fleeting | a warriors fanfic

chapter eight.

                                                                                    // this chapter brings up disturbing topics.

 This place wasn't home. Fawnpaw was yet to know what happened that devastating night and its affect on the ones she cared for most.

Her limbs were numb, like she had been running forever and had only just collapsed of fatigue.  Little did Fawnpaw know she would be feeling a new, sinister feeling when she awoke. Fawnpaw's flanks heaved and her pulse was slow and heavy like a rock. Dawnstar hadn't greeted Fawnpaw with a purr and a skip in her step, no-one had.

"Its was quite a thud poor thing." came somecat's voice.

"That's what feckless apprentices should get for being so reckless." came another.

The first cat snorted and dismissed the second one.

Eventually, the she-cat's eyes flickered open with flecks of sleep getting blinked out from her eyes. She yawned and turn towards the first voice.

"Hello dear, you must be famished!" Sagecloud's soft mew went.

Fawnpaw nodded , light-headed. She evaluated the space around her and noticed multiple other cats cowering in pain.

"I'll fetch you some prey, Starclan I really should have an apprentice!" she purred.

Breezepaw stepped into the den.

"Why am I in the medicine den?" she asked.

"You hurt yourself," he mewed, sadly for whatever reason. "are you okay?" 

Fawnpaw didn't respond.

"I'm back!" Sagecloud interrupted, dropping a bird of some sort at Fawnpaw's sheathed claws. Gratefully, Fawnpaw dipped her head in thanks.

"Oh hello Breezepaw," Sagecloud attentively whipped her head round to face the tom," anything wrong?"

In a whisper, Sagecloud hissed something into Breezepaw's ear. He then hastily straightened his form as forced him  listless crystalline glare onto Fawnpaw. "We have good and bad news..which one do you want to hear first?" Breezepaw asked as squeakily as a mouse.

"The good one, like any sane cat." Fawnpaw snorted.

"So, our clan has four new warriors, Cloudedsky, Flamechaser, Gingertail and Dappledrose." Breezepaw mewed, not even he smiled at this sentence.

"The bad news?" she asked warily.

"We lost a few clan members last night. One was Hollypaw and the other...Buzzardflight." Sagecloud put in, her voice fond, and soft.

"Hah!" Fawnpaw purred. "Now tell me the real bad news, our mother knows how to care for herself!" 

"No."

"Hmm?" 

"No, Fawnpaw."

"...What...?"

"She's gone, Hollypaw too." Sagecloud mewed quietly. "Fawnpaw, they aren't coming back now."

In a flurry of tears, Breezepaw pulled his head into Fawnpaw's fur and meowed in a hushed way, "Our mother is dead and one of our closest friends is too."

***

Days passed, Fawnpaw tried and tried to ignore the empty, hollow pit in her stomach. She simply denied it, didn't come to training and refused to leave the apprentice den. 

"Even I've accepted it!" Breezepaw would roll his eyes whenever he was in earshot of Fawnpaw.

"We can see them in Starclan!" Littlepaw would try and reassure.

Fawnpaw didn't listen, she was sleep deprived and eating the tiniest of morsels. She wasn't properly alive everyone said and thought. Death hits harder than a blow from the strongest paw, she learnt this the hurtful way.  Breezepaw would come in and avoid eye-contact with Fawnpaw at all costs, it was like they weren't siblings. Even Snowdropfur couldn't get the tabby to training, she considered that some grieve longer than others and Fawnpaw was one of them instead. Even Tealshine had been managing, though he hadn't the guts to confront Fawnpaw. Even Littlepaw and her siblings had been surviving after Hollypaw's demise.

But Fawnpaw wasn't.

One dark, gloomy night, Littlepaw ,who was looking fatigued after a long day of training, ducked into the den. All though Fawnpaw was a grieving mess, she felt she had to say at least a curt 'hello' to her kithood friend. "Hi..Little."     

"Oh hey Fawny, I didn't realise you were a-awake!" she stuttered. "That reminds me, I hafta tell you something. But you can't tell a soul."

"Of course." Fawnpaw mewed raspily, even through her 'dark spiral of despair and depression' Fawnpaw knew she could manage to at least listen.

"Well actually, it's two things. One about you and one concerning myself."

Cautiously, she narrowed her amber eyes at Littlepaw. "Fire away!" she shrugged.

"Okay so one, I heard your brother and Frostpaw talking whatever time it was- sunhigh I'm guessing about you. Breezepaw was saying things like-like uh... 'I'm so ticked off by that depressed mange-face-" and then I couldn't hear, but later he said..."I wanna hurt her so bad right now!".....It was kinda scary Fawnpaw... But I heard Frostpaw say something even more fruitful!"

"What was it?" 

Curiously, Fawnpaw drew her slim form upwards into a seat.

" He said: "But Breezepaw don't touch her, you're her brother. And I-I-I love her...!" Ha! he sounded so awkward and embarrassed, but you know what that means? You have an admirer Fawn!"

Dumbstruck, Fawnpaw recoiled, not sure whether to be disgusted or impressed.

"The other thing?" She pressed.

"Never mind...Its not as important."

"Oh?" Fawnpaw frowned.

Littlepaw swished her tail, she clearly did want to tell someone about her situation. Out of the blue, Fawnpaw pulled her extremities from beneath her tired torso and briskly got to her paws.

"Y'know what...meet me here tomorrow at Sunhigh. I'll tell you then." Littlepaw sighed.

Fawnpaw nodded firmly, she was pleased she could get Littlepaw to open up.