Daisy’s family situation was a bit out of the ordinary. She had a mother and a father, of course, just like anyone else, but the difference was that the two didn’t love each other romantically. Anise and Jasper were close friends and cared for each other as such, but they were both aromantic. They didn’t want to keep looking for partners, so decided to have kids together. Despite their unorthodox situation, the two of them were good friends and doted upon Daisy and her littermates quite a bit. The two of them had very different parenting styles, but somehow together, they worked quite well. Regardless of whether or not Anise and Jasper loved each other, it was clear that the litter would grow up knowing that they were loved. And that was what they agreed was important.

Anise and Jasper’s litter consisted of three cats: Daisy, Cicada, and Owlet. Daisy was the ringleader. She was sharp and confident- good at recognizing patterns and coming up with strategies to slip away from their parents’ watchful eyes. She would lead them in their little crusades, keen to trouble. Whether it was something harmless to something potentially dangerous (like daring Cicada to kick pebbles into a fox den) Daisy was always at the head of it. And as quick as she would get them into trouble, Daisy had a quick enough tongue to get them out of it. Once Anise and Jasper thought they had their oldest daughter all figured out, she would come up with a different strategy, or find some other unpredictable way to trick them. She was a clever kitten, after all!

Cicada was a good-natured and creative tom who admired Daisy’s audacity, always up to go along with some of her schemes. Cicada was always goaded into participating in their shenanigans, always up to prove himself as a brave and not at all a weak cat! Owlet, the littlest of the three, would be a passive watcher. Daisy never tried to force them into doing anything they didn’t want to. She always took care of him the most. She would never encourage them to get into trouble, even though they would always tag along with her and Cicada. Owlet was the first that she would defend. Even when her sharp tongue led her to want to reproach Cicada, or give him a good smack around the ears, she was always gentle with the little cat. Cicada would often huff and rolls his eyes at the way Daisy treated Owlet so gently in comparison, but he would never complain - he couldn’t hurt Owlet, either.

adulthood

When Daisy was around a year old, the scent of smoke and fire drew Daisy away from her home and towards a scarlet light that lit the tops of the trees. She followed the smell to find a half-collapsed human cabin, clearly abandoned, which was engulfed in flames. She was still for a few heartbeats, half mesmerized, half terrified by the orange and yellow ripples that swelled over the structure. Then she heard the wails of another cat inside. Instantly Daisy dove into the structure, weaving her way around the wooden beams and dodging the fiery licks until she spotted a soot-covered tom sprawled under debris. Daisy dragged him out of the mess, saving his life that night. Her home was too far to bring him to that night, so she found him a temporary den and settled him down there.

The tom was unconscious for the night and woke up the next morning. He introduced himself as Shrike, and thanked her for saving him. He seemed to be amazed that she would jump into the fire for a stranger, and come out “unscathed” (she wasn’t unscathed, but of course she came out much better than him). As he got to know her more, it was obvious that Daisy had won him over. He was enamored with her fire. She would force him to drink water to clear his throat even when he wasn’t thirsty, eat to keep his weight up even when he insisted he didn’t want anything, and would talk with him until late at night to help him doze to sleep. They would argue constantly about everything, and it annoyed him that she always seemed to be right, or would always win. But he was head over heels.

After his recovery, Daisy and Shrike’s friendship continued. She found herself wanting to see Shrike more and more, and their arguments and friendly animosity tapered into an affectionate rivalry. They got along very well. The pair were very flirty, and Daisy was making excuses to spend time with him. He seemed to always know how to challenge her, to ignite the fire he loved so much. They would compete in hunting challenges against each other, in races, in fighting scrimmages. She was spending more time with him than ever, and Daisy wasn’t complaining one bit.

Her family was very amused by their relationship. They knew that Daisy had always wanted to strike out on her own, and taking Shrike as a mate could’ve been her chance to do so. Anise and Jasper were just waiting for Daisy to tell them that her and Shrike were together officially, and were leaving to travel together. The couple liked Shrike a lot, as he got along with everyone and was always very polite. Jasper gave him the shovel talk, Anise would joke around with him, and Cicada would just sit next to Daisy and roll his eyes.

Well... Shrike got along with almost everyone. He didn’t seem to like Owlet very much. The shy little cat annoyed Shrike, and it seemed to particular annoy him about how clear Daisy’s love for her sibling was. But... Daisy was spending a lot of time with him as well. So it was all Shrike could do to smile and be supportive. He wouldn’t want to drive Daisy away, after all.

Then Owlet got sick. Daisy expected him to get better quickly; he always got better quickly. But he wasn’t getting better. Soon all the time that Daisy had been spending with Shrike became time spent next to Owlet instead. Fetching him water, hunting for him. Cicada, Anise and Jasper insisted that they could do it themselves, that she should be with Shrike, but then Jasper got sick too. Cicada and Anise tried to console her that two cats could still hunt for them, but Daisy wasn’t convinced. Jasper was the best hunter out of the five of them, and Anise and Cicada couldn’t hunt for two cats (four including them) all by themselves as the leaves started to change color.

She confided in Shrike, expecting him to understand. Instead, he got frustrated with her. He insisted that Anise and Cicada could handle it on their own- that Jasper and Owlet were still young and healthy and they would get better. They should move away together and have a family, he said. Daisy was taken aback. She had expected him to be supportive of something so clearly out of her paws. She stared at him for a second and then firmly told him that this was non-negotiable. She liked him, but she couldn’t leave her family when half of them were dealing with sickness. If he couldn’t understand that and couldn’t support her, then he should go on his own, and she wouldn’t follow him. To her relief, Shrike didn’t argue with her and let it go. He agreed to wait. He said that as long as he was with her, they didn’t care where they were. But there were hints of impatience in his message.

Weeks passed, and while Jasper was slowly recovering, Owlet only seemed to get worse. Daisy tried her best to split her time between Shrike and her family, but she was beginning to spend more time with the sick Owlet. To appease the increasingly frustrated Shrike she slept in his den with him, but would be gone in the morning to watch over her family. As the oldest of the litter, she felt a certain responsibility for them. She couldn’t just leave them as they were feeling unwell, especially not when the cold seasons were approaching.

Shrike was becoming more restless. He didn’t like that she was spending time with Owlet instead of him. He’d gotten so used to having her take care of him and help him. Now that she wasn’t beside him as much, he was feeling unsettled and insecure. He fought with her one night about this. He was mad that, despite being mates now, she still wouldn’t move away with him. Daisy pointed out that they still saw each other plenty, and even slept in the same den together now. Seeing and taking care of her family didn’t mean she didn’t love him. Did he even realize how silly he sounded? Her little sibling was sick. She couldn’t just ignore that because they were mates. Shrike disagreed. He insisted that, because he loved her, she would have to come away with him. She was his mate first before she was a sister or a daughter.

Daisy got oddly quiet. She stared at him for a little too long. Then she spat at him, with fury he wasn’t prepared for, that being in love did not make her stupid. She did not belong to anyone but herself. She was Daisy before she was his mate, or a daughter, or a sister, and she chose what she wanted to be. Right now that meant that she would have to be a sister to her ill sibling. If he truly thought that he owned her because he loved her, then he was not the cat she thought she knew. Daisy stalked away from him, hissing that she wouldn’t be coming back the next night. They didn’t speak for the next several days.

Daisy woke up one night and the space next to her was bare. Owlet was gone. Panic swelled inside of her and she went out to look for him immediately, following his scent to the river where the trail ended. There were four little paw prints in the mud, and claw marks scrabbling on the shore. With a sinking heart, she realized that Owlet must have somehow fallen in. But the little cat didn’t know how to swim! He stood no chance against the rivers, which had been swollen after many days of rainfall. She immediately took off downstream, hoping to see him bobbing up and down in the waves, or washed up on shore. As she looked, it started to rain.

She sensed movement behind her and turned immediately to see Shrike. Daisy was stunned. He started to ask what she was doing there, to compensate for his own appearance there, and he kept babbling, but she didn’t hear him. She was more concerned with the way his expression didn’t seem quite right, the flecks of mud on his pelt, the black fur stuck in his claws. Shrike drowned Owlet.

Cutting him off with a snarl of fury, she demanded what he thought he was doing. What in the world did he do to her little sibling? Where was Owlet? What did he do? She waited for his responses with a fury unlike he’d ever seen from her. Her whole pelt was bristling, her claws were out, her teeth were bared. Shrike tried to deny anything, and a shrill wail from further downstream cut him off. Both of their attentions immediately pointed down the river, and as Daisy turned to chase after it, Shrike stopped her.

It was raining harder now. Shrike refused to let her go, so Daisy attacked him. They tousled together, all of their rage let out in that moment. Shrike admitted, yes, he pushed Owlet in the river for taking her away from him. Daisy clawed and teared at his fur, and as she saw the river rising behind him, she lunged at him, rolling both of them into the water. The currents swept them away as a larger wave crashed over their heads, and sent them tumbling downstream. Any time Daisy caught eye of Shrike bobbing in the waves, her fury rose in her anew. She did as much as she could to push his head below the water, to punish him for trying to (and perhaps succeeding) in taking Owlet away from her. Fire brought them together, but water would destroy them.

She washed ashore in a place she’d never seen before. She was exhausted and weary, bleeding from her fight with Shrike. A new wave of grief hit her remembering what happened to Owlet, and she immediately started to look for them. There had to be something left. They couldn’t... they couldn’t just be gone. Through the next months she went through the motions. She ate when she was hungry, and she slept when she had exhausted herself. But all she cared about was finding Owlet. At some point she had to admit it to herself- they were gone, she wasn’t going to find them. And at some point, she stopped looking. Daisy didn’t want to find their body anymore. If she didn’t find them, then she could tell herself that they found themselves a nice owner, that they were a housecat now living a better life than they could’ve ever in the wild. She never found Shrike, either, but she hoped that he was dead. She wished that she had left him in that burning house if she knew how it would end.

And Daisy never went back to her family. She couldn’t bear to face them again. She would rather them think that her, Shrike and Owlet all went off together than the horrible truth of the matter.

After wandering aimlessly for a while, she discovered a group of cats. They introduced themselves as the Cavern Colony and for some reason… Daisy felt drawn to them. Maybe she just wanted a new family, or a reason to give herself a purpose, but she didn’t want to be running around anymore. She wanted to be around cats again that didn’t know her history… that wouldn’t blame her for what happened. After learning about the different ranks, Daisy thought that she would fit best as a guardian. After all, if she could protect the other cats in the colony...then, well...maybe she could prevent something like Owlet’s fate from ever happening again

Daisy spoke with the colony’s leader, Lupa, and joined them as a guardian. She settled in with the colony quite nicely, and took to her tasks well. It took a while for her to recover from the grief of Owlet’s passing- not just the grief, but letting herself thaw. It was hard seeing other cats and not being suspicious of ulterior motives. She’d spend time looking out the cave mouth to see if Shrike was passing by- she would never let him come near her family again. But...perhaps she had a future there after all.

adulthood

She settled into her new life adeptly. There were a few issues with a nearby colony - something about shoddy leadership, and one of their leaders got run out of the territory? Daisy didn’t really care to know more about it, though she was sometimes intrigued by the drama surrounding it. It seemed that they would have to learn more about it, though, because when the nearby colony eventually fell apart, some of their cats came looking for refuge in Cavern.

One cat in particular, Lamprey, Daisy took to like a burr. They were similar in spunk and confidence, with a fire for bets and competition. They often challenged each other, and Daisy enjoyed her company quite a bit. Their lighthearted play made Daisy very happy, and felt like she could take on the world with her new friend beside her. Soon Lamprey would confide in Daisy about what had troubled her in the past, and her worries going forward, and Daisy would do the same. Their friendship strengthened deeper than dares and silly competition.

Lamprey eventually expressed the desire to raise kits, and asked Daisy if she would co-parent the litter with her. Daisy was surprised, and her own worries passed by her mind, remembering her time with Shrike. But life was different now. This was different. They wouldn’t be mates, but platonic partners raising kids together, which was reminiscent of her own parents. Daisy agreed, touched to be apart of it. She quickly grew excited for their future together.

Lamprey got pregnant with the help of a surrogate, and soon they had five kittens, which they named Myrtle, Granite, Finley, Slug, and Chirp. Daisy had grown a lot since joining the Cavern Colony, and although she liked her silly games with her bestie, she was overjoyed and overwhelmed for the new chapter of their lives. It wouldn’t come without its struggles, of course, but this was her family. This was her home. She would always fight for all of it.