Selenite had grown steadily over the past cycle against one of the trees near the river, just on the edge of the woodland. Time eventually softened the exterior shell, allowing the cat within the drowsily knock its head right out of its now feeble chrysalis.

Seafoam eyes blinked blearily open, the soft bubbling of the river the first sound it heard and the sight of the open meadow the first sight. She was still for a moment before a desire to get closer and see it better had her stumbling right out of a crystal that crumbled around her. She let out a mrow! of surprise as she tumbled forward, still a bit wet and sticky from the chrysalis fluids. She raised a paw to look at the dampness of her fur, and then immediately began to lick it, not enjoying the clumpiness it caused.

She sat there for a while, near the river in the shadow of the trees, cleaning her soft fur and enjoying the sound of birdsong in the trees. She didn't know what that was but she ached to chase and hunt it. Her claws itched. She wondered why that was.

@Deernose

Not too far away sat a natural hunk of malachite, deep green and blending into the tall grass around it. Its pocked surface, too, began to soften. The creature inside, however, was much less enthusiastic to come out. Despite curling deeper into herself, eventually the stone crumbled against her broad shoulders and with a startled yelp, the dappled kitten came tumbling out.

She went a considerable, near-impressive distance, limbs and damp fluff going in all directions as she somersaulted into the shallow part of the stream. It was cold-- everything was cold, but the water was especially cold. The kit scrambled out quickly, thick fur clinging to her body, claws tipped out of her mittens.

It took a moment for her to notice all that had occured in front of a stranger.

"Hello," she said slowly, like she were testing her voice out for the first time. Largely because she was. The kitten shook herself dry urgently, feeling uncomfortable and heavy.

@Clearstorm

The peace and silence was broken by a shattering and a yelp and the white kitten flinched, fur puffing in surprise as she whirled around to face the noise. There, another kitten had just tumbled out of her shell as well. She hadn't even seen it in the grass, the shards looked so much like the forest around them.

Her fur smoothed at the lack of a threat and she sat back down, as if nothing had happened. "Hello," she replied back, licking a paw clear. She noted the long long hair of the stranger and realized it, too, was covered in the amniotic fluids as well and she felt a pang of sympathy. That was going to take forever to clean and with her much shorter fur she was finding it a pain.

She had little sense of social norms right now. It seemed practical to offer - they had, after all, basically hatched together. "Do you need help with that?" She blinked slow, looking at the other kitten's fur. "You have a lot of fur."

@Deernose

It did not occur to the kitten that having someone else clean their fur might be inappropriate, or that asking might have been an overstepping of boundaries. There'd be time to learn that later. For now, though, the kit muttered a soft "Okay," and shuffled closer.

She copied what the stranger had been doing-- she bent her head and began rasping her tongue along her paws, wicking the water away. It'd felt better already, really, even if only because the fur was more sparse around her pawpads.

"Do you need help, too?" The kitten asked quizzically, looking over the paler pelt. A beat later, the thought occured to her, "Why is mine so much longer than yours?"

@Clearstorm

She stepped in closer to the larger cat and sat down, reaching her head over to start licking the fur of her shoulders and over her back, places that it would be harder for her to reach on her own, so she could clean the more accessible parts on her own.

It was nice, for a moment they sat there in silence, working together to clean her fur.

At the question, she pulled back, looking down at her own body and remembering that she, too, was still a bit wet. But the more she sat in it, the less she seemed to really care. Not that she didn't care at all, but it wasn't so bothersome. She shrugged. "I'm ok, unless you want to help." She wondered if the other cat would say yes - would it feel nice?

She blinked, confused. The question confused her, but then she, too, wondered the same. "Oh...huh...I don't know!" She tried to come up with some kind of explanation besides just "they just happened to have different lengths of fur. "Maybe. Um. Maybe it was made like that! So you would need help cleaning it! So we would meet!" Seemed reasonable - it had worked out like that after all.

@Deernose

"I think I want to help," the kitten said. It seemed nice to help. It was nice to be helped, at least. She turned her head and began grooming down the back of the white kit's neck, where her own tongue wouldn't be able to reach. The idea that she was made a certain way just for someone to meet her and clean it seemed... odd, but it wasn't like she knew any better. Maybe something out there made things happen just so other things would happen.

Hopefully this won't be a formative thought that will change the projectory of her life forever!

For a time, the two kittens cleaned each other up. When she was done, she settled down to lay around for a while, quiet and content against the other cat. Soon enough, though, a dim noise caught her ear and she opened her eyes.

She realized something, then. "I'm hungry." She hadn't known such a word to exist before it fell out of her mouth and she linked it to the empty pang in her gut. On instinct, her ears twitched and she lifted her gaze to something skittering high up in a tree.

It didn't occur to her it might be another living, breathing thing. She just saw it as food, and the fluffy kit was getting to her paws, tail lashing. "Do you see that up there?"

@Clearstorm

The kit's eyes widened minutely when the other began to clean the scruff of her neck. Some inner part of her rose up to protest, as if this vulnerable act of allowing someone to touch her, groom her, help her, was somehow repulsive or hurtful to a newfound sense of pride. It wanted her to rear back and hiss and give the other cat a warning smack with her paw. But her heart batted it down. It felt nice. And she didn't mind it in the slightest, even if it did go against something innate in her. She wondered, if it had been anyone else but this cat, would she have allowed it? Maybe not. But with her, it was okay.

She went back to her own work, getting through the long fur a little slower then it would be to get through her shorter coat, but eventually the two of them were, for the most part, cleaned of whatever it was that had stuck to them. She rested as well, enjoying the company and the feelingof their cleaned pelts warm against each other and purred softly through the moments. This was nice. The air was warm, the sound of the stream bubbled pleasently, and she had good, safe company for a moment. Her eyes slid closed as she briefly dozed.

But then her eyes were blinking open at the sound of her companion's voice. She looked over, brain restarting to catch up with what she'd said. "Hungry?" The word was like a sense opening, to the realization that she, too, was hungry. It brought back one of the first senses she'd had, to chase and hunt the things in the trees. She sat straight up, ears pricking, just as the other rose to her feet.

She followed her gaze and indeed saw something moving about in the branches above their head. She rose, too, tail tip and whiskers twitching. "I see it." She didn't even think about it, just turned towards the tree and began to climb. It was, well, not graceful in the slightest. She was strong enough to do it, claws gripping firm as she scrabbled up, but she wasn't careful. The loud sound of scraping wood and bark probably frightened away whatever it was she was trying to hunt in the first place as she scrambled onto the first branch she could.

She looked at where she'd seen movement, gripping the branch tighter as she looked right and left, confused. "Where did it go?"

@Deernose

It was a good thing the fluffier kitten didn't have eyebrows, else they might have shot right off her face. She watched the pale kitten fly up the tree with some concern, lifting herself up to stand and watch. She'd been too focused on the other kitten to notice where the food-on-legs had scrambled off to. "I don't know."

The kitten paced to the base of the tree, sniffing at the little scuff-marks Clearstorm had left behind. "Are you okay up there? It's very high up." She might fall and hurt herself. That would be bad, some primordial instinct told her.

Her tail batted at nothing, and when she heard something rustle nearby, her ears went stock upright. There it was. The kit pelted after it. It was lucky that it was already running from one kitten, that the catsquirrel didn't notice the second. Pure instinct took over her limbs as she lunged for the back of it, sinking her fangs into the back of the creature's throat and biting until it fell still.

The blood was warm, comforting, in her mouth.

She looked up. "How are you going to get down?" The kit asked with some concern.

@Clearstorm

Her claws dug deep into the branch as her tail lashed, trying to keep herself steady. A sudden race of fear ran through her as she realized how far up she was. Looking down at Deernose, she saw the ground quite far away. Shit! Shit fuck shit! Curses that she'd never heard before went flying through her head as she gripped tighter to the branch.

Still, she tried to look calm. "I'm fine." A lie, but she didn't exactly want her new friend to worry. She'd already looked stupid enough trying to climb up here.

She put off the moment she was going to try and get down, watching Deernose race for the catsquirrel and catch it quickly. Ugh...why hadn't she been able to do that so easily? But she didn't want to hurt her feelings and instantly felt kinda bad for even thinking bitterly about it. "Good job!" is what she chose to call down.

Ok. Time to get down.

She lifted a paw from the branch and began to very carefully move herself backwards, but it was a bad idea. Things went wrong pretty much immediately as her paw caught on a knot in the bark and slipped. She let out a yowl of shock as her hindquarters lost balance and tried to grip harder with her front paws, now hanging off the branch. Her tail was bushed in fear as she tried to scramble back up onto it, but she wasn't strong enough to lift her own body weight.

@Deernose