~0 Permafrost Tears : A Fleecepaw SRP 0~ He couldn’t breathe. He *couldn’t* breathe. Paws trembling every time they hit the dusty and sandy ground beneath them, heart racing as he moved like a blur out across the sand, mind racing and tumbling so fast he couldn’t stop it, but try and he might Fleecepaw couldn’t get the tightness in his chest to release. He heard calls and shouts behind him, other cats shouting his name perhaps, but that didn’t stop Fleecepaw as he bolted out of the clan’s makeshift and sand covered home. He didn’t know how long or far he ran, but as he stumbled and his paws gave out under him he simply let his weight carry him, crashing into the ground with a thud and a quiet wail. His entire flank burned from where he’d skidded along the rough, far to warm ground. Fleece just laid there, splayed out in the sand as cries that were so unlike his usual bratty bravado started to bubble up and out of him. He couldn’t make them stop, not the weeping cries nor the tears that started to fall from his eyes with them. Everything was *wrong* and he couldn’t do anything about it. He flexed his paw, the one that he had rested on Hadalshatter’s forehead in a futile attempt to help cool her, clutching it to his chest with a sob that wracked his whole body. He’d felt them go, felt that last bit of life just left his grandparent in a single moment. It disgusted him, it terrified him, it made every bit of him want to crawl into the cursed dry and sand ground beneath him and never climb back out. Of course Fleecepaw understood the concept of death, he had since he was a small kitten. Or at least he’d thought he had. He’d *understood* his littermates had passed, too weak to survive the illness they’d all been afflicted by after their birth. He’d *understood* they were dead and that he was all his mother had left, that was why she constantly put all her attention on him. But here, covered in gritty and uncomfortable sand, Fleecepaw considered that he hadn’t truly *understood* what death meant. Perhaps the concept, yes, he’d managed to comprehend as a young kitten, but he’d never considered *this*. That it takes without warning, without pause, and it does not wait for anything. The young icecat clutched his paw closer to his chest, and stopped trying to hold himself together. There was no one here to hear or judge his wails, the way he sobbed and babbled to himself. Nine moons worth of emotion crashed into him all at once, as he finally spent the quiet and secluded time to truly feel it all. His siblings were gone, his mother was likely gone, his father probably wanted him dead. He’d failed Grizzlehollow, failed Skipskitter, failed Hadalshatter. Perhaps he was failing all of Starclan itself, Grizzlehollow’s words about how their ancestors had demanded it was *him* that be his apprentice ringing in the young cat’s ears. Fleecepaw continued to weep, curling into himself and putting his paws to his face as he let out a wail. The tears rolling down his muzzle suddenly seemed to rapidly cool, until several crystalline droplets and a thin layer of frost clung to the fur of his face, frozen by accident. He shook his head and dislodged them, watching the frozen tears fall to the sand and begin to melt again. The moisture darkened the sand and in a matter of moments they were gone. Eventually, out of tears and cries, he shakily stumbled back to standing and didn’t even bother to dust out his fur. Hollow feeling and buried under his grief, Fleecepaw reasoned if he was likely to get snapped at by Grizzlehollow for running off when he returned, he might as well try and find some herbs to placate the older cat. So, shaking with each step and sniffling back sobs, the young icecat started off even further from Iceclan’s temporary camp, lost in his own misery. - - - - - - We ignore that i meant to post this weeks ago-- oops.
