A fly to the pass [Moony]

"Remember, your gut instinct can make all the difference in the world during a battle! Trust it."

Patchclaw struck to the left, feigned strike to the left again, and instead bolted to the right. He had accepted a request to help with some battle training today. One of the mentors had fallen ill with a cold, and Thistlespot wanted to kick it out before it developed into anything worse. It was to close to leaf bare to fear sickness breaking out in the Clan. He was working with one of the deputy's kits, a Dappledpaw. They had switched up apprentices for the day, shake up the normality of routine the apprentices had likely grown use to. It was proving to be a fruitful experience for the young cats.

The she-cat apprentice had fallen for his feint to the left, but Patchclaw caught the unmistakable look in her eye that she thought he would go right. "Trust it!" he hissed sharply at her. She looked a little shaken at his hiss, but Patchclaw wasn't sorry. All new warriors had to learn to trust their instinct. It could make the difference between life or death in a later scenario.

Patchclaw tested her instincts again. He started to circle her quickly, in hopes to throw her off balance as she tried to get ahead of him. But then it stopped, throwing his momentum the other way to strike at her. He watched her movement closely, and knew already that she had caught his trick. Instead of throwing all her force into turning around, she threw it into her hindquarters, reaching out and kicking him in the abdomen, which was wide open as he went in to tackle her. The kick knocked the air clean out of him, and he fell backwards onto the ground.

He grimaced as he took a shaky breath in, filling the empty void that had once been full of air. He got to his feet. "Great job. Next time, though, save it all for the enemy."

As the apprentice began apologizing, Patchclaw saw movement above. He looked up and caught the form of a cat watching from the shadows. It was a familiar form, and no scent of trespasser hit Patchclaw's scent glands. He called for a break, and the rest of the mentors agreed. The apprentices ran off to the other end of the training area, discussing their training so far. Patchclaw nodded a greeting to the form that was watching from the shadows. The other mentors were a few tail lengths off, talking about training techniques.