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"Has someone, anyone, seen my eyes? I'm afraid I've dropped them in a puddle."

-Bloodborne: The Old Hunters

Chapter 44:: The Futility of Life

Winterflame was stumbling and he couldn't properly remember why. There was a weight over his shoulders and he wondered what it was, but every time he wondered his mind immediately focused on something else. All he was aware of was that beside him, Bloodeye was sharing the same weight.

His paws automatically followed the same path to the camp that they had his entire life. He took extra care to not trip on a rock or a root. He took extra care to make his pawsteps even. His breath even. His mind occupied.

He was suddenly beset by the issue of the camp tunnel not being wide enough for both himself and Bloodeye and he stopped. Bloodeye hissed and said some words that Winterflame didn't hear, but his body moved with Bloodeye's to set the weight onto the snow. No longer bound by it, he was free to enter the camp. Some curses were said behind him and he heard the morbid sound of weight being dragged.

"Winterflame." He recognized Poisontongue's singular voice and raised his eyes. "Where's Blood-"

He cut off his words, and Winterflame knew that he had seen. He deemed his presence no longer needed and moved away.

He definitely saw it, and so did everyone else.

There was suddenly a very loud bustle, and Winterflame's ears pressed against his head. His paws made their way to his den for some quiet and because he was tired, but his legs went slack and he found it necessary to be seated.

"Winterflame?" There were hesitant pawsteps next to him, and Winterflame looked up to Rockpaw with an emotion something like relief. Rockpaw's eyes were bright as always, their colour made bluer by the snow. They were wide now, and Winterflame could sense his tension and it made him tense, too.

He always tried to be relatively friendly to Rockpaw because Rockpaw was friendly to him and when two cats are friendly to each other, it makes their interactions pleasant. However, the breath in his throat constricted his words and he could only say three words. He wasn't aware of what those words were; he didn't hear them or have any predetermination of what they would be, he felt his mouth move and that was all.

He tried to offer a smile then, because Rockpaw suddenly looked very troubled, but his lip curled the wrong way and suddenly tears were threading through his fur.

(POV: Stonewhisker)

Stonewhisker often felt that he was dead. This was not a falsity; his body lay rotting underneath many others covered by dirt and roots. Sometimes he woke up within that body. He opened his eyes and breathed and smelled the sweet air and felt his breath flit in and out of his veins in painful whistles. Those were the times his ears heard a voice, a quiet, rambling whisper of a voice. He could never understand the words and idly thought that they weren't words at all. It muttered and its pitch fluctuated without purpose and its tone rocked back and forth and back and back and back and then it was silent because Stonewhisker's eyes had closed again.

Stonewhisker often felt that he was dead, but sometimes he felt like he was alive.

His heart beat slowly, and painfully. He breathed again, and opened his eyes again, prepared for the torture saved for the living alone.

But he saw two eyes pointed towards his own.

He felt a sudden hope. Here was an angel, here to save him! Or another corpse being tortured the same as him, or just a living cat here to share their woes. In any case, he wouldn't be alone anymore.

But, no. He realized quickly that they were none of those things. They were just two eyeballs connected to nothing in particular, bloodshot and staring.

Whose are they? he wondered curiously. Maybe their owner was close by. Maybe not, maybe just a mouth and a tail. In any case, if they were, then he wouldn't be alone anymore.

But the mouth and tail were on his body.

Those were his own eyes staring at him.

And, with this revelation, he suddenly saw through his eyes. He saw himself. The blood that was frozen, the grotesque twist of his jaw, the black, leaking holes where his eyes were supposed to be.

He would have screamed, cried even. He would have run away. He couldn't do anything, though.

His days were spent trying to close his eyes, trying not to breathe anymore. But he had to. He stared at himself while his fur fell off and his teeth became gnashed and his skin turned into bone.

(POV: Rockpaw)

"Ah, so it's Blooddapple this time, isn't it?" Fowlpaw was beside Rockpaw and Rockpaw had been ignoring him for a while. The medicine cat shrugged. "Well that's unfortunate, I guess."

Rockpaw could have been surprised if he'd tried to be, but he was in the perfect mood to accept that Fowlpaw was among the scum of the earth. He flattened his ears and turned away. But he still spoke. He was unable to determine whether it was curiosity or some desperate attempt to find humanity in Fowlpaw's derisively aloof gaze that prompted him to ask the question- "How can you be so casual about it?"

Rockpaw had eventually figured out that the reason for the suspicion against him when he had first arrived was a drawn-out series of murders in SkyClan. Sphinxface eventually did clear him of almost all suspicion, and it was likely to have cleared completely now that Rockpaw had an alibi for Blooddapple's murder. In that sense, Rockpaw could see how Fowlpaw could have been numb to death to a certain degree. But it didn't altogether seem that way.

Fowlpaw shrugged. "Cats die. It's my job to be casual about it."

Rockpaw finally turned to look at him with a hard look of surprise. "You're a medicine cat. It's your job to care about it."

And Folwpaw looked back at him with a gaze of mock sympathy. "It's my job to care about living cats. Do you think that by the time I saw Blooddapple, I would have been able to help her?" He gestured to her with a jerking twitch of his head that was very true to his fashion. "I couldn't care less that she's dead because I was never in a position to prevent it."

Rockpaw scoffed. With an outlook like that, it was a wonder that Fowlpaw was a medicine cat apprentice instead of a warrior. He decided to voice these opinions.

And then Fowlpaw scoffed. "A warrior? No, that's not me, sorry."

"Why?" Rockpaw tilted his head rather mockingly. "What, are you some kind of pacifist? Or just a coward?"

"All cowards are pacifists," Fowlpaw quickly retorted.

"But not all pacifists are cowards. So which is it?"

Fowlpaw turned away and did not answer.

"I have to go out and pluck the jasmine from its root," he said softly. "Knead the perfume onto the fur, lay the petals around the corpse. His whispered tone was was such a change of mood that Rockpaw's frustration dissipated immediately into curiosity.

"I've been told to find a warrior apprentice to come with me. There is a serial killer out there, you know." Suddenly that sarcastic jauntiness was back, and he bounced onto his paws and began trotting away. "So let's go, Rockpaw."

"What? Wait." He quickly moved to stand in front of Fowlpaw, blocking his path. "If Blooddapple couldn't fight it off, what makes you think an apprentice can?"

Fowlpaw gave him a mean snicker that caught him by surprise. "Don't worry, Rockpaw. You're really only there as a safety net." He suddenly stepped forward, looking nose-to-nose into Rockpaw's eyes very sincerely. "You can trust me, I promise." Rockpaw backed away indignantly and gave him an irritated glare. Fowlpaw laughed, returning to the expression of sarcasm and mockery. "I am neither a coward nor a pacifist. There's no need to worry." He stalked past Rockpaw with his tail held high.

It took a moment for Rockpaw to follow. Fowlpaw's words had left a chill in his spine, and his deadened eye had seemed to glimmer. He did wind up following, eventually, however, he had decided not to follow Fowlpaw's advice. He was very worried.