#bb!redtail

The Rose Twins are everything to me ngl.

Their deaths haunt the narrative. They were both in positions of massive authority. One takes life too seriously and the other laughs in the face of oblivion. He desperately wants to keep his children away from her so they don't pick up her habits. She teases him that no cat avoids the doctor forever. He hates she's right. She loves that he hates that she's right. If she needs to sneak out of StarClan she tricks him into making daisy chains. She will break the veil between life and death to speak to him again. He wastes the entire session barking at her about witchcraft. He never rats out her crime to the heavens he's so very loyal to.

I've always, since I was a kid starting TPB for the first time, had an image of Redtail as someone who was a dedicated, commanding sergeant-type. The kind of person that Tigerclaw wanted to kill partially for ambition, but also, because the little punk thought he could boss him around.

Half power. Half pride.

There's a special place in my heart for characters who die before the proper plot begins, whose life you can measure only by the hole they left behind. And it was really frustrating and disappointing imo when they released side material for him and made him... an anxious boy who's so humble and indebted to Tigerclaw.

Like, why would Bluestar make this guy deputy? She should want someone firm and charismatic, a cat who can challenge her, just like the other two deputies she picked. Idk, always hated the direction they took for Canon!Redtail.

And that's how BB!Redtail became deputy. He's organized and self-assured. He's tough but fair. He challenges Bluestar but respects her authority. Cats listen to him because he is confident and collected.

He was her ideal choice after her first deputy, Thrushpelt, died of plague shortly before TPB.

ThunderClan owned Sunningrocks.

And yet, Leopardfur and Sunfish were perched on the largest stone, just enjoying the warmth in spite of the cold day. Running their tongues across each other's fur, not a care in the world, mocking them...

"Thistleclaw," Redtail barked, "I told you not to engage."

It burned him, deep in his stomach, like a hot coal that steams and bloats and tries to sear through. That the parasite-loving deputy Thrushpelt had died, only to be replaced by one of the festering blights that his sister had dropped into this world. Now he had to bow his head to an insect half his age and half his height.

ThunderClan was punished for their insolence by that plague, he was sure of it, and now the other one was the acting Cleric. Both whelps serving a dog of a leader.

And here they were now, evenly matched 2 vs 2, and this rogue of a deputy was telling him to stand down. He'd show him what a real warrior acts like.

---

Redtail barely remembers the fight that came after, he just remembers shouting at Thistleclaw and the horrified expression on the RiverClan warrior's face as he descended on her. It happened so fast, there was screeching, fur and scraps flying, she didn't even have a chance to turn around.

It was a whirlwind of blood and bodies, until a wet CRUNCH ended the chaos. Just like that. Redtail's lifelong tormentor was hanging in Leopardfur's furious jaws, limp as prey.

He didn't have a first thought, just a ringing in his ears. But his second thought was, "How can anyone be gone so fast?"

There's a headache after a death like that, one warrior dead and another dying of infection. Arguments and discussions and peace-talks, "How do you plan to make up for this?" Crookedstar asked at one point, to which Bluestar responded coolly, "With the life of a warrior who never listened to orders."

It happened fast, and ended fast. So quickly that Redtail was still steeling himself up when he was assigning patrols, accounting for how he was going to keep Thistleclaw out of trouble today. It all felt... too peaceful. As if things shouldn't run so smoothly.