AshSquirrel

AshSquirrel is the het ship between Ashfur and Squirrelflight from the Warriors fandom.

Canon
Ashfur was born to Brindleface(and according to the Warriors family tree, Whitestorm as the father) many moons before Squirrelflight was born to Firestar and Sandstorm. Squirrelflight was apprenticed and at eight moons she set off on a journey to The Sun drown place with Brambleclaw, Feathertail, Crowpaw, Tawnypelt and Stormfur. They don’t have any notable interactions before the group returns.

By the time the clans reach The Lake Territories, Squirrelflight and Brambleclaw are very close, although not officially mates. But they soon start to argue over Brambleclaw visiting with his brother Hawkfrost, who Squirrelflight thinks is too ambitious and dangerous. Brambleclaw accuses Squilf of judging Hawkfrost based on their father’s actions, which she denies but he doesn’t believe her. They grow apart and stop speaking to one another except for the occasional aggressive words. During this time, Squirrelflight gets closer to Ashfur and they become good friends. Squilf considers Ashfur romantically, observing how refreshing his kindness was in contrast to Brambleclaw’s agression, but also that she doesn’t like how he babies her and his hatred of kittypets. Brambleclaw begins to get jealous and starts mocking and generally being rude to both Ashfur and Squilf, getting to the point that the two toms almost break into a physical fight. Ashfur wants to protect Squirrelflight from Brambleclaw but she isn’t too fond of others fighting her battles for her, something he also tries to do when they are attacked by a Fox.

The camp is attacked by badgers and Squirrelflight and Brambleclaw make up to fight them off. Squilf decided that she loved Brambleclaw and breaks up with Ashfur to be with him. Ashfur does not take this well.

Ashfur grows bitter and angry throughout the rest of the arc. Hawkfrost convinces Ashfur to help him kill Firestar, and Ashfur lies to his clan that he had seen Brambleclaw with Hawkfrost implying that Brambleclaw was helping him kill Firestar. Brambleclaw kills Hawkfrost, who before he dies mentions that he had help but doesn’t reveal it to be Ashfur. Ashfur helped Hawkfrost because Firestar was Squirrelflight’s father, and he wanted to make her suffer.

In Power of three, Squirrelflight brings her sister Leafpool’s kits to camp and claims them to be her and Brambleclaw’s; Jaykit, Lionkit and Hollykit. When lightning strikes a tree and the ThunderClan camp is set on fire, The three are trapped in camp and Squirrelflight goes back to save them. She knocks down a tree to reach them, but she is blocked by Ashfur, who monologues about how much she hurt him, making him feel like he was ‘Bleeding out onto the stones’, ect. He then tells her that to make her pay, he was going to let the fire kill her kits. To try to get him to stop, Squirrelflight tells him that the three were not her kits, and so killing them would not hurt her. This shocks them all, and Ashfur decides that telling the clans that she lied about the kits heritage would be a better punishment, and threatens to tell everyone her secret at the next gathering.

The three are devastated at this revelation and attempt to convince Ashfur not to tell anyone, but it is in vain. Ashfur is found dead days later, his body drifting in the lake. Hollyleaf had killed him to prevent him from spilling the secret of her birth, although she later reveals it herself.

Ashfur originally goes to StarClan, but never gets over Squirrelflight and plots revenge. When Bramblestar loses his first life Ashfur posseses Bramblestar’s body and keeps Squirrelflight with him in his den most of the time, Rarely allowing her out to organize patrols or fetch prey. He eventually banishes Squirrelflight and his health continues to deteriorate, putting on weight and refusing to groom. Squilf helps with the rebellion to take down Ashfur and he is caught in a battle and imprisoned in ShadowClan territory.

Ashfur kidnaps Squirrelflight, dragging her into the Dark forest and tries to convince her to be his mate. She refuses and challenges him to fight and he says no, telling her he still loves her and would never hurt her. She and Bramblestar escape and Ashfur is later killed by Bristlefrost in a confrontation that Squirrelflight is absent for.

Fanon
This ship is riddled with controversy. In the early warriors fandom days,(2004-2014), the fandom largely thought of and portrayed Squirrelflight as being in the wrong and Ashfur being an innocent baby simply driven mad with unrequited love. This was encouraged by the author’s statement on why Ashfur went to StarClan, ‘he simply loved too much’, as well as Yellowfang echoing this statement in Fading echos. There was also a belief that this ship ruined Ashpaw’s character, turning him from a loyal warrior into a heartbroken maniac.

Later, arguments arose that Ashfur was the villian who had no excuse for his actions, and that demonizing Squilf for rejecting him was sexist and biased. Many in the fandom accepted and held this opinion, though there were still a lot of who defended Ashfur.

Moonkitti is a YouTuber known for their popular warrior cats comedy skits and rants, as well as the iconic Blonde Ashfur. They posted a hour long video detailing how they believed BrambleSquirrel to be a abusive relationship. This caused many people to dislike Bramblestar and this ship, and some turned to AshSquirrel saying that Ashfur was the better choice and wouldn’t have hurt Squirrelflight if she hadn’t dumped him. Moonkitti then released a video titled Quick Ashfur Addendum where she states her opinion that Ashfur would not have been a better choice and that he would have treated Squilf badly even if she didn’t reject him. Moonkitti is a very influential voice in the fandom and therefore currently this is a widely held view across the fandom.

Fandom
https://www.tumblr.com/tagged/ashsquirrel?sort=top https://www.wattpad.com/stories/ashsquirrel https://www.wattpad.com/search/Squirrelflight%20x%20Ashfur https://www.quotev.com/search/Ashfur+X+Squirrelflight https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Ashfur%20(Warriors%20-%20ThunderClan)*s*Squirrelflight/works

Trivia

 * The Warriors family tree states that Brindleface is Sandstorm’s mother, which would make Ashfur Squirrelflight’s uncle. However wether or not the Warriors family tree is canon is debated.
 * Victoria Holmes originally suspected that Runningwind was the father of Ferncloud and Ashfur.
 * When asked about Ashfur's residence on her Facebook page, Vicky said the following: "[He] went to StarClan because he was essentially a loyal and well-meaning warrior. He was just driven a bit crazy from unrequited love!", and also replied that she'd been thinking for a long while about where to send him, and considered the Dark Forest.
 * Vicky doesn't believe Ashfur was chosen as the cat who loved Squirrelflight for any specific reason.
 * Kate Cary does not like Ashfur and she has stated, "I feel Ashfur had a major hissy fit because he wasn't going to get to be on the A list, and it’s hard to respect him for that."

Gallery
Fanart by https://www.instagram.com/frostyyart/?hl=en Fanart by https://www.deviantart.com/gamakichisora Fanart by https://www.deviantart.com/belka-1100

Videos
https://youtu.be/zfNBR8fjgWk https://youtu.be/aADMpNW952c https://youtu.be/eNjiuyJosrM https://youtu.be/h8PbUSywU3Q https://youtu.be/M9e6HlezVPw https://youtu.be/oIuaVZm9SSw https://youtu.be/19Fu0wVgsnY https://youtu.be/XBx8Wh0WoBc