River

[Ferntail]

Next day.....
Ferntail got a drink and left.

[Leafstripe]

Later...

Leafstripe came out of the forest and parted her jaws. She smelled mouse, water vole, and something she couldn't identify. It smelled like a fox mixed with badger that had just eaten a frog...
She took a sniff again. Something caught her eye. A tuft of fur caught on a rock just out of reach in the middle of the river.
Leafstripe walked closer. It was fur, but who or what's, she didn't know. She took a flying leap into the water. She purred as water swelled around her and moved her fur. She took 4 powerful strokes and reached the fur. She got out of the water and onto the rock to look deeper at the fur.
Reeds moved.
Water rippled.
She could see some two yellow eyes glaring.
There was something was over on the ThunderClan bank by sunning rocks.
Leafstripe froze and unsheathed her claws, just in case it was not friendly.
"This is what the fur came from!" she thought. "I don't know what I am up against... What if it is a badger?!?!? Get a grip Leafstripe, you are in the middle of the river, what ever it was most likely can't swim."
Something was tugging at the back of her mind, "If it can't swim, how did it's fur get all the way in the middle of the river! I need to get help, but if I move, it might attack, if I yowl, it might attack, if I do nothing, it might attack!!!"
Not moving the rest of her body, Leafstripe looked down at the fur. She heard a growl, and knew what it was, it was a rouge. She drew herself up to full hight and yowled a battle cry!
Leaping off the rock and swimming to the shore in half the time it took her to get out to the rock, she sprang onto the bank and lept at the reeds spitting.
She landed and looked around.
There was no one there...
Just then she looked down, and at her paws were two mewling kits.

[Leafstripe]

Leafstripe hissed in suprise. She bent down and sniffed them. Rouge kits that hadn't been fed for a while, and their mother was nowhere to be seen. She had to get them out of ThunderClan teritorry, that was for sure. She picked up one and leaped into the river, swam to the other side and put it down, swam back accross the river and grabbed the other one. She swam to the other one and put the secound down along side the first. She sighed. So much for hunting...
Leafstripe bent down and licked them both clean. Now she could get a better look at them. The female was a dark tabby with white paws, and the male was black.
She picked up the female and padded 5 tail lengths, put her down and bounded back to the male. She bounded to the female and 5 tail lengths, put him down.


Later...

She padded up to the camp entrance with the male and set him down. Leafstripe went back for the female and pushed the male into camp.