Marigoldkit had been spending the day, up until that moment, how he always spent his days; off by himself, attempting to bother no one. In particular, he had been in front of his earthworm observatory; which in reality was a once-but-no-longer-small hole in the ground that he had slowly been extending out every day. It still wasn't huge, not by any means, but it grew little by little, ever wider and deeper. Mostly because, every day, they'd realize that they'd have to uncover fresh dirt to look for earthworms, and the thought of re-filling the hole and then digging it up again hadn't come to them yet. Besides, the depth had the benefit that when he dug sideways he more likely to find them first-go, and that convenience alone made the system a success in his eyes. It did, however, have one measely issue; that being that it had become an absolutely little pit-trap and trip-hazard that around three cats had fallen into or because of at this point -- four, if you counted the one occasion he had tripped into it himself.

Of course, that was never Marigoldkit's intention, and it was only now, the third cat in, that Marigoldkit had to consider that this was actually completely and utterly his fault. Which, to be fair, he had considered in flashes before -- he was the kind of cat to consider everything his fault, and he was used to always feeling like he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. It seemed like he was always under someone's foot, or in the wrong area, or having set something of his own in a bad place; perhaps that was just one of the more somber parts of childhood -- it's hard being a tiny young thing always out of place in a world made for awfully big adults. Either way, as always when something went wrong and they felt personally responsible, Marigoldkit felt awful, and they, in their panicked, shaky, pitiful sort of way, started curling themselves into a little round puff-ball ball by instinct, closing in on himself until he was just a round little head pressed into a round little body, in a way that resembled a turtle retreating into a shell who just couldn't wholly tuck in his head. His amber eyes fell to the ground, unable to make eye-contact, expecting to get derided, or at least get told that he should probably move along and play "elsewhere,", wherever elsewhere was. But after a moment of silence, when nothing else came, his gaze as wide and watery as ever, quickly flickered up to catch a glimpse of the apprentice, sprawled out in front of him and choking on dirt, Marigoldkit's voice finally lifting up in the pitiful croak of a soft, "Sorry."

Gaze still centered straight on the ground, Marigoldkit barely moved an inch as Brackenpaw continued on, if anything just tightening the pitiful ball that he had wrapped himself into. He was glad, in some respect, he hadn't gotten yelled at, but he felt almost as bad that the apprentice in front of him was hacking up dirt and taking even part of the blame for something that was, truly and utterly, his fault. He shouldn't have had to have watched where he was going and he wouldn't have had to, if there hadn't been a giant hole in the ground.

Marigoldkit's ears fell a little at the question. He'd never really liked telling others what he was doing; for multiple reasons really. First and foremost, because it required actual, real interaction, and Marigoldkit was absolutely and utterly terrified of that. There was, for some reason, a mutual understanding that your clan-mates were like your extended family -- you should be close to them and friendly with them and at least treat them all as moderately friendly acquiantances. But to Marigoldkit, they were a mass of shadowy-faces, large meandering, hulking strangers that made a tiny ball of orange fluff like him feel small and insecure among them. He felt like a foreigner in his own home; he had always felt like that, perhaps he always would.

But secondly, and what made the interaction just a bit more miserable, was trying to explain what he was even doing. He'd gotten looks before, looks enough to tell him what he did was strange, that it was something that -- while no one really disapproved of it -- it was still so distasteful that no other cat either wanted to bother with or mess with what he was doing with ten-foot pole, and so while he continued on with the things he did with the same interest he always kept in it, he always felt a burn of shame whenever someone watched or payed too much attention to what he was doing. Like it was something humiliating that no one would tell him was embaressing, but they thought it nevertheless. And that silent judgement was stifling. Still, Brackenpaw has asked, and so Marigoldkit, as pathetic and terrified and abashed at the thought of giving an answer as he was, very softly rose up his voice, though his gaze never dared move up to meet Brackenpaw's again. "...Digging a hole. For earthworms." It was the simplest way he knew to explain it in a way that used as little words as possible, and though he wavered a bit at the thought of being more descriptive, in the end he just accepted that that was the best he was going to manage to explain himself.