step into the hall of mirrors ✦ poppypaw

[FLINTWISH]

cw / nasty descriptions of illness

Starlingheart's wards have infected Flintkit thoroughly. His lungs ache with each breath in, and rasp with each breath out as the air navigates the sticky mucus inside. There is so much of it. Too much of it, balm-yellow and nearly as waxy. He can hardly breathe with all of this sickness inside him, progressing like ash borers to the core of their tree, heating him up from the inside out. Maybe his core is molten like the Earth's. Maybe if someone were to pierce him, magma would erupt from the wound instead of red blood, for he feels so hot that it must be the case. But no cat is piercing him-- nor are they paying him attention, aside from his mother's occasional whirling with cold-soaked moss and honey. Not that they help. After it all, the ache still remains.

But his luck seems to have changed. For this evening, while the sun is busy bowing its head beneath the horizon, the stars themselves have seemed to filter into the medicine den. Flintkit's breath rattles through his gaping maw as he watches them, slack-jawed and dull-eyed, twinkling playfully along the rocky ceiling. They make no shapes or words, just twinkling while the kitten tries his best to have a single thought in the midst of his ill haze. But slowly– or perhaps suddenly, for his sense of time is lacking in his sorry state –a feline emerges from the stars' light, and before him stands Poppypaw.

Flintkit has no way of knowing her; how terribly entangled his family is with her demise. But he does recognize her as a visitor. "Hello," he attempts, and then is halted by a fit of phlegmy cough. But her appearance has sobered him some from his illness, and so he persists, though he hates to look too eager: "Are you here to see me?"

@Poppypaw​

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[Poppypaw ★]

Was she being punished? It's her first thought on seeing the grey and white young tom, her fur prickling in horror and unease because at a glance there was no denying whose kit this was. Poppypaw was dead, yet the fear of the tom who had left her to die lingered like old scars; if she thought about it she could still remember the way teeth closed tight around her body, the feeling of falling before the pain. She shakes her head to clear it, takes a few cautious steps forward and the kitten speaks in a voice mystified and unaware. He had no idea who she was.
"Oooh, yeah-! I'm a scary ghost come for your soul! Going to gobble it up!" She smiled bright, laughing through the grit set of teeth so tight her jaw ached, "I'm kidding! I'm just here to let you know it's going to be okay."
Flintkit was not his father. Not for lack of trying on Granitepelt's part probably, but for the time he deserved none of her judgement or fear. "I'm Poppypaw." Did the clan speak of her fondly, did they tell stories about her still? She knew her mentor missed her, he'd named a kitten after her too so at the very least her memory now carried in another. The red and white she-cat wonders if her mother even grieved once. She doubts it, but she knows Starlingheart would if this little furball didn't wake back up in the world of the living so she tries her best to be encouraging, "Your mom's real smart. So don't worry your little head, she'll figure out what to do. I'm sure of it." StarClan had a plan, not that they ever shared any of it with her. Rude.
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[FLINTWISH]

Was he being rewarded? The prospect of some stranger greeting him kindly despite the risks of his illness is exciting. It soothes the deeper, bruising ache that persistently worries him: the way that his peers don't acknowledge him. The way that they see Granitepelt when they look at him. And in an instant he feels guilty for even having such a thought. If Granitepelt is as good of a cat as Flintkit believes, then looking like his father should be a badge he wears with pride-- and he does, he thinks, wear it with pride, though it is also at the cost of other things. Friendship; smalltalk; a passing smile. When Poppypaw's shimmering form moves closer to him, even in the smallest increments, he feels hope spark between his ribs.

She at first makes a joke about gobbling his soul, and though he'd been initially startled by it, he would not reveal his fear so easily. Flintkit laughs with her as much as he can handle. His own laugh sounds like grime clinging to the sparkling brightness that she presents. It's going to be okay, she tells him, like Starlingheart had told him before. But the StarClan apprentice's words are not held down by the same weights of worry that his mother spoke with. It seems like Poppypaw is as bright and weightless as the stars themselves.

He sniffs as she introduces herself. "Like Poppykit?" he wonders aloud, and slowly he finds the resemblance between this girl and Frostbite's daughter. He's not heard tales of her before, but surely his ignorance is not for his Clan's lack of care; Flintkit is simply not privy to those sorts of discussions. As she continues, his ears twitch with consideration. Starlingheart is smart, but how does Poppypaw know her? It takes only a few more moments for him to finally put the pieces together in spite of the illness that addles his reasoning.

"You're from StarClan," he realizes, his words turning acrid as fear rises in his throat. He tries to breathe through the webs of mucous in his nose and throat and lungs; tries to calm himself. After all, it's okay– she's not here for his soul, she'd said, and she seems kind. She's visiting him, after all. She must care. But his fur prickles at the realization regardless. Is he so sick that the only souls who can speak to him are ones that have already passed on? Is he going to die? Terror creeps slowly across his pupils, small spiders weaving it over his vision, blinding him to any possibility of safety. A cough squeezes his lungs further than fear dares to. Flintkit curls into himself, though he refuses to take his gaze off of Poppypaw. "Am I that- am I really sick?" he asks her, quiet. "I don't wanna be sick anymore." I don't want to see StarClanners, he thinks, though he equally loathes the thought of pushing his sole company away. "I'm- I'm scared."​

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[Poppypaw ★]

"Yeah! She was named after me, isn't that cool? I think you were named after someone too..." She doesn't really think fondly of Granitepelt, but she does remember the name of his father and she fights to maintain her wide grin even at the memory of the tom who caused her death. Part of her wants to tell the kitten, warn him to be careful, that his dad was a murderer, that he'd killed so many of them already and might continue to do so...but she had died because of unwarranted suspicion alone. She'd known nothing, but the worry she might had been enough for the gray and white warrior to kill her. She can only imagine what he might do to anyone else who acted even a little strange in his presence. She's decided to hold her tongue for the time being...it was safer for them. Justice would eventually serve itself.

"I should've started with that StarClan thing huh....my bad! But I am, yes! I'm from StarClan!" He's worried he's dying and she can't blame him, it was a horrible thing this illness that was plaguing her clan. Her home was in shambles, so many cats were dying or dead now and she's afraid. But she won't share this fear, not with this kitten. He'd done nothing to deserve, even if she wished nothing but the worst upon his father.
"You're really sick, but you're here so I can tell you not to worry! Everything will be okay." He was one of the lucky ones wasn't he? Mother was a medicine cat, first in line for the cure. Poppypaw dips her head to touch her nose on his forehead, "It's okay to be scared, but don't give up! It's not your time yet."
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