#<- descriptive

[destinyclan]

Before Moon 0 (7/8)

This was far from how Grousestar expected this night to go. And it was seriously messing with her mind.

Though a little anxious at first, at the prospect that nobody would be joining her and Tempesthaze, to which Tempesthaze kindly reassured her that she would remain by her side nonetheless, her fears were soon disproven. Sunnyfeather had decided to take Aphidkit along with her to the journey. "You found him after all, it's really only fair. And this way, you won't have to worry much about how he'll survive back in the clan." she had said. A little while later, two feisty apprentices showed up, Cranepaw and Tempestpaw respectively, begging to join the new clan. Grousestar hesitated, but felt herself obliging, since she felt she wasn't really in any position to turn any cat down, a fact that would prove itself later again, when the two warriors who arrived later, introducing themselves as Bouncerise and Oriolespeckle, seemed pretty displeased with the last cat to join thus far, a she-cat named Shortgrass.

But despite this, things went well. Grousestar caught the first piece of fresh kill in moons that had more than skin on it's ribs. Eating it felt like eating a piece of prey from StarClan. She saw the sun shine at sundown in a way that she hadn't seen in a long, long time. Truly, she felt like this was right.

Later in the night, the cats were arguing about rest. Tempestpaw wanted to continue, but Tempesthaze reminded her to mind the other members of the group, Sunnyfeather and the kit in particular. Just as Grousestar decided to call it a night and make a shelter, a faint bloody scent reached her nose, far too intense to be anything old. The others seemed to have caught it too, as Tempesthaze pretty instinctively ran towards it to investigate. Grousestar's stomach turned at the sight of another cat's leg, injured and ridden with an infection, but Tempesthaze did not hesitate for a moment, immediately crawling underneath the bush that that cat had seemingly made it's nest. Grousestar followed.

The cat's chest moved, but she was breathing shallowly. Painstakingly lifting her head at the new arrivals, she used her frail voice to plead.

"Please... save her..." Grousestar tilted her head, a little confused, before the she-cat moved her tail to reveal a tiny kitten, barely a moon old, clinging to her mother's belly. Meanwhile, Tempesthaze had already made a move to order the rest of the group. "You two, go get cobwebs! And marigold, if you know what it looks like!" She commanded Bouncerise and Oriolespeckle, who immediately got going. To the apprentices, she said "Go fetch moss and get it wet, so she has something to drink!" and lastly, once the apprentices were on their way too, she turned to Shortgrass. "I'll go look for marigold and nettles, you come with me if you know what they look like. If you don't, help guard the cat and Sunnyfeather with Grousestar." Not awaiting a response from Shortgrass, she immediately went on her way. The aching queen uttered inaudible words, not long before she would sigh, in pain but too exhausted to scream. It wouldn't be too long before everyone returned, the apprentices first who were quickly ushered under the bush by Grousestar, who was speaking reassuring words to the wimpering cat.

"Don't worry, we'll help you! Have this..." She used the wet moss to drip water into the dry mouth of the cat. She heard a very faint "Thank you" from here, before she began crying out in pain again. Tempesthaze, Bouncerise and Oriolespeckle returned aswell, and Tempesthaze began her treatment, desparately working against what she knew were impossible odds. How long had she been living like this, the medicine cat wondered, taking note of how far the infection had spread. Did she have enough time to save her? "Keep her awake! She can't fall asleep! You two, bring the kitten to Sunnyfeather!" The queen let out a heartbreaking noise as her kitten has gently taken away from her flank, but Grousestar rested her nose upon her head. "Don't worry. We will save her, like you said." It seemed to have worked, but now the queen was getting quieter again.

"What's you name?" Grousestar asked, in a bid to keep her awake. "Muddy..." the she-cat whispered, and Cranepaw parroted the bizarre name back to her. "I was a kittypet..." Her heavy gaze fixated on something hidden between the bushes' leaves: a thick, red vine, the kind that kittypets wore around ther neck. "My twolegs had a dog... usually he was harmless but then he..." She began weeping, as she assumably recalled the events of her injury. Grousestar buried her nose deeper into her fur. A clan cat like her was already well aware of the kind of things dogs were capable of. She could only imagine how a kittypet, with no fighting experience, fared in that situation. "I didn't think about it... I just... ran."

Muddy's breathing slowed down, her eyes got even wetter than before. "... I just wanted to be happy... and have my kits..." she cried, her voice getting quieter and quieter. At last, she gazed up into Grousestar's eyes, who felt extremely haunted by the gaze she met. The queen was about to die, and they were all helpless to watch.

"... Will you protect her?"

"Yes! I promise we will. She will be safe with us."

A final breath. A hint of relief and happines, before her eyes went completely blank. Empty.

Tempesthaze growled out in sadness, and frustration a moment later. She looked at the dead cat, the cast of herbs she had applied hoping it would help as a last ditch effort. He brought her nose down to her pelt for a moment, before leaving the bush to check up on Sunnyfeather. Grousestar remained for a little longer, looking at the queen, as well as the two apprentices who were still holding onto the wet moss, horrified at what they had just seen. Then she left too.

Sunnyfeather had accustomed the kitten to her in the meantime. Oriolespeckle had fetched some more moss to temporarily nest in, and for the kitten to stay warm. She was feeding well, seemingly without issue. Having left the bush a few leaps behind them, the group gathered around Sunnyfeather, looking down at this tiny being.

They were all silent, some looking away, some at each other, sadness in their eyes, uncertainty, but also hope. Some only having eyes for the kitten, who looked exactly like her now deceased mother. Mobody dared saying a thing, not about what had just happened, or this kitten. That was, until one of the apprentices leaned in closer. Cranepaw, too, seemed to have noticed the resemblance, as she carefully brought her nose closer to the kitten and cautiously spoke her mind. "Mudkit..." she whispered, before looking up at Sunnyfeather with big eyes. She closed hers, as she replied. "Yes, that sounds lovely..."

[itsdappleagain]

jesus no

[incendavery]

average library childrens room tasks

[ceevee5]

[toxifoxx]

[tinsnip]

"In recent years, there has been a rush on the internet to supply image descriptions and to call out those who don’t. This may be an example of community accountability at work, but it’s striking to observe that those doing the most fierce calling out or correcting are sighted people. Such efforts are largely self-defeating. I cannot count the times I’ve stopped reading a video transcript because it started with a dense word picture. Even if a description is short and well done, I often wish there were no description at all. Get to the point, already! How ironic that striving after access can actually create a barrier. When I pointed this out during one of my seminars, a participant made us all laugh by doing a parody: “Mary is wearing a green, blue, and red striped shirt; every fourth stripe also has a purple dot the size of a pea in it, and there are forty-seven stripes—”

“You’re killing me,” I said. “I can’t take any more of that!”

Now serious, she said it was clear to her that none of that stuff about Mary’s clothes mattered, at least if her clothes weren’t the point. What mattered most about the image was that Mary was holding her diploma and smiling. “But,” she wondered, “do I say, Mary has a huge smile on her face as she shows her diploma or Mary has an exuberant smile or showing her teeth in a smile and her eyes are crinkled at the edges?”

It’s simple. Mary has a huge smile on her face is the best one. It’s the don’t-second-guess-yourself option."

--Against Access, by John Lee Clark, a DeafBlind educator

[theshehulkproject]

Some D&D party is out there playing the coolest campaign ever.

[theo-files]

is this anything

[wellfine]

Au fucking revoir Mister Prince

[prinnay]

Stroll in the Rain

[destinyclan]

Before Moon 0 (6/8)

Bouncerise instinctively felt a growl rumble up in her throat. She lowered herself into a battle stance, as the other cat merely rolled her eyes.

"Yes, it's nice to see you too, Bouncepaw."

"It's Bouncerise now!" Bouncerise replied after a heartbeat of confusion. Right, she remembered. Shortgrass never witnessed our warrior ceremonies. A strange thought. It made her feel old for a moment, she knew it had been forever since she'd seen the other she-cat, but her warrior ceremony still felt like it was just yesterday.

"Bouncerise? That's cute. Did Lionstar pick the name for you?" The mockery at the mention of her leader aggrevated Bouncerise further, but it also send a shiver down her spine, as she recalled the exact circumstances of her departure from the clan. Departure? No. Banishment.

"Tallspike! No, Tallspike!" Bouncepaw heard the disraught voice of her older sister, Whistlewind, die down to a devastated whimper as she cowered over the body of her mate. Bouncepaw let her head drop. All of this felt incredibly unfair: This was meant to be the happiest day of her life so far, the day she was made an apprentice. Having Lionstar's kind eyes lock with hers as she was given her name and apprenticed to Tallspike felt amazing, like she had finally earned a place among her clanmates. Soon, she would learn how to fight and hunt! Yes, one or the other chore was a given, but it was going to be worth it! She knew Tallspike was going to be a great mentor; Whistlewind assured her so, and her sister was rarely ever wrong about anything!

And it took only one cat to take it all from her again.

Bouncepaw and the other apprentices retreated to talk to their new mentors. Tallspike told her how happy he was that she was her new apprentice, but before she could tell him she felt the same way, an angry cry of objection disrupted the crowd that was about to depart to pursue the regular clan duties. All eyes turned to her: Shortgrass.

"This is it! You promised me an apprentice moons ago, Lionstar! I have been taking twice the workload of a normal warrior, even organizing patrols when your deputy didn't feel like it! Where is my reward?!"

Lionstar, who was still seated where he held the ceremony prior, seemed like he was about to reply, but Tallspike cut in, fed up with the way Shortgrass was acting, and had been acting for moons now. "You don't get to talk to the leader like that! And how dare you disrespect the deputy!"

"The fact that you of all cats got made a mentor before me is a joke! You couldn't hold your own against me!" Shortgrass was pressed low to the ground as she hissed at him, tail lashing furiously. Tallspike extended his claws. "Why don't you prove that before you open your big mouth!"

And it only took those words to seal his fate. The battle was fierce, but Shortgrass ultimately came out on top. Bouncepaw didn't know how long the battle lasted for, only that it felt like an eternity between hearing Tallspike's last howl and her sister's weeping. The rest of the clan was shocked, unable to move. Except for one of them.

"See? You might as well make me Bouncepaw's new mentor, Lionstar! I can certainly teach her more than him!" Did she grasp the impact of what she had just done? The sort of wounds she had caused him? The clan was horrified. What kind of cat would go this far to prove a point? To get back at another cat? To get an apprentice? By StarClan, they were clanmates, they slept in the same den, they laughed together, they shared prey... Bouncepaw felt sick.

It was the last day she ever saw Shortgrass. Of course Lionstar did not make her her new mentor, but banished her from their clan, with the notice that the next time they saw here thread these grounds, they would kill her on sight. And it seemed she wouldn't dare cross paths with her now former clanmates again.

Until now.

A rustling of the bushes behind her made Bouncerise flinch and Shortgrass twitch her ears. "Oh, you brought Oriolepaw too..."

"Oriolespeckle!" Bouncerise defended her clanmate. The tom in question did a double check upon seeing the black she-cat, a very baffled expression in his face, eyes huge. "Shortgrass?! What are you doing here?!"

"I should be asking you." Shortgrass stalked closer to the tom, "As far as I know this isn't clan territory. Or else, what was it... you were going to kill me?" The lightheartedness of her tone made Bouncerise sick to her stomach. "Is Lionstar extending the boundary or something?"

"What do you care?! That's none of your business!" Bouncerise yelled, tail lashing. Shortgrass' ears twitched, she really didn't seem to care. "Well, he's not enough of a mousebrain to send the two of you alone out for such a mission..." It looked liek she wanted to say something, but her gaze dropped below their eye level.

"You two look hungry. Come." With a waving of the tail, she ordered them to follow. After hesitating for a moment, Oriolespeckle began moving, before Bouncerise halted him with a low hiss. "Seriously?!" The tom hissed back in defense: "We haven't eaten since last night! Whatever she found it's all we're going to get until we reach those 'promised grounds' or whatever."

It was true, the path here was as barren as Bouncerise assumed their neighbouring clan's territory to be. Nonetheless she was cautious, since after all what reason did Shortgrass have for feeding them? She went after Oriolespeckle and met Shortgrass again, as she hauled out a rather skinny hare from underneath a pile of dirt.

As the three cats feasted, and the two young warriors stuffed their mouths with as much as they could, Shortgrass asked: "So... who became your mentor in my absence?" Bouncerise almost choked on the hare when she heard that. She felt the anger bubble up in her again, the more memories of Tallspike resurfaced, but she pulled herself together, since she did not want to give up the meal she was having right now. At the same time... was it smart to draw the ire of Shortgrass and pin it to someone else? Someone who, maybe, Shortgrass would then seek out? Bouncerise got a grip again, realizing she was thinking too far. If Shortgrass attempted anything she'd kill her right here and now. "... Bluebellheart."

"Bluebellheart!" Shortgrass parroted with clear ridicule. "Well I hope for you that some other cat stepped in, because if she taught you how to fight, then you're gonna be as good of a fighter as a squirrel!" Shortgrass then took another bite from the hare. Bouncerise felt how hard it was to contain her anger, especially when Oriolespeckle laid his tail on her back, not exactly reassuringly, but afraid she would soon combust with rage. There's no point in killing her, she told herself. You'd be just as bad as her.

"And what about Reedstalk? There's no way that old foxheart is still alive anymore, who took his place?"

"Snakefur." Oriolespeckle replied almost immediately, causing Shortgrass to now be the one to almost choke on her meal, though not from shock, but from amusement, as she was purring with meat between her teeth.

"Snakefur... oh, that's a good one..." she forced out between purrs and coughs. Once she got a hold of her voice again, she continued. "If he becomes leader your clan is more doomed than before... Is that the reason why the two of you are out here?" She got up and mustered the two with her cunning eyes. "It wouldn't surprise me, is all."

Bouncerise finished up and got up too, to look Shortgrass directly into the eyes. "What our business is out here is ours, not yours!" she yelled, gaining merely a simple change to a bored expression from Shortgrass, before the black she-cat rebutted in her usual manner. "Is that any way to treat someone who just gave you food? You're not scared of me, are you?"

Bouncerise flinched and bristled her fur up further, gaining another amused purr from Shortgrass. Whilst Oriolespeckle got up too and joined Bouncerise's side, Shortgrass began pacing around, monologuing, even going as far as turning her back to the two.

"You know, Bouncerise is such a silly name for you. If I was the leader I would've named you something like Bouncestrike, or Bounceclaw. You've showed potential as far back as the day you took your first steps." She turned around, looking the other she-cat straight in the eyes. "You still do."

Bouncerise didn't move, still ducked to the ground in a battle stance. But she did begin shaking. Why is she saying this? What's her plan? Does she actually... mean all of this?

"Fearing me would be foolish. After all, you could always call Lionstar to send a patrol out after me, couldn't you?" Shortgrass questioned, making Bouncerise shift around even more uncomfortably. Her tone... It was almost like she knew they weren't going back to their clan...

Then, she backed off again, purring in an unusually kind tone. "But if that's not the case, you two could use any helping paw you can find. Just saying..." No, it wasn't a kind tone. There was something so off about it...

A hit to her flank almost made her lose balance. It was Oriolespeckle, who had pushed her slightly. "Come on, let's get lost!" He said, before he let out a half-hearted "Thanks for the hare." into Shortgrass' direction.

Bouncerise followed him into the thicket as fast as she could break out of her position. Shortgrass stared after them for a while, toward the bushes they fled into. Not before long, she would be on her paws too, becoming a shadow in the woods, stalking them...

[incendavery]

a message from squirrel

[theinconvenientlifestyle]

[image ID: a tweet from America The Ghetto 🇵🇸🇨🇺, @LizzMurr56, which reads: "You don't have to be nice or civil about ending a genocide. The idea that people who are actively funding a genocide have any moral authority to demand civility is ridiculous. Civil people don't create mass graves! Civil people don't give weapons to those creating mass graves!" end ID.]

[thechekhov]

my favorite thing about senshi is whatever the heck this is called

[coldalbion]

As a disabled person who's loved LEVERAGE and LEVERAGE REDEMPTION since the beginning - for the characters but also the whole ethos of performing acts that help people against crap systems, it's wonderful to be reminded that it springs from reality.