Oil and Grime || Mangled frog

[Frostbite]

It was the start of another day. Early morning light lit up the sky, and like clockwork, Frostbite rose with the dawn out of duty. He stretched like he always did, still groggy from sleep. His mind wasn't all there yet, it would take a few minutes or so for him to fully wake up. It was about this time he usually collected his apprentice for training. His mind saw fit to be cruel to him this morning as he padded over to where the apprentices huddled in the tunnel. I need to wake up Poppypaw, he thought to himself.

But he stopped short.

He gazed blankly over the sleeping apprentices as reality finally broke through his stupor. Ears flattened against his head and his heart sank. He quietly turned from them, heading out of the tunnel by himself when normally he had a loud obnoxious hellion beside him. He could almost hear her voice, if he tried hard enough. Declarations of destruction and and claims of being the best apprentice echoed in his mind as if to offer him some comfort, a hint of normalcy. But it only rubbed salt in the wound. He shook his head and pushed forward into the marsh.

He saw it with his own eyes, yet he was still grappling with his reality. She was going to burst from a bush any moment now to tackle him to the ground. The more time went on with only him and his thoughts and the sounds of the marsh waking up, the more he began to bristle. He fought back tears of frustration and continued his hunt.

His victim today is an uncommon sight, a rabbit. He dropped low, approaching like a vengeful apparition through the grass and reeds. As soon as he was close enough, he prepared to pounce...... When a frog who had been previously unknown to the rabbit croaked, scaring the poor thing and sending it running. He swore under his breath and gave chase, but his hunt had been doomed from the start. The rabbit speeds over the mud slicked ground, but Frostbite is heavier than the rabbit. With an awful sounding squelch, his legs sink into the mud and stop him in his tracks. A frustrated growl escapes his throat as he pulls himself free, his front legs, chest and throat dripping with mud.

He hates everything. Fury bubbles forth and he whirls to rake his claws against a tree, shattering bark and sending it flying.

He retraces his steps. Where's that starforsaken frog. He was going to slaughter the damned thing. Luckily for him, it hadn't moved from its pool. He made his attack quickly, biting into it and shaking it like a dog.

He feels empty.

He shakes his pelt to free himself of extra mud and returns to camp with his mangled consolation prize, dropping it in the pile and sitting by the tunnel entrance. He doesn't want to look at that thing.​

 

[loampelt]

Loampaw hasn't ever needed to grieve someone before. As much as ShadowClan has known death, as much as Loampaw has known death, it has never felt so close to him before. He's never had to navigate the absence of someone, and Poppypaw's is an absence keenly felt. She had always been herself: loud and talkative and largely overwhelming to Loampaw, who felt as though he could never quite keep up.

She's gone now, and Loampaw is left waiting for the punchline. There is a just kidding somewhere around the corner, and as angry as Loampaw is about it, he thinks he would still laugh if it meant he would see his friend again.

Frostbite rolls into camp like a storm, carrying a frog that is more blood than anything else, and Loampaw thinks maybe he gets it. Better to let anger out on something as inconsequential as a frog than on one of his peers — but the sight of it still makes something curl in Loampaw's gut. Just a frog, Loampaw reminds himself.

"Must've put up qui-qui-quite the fight," Loampaw says, then clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. He misses Poppypaw too, he doesn't say, because that feels too much like an admittance, "Glad t-tuh-to see such a dangerous thr-threa-thr-threat dead." ​

tags ∘ shadowclan apprentice ∘ solid black with hazel eyes ∘ curled front foot ∘ 12 moons​

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[Scorchedmoon]

Death was just something natural to Scorchedpaw, and he didn't really ever ponder it that much. Maybe it was naivety, but he didn't have anyone truly close to him perish, either. Dying would happen to them all eventually, so why fear it? Even so, he can understand the guilt and sense of loss that pervades after the fact, even if he himself has never had to experience that. He can't imagine what Frostbite must be feeling right now, so tragically losing his apprentice. He's not surprised when he hears footsteps approaching, and it's him. He doesn't move, keeping one eye open and watching the warrior before closing it again. When Frostbite leaves, he finally rises, and stretches his paws to begin the day.

When he hears Loampaw speaking to the white tom, he approaches himself, interested in what he was doing outside. He certainly didn't expect to find a mangled frog corpse, but he supposes that's one way to get out your frustration. "It sure is...dead." Good going, Scorchedpaw. "Do you wanna...talk? Maybe?" It's all he can really think to offer. ​

 

[Needledrift]

Stinking is never a word that Needledrift would've applied to Frostbite before the tunnels, but it certainly applied. He stank of wetness, of dirt, of frog viscera, and something else that lingered above it all. It wasn't so much a scent as a mood, something that only another cat could sense. Something that made them want to curl up with their colony members and purr, since purring was the most universal thing so you could do to make someone feel better.

But Needledrift knew that purring wouldn't make this better. Not this time. Past the mangled frog, past the mud, past the tiredness, was Poppypaw. Poppypaw, the clan whispered. Poppypaw, the loudest apprentice ShadowClan had in a long while, silenced by bear jaws. Poppypaw, Frostbite's apprentice, dead. Guilt burned at her. She had been off with Chittertongue when it had happened, cleaning carrion-scent off his pelt and meandering her way back to camp with a friend at her side while one of her clanmates had been claimed by what Magpiepaw had deemed as StarClan's wrath - but what had Poppypaw ever done to earn such a fate?

She thought about the bear that had passed her on the way back from the Carrionplace.... had it been the same bear? Just going for a leisurely stroll after its mauling?

Green eyes move from frog to fur as she approaches Frostbite on ginger paws. She stops about a mouse-length and half away from him - close, maybe too close - and sits. She says nothing, asks nothing of him. She doesn't think she needs to.​

i will never leave your room, tell everything that bothers you​