Spiderkit and Webkit were born on the same night, but Webkit is weak and Spiderkit is a bully. Watch as the two grow up and try to work out their differences... or in some cases, refuse to.
Prologue
Weedclaw felt very overwhelmed.
Here he was, outside the ThunderClan medicine den, listening to not one, but two she-cats, writhe in the pain of kitting. To make it worse, Jaytail's first kit, a little black she-kit, had been born dead. Weedclaw, despite all his moons of being the only medicine cat in ThunderClan, couldn't help but feel like he was doing something wrong.
He heaved a sigh and went back into the fray, only having left it for a brief breath of fresh air. He forced positivity into his voice as he went to Jaytail, saying, "You have one more kit left, I'm sure it's alive." She only looked up at him, her eyes wide with fear and pain. Her black pelt glinted in the moonlight shining through the nursery ceiling.
The other she-cat, Featherfur, was having an easier time of things. In fact, she was rather quiet all of a sudden. Weedclaw mewed nervously, "Featherfur, what's going on?"
The gray queen didn't answer. Weedclaw prodded her with a forepaw. "Featherfur, what's going on?" he asked again.
Her head fell forward at the same time that a kit rolled out of her. Weedclaw lunged for the kit, nipped the sac, and began to lick its fur back faster than he could ever think he could. He prayed to StarClan for it to live, somehow.
He felt a tiny, shuddering breath go through the kit's tiny body and Weedclaw couldn't stop his cry of relief, "Thank StarClan!"
The tiny kit's father, Eaglewing, stepped into the nursery. "How's it going?"
Weedclaw quickly picked up the frail kit and put it in front of its father. "You know what to do. Keep at it until I tell you to stop." Eaglewing looked surprised, but obeyed the order, glancing over at Featherfur, who still hadn't moved.
The medicine cat moved back toward the black queen, who seemed prepared to give her final push. "Go," Weedclaw told Jaytail.
With a groan, she pushed, and out came a much stronger-looking kit. "Thank StarClan," Weedclaw heard Jaytail whisper as he nipped the sac and began to lick the fur backward. The kit drew a breath and struggled to move closer to its mother to drink her milk.
"It's a tom," Weedclaw declared to Jaytail. "Congratulations," he added as he moved back toward the tiny kit that Eaglewing was still licking.
"Eaglewing, she's weak," Weedclaw told the tom, referring to the tiny she-kit between them.
Eaglewing looked up briefly. "What about Featherfur?" he asked, before licking his daughter again.
Weedclaw carefully moved past Jaytail and the tom-kit toward Featherfur. With one look, he knew, but he checked away. "Dead."
Eaglewing yowled with grief as Weedclaw picked up the tiny she-kit and placed her in front of Jaytail. "Can you give her milk?" the medicine cat asked the queen.
She nodded and the she-kit squirmed next to the tom-kit. Jaytail looked worried. "She's not very strong. She's barely getting any milk, compared to my son."
Weedclaw felt crushed. "Oh, no."
Eaglewing pushed past Weedclaw to get to his dead mate. He buried his head in her fur.
Weedclaw leaned toward Jaytail. "Help me keep their she-kit living. Please."
Jaytail nodded at the medicine cat and went back to cooing at her son and making sure that Eaglewing's daughter was getting enough to drink.
Weedclaw sighed to himself and left to tell Gorsestar the so-called good news.