that is already crazy.

I've been doing this Youtube thing for almost three years now and have created some videos

I am really proud of.

One thing I didn't expect going into this, well, one of the many things I didn't expect,

was that this little kitty you see would ever be anything other than myself.

I created Sunnyfall as a character just so she could represent me and be something I

would both enjoy looking at and not mind drawing.

Her prefix, Sunny, was one already attached to me for years as it was a piece of one of

my first usernames.

I looked outside that day, the sun was shining, and forever more Sunny was one of the names

I went by, especially in the last 7 years or so.

Fall just came about because I was trying out various possible suffixes and Sunnyfall

just flowed nicely.

It also lined up with the color palette I was already hoping for: ginger with some darker

and lighter markings since orange is really the only bright vibrant color cats naturally

come in, and I happen to like vibrant colors.

But really, that's all she was to me: a design, taking into account pieces of myself

and my preferences to make a cat who would represent me.

It was a surprise, then, when several people over the years asked me what Sunnyfall's

life was like, what she did for fun, who her family or friend were, and when and where

she lived.

I didn't have the answers to any of those questions, and usually made up something small

on the spot.

But today, I would like to change that.

Today, I would like to tell you about Sunnyfall's life, separate from my own.

Sunnykit was born into Riverclan many many seasons after any of the current cats were

alive.

She was the only kit of Amberlight and Sootstone, a rarity for cats in general but especially

in the booming generation in which she found herself.

After moons of peace, all four clans had flourished and there were numerous new warriors in every

clan.

However, by happenstance, there were no kits or apprentices for Sunnykit to grow up with.

The younger kits were born only a moon before she left the nursery and the older apprentices

had only a moon to share with her in the apprentice den before they were promoted.

Sunnypaw grew up without any other friends her age, but that didn't mean she was alone.

She loved spending time with her family and the other cats of the clan, especially the

medicine cat: Heronpelt.

He was a very serious tom, talented and alluring because of that talent, but rarely sparing

a moment to speak to many other cats.

As a kit, Sunnykit tried to spend as much time with him as she could, already enticed

by the job of a medicine cat, but often those attempts failed as Heronpelt was too busy.

Instead, Sunnykit would spend time weaving reeds along the nursery wall to play games

with her mother or even set up obstacle courses for the two of them to run, just as practice.

She'd also spend plenty of time with the elders, senior warriors, and her parents just

getting stories and advice from them whenever she could.

She really looked up to all of them, and growing up without any siblings or other cats her

age to play with, she matured quickly, skipping past and sometimes devaluing the more childish

routines most cats had gone through.

Her mother, Amberlight, decided to be a nursery aid by the time Sunnypaw became an apprentice.

She had learned enough healing in passing to take care of the kits until they could

see a medicine cat, and sometimes even taught others the basics.

She was very kind, patient, and always loved to tell stories of the history of the clans.

Though creating and solving puzzles and games was always her forte, she loved learning about

and sharing how far the clans had come and thinking about the way things used to be

Her father, Sootstone, was a great warrior, dutiful and hard-working, and knew everything

there was to know about different fish and which ones you could expect to see at different

fishing spots at different times of year.

One of his legs was limp and the claws at the end of it couldn't expand, but that

had never stopped him from being a great hunter thanks to his unique techniques and absolute

refusal to give up or treat himself as lesser.

Sunnykit looked up to both of them and enjoyed soaking up everything they, and the other

warriors, knew.

The one exception to this was her clan's fascination with decorating their dens.

When she and her mom made games and obstacle courses for each other, that made sense, but

what use was there in a pretty rock or a few extra feathers that could just prick you at

night if you weren't careful?

Why would any cat add twoleg rubbish to their dens just because it was shiny?

Maybe she was just too different from them.

That wasn't what either of her parents did, afterall.

And it wasn't what she would do either.

Through her mom, she was introduced to Heronpelt and, after many visits and a lot of pleading,

became his apprentice when she left the nursery.

She was pretty good at memorizing herbs and loved being able to help cats, but she got

queasy around issues larger than a cold or a scratch and found out she herself was more

susceptible to sickness than other cats, so she wasn't excelling in the way her parents

did in their careers.

Moreover, she was a massive extrovert, and the lifestyle of a medicine cat turned out

to be much more private than she had hoped.

So after two moons of training, she decided she wasn't cut out for the job and, though

it was difficult, became a warrior apprentice instead under Dawnstream.

Like her mother, she kept her basic healing knowledge with her and was reassured by the

fact that the things she had learned wouldn't go away.

She would just have to find a different way to put them to use.

Dawnstream cared a lot about organization, making sure every apprentice who she trained

learned to keep track of their own time and tasks so they wouldn't always have to fall

back on the deputy or their mentor to tell them where to be.

Sunnypaw took to this particular task very well and ended up genuinely falling in love

with the ability to sort through and plan her work, easing her worries as she could

have it all laid out in front of her.

They had their rough patches at times, but Dawnstream was overall a great mentor and

influence on Sunnypaw and she respected her mentor greatly, enough that by the end of

her apprenticeship, she was certain she wanted to be a mentor herself, badly.

She never got as much into fishing as her dad did, though she tried to, but she did

love eating different types of fish and learning to discuss the different flavor profiles.

One of her favorite fish is salmon, though of course it and its distinctive flavor doesn't

come around as often so she would also happily take some chub, trout, or carp.

She'll even take a mouse or vole on occasion, though she doesn't eat squirrels.

According to her they're “too cute” to kill.

Plus they end up making trees when they bury all those nuts, and Sunnypaw loves trees,

so really she's just protecting the lake by not eating squirrels.

Even loving Dawnstream and her training, though, Sunnypaw always mildly hated fight training.

Swimming was great, and the times when they learned Riverclan's special suit of moves

was fun thanks to just being in the water, but on land she wasn't very agile or coordinated

and didn't love hurting cats in the first place.

It turned out though that she did have a lot of raw strength and some sizable reflexes,

which let her get by.

If she could get someone into a pin, it was unlikely they would ever be able to get up,

so she made do in training, even without enjoying it.

Actual battles though still get her heart racing to this day.

She ended up loving swimming a lot more than she expected to.

The water enveloped her in a quiet, cool, peaceful cocoon and, whenever she was there,

she had an excuse to not consider her dozens of plans and tasks or the hunting she had

to do for the clan.

She never stayed long, not wanting to shirk her duties, of course, but it did feel nice.

When she finally did become a warrior, Sunnyfall, she eased quickly into the daily routine of

patrolling and hunting thanks to Dawnstream's values, but did find it more difficult to

fit in with her now-peers.

The other young warriors having grown up together or at least getting to know what other young

cats were like gave them a very different perspective and, sometimes, it felt like they

lived on different planets.

Still, she wanted to get to know them regardless.

Being without any friends was a quick way to deplete any energy or happiness she had,

and she knew she couldn't really be a part of the clan if she didn't interact with

it.

It took a while, but with her parents' and mentor's support, she stuck it out until

she had made a few friends among the warriors in the generation above hers, including another

she-cat who deeply wanted to be a mentor: Flashtrail.

Together they spoke with more experienced mentors, sat in on training sessions, even

ventured to the other clans to learn everything they could about teaching the new warriors

of their clans.

Of course, Flashtrail was several moons older than Sunnyfall and neither of them were as

old as the most seasoned mentors they spoke with, but they already knew this was their

passion and they would work to make themselves the best mentors they could be.

A couple of seasons later, they were ready, and Sunnyfall and Flashtrail were both made

mentors, to Aspenpaw and Duckpaw respectively.

They moved their nests next to each other in the warriors' den and from then on, they

were the greatest of friends, rarely going a day without talking and coming to see each

other whenever they had questions to consider about how to best train their apprentices.

Friendship didn't only exist in Riverclan for Sunnyfall, though.

During her moons of being the only apprentice in her clan and before she had made friends

with Flashtrail, Sunnyfall got to know several cats from other clans at gatherings and border

meetings and, although they couldn't see each other every day, they met regularly enough

that Sunnyfall was ready to consider many of them her closest friends.

Some of them introduced her to storytelling: weaving elaborate tales that took elements

of the clans' history and spiced them up with more intrigue or more relationships that

no cat was sure really existed at the time.

Others introduced her to art, decorating their dens even outside of Riverclan and even carving

delicate designs in the dirt floors to make artistic pathways or demonstrations of the

stories others would tell.

Though she still didn't quite have the passion for it that her friends did, Sunnyfall grew

interested in trying out this craft as well in order to accompany her stories.

A couple of friends were even just as interested in history as Amberlight was and would talk

with her for entire nights about the possible motivations and conflicting accounts of the

cats long gone.

They brought Sunnyfall back into a passion for clan history that she had almost left

behind as an apprentice.

Soon enough, Sunnyfall had become a sort of historian herself, telling stories to the

kits and apprentices of the clans' history and using her carvings and decorations to

accent the tales and keep the young cats' attention.

She even started something relatively new, analyzing the history for signs of where cats

went wrong, what lessons could be drawn from their lives, and how the clans could improve

upon them in their current world.

After a while, even some of the older cats and cats from other clans would come to see

these sessions, more than she could have imagined.

(This is just the in-universe explanation of my Youtube channel, by the way.

This is what Sunnyfall is doing when you see her in videos.)

Her favorite historical figure is, of course, Hollyleaf, though she also has a fondness

for Thornclaw and Brightheart, Ivypool and Dovewing, Briarlight, Bluestar, and much further

back, Tall Shadow, Gray Wing, and Half Moon.

These days, she splits her time about equally between studying history and mentoring Aspenpaw,

along with, hopefully, the many more apprentices she will get to train in the future.

It's certainly a lot of work, sometimes more than she bargained for, but she wouldn't

have it any other way.

Now she gets to do everything she loves and lives a balanced life of work, hobbies, and

relationships.

That balance does get a bit tenuous at times, but it's why she wanted so much variety

in her life.

It's easy to get burned out on the daily cycle of clan life when all you have is patrols

and mealtimes.

Her life is full, but it's rewarding, and for now, she couldn't be happier with it.

At Flashtrail's encouragement, she has even learned to, at least sometimes, spare a moment

to take a break floating in the river to truly clear her mind for a while.

She is doing well.

I can say that much.

And that is the story of Sunnyfall, as much as I have for now, anyway.

I don't know that any of this will factor into, well, anything in the future considering

the words coming from this kitty will still just be what I want to say to you, but I hope

it was entertaining at least.