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This is where I'm going to be putting my "worth-while" posts. Feedback is always nice, though I'm not sure many Gaia users actually read other people's journals. Oh well. *shrugs*
On we go.



When children are beginning to acknowledge the presence of a shadow, they may feel attachment upon seeing it. Out of this attachment, a character is born within the child's shadow, and this character is given a consciousness. The shadow, while it now has the ability to think its own thoughts and hear what goes on around it, is only ever thinking of what the body its connected to is doing. It cannot speak, nor can it move of its own free will. It will remain like that, inevitably, forever.

Except... There was one shadow that did not remain in this way forever, like it was intended to. Its body--a young girl of fourteen years at the time, perished in a terrible fire on a school trip. By the time that the fire was put out, there was no body remaining left of the little girl, that our shadow had been connected to. The bond was severed between body and shadow. As this had never happened before, what was to become of our shadow now? Well, it slunk away from the accident where the fire occurred, moving slowly, because it was not used to moving on its own.

'What am I to do now?' It thought, 'If I have no body to be connected to, then what shall I become? Will I even continue to exist in the way that I have been for so long?' The logical thing--if shadows understood the principles of logic, which remains uncertain to this day--would be to locate a dark place, and try to merge into the existence of other shadows. When our shadow attempted to do this however, it was unable to find other shadows that allowed it to blend in with them.

Our shadow felt unable to find any other to accept it. No matter how hard it tried, it seemed as though any other shadow which it tried to blend in with shrunk away.

'With this knowledge,' it thought, 'I cannot be a shadow. Instead, I shall be a little girl. I have the outline just right, and I am sure that with time and practice, I shall be able to make myself a body too.'

With that, our shadow slowly began to manifest into a young girl, very similar to the body that it had belonged to. There were obvious differences as well, for our shadow now had red eyes instead of her bodies previously hazel ones, black hair instead of brown, and very pale skin, in place of golden-brown.

When she would walk down the streets, others would often remark among themselves that she was so pale in complexion they could see through her! Because of this, many choose to stay away from her, thinking her to be a freak. She acknowledges their feelings, and she knows that it is true that she will occasionally fade and become translucent, but she always turns "back to normal" and solidifies, especially when people begin to point and scream.
Now, I'm sure you're wondering about what our shadow has been doing since she became a girl. Well, she has been attempting to live on her own. She goes wherever she has the fancy, and can get in and out of any situation. The ability to speak is one that she has yet to master, because it is more difficult than it looks to keep vocal chords you weren't given originally in place all the time. When she wants to communicate (and finds someone who will patiently listen to her) she does so through gestures of the hands and arms.

Most often, you can find her lurking near the back alleyway of a music store, sitting on a dumpster in order to hear the music that floated down from the open windows and doors of the shop. While many may think that she could do so much more with her established life, she thinks otherwise. Besides, if you think about it, sitting down and listening to music all day, would be pretty fulfilling as a life choice, even if you were just a shadow.





Spottedear was in a pleasant mood that morning. She had assigned the morning patrols in a timely fashion and decided to join the hunting patrol, before they left. The patrol was small, because she'd sent out a large border patrol. The group included Fernfeather, and her apprentice Palepaw, and the newly made warrior, Squirreltail, who was her former apprentice. Even if he wasn't her apprentice, she had still felt herself uneasy with leaving him alone in the camp. He was... a flighty tom cat, and she would be keeping an eye on him, until he grew and mellowed out. As the deputy, she had the right to watch over her fellow warriors.

"I'm going to catch an owl today! Prove to everyone that I'm really a warrior!" Boasted Squirreltail to the others.
"Owls only come out at night, remember?" Replied Palepaw, who rolled his eyes, "I'm still surprised that Sootstar didn't name you Squirrelbrain!"
Squirreltail's whipped around to give an angry retort, but Spottedear cut in, stepping between the two, and nudging Squirreltail ahead.
"Squirreltail," She whispered to him, her eyes on him, "Why don't you prove her wrong? Go find something huge to show the Clan that Sootstar wasn't wrong to make you a warrior."

At first, the russet-furred tom opened his mouth, as though to disagree, but then his eyes shined and he smiled. With a brief nod, he took off into a patch of bracken just ahead. Spottedear let out a relieved sigh when Fernfeather and Palepaw caught up.
"Squirreltail is going to do some solo hunting for a while." Spottedear explained to Fernfeather and Palepaw. While Palepaw looked a touch suspicious, Fernfeather leaned in and mewed to Spottedear,
"You handled that well." Before turning back to Palepaw and asking the apprentice, "What can you scent?"

Spottedear left the mentor and apprentice alone for a while, while she padded off in the same direction Squirreltail had gone. She moved with concentrated stealth through the bracken, making sure the fern leaves didn't make rustling noises as she went through them.

When she spotted his red fur, she paused, watching him sniff at a bush. Her smile appeared again. It seemed like he found a scent. Very good. She was sure she could leave him to his own accords for a while, and she trailed off to the left, following a scent path of her own. It didn't take her long to locate a plump shrew, and its death was executed in a swift blow. She thanked StarClan as she buried it, and then turned away to go locate where Squirreltail had gone off to.

Retracing her steps, she found herself looking back at the bush that Squirreltail had been at earlier. The sight she found there however, was not as pleasing as she thought it would be. The red warrior lay next to the bush, and she bolted forward.
"Squirreltail!" She exclaimed loudly, as she came to his side. Had he been attacked? She scanned his body for a wound, but most alarmingly, the only thing that was most noticeable was the foam that was starting to appear around his lips.
"Spottedear?" The worried call of Fernfeather caused the deputy to look up, seeing her friend approach, with Palepaw at her heels. As the opposite she-cat approached, she let out a sharp gasp, "Oh StarClan-- Are those Death Berries?"
Spottedear's head whipped up as she looked more closely at the bush, suddenly recognizing the poisonous, red berries.
"Oh no... Fernfeather, I think he's eaten them!" Spottedear mewed, her claws slipping out in her anxiety. Fernfeather turned to Palepaw, whose eyes were wide,
"Palepaw! Run back to camp and tell Thorntooth and Tanglepaw to come quickly! Squirreltail's eaten Death Berries!"

The sound of fading pawsteps signaled that Palepaw was following orders.
"Fernfeather, what can I do? I'm not a Medicine Cat, and there's not-- there's not enough time!" It was all Spottedear could do to keep herself from wailing.
"Spottedear, you're the deputy. You'll think of something." Fernfeather replied, ever calm in a desperate situation.

Spottedear racked her brain for any sort of information that could help them or an idea, or something. She stared hard at Squirreltail's foaming muzzle, and abruptly, the tom began to convulse. The poison was getting worse.

Then, the idea was there, bringing a wave of urgent calm with it.
"Fernfeather, get his muzzle open." Hissed Spottedear, who began to churn up the dirt beneath her claws.
"There!" Fernfeather gasped, getting it open. Spottedear deftly scooped a pile of dirt onto her paw, and then pressed it into Squirreltail's mouth, across his tongue and down his throat. The tom convulsed again, but this time it was because he was throwing the dirt back up. Foamy flecks of red were seen in the dirt mixture, and Spottedear let out a small gasp of relief. After the same process was repeated two more times, she checked Squirreltail's mouth, and from her view, didn't see anymore flecks of red around his teeth or tongue. Only brown dirt. His convulsions had stopped too. She was about to remark something to Fernfeather, when the booming growl of Thorntooth came into her perception,

"Move out of the way!" He snarled, ever the pleasant Medicine Cat. Behind him, Tanglepaw set a leaf at his paws, upon which a poultice lay. Thorntooth spared no time in forcing the juicy leaf into Squirreltail's mouth, and in a moment, the red tom's eyes opened and bulged and he threw up everything in his stomach. Spottedear and Fernfeather stepped away, awaiting the news of Squirreltail's condition. Then, to everyone's great relief, Squirreltail began coughing, and taking breaths between each one.

"Yarrow." Came the deep rumbling voice of Thorntooth, "Always saves the day in terms of poison. It's a good thing I got here in time. No thanks to any of you." He said, looking behind him. Fernfeather gave a tight smile, and Spottedear indulged the older tom cat,
"Indeed. Thank StarClan for you Thorntooth."
Thorntooth studied her, and then nodded, stalking away with Tanglepaw following him.
"Come on, Squirreltail." Spottedear mewed to her former apprentice, "Let's get you back to camp. I'm sure Palepaw and your other Clanmates will want to hear all about your huge finding today." She purred teasingly, and Squirreltail gave a sigh and a weak smile, as the three cats began to walk back to their home.