border THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH ౨ৎ a body

Jul 10, 2023
72
51
18
DuskClan
TW for dehumanizing descriptions of a corpse/violent thoughts/minor blood and gore.

If killing Applejaw had been a high, figuring out what to do with the thing that used to be Applejaw is the crash. That's what it is, really, isn't it? Not a cat anymore, not a deputy's daughter or a self-proclaimed marsh princess. Just a lump of death-heavy flesh, void of all that had made it worth much of anything. The worth had been in the taking; Ghostmask entertains the notion that she had consumed what made Applejaw Applejaw whole for herself, like some perversion of a nine lives ceremony. What's left behind is an absence drawn in meat.

Her white muzzle, still dappled smeary red and pink with Applejaw's blood (the stuff drips unappetizingly off her chin), crumples into an unbecoming grimace as she considers the corpse-thing. It had been easy to leave the other three where they lie, but that hadn't worked out well for her, had it? And besides ... she casts her beetle-black gaze to the jagged maw of Highstones ... this is too close. Not to home, because DuskClan is the furthest thing from it, but too close regardless.

Grimacing, she takes the Applejaw-thing's cooling scruff between her crimson-clotted jaws and begins to drag. It's easier than she'd thought; though the thing is heavy with death, Ghostmask bears the wiry strength of the hungry and the damned. She will not be driven from her singular mission, and she pursues it with the wolfish hunger of someone with little else to strive for. Getting the corpse-thing to somewhere else is suddenly an ambition as monumental as leadership, and equally as important.

It is a long journey, longer still with the Applejaw-thing's now-cooled weight straining her jaws, but she makes it in the end. The line blurs between marsh and forest, delineated only by a strip of stinking asphalt. It feels like an appropriate place to leave the corpse-thing, better still in that it is distant from her world of dust and paltry scrub. Examining the thing, she does not find much evidence of her theft upon it; she is as soundless and hidden as her namesake, anonymous with her smell of blood and dust, the smell of a hungry coyote.

She lets it flop heavily to the ground just on ShadowClan's half of the border, watching with something like pity tempered by revulsion as its torn-open neck slackens and lets its head roll. If Applejaw-the-cat had deserved her final usefulness in her end at Ghostmask's teeth, Applejaw-the-corpse deserves its lonesome home, strewn along the Thunderpath's edge. She casts it a final passive cut of the eyes and then turns back not-homewards, long vanished into the underbrush by the time anyone arrives.
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OOC : Applejaw's body has been left on the ShadowClan side of the Shadow-Thunder border, but Ghostmask is long gone. Open to ShadowClanners (aka not TCers, sorry) :)
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The body is cooled by the time she comes across it.

The scent of blood is bitter in her mouth, like the anger she had stored away in the face of Mirepurr, the anger she had stolen away from herself at Smogstar's disappearance. Bitter, though, this is like ash, the taste of grief so rampant she isn't sure what to do with it. Eyes simmer with anger as she stares on at the body- and she feels herself slip, just a little bit. So well put together and boxed in with rules and strict barriers, Scalejaw feels herself wanting to rip along the path left behind by whoever carried her here, to make a war statement.

Vision flickered briefly, and she inhales sharply- eyes snap close. The irony isn't lost on her- Smogstar's disappearance, now his eldest turns up dead at the border, her throat cruelly torn free. Morbidly she wonders how quick the death was. If the wounds lining Applejaw's body were indicative of if she was tortured or given the mercy of silence. Scalejaw opens here eyes, replacing them upon the body she nearly refused to recognize as that of Smogstar's daughter. Some of Halfshade's last drops of blood in this world.

For a terrifying moment, she realizes that Smogstar's ink-stain against their lives, her lives, are only living here in the bodies of his children. The only proof he was real, was that others remembered, that he had kits. Scalejaw swallows, the rising bile in her throat caught with meticulously timed swallows. She kept going until the feeling left her. She hasn't felt this way over a body in moons.

Would she feel like this, if they ever found Smogstar's?

Thinking like that is an admittance of his disappearance, that it was death he met, and not perhaps a twoleg's furless paw to cure him. Scalejaw inhales another shuddering breath, and her head turns, finally calling to the patrol she had departed moments earlier with a croak of a voice. "Here. I found.. Applejaw." The words feel like sludge, a slurry of evil and black and tar, harder to say then she can imagine. When Scalejaw looks forward again, as if frozen in place, she wonders, Did you fight well? Did you give them wounds to remember you by?

".. We need to take her to camp." Scalejaw says to whoever approaches, thought she doesn't move. Not yet.
  • "speech"
  • SCALEJAW 🌧 she/her, warrior of shadowclan, sixty five moons.
    A SH black/LH blue smoke chimera with glowering orange eyes, tufts of fur that make her look dragon-akin, and scars that she wears with pride. motherly and stern attitude, with a warm streak for clanmates and a cruel streak for enemies.
    mentoring no one
    padding after no one / / mother to bonerattle, nightwhisper, and shadefall
    peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / / underline and tag when attacking
    penned by dallas ↛ dallasofnines on discord, feel free to dm for plots.

 
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Halting beside Scalejaw, Salamandersnap's icy gaze falls upon the body. She too is angry, the stench of blood and beginning stages of decay filled the air around them, and she wrinkles her nose as her nostrils are flooded with the uncomfortable smell. Scalejaw seems frozen in place for several long moments, and just as she opens her maw to speak, Scalejaw is mentioning how they need to take her back to camp. "I've got her." Salamandersnap meows simply, bending forward to begin lifting what remained of their clanmate. The sooner they returned to camp, the sooner she could wash the scents and reminders of death from her pelt.

She doesn't take time to argue or make one of her usual blunt statements in return. This time, her own anger has silenced her, only speaking to uphold the older woman's request. Was Scalejaw in shock, and using the request as a way to ground herself and remind herself what steps needed to be taken next? "We'll find whoever did this... they've got another thing coming if they think they're getting away with this." A quiet mumble under her breath, she pays little attention to anyone who may be listening. She hadn't meant for them to hear anyway. "The last thing Mirepurr needs right now is this. They're under enough stress as it is." Again her quiet meows are in hushed tones, speaking mostly to herself as she stands, shifting under the weight of Applejaw's mangled corpse upon her back.

  • ooc. —​
  • SALAMANDERSNAP
    ↪ salamandersnap / cisgender female (she/her)
    ↪ 24 moons / ages realistically on the 19th
    ↪ shadowclan warrior
    ↪ lh black smoke
    ↪ "speech" / thoughts
    ↪ peaceful/healing actions may be powerplayed / attack in underline & @/account
    ↪ note: all thoughts/actions are based off ic opinions only !!
    ↪ penned by halimede
 
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⚛︎₊˚‧ The smell alone was enough to cause Amberhaze's pelt to prickle with dread as he padded closer with unsteady strides, the fur that laid thickly on the back of his neck spiking into quills mimicking the pine needles that made up the ShadowClan canopy above. It permeated the air, growing thick enough to choke on as the modest patrol closed in on the harrowing scene that awaited them. He thought he would be prepared, mentally, emotionally, physically- but alas, he was mistaken- his ocher eyes growing all the wider as they fixed themselves almost unwillingly onto the mangled body of what was once was Applejaw. Animated, orbs full of life and a soul still pulsating through every fiber of their beating heart, every pulse inside of a chest once full bringing warmth to plush flesh. Gone, having escaped them like a bitter Leafbare wind flowing through winding trees, a departure as swift as its arrival.

He swallowed back bile as his body trembled with fear so instinctive it was nothing more than second nature to him, only allowing himself a singular sniff of the ragged crimson stained corpse before recoiling with a desperate scramble. With a scrunched muzzle, he grimaced as he waited for the burning sensation to slowly dissipate from his nostrils. "Oh...Ohhh man...T-This doesn't look like an accident..." It had dawned on him what a strange circumstance this was- Applejaw, who had been in perfectly decent health just some time prior minus the obvious turmoil that had shaken the whole clan after their leader's disappearance was suddenly nearly dismembered and left for the worms on the edge of their very own border. There was no explanation, no reason, the killing wound jagged and sloppy like that of another animal with the intent to maim and tear. The nauseating aroma of expiry was too strong for him to make out anything underlying it, though it went without question there was surely something more to be found there. "W-What if this has something to- uh- do with Smogstar? They were related, right? Someone could be t-trying to wipe them all out!"

Irrational. Delving into irrationality. To him, this was clearly someone or something trying to weaken ShadowClan by means of getting rid of their strongest asset and all of those close to him. It could have been anyone, of course, but it wasn't just anyone- it was Applejaw, and before Applejaw it was Smogstar. Who's to say he hadn't met the same fate elsewhere, somewhere so far and so deeply hidden away that he might never be uncovered? Who would be next? Would they ever uncover who was behind such a horrendous string of events? Would it get worse? Perhaps even worse, could it even be someone who they thought they could trust, hidden amongst them all undetected and picking them off one by one with ease? Amberhaze began to tremble as he stood there, his deep orange gaze staring across the border and focusing on nothing in particular as his thoughts continued to run rampant.
° . ⚠︎ . °
  • ooc:
  • whaddahaell3.png
    AMBERHAZE — HE/HIM ・ 20 MOONS ・ WARRIOR OF SHADOWCLAN ・ PENNED BY SLOANE
    a short but lengthy black cat with a boney build and striking ocher eyes filled with unveiled trepidation. black oriental shorthair.
 
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જ➶ The smell of blood is an easy thing to pick up. Potent in the iron that it slips along their tongue. It makes them swipe their tongue along their rich chocolate muzzle as they step along the bend of a thick pine tree. Eyes shift between the group that is already there, the dead body already upon the back of another. A rough breath leaves them and his eyes almost stay glued to Applejaw. What happened to the molly that leaves her throat wretched open like that? Death is a heavy drape over the body and a frown pulls at their muzzle. "Things normally take a while to settle." They mutter, trying to figure out the circumstances. How horrendous this is and right after Smogstar has gone missing. Their sibling is not going to be...well after this. But what can they do? What can they hope to do to help them? They feel powerless in the face of all this and their ears pull back as Amberhaze draws connections in panic.

"We don't know that. The last thing we need is to panic and start pointing our tails around. We need to get back to camp...away from the Thunderpath. Someone needs to let Mirepurr know what has happened." They mutter then before taking a step back as they want to. They disregard the side of Thunderclan, not wanting to think that their neighbors are capable of murdering one of their own. But they can't just toss the notion completely away.
 

"No need."

Mirepurr's voice comes as a croak from behind trees and fog, unsettled as it comes from their throat. Blood had filled all their senses, but it had taken them some time to pinpoint the exact location, courtesy of the nerves rushing through their veins... it is thanks to the patrol's conversation that they come across the untimely demise of Applejaw.

Nausea grips them in iron vice. The way her normally stark-white throat has been ripped open is perhaps the worst of it all; it suggests a death that has proven to be painful, or even dragged out. Mirepurr swears they feel blood within their own mouth and threatening to suffocate them before a next breath can be taken. The least they can do for Plumpaw — poor Plumpaw who should not be here to see this — is to place themself between Applejaw's body and Plumpaw's line of sight; give her the opportunity to look away, or the decision to look anyway.

Amberhaze's theory ruffles Mirepurr's fur. At this point, anything feels plausible... it is Thrasherthroat's reasurrance that grounds Mirepurr enough not to run with it.

But one thing stands out to them particularly. "ThunderClan..." they mutter the response to Salamandersnap's promise of revenge. Could they have done this? According to Flamestar, they are only now starting to recover... it feels difficult to imagine a Clan full of wounded warriors attacking their rival, but the placement of the body is too odd to ignore.

Mirepurr forces themself to avoid falling down a rabbit hole. There's no time for it now; Applejaw deserves a proper burial, a proper send-off after being taken from them too soon. Unspilled tears gather at their lashline as they look at Scalejaw. "I can carry her with you." Nobody should undergo the cruelty of that by themselves — the rigid limpness of someone you used to hunt with, fight with, live with.


 

Scalejaw swallows once more as other cats approach. Their words buzz like flies in her ears- she hardly hears them. Salamandersnap is quick to approach the body, bidden by Scalejaw's request, mumbling words out. It's her last sentence that causes Scalejaw's ears to twitch. ".. It's a lot." She agrees, with a voice well removed and near-silent, cold shouldered and bitter tongued already. Death had long since claimed Applejaw, and while she was lamenting on the semantics behind it, other cats were approaching, too.

Amberhaze is quick to panic. "Smogstar left of his own volition out of camp. That, we know. There was no scent of intruders on the territory. It can't be related." She says, and by the tone of her voice, it's a wonder that she isn't try to convince herself. Thrasherthroat says something, she thinks, but Mirepurr's voice causes her to turn her head. Glowering coals for eyes stare for a long moment, then sweep towards Plumpaw. Seeing a corpse like this is.. harrowing, and she feels, briefly, for the apprentice.

Vision lifts towards her former apprentice, and her ear twitched. "With Salamandersnap." She says quietly. A request, a reminder, or an order- none of them. Perhaps much the same of Mirepurr's intent- no cat should have to carry a clanmate's corpse alone. She steps underneath one end of Applejaw's corpse from where Salamandersnap moved to stand with Applejaw, taking some of the weight.

Her thoughts dwell with the deceased. Applejaw feels lighter then they should have- perhaps, on the account of blood loss from elsewhere. When Mirepurr takes the other end of the corpse, she starts forward, keeping in step with the other two warriors to take Applejaw back to camp.
  • "speech"
  • SCALEJAW 🌧 she/her, warrior of shadowclan, sixty five moons.
    A SH black/LH blue smoke chimera with glowering orange eyes, tufts of fur that make her look dragon-akin, and scars that she wears with pride. motherly and stern attitude, with a warm streak for clanmates and a cruel streak for enemies.
    mentoring no one
    padding after no one / / mother to bonerattle, nightwhisper, and shadefall
    peaceful and healing powerplay permitted / / underline and tag when attacking
    penned by dallas ↛ dallasofnines on discord, feel free to dm for plots.

 
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