sensitive topics You can kiss a hundred boys in bars ⚜ Birthing

[Duckshimmer]

*+:｡.｡ TW FOR RELUCTANT MOTHER THOUGHTS + COMPLICATIONS

There's not much to it when the day arrives. Late is her first, irritated thought. It had been expected to be earlier yet here she is, belly swollen beyond withstanding - Stars, if I don't bounce back these kits better hope to the heavens- the thought ends there as a sharp pang rakes through her.

Duckshimmer has, and might never be, much of a believer in the stars, their inhabitants, or their little abilities to control fate. Perhaps it's a defense mechanism. A refusal to accept that mistakes could be preplanned punishments. Coincidences are just coincidences - they have to be. But if they weren't...what would this be?

The birth goes without much fanfare. Duckshimmer, dramatic as she's known to be, was quick to sequester herself in Marbleleaf's den - Sweetheart, I'm just making this easier for you, all your herbs are right on hand, isn't that more helpful than lugging it all to the nursery? She wonders if Marbleleaf sees right through her - that Duckshimmer wishes more for as much privacy as she can get than Marbleleaf's comfort. Whether she does or doesn't, it's no matter - Duckshimmer steals a nest and relives the wonders of childbirth for the second time in her life.

There is nothing beautiful about it. There hadn't been the first time, either, but something about this time just felt...colder.

There's more blood than there was last time, so perhaps that has something to do with it. She can't remember if the pain is worse than before, but her tongue tastes of splinters where she'd broken the stick Marbleleaf had shoved in there somewhere between "sweetheart" and a mouthful of raging curse words. Everything has grown cold and numb long before she realizes she's finished. Two mewling lives are placed by her stomach, she vaguely feels their paws. For a brief moment, she wonders where the third one is...but she's too tired to look...to care. Instead, she lets the new lives nurse and tries not to think about how each suckle drains more and more of that already receding warmth.

What had Chilledstar said, all those moons ago?
About...the coldest season...about love...what had they said about warmth? She can't remember. She can't remember them.

With a heavy sigh that sounds dangerously close to a sob, Duckshimmer whispers, "Sweetheart...Marbleleaf...could you...?" A question lingers on her lips, fragile and hypothermic, a whisper away from being carried away by the next shaky breath. Her paw twitches, the loudest her request will ever be. Ultimately, she doesn't ask. She never did when Chilledstar was alive, she won't start now.
Instead, with a sigh that sounds as it usually does - tired and bored - she concludes, "You did good" before letting eyes close.

Tomorrow, she'll feel like a mother. Tomorrow...

For tonight, she dreams of a starless sky and pretends to find comfort in the familiarity of darkness.

*+:｡.｡ Updated 2/8/25

• AAAAAAAAAAAH IM SO SORRY THIS IS SO LATE!!!! Hopefully, the next milestones won't be so difficult for me to write out </3 Welcome to the world babies! Sorry Duck and I are both crap at this fufu
  @vulture @ouijeejuice
  
  This is written as a oneshot but feel free to respond, Duck suffered some heavy blood loss but aside from i'd imagine having a longer recovery she's fine <3
• 
  GENERAL:
  ⚜ Duckshimmer
  ⚜ DFAB— She/Her — Bisexual
  ⚜ 41 moons
  ⚜ Mother to Singeglare, Swallowflutter and Sneezeduck
  ⚜ Shadowclan — Queen
  
  
  
  
  
  COMBAT:
  ⚜Physically medium | mentally hard
  ⚜ Attack in bold #ffa98f
  injuries: Currently pregnant

[/i][/i]​

 

[sneezeduck]

SNEEZEDUCK

HE/HIM SHADOWCLAN WARRIOR

As soon as he heard the news, Sneezeduck was quick to drop his activities and duties in favor of the pacing that he had grown so accustomed to. Much to his comfort, Duckshimmer found solace in Marbleleaf's den; but much to his fears, he had been shoo'd out by his mother. So, the boy is left to pace at the mouth of the den, fighting every urge to march right in and ensure things are going safely.

If it were any other cat treating his mother, he'd have hovered over the two like a concerned parent. Today reminded him just how much trust he put into Marbleleaf.

It's when the scent of blood tickles his nose that Sneezeduck grows more restless. Golden eyes flit to and fro, anxious paws dig at the thawing dirt beneath him. If he swivels his ears in the right direction, he can hear the curses and comforting mumblings inside. Pointedly, he turns his head away.

The wait is long and excruciating but, as much as he struggles to, Sneezeduck waits until the chatter inside stops, and he assumes that Duckshimmer is asleep. Hopes, anyway. It is now that the warrior finally pokes his head into the den, training his eyes first on the two kittens that nestle against the queen's side - not without startling at the sight of blood - then to Marbleleaf, eyes round with concern. " Is she..? " he questions quietly, letting the rest fall empty into the air. Okay? Going to be?

Can I come in? he wants to ask, which may be conveyed by pleading eyes, but he knows his mother better than to intrude on her rest. Instead, he merely stands at the mouth of the den, looking over them with awe.

ooc:

accordion

Sneezeduck is a chocolate tabby tom with cream under-accents, a disorganized pelt, and abnormally long head-fur. He is tall and lanky with big paws - overall clumsy in appearance.

— duckshimmer x unknown tom
— brother to singeglare and swallowflutter
— half-brother to unnamed kit and unnamed kit
— mentored by sharpshadow
— 16 moons old as of 2/05/2025

penned by ixora

 

[MARBLELEAF]

MARBLELEAF

SHE / THEY ◆ SHADOWCLAN MEDICINE CAT

Marbleleaf hasn't forgotten Duckshimmer's low morale, the way she had cried when she had realized she was expecting another litter of kits. When the queen comes to her now, heavy with her burden, it is with an unspoken announcement. The medicine cat's fur prickles along her spine, but she does not show her fear. I have done this before, she reminds herself; she had been there for Ternstar's kitting, had helped with Ashenfall's, and though this is the first birth she must assist with alone, she finds that her paws are being guided. She allows Duckshimmer into her den with an understanding nod, and once the queen settles into one of Marbleleaf's detested sickbeds, the pale tabby begins to work.

There is nothing, she thinks, that can compare to the grotesque pain a queen experiences when their body commences a kitting. She is inept, as far as painkillers go—but she offers Duckshimmer a stick, one she has been saving for two moons for just this occasion, and the point-faced she-cat takes it into her jaws with fervor. It serves its purpose; Duckshimmer wears it into splinters with fiending teeth as her body struggles and fights and heaves. Marbleleaf lingers near her nest, her eyes wide, taking everything in as though she were an apprentice again.

Starlingheart, are you here? Have you come to sit beside me? She can almost swear there is an otherworldly presence in her den today… but she catches no glimpses, sees no spirits. She almost wants to ask Duckshimmer if she feels it, too—that StarClan has come to watch over them—but she refrains. The queen fights her battle, in between hissed curses and snatches of forced pleasantry, until the first kit is born. Then comes a second, and a third, and Marbleleaf exhales with relief that all is done.

Marbleleaf helps the kits the best she knows how. She nips the sacs open, she begins to lick them clean, roughly lick their fur the wrong way to ensure they are breathing, alive—and two of them are. Two of them are guided with care toward Duckshimmer's milk-wreathed belly. The third, though… the medicine cat tries. She does everything she can to resuscitate it, to hear its crescendo of mewls, to feel the beat of its heart beneath her desperate tongue… but it does not move.

She draws away from the third kit, her heart leaping into her throat. Stars, I tried. You saw that I tried—you were here, watching me. Her lower jaw quivers—but Duckshimmer is drowsy, weak, drained from the effort. She looks to Marbleleaf with hazy blue eyes, asking her an unfinished question: Could you? The healer looks back at her, helpless. "You did good."

"So did you," she murmurs. She fixes the kits—siblings to Singeglare, Swallowflutter, her friend Sneezeduck—and she whispers: "Welcome to the world. Welcome to ShadowClan."

She will need to bury the third kit. Duckshimmer should not have to see its body. But she can see anxious pacing at the mouth of her den, and she slips out, her expression strained. Sneezeduck is there, the concern for his mother, his new siblings, written large across his anxious face.

"She's okay," Marbleleaf tells her friend. She thinks nothing of what she does next—she presses forward, pushes her muzzle briefly against Sneezeduck's. "There were three. One… did not make it. But the other two seem healthy as can be." She pulls back, her eyes soft. "She needs rest, though. You can come see her and the kits tomorrow."

ooc:

—

accordion

Marbleleaf is the ShadowClan medicine cat. She is thin, with a short fawn tabby pelt; the base color is a dull, almost-gray slate, and the whorling classic stripes are deeper shades of wet sand. She has white facial markings, chest, and paws, an angular face and build, and moss-colored eyes.

Lilacfur x Siltcloud / sibling to Sycamorebloom / mate to none / parent to none
mentored by Starlingheart / mentoring none
14 moons old as of 02/01/2025

penned by Marquette

 

[???KIT]

The kitten does not cry when it is born.

It does not wail like its littermate, does not squirm or thrash in search of warmth. It simply arrives, pulled from the cold hush of the womb into the cold hush of the world, and blinks. The air is thick with the scent of blood and herbs, with exhaustion and something nameless—something hollow. It is unfamiliar, but not unsettling. The kitten does not yet have the capacity for unease. It only knows sensation, and even that is distant, dulled. The rasp of a tongue over its fur is noted and then discarded. The shift of its sibling against its side is acknowledged but unimportant. It breathes. Its heart beats.

Placed at its mother's belly, it latches without hesitation, because that is what it is meant to do. There is no hunger, not in the way a living thing should feel hunger—no desperation, no urgency. It simply understands that it must nurse, so it does. It drinks in silence, slow and methodical, unbothered by the shuddering sighs above, by the weight of words unsaid.

Its mother is quiet.

So is it.​

 

[promisepaw]

Promisepaw acts out of pure selfish need. As a boy dwelling in the apprentice's den now, he does not notice when one queen goes missing. His paws simply carry him forward, on his never ending mission to reclaim something as his, in a world forever changing around him. The moment he hopes for is that of a fatigued doctor, giving in because there is little else to do in the chaos of the Clan. What he is given, instead, is a warrior pacing before the medicine den, and soon after his cousin parting the entranceway to speak with him. The pieces click together in a useless puzzle, and there's a poor, cold thud in his chest as he hears the news.

"... One did not make it."

He does not damn StarClan for their choice in stolen lives. He can only imagine being born with one less sibling than intended (but then again, perhaps 'intention' would've always had this path in mind for Duckshimmer and her family.) She thinks of how small of a grave they would have to dig, and for a moment, almost weeps for just how... sad it is. He has no attachment to the queen nor her family but his heart still aches for them - perhaps his father's combined empathy did bear something in their long-legged son.

He says nothing. He dips his head in understanding and abandons his mission, tilting his gait away instead. He'll talk with Swansong about this. She always knows what to say.​

 

[Mysterykit 1]

In contrast to her quiet littermate she is brought into this world wailing, second born by a heart beat but with the way she demands the attention of all those around her she could be assumed the first. The world is far too cold, she cares not for the change in seasons, the fact that it's technically a lot warmer than a few weeks prior. She has known no bitter chill, this less than ideal temperament is the worst thing she has EVER felt as consequence. The she-kit squirms, finding dissatisfaction in the meager warmth she finds when Marbleleaf takes her momentarily.

An unhappy mewl greets the medicine cat as she cleans her, a sneeze and grunt is given in reply as her fur is licked in the wrong direction. The tongue far too harsh, she doesn't stop meowing her displeasure until she's placed beside her mothers belly. Beside her littermate, a presence she may not have noticed if not for the warmth of it's body. The idea of having a third sibling is absent from her mind, born vulnerable and ignorant all she can do is acknowledge what's in front of her. That being her mother and her littermate, and herself of course. ​

​

 

[Swallowflutter.]

OUR LOVE STORY
COULD BE KINDA GORY ​

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swallowflutter ❀ 17 moons ❀ polygender ❀ any pronouns ❀ shadowclan warrior​

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Swallowflutter is all but vibrating out of hs skin - teeth gnawing painfully at his cheek, pacing back and forth. Duckshimmer, in all her wisdoms, hides away in the medicine den - and it is only this implicit request for privacy that keeps him from going in after her Instead, he paces as he waits - litening, anxiously. Stomach churns in unease - and, perhaps, a bit of something.. else - but he knows he will not be able to rest until it is over. When marbleleaf emerges, he expects to be relieved - instead, a small, sharp, pained noice slips from his lips - two-toned blue eyes wide.

' There were three. One… did not make it. '

Three. There were three. were.

Swallowflutter swallows woodenly, staring uncomprehendingly - struggling to picture a world where there isn't three. Three siblings. Three kits. The perfect number - the one that fills her own dreams, any time she thinks of her future. Of having a family. " I- how? What happened? " confusion paints her face - pained by the nights events.

They have two new siblings, true... but there should have been three.

━ actions & " speech, " & 'thoughts/quotes' ━

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