She heard a shout, then a splash, then a scream.

"Mangopaw?!" Pearpaw yelled for the second time. She ran as far as she could, before skidding to a stop when she heard the splash of a stream. Understanding dawned on her. "An underground stream?" She asked, walking more carefully. She felt the cold, crisp water under her paws, very different from warm seawater.

"I'm across the water," Mangopaw replied.

"Is the water deep?" Pearpaw asked, dipping her paws in the splashing water. It wasn't fast like a strong river, or small like a trickling stream. It was like a swirling wave that felt like small hurricanes and storms around her paws. "It feels nice!"

Mangopaw hopped down with her sister by the stream. "It does," she agreed. She knelt down and drank from the stream. Making a weird face, she swallowed the water and shuddered. "Yikes. It tastes so weird! Ew. Seawater is so much better than this stuff."

Pearpaw lapped at the water. "It's not too bad," she said. "Not like our water though." She felt it slide down her throat and gagged at the aftertaste. "Yuck! I see your point. It's tasteless!" She rubbed her tongue on the roof of her mouth and shuddered. "I'll stick to swimming in it." She got deeper into the rolling stream, relishing the coolness of it.

"But if we ever have to make an escape, we could travel along here." Mangopaw's face lit up and her ears rotated happily. "Let's explore the river! We can swim against the current to see where it starts." She dived down into the stream, her head resurfacing. Pearpaw could see her paws paddling through the crystalline water, even in darkness. "Come on, Pearpaw!" She swam upstream, disappearing through the tunnel.

The hole that the water came through was small, but Pearpaw knew that most cats could fit through it. Not Duskblossom, though, she thought, stifling a purr. She paused to look at the tunnel where they had come from. Would they be able to find it again?

She twitched her ears and sighed. Mangopaw might get into trouble, and Mom and Dad wouldn't like it if their smallest daughter got hurt. But then again, she acknowledged, they wouldn't like it if both of their daughters got hurt. She slipped into the stream after taking a breath.

Pearpaw followed Mangopaw's faint outline for a while, until it got too dark. For a while, there was just water, but the tunnel widened and she could breathe while swimming. She thought she had brushed up against a creature, before realizing it was only a branch. "Mangopaw?" She called. She didn't know how long they had swam, but there was no light ahead and her orange sister had disappeared.

"I'm still here!" Came a voice from ahead. "The tunnel is getting larger, can't you tell? We're getting closer!" She sounded excited rather than apprehensive.

Pearpaw felt the water getting weaker as the tunnel was larger. She strained her neck, trying to see the light. It was only a few palmlengths ahead.

"We've reached the end! Close to the end! We have to power through this- look, the light!" Mangopaw replied loudly.

Pearpaw raised her head even higher. She could see Mangopaw clearly now, her orange tabby head bobbing in the weak water. The sky was visible now.

Then she felt the splash of a fish, a joyful yell from Mangopaw, and she was in the light. Palmpaw felt the hot winds blow above her head, contrasting against the cave breeze. She couldn't believe they had swam through a cave.

"Mangopaw?" She asked, looking around blearily. She noticed an orange pelt lower down the bank and ran over to her sister. She stretched her legs and shook out her pelt.

"How did we do that?" Mangopaw said, jittery. She shook out her pelt, blinking furiously.Pearpaw tilted her head and flicked her ears. "Somehow, I guess. It's not that unbelievable, is it? We swam underwater, with air, with breaks. We didn't create a whole new clan, or something."Suddenly, they heard calls from the opposite bank. Pearpaw opened her mouth to taste the scent, and met a wave of TideClan smell. They had accidentally crossed the river border.

"Pearpaw! Mangopaw!" Mistgaze called, Cloudwish, Ivypaw, and Orcamask following. "What happened? Ivypaw said that you had been stuck in a tunnel, but when we got to the Grass Patch, you weren't there!"

Mangopaw shook her head, causing little spikes of fur. "We explored and found a cave. How did you find us, Mistgaze?" She bounded above the river, Pearpaw following.

"We decided to explore down the tunnel. We noticed your scent pooled, but then it faded. We thought that you had drowned, but we knew that if you had, there would be more signs. After all, the water wasn't too strong." Orcamask had spoken instead. "We decided to follow the river. After all, the underground stream had to come from somewhere."

Ivypaw waved her tail eagerly. "Was it hard to swim upstream? Did you hold your breath the whole time?"

Pearpaw blinked at Ivypaw. She was never that excited for anything. Pearpaw couldn't remember any situation where she was more energetic than Mangopaw. "It was, but the stream became calmer as we went. And we didn't need to, there was air. But sometimes it was hard to breathe."

Cloudwish nuzzled Mangopaw, then Pearpaw. "Oh, kits, let's get you home. You're both shivering!" Ushering her kits forward, she licked them both on the head. Pearpaw purred, trying to get warm. That was fun. 

⊹˚︵‿₊˚ʚ💧ɞ˚₊‿︵˚⊹

first chapter!

~what role do you think ivypaw plays in the story?

~Do you think the antagonist [if there is one] has already been introduced?

~who's your favorite character so far?

published: 05.27.21

edited: 06.12.21

word count: 1886