sensitive topics mary did you know // grieving

[✧ Snailcurl.]

SHATTERED SURFACE SO IMPERFECT
snailcurl | 31 months | female | she/her | physically easy (heavily pregnant) | mentally medium | attack in bold pink

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Snailcurl has not moved in days, other than to do the bare necessities her body requires. As if losing her friend during her kitting was not enough, at just days away from her weaning Sproutkit had faded away into nothingness, her still form imprinted into the queens brain. She'd lost to much weight, her milk not nutritious enough - leafbare hitting her hard, hitting her already sickly runt even harder. Her litter had not come out of the ordeal that brought her to shadowclan unscathed - there was something not-right about Mothkit's movements, Rosekit's leg twisted at an awkward angle, sproutkit's skin and bones figure even before the hunger had set in proper. Not for the first time, she has begun to wonder is she has done something wrong, if she has done something to deserve this misery. If she has been cursed.

Staring blankly at the snowdritfts from the nursery, she's near absent, mind utterly blank. In a few days, she'll return to her warrior duties - shadowclan may not put their kits to work, but she will never be comfortable being idle. They will no longer need her milk, and will have Bramblesong to watch them during the day - her presence in their nest and at meals all that is required. But for now, she grieves, truly grieves, for the mate and the child she has lost. She hopes this Starclan is real, and that she'll see them both there someday, for that is all she can do.

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[CHILLEDSTAR.]

the deputy had noticed. it was hard not to see the withering form of the queen, scent of despair and uncertainty coming off of her in waves. they don't quite... get it, but they see it. they can't understand in a level that another queen that had lost kits, or another cat that had lost their mate, but they can relate to the loss and having to care for kits when they barely can care for themself. their thoughts immediately went to minkpaw. poor kit was luckily enough to have access to a queen that had enough milk. he survived and chilledgaze did everything they could to see to that. it wasn't like snailcurl wasn't trying– stars knew that she was– but it was leafbare. everything was hard here. starclan had to have hated them. so much pain, so much heartache.

you can't fix this one. she needs to greive. just make sure she knows she isn't alone. they only could do so much. with a deep breath in, they lashed their tail before bringing a half eaten scrawny mouse. it wasn't much... they'd taken a couple bites themself, but this was all they had.

"it's not much. i'm sorry."

they don't exactly sound it, but they truly are. snailcurl had been through a lot. with a deep breath, a shiver shook them before they pressed their nose briefly to the queen's ear before stepping back with a nod. they weren't going to do that again. they felt sick thinking about it, but snailcurl needed the comfort more than chilledgaze needed to feel comfortable. ugh. never again.

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[ NOBODY ELSE MATTERS, GIRL ]​

 

[Starlingheart]

Starlingheart feels the weight of every life lost heavy upon her shoulders, it weighs her down and makes her drag her feet when she walks and avert her gaze whenever it falls upon the nursery. That was an awful day. The clan should not have lost what it did, the stars should not have taken them from them so soon. But her faith in them does not waver. She has to believe that things happened for a reason or else the weight of Viridianskies death would drag her down. Perhaps she would find solace the next time she visits the moonstone. She holds onto that hope frivolously.

Snailcurl has lost so much. She hopes that she does not blame her for that loss. She had watched just like she had as her kit slipped away before their eyes and there was nothing any herb could do about it, no amount of coaxing or pleading could bring someone back from that state. Not born to live is what she had heard some of the adults say.

When she sees the queen in the camp, her ears press flat against her skull. She does not want to see all the stares saying silently it is her fault, does not want to hear the queens accusations she is sure is going to be thrown her way even though she had done everything she could to help, had pleaded to the stars every night to please save them, to please not take another life. Still she prays to them, still she believes because if she stopped, if she believed her clanmates about Star Clan abandoning them it would mean she had stopped believing in her mother, her father. She would never.

Everything happens for a reason, she reminds herself as she goes to the folded-ear queen and the black and white deputy. "I ha-have sooome some fresh muh-muh-mooosss in my uh my den i-if you ne-neeed it for yuh-you're n-n-neeesttt" she informs her quietly. It was the only thing she can think to say and she avoids her gaze as she talks, not wanting to see blame in her eyes, even if it wasn't there she does not want to risk it but she still wants to help.
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[✧ Snailcurl.]

SHATTERED SURFACE SO IMPERFECT
snailcurl | 31 months | female | she/her | physically medium | mentally medium | attack in bold pink

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It is not until she hears chilldegazes voice that she even realizes the other feline is there at all. Green gaze is unblinking, unseeing for a moment, before confusion and then understanding clouds her. "Thank you..." she says, mustering a pitiful excuse for a smile. She knows it is not healthy, not right, this wallowing she's doing, but she cannot seem to care. Cannot find that fire that had still been present upon her arrival here, that will to keep going when things seemed dark. Now there is simply a pit of nothingness.

Gaze flits to the side as she takes a tiny bite - though the prey is not much to look at, after such pitiful hunting success and her own tiny body size it seems a feast fit for a king, or perhaps more aptly, a queen - starlingheart makes her presence known. There is no judgement to be found as feared, only painful acceptance - as much as she wants to, she cannot blame the child for this loss. It is her fault and her fault alone - or perhaps, she thinks spitefully, it is starclans fault. She'd grown up on kitten tales of a starry after life that the colony cats were granted, that perhaps her own ancestors had joined to, and to bear witness to pitchstar was to bear witness to the proof of that fact. But where was starclan when they had stolen her kit from her?

"That'd be nice, thank you. I'm sure... the little ones will appreciate it," she says slowly, as though speaking is just as hard as thinking, as existing. Maybe it is.

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[GHOSTPAW]

Before, when kits came into the world, Ghostkit had thought them dead. Why else would they be so tiny? So frail? Wiggling around with their eyes shut. Had something gone wrong? Had something happened? But their eyes always opened, eventually; and then, Ghostkit could call them denmates. They could all play together, chase tails as if they hadn't all been strange and wiggling once upon a time.

Snailcurl's kits weren't so lucky. They'd been even smaller, even skinnier, even stranger. And now, they weren't here at all. Ghostpaw knew now, they weren't the miracles that Snailcurl's kits had been.

Snailcurl looks sad, and she has the right to be, Ghostpaw thinks. Chilledgaze is here, too. Sorry they say. Everyone had told her sorry. Ghostpaw should say sorry, too. Starlingheart had been there. She'd probably said it lots, already.

Ghostpaw doesn't have anything to offer like mice or moss or medicine. He doesn't know what face to put on, but he's sorry. "M'sorry..." he tells the queen. Had he been closer, he would've offered a friendly head bump, like his ma' used to give him when he had scrapes. He doesn't know the right thing to say. "Your kits are so pretty, Snailcurl." He doesn't want her to think they're wrong.​