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pluckyredhead · 6 years

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Thanks for doing the RAICES fic fundraiser! It's inspiring to see people making art for good causes. Receipt: imgur(.)com(/)oGHPVPE Ok, so, Iron Fist was a mess but I love your Danny, you do a great job with him. So I'd like to request Danny-centric Defenders mini-casefic or team found family good-natured sass? Otherwise, if you're not good with that, I could go for some fabulous Pride lawyer silliness. Thanks!

I love writing Danny, thank you! (And thank you for donating!) This got…real silly, and ended up being as much about Jessica as Danny, and also Danny steered HARD into the goofball curve, but it was fun to write. Hope you enjoy!

Jessica had not been thrilled to be woken up by a phone call from Danny. Sure, it was two p.m. when he called - but on the other hand, it was Danny, and that didn’t seem worth getting up for any hour of the day.

But Danny had been insistent that she come over now, and so Jessica had pulled on her least stained jeans from off of the floor and sulked her way across town in a cab she fully intended on making her own personal Ralph Macchio pay for.

Now, as she stood between Luke and Matt, gaping at the thing Danny was holding in his lap, she was starting to understand his urgency.

“Is that…” Matt started to say, closed his mouth, opened it again, and shook his head.

Colleen, sitting on the couch, put her face in her hands. She looked tired.

Matt tried again. “I’m assuming that my senses are letting me down right now and that is not, in fact, a dragon?”

“It’s totally a dragon!” Danny said, beaming up at them. The green, slinky thing in his lap stretched and yawned like a cat before burping out a puff of fire. “Isn’t it awesome?”

“Sweet Christmas,” Luke said.

“Where the fuck did you get a dragon, Rand,” Jessica said, once she’d found some alcohol in Danny’s fridge - Mike’s Hard Lemonade because he was an actual child, but better than nothing.

“Farmers’ market,” Danny said, scratching the dragon under the chin.

“What,” Matt said.

“It wasn’t a farmers’ market,” Colleen said with a sigh. “I told him to meet me at the farmers’ market and he got lost and wound up at some weird street fair instead. With dragons, apparently.”

“You can buy dragons at a street fair?” Luke asked.

“No,” Danny said, in a tone like Luke had said something ridiculous. Well, like Luke had been the first person in the room to say something ridiculous. “I bought a dragon egg. I’ve had it for months.”

Jessica and Luke looked at Colleen. Even Matt pointed his chin at her.

“Don’t blame me for this!” she said, throwing her hands up. “This apartment has ten bedrooms! I don’t check them all on the regular for mythological beings.”

Danny shrugged. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I figured it was a scam or a dud, or just, you know, a really cool paperweight. It’s really hard to get dragon eggs in this hemisphere. But it was only a couple thousand dollars…”

“Oh, of course,” Luke muttered.

“…and even if it wasn’t a real egg it was so cool looking. You guys didn’t see the shell, it was neat. And the guy who sold it to me kept winking, like, hey man, this is the real deal. So I thought I’d stick it in a spare bedroom, crank the heat up in there, and if it didn’t hatch in a few months, that was that. But…” Danny gestured to the dragon as if anyone else had been able to stop thinking “HOLY SHIT THERE’S A DRAGON IN HERE” the entire time he’d been talking. “It hatched!”

“And then it peed everywhere,” Colleen added.

“And then it peed everywhere!” Danny agreed. Jessica had never seen him so happy.

If Jessica was good at anything, it was finding out weird shit on the internet. She sat down in Danny’s “office” - more like a sticker collection room than anything, honestly - and opened his laptop. “This is too nice of a computer for you to use for nothing but Neopets, you know,” Jessica muttered.

“I needed to make sure my little dudes were still alive!” Danny protested. “I was away a long time.”

Jessica rolled her eyes and started searching. “Are you going on the dark web?” Danny asked, craning over her shoulder. She put a hand on his face and pushed him away.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Luke said, then glanced at Jessica. “Are you?”

“No,” she said. “There’s this forum, Strange Tales dot com. People talk about weird stuff they’ve seen and heard, try to get confirmation of it. These days it’s mostly people debating whether it’s Avengers shit or not, but sometimes there’s sightings of, oh, a man in black backflipping off a roof. A guy punching his way out of prison.” A flying, super-strong woman, too, but she’d done her best to discredit those sightings with the several identities she’d created on the forum until she hadn’t been able to hide any longer. “If anyone knows how to get rid of a dragon, these nutbars do.”

“But I don’t want to get rid of Shou Little!” Danny protested, hugging the baby dragon to him. It bit him. “Ow. I love her!”

“Shou Little?” Matt repeated.

“The dragon I got my powers form is named Shou Lao. She’s much smaller, so…” Danny shrugged like it was obvious. “I just shrugged, sorry, Matt.”

“I know,” Matt said.

“How do you know she’s a she?” Jessica asked. If mystical kung fu monk training involved studying dragon genitals, she officially quit.

“I don’t, not really, but she’s pretty tough, so I just assumed,” Danny explained. The dragon - Shou Little, apparently, bit him again. “Ow!”

Okay. Maybe Jessica wouldn’t quit just yet.

“If dragons are real, what else is real?” Matt asked.

“My disinterest in this conversation?” Jessica asked, glancing away from the computer for a minute. Matt and Colleen were stretching side by side in matching and frankly implausible looking poses, while Danny lay sprawled on the floor beside them. Luke at least knew what furniture was for, and had commandeered the office couch.

“I’m asking Danny, not you,” Matt said. “Okay, we have dragons. Does this mean…unicorns are real? Pixies? Demons?”

Luke raised his eyebrows and lifted his hand. Shou Little hung determinedly from his finger. She had been gnawing on him for ten minutes, ever since he’d offered himself as a more durable chew toy than Danny. “Worried you’re going to get in trouble for biting the underworld’s style?”

“Look, we’ve already dealt with resurrection and now dragons. I’m just wondering if mermaids are next down the pipeline,” Matt said.

Danny shrugged. “Unicorns and pixies are western mythology. Shou Little’s a Chinese dragon. I have no idea if that means the European ones are real, too.”

“Okay, so what else is in Chinese mythology?” Luke asked.

“K’un-Lun isn’t really part of China per se, but, uh…fenghuang,” Danny said, glancing at Colleen.

“Nian,” she added. “Fox spirits. Spirits in general.”

“And mermaids?” Matt asked.

Jessica turned all the way around. “What is it with you and mermaids? You really into clamshell bras or something?”

Matt gave her that annoying deadpan look that meant he could be joking or just that weirdly intense. It was harder to read when he was upside down. “We live on an island! It seems like pertinent information.”

“I’d worry less about mermaids and more about water dragons,” Danny said matter-of-factly.

“Water dragons?” Luke repeated.

“Grawr,” Shou Little added.

It took Jessica thirty-eight minutes to sort through all the tinfoil-hat selfies and conspiracy theories to find rumors of an honest-to-fuck dragon sanctuary in Ghuizhou Province, eleven minutes of Danny and Colleen having two separate phone conversations in Mandarin to confirm that this place was apparently somehow for real, forty-seven minutes for Matt and Luke to go to the nearest grocery store with Danny’s gold card and buy all the fish they could carry to feed the little monster…

(“She likes gummi worms too,” Danny had assured them. “I checked.”)

…and going on two and a half hours trying to convince Danny that no, he could not keep a dragon in a midtown Manhattan high rise.

“It’s a big apartment!” he insisted, clutching at her. “She’ll have plenty of room!”

“Didn’t you say Shou Lao filled an entire mountain?” Colleen asked.

“Maybe Shou Little won’t get so big! Her name’s only Shou Little, not Shou Big!”

“You named her that! Today!”

“You have neighbors,” Matt pointed out. “Neighbors who will notice weird noises and floors shaking and the fact that you’re covered in blood from dragon bites all the time.”

“Says the guy who crawls half-dead into his own apartment four nights a week,” Luke muttered. Matt frowned. “What? You think Claire doesn’t tell me all your business?”

“Matt’s still right, even if he is also stupid,” Jessica said. “Do you want to be stupid like Matt, Danny?”

“Hey,” Matt said.

“No,” Danny admitted.

“Hey!”

“She doesn’t belong here,” Colleen pressed. “She was stolen. She needs to go home.”

Danny was clearly weakening, but he still clung to Shou Little. “But she loves me!” Shou Little bit him. “Ow!”

“Look, man, we can just get you a puppy,” Luke said.

“I’m a millionaire. I can have both.”

“Dragon might eat the puppy,” Matt pointed out.

“Dragon might eat you,” Luke added.

“Come on, Jackie Paper, give it up,” Jessica said. “We’ve been here for hours and I have paying clients to meet with…” Malcolm had her schedule. “…eventually. Probably.”

Colleen sat down next to Danny and put a hand on his knee. “Hey. Danny, talk to me. What’s the actual issue here?”

Danny frowned at her, then dropped his gaze back to the dragon in his lap. His eyes softened. “Look, I know she doesn’t belong here,” he admitted. “I do. But…I get what that’s like. Not to belong. And I thought that maybe if the two of us didn’t belong with anyone else…”

Matt’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s what this is? You’re looking for another fish out of water?” Shou Little raised her head at the word “fish.” “No, you had your dinner. These are metaphorical fish.”

“Stop arguing with the lizard, Murdock,” Jessica muttered.

“There wasn’t anyone like me in K'un Lun,” Danny said. “And there’s not anyone like me here.”

“You think there’s a lot of bulletproof dudes walking around this city?” Luke asked.

“Or people who can hear heartbeats?” Matt added.

“I carry a sword around a crowded metropolitan area,” Colleen pointed out.

They all looked at Jessica - well, except Matt.

“What?” she asked. “I’m completely normal. You four are the weirdoes.”

“See? And then there’s Jessica,” Matt said. Jessica flipped him the bird. “I know you did that.”

“That’s why I did it.”

“You’re not the only freak around,” Colleen said. “So why don’t you let Shou Little go back to where she belongs, huh?”

Danny sighed. Then he looked up at them and grinned. “Only if Jessica says she loves me just the way I am.”

Jessica crossed her arms. “Looks like we’re keeping the dragon.”

“Jessica.”

“What?”

This whole dragon thing was unutterably stupid, but Jessica wasn’t going to pass up a free trip to China if Danny was willing to cart all of them there. She’d take a week’s vacation in China over snapping dirty photos of cheating spouses any day. Even Claire and Misty and Matt’s fluffy lawyer friend had managed to get themselves invited.

Of course, it was entirely possible that Danny had invited them all because the kid was terrified of flying. He’d been deathly pale the whole way to the airport, and clutching the armrests of his seat long before they even started taxiing. Jessica was no good at comforting, so while the others kept Danny distracted and soothed up at the front of the plane, she sprawled sideways across some seats in the back, staring out the window and working her way through a few of those tiny bottles of hooch.

A scratching noise made her look up just as Shou Little - who Danny had given free run of the plane because he had a brain like a Hostess snack - clambered up onto her seat. Jessica sat still and wary as the baby dragon picked her way up over Jessica’s legs, her tiny claws poking through the denim. Shou Little sniffed at the bottle in Jessica’s hand, sneezed, then sat down and looked up at Jessica with shiny black eyes.

“What,” Jessica said.

Shou Little stared at her.

“Go on, go cuddle up to Danny,” Jessica said. “Or Nelson, he lost his mind over you.”

Shou Little didn’t budge. Jessica thought about dumping the thing off her lap, but…oh, fuck it, she wasn’t a total monster. And when was she going to get to chill with a dragon again?

“Fine, stay there if you want,” she said. “We’re landing in less than an hour anyway.”

She turned her head to gaze out the window again at the unfamiliar landscape far below. Shou Little inched closer, up over Jessica’s thighs and belly until she could peek out the window herself.

“What?” Jessica followed the dragon’s gaze to the ground. “That’s where you’re from. Whadya think?”

Shou Little stared blankly at Jessica, and Jessica realized belatedly she was talking to an animal like it could understand her. On the other hand, it was a magic animal. Who knew what the rules were?

Still, she dropped her voice so that the others couldn’t hear her. Well, Matt could still hear her, but if he tried to make fun of her for it later she had a list of burns as long as her arm that would probably make Lawyer Boy cry.

“Come on,” she said to Shou Little. “You didn’t want to stay in New York. It’s basically a pit. Way too many people and way overpriced. Plus you’d have to live with Danny and he’d probably make you do Mommy and Me yoga or something. You don’t want to sink to that level.”

Shou Little sank down against her and rested her head against Jessica’s stomach.

“Oh no,” Jessica said. “Don’t try to get around me. Better babies than you have tried. Malcolm…” Who she had eventually befriended and hired. Bad example. “Okay, Danny…” Who had convinced her to fly around the world on the silliest escapade she’d ever been a part of. “Whatever. Bambi eyes don’t work on me. And neither does cuddling."

Shou Little let out a tiny squeak of a yawn.

“…Ah, fuck it,” Jessica said, and gave in to the urge to pet the little monster, right behind her frilled crest. Shou Little closed her eyes and rested her head on her front claws.

“You’ll be okay,” Jessica told her. “Apparently there’s other dragons at this place. I guess even freaks of nature can manage to find each other.”

Something made her look up. Back up at the front of the plane, Danny was facing her, looking less pale than he had before, and Claire was leaning in saying something low and probably extremely sensible to him.

His gaze flickered to the dragon in her lap and then back up. Jessica scowled at him.

He grinned and gave her a thumbs up.

Jessica rolled her eyes and looked back down at the sleeping Shou Little. “See?” she whispered. “Even that dope. Even me.”

She looked out at the green, terraced landscape beneath them, growing closer every minute. “Yeah,” she said, running a finger down Shou Little’s spiny back. “You’ll be just fine.”

#defenders #iron fist #jessica jones #i write things #zsredfolder

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staircasttext · 3 years

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Ep 02 Transcript: Ass Ticks

Episode 2

[intro music]

PAZ: Hi everyone, welcome back to Stairway to Starclan, our Warriors Cat reread pawdcast that we have a name for. We have cover art. We're in the big leagues. I'm Paz.

JULIAN: I'm Julian.

LIZ: I'm Liz.

PAZ: And we are back again, reading Into the Wild. Yeah, we read chapter five through chapter nine this week. Do we have anything to say beforehand or should we just go right into the summaries?

JULIAN: I'm sure we'll talk about this more, but I love Yellowfang.

PAZ: Yes, I think that might be a theme of this episode but we'll have to see. I echo that sentiment.

LIZ: She's great.

PAZ: Well, okay, let's go meet her in these chapter summaries. So we started with chapter five, which opens on Firepaw's first day of training. Graypaw and Firepaw go on a patrol of the ThunderClan territory with Lionheart and Tigerclaw. And we kind of get the beats of like settings in the book, such as the lumber mill, which the cats call Treecutplace, RiverClan border, and Fourtrees. And Fourtrees is the neutral place where all four clans meet periodically.

And Firepaw asks why the clans have to fight for resources instead of working together, which was very scandalizing to all the other cats.

Then they go patrol the ShadowClan border, which is a road. They call it the Thunderpath. And the cats seem to have absolutely no understanding of what a car is. Then they all head back to camp, and the next day Graypaw, Firepaw, and Ravenpaw practice hunting. Tigerclaw makes some mean remarks to Ravenpaw, who is noticeably scared of him. And the chapter ends with Firepaw catching and killing his first mouse in the forest.

Chapter six starts off with a time skip of two moons. Firepaw's out on the hunting patrol. He's about to catch a vole and then a strange cat interrupts him who turns out to be Graypaw. They have a little fight and then some banter about how loud Graypaw is. And as an apology for scaring away the vole, Graypaw offers to help Firepaw hunt. Along the way they see a fox, and Graypw's like, damn, a fox totally would have killed you before, haha. Isn't that funny?

And then their hunt takes them all the way to the Thunderpath, which Firepaw briefly touches, and as he touches it, he thinks he sees the eyes of a ShadowClan warrior across the road. And then they run away from the Thunderpath and go their separate ways. Chapter seven, great chapter, instantly opens on Firepaw getting attacked by an unknown cat, who helpfully announces that she's Yellowfang in third person. Firepaw is like, wow, Yellowfang looks all fucked up and old and gross, and then attacks her again because she's trying to hunt in ThunderClan territory. And there's a fight scene between them in which Firepaw eventually wins. Yellowfang is like, better make it hurt. Better kill me in one shot.

And then compares him to a kittypet, which really riles up Firepaw. But he decides he's going to help her and get her some food because he's a nice boy. He catches a rabbit and Yellowfang eats it, and then Firepaw eats some of the leftover scraps because he's hungry. But in doing so he is breaking the warrior code of feeding the clan before himself. And then, oh no, ThunderClan cats show up.

So chapter eight. A lot happens. Firepaw and Yellowfang are confronted by the ThunderClan patrol, which includes Bluestar and Tigerclaw and Graypaw. And Bluestar's like, I hope you had a good reason for breaking the warrior code and feeding the enemy and yourself. But then Bluestar realizes Yellowfang is in fact ShadowClan's former medicine cat. Some of the other warriors say they should just kill Yellowfang but Bluestar decides to bring her back to camp.

On the way Graypaw explains that Yellowfang must be a loner now, which means not attached to any clan but not a kittypet, either. Once the patrol gets back to camp, Firepaw has to watch everyone else besides him eat because he broke the warrior code. He listens to Bluestar and Tigerclaw debate what to do with Yellowfang, and Bluestar explains that they should keep Yellowfang around because she might share ShadowClan intel.

Bluestar calls a meeting and then delivers the news that they couldn't find a single WindClan cat in WindClan territory and that ShadowClan appeared to have attacked WindClan. Everyone is shocked. Bluestar decides that ThunderClan has to hunker down and prepare themselves for a possible ShadowClan attack. And she also decides the apprentices need to be trained faster and takes Firepaw on as her own apprentice. But then Firestar-- Firestar, whoops. Bluestar. Bluestar gives Firepaw his punishment, which is to take care of Yellowfang, and hunt for her, and clean up her "dirt," quote unquote.

Our last chapter is chapter nine. Firepaw goes over to talk to Yellowfang, where she taunts him for being a former kittypet. Firepaw then psychoanalyzes her and is like, you're just humiliated that you have to rely on any cat, which Yellowfang seems impressed by, and they're kind of chill after that. Three days later, the apprentices are heading out for training, and Sandpaw and Dustpaw mock Firepaw for being Yellowfang's caretaker and the fact that Bluestar still has yet to actively train him.

After Firepaw catches Yellowfang's breakfast, there's a scene where Yellowfang reacts very badly to a kitten running into her and imply some sort of bad backstory about her and children. And then there's some scene setting about how ThunderClan is fortifying their camp for an attack. Firepaw goes to visit Spottedleaf, the medicine cat, for some supplies for Yellowfang, and Firepaw feels, quote, "suddenly cheerful and tingling with energy" after the meeting.

There's a few more scenes with caring for Yellowfang and hunting, and then there's a scene where Graypaw offers to bring food to Yellowfang instead and has to overeat to cover up when Tigerclaw confronts him. And the chapter ends with Firepaw running off to look after Yellowfang again. So that's all of our chapters for this week. Anyone have opening thoughts?

JULIAN: Firepaw needs to learn road safety.

PAZ: Okay, the fact that Firepaw doesn't know what a car is? Kinda...

JULIAN: He used to be a kittypet!

PAZ: Yeah, I mean like I guess he's never been to the vet to get his balls cut off, but he probably still like saw out the window every day.

JULIAN: Did he never see his humans like go get groceries?

PAZ: Right?

JULIAN: Did they not bring him home in a car? I have so many questions.

LIZ: Maybe he was asleep. He's just a little baby.

JULIAN: That's true.

PAZ: He is a little baby. I do have to rescind my call out post for Firepaw because I think Julian pointed out that he is six months old and is--

LIZ: Oh my god.

PAZ: --just a little guy, so.

LIZ: He's so little.

JULIAN: Now I did see that. I did see that in an Amazon review so I don't know if it's canon or not.

PAZ: I mean, I guess it's true he has to be pretty young if he hadn't gone to get neutered yet.

JULIAN: He's just a baby, and he has baby's first crush on Spottedleaf.

LIZ: Aw.

PAZ: Yeah, I think we can get to that.

LIZ: I've got some highlights from that I wanna talk about.

PAZ: Yeah, do we want to kind of go a little bit in chronological order?

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: I mean the first chapter is kind of just more shit about patrolling and stuff.

JULIAN: He does do that-- he suggests that they all share prey, but the other cats are too tied to the scarcity mindset.

PAZ: Yes, that is definitely, like, once again, there is extreme like cat nationalism, like very, very strict like border control. And also, like, xenophobia, and absolutely no sharing resources.

JULIAN: It seems like, aside from that one question, though, he's bought into it very quickly because like there's one point where he smells the other cats and he's like, Oh, they smell nasty.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: And it's like, what, what are you talking about?

PAZ: That, yeah, that, like, cultural conditioning real fast.

LIZ: Well, he's like, he's a baby so he's just imprinted instantly I guess. Not that it's good, but um, yeah, the smell thing comes up very soon when he sees or smells the other cats. Like oh, it's sour and bad.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: I think they all smell sour and bad because they're just living in a forest, probably,

PAZ: Who... I don't know. I don't, I mean, cats still groom themselves. That's the good thing about cats.

JULIAN: I mean, Yellowfang smells sour. I'm jumping ahead, though. The descriptions of hunting are like very... They make me want to hunt. They're very good to read.

PAZ: Yeah, I think, like the hunting and fighting descriptions are all really good.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: Although I do, I do think that like written out... Liz, I think you're cutting out a whole bunch for me.

LIZ: Yeah, I think I am. I don't... Let me try restarting from the beginning, I guess.

PAZ: Okay.

LIZ: Sorry, one second.

PAZ: That's okay.

JULIAN: It's okay.

LIZ: Hello?

JULIAN: Oh, hello.

PAZ: Hello.

LIZ: Hi.

PAZ: Welcome back.

LIZ: Hi. I hope it sticks this time.

PAZ: We're being censored.

LIZ: We are. We said too much about the balls.

PAZ: Okay, so we were talking about hunting, hunting and fight stuff.

LIZ: Right.

PAZ: I was gonna say is that the hunting and fighting is all very well written, but the like written out cat sounds are extremely funny.

JULIAN: Oh god.

PAZ: Like I have a page open here to the Yellowfang and Firepaw fight. I'll read some for us. "Grawr. Yow."

LIZ: Go on.

JULIAN: Somebody learned about onomatopoeia in English class.

PAZ: I think it's great, I think it's so characterful.

LIZ: There's a part later when Yellowfang is laughing and it's written out as like mrr-ow-ow-ow.

PAZ: This, I think, Julian said it last episode, said is dead disease. Also must write out all sound.

JULIAN: No, I think my favorite, and maybe this is the one you're talking about, Liz, where it's "'Reow-wow-wow,' Yellowfang screamed in agony." And you know, when I hear the sound "ow-wow," I definitely think agony.

LIZ: Well, that's what I say when I'm in agony, like, ow, owie. We're the same, me and cats.

PAZ: Beautiful, beautiful stuff.

LIZ: I actually word searched "said" just to check, Didn't look--

JULIAN: Oh good.

LIZ: Don't worry, I didn't look past the chapters we read, and it only comes up when someone else is talking like in dialogue. Like Person A is being like, oh, person B said this.

JULIAN: Oh my god.

PAZ: Oh yeah.

LIZ: There are a few instances of “said” as a dialog indicator later, but um, I didn't look--

PAZ: Do you have a count on that, or does it not give you that?

LIZ: I don't think it gives you the count on Libby.

PAZ: Darn.

JULIAN: Let me see if it does on my reader. Yeah, it definitely gives me a count for other words, because I just did a search for Yellowfang.

PAZ: Oh, please tell me how many times “said” is in this book.

JULIAN: So “said” appears in this entire book, this entire, like 20 chapter book--

PAZ: It's almost 300 pages, I think.

JULIAN: Yeah, so, do we want to do bets, over/under?

PAZ: Okay. Over 25.

LIZ: I'm going to say, under 100.

JULIAN: It is 34 times.

LIZ: What?

JULIAN: In this entire book.

LIZ: What?

PAZ: Oh my god.

LIZ: That is not a lot.

PAZ: No.

JULIAN: And it's not that the cats don't talk. They talk a lot.

LIZ: They meow a lot, and they yowl, and they mew.

PAZ: And purr. They're not saying.

JULIAN: They purr so much.

LIZ: Oh, we need to talk about the purr.

JULIAN: We have to talk about the purring.

LIZ: I've got it right in front of me.

PAZ: Yeah? You want to read it, or?

LIZ: Yeah, I know we're jumping ahead a little but, um.

PAZ: No, go ahead.

LIZ: Someone told me that it's usually a horny indicator. I was very alarmed because when we meet Yellowfang-- I'll read you the paragraph. "Yellowfang seemed to sense the change in him. Her fierce orange eyes sparked with new respect. Tipping her head, and dropping eye contact, she started to back off. 'No need to be hasty now,' she purred in a silky tone."

PAZ: This to Firepaw?

LIZ: Yes, when they meet.

PAZ: Okay, I think I was saying like, just like in the world connotation-wise, purr is like, like flirty to me, because just of humans.

JULIAN: Same.

PAZ: But I don't think the book uses it that way, but it's so funny.

LIZ: Yeah, I hope not. because when this happened I was like, Oh, is this like the girl cat that's going to be the love interest, or whatever.

[Julian snorts]

PAZ: No.

LIZ: But no, she's like an old lady.

JULIAN: Oh my god, yeah, no, Yellowfang, especially like "purred in a silky tone." Yeah, that, to me, reads very horny.

PAZ: Yeah, like I know they're cats but, like, we're not. We are humans reading it, and I think words have connotations. But I guess also, we're not 12. So maybe...

JULIAN: That's true.

LIZ: I guess it's supposed to come off as more menacing, because she's trying to menace. I think.

PAZ: Like sinister.

JULIAN: I think she's trying to be snarky, kind of.

LIZ: Yeah. But it was just very alarming to read the first time

JULIAN: Oh, we did learn-- I made a note of this in chapter six when we see the fox, they also discuss badgers.

[Liz gasps]

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: We do learn that Halftail was not born with the name Halftail and that, I guess, was not his original warrior name because he lost his tail to a badger.

LIZ: Do you think he was like Mediumtail? Because there's already a Longtail.

PAZ: I've also made the same exact note of there being badger confirmation and also name change confirmation.

LIZ: Good for them.

PAZ: Yeah, I mean that's... is that like he changed his name, or like someone was like haha Halftail, and everybody started calling him Halftail?

LIZ: Aw, that's sad.

PAZ: That would be very sad.

LIZ: Maybe he's like I survived a badger. I'm Halftail now. Check it out. Badgers show up in a lot of these books with animals doing violence.

JULIAN: Yeah.

PAZ: I've never seen a badger. I don't even think I've seen a badger at a zoo.

JULIAN: Do they live in North America? I should know this but I super don't.

LIZ: They do, yeah.

PAZ: They do? I know we have wolverines, which are even scarier.

LIZ: Or mm, maybe, this is a book written by eight British people, right?

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: Right. Oh, there are American badgers, but they're a different species.

PAZ: Oh, okay.

LIZ: So they're British badgers.

JULIAN: Yes.

LIZ: I see.

JULIAN: I'm pulling up their-- yeah, yeah, the European badger is across basically all of Europe except the very top of Scandinavia.

PAZ: Wow.

LIZ: Those motherfuckers can move.

JULIAN: And some of the islands. Oh, there aren't any American badgers on the East Coast. That's why I have not seen any of them.

LIZ: Well, you're safe then. They're real mean.

PAZ: Are they?

LIZ: I say that like I've seen them. I haven't.

PAZ: I don't know anything about badgers, except that they attacked Halftail, but um, speaking of cat stuff. Lots of balls talk last section. Gotta say, there is a real focus on pee also.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: And there's lots of mention of spraying to mark territory. Once again, the things this series chooses to be realistic about.

JULIAN: See, so I was unclear whether that was actually pee, or whether it was like-- because I know that cats will, like, are described as like spraying their scent, but I don't know if that's actually peeing, or if it's like coming from their scent glands, because I do not have experience with non-neutered male cats.

PAZ: I have a lovely description for you.

JULIAN: Oh, great, thank you.

PAZ: From google.com. "Spraying is when a cat backs up to a vertical surface with their tail erect and squirts urine."

JULIAN: Goddammit.

PAZ: I just...

LIZ: Well, now we have confirmation.

JULIAN: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

PAZ: Why, why does this book have to be realistic about the worst things?

JULIAN: There was so much focus on Yellowfang's absolutely gnarly parasite situation.

LIZ: Oh, the-- I remember what they call it. It's her "rump."

JULIAN: They're like-- there was a description of Firepaw crunching her fleas between his teeth.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: No, no.

JULIAN: And I was like, this is the worst thing I've ever read.

PAZ: Yeah, like when he got the punishment of being like, Oh, you have to go take care of Yellowfang, like some other cats even said like, oh I hope you're good at crunching fleas or whatever.

JULIAN: I did not think that was like a-- do they have to crunch-- do the other cats have fleas? Like are they worried that they're going to get fleas from her? Do they have to crunch all the fleas for all of the elders? I'm very curious about the flea situation in this camp where all the cats live together.

PAZ: Well, you're not gonna get the answer to that. But you will get the realistic pee experience.

LIZ: The pee is such a dramatic reveal, too, because it's like-- there's a moment of horror because they find out that ShadowClan's like all up in their territory or something. And it's because, oh, someone's been spraying here.

PAZ: Yeah, I know.

LIZ: Also wait, during the flea... thing, it's shown that like Firepaw can use his paws to like put the, whatever medicine on, right?

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yeah, he puts the mouse bile on with his paws and then has to go wash them in the river. Is that a thing that cats do?

PAZ: I don't think so.

LIZ: Why did he have to crunch, then? Couldn't he just like--

PAZ: Well, fleas are too tiny.

JULIAN: Yeah, the mouse bile was for the ticks, to get the ticks to release.

LIZ: Oh right.

JULIAN: She is rife with parasites.

PAZ: Should we just talk about Yellowfang while we're talking about her parasite situation?

JULIAN: Yes.

PAZ: Yeah, she's also the whole second half of the chapters we read, basically, so.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: I love her.

LIZ: She's mean and good.

PAZ: Yeah, we all established that we love her before we started talking about this chapter. But yeah, she rules. She's just like an old mean, cool cat.

JULIAN: I mean, I'm always a sucker for a mean old lady. And that's her. Plus apparently she has, like every other female character in the series, child trauma.

PAZ: I know, I got to that scene, and I'm like, oh god, come on.

LIZ: It comes so suddenly. I also have that bookmarked, cause it happened while she was just like being mean to some kids. Let me see. Yeah, she like, she says, "'I have no kits,' Yellowfang spat." And then she turns around and then she sounds very wistful. And then she says, specifically, "accidents seem to happen to kits when I'm around them." Just as like conversation.

JULIAN: Just as a normal thing you say to the child who's caring for you.

LIZ: To the child who's caring for you, in front of even younger children.

PAZ: I mean, Firepaw did like a full psychoanalyze scene on her, so we're getting real personal here.

JULIAN: As a kittypet, he knows all about Freud.

PAZ: Yeah, new Firepaw lore, just dropped. Avid reader of Freud. But yeah, I think it was brought up that like, oh, there's a lot of weird plots about like child loss and infertility in these books. And I don't remember well enough to say so. But I'm like, this is it. This is it coming over the horizon at us.

JULIAN: Yeah, if I remember correctly, there's a lot of them, to the point that I gave my medicine cat OC some of her own child trauma.

PAZ: Oh my gosh.

JULIAN: It just seemed like the thing to do.

LIZ: Do the cats have a low birth rate?

PAZ: I don't think so.

LIZ: Is it cause there's like some, some guy out there just like catching and neutering cats, because he thinks it's safer for the cat population? Is there just like one vet who's everyone's enemy in this book?

PAZ: No, no. We've already established you can't be a warrior if your balls are cut off. Like I just don't think they'll let you into the camp, so.

LIZ: Does it only apply to like male cats, though, or, or is there--

PAZ: No, I don't think so. I don't remember anything about being like an unnatural infertility thing.

LIZ: Alright that's good, I guess.

JULIAN: Yeah it's mostly like they lose cats who are already born.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Or like they can't have children because they're a medicine cat and it's forbidden.

PAZ: Spoiler, they do.

LIZ: Yeah, I kind of assumed.

PAZ: Yeah, I don't remember what Yellowfang's child relationship situation is. But I assume we'll find out.

LIZ: I don't know, hearing that there is going to be more of this from many corners has a very like Whedonesque foreshadowing.

PAZ: Yeah, okay, I was trying to think of like, Oh, who's that person who does like weird infertility plots all the time. Yeah, yeah, it's Joss Whedon.

JULIAN: Now that you mentioned that the cats are all barefoot also.

PAZ: No.

LIZ: No. I'm saying no but there are a lot of like foot names also.

PAZ: If they ever make a Warriors Cat movie--

JULIAN: There you go.

PAZ: --they know who to call up. It's Joss Whedon.

LIZ: No.

JULIAN: Ugh, god.

LIZ: Warrior Cats as directed by Quentin Tarantino. [laughs]

JULIAN: I would bet money that somewhere there's like a animated Warrior Cats video set to some like Pulp Fiction dialogue or something.

PAZ: Oh my god, you're probably right.

JULIAN: Listeners, if you find it, tweet it at us.

PAZ: Please.

JULIAN: God.

LIZ: Alright, but putting the feet aside. Yeah, we love Yellowfang here. Is there anything else we want to say about her?

JULIAN: I want her and Spottedleaf to talk, but they do not seem to yet.

PAZ: I did write down that Yellowfang also calls Spottedleaf like, “pretty little medicine cat.” I was like, damn, okay. Yeah, I want them to talk. I also think Firepaw was rude as hell when he described her. Real grody description.

LIZ: Yeah, she, she just got like, what, attacked by some badgers right? That's why she's all fucked up?

PAZ: Yeah, that's what happened.

LIZ: Yeah, sure. Anyway.

JULIAN: Definitely.

LIZ: You should be a nicer young man. Just because you live in the forest doesn't mean you don't have to be nice to little old ladies.

PAZ: That's actually kinda like--

JULIAN: He should respect his elders.

PAZ: Yeah, Bluestar is very insistent, like, be nice to elders, which is nice.

LIZ: Yeah, there's the part where the other young cats are making fun of Firepaw for having to take care of her. And then she's like, it's not embarrassing to take care of old people.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: That's a nice lesson, I think.

LIZ: Yeah.

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: I'm also, I know we don't get it in these chapters, but Bluestar. I want more Bluestar content.

LIZ: She's good.

PAZ: She kinda hasn't really been a character in focus yet so far. She's kind of been like giving speeches and orders.

LIZ: I'm like, assuming she's gonna step in more since she has to train Firepaw, right?

PAZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yes. Yeah, no. We'll see more from her if I remember correctly.

PAZ: Yeah, I'm pretty sure, I mean, she's a pretty important character.

JULIAN: She'll be a girl boss on screen.

PAZ: Please.

JULIAN: What was the pun that Gabe was mad that we didn't make? Cat-paw-talism?

PAZ: I don't know.

JULIAN: I think it was instead of capitalism, cat-- catpawtalism or something like that.

LIZ: Yes.

PAZ: It's weird because they don't have catpawtalism.

JULIAN: They don't.

PAZ: There is a scarcity-- they have like, they share. They share resources but there is a scarcity narrative.

JULIAN: It's like, socialism, but like, each of the clans is like its own little socialist state.

PAZ: It's nationalism, and then socialism.

LIZ: Just a little xenophobia, just for flavor.

PAZ: There's so-- that's another thing. There's so much. There was even some eugenics-esque stuff that showed up.

LIZ: What?

PAZ: Yeah, where-- I forget who, but somebody was saying-- it was Yellowfang. She's like, kittypet blood is not the same as warriors blood.

JULIAN: Oh right.

LIZ: Oh yeah.

PAZ: And I was like, whoa. Slow down there.

LIZ: He's just like a little baby.

JULIAN: Also all cats are the same.

PAZ: Yeah, all cats are queens.

LIZ: It's true. Also you think they'd be like, less like hard on the blood stuff on account of like all of them probably being like stray cats, right.

PAZ: Yeah, these aren't like wild cats with like the species. They're just stray cats.

LIZ: Yeah, they're just, whatever. It's not like any of them are, I don't know, like purebred Scottish Folds or something.

PAZ: I think a pure--

JULIAN: Well, according to that one drawing, Yellowfang is clearly Persian.

PAZ: Yeah, so, so I have the Cats of the Clan book, which comes with full illustrations of all the important cats. And there was a Yellowfang illustration in there, and she was indeed a Persian cat.

LIZ: Maybe she's like, she's just like, she's got a Persian cat dad or something.

PAZ: No but, but--

JULIAN: Her dark secret is that she's got like a kittypet ancestor somewhere.

[Liz gasps]

PAZ: Oh my god. Yeah, cause she's--

JULIAN: I'm making that up. I don't know if that's the case.

PAZ: We can add that lore in.

LIZ: I mean, that must be the case for like a good amount of the population, given how stray cats happen?

JULIAN: Right? Also like, otherwise how do the cats avoid inbreeding?

LIZ: Mm.

PAZ: I have a cat story of my own. So when I was younger we had a cat, Maria, and she kept like getting out of the house and getting pregnant before we could get her to the vet. She had like three litters. And she just kept doing this like, over and over again because we couldn't get her to the vet fast enough like after she had the kids. So she had like three litters like that. She was going out there and, you know, sharing tongues with--

LIZ: No.

PAZ: With some stray cats.

LIZ: No.

JULIAN: There is a really tender scene where Graypaw and Firepaw share tongues together and I did just write down "gay."

PAZ: They are really cute.

JULIAN: In my little comment.

PAZ: They're very, very cute.

LIZ: They're sweet.

JULIAN: They're really cute. Graypaw goes out on a limb for him a lot. He's still exposition, he still has JRPG protagonist syndrome, or protagonist friend syndrome, but he's a sweet little guy. They're cute together.

PAZ: Yeah, I think they're very cute and it is gay. Is it gay to share tongues with your friend?

LIZ: Makes you think. Um, sorry, what were you saying before, before we got to...

PAZ: I don't know. We were talking about cat eugenics. Uh...

LIZ: No, you were talking about your old cat, right?

PAZ: Oh, yeah, I mean, yeah, she just kept going out and getting pregnant with stray cats, so like, who's to say there's, like, kittypet blood in there, in these clans.

LIZ: She's the mother of all clans.

JULIAN: I do have a note about how evil-coded ShadowClan constantly is. That their leader, that their series of leaders were Raggedstar and then Brokenstar.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: It's like, who's naming these cats?

PAZ: That's also something I wanted to talk about. Because they're so evil coded, like who said like, Oh, we're gonna be the evil clan. Let's all give ourselves evil names.

JULIAN: I want to pick a name that makes me sound like a real leader: Brokenstar. Like, okay.

LIZ: Maybe they're just like, goth.

PAZ: That's true.

JULIAN: They might just, it's a clan full of little edgelords.

LIZ: Yeah. ThunderClan is like preps.

PAZ: Jocks. Or preps.

LIZ: No, they've got a jock thing, I think. You're right.

PAZ: Yeah so ShadowClan is the goths. ThunderClan is the jocks. Maybe RiverClan is the preps?

LIZ: They could also be jocks, but like they play water polo.

PAZ: Wait, what, Julian?

JULIAN: Oh, I was gonna say that RiverClan gives me stoner vibes, because they like, chill out by the river a lot, and they're all fat and happy.

PAZ: I don't remember them enough to say so.

JULIAN: Because they have a whole other source of food that all the other cats don't have, because they can eat fish.

PAZ: Why don't they-- but like Firepaw was hunting by a stream. Why don't they just also catch fish?

LIZ: Is it because they can't swim? Can they swim?

PAZ: He went in the water.

LIZ: He like, just like stood in it. That's different from swimming.

PAZ: Well, that's all you need to do to catch fish.

JULIAN: Maybe the stream isn't big enough to support a big fish population, you know.

PAZ: Maybe, yeah. The maps show the landscape, kind of.

JULIAN: Is there a sense of how big the streams are?

PAZ: Okay, well, that--

JULIAN: Is there a scale marker?

PAZ: No scale marker. Does say river by the border with RiverClan, and then there's like little streams going off into the forest. So yeah, maybe they're not big enough, but who knows.

LIZ: That's so sad. Cats would love fish.

PAZ: They would. RiverClan has a monopoly, and they must be stopped.

LIZ: RiverClan is like having their own sashimi every night, and I don't know. They should teach the art of fishing, and maybe that'll bring all the clans together. Finally there is peace. Just so they can get the fishy.

PAZ: No, you can't share resources, absolutely. It's against the warrior code.

LIZ: Why? It's like...

JULIAN: The warrior code rule number one is don't share resources.

PAZ: Yeah, hold on, I gotta go get the exact thing that Tigerclaw says, cause I was like, okay. Okay, here it is. "'It is our clan loyalty that makes us strong,' Tigerclaw meowed in agreement. 'If you weaken that loyalty you weaken our chances of survival.'"

JULIAN: Well, damn.

PAZ: This was in direct response to Firepaw being like, why don't we all share?

JULIAN: Damn.

LIZ: It's not like they don't have a concept of sharing. They clearly do it within their clan. It's like here is the communal food hole, which is, you know, hole is what it's called in these chapters, so that's what I'm gonna go with. And then everyone can like, eat. I don't know.

JULIAN: I'm also concerned about like prey decomposition in the hole, in the hole that they bury all these mice in.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: Maybe it's just like, aged beef.

JULIAN: God.

PAZ: I don't think these cats discovered the concept of curing food. Once again, the things this book chooses to be realistic on versus not realistic on are baffling.

JULIAN: Right?

LIZ: Do the cats at any point discover cooking?

PAZ: No.

JULIAN: No, they're very afraid of fire.

LIZ: I don't know, they have medicine. That's just like cooking for your health.

PAZ: Is it?

LIZ: Yeah, gotta mix some liquids together. Now it's a serum that I eat, or whatever.

PAZ: I don't think they mix anything, though. It's just like herbs. Mouse bile, poppy seeds. I guess we're fuckin taking opioids.

LIZ: Poppy seeds are harvested. That's like pre-cooking. That's getting your mise en place, right?

PAZ: I don't think...

JULIAN: We can't get into an argument about what cooking entails.

PAZ: We have not talked about Spottedleaf yet, and Firepaw.

LIZ: Oh my god.

JULIAN: His tingles.

PAZ: So we were informed by other former fans that these books are weirdly horny. And I think we got the first glimpse of that here.

LIZ: Can I read you guys a section?

PAZ: Yes, please.

JULIAN: Oh yes.

LIZ: So to set the scene, Firepaw has gone to Spottedleaf to get some medicine, medicine which is very romantic. They describe the bile in some detail. It's like some moss soaked in it on a stick, and she says to him, don't get in your mouth, because it tastes nasty. [soft jazz begins to swell] But before that, she passes it to him, and the sentence reads, "He tasted her warm sweet breath, as he took the bark strip between his teeth."

PAZ: I like put my head in my hands at that passage.

LIZ: Losing my eyes.

PAZ: This is a--

JULIAN: 10 year old me had a lot of feelings about Spottedleaf. We're just gonna leave it there.

PAZ: I cannot wait. I love that like Firepaw's getting his tingles or whatever. Spottedleaf is just like, no idea. She's just chilling. She's just doing her job. Yeah, we know why Rusty has to have his balls now, wink.

LIZ: No. I guess he's like getting older right because it says two moons have passed.

PAZ: Yeah, I wasn't sure like what amount of time that signified, actually, if that was like months or like moon cycles.

JULIAN: Yeah, I think it's a moon cycle. It's like a month.

LIZ: Yeah, so like two months.

JULIAN: So, yeah.

PAZ: That's a lot for a cat.

JULIAN: Roughly.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: Yeah, so he's like, you know, eight or nine months old now.

PAZ: Cats are pretty big at that point.

JULIAN: That's old enough.

PAZ: Old enough to have a crush on this medicine cat who is literally just doing her job.

JULIAN: With her warm sweet breath.

LIZ: She's, she's handing him the worst medicine possible for the worst affliction possible, which is ass ticks, and he can still find time in his heart to feel romantic. So good for him I guess.

PAZ: Met over ass ticks.

JULIAN: They didn't even. She doesn't have to do anything with the ass ticks.

PAZ: No.

JULIAN: She's delegated that.

PAZ: Well, I mean that's because the Yellowfang like won't let her come near her. I don't-- because Yellowfang's too proud or whatever.

JULIAN: Her past.

LIZ: I guess, does the doctor ever go to the doctor? Makes you think.

PAZ: Yeah, isn't the thing with medicine cats that there's only ever like one, and then the apprentice? Like that feels like a bad system.

LIZ: Yeah.

JULIAN: It's a terrible system.

PAZ: Well, if your medicine cat dies then you're just fucked. So...

LIZ: I mean you've got like their teenage apprentice, which is probably fine.

PAZ: But Spottedleaf doesn't even have an apprentice right now, I don't think. Okay, I think that's all we have to say about the reading for this week. So we're gonna move on to another exciting activity.

JULIAN: Oh I love that the first-- we found, or Liz has found an article.

PAZ: I think Liz should take us through it.

LIZ: All right. Well, I think we've already expressed some dissatisfaction with how the canon clans work, which is why it is very fortuitous that I found, just by chance, a wikiHow article on how to make a Warrior Cats clan with your friends. Last updated October 2020, so you know it's recent.

PAZ: Oh my god, it's in the cat role playing category subsection which I guess...

JULIAN: Oh, I am very excited to see what else is in there.

PAZ: Oh, it's only one other thing. And it's scary.

JULIAN: But that's an exploration for another time.

LIZ: I don't know if I want to look. Alright, well first of all just for some visuals, the thumbnail preview for the link to this is a little cat man giving a thumbs up to an elderly cat person. Just cat people.

PAZ: Yeah, we're talking like anthro people. Don't think that's in the books, but okay.

LIZ: He does have the Warrior Cats bangs, or at least some bangs, so there is some connection here to the house style. Not very much, I would think, cause again, very humanoid, but.

JULIAN: Yeah, he has thumbs.

LIZ: He does have-- well, cats have thumbs.

PAZ: No, they don't.

JULIAN: No, they don't.

LIZ: Yeah they do. I mean they're not thumbs, but they're like thumb-ish.

PAZ: They don't have thumbs.

LIZ: I think you need to expand your definition of thumbs. It's not my fault you're so close minded.

JULIAN: Also they're wearing clothes, which is not...

PAZ: No. Warrior Cats...

JULIAN: I guess they're wearing clothes because this is a rated G wikiHow article, but. This old cat is in like robes. He looks at Luke Skywalker, or sorry Obi Wan, Obi Wan.

LIZ: Wait, wait, wait. Don't you mean Obi Nyan?

PAZ: Okay, well, you know, moving on to this article. Should we read the beautiful description too?

LIZ: Of course. "Do you love Warrior Cats? Do you have friends that know Warrior Cats? Try making a Warrior Cats clan. It can be lots of fun for everyone. But you need to make sure to keep it realistic and fun."

JULIAN: Why do I have to keep it realistic?

PAZ: Who says it has to be realistic?

LIZ: Yeah, that's very limiting. So let's-- actually, this is a huge layout. I have to zoom out to be able to read anything, because it just takes up the whole page. Yeah, there's an image of some anime people sitting around a table, arms crossed for the women. One glasses guy. And they say, "first, ask your friends if they're interested in making a clan." Well, are you interested?

JULIAN: Yes, absolutely.

PAZ: Yes, I sure am.

LIZ: Mm, good, good. They do make a note to clarify that "if one of your friends says no, ask if they want to be a rogue, loner, kittypet, or even another animal."

PAZ: Hold on a second.

JULIAN: "If they still refuse, don't force them to play along." How do you force someone to roleplay a cat?

PAZ: I am not unlocking this door until you meow.

LIZ: You put them in a horrible labyrinth and say, you role play, or I will not let you out.

JULIAN: God. Alright, step two.

LIZ: If someone is new to the world of Warriors, tell them the key things about the books. I think I have to let you guys take over here.

JULIAN: Sure. Well, do you know about the clans, the warrior code, the ranks, and the traditions?

LIZ: No, I am just a mere kitty pet.

PAZ: Oh.

JULIAN: Well.

[laughter]

We don't have time on the podcast for me to explain the ranks and the traditions, right at this moment, but can I suggest that you start off as a kit or apprentice?

LIZ: You may. That sounds intriguing. Step three, decide on the ranks. And just to give you a little flavor, there is an image here. It is a pyramid of cat icons in silhouette, so it's very mysterious, but one is circled, and it is one cat icon that is a full picture of a cat. You can see its face, and it is circled to indicate decision.

So I think we need to decide our ranks. I've got-- I know nothing about this. So, I'm an apprentice, let's say. What about you guys?

PAZ: Well, don't you want to read the flavor text?

LIZ: It's a lot of flavor text. Do you want me to?

JULIAN: It's a lot.

PAZ: I don't know, some of it's pretty good.

LIZ: I'll go through it, then. "Every clan needs a leader. This must be an experienced reader, whoever has read the most books or gained the most knowledge, and somebody that can be a good role player."

PAZ: Well, between me and Julian, I think Julian might have actually read more books because I never read all of the first series.

JULIAN: I was gonna say that you've read more of the books, because I pretty much stopped reading after the, like, halfway through the second series. So.

PAZ: Maybe it balances out.

LIZ: I think you need to fight to the death.

PAZ: Well, no, this is our clan. What if we're like co-leaders?

JULIAN: That works.

PAZ: Yeah. This is our clan, our house.

JULIAN: This is our clan. We can make the rules.

LIZ: You're right.

PAZ: Okay, we're the co-leaders.

LIZ: Well, leaders, next you need to choose a deputy.

JULIAN: I'm sensing that we're going to run into an issue.

LIZ: Wait, wait. "If your clan is nefarious, the leader should make sure the deputy is wicked unless the leader isn't actually evil and they want their clan to be well off."

PAZ: Is our clan nefarious?

JULIAN: Ooh, that is a good question.

PAZ: See, it's fun to be evil, but also I know we've had issues with the insular nature of canon clans.

JULIAN: Right, see, would the other clans think that we're evil because we're breaking the warrior code so much?

PAZ: Ooh, they probably would.

LIZ: That's true.

PAZ: So we'll take in everyone and we love to share: evil.

LIZ: We go to the meeting thing that they have, and we bring everyone like little gift baskets and they hate that.

PAZ: They hate it so much.

JULIAN: Oh, perfect. Again, it's saying that we should have at least three warriors, which I think, I think we're going to run into an issue because there are three of us.

PAZ: No, no, we can make our cats the warriors.

JULIAN: Oh, good call.

LIZ: You're right. So we have four technically.

JULIAN: Oh, there we go. Which of our cats would be a medicine cat?

PAZ: Well, Lu just came up here and meowed. So, I think she's volunteering.

JULIAN: Well, there you go. She sounds like she's a good role player who can act fast.

PAZ: Yeah, she was found in the woods too. She probably knows all about the herbs.

JULIAN: There you go.

LIZ: She knows the mosses and the leaves.

JULIAN: She's a little hedgewitch.

PAZ: Okay, that's settled.

LIZ: Dr. Lu.

JULIAN: Yep. And then, Liz, are you an apprentice?

LIZ: I'm Lu's apprentice, I think.

JULIAN: Perfect.

PAZ: Wait, you're a medicine cat apprentice?

LIZ: Yes, I don't think I'm very combat heavy.

PAZ: Okay.

JULIAN: I like this.

LIZ: "A medicine cat should be smart, quick learner who has read a good amount of the Warriors books." Which she of course has. "They don't actually need to know all that much about herbs, but suggest them searching up different plants and how they can be used."

PAZ: "Apprentices, despite common depiction, are close to the same size as warriors." Good to know. "And it's also fun to have elders." Chloe. I'm gonna volunteer Chloe for that. Thanks Linda.

JULIAN: Oh, yes, of course, Chloe is a storyteller.

LIZ: She is.

JULIAN: She has a lot to share.

PAZ: Okay, I think we got a good basis for our clan here.

JULIAN: "Step four, name your characters. Names are very important. If your cat has a certain interesting feature, like a disfigurement--" oh boy-- "you can add that into the name."

PAZ: Oh, wait, this article clarifies some lore. "Elders keep their warrior names unless something has changed about them." Thanks. Well, Julian and I-- oh.

LIZ: Oh?

PAZ: "Make sure all the names are natural unless they are kittypets (house cats.) You would hardly find a cat named Mustangpaw or a silly name like Awesomepaw, Cocoapaw, or Foampaw. This is why it's vital to have nature related names."

JULIAN: Oh, and then also an important point of information. "Do not create mean names, or someone could get hurt, refuse to join, or tell on you as bullies, which you don't want to be."

PAZ: That's good, that's good.

LIZ: That's good. Yeah, I'm gonna say, cats in our clan can just change them when they want to.

PAZ: Yes.

LIZ: You don't have to wait.

JULIAN: Yep. Name anarchy.

PAZ: Julian and I are co-leaders, so I guess we're star, something-star.

JULIAN: Right. I should have thought of something beforehand.

LIZ: Warrior cats name generator.

PAZ: List of flowers.

JULIAN: I'm gonna yoink the prefix of my old OC, and I'm gonna be Pinestar.

PAZ: Fuck yeah.

LIZ: Do we not want the one from fantasynamegenerators.com, which gave me Raccoonsbelly?

PAZ: Well, that's obviously your name.

JULIAN: There you go.

LIZ: Fishnose.

PAZ: Oh, Fishnose is really good.

JULIAN: Fishnose is really cute.

LIZ: Curvybush.

JULIAN: That's obscene.

PAZ: Share tongues at the curvy bush.

LIZ: Cootbranch?

JULIAN: Can you link to this?

LIZ: Yeah, it's real bad, I think.

PAZ: Well, thank you fantasy name generators.com.

LIZ: Thank you with an asterisk for a caveat because I don't know about this one.

PAZ: Well anyway, my Warriors name is gonna be Larkstar. Thank you.

JULIAN: Oh, that's cute. Oh, I'm sorry I do have to shout out Eelkit, which is what the name just gave me.

PAZ: Oh, fuck yes.

LIZ: Oh, that's really good.

JULIAN: And I am going to be Eelstar.

PAZ: Yes.

LIZ: That's beautiful.

PAZ: Okay so, Eelstar and Larkstar are co-leaders and our trusted apprentice...

LIZ: Um, wait, do apprentices have the paw thing?

JULIAN: Yes.

LIZ: I liked fish.

PAZ: Fishpaw?

LIZ: I'll be Fishpaw, yeah.

PAZ: Hell yeah.

LIZ: I'm going hard for the fish that you-- I'm not really that big of a fish fan in real life. Please do not be mistaken.

JULIAN: That's where the role playing comes in.

PAZ: Yeah, really test your limits. Okay, step five, "tell all your friends about your character. They don't have to know everything, but make sure they know their personality, their aims in life, etc. Make sure they also know what your cat looks like. Pretend that they are blind and describe your cat to the best of your ability."

LIZ: That's not how blindness works, but okay.

PAZ: That's really not, yeah.

LIZ: WikiHow, be better.

JULIAN: Come on, wikiHow.

PAZ: Be better, wikiHow, with your traced art. Well, we are nefarious but only because we are good.

JULIAN: Right. I'm sensing, again an aquatic theme, which does lean into step six of choosing a habitat.

PAZ: Yeah.

LIZ: What if we're beach cats?

PAZ: Ooh.

JULIAN: [gasps] Yes.

PAZ: Fuck yes.

JULIAN: Here we go. The second sentence of this is "you may be playing in your school playground, but your clan may whisk you away to a beautiful tropical island."

PAZ: Yes, we are in the tropical island.

LIZ: Love that.

JULIAN: On the beach, and we want everyone to come eat fish with us.

PAZ: We're on island time. That's why we're... so friendly.

LIZ: Do cats eat crabs?

PAZ: I don't know.

JULIAN: I think so.

LIZ: We can.

PAZ: [typing] Do cats eat crabs? Yes. Cats can eat crab meat as a treat.

LIZ: Beautiful.

PAZ: Every week we have Crab Day where we eat crabs as a treat.

JULIAN: Can I sell you on the name for our clan?

PAZ: Yes.

JULIAN: Which is CrabClan.

PAZ: Ooh.

LIZ: Yes. Oh my god, time for crab. It's here.

PAZ: Do we want to be like ClawClan?

JULIAN: Oh.

LIZ: I can see that too but... crab.

JULIAN: That seems violent for how we are.

PAZ: We are nefarious.

JULIAN: That's true.

LIZ: We're nefarious because we're nice, though.

JULIAN: Are we overthrowing the clan order?

PAZ: Yes. Okay, we're actually like a community of revolutionary minded cats who have been exiled from the clans. Come to the beach.

JULIAN: Incredible. Come to the beach. We have crabs.

PAZ: CrabClan's good, though.

LIZ: Yeah. If we did do battle I think ClawClan would be also good, but we don't. The only battle we do is with crustaceans.

PAZ: I think we figured out our clan.

LIZ: We love to share resources.

PAZ: We have one more step though.

LIZ: Yeah?

PAZ: Seven.

LIZ: Oh.

PAZ: "Begin role play. Always accept new members. Have fun."

LIZ: All right, for our beloved listeners, if you want to join CrabClan, we welcome you with open arms and claws. Some of these questions at the end are kind of good, community questions.

PAZ: "What if nobody at my school even knows about the books?"

LIZ: [gasps] No.

PAZ: "Try telling your friends about it. Let them read a few books and then ask them if they want to join."

LIZ: "Is Flamepelt a good name? Yes, Flamepelt sounds like a name that would fit an orange cat with an energized or determined personality. Flamebounce or Flamestrike would also fit if you're looking to go exotic."

JULIAN: Same person who asked about Flamepelt also asked, lower down, "Is it okay if I do it by myself and imagine the other cats, or does it have to be with other people?"

LIZ: Oh no. Flamepelt, join our clan.

PAZ: Oh, come join CrabClan. "How long would this take? It could take from one day to two weeks to form your clan." Amateurs.

LIZ: No, no judgments, we are, remember, we're accepting.

PAZ: Oh you're right. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Maybe I'm the nefarious deputy.

LIZ: I knew it.

JULIAN: Oh, the tips are also really good. "Doing this outdoors will be the best setting as it will be more realistic. You can build caves if you use sheets." Pro tip.

PAZ: "First law of the warrior code is always be loyal to your clan." No. Striking that out of the books.

JULIAN: "If you have a real cat, include them in your plan. Make your cat an apprentice for a real Warrior Cats effect."

PAZ: We did that.

LIZ: We did it.

JULIAN: We've already done that.

PAZ: "Don't actually get into fights with clans."

LIZ: Yeah, that's a founding principle here.

PAZ: "If there is another clan around, make sure they know you're there and that you agree on borders and other important things like that. If you want to be hostile towards each other, make sure no one gets hurt. For prey, you can take little mice, squirrels, birds, etc, stuffed animals and place them around your territory to hunt."

JULIAN: "You can also use goldfish crackers, gummy mice, or any food that looks like clan prey."

LIZ: Wait, I don't remember if this is correct. Someone tell me if it's... isn't there like... so, at Trader Joe's there's like this thing they do where there's a big plastic lobster that they put around like one around the store.

PAZ: Like lobster gummies?

LIZ: No, like a plastic lobster.

JULIAN: I've never heard of this.

LIZ: If a child finds it, they get given a piece of candy.

JULIAN: That's so cute.

LIZ: I don't know if that's... if I'm remembering that correctly, but I have a big plastic lobster on top of my fridge. We could use that.

PAZ: There we go.

JULIAN: Well, there we go. That's our prey. Perfect.

PAZ: Well, I don't know. I think we got this on lock.

Yeah, I think we've created the perfect clan.

PAZ: Should we rate this? 89% of readers found this article helpful. I'm going to give it five stars. Very helpful.

JULIAN: I also found it very helpful.

LIZ: Oh, we forgot the very last tip.

PAZ: Oh.

LIZ: Well, one of the last tips. "Don't attack your clan mates as this can get you banished from the clan." So, better watch out.

PAZ: Wait, hold on, what?

JULIAN: Is that a threat?

LIZ: [laughing] I was the nefarious one all alone. Wait. I'm sorry, there's warnings, different from tips. "Make sure nobody gets hurt. Make sure you don't eat any random berries you find outside. They could be poison."

JULIAN: Well, that's why we have you as the medicine cat apprentice.

LIZ: Moment of respect for the founding of our clan.

PAZ: Paws out for CrabClan.

LIZ: Oh.

JULIAN: Perfect.

LIZ: Oh, we should have like, like how fantasy novels always have like house sayings, we should be like Paws and Claws.

JULIAN: Oh, that is good.

LIZ: Because that's what we have, but it also suggests unity. The image would be a paw shaking hands with a crab claw, even though we do eat them.

JULIAN: I mean, is there any unity greater than eating something?

PAZ: No. Well, I think that ties it up for today. Do people want to like plug their Twitters or something?

JULIAN: Sure. We should also plug the show Twitter.

PAZ: Oh yeah.

JULIAN: Which is @staircast.

PAZ: Staircast on Twitter.com.

LIZ: Because we've got one now.

PAZ: We do.

JULIAN: We sure do. It has beautiful art by Liz.

PAZ: Yes. Well, you can find me @ootron on Twitter. That is o-o-t-r-o-n.

JULIAN: You can find me @shipyrds, without an A. That's ship-y-r-d-s. I did not choose my handle based on podcast pronounceability.

LIZ: You can find me through detective work of your own. I'm not gonna make it easy for you guys.

PAZ: Wow, okay.

JULIAN: Liz is a mystery.

LIZ: Listen, if you want to be a warrior, you have to know how to hunt.

PAZ: Hi everyone, this is Paz from the future. We forgot to plug our email as well and we would love for people to send in questions or fun anecdotes about the series to read next episode. So if you have any, feel free to send them in to [email protected]. Thanks.

So, for next week we're gonna be reading chapter 10 through 14 so for anyone reading along, that's where we'll be at. And I think things are really gonna start popping off. So thanks everyone for joining us today, and may Starclan light your path.

LIZ: Paws and claws.

PAZ: Paws and claws. Bye.

LIZ: Bye.

JULIAN: Bye.

[outro music]

#transcript #ep 02 #into the wild ep #ass ticks

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