you are the antichrist to me [closed]

Daylight had broken at some point but she had not stopped to care. Although exhaustion saturated her bones and soaked through her pelt like a strenuous swim, the she-cat could not stop. This was a far more treacherous trek without the assistance of strengthening herbs. Even though the forest was still frosted over and ice chilled her pads, the she-cat felt as if the sunlight was scorching her pelt and slowing her erratic steps. There was no option.

Crossing the Thunderpath had left her limbs shaking. A beast had breathed heavy breaths down her coat. One slowed step, and surely it would have eaten her right up. It was about this time that Darkglow began to feel truly hopeless. Her mouth was dry and her stomach knotted. She thought she might heave - either from circumstance or sheer physical exhaustion, she wasn’t certain. After managing to carry on for some time, the warrior felt ready to collapse. Out here, outside of Mothermouth, this was an empty wasteland. But still she threw out one desperate pleas through a croaking call.

“Klaus! Klaus, please! Please! I need you! I need you. I need… anything.”

Klaus had been staring at the nearly full moon. Would it be wise to take the Order and attack the clan camps while they were at the gathering? It was during these ponderings that he thought he caught a voice on the wind. He blinked, the voice pulling him from his thoughts. He stood and listened again… his name? Darkglow? He bolted in the direction toward Highstones. It wasn't like they were that far, and leafbare nights were quiet. With his Windclan trained legs, he ate up the ground quickly.

It had been Darkglow… and Dark Forest did she look awful. He slowed himself to a stop in front of her, taking in her exhausted form. What had happened to make her run all of the way here? … Was that milk-scent?

"Darkglow? What's wrong?" He asked her calmly, but he was taken aback at her state. She had abandoned newborn kits and ran all of this way? Or were her kits gone? Maybe something happened to Riverclan again. … Or maybe this was what he'd been waiting for.

Like an answer to her prayer, the tom materialized. His golden pelt drew a sigh of relief from her maw as she sank into the stoney ground. It was coarse against her coat, far from comfortable, and yet somehow this felt like the softest nest - a brief respite amid this churning confusion. He was here, she was safe… for a moment. Gulping down the afternoon air, the warrior tried to steady herself enough to speak. Finding the right words proved to be an impossible task. But if not to speak, if not to seek guidance from her clan-distanced companion, why else would Darkglow have abandoned her kits and raced so far away from the comforts of home?

“Oh, thank Starclan, I-I’m so happy to see you, Klaus.” Her smile was frail and fleeting as she glanced up at him with wide eyes, drinking in the form of her companion. The split-faced calico tried to push herself up slightly. What she really needed were the soothing herbs of a medicine cat, and if she were smarter, with a clearer mind… then she would have sought out Cloverheart. Instead, she had run all this way to seek out a loner in a futile attempt to outrun impending fate. A particular weakness had already overwhelmed her at birthing kits. Funny, how one moment she'd been so content, and the next the world was fractured.

She missed them; she missed her kits. Kitekit, Rushkit… their names swirled in her head as she thought of curling up to the little bundles once more and forgetting everything else. However, with such dear splitting her mind, rest would be impossible. Darkglow found Klaus' eyes, "I don't know what to do. The ancestors… they've told me something terrible is coming. Something evil and dark. Tomorrow the moon will be covered and the stars powerless against these foes. I-I'm just one cat. What am I supposed to do? What are the clans supposed to do? I hardly know what's going to happen. Oh, Klaus… what do I do?"

The she-cat tried to move closer to him, seeking comfort. He was level-headed and smart, smarter than many clan cats she knew. Her frame seemed impossibly small as a sob entered her words. She had to protect her kits, her the cats she loved. And without ancestors? Where was any sort of hope when she needed it most? With eyes glistening, Darkglow glanced up again. It was here, she told herself, he'd help her sort through this. And then, everything would be okay. Her kits would be fine. Tonight she and Flywhisker would share a nest and they would face this together. Tragedy would surely pass. All would be well. Soon…

Klaus was legitimately concerned with her reaction, but he managed to tune in to what she was saying. Tomorrow the moon will be covered and the stars powerless against these foes. Klaus blinked as realization flooded over him. This... this must have been what he was waiting on. He was sure of it. Darkglow moved closer to him and he moved closer to her. He rested a foreleg on her spine and held her close, allowing her to nuzzle in his neck fur if she wanted.

"That sounds... interesting, Darkglow." Klaus's voice had lost all warmth that it normally held when speaking to Darkglow.

"I don't think any cat could do this all alone... nor could clans. It's unfair to ask you to shoulder these responsibilities. It's cruel of Starclan to ask this of you..."

He leaned back away from her, having given her the last bit of comfort that he ever would. His claws unsheathed under the snow. "You're a good she-cat... really." He said earnestly... right before his claws shot up and caught her throat, cutting the lifeblood from her body. "I can't have you telling anyone else. I'm sorry." He waited and watched, making absolutely sure that she would not be able to run off and recover. He doubted it anyway, as she had just given birth and made such a long journey. She wasn't going to recover from this. There was no way.

Klaus turned away from her, not without a twinge of guilt, and headed into the Mothermouth. He knew what he needed to do.

A relieved sigh left her lungs as she felt the warmth of the tom. Comfort, at last, that would surely come just before the guidance. Soon, she'd be back with the kits and there was a resolution. Coming here had to have been the right call, otherwise, the she-cat had wasted precious time that was meant to be spent with her kin. Although, thinking of it now, Darkglow would have been weighted down by grief regardless. She was a powerless creature and had proven that over and over again. This time had to be different. Time was short and soon the moon would sit heavy in the skies, only to be dampened out an allow for evil to overwhelm the forest.

Expectant eyes tried to find his when he spoke. Something had melted out of his voice, in the worst possible way, replaced with an eerie indifference. She cocked her head in confusion. All the thing he said spoke to her, the very depths of her soul that had cried for relief from this burden. But she hadn't come solely for comfort, it was resolution she sought. Could it be that her friend had no answers? It was above Starclan's head after all. A frown worried itself onto her maw. A loner with no connection to the stars had been her first though, when the medicine cat and the ancestors above didn't hold answers. The realization hit her - it had been a genuinely selfish thing that she sought him out. Leaving her kits, her mate, her clan.

Everything that was about to happen would be her fault because of this daft and thoughtless decision.

As her frown transformed into a look of horror at her own actions and inadequacy, Klaus spoke once again. She craned her neck back to find his eyes and saw the flash of claws too late. Darkglow sank. A protest, a cry, was nothing more than a bubbling mess of guttural sound. Her throat bled out into the snow. He'd never seemed like a horrible cat before. Klaus had been friendly, warm, and safe. Those ever-widened eyes pleaded for an answer, an explanation of what would cause him to do such a terrible thing. But it would never come. And her time was short.

It was a rather quick process but in those few fleeting moments, those final seconds... she thought of them. The kits. Flywhisker. Tinypool. Cloverheart. Robinpatch. Ebonyhaze. If it was up to Starclan to save them now, they were simply all doomed. She had condemned them.

They needed something greater than the stars to save them now, if there was to be any hope for the living.