I'm sorry for the long wait! I'm writing the last part of this on my crappy laptop, since we're in the process of replacing our main computer to a newer version.
I hope you like this chapter of Tall Pines :)
-Mossy
Chapter Nine - Pine - Moon 5
"It's only when someone is taken from you that you realize how much you took them for granted."
Pinekit slowly lifted his head from his vole, and winced. His neck felt sore and heavy, like a boulder was resting on it. The young tom licked the blood from his lips and mumbled, "What? That was a mouthful."
Needlekit glared at him. "Sorry, was I talking in your 'bad' ear?" He lashed his tail and took a deep breath, calming himself. "I just said that now Ebonypelt's gone, I see how much she did for us."
Pinekit froze, and gulped down a morsel of meat that had suddenly turned tasteless in his jaws. Does he have to talk about her now? The Clan's finally had a break from its grief and suffering for nearly a half-moon, and now he brings her up again. Words stalled on his tongue, and, unable to speak at the moment, Pinekit simply made a low noise in his throat.
His brother arched his brow at him. "Well, growling at me isn't very nice. I'm not a badger you have to defend the Clan from..."
"A- actually," Pinekit snapped, rising to his paws and kicking away the picked-over fresh-kill, "I am defending the Clan from you. By mentioning her name again, you're only bringing ShadowClan back into a world of depression and angst!"
His anger flared even more when Needlekit smiled. "So you do miss her," he murmured, blinking fondly at Pinekit.
"Well, of course I do." Pinekit's voice quieted and he sat back down again, his tail drooping limply on the earth. "How could I not? She was like our mother."
Needlekit didn't reply. His affectionate gaze softened even further, if that was possible, into one of deep, unfiltered sadness. Pinekit doubted he'd ever seen this expression on his littermate's face. Yes, Needlekit was often the one who expressed how he felt more quietly, with just his eyes. But this was something totally brand-new. This time, Pinekit felt exactly what his brother felt. We're alike more than just in our appearance...
o3o
Pinekit cracked open one eyelid, and found the silhouette of a cat standing in front of him. Heart pounding, the black tom opened his other eye, and shrunk back into the moss of his nest.
The cat arched his back and a chilling, almost strangled hiss emerged from the bottom of his lungs. Mud-streaked golden fur flashed before Pinekit's wide eyes, and in heartbeats the cat was face-to-face with the kit. Cracked, yellowing teeth snapped at Pinekit's nose, and again the former rogue tried to lurch farther away from the hostile face, but he could only flatten himself against the nursery wall. Chuckling pounded in Pinekit's ears like a heartbeat, and in the next instant, his muzzle was bathed in rancid-fish-scented breath.
A paw swiped, and Pinekit registered a sting on his cheek. He dabbed his paw where he'd been clipped, and when he pulled his foot back to inspect the damage done, he found it was covered in blood. The sharp, distinct salty tang hit him right then, as if his dream-opponent had hit him with another blow. And maybe he had, for right then Pinekit felt stickiness under him. His mossy nest and the other occupants of the nursery were gone, replaced with a pool of blood, lapping hungrily at Pinekit's paws. And all he could do was press against the stupid wall, trapped.
o3o
Pinekit roused with his chest heaving. "Blood everywhere," he whispered, forcing his trembling forelegs to push him into a sitting position. He was about to exit the nest when he was startled with another surprise: Scarkit and Owlkit, in their slumber, were clinging onto him like dogs trying to hold onto a tree trunk: desperate, fearful. Pinned down by Scarkit's smaller body draped over his haunch, Pinekit twisted around to see if Needlekit was in the same predicament. And, sure enough, his brother was also stuck under Ivykit, though both were sleeping and he was unaware.
"What in the name of StarClan..." Pinekit grumbled. He shrugged Owlkit off his shoulder and was just starting to nudge Scarkit off of his leg when a soft voice halted his efforts.
He glanced past the snoozing Evesky, who had moved in awaiting the arrival of her and Lintpelt's kits, to Auburnnose. The thin white queen was curled in her nest with her kits, excluding Coldkit, who had insisted on a nest for himself already. "Don't push them away," she mewed.
"I just want to have feeling in my leg again, thanks," Pinekit growled softly as he again tried to remove Scarkit from his leg. He sighed as the numb fizzing began crawling up his haunch.
"You know as well as I do that they have no one else to go to," Auburnnose continued quietly. An edge was now distinct in her tone. "With... Ebonypelt walking in Silverpelt and Fleetwhisker constantly in some stage of grief, you and Needlekit are their only remaining family members."
Pinekit stiffened and stopped prodding Scarkit. "What? So you mean Fleetwhisker is just... ignoring his kits?"
But Auburnnose didn't answer. She had already curled her skinny body back around Ravenkit, Featherkit, and Hailkit, her back to him.
Pinekit frowned, perplexed. He looked down and studied Scarkit and Owlkit for a moment. Their faces were slack in slumber, but even so Pinekit thought he saw a trace of desperation there. They miss her warmth. The black kit swallowed his uncertainty and let his body fall back into the nest, his body entwined with his brothers'.
o3o
"Just what do you think you're doing?"
Pinekit opened his eyes. A dark cat was outlined against the fading moonlight filtering into the den. For a moment, the young cat was frightened. It's the cat from my dream earlier! But then his eyes adjusted, and he recognized the bristling brown pelt of Fleetwhisker.
The tom was standing rigidly over him, his tail straight out behind him and fluffed up. With the dying night still masking part of his face, Pinekit couldn't help but remark, "You look like a pathetic raccoon."
"Get off of my sons," Fleetwhisker snapped.
"Okay, okay, chill," Pinekit mumbled, sliding his shoulder out from under Owlkit and removing his tail from Scarkit's rising and falling chest. "Raccoonface," he added in a whisper, though luckily the lithe brown warrior didn't appear to have heard him.
Grunting, Fleetwhisker nosed Owlkit and Scarkit awake, then proceeded to pick up the former. The tiny spotted tom squeaked in protest- "I'm five moons old, Fleetwhisker!"- while Scarkit snickered and followed them. Pinekit stared at the mottled kit until his tail had whipped around the corner. It's like they don't even remember clinging on to me...
He was startled by Needlekit's incomprehensible mew, and twisted to see his brother looking ruffled and disgruntled a tail-length away. Ivykit was nowhere to be seen; probably already carried outside by her father.
"You were run over by the Fleet-monster too?" Pinekit asked, even though the answer was obvious.
Needlekit just sighed and nodded. "I don't know what his problem is. He doesn't give a mouse-tail about his kits for nearly a moon, and now he's shoving us aside in favor of his blood offspring."
Pinekit rolled his eyes. "Captain Obvious."
"Well, sometimes it's good to be obvious," Needlekit said, making his way over and flicking his brother over the ear with his tail. "Because often you don't see the situation exactly as it is."
I do this time, Pinekit thought grimly. But he didn't tell his sibling.
o3o
"Hey, I've got an idea to get our minds off Raccoonface."
"I don't even understand that nickname. He doesn't have a single black hair on his pelt," Needlekit objected.
Pinekit shoved him. "It's a long story. But don't you want to hear my idea?"
It was around sunhigh, and the pair was sunbathing after an interminable game of moss-ball that'd finally been settled by Pinekit kicking the ball into a clump of poison ivy.
"I suppose I have no choice. Shoot."
"Let's play a game where we pretend to be each other," Pinekit chirped excitedly. "Like, I act like you, and you act like me."
Needlekit's gaze drifted lazily across the clearing, and Pinekit, with a prick of irritation, wondered if he was even fully listening. "And the goal of this is?"
Pinekit embedded his claws in the needle-strewn earth. "To get our minds off you-know-who, like I said. 'Cause if we just keep thinking about Sir Grouchy, we'll be unhappy."
"And unhappy is... 'ungood'," Needlekit meowed, reciting Pinekit's current life motto. "Fine. Let's do it. I call the elders-"
"No way," Pinekit interrupted. "I would never hang around the elders, they'd know it's you. Go try chatting up some younger warriors, and I'll face the elders."
Needlekit inclined his head, then straightened and bounded across the clearing- just what I do. Pinekit winced as he watched the other black tom. Though I hope I don't look as graceful as a goose, like he does.
Making his paws heavy, Pinekit practically dragged himself across the clearing. He passed Graypaw, who was sitting with Blizzardpaw. The gray she-cat dipped her head and questioned, "How's it going, Needlekit?"
A triumphant spark burned in his chest, and a chuckle started to creep up his throat, but he held it back and answered neutrally, "Fine, Graypaw. Thank you for asking."
He continued on, passing several cats who barely spared him a glance. Finally Pinekit reached the elders' den, a place he had never visited before. This has always been Needlekit's haven, not mine. With a deep breath, he strolled it as nonchalantly as he could muster.
A patchy cream-and-gray tom in the corner of the den lifted his head and flashed a stained yellow smile. "Needlekit! Come closer, son. It's so dark in here, I can only see those bright eyes of yours."
Pinekit chewed on his lip and shuffled forward a mouse-length toward the old tom- Ferretclaw, I think he is. Why is he calling me son? I'm not-
"Is that Needlekit? Ah, Needlekit, ol' buddy! What wisdom do you have to share with us today?" Redpatch's dappled, scarred face loomed out from the shadows.
Pinekit shakily sat down between their nests and gulped as he curled his tail over his paws, like Needlekit often did. "Well," he began, "You wouldn't believe what my uncontrollable brother, Pinekit, did today..."
I thought they finally needed to do that classic twin-switcheroo thing.