no control [solo]

The moon and stars were the light that led Nightdancer's pawsteps out of ThunderClan's camp and into the territory. She padded softly, not sneaking but not particularly wanting to be seen, treading a familiar path. As she walked, she gathered flowers- leaf-fall meant that they would be withered and wilted before too long, from what she understood. She wanted to find them while they were still bright and colorful and wholly alive. Her black coat blended well into the darkness, save for her one white paw- once something that matched her as one of a set, near impossible to tell apart from her sisters. She had wanted to stand out, but all the same she had loved being one of three- one of several, with their brothers counted.

And one by one they fell, until only she was left.

There was Hornetpaw, but that was different- Hornetpaw had made it clear long ago that he wanted nothing to do with her, and so in practice she was left entirely alone.

Six kits. Three dead apprentices, one vanished medicine cat, two distant siblings.

One warrior.

Nightdancer didn't like to be alone, but it seemed that was all she ever was.

The last remaining sister, the white paw that marked her as one of three now a mark of the one that survived.

No one called her Milkpaw or Eggdrop anymore, and no one called them by her name- because she was all that was left.

It was never supposed to be like this.

She had wanted, all her life, to stand out and to be seen as Nightkit-Nightpaw-Nightdancer, but she had wanted to stand proudly by their side all the same. Had wanted to switch places with her sisters for no reason other than the sake of new experiences, wanted to hunt and spar with Whitepaw and Shadepaw. Now she bowed her head and sobbed at their graves, laying a single brilliantly-colored flower for each of them.

Maybe Eggdrop wasn't dead, but a flower was left in an empty space. "Please come back," Nightdancer whispered, a wish on the stars. "It shouldn't be this way."

I thought I had it all worked out- even if it was just us, we'd at least have each other!

Hornetpaw was alive and well, but another flower filled another empty space. Grief for the love that might have been there, once upon a time in another life.

She thought back to her visit to the Moonstone, the StarClan cat's words.

You have no control, she had said.

And she wanted to march all the way back, to sit down again with her and demand to know why. If she had no control, surely they had some- why would they let this happen? Did Whitepaw and Shadepaw and Milkpaw deserve to die? Did Eggdrop deserve to vanish without a trace? Did she deserve to feel so alone, so unloved and unwanted in her own home?

For all her complaining, Nightdancer had dedicated everything she had to ThunderClan. She had been proud, perhaps a bit arrogant at times, but she had always been loyal. She was a skilled warrior, one who used that skill to benefit her clanmates. What had she done to deserve all that had happened to herself and her kin?

If she didn't control her story, who did? More importantly- how could she take it back into her own paws?

How could she keep herself from getting hurt again?

She turned her gaze skyward, wondering which of the glittering sky-lights was the one who had spoken to her. It didn't matter- what she said next was for herself, more than any one of them. "I'll be dead and buried myself before I let anyone else have their say on my life! I might not be able to control how anyone remembers it, but I can certainly tell my own story. Whatever your grand plan is, I don't want any part of it. I'll make my own!"

Yet beneath the watchful gaze of her warrior ancestors and above the bodies of her kin, she still felt hopelessly alone.

Why do I still feel so out of place in my own home? Isn't this the one place I should feel like I belong?

She curled up to rest a short distance away, not wanting to return to camp in her current state. The last of her flowers was laid at her paws, this one for herself. A symbol of connection, a promise that they were still together in some arbitrary sense, even if they weren't tied together in any other way. And though she knew it was only her imagination, she could almost feel them lying beside her, an echo of a memory of a time she longed to return to.