Overwhelm [c]

Forward. He had to keep going forward. He had to keep going, because it was all that he had left. Pale-blue eyes stared blankly forward, dark tan paws dipped in and out of uneven snowdrifts, and there was no sign of life--no twitching ear or waving tail--to suggest anything akin to rational thought. And yet his mind was awake... and working overtime to reconstruct images of white matted with bursts of pure crimson. To try desperately and remember the exact motions that Egretswoop's mouth made as she spoke to him, as those wild honey eyes looked somehow through him, as she said her final words that he hadn't even been able to hear. What had she said? What had she said? It became almost a mantra as he walked monotonously forward, ever forward, each pawstep a syllable in the sentence that was beginning to drive him mad. What had she said? What if those words were lost forever, lost just like the body that had vanished into an incomprehensible mess right before his eyes, and the last thing she ever said to him was something he would never get to know?

It hurt. But if he ignored it, maybe it would go away. He refrained from blinking, because the momentary darkness always lit up with bright red. The nausea in his throat must have been some lingering effects of his mild sickness; there could be no other explanation. There couldn't, because anything else simply would not enter his mind. It was too full of the same four words repeating. Because if he ever stopped to slow down, then he knew that it would all overwhelm him completely. It would become too much. And right now he had to go forward because the only alternative was to go back and it scared him how much he wanted to. How much he wanted to suddenly turn and run full-force, sprint into the jaws of the beast screaming and begging for his mentor back, for his friend back, for his Egretswoop back, for his Milk back. He'd never told her that she was like a sister to him. The thought felt like a sharp claw tearing at his heart from the inside so he stomped it away. Gone. He couldn't think. He couldn't think or he would go mad.

Background noise gradually faded. Something was still ringing in his ears--the many screams he'd heard. But they weren't real. He knew that much. The pelt still remained across his shoulders, because that was the only other thing he had been able to focus on, but it gave him very little warmth. Or perhaps the cold he felt was emanating inward rather than outward. The harsh leaf-bare sunlight had gone, replaced by a weak blanket of stars that served as a poor substitute. But he could still walk. He could still walk, so why was everyone stopping? Why were the shapes in his peripheral vision moving away, yawning, murmuring inaudible words to each other? They had to go. They had to go forward because he had no idea what he would do if he stopped. So he continued walking. It escaped his notice completely that the silent shadow nearby had gently guided him in a different direction, subtly nudged his momentum away from the crowd of exhausted Clanmates. Any other form, any other noise was simply background to his undying need to move forward. To go. To leave. He remained completely unaware until suddenly he was forced to halt. Because something stood in his way. A form he recognized, barely distinguishable from the night itself due to ember-orange eyes glimmering at him with a mixture of painful and searching emotions he felt no desire to sort through. Murkyriver. Here, in front of him, stopping him. But why? He wanted to move around her, but found that he suddenly lacked the strength. The weariness of his limbs betrayed him, caught up to him from the shock that had seized his veins for hours upon hours, stopping him in his tracks completely. Why? Why couldn't he move?

Before he could summon his voice from his disuse-tired, scream-raw throat to ask the questions beginning to boil up in his mind, Murkyriver moved. In one fluid motion, she rested her head atop his and lowered his face into her fur. The subsequent inhalation of breath came more out of reflex than anything, but some distant, unused corner of his mind could not help but notice the deep intricacies of her scent. As if from a faraway place, his ears registered a husky voice saying something.

"Do not hold it in."

Hold what in? he wanted to protest, but the words were useless because he knew exactly what she meant. The soft cream fur splattered with rich scarlet. The loud, despairing shriek that must have been his. The way he had been desperately focusing on nothing but moving forward for fear that anything else would destroy him completely. Do not hold it in. But why? Why would she care? Why would she want to release the inner mess of loss and sorrow and rage and untamable grief that he had been struggling to swallow down? It was no use. And yet it was also no use to resist, because his traitorous heart took that as the sign it needed to let go of its white-knuckled, tight-clenched hold on his emotions. The next breath he took sounded more like a half-choked sob. It was embarrassing to behave this way. He was supposed to be strong! He was supposed to be able to take it. He was... he was... Her scent was so soothing, a mixture of marsh and bracken and river silt and something completely different. Something like lavender. Why was that the only thing he could think of as tears began to finally slide down his cheeks?

Dovepaw buried his face in Murkyriver's fur and cried. He looked smaller than ever, despite having grown over the course of the journey to be only half a head shorter than she. The gifted fox pelt enveloped him completely from behind, and Murkyriver protected him from the front. He was completely sheltered. No one else would hear the gasps for breath, the pitiful sounds that escaped his throat. Her chest must have been completely dampened by now. But did it really matter? Did any of it matter when Egretswoop was dead? The word he hadn't allowed himself to think only caused his shoulders to shake. Agony. Dead. The word was awful, final, irrevocable. But he couldn't undo it, and the understanding of what exactly he had seen--the meaning of the crimson on white, the meaning of the pelt draped across his back--worsened everything. Every time he gasped for breath, the air came back out just as fast, lost completely in the endless sensation of weeping with every ounce of energy he had left. Words escaped him too, almost lost in the muffling of fur and sobs. "I don't remember what she said. She told me something before she died, and I don't remember what she said."