Puddlespirit

Puddlespirit is currently the medicine cat of FallClan.

Name- Puddlespirit

Gender- Tom

Clan- FallClan

Rank- Medicine Cat

Family- Silkfur (mother), Joel (father), Turtleheart (sister), Jess (aunt), Chivethistle and Echo (cousins)

Friends- Mosspaw

Enemies- none yet

## Appearance & Personality

#### Appearance

Puddlespirit is a wan white tom with small, mottled spots of light and dark orange and yellow eyes. He’s very undersized and runty for his age, and is pretty frail. His fur is often ragged-looking, and he's very thin and bony. Poor lil dude. He's also sort of a midget cat. Like... he probably has whatever condition Scourge had in Warriors canon. He'll probably never get bigger than the size of a middle-aged apprentice.

#### Personality

He’s extremely quiet and reserved. He doesn’t talk much. He’s a sad boi, and usually comes off as pretty shy, but he’s actually very opinionated and likes to joke around, and he has a pretty bright personality if you bother to get to know him. He's still a nervous and mostly silent lil guy who prefers to hide in other cats' shadows, though. He's jumpy and startles easily, although he's starting to get better.

## Backstory

#### Kithood

Puddlekit was born to Silkfur in FallClan alongside his sister Turtlekit. When he was first born, Silkfur and the medicine cats - Crystalrock and Seedpaw - had a bit of a fright because he wasn’t breathing, but he revived after a few moments. Wack.

He was a pretty weak and sickly kit, which worried his mother, because she didn’t want him to become any more susceptible to the plague. Puddlekit just vibed a bit with Turtlekit for the early moons of his kithood. He was pretty far behind on his developmental skills, and had trouble walking correctly until he was four moons old, and he didn't even start speaking until three moons. He was very intelligent and perceptive, though, and once he was capable, he decided to spend more time in the medicine den, curious about herbs and such. He saw Crystalrock often enough since he was sick most of the time to begin with, so he wanted to help her with her duties in turn.

Puddlekit learned some things from the medicine cats. He enjoyed it. When he was four moons old, Drizzlesnow's kits were born: Mosskit, Mallowkit, Shellkit, and Rainkit. Puddlekit was a bit nervous at the prospect of having denmates, but upon seeing that Turtlekit was getting along well with them, he worked up his courage and decided that he would try to be friendly as well. When it was discovered that Shellkit had an issue with his lungs, Puddlekit was curious about that and wanted to help. He came to the decision that he would like to become a medicine cat apprentice at six moons old. He asked his mom about it, and she didn't mind at all, so... yay. Happy Puddlekit! But then he took his requests to the medicine cats. Unfortunately, Crystalrock was like "uh, no, I already have an apprentice dude, sorry", and Seedpaw wasn't exactly close to earning her full name yet, so Puddlekit was out of luck. Oh well.

Anyways, for the next two moons, Puddlekit vibed. He got a bit healthier and less... pitiful, I guess. I mean, he was still pitiful, but not as bad as before. He connected a bit with Mosskit in particular, because they were both awkward little potatoes and struggled to actually get along with anyone. So he and Mosskit became good friends over the course of the next two moons. Mosskit actually kind of got a little bit of a crush on him, although Puddlekit didn't know that. They'd play around a bit. She thought it was neat that he wanted to become a medicine cat, and would help quiz him on different herbs, even though he'd already been turned away from the role. He appreciated that she wanted him to pursue his interests, though.

The rest of Puddlekit's kithood was chill. He loved listening to his mother's stories about his father, Joel. He was saddened that he would never get to meet the wonderful cat she was describing, but it made him happy to know that his dad had been such a good cat, and he promised Silkfur to live up to her expectations and make Joel proud wherever he was - StarClan or not. He spent a lot of time chilling with Mosskit and Turtlekit. While disappointed that he couldn't become a medicine cat, he was content, for the most part.

#### Apprenticeship

Puddlepaw and his sister became apprentices at six moons old. Puddlepaw was originally apprenticed to Sorrelseed while Turtlepaw went to Stormclaw. Since their mentors were friends, Puddlepaw got to train with his sister a lot, but he really wasn't good at it. He could barely hunt, and battle training was like a nightmare for him. He was miserable with it. Silkfur noticed this and had a word with Crystalrock about letting him train as a medicine cat, but she still refused.

Oh, yeah, and this was around the time that the third wave of the plague hit hard. It ended up killing Seedpaw. Crystalrock was also kind of sick with it and needed help, so she was like "yes sure whatever" and let Puddlepaw switch roles and become her apprentice. Yay, Puddlepaw.

But, uh, then Crystalrock died. Like... only a day or two later. Less cool. So FallClan was stuck with a six month-old, inexperienced child as their only medicine cat. Nice. Puddlepaw was stressed and panicking and also really sad about Seedpaw and Crystalrock. Within two moons, he lost his first patient- Auburnpaw. She was a mere moon away from becoming a warrior, too. Puddlepaw was sort of traumatized by that. F in the chat, my guys. A young warrior named Oceandusk died a couple of weeks later, too. Puddlepaw has absolutely no faith in his abilities, and even though Turtlepaw, Silkfur, Mosskit, and a few other cats tried their best to help him in the medicine den, he was still an absolute mess.

When Sunstriker had her kits, she was already sick. He did his best to help her with assistance from Silkfur, but it wasn’t enough, and she died just before naming her fourth and final kit. Puddlepaw, feeling guilty and like a complete disgrace to the role of medicine cat, named the final kit Seedkit in honor of Seedpaw, hoping to receive some form of guidance from his predecessor. He decided that he would come and see them in the nursery whenever he could since he felt terrible for letting their mother die, and also because Silkfur was going to be raising them, and he figured it was almost like having younger siblings.

A few days after Sunstriker's death, Drizzlesnow's kits became apprentices. Mosspaw tried to spend as much time as she could with Puddlepaw in the medicine den, which he greatly appreciated. She asked him on one occasion if it was lonely in the medicine den at night, and offered to move her nest in with him if he wanted company. He told her not to, concerned that she would be more likely to get sick, but was warmed by the offer all the same. She completely ignored what he'd said and moved her nest in anyways. Puddlepaw was pretty uneasy about the whole thing. He hadn't had company overnight - save for sick cats - since he was in the nursery. Mosspaw insisted that it was okay, though, and said that she wanted to do whatever she could to help him feel better about himself, starting with keeping him company. Puddlepaw thought that was incredibly sweet, but also felt guilty because he didn't think he deserved it, and sort of just started awkwardly crying. Mosspaw proceeded to cat-hug him and make various unfunny herb jokes until he laughed instead. It was cute.

So Mosspaw kind of unofficially moved into the medicine den with him and didn't let anyone make her leave. Puddlepaw got more comfortable with it eventually, and the two of them were closer than they had been before. She would sometimes accompany him to go check on Sunstriker's kits and to collect herbs and stuff. On one occasion, she was out fishing with Rainpaw when he accidentally dislocated his paw by slamming it really hard into a rock because one of his eyes wasn't working right. The two of them went to Puddlepaw, and Puddlepaw set the paw, but was confused about the eye. He did what he could, but it was a similar case to Shellpaw's lung problem - Puddlepaw wasn't entirely certain how to fix it. He felt bad for not being able to help Mosspaw's brothers, but she reassured him that he wasn't doing anything wrong. Puddlepaw's self-confidence is still pretty much nonexistent, but it's improving. Yay?

For the next moon or so, Puddlepaw just chilled. He was getting help from the other medicine cats through the messengers, and with help from his family and Mosspaw he became comfortable enough with himself to do his job pretty decently.

#### Medicine Cat Life

At twelve moons old, he earned the full name Puddlespirit. It was given to him by Weepingstar since he had no mentor to take him to the Moon Falls. He thought his new name was wonderful and promised himself and his Clan that he would do it justice.

Puddlespirit hasn't done much yet. He's still just chilling.

## Other

#### Trivia

* He was named for his father’s love of puddles.
* He is absolutely going to end up with Mosspaw.
* He actually originally died because his owner left Scratch. But they gave us permission to revive him, so I (Starling) snagged him because I didn’t want my gal Silkfur to be too depressed.
* He, like Rippledusk, was left without a mentor before being old enough to have received his full medicine cat title. Except, uh.. this lil guy... he was *too* little. Uh oh.

#### Quotes

*"Are - are they coming?"*

*I'm a failure. I'm a disaster of a medicine cat. I can't even bring new life into the world without losing some.*

*If I'd known what I was doing, Sunstriker probably wouldn't be dead. I wish I'd had more time. I wish I'd had someone to learn from. I wish that - if not Crystalrock - Seedpaw at least could have lived.* - Puddlepaw thinking to himself before naming Seedkit