Aspen had never known a single home. He was born into the group of travellers, searching for the remnants of what was once a mighty Clan - ThunderClan, they told him, the mightiest of Clans. They travelled throug the day and told stories through the night, struggling to preserve pieces of a history no one could agree on. Pieces of their purpose, pieces of what they were searching for.
Dust was the eldest, and the wisest, and the first to fall. He was stubborn, the old cat, and he was still trying to lead them even as he drew his last breath. Second was Moth, because anywhere Dust went Moth was never far behind, and she followed him even into the stars. Willow and Cloud chose to stay with them, tired of their long journey after so many fruitless moons.
Petal, Drift, Briar, Bee, and Aspen carried on for a time. In the middle of the night, when everyone was sound asleep, Briar vanished. None of them were certain what had happened, but they fled as quickly and carefully as they dared once they woke and realized she was missing. Petal's death was a tragic accident. She and Drift had been hunting for the younger two when a raccoon attacked, and while Drift managed to fend it off, it was too late to save her.
Drift had just barely survived the encounter, but he was too injured to win his next fight - a fox, the three of them combined barely able to chase it off. Drift had told them which direction to continue in, and closed his eyes for the last time, Petal's name the last whisper on his lips. Bee led the way on, so excited to see the place they had spent so long searching for and so determined not to think about all they had lost in the process.
However, the further they traveled the more reckless she became, even as Aspen warned her to slow down and rest. When she started coughing, he made them stop for a while, but it was only a day before Bee insisted they carry on. Sensing her determination, he had relented, and regretted it ever since. She spoke so excitedly of the life of a warrior, bits and pieces from stories told by those who barely remembered it themselves.
She had been doing better, and Aspen's worry was starting to fade when it happened. She went to sleep next to him one night, and no matter what he did she wouldn't wake up.
"No," he whispered. "Bee, c'mon, you have to wake up! I can't... I can't do this by myself," he whispered. "I don't want to be alone!"
Aspen buried her body in silence not long after that, and he spent the rest of the day staring at the dirt beneath his paws. He slept there that night, beside his sister's makeshift grave. Once the sun rose, he bid her farewell as cheerfully as he could, imagining she was right there and was simply going to wait a while before catching to him, and then he carried on, and hoped ThunderClan was worth all that it had cost.
The day wasn't yet over when he saw it. So much water, shimmering in the sunlight, that he almost mistook it for ground that was simply a different color until he got close. A single thought crossed his mind, and he didn't bother pushing it away. 'Bee would love this place.' She had always loved unusual things, and this was clearly unusual.
This, he realized, must be it. ThunderClan. He had imagined this moment so many times, each with less companions than the last, but he had never thought he would be alone in this moment. At the very least, Bee should have been there with him, she had come all this way the same as him. But he was alone, the last of the group he was born into, and all he had to guide him were half-remembered stories that may or may not have been accurate in the first place.
Still, he remembered one thing... Clan cats were supposed to fight for their Clan's honor, weren't they? He would fight for the honor of ThunderClan, sure, but he would fight to honor Moth, and Dust, and Briar, and Petal and Drift and Bee. They had journeyed in search of ThunderClan too, after all, even if he was the only one to find it. The fact that they kept searching until their very last breaths had to count for something.
Something caught his attention - a scent he hadn't noticed in the sea of unusual things and reflections?
"Who are you?" he asked quietly, hoping he sounded more pleasant than he felt.
