The sickness was destroying him.
He hated the gut wrenching pity in everybody's eyes when they saw the funny way he walked, his legs wobbling as if they were made of twigs. He had to pause for a breath even just by walking across the camp. He found himself forgetting names of kits that he had just seen a day earlier, and he couldn't stay in the sun. Shade was hard to find in WindClan, so he suffered. Aspenpaw’s brain was on fire, and it was devastating him. He supposed he should consider himself lucky, as his symptoms had certainly lessened. After the blow, every memory of the mountain was wiped from his mind. He foggily recalled the forest below him and the pelts of the tribe cats that tended to his clan. His conversations with Finchstar were broken up into pieces. Worst of all, he had forgotten the faces of the cats they had lost in battle. He had forgotten that Frozenpaw had even passed. Asking about the fallen or what exactly had happened caused his clanmates pain, pain that filled their eyes and silently begged the apprentice to stop. There was no greater shame than to quickly apologize for not knowing any better. He had given up his questions. It was too much to bear.
Alone with his thoughts, he began to question his sanity. Being confined to the same bunches of haphazard dens was somehow worse than being confined to the medicine den. At least there, he could imagine what it would be like to run the moors again. It seemed as though he never would again. Aspenpaw spent many nights rolling over and staring at the stars. He cursed their names. He begged them to speak. All that time in the mountains, and he had never even been to the Moonstone. I don't have the strength in my legs, he called out silently, so come to me instead. They never did. He never got his answer, so the apprentice was forced to make one up on his own. He had been dumb and rash when the dogs attacked, and for that, perhaps, his body would never recover. It wasn't as though Aspenpaw could not hear the whispers around him, speaking about permanent damage and disability. All he wanted to do was scream at them for acting as though he did not know what was happening. The thing that scared him was talk of a "falling sickness." Apparently, it had happened in the forest before. A cat would convulse as if being possessed by StarClan itself, or suddenly drop like a stone, or stare off into space with no way of reaching them. Sometimes it happened to cats like Aspenpaw; cats that hit their heads in just the wrong place. He paid it no mind. Fear-mongering. Rumors. He loathed it.
After two weeks in camp, he had something to prove and nothing to lose. He was much more stable on his feet, less sensitive, and less forgetful. And still, they would not let him leave. He showed them how he could walk laps around camp like any other cat. He only occasionally stumbled, and he could recite the Code front to back. It wasn't enough. In the dead of night, he crept haphazardly around his denmates. He hadn't the faintest idea why they tortured him by making him sleep with the other apprentices while spitting in his face with the notion that he may never become a warrior. He was not one for stupid decisions, but it wasn't like it mattered. Finchstar wouldn't make him a warrior no matter what he did... But maybe this would be enough for him to consider it. One shot to show them all. One shot to mean something to his clan, other than the poor disabled apprentice who got beaten down by a mangy, moronic animal who he should have outsmarted easily. He could not throw away his shot.
The moor was beautiful in the moonlight. It was nearly time for a Gathering, though he wouldn't be in attendance. The air was thick with moisture and hung heavy with the temperature. It had a way of pulling Aspenpaw back to his nest, the way the breeze brushed through his short silver pelt. He was on a different mission tonight, and for the first time in his apprenticeship, he felt ready. He walked the land as if Finchstar were following close behind, making note of every wrong move. He stayed upwind, stayed in the tall grasses, and his ears twitched and rotated with every half step. Then, he spotted a rabbit: the prey that always eluded him. The animal he could never successfully catch. He hated that rabbit. In that moment, the animal took on the form of every disappointment he had ever wrought on his clanmates and his mentor. What an ugly creature he was looking at. He planned to drop it directly at Finchstar's feet and ask that it be given to the kits. That rabbit would be plenty for them all. He crouched down low, and he felt infinitely more confident than he had last time he had stalked prey. His heart beat slow and serenely, like the pounding of a drum. He smiled softly as he readied himself for the chase. Though, something changed in him. His vision lurched. Picking up his paws one by one, none of them felt like his own. Something felt very wrong and unfamiliar about this place, though he was a tail length from the stump! He cried out as nausea tore through his body. He suddenly felt very small, very dizzy, and very...
very...
v e r y . . .
She assumed she was safer at night, foraging for berries, but she knew she was wrong when she smelled the cat coming. Her ears perked up and her chewing subsided. A rabbit was only safe in a warren, and her eyes quickly shot in the direction of the nearest one. Danger, danger, danger, run, run... She stopped suddenly when the cat yowled out in alarm. That couldn't be right... It hadn't moved from its spot at all. She bounced up onto a rock to get a better look at the thing. The tall grass rustled heavily as the creature fell to the ground, completely still. She was confused. Dead? From what? She drew nearer, studying the haunting stillness the cat had taken on, only for the abomination to start twitching and shaking like no other. Its blueish eyes were glossy and blank, and its mouth was foaming and agape. It kept making horrible sounds, like it was screaming and breathing all too raggedly. If it was in pain, she was glad to have the distraction. The sight of it made her heart leap in fear, so much so that she turned and hopped in the other direction.
The grass stopped rustling. The cat did not move. The rabbit could hear painful moaning behind her. It filled her heart with dread to hear a predator make such odd noises. She knew she could no longer stay and watch. It would be up again soon, ready to snatch her from her place, devour her, and use her bones to clean its sharp teeth. She did not care to be around when it rose. As she crawled inside her warren, the screaming started. Screams of terror and confusion that tore open the heavens, a cry that she had only ever heard once in her life, when her child was snatched up by a small cat. She recalled the fear, the anguish, and the disorientation, and decided that this cat was only getting its just reward. The shrieking did not stop for some time. She was awakened near sunrise by the stamping of paws above her, the panicked yowling of at least two other cats, and the warbling voice of her assailant, choking on its own sobs.
As the cat was led away, she rose from her warren and continued to eat.______________________________________
》Former Admin《
Rushkit | RiverClan Kit | #4b5320
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