private KARMA IS A CAT — sparkspirit

[SNAKEHISS]

Snakehiss' torment had been limited as of late, aside from the usual quip and snarky responses that he reserved for clanmates on the daily. While he had actively sought out victims to harass and belittle as an apprentice, the young warrior found himself preoccupied with other matters that took attention away from such activities. Sparkspirit had historically been a subject of Snakehiss' ire, a living embodiment of everything that he was taught to hate and feel disgust for, but... he couldn't view the mock tortoiseshell tom in the same way since the rogue battle. The images are on a constant loop in his mind whenever he sees—or is even reminded of—his fellow moor runner. Lifelessness glazed over their eyes, their body being rendered limp and cold, blood smearing the blue-eyed feline's muzzle. He had killed that cat, and yet, he had saved Snakehiss' life.

A melancholy air surrounds the lanky tom as he perches by the edge of the sun-warmed pool. It is not so warm now as the sun has made its nest for the night, giving way to dusk-filled skies. Faint lights above, stars, begin to wink their eyes from slumber. Snakehiss dares not look at them — guilt plagues his body like a sickness, eating him alive. So much bloodshed had enveloped WindClan lately — the rogues, Smokethroat's attempted murder, he and Sootstar's battle with Hyacinthbreath. Yet, he still could not bring himself to take a life. Would his hesitance eventually catch on? Would his reputation suffer because of it?

Viridian eyes remain dulled and heavy as he looks up, movement breaking through the rushes surrounding the area — Sparkspirit. He nearly double-takes as red is splashed against his cheek, only for Snakehiss to realize that it is simply the color of his fur. His chest wrings and twists. He thinks of Pollenfur, how he had attacked her and chased her off those many nights ago. She is a traitor. Her kin are traitors. Snakehiss knows this, and yet, he opens his maw to address Sparkpspirit anyway, "What did it feel like?" The question was blurted out, rather, a thought that had been shaken around in his mind for so long that it decided to burst outward like an angry geyser.

"When you took the life of that rogue... did you feel anything?" His willingness to speak to the kin of traitors betrayed everything that Snakehiss ever knew, but his curiosity outweighed anything else. He wanted to know, he needed to know.

₊ ⋆ * ⊹ ₊ ☾ —— 𝙬𝙖𝙫𝙚𝙨 𝙩𝙪𝙧𝙣 𝙩𝙤 𝙜𝙧𝙚𝙮

• @sparkspirit

• 

• 

  ✰ SNAKEHISS
  —— he/him; moor runner of windclan
  —— bisexual; single; not looking
  —— long-limbed black tom with green eyes, a small white chest patch, and a notable bite mark on his right foreleg
  —— "speech", thoughts, attack
  —— link to full tags; @ on discord for plots.
  —— penned by beatles

​

 

[sparkspirit]

He comes here to wash the blood from his pelt.

In the heat of battle, they'd had no such opportunity. The clans staggered from the moor onward, until their limbs threatened to collapse beneath their own weight but the entirety of the forest was under their control once more. Sparkspirit had carried that rogue with him as their body cooled to nothingness. Until their limbs grew stiff and bugs began to crawl into their fur. His heart beat on, his blood warmed their blood; they died, and he lived. And so did Snakehiss. Was it worth it, really? Could it ever truly be? Snakehiss was no better than Hyacinthbreath, or the others who ran from WindClan for the sake of what was best for themselves. The cats who abandoned what was right for– for nothing. (There is something horrible about likening him to the molly. Sparkspirit doesn't know she's gone. He has no idea what happened to her. To Pollenfur. Only that his stomach knots up.)

There isn't really any blood on his fur. Sometimes he too gets distracted by the splash of red across his face, his blood-tipped ears and gore-smeared cheeks. In reality it had seeped into his fur. A temporary crimson, yes, but like any liquid it crept into him until his fur was copper-smelling pitch: slick wet black. That is what killing felt like. A story, the truth, fictions and facts all woven into one until nothing matters but what his mind became of it. There is no blood on his fur, but he looks at Snakehiss, startled frozen, and then totters forward to wash it off anyway. He ducks his entire head under the shallow water as best he can. Stars' reflections shatter and burst apart into sparkling slivers of silver.

When he lifts his head, they slowly reform. Sparkspirit doesn't see them, his eyes tightly closed as he lets the water drip off his muzzle. He's good at avoidance, but...once its in his face, Sparkspirit is a terrible liar. "I–" His voice cracks until the warrior silences himself. Is this some kind of test from Sootstar? She thinks him loyal, never treats him as anything less than a capable warrior trained by her beloved mate, but Snakehiss is far closer in reality. He knows Sootstar, and he knows Sparkspirit, and all the taint inside of him. If it was a test, he should lie. He knows that he can't. "I don't know."

The breeze pulls a shiver from him as it slips across his still-wet face. The rustling of moorland grass pulls him away from the memory, but his own shuffling paws take him back. The ground beneath him. His hind paws digging into it, seeking leverage. His forepaws pinning, holding, even as desperation forces the rogue to struggle against him. A struggle for life. One that he had ended. "It just– happened. I saw you, and them, and... I did it." Like it could ever be so simple. Sparkspirit swallows, and then retches dry as the feeling comes back. Fur on his tongue, blood on his teeth, choking on liquid like he was drinking too fast. How sour his stomach had been after that. "I felt their breathing stop," he confesses. "I felt their blood. And their fur. And– and the way they clawed at my shoulders, trying to get me off, and you– you, back when we were apprentices. At RiverClan. When you– that warrior–"

His heart is hammering now but Sparkspirit's eyes are still closed. If Snakehiss is pleased with his weakness, he doesn't want to see it.

"They said you were mean," he laughs. Far from pleasant, this shaky fearful noise. "When I tried to apologize, but I keep thinking about it now. The way you were– alone, and he could have killed you then and it's my fault because I helped Weaselclaw but he's gone now anyway." This time when the stars vanish from the silvery surface it is because his paw strikes them. Ripples scatter across the surface and with them goes his sudden anger. Tension rose and now falls just as quickly until he slumps and realizes just how much he had given away in so short a time.

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"

​

 

[SNAKEHISS]

Snakehiss feels the pang in his chest grow as Sparkspirit answers his question with precise detail — their halted breath, the feeling of their fur, their struggle for life. Dim green hues study the red-splashed face carefully as he speaks his truth. Pollenfur had slipped out from under him, but he cannot wonder if he would have felt the same had he the chance to rip into her throat. She killed Hyacinthbreath. I saw her do it. He wanted to say. Snakehiss wanted to tell someone, anyone, though he was permitted not to. For some reason, even though it makes absolutely no sense, he wants to confide in Sparkspirit about that night with Sootstar. He hadn't gone around spreading rumors about his cowardice in the face of a badger, in the face of a lowly rogue; would this be a secret that he'd be able to keep?

No, now he was starting to think nonsense. His thoughts swarming like incessant flies, Snakehiss bats them away and attempts to move on. Sparkspirit jogs a memory that was lodged deep in his brain, one from his days as a young and boyish apprentice who hadn't even grown into his own body. He was hardly older than a kit yet he had witnessed battle with his own eyes, blood spraying across the clearing of RiverClan's makeshift camp, fur flying in the air like pollen across the moors, yowls and screams ringing all around him. Of course that oafish warrior could have killed him; he had practically been the size of his paw! The memory is so distant now; he remembers being furious over Sparkspirit's actions. Snakehiss had been so cold to him after that, even on top of insults and jabs toward his kin. "All those moons, all the times I've spat in your face, and yet," He still would. As it stands, Snakehiss has no quarrel with Sparkspirit anymore; he owes him his life... twice now, to be exact. Still, he possessed the blood of traitors. If it came down to it, would he kill him if it meant seizing what he always dreamed of, what he was meant to be? His destiny was much larger than a moral obligation, was it not?

Snakehiss hates that he even has to think twice about it.

The moor runner's thoughts are jumbling, unable to be finished before he staggers onto the next, "They could have killed me, right then and there. Why didn't you just..." Snakehiss cannot bring himself to meet Sparkspirit's gaze, even so much as fully turning his head away. Staring at the ground came much easier to him. At least the floor was incapable of searching his eyes for any slivers of vulnerability. It was terrifying, to contemplate what could have been his death. "... let them?" He uttered, quieter this time. Snakehiss would have gladly rid his life of cats like Milkthorn, Goldenstrike, and Addervenom if the opportunity presented itself; it would have been just as easy as looking the other way. Why didn't Sparkspirit seize the moment and do the same?

₊ ⋆ * ⊹ ₊ ☾ —— 𝙞 𝙙𝙤𝙣'𝙩 𝙗𝙚𝙡𝙤𝙣𝙜 𝙝𝙚𝙧𝙚

• 

• 

  ✰ SNAKEHISS
  —— he/him; moor runner of windclan
  —— bisexual; single; not looking
  —— long-limbed black tom with green eyes, a small white chest patch, and a notable bite mark on his right foreleg
  —— "speech", thoughts, attack
  —— link to full tags; @ on discord for plots.
  —— penned by beatles

​

 

[sparkspirit]

A phrase rattles about in his head– claws forget; flesh remembers. There is something nearly absurd about the thought that Snakehiss would not remember that moment as clearly as he did. What was a distant kitten-tinged memory to the darker tom is imprinted clearly upon the front of Sparkspirit's skull. Time and guilt made it nebulous in its own way. He could never decide which of them was in the wrong. Weaselclaw approved of his choice, but Weaselclaw was dead, shunned by the stars and rotting beneath the ground he walked. Snakehiss was here. A shadow given life in a frustrated face and the most idiotic of questions.

He laughs deliriously, because there's no way that he doesn't know. Misery itches his throat from its roots in his heart, blooms and flowers behind his eyes until they feel heavy with something terrible. He forces himself to look away before any of it truly escapes, though staring tight-jawed down at the still water does nothing for his mind. No distraction is quite enough to stop the quivering of his throat as words battle their way out. A thousand things he could say. It wouldn't have solved anything, he could admit, a sideways truth. Because it wouldn't have. Letting Snakehiss die would have been worse than saving his life. These nightmares haven't managed to convince him otherwise. There's no regret in him. No space left for it, not even a crevice.

Neither of them are looking at each other, yet Sparkspirit can still feel the vulnerability of it all chewing at him. Gnawing an opening in his chest where everything might spill out. Looking at you is like prodding a bruise. Like when the gash across his nose had still been fresh and each wrinkle of his muzzle would send a jolt of pain through him. Like how he couldn't stop doing it as if to test. Is it there? Do I feel it? Has it left me too? He can't say what it is. That crawling sickly feeling that digs itself deeper into him and makes his heart-lungs-chest squeeze fast. Telling him is an admission of guilt: he has to know. Whatever his reason for needing to hear Sparkspirit say it– he's humiliated himself enough, he thinks.

So instead, throat raw, he confesses, "I don't want you to die."

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"

​