Hickorypod

Hickorypod is a lanky, thin, white-and-brown semi-tabby tom with a long, tufted tail. He has layered brown and yellow stripes, and a spikey stripe-like pattern on his tail. His nose tapers into darker browns from the top of his head, and his ears are brown.

He has tired green-and-yellow eyes, dark spots beneath his eyes, tall ears, fur that sticks out in odd places, thin paws, and fur that splays out on the back of his head like a mane. He's often seen with a grumpy expression.

Hickorypaw started out as a confident young apprentice who was eager to help his clan as a medicine cat. As time went on, however, he became more distant, always secretly terrified that any of his clanmates could die if he fails to help them. Later very stoic and grumpy, Hickorypod broke off communication with his family as he partially blames them for the way he feels.

After closing himself off, he became more and more dispaired, deciding to mask his deep-rooted depression and self-worth issues with anger and bitterness to drive anyone away before they can get close enough to see what a mess he is inside. His goal is to try his best to heal his clanmates, but he can't stomach failure on his own behalf. The few things he enjoys is running, wind, hunting, collecting herbs, sleeping under the sun, and being alone.

Hickorykit was estatic to become a medicine cat apprentice after realizing he was the best of his age-group when it came to memorizing herbs. He trained hard at a young age to push himself beyond what the current medicine cats expected of him to ensure his position, but his mother argued he had to work even harder, and it resulted in many nights without sleep for the young kit, and multiple missed meals, resulting in him becoming very thin. Once he became an medicine cat apprentice, Hickorypaw was estatic to become a healer and help his clan in any way he could. However, the constant influx of droughts and famishes that struck the clan while he was still in training made him doubt his abilities to help once his mentor passed. Still, he kept going.

His mentor passed all-too soon during a greencough pandemic in the middle of Hickorypaw's training, leaving the medicine cat apprentice to be trained by all the other clan's medicine cats interchangibly whenever they could spare the time. When he finally became a full medicine cat, Hickorypod was already too self-loathing to act kindly to his clan anymore. His mother kept pushing and pushing until he shut her out for good, despising her for her abusive treatment towards him as a kit just so that he could be above his peers. After cutting off the connection to his only family member, Hickorypod soon spiraled into a mess of anger and sadness.

Things however finally began to look up when Hickorypod chose to take on an apprentice of his own. He and Haypaw became close, and Hickorypod began to open up to her slowly. Haypaw tried her best to better Mousepaw's condition under Hickorypod's mentorship, but the two soon realized they couldn't do anything for Haypaw's brother, and she became more hesitant to trust Hickorypod's advice afterwards. The two drifted away slowly as Haypaw became more and more argumentative, much to Hickorypod's dismay, and he responded back with anger.

When an awful thunderstorm caused a flood in PrairieClan camp, Mouserush managed to guide his clanmates to safety, but his weak condition caused him to die nearly right after. His death caused Hayfall to snap and accuse Hickorypod of not caring whether any of his clanmates lived, and she decided to switch to being a warrior apprentice after a heated argument. Now with no support whatsoever, Hickorypod became even more withdrawn and cold, vowing to never let anyone into his life again out of the fear that he'll let them down as he watched his ex-apprentice become a warrior without ever needing him.