camp CHECKPOINT & SNOWBALLS

[sparkspirit]

That they are alive is both a blessing and yet another twist of the knife. Each breath in is a crisp, stabbing reminder of his mortality. Cold air stung his nose and his maw until it warmed up on its way down his throat. That combined with the cold leafbare sun high above his head leaves this place a surreal, painful reminder of what he had earned in that battle. And all that he had lost.

Because the snow-stained moor grass is crisp and crunchy beneath his paws, and the snow at the edges of camp had been smoothed and flattened by countless paws. And each time he moves from one extreme to the other, it reminds him of Larkfeather. They had raced around in weather much like this, Yewberry watching, and– Galeforce, he thinks. Coyotepaw, the SkyClanner. Time had been frozen. This– this stuck sensation, helpless, as the patrols came and left and Sparkkit was left in envious wait. Juniperfrost had promised him a sea of gold, rippling like the river. Sparkspirit. . . isn't sure he'd ever truly seen it. Had he been looking?

Now the world is frozen again, and so too is he.

His paws shift on their own, piling up the loose snow. Curling them, pressing in, until the small mound breaks away from the ground and he's left with a small, misshapen snowball. So he tries again, and again. Dig in, press, curl, lift, each one better than the last, until there is a veritable army of snowballs beside him and his mind is peaceful once more. The anguish has smoothed from his expression by the time he gets it perfect. A sizeable snowball, almost as round as the sun itself, and hefty enough that it takes some effort to roll away from his body and off towards the center of camp.

𝘛𝘈𝘕𝘎𝘓𝘌𝘋 𝘐𝘕 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘞𝘖𝘙𝘋𝘚 𝘛𝘏𝘈𝘛 𝘐  ･｡ﾟ  🗲  ╱╱ 11.07.2023 𝘊𝘈𝘕𝘕𝘖𝘛 𝘚𝘈𝘠 ˊˎ＜

• OOC. —
• 🗲　　. 　 ˚　.  SPARKSPIRIT. HE - HIM - HIS. 14 MOON OLD MOOR RUNNER OF WINDCLAN. VERY LOYAL TO HIS CLAN. PENNED BY REVELATIONS.  ————
  
  
  ——  a trim mock tortoiseshell tom with mostly black fur splashed with the occasional patch orange. he has a singular white mark on the back of his neck shaped similarly to a lightning strike, and a small scar across the bridge of his nose. his eyes are a shocking electric blue.
  

  ✦ ECHOLIGHT x ELMBREEZE. ADOPTED BY YEWBERRY. BRIGHTFAM, BUT SOMEWHAT ESTRANGED DUE TO HIS LOYALTY TO WINDCLAN. ————————

• "speech"

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[RATTLEHEART]

Though being alive after all that had happened within Windclan was truly a gift, it was a gift that would be tinged with grief and reminiscing for some time - until the open wounds of the past finally scabbed over and left nothing but old scars in their wake. Sparkspirit was one of the many that had lost so much not only as a result of Sootstar's actions, but as a result of the vicious fighting that had finally free the moors from her unyielding grip. It wasn't a surprise to see him staring out without purpose, his mind clearly full of thoughts that Rattleheart could only guess at even with context. Regardless, the tunneler found himself watching Sparkspirit from afar, wondering if there was anything that he could do to even begin to make things better.

Maybe a gesture as simple as sharing prey would go far?

He had been glancing towards the freshkill pile when the moor runner finally shifted once more, paws working at the loose snow in front of him in an effort to shape it. For a moment, Rattleheart wondered if Sparkspirit was working to create another snow den in camp, somewhere where he could just curl up and relax without the currently frigid air of the moors whipping at him and freezing his pelt. As time passed though, that clearly didn't seem to be the case. Instead he seemed to be making a veritable army of snowballs, some misshapen and some almost perfect, until eventually it seemed he had created one satisfactory enough. The slow creation was actually enough to make Rattleheart the faintest bit nervous, wondering who might be the target of such a large collection of packed together snow.

Though, his attention was dragged away from the pile of snow weaponry by Sparkspirit's final creation, a soft yelp of surprise leaving him as it began to roll steadily towards the center of camp. At least it was large enough that it wasn't going at a breakneck speed, an impressed purr leaving the tunneler as he stepped to the side. "That's quite the prize you've got there, Sparkspirit. Soon enough you'll have gotten rid of all the snow around camp... what's it for?" His question was punctuated by his gaze flicking back to the other piled snowballs, ears twitching down a little in anxiety. "And... maybe make sure the apprentices don't get their paws on those. We'll end up with a snow war." Though maybe that wouldn't be so awful - far less destructive than the types of wars they'd been dealing with lately, at least.
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[ PENNED BY EO ]​

 

[FOXGLARE]

⁀➷ The last time the snow stuck to the ground, Fox was nothing but a kitten, alone and facing the world with only his own four paws. Everything had changed since then, in every way possible, and Foxglare had long given up trying to make sense of what could be to come. He tied his loyalties here, to moors and to the cats that built their lives here alongside him, but he was profoundly aware that each one of them bore heartache that he would not begin to comprehend. But he was here, and so were they, and that... meant something.

There was so much to do but... could he stand for a moment, feeling the snow crunch beneath his paws and wind rustling his fur and appreciate that he lived to see another leaf-bare?

"Oh, y'made a lot of em," the pale tabby observes after depositing a field mouse (small, but he wouldn't complain about any catch in this season) into the freshkill pile nearby. He approaches one of the many imperfect snowball prototypes and taps it curiously with a paw, "How'd you get em so round? It's- oh..." The snowball he had fixed his attention on suddenly crumbled into a pile beneath his paw.

"Sorry, 'll just..." he murmured, embarrassed at ruining Sparkspirit's handiwork, and tried gathering up the snow pile into something vaguely circular in shape.

HOW COULD YOU THINK, DARLIN, ⁀➷☾⁺₊ ID SCARE SO EASILY?

• OOC:
• 
• 
  — sun . fox . foxpaw . foxglare
  — he/him. 15mo moor-runner of windclan
  — a large, scarred white and golden tabby tom with grey eyes
  — smells like dewy oak and sedge
  — sounds like leon kennedy, with a vague texan drawl.
  — the straight-faced and taciturn adopted son of houndthistle, lived as a twolegplace loner until 7 moons old, now a moor-runner of windclan. resilient, but not invincible. the continued stresses of war and a significant loss have led him to hold fast to his strict internal moral compass for fear of faltering.
  — “speech”, thoughts, attack
  — fullbody and chibi by antiigone
  — penned by eezy

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