Felidae Island

A long time ago there existed only shifters. Shifters were everything in the Mamalia class in the animal Kingdoms know today. They had the amazing ability to shift from the mammalian form into a hominidae. Then one day, many centuries ago, two shifters, one a Canine and the other a Felis had a child. The mother had difficulty shifting towards the end of her pregnancy and so had to maintained her hominid form until her singular child was born. He was born in his homonidae form. As he grew older the parents encouraged him to shift. He should have been able to shift to a canine or a felis as others had done. The child remained unable to shift. Without the ability to shift the elements took him at a young age. Slowly but steadily these cases grew more common. As more and more families started having mixed blood offsprings it started to be very noticeable that these new generations were loosing their abilities to shift at an alarming rate. Those born without the ability to acquire a mamalian form became known as non-shifters. Shifters started to worry. Eventually as the number of cases occurred and as women lost the ability to shift forms later in their pregnancy they knew what it meant. Panic set in among the shifters. Some wanted to stop cross families from having offsprings thinking that would solve the issue. The hominidae babies were weak, they couldn't protect themselves from the elements, they had weak stomachs and couldn't eat like everyone else. Their deaths were assured in the early days. Non-shifters were given such a terrible name because they were seen as inferior, fragile, and cursed. Therefore many shifters decided to keep the lineages pure, frowning on those who crossed families and shamed those who created a non-shifter. Unfortunately, this purity also created offsprings born as a mamalia and unable to shift into a hominidae. These offsprings were preferred as they could potentially see into their adulthood's and this potential was what made them excepted. They were simply referred to as whatever their Mamalia genus was. Women would know what would befall their offsprings towards the end of their term. If they lost the ability to shift they would bear a child unable to shift. If the women were stuck in their mamalian form the babies would be as well and vice versa. For the women stuck in their hominid form it was pure torture. They themselves would have to brave the elements without their furs and with weak stomachs but would also bear a child that would most definitely fall ill and die so soon after birth. They were born without any chance of survival. Women and their partners mourned the loss of their child before it was even born. As the century went on, the women stuck in their hominid forms learned to survive as such and eventually offsprings I.e. non-shifters were able to survived into adulthood. These non-shifters became older and wiser. Everything they did was to survive and they learned fast. Eventually it wasn't such a curse to bear a non-shifter child. However non-shifters had a lot to overcome and had to become fiercer than any species. Their survival depended on it. However, as they grew together as a species they became the angriest and toughest of us. They had to constantly prove they could fit in with the shifters. Resentment grew towards the shifters. Shifter parents often abandoned their non-shifter offsprings to the growing communities of survivors to give them their best chances. Non-shifters then had offsprings of their own who would always be born a non-shifter and so their communities grew faster than any species had ever seen. Their started building settlements to shield them from the elements, farming to provide food they could safely consume. They created tools to help them do what shifter claws and jaws were able to do. Eventually the shifters and non-shifters separated and refused to interact with each other. Both sides became scared of the others abilities enabling the fear, anger, and resentment to grow into deep seated hate. At first the hostilities were simple and the shifters kept the non-shifters in check by killing only the ones who hunted on personal territories. However, the non-shifters were smart, cunning, and ruthless. It took two years, or so they say, before the non-shifters finally had the upper hand with weapons, armour and tactics specific to killing shifters and the tides had changed. Non-shifters were never able to fend off an attack by a shifter before. Now they could fight back and maybe win. Tensions grew and an all out declaration of on site hostilities was declared. This was a long time ago though, they say about three decades or so. To this day the non-shifters remain so angry at the world, always so angry. The war was so bloody and never ending. The war continues on to this day but many of the non-shifters have forgotten about shifters completely and fight amongst themselves now. To the few shifters that remain the war is still ongoing with no peaceful end in sight. A small sect of what they are now called as humans still hunt shifters and have vowed to end the species completely. The only thing keeping us shifters alive is our instincts and our small numbers that are easy to hide. However the specially trained group of humans who hunt down the shifters have had a decade to train and become proficient in their art of finding us and ending us. Very few shifters now survive a raid but some shifters keep fitting back and some still survive. Shifters never gave up, they kept surviving despite the non-shifters efforts. The shifters animal spirits would never let them give up. Generations of shifters have now been born and never known a peaceful world where all species in nature coexisted in harmony. Their animal spirit however yearned for that world and somehow had not lost its sense of direction. This is what kept the shifters from going extinct. Maybe it could help them find a balance again. ***** Among all that chaos, almost eighteen years ago, two dedicated and loving lions, one Barbany and one African, met. It was rare to meet shifters of the same genus but these two had. Wether by chance, luck, or fate, they fell in love from the moment they saw each other but love is a dangerous thing. It lead to the female getting pregnant and birthing triplets in her mamalian form. These lions were the third generation of war time children meaning that they only knew a world where shifters had to hide and survive brutal raids. They would never give up the fight to live but they didn't want to place that challenge on a new generation either. However, when they met eyes and when they caught a whiff of each other they forgot about all the trials and tribulations they had lived through. They couldn't get enough of each other and never left each other's side. Within the month the mother went into heat and neither party could prevent what happened next. The father watched his love, the mother of his offspring finally lay down after being in labour for most of the night. He looked at her and thought he could never be more in love. She laid down ever so carefully as to not crush the new kittens and let all three suckle from her. They were small and wiggling everywhere and he almost laughed as one tripped over itself. These poor defenseless kittens were in for a much harder life than he would wish on them. He was sure his love thought the same thing as he watched tears roll down her golden fur. He leaned in and licked away the tears and tried to comfort his love as best he could but he was only half hearted in his attempts as he dreaded what was to come. He held on hope that they would be able to keep these blind, defenseless kits safe until they could do it themselves. They had done everything to get her to this point. Surviving a pregnancy was difficult. They had to leave their pride early on and stayed moving. The last few days however they had remained carefully hidden in a dirt burrow under an empty and delapitated wood building. They did everything they could to not attract attention in anticipation of the kittens arrivals. They knew that if a raid occurred while she was pregnant, she would not survive. His love being big and pregnant would never survive even a small scouting party. So neither had hunted in three days for fear that it might attract unwanted attention. Now that the kittens were born and safely suckling he had to go out to get food, he could not delay any longer. His love needed it to create the milk that these little ones were draining from her. "Just one more moment" he thought as he looked on. He shifted to human which was uncomfortable in the cramped space they were in but he wanted to talk. He grabbed the first kitten that struggled against him at first and wailed her displeasure. "For your favorite smell and for a strong spirit to live on we should name her Juniper" He put her back snug up against her mom and picked up the second. He wasn't angry like his sister but curious and very chunky for a kitten. "To give him strength and toughness to survive we should name him after the sturdiest tree. What say you Oak?" He put the boy back to his mother and picked up the last kitten. "We wish your spirit to be bountiful and resourceful like the season you were born in. Summer we hope you never lack for anything" He put the last kitten down. Now all aptly named. He shifted back and his love reached out for him with her paw and scuffed. She was thanking him. He turned around and dug out a hole to exit the burrow. He finally breathed in fresh air after 3 days of being cramped. His body relished every molecule. Shifters we're not meant to be in hiding but they would do anything to stay alive now. He covered the whole up again and went on a hunt for food. It was a chance he now had to take.