development just like the clouds, we part // acceptance.

[Fireflyglow]

WE'VE BEEN DOIN' ALL THIS LATE NIGHT TALKIN' ✧​

//cw for grief, and accepting the death of a relative. you're free to reply after this! it's just a development thread of firefly being the first of his siblings to completely come to terms with morningpaw's death. <3

Grieving felt like illness, he's noticed. It's paralyzing, leaving him numb to the core. When they'd lost Leopardcloud, he hadn't been present but he'd heard her wails in the distance. The nursery was safe, and yet the wails of a grieving mother as she died was buried in his mind forever. Nothing could ever compare to the sound of Little Wolf's wail of agony, loud sobbing as she gripped the cold, dead corpse of his baby sister. Her daughter, so kind and selfless. Morningpaw didn't deserve to have died so young, and yet.. Yet..

His paw brushes over a scrawny mouse idly, pondering. Thinking.

She didn't deserve it. She deserved better. She was.. Good. Dawnglare's words echo in his mind, and yet they don't comfort him as much anymore. She deserved better, but what good would it do to ponder that, when she was already gone? Her nest was gone, discarded to allow new apprentices a place to sleep. And it didn't smell of her anymore.

Don't- Don't take her from me! Don't! I want my sister! Give her back to me! He'd sobbed to the sky, wishing- begging for something to change. For the Mother to return his beloved sister to him so they could apologize, so he could.. Could do something other than wish she was here. He wanted to see her, wanted to breathe in her scent one last time. Selfish, selfish!- He kicks the mouse away, an apprentice grumbling before snatching it away to take to their nest. If you won't eat it, I will. They grump, and Fireflypaw can't find it in him to argue. He wasn't hungry, after all.

The sight of his father atop the Great Rock, so numb to the world- to the drama that unfolded at his first Gathering. Blazestar was grieving not just the loss of one kit, but the loss of his mate and separation from his other two kits. Morningpaw's shadow, her twin- his precious Crescentpaw.. His precious Burnpaw. They were both in ThunderClan, and they could only be treated as trespassers if they were to ever make their way into their territory.

Fireflypaw would have to chase them out.

Shaking his head, Fireflypaw sits up and walks outside of his den, shaking snow off of his paws. Numb, and yet peaceful. The quiet of the camp was comforting. He looked around, watching a few of Thistleback and Deersong's kits run about the snow outside of the nursery. Oh, how he missed those days.. But he was growing up, and he had ached to grow up back then. Morningpaw wanted to remain inside, wanted to be groomed by her mother with Crescentpaw and never leave. "I miss you." Fireflypaw whispers softly, a tear slipping down his cheek. It glistens, bubbling, before dropping to the snow below. "But you're gone, and I'll see you again soon. Some day." He croaks softly, eyes guided upwards to the stars above. Oh, how pretty she would look with stars in her pelt. "So watch out for us, okay? I'll.. I'll protect Howlpaw, and dad. Both of 'em." He hiccups, rubbing at his eyes until the blurriness got more intense. His shoulders quaked, and yet he felt lighter. A cool breeze sweeps past him, and Fireflypaw feels a paw push against his back.

He flinches, ear flicking to listen. Are you okay? Someone asks, and Fireflypaw nods his head. He glances behind him, giving a tearful smile. "Yeah, I am. Just thinkin' about Morningpaw. She's probably having the time of her life up there with our ancestors." He mumbles, sniffing away his tears. She would be okay. He would see her again. This wasn't goodbye, just 'see you later', after all. Nothing was ever goodbye.

;; tdlr he was sobbing in the middle of camp but now hes just sniffling and cheering up. ​

 

[DUSKMANE]

"WE’VE COME TO A DANGEROUS PLACE"​

Duskmane hadn’t meant to intrude on a moment like this. Grief was hard, a turbulent feeling that grabbed a hold of anyone. Burning them whole as it sank into their heart and bones. Letting the pain go was that much harder. The ache in ones heart would never truly go away. It lingered there, like a dark spot on ones heart. Duskmane knew that Fireflypaw wasn’t necessarily okay, but he still wanted to ask. “Are you okay?”

The words felt like sandpaper on his tongue. The apprentice had lost his mother and sister in a short length of time. How he mourned for Fireflypaw. He mourned the kithood that had been robbed from him because of these deaths. “You know…there’s something comforting in the idea that your ancestors live in the stars. Stars are always there and any cat knows they are there even if they aren’t visible.” Duskmane stated. “When I lost my closest friend, there was a sadness like I had lost my sibling. They were…a sibling to me. I had been swallowed whole by my grief and my pain, the sadness that I felt ached as if I had truly injured myself. Yet, another who was wise said something to me. I’ll never forget it.”

The warrior looked at Fireflypaw in the eyes. “Goodbyes aren’t forever.” His words were kind, yet emotionally charged. “You’ll always miss her. But she’ll always be with you as long as you remember the things she taught you in life. In a way, you’ll never be apart. As long as you hold her here.” The tom pointed to Fireflypaw’s chest, where his heart sat. “So, Fireflypaw, let yourself remember. Talk with Morningpaw, your mother, and the rest of the stars. Allow yourself to hold onto them, but don’t forget to live. Live for the days they never saw.” ​

✦ ★ ✦​

 

[Finchfang]

In all honesty, Finchfang didn't like dealing with feelings. He knew they were important, and he knew that no one was exempt from having them - StarClan! he knew that! - but he'd had enough experiences in his life where getting too close to the blast radius of feelings had left him with stars wheeling above his head, and not in a good way. He knew grief, sure he did - and if he hadn't before, he surely did now, what with the way the skirmish had left them all feeling. If he had not known the touch of grief before, well...surely he knew it now, having seen its handiwork in hollowing their leader out. And, despite himself, he had been dwelling on it: on the loss of Morningpaw, on the ways her death had rippled through the Clan. Despite his resolve to not allow it to affect him or his work, despite his determination to do his part by keeping his head down and moving on, it was difficult, if only because he could not resist feeling concern for those most directly impacted. Blazestar, of course, but also Fireflypaw and Howlpaw, the latter of those perhaps the most hard for him to ignore. The blue-eyed boy was just so...cheerful...it made his heart hurt in a way he didn't appreciate.

Therefore, when he saw the leader's young son teary-eyed and engaged in what seemed to be a very heartfelt and private conversation with Duskmane, his immediate reaction was to turn and run. Preferably while no one noticed he was there. But there was something...just something...that motivated him to approach very carefully, as if approaching a dangerously unstable predator, his dark tail stiff behind him. They were talking about Morningpaw, about death and goodbyes and memory. Finchfang felt a little queasy - or a lot queasy - but he nodded slowly in agreement, trying to look at Fireflypaw with appropriately sympathetic-but-not-pitying eyes. "She'll be proud of you." said the tabby in his quiet voice, after a long pause.​

 

[BLAZESTAR]

( * ˚ ✦ ) In the bleak haze of his grief, Blazestar has forgotten his son, his daughter. Fireflypaw and Howlpaw have been left with no one to comfort them but the other, and haven't they lost just as much as he has? More, even, in some ways -- for his oldest and his youngest have also given up their birth Clan, their mother's kin, their remaining littermates. They're in his Clan, now, having vowed to become loyal SkyClan warriors, and Blazestar has neglected them.

He watches with mist-filmed eyes as Fireflypaw sobs in camp. "I miss you. But you're gone, and I'll see you again soon. Some day." Blazestar's heart cramps with grief, threatening to twist until it shatters. He knows his child is right, has walked with StarClan himself. He'd stood in their silver-coated forest, draped with shadow and light, as one by one his deceased comrades walked a path to give him their lives.

He will see Morningpaw again. Of that he is certain. It's the long, torturous path to get to StarClan he must endure, and it's that path he does not know if he has the strength to walk. Not without Little Wolf by his side, not without the endurance her love has always given him.

Duskmane and Finchfang, out of the kindness of their hearts, take Blazestar's place in comforting his son. He admonishes himself, blinking the veil of tears away. That should have been you, he thinks. That should always be you, there for your children who have given up everything to be here.

He forces himself to join the small group. He sits beside his son and gazes down at him, though soon the boy will be almost as big as he is. The Ragdoll blood, the kittypet blood, is rampant in his oldest -- they share the thick coat, the sparkling blue eyes, the big paws -- but there's traces of his mother, too, in the jet-black points, the ferocity and determination to accomplish whatever he must.

"They're right. You will see your sister again someday. I've seen where StarClan hunts, with my own eyes." He bows his head, ashamed. Where were these words to his kits when she had first died? Why has it taken him so long? He continues, "It's so beautiful. She will wear starlight in her fur, and she no longer has to be afraid of anything, like she was in life."

A rare glimmer of clarity creeps over the Ragdoll's expression. He's not only comforting Fireflypaw -- he's reassuring himself, though he wonders if it's effective. He places his cheek against Fireflypaw's and leaves it there for a couple of heartbeats before pulling away. He gives both Duskmane and Finchfang a slow blink of gratitude, of warmth. Thank you for being here for my son when I could not be.​

( AND EVERY TIME IT RAINS , ALL THE ANGELS CRY FOR ME )