Do I know you?[CLOSED for Stormy]

Dennis wandered about Twolegplace, artificial pelt making up for the cold wind that whipped at his face. He'd been spending less and less time at home lately; he could walk better by the day and didn't have to spend as much time lying around, replacing his lethargy with restlessness. Plus, the frequency of his flashbacks was becoming almost overwhelming, leading to more and more walks to clear his mind. He didn't really know where he was going, paws treading unknown territory as countless thoughts swirled around his brain. Why was he here? Why did it feel so wrong? Who were the cats that came to him in his sleep? He even had some names now: Lilypaw, Ivystar, Spiderquill. He couldn't put faces to them, but each one seemed to awaken some visceral sadness and longing within him. Which begged the question: did he want to know? Was he better off living in semi-blissful ignorance?
He sighed, shaking his head in an attempt to clear his mind. This walk was supposed to calm him down, he wasn't about to let intrusive thoughts ruin it. He kept on walking in his uneven 3-beat pace, trying to keep his mind off of his fragmented memory and the fact that he could sense a pair of eyes watching him.

Stormpaw couldn't hide her shock.

What in MoonClan's name was the RiverClan medicine cat doing in Twolegplace? With a missing leg? And a skypelt? He didn't seem to know where he was going, and from her brief grip to Twolegplace with Daisybloom, she knew catmint didn't grow in this area. So why was he here? Limping over, a small patched trail of blood following from her still open wound, she approached him warily.

It was impossible not to recognize him. Even with a missing leg, she'd know his face anywhere. The three claw marks on his cheek from Larchneedle confirmed her suspicions. "...Spiderquill..?" the name felt awkward on her tongue, but yet felt like home. With a feeling of dread, her paws carried her forward.

What was she doing? Why was she approaching him? She'd vowed to leave the Clans for good! So why were her paws so insistent of carrying her to him? Shoving down her anxiety, she glanced around in paranoia, holding her back left leg off the ground, a single blood drop landing on the ground underneath it. "What are you doing here?"

Dennis watched, beart thumping wildly, as a strange cat came walking out of the shadows. No, not walking--limping. Blood dripped from her left hind leg- the similarity did not escape him- as she walked. He opened his mouth to comment on it, but was stopped in his tracks by her next words.

"Spiderquill?"

His heart seemed to stop. Spiderquill. He recognised it, remembered it from his dreams. Was it really not just a figment of his imagination? He tried not to let the shock show on his face. Was this... His name? But it didn't feel right to him, not like Dennis. Dennis was blankets, and warmth, and good food. Spiderquill... Spiderquill reminded him of blood, of tragedy.

"I-it's Dennis. I live here. A-always have, yep. Who are you? Why did you call me S-Sp- ...that?" He remembered something, looking down at her leg. "And what happened there?"

......

Dennis?

The confusion showed on her face as clear as a brilliant flame, as she curiously examined him. Sniffing, she realized he smelled... Weird. Like a tamed kittypet. Oh. Oh no. "Oh my moons, I don't believe it... Did Twolegs take you to the cutter?" She whispered in disbelief. She faintly remembered stories of Magpiestar, an ancient leader of ShadowClan who'd been kidnapped by twolegs and taken to the cutter.

Loners on her travels spoke of the place with great dread and she assumed the place was a place of evil. Once she'd asked a kittypet what it was, and the poor thing looked like he'd have fainted if his friend hadn't changed the subject. "You.. Don't remember RiverClan...?" Now Stormpaw was definitely confused. Was this why cats feared the cutter? Could they wipe memories?

"You don't belong here!" She furiously shook her head, "You need to go home! Ivystar is probably worried sick, for Dacedream's sake!" There was no way Spiderquill would've left RiverClan of his own free will. "Your clan still needs you. While you're off here in Twolegplace, your poor apprentice -- wasn't her name like Bramblepaw? Sharppaw? Thornpaw? Something like that, -- is most likely overworked and grieving. Great MoonClan! They probably think you're dead!"

Ah. She was spiraling. It was reminiscent of her younger, more innocent days. Frantically apologizing, second guessing every movement, every choice. How she'd changed. "My foot? What happened to your foot? Mine got run over by the paws of a monster after I threw Rainstrike underneath it. You remember her, right? She's the one who killed Dacedream and attacked Minkstream. Whitish gray, evil blue eyes, or rather, eye? Yeah that's her. Anyways," She eyes Spiderquill's missing leg, "What's more important is why you're here and how you got here."

The little ragged tom watched in confusion as a myriad of expressions crossed the she-cat’s face. What was a cutter? He wanted to ask, but the other cat looked as if she expected him to know and he didn’t want to look like an idiot. Apparently it had something to do with the way he smelled, judging by the way she recoiled at his scent. He sniffed himself. Nothing out of the ordinary; lavender, mint, and a hint of an odd sterile smell… Realisation dawned on him and he relaxed his face a little. And here he was thinking the cutter was something horrible! ”Ohh, you mean Vet! That’s his name, I think. He’s the one who healed my leg- well, what’s left of it. He’s really nice! He helped me get food for Crystal too.” What he failed to mention was a certain… absence that he didn’t feel too proud about. Best not to mention it, he decided.

The semi-relaxed expression gave way once again to poorly hidden anxiety at the mention of a RiverClan. It sounded so familiar, he could almost see it… and yet the memory of it escaped him. How could something seem so alien yet so… home? ”R-RiverClan? Am I… am I supposed to remember?” He was starting to feel like this was some elaborate prank or hallucination, set up to confuse him into mixing dreams and reality. “No. I-I belong here. This is my home.” His voice grew less convincing by the second. Every name she mentioned made him want to throw up, even the ones he didn’t remember from his dreams. Why didn’t he remember this? How was it that he could remember the names, the feelings, the smells, yet feel like it was someone else entirely who experienced that life?

He bobbed his head helplessly when she described her injury, and looked away when she asked about his. ”I… I don’t know. Looks like a dog bite, I think. You can see the bite marks on the scar tissue, see? It’s pretty hard to tell though. Makes sense that it’s hard to see, if it was a dog then most of the bitten area would have been destroyed beyond recognition.” His voice slipped into a different tone- like the one he’d adopted when treating Elsa’s sprain, or when he’d pulled quills out of… who? Someone. He didn’t dwell on the memory for fear that he may cry. He looked back up at Stormpaw, desperate for something concrete to focus on. ”Mind if I take a look at that injury for you? I- I may not know much, but I can heal. I think. I remember what all the herbs do.” He swallowed nervously. ”You can tell me about RiverClan while I work. Maybe… maybe I’ll remember.”

Stormpaw shrugged, "Sure, you're a medicine cat, I trust you. Medicine cats never did any harm to me, and I doubt you'd be different. You remind me of Daisybloom, actually." A sad smile crossed her maw as she thought of Daisybloom, one of the sisters she'd left behind in ThunderClan. "If you don't remember your own mothers, I doubt you'd remember me; we aren't from the same Clan. I'm Stormpa-- er, Storm. I'm Storm. Who's Crystal?"

With an almost guilty expression she looked away, slightly embarrassed. Best not to speak too much about herself. If Spiderquill went back to RiverClan -- which Stormpaw was certain he would once he remembered properly -- then she didn't want him to know too much about her. If he told Oakstar, he might come looking for her. Nobody had expected her to stay by the forest, and she half wasn't sure why she had herself.

Sitting down, being careful not to hurt her already injured paw, she decided to keep things as simple as possible. "I'm not groom RiverClan, so I don't know everything about you, but I know a few things. You're a medicine cat, so most cats in the Clans know who you are. Your mentor, Mistleshine, trained you as a medicine cat got a bit before she got injured and retired. You were adopted by Ivystar and her two mates, Stormbringer and Honeytongue. I'm not sure what happened to your birth parents, but I do know that Ivystar adopted another cat. I think his name was Ashpaw or Sootpaw? He was gray and fluffy and had green eyes but that all I can remember. You see those three claw marks on your cheek?" she nodded towards them, "They came from a Righteous Few warrior, Larchneedle. One of your medicine cat friends, WindClan's, but I can't recall her name, defended you. Or, at least, tried to. The Righteous Few are heartless monsters," as she began talking about the Righteous Few, she spat, snarling.

"The Clans defeated them easily, ignorant foxhearts! They killed your mother, Ivystar, but she came back to life. Since she's RiverClan's leader, she has nine lives. I'm not sure if she's lost any since. Stormbringer, your other mom, was deputy of RiverClan, last I heard." Pausing in her summary, she let the knowledge sink in,not wanting to overwhelm him. She'd only told him important events that she knew of, and hoped these would be enough for now.

Dennis’ ears pricked up at the mention of Daisybloom. ” Hey, my friend Elsa met her! I think. She compared my healing to hers too.” He frowned. A medicine cat, huh? He had to admit, it wasn’t so hard to believe. How else would he know all this herb stuff? Or how to deliver kits, or how to feed them? He was following so far. ”Oh, Crystal’s my- er, a kit I helped to raise. Her mother died. She lives with her brother now, StarClan knows where those kids have wandered off to. Tell them hi for me if you meet them, and to come visit. They don’t visit enough.” He was rambling now, he knew, but talking while preparing herbs helped him concentrate.

He listened intently as he worked, idly cleaning her wounds like second nature as he watched her tell his story. It grew more and more unbelievable by the second, with odd compound names being tossed around left and right. Mothers, mentors, brothers… His little world had just exploded into a whole other life. And yet, despite the sheer weight of what she was saying, Dennis believed her. It was hard not to; every word seemed to resonate with him. To bring feelings of warmth, or fear, or a rare bit of hatred. This was it, this was his past life. Summed up to him in a matter of minutes. Yet, as he silently wrapped her treated leg in cobwebs, he couldn’t help but feel disappointed. He was expecting… what, exactly? Some big epiphany? A ‘gotcha’ moment, when all the pieces fit together and he was suddenly Spiderquill again? Sure, he remembered the feeling. But it felt like watching a distorted movie from someone else’s perspective. He sighed quietly and looked back up at his patient with a soft smile.
. ”Well, that’s all I can do. It won’t get infected, as long as you change the cobwebs and clean the wound regularly.” He looked away again, tail twitching nervously. ” Thank you, Storm. I- I want to know more. Do you… do you know where I can find this RiverClan? I may not remember, but I want to know what it was like. For Spiderquill—er, for me. Before, I guess.”

"So, you remember StarClan.." She growled, thinking of the Righteous Few. StarClan had taken everything from her. She no longer followed them, no longer worshipped the ground upon which they stood. Bah, they were just cowardly fleahearts. Her true ancestors, like Dacedream, Jaydream, Dawngaze, and Finchstar, walked among MoonClan, praising peace and acceptance. She sat stiffly as Spiderquill explained how to care for the wound, and she nodded.

"You want to find RiverClan?" She looked up, surprise in her eyes. Despite the fact that she did indeed want him to go home, she didn't think he would have been persuaded so easily. "Well if you follow the Twolegplace along the SkyClan border, you'll eventually come across Moonlit Creek, and you'll want to stay on the left side of it. From there, you'll probably find a patrol near Sunningrocks, so you follow the creek downwards and th---" Stormpaw cut herself off when she realized the tom wouldn't understand her directions.


The smell of blood. A gray pointed tabby entered camp, not a single scratch on her pelt. On her back lay a thick furred dilute tortoiseshell, coated in blood and wounds. Dried tears smeared the blood on her cheeks, and her dark hazel eyes were wide open in terror. She was the third cat to arrive and the first to scream. A gray tabby form rushed to the tortoiseshell's side, going through a mariade of emotions before settling in grief and anger. A big, dark tabby approached and demanded to know what happened. The pointed cat explained, revealing that she'd allowed the other cat to die.

Many other cats joined them, but the gray molly heard nothing but what the pointed tabby had said. Rage filled her and she leaped towards her, intent on killing her. A calico separated them, but she'd fueled a spark a ginger tom launched himself onto the pointed tabby. A fiery brown and auburn apprentice screeched defiance at the pointed molly, hatred in her eyes. The dark t took control over his Clan and handed out punishments, but the little gray tabby cared not.

Her entire world was laying dead on the ground and nobody was doing anything about it.

Stormpaw's whole body was shaking and she was crouched down like a feral creature, her blue eyes wide and haunted when she seemed to recognize where she was. Taking a few deep, shaky breathes, she turned to Spiderquill. Could she do this? Sunningrocks.... Was where Dacedream had died. She couldn't... Could she really go back there..? What if Oakstar saw her? Or Moons forbid Cedarheart or Daisybloom. It would be impossible to say goodbye twice. But... This was the right thing to do. Dacedream would want her to help Spiderquill, they were distant kin via Ivystar and Honeytongue, after all. And she'd made a promise to protect Dacedream's kin no matter what.

Dennis frowned a little. He did remember StarClan. Odd. He had no real memories of it, but apparently it had been such a frequent talking point that it had made its way into his regular vocabulary. Interesting. His expression was one of curiosity and mild surprise, but Storm's did not match. Her jaw was set, her posture stiff. He wanted to say something, to ask if she was alright, but she was so caught off guard by his next question that her face reset back to neutral. She seemed surprised that he wanted to know more.

"Well, not to live there. I'm coming back. I just want to, you know. Scope it out." He wasn't convincing anyone, least of all himself. But the thought of just... leaving made him anxious. He'd probably hate it anyway. He only had bad memories of that place, of the little memories he'd regained.

He watched with polite confusion as she explained the directions. His mind raced desperately for some memory of these places, not wanting to annoy her, but drew a blank. He didn't interrupt, but she probably saw the confusion on his face as she stopped in her tracks. "Er, it's alright, I can just-" He stopped. She was frozen, chest heaving and eyes glazing over. He recognised this. The sounds of her uneven breaths brought him back to somewhere. Blood. Stars. Cobwebs on his paws. Claws sheathed. Tears muddling his vision. Useless useless useless-

He blinked and it was gone. He snapped out of it before Storm, having apparently adapted to these things. He rushed closer to her as she came to her senses, looking around like a cornered rabbit. "Hey, you alright? I- I'm sorry. This is probably difficult for you. I can see you dislike this... StarClan place. I can... find RiverClan on my own, or just stay here, It's really no big-"

"I'll take you there."

He blinked. Blinked again. "Are- are you sure? You're not kidding? It would- it would mean the world to me. Really. I'll repay you somehow! I can... I can... Well. There's not much I can offer. But if you ever need a favour I'm eternally in your debt! Except for murder. I draw the line at murder. I'm really quite bad at it anyway. I'd assume. Noodly legs and- Ah. Rambling. Sorry." He reddened a little. Every darn time. Seemed it was a habit he just couldn't shake. He waited, ears perked, for Storm to lead the way.