Annd... we're back on schedule!
I hope you enjoy this chapter, it's a bit of a transitional one with some introspection and all. Next chapter we'll hopefully get some action, but I'm not entirely sure what'll happen then, as I haven't written it yet. ^^
I'm not entirely sure what else to put here, so on to the review replies~
Nightbird: Here's some more Moki! -hands Moki plushie-
Shadow: I know! -sniff- But they'll come around... eventually...
Leopardstar: Thank you! That's kind of like me, but I get annoyed by them easily so I tend to keep them rather short.
Lilystripe608: I'm not sure if I should feel guilty or flattered that you cried a little... I'll just awkwardly hover between them and switch at random times, how about? :3 This is another happy chapter, hope you like it!
collaterals: Aw, thank you so much! -hugs- It really means a lot, thanks a million for reading my story! I'm really pleased with how it's turned out so far (especially with Rowan's and Raven's parents... no one's guessed who they are yet!). Here's the next update, sorry it's a little later than usual.
BrightMind: Yep! :) -hands cookie- Really? I got the feeling I described their actions a little too much, I'm glad you enjoy it! Yeah, munchkin cats are super adorable, and they actually aren't that disabled, they can run and jump just like normal cats, though not as high, like a cat dachshund.
Eradrin: Yeah, I am! I'm going to about 4 camps this summer (whew!), one of which is the same church camp I went to last year, and doing swim team again. It doesn't leave much time for writing but hopefully I'll be able to keep my updates relatively on-time... ^^; My favorite part is probably the freedom I have to meet up with friends, I had two lunches/hangout sessions with completely different friends this week, as well as going strawberry picking, which is fairly incredible. How bout chu?
I started awake, chest thumping like paws against concrete, to the sound of muffled scraping. Half blinded by light, I grunted to myself and squinted through still-adjusting eyes, staring wildly around for my attacker.
"Morning, sunshine!" A slight thud sounded and an odd, somewhat tantalizing scent wafted in my direction. Pupils narrowed against the smothering brightness, I blinked Moki into focus as the overwhelming, sickening tang of blood dissipated from my nostrils.
Of course it was the munchie. I doubted if Rowanpaw would even be able to say the word "sunshine" this early (curse the east-facing door). Her head poked over the edge of my crate tower—I realized, to my dismay, she'd found my lookout—and at her chin lay a hunk of something brownish. Was it edible? It certainly looked so, though it smelled rather sharper than any food I'd ever encountered.
Moki didn't seem fazed by my silence. Nosing the brownish thing toward me, she insisted, "Breakfast. Come on, you look hungry."
I was; I hadn't eaten anything since the previous morning. But despite the painful emptiness in my midriff, my teeth remained stuck together in an interlocking pattern. I'd just met this cat yesterday, so why should I trust her?
Picking up on my hesitation, Moki rolled her eyes good-naturedly. "You're a good little city cat, aren't you? But you don't need to worry, I'm not about to poison you. Imagine trying to lug your dead body off these crates and out the door! That'd be way too much work, trust me. It wouldn't be worth it." She nosed the lump—breakfast?—again, pushing it close enough to brush my paw. I unconsciously tucked my foot underneath my chest, wincing as the movement stretched my still-sore shoulder. "Eat," she urged. "Honest, it's good."
I shot her one last calculating stare before giving in. If hunger still pulsed through my body when Rowanpaw got his portion, I would be too distracted to properly watch over him. What if he was poisoned because I couldn't force him to throw up in time? He would, of course, start eating without a second thought. Sure, Moki seemed nice enough, but I'd always been taught to mistrust cats in general. I wasn't about to stray from that even if Rowanpaw and I were on our own.
My thoughts slipped back to where they'd been stewing just before Moki woke me up, and my chest transformed back into concrete. The dream had emphasized the gathering shadows in wake of the setting sun, emphasized the splashes of dark, dark red, painting the grayscale with flashes of color.
No. I couldn't think about that, couldn't dwell on that. I'd left it behind in the city. Out here we were unknown, the world was unknown, everything was unknown. I had to stay strong and focused if I wanted to survive, if I had to help Rowanpaw survive. I had to focus… focus…
My gaze strayed back to Moki, her eyes bright, encouraging, and her claws sunk deep into the wood of the crate to hold herself up. I blinked at her paws—weren't they getting sore by now from holding up her entire body weight?
"Um, you can get down if you need to," I meowed awkwardly.
"What? Oh, this?" Moki shifted her paws, pulling one free and flexing its claws. "Nah, I'm fine. And besides, you're not eating." She nosed the lump of what I assumed to be meat. I continued ignoring it.
"But… how can you stay there for so long?"
Moki's eyes glinted. "Well, being a munchkin, my shorter legs move my body closer to the crates, meaning I exert less energy than normal cats do. Additionally, since I'm shorter, I weigh less, so there's less of me to hold up."
I blinked. Being a munchkin was helpful? That couldn't be right. She must be faking… right? But then again, how could she fake hanging there for such a long time? And, now that I thought about it, how'd she get up there in the first place? Didn't Royce say munchkins couldn't jump properly?
"Come on, eat!" Moki urged. "I know you're hungry." Her words were echoed by a loud snarl from my midsection, as though my belly had turned into a ravenous dog. Moki's mouth stretched in a triumphant smirk. "See?"
Ugh. "Fine," I muttered, focusing my irises once again on the probably-meat. Bending down, I sniffed at it, wrinkling my nose at the overpowering tanginess of the scent. For a moment I hesitated, wondering if this really was the smartest thing to do. But at the frantic urging of my belly, I swallowed, gathered my courage, held my breath, and dabbed it quickly with my tongue.
It tasted salty, overpoweringly salty—which, I supposed, was probably the source of the smell—and somewhat shriveled. I licked my lips a couple times to deplete the taste's strength, spreading it out over my fur, swallowing what was still in my mouth, then recovering the spread-out taste from my fur again.
It was rather gross, but judging from the aftertaste, it was indeed meat. My stomach roared in triumph, gurgling happily for more. Of course, I supposed I had eaten worse in the city, and the slight taste of food had heightened my hunger to an overpowering force. Swallowing another couple times to ensure the taste had been fully eradicated from my mouth, I summoned my bravery again and grabbed a chunk of the meat between my teeth.
Though I tried my best to keep my tongue from touching my bite, I couldn't prevent the salty flavor from flooding my mouth, probably because my mouthful refused to part easily from the toughened larger portion. As I struggled with it, both forepaws holding the lump of meat down, I reflected it must be several days old. Unappealing, sure, but I had, of course, eaten worse in the city, so I refused to let it bother me.
Finally managing to tear off my mouthful, I quickly transferred to my back teeth, opening my mouth wide as if yawning to bite down on the meat. Water flooded my jaws, washing the salty taste toward my tongue. Between the taste and the overall texture of the meat, I had a difficult time forcing down my gag reflex. To prevent myself from retching, I dropped half of my mouthful on the crate's surface, only able to pick it back up after swallowing the first half and waiting a couple moments to properly swallow the overpowering saltiness.
On the other side of what remained of my breakfast, I saw Moki struggling not to laugh. "A little strong, isn't it?" she meowed. "Don't worry, you get used to it." She glanced over her shoulder, to where I knew Rowanpaw to be sleeping. "You finish that, okay? And I'll get Rowanpaw his." Retracting her claws, she pushed herself away from the crate tower, twisting in midair to land perfectly balanced on the train floor, then immediately slipping into a fissure between boxes. I blinked, startled by her sudden agility, before returning my attention to my breakfast.
I worked my way slowly through the meal, pausing every few bites to check for symptoms of poisoning: increased heartrate, pressure on my lungs, tingling paws or tail, etc. (it never hurt to be careful). By the time I'd licked down the last morsels, I had, as Moki had insisted, gotten used to the saltiness. While still unpleasant, the taste was bearable.
I licked my lips to swallow the last few traces of meat, my belly not quite full but still pleasantly hunger-free. Standing, I stretched, wincing at the twinge of pain in my stiff shoulder. Blinking away the last few traces of sleep, I surveyed my surroundings.
The train car looked much the same as it had the previous night, complete with crates, boxes, shadows, and cats. Training my eyes near the base of my tower, I watched as Moki, teeth gripping another salty hunk of meat, poked a paw into Rowanpaw's side, just between his ribs. "Morning su—"
With a loud hiss, Rowanpaw slapped her foot away, rolling and extending all four sets of claws in Moki's direction, one forepaw almost brushing her muzzle. The hunk of meat fell with a slight thump to the ground as Moki hastily backed away, eyes wide. Cautiously, feeling I might be needed to intervene, I slipped off my crates, landing soft-pawed beside my brother.
Rowanpaw blinked open his eyes, squinting through the fuzziness gifted to him by sleep. Upon recognizing his supposed "attacker," he hastily lowered his paws and sheathed his claws. "Sorry," he muttered, coughing slightly at the hoarseness in his throat. Rasping his tongue over his foreleg self-consciously, he cleared the last of the sleep-goo from his eyes and pushed himself up on his elbows. Spotting the meat lying forgotten between Moki's paws, he nodded at it and meowed, "What's that?"
"Um…" Moki glanced downward. "Oh! This?" She pushed it closer to Rowanpaw with one stunted foot. "Breakfast," she insisted. "I, uh, assume you're hungry?"
"Oh. Yeah, yeah I am." Rowanpaw bent down to sniff at his meal, recoiling suddenly with a wrinkled muzzle. "What is this?" he asked, sounding disgusted.
I almost missed Moki's reply through my snort. "Salt pork. The Trainmen keep these huge stores of them for food. I've rarely seen them eat any, though, oddly enough."
"Probably because they smell poisonous," Rowanpaw muttered, eying his salt pork with a wary expression.
Moki shrugged. "It's good once you get used to the saltiness. Just imagine it's salt from prey blood, that's what I do. Trainmen don't eat blood at all, for some strange reason, so I guess they overcompensate with salt."
Rowanpaw tentatively took a nibble off the end, much like I'd done. And, like me, he almost spat it out at the overly salty flavor. I snorted again and earned a glare from Rowanpaw. "Yeah, like you liked it any better than me," he grumbled.
As Rowanpaw finished his breakfast (with many snort-worthy moments, like when he got a string of meat stuck between his teeth and tried endlessly to dislodge it), Moki and I waited patiently. Finally, licking the last few traces of salt from his lips, Rowanpaw sat up and looked back and forth between us. "I'm thirsty," he declared.
"I figured," Moki nodded. "You too, Ravenpaw, right?"
Now that you mention it, I thought, suddenly recognizing the dryness on the roof of my mouth, the yearning in the back of my throat.
"Follow me," she meowed, getting to her paws and leading the way toward her most common hiding place, the space between box and crate along the opposite wall of the train car. Flicking her tail, she disappeared into it. With a glance at Rowanpaw, who had already gotten to his paws, his tongue peeping out from between his partially open jaws, I followed him and Moki into the shadows.
It was dark and cramped, though surprisingly dust-free; I supposed Moki had walked this path enough times to effectively clean it. Nose twitching as Rowanpaw's tail brushed my muzzle, I touched my whiskers against the box beside me and followed his and Moki's scents back into the mazelike space, winding around stacks of wood and cardboard. After a moment of silence, I felt Rowanpaw's tail brush my paws, warning me to stop.
In the minimal amounts of light filtering back through the hard-edged surrogate walls, I saw the flash of white on Moki's paws dance back and forth. "Back here there's a leak in the roof, and when it rains water drips down and lands here, in this puddle. It's a bit dirty and smells funny, but it's liquid. It's handy because, though it hasn't rained in about a quarter moon, water lasts a long time in the shade back here. Go ahead and drink, just be careful not to slip on the mildew."
Rowanpaw shifted forward and the sounds of his tentative lapping filled the air. I waited endlessly until he finally scooted sideways, giving me just enough room to edge forward. Reaching forward with my paws until they encountered wetness, I crouched at the edge of the puddle and lowered my muzzle until my chin brushed the surface. I drank until my thirst was sated enough for me to be vaguely disgusted by the scent of mildew, then sat up and licked a few stray droplets from the short fur lining my muzzle.
"Finished?" Moki asked. I nodded, then realized she probably couldn't see me. It didn't matter, though; believing her assumption to be correct, Moki barely left us enough time to answer before moving on. "All right, then, let's head on out."
As I'd entered last, I was probably the closest to the exit and should lead the way now. Shuffling my paws, I tried to turn around, but there wasn't quite enough room on dry ground. Figuring it wouldn't matter much if I got damp paws, I edged into the puddle before twisting around.
Suddenly I found myself falling. I hit the ground with a muted splash, water soaking my fur instantly. I froze from shock, adrenaline pounding through my body as I scrambled upright again.
"Ravenpaw? That you?"
Inwardly cursing my white fur, which probably stood out like the moon against a background of dark clouds, just as Moki's striped paws had earlier, I refused to answer. My pelt burned against the somewhat cool water and it was suddenly much harder to keep my ears and chin up.
Moki clicked her tongue sympathetically before speaking again. "Yeah, I probably should've figured it'd be too cramped back here to turn around. Sorry about that, I should have suggested you back out of here."
It probably wouldn't have done anything, as my pride would've gotten in the way of me exiting tail-first, but Moki's taking of part of the blame helped a little. I narrowed my eyes to better make out the light (it seemed my fall had helped something, as I now faced the exit) and padded slowly forward, whiskers against the wall again to guide myself out of the dark tunnel.
The three of us exited Moki's fissure and I made my way swiftly over toward the base of my tower. Sitting down with my back against the rough wood, my body blocking the wind from my damp side, I started cleaning the mixture of water and mildew from my fur.
I began with my chest, working my way down through my belly fur, then traveling back up toward my head, pausing along the way to wash my legs and paws. As I worked on my ears, using my almost-clean forepaws to rub the drying mildew from the short fur, I caught a glimpse of a pair of grass-green eyes fixed on mine.
Rowanpaw's expression was odd; I couldn't quite read it, despite having grown up with him, having memorized most of his facial gestures by about three moons of age. He looked almost… longing? Though it wasn't just that, there was also sadness, a hint of depression? But then again, now that I really thought about it, Rowanpaw was wearing his resting face. Could I have just been projecting emotions onto him to read?
His eyes never wavered from mine, despite how I'd been gazing quizzically at him for several long moments, trying to decipher the enigma in his expression. What was he up to? What did he want?
"Um, hey Rowanpaw," I meowed uncertainly.
He didn't respond. Perhaps I should've tried a more direct method?
"What?"
Rowanpaw looked down, away, focusing his pupils on the grimy floor. "Nothing."
"What?" I repeated, a little more emotion worming into my meow. He'd been staring at me with such intensity, despite his neutral expression; it obviously wasn't nothing.
"I just…" he blew out a breath, growing silent again. I waited expectantly, not daring to make a sound, to move at all. My eyes fixed on his, which stared fixedly at the ground. For a moment I considered holding my breath, but decided against it; who knew how long Rowanpaw would hold his silence?
"What are we going to do, Ravenpaw?" he finally burst out, lowering his voice to ensure Moki remained out of earshot. "Where are we going to go?"
"I…" I hesitated, biting my tongue. He had a point. I hadn't been thinking much about the future. Admittedly, I hadn't been thinking much lately, due to the irritating habit of my mind to drift toward the past—
"I don't know." Taking a deep breath to refocus myself on the present, I continued, "What could we do? What are our options?"
"Well…" Rowanpaw's eyes flicked toward the door. "We could go live in the wilderness somewhere. Just hop off the train and make ourselves a home."
"That's no fun," I grumbled. "Where's the adventure in that?"
"Sometimes life isn't about adventure. It's about survival."
"Yeah, and to survive we need food. I don't know about you but I've never caught wild prey before and I'm not sure if I can."
"I bet we could learn pretty quickly. Remember when Asteria caught us that rabbit? She was pretty quick about it; I bet there's a ton of prey out there we can practice on."
"Yeah, and after that? We learn to hunt, then what? We settle down somewhere and eat and sleep for the rest of our lives. No thank you."
Rowanpaw sighed. "Okay, fine. Your turn. Where to, Ravenstar?"
Ah… dog-dung. "Um, we could just wait for the train to slow down and hop off at the station? If what Moki says is true, there'll be a city around there. We can—"
"Hey, we could go with Moki!" Rowanpaw cut in. I stared at him, eyebrows raised. "What?" he added defensively. "It's a good idea. I bet she'd love some company on her travels."
"Uh huh. And you'd prefer to traipse off into the unknown instead of sticking with what we know?"
"Where's the adventure in that?" He gave me a look. "That's no fun, right?"
My pelt boiling under my rising flush, I glared at him. "Cities are full of adventures, what're you talking about? And this is a new city, so we'd have completely new places to explore."
"And completely new dangers to avoid. Come on, I don't want to live in a dirty city all my life!"
"You seemed fine with it before, when the choice was city or Clans," I shot back. "You were perfectly content to grow old there. What's the difference now?"
"I… how can you stand to even consider living in a city again?" Rowanpaw spat suddenly, his eyes bursting into flames. "What, were you thinking about getting a nice little rag nest behind two metal cans in a dusty alley again?"
His words splattered a full color, highly defined image across my mind's eye. I reeled backward from its force, staring wide-eyed at a vision of a younger Ravenkit playing with Rowankit, their identical eyes shining with pure, unblemished joy. In the background lay Thalia and Toby, their tails not quite touching, watching the play-fight. As I slipped and accidentally inhaled a lungful of dust, sneezing violently several times in quick succession, Toby let out a burst of laughter. He nudged Thalia, who resigned herself to a small smile, her eyes gleaming with affection…
"No!" The thought burst from my mouth like a train from a tunnel, echoing around the small space, resounding in my cone-shaped ears. No… No…
I couldn't meet Rowanpaw's gaze, fearful of seeing other memories plastered there. For that was obviously what this was about. Memories. Too many of them filled the cities, not just the one we'd fled but also the one we approached.
"Fine," I growled, staring at the ground, at the dull shine of my partially unsheathed claws. If only I could claw the memories out of my head, maybe that would help.
"Fine?" Rowanpaw repeated. "As in… fine, we're going with Moki?" He eyed me shrewdly from behind a closed expression.
"It would be cool to see what that Tribe was all about," I muttered to myself.
"What was that? A Tribe?"
"Moki's going to find her brother. I guess he's in some sort of Tribe."
"Oh. Okay, yeah. I guess we'll go to this Tribe?"
Before I could nod, I heard Moki's somewhat scratchy voice calling from across the train. "Hey you two! Get your butts over here, pronto!"
I glanced over, blinking and narrowing my eyes to focus on Moki's dark fur, blocking out the cloudy light shining through the door. My mind just barely had time to process the contrast of her pale teeth against her fur before I was sucked back in by what I saw outside the train. My eyelids stretched as far open as they could go and my jaws parted, allowing the chilly air access to my damp tongue.
"See?" Moki meowed in triumph. "See? What'd I tell you? I do believe I have a knack for predicting weather. Comes in handy when traveling, eh?"
Her jabbering washed casually through my memory, leaving only a slight imprint behind. I couldn't focus on her words when my entire attention was fixated on the… what even was it?
Cautiously, with claws sheathed and soft, wary pawsteps, I padded slowly forward. I knew full well it wasn't going to hurt me—it couldn't hurt me, it wasn't mentally capable, being an inanimate object—yet still I found myself unwilling to disturb the silent serenity. By making a noise, it would draw attention to me, like I was proclaiming myself to be superior to this phenomenon. And although we were about the same color, I knew I could never compare in wonder to whatever this was.
"I do enjoy the first snowfall of the season," Moki breathed. "Frozen-time can't start without snow for me."
Snow. Thousands, millions of miniscule fragments drifting toward the ground with a mission to correct the world's imperfections, to hide them under a coating of purest white and give the world a second chance, a chance to begin again, a chance to… to become a different cat, even. A different backstory, a different personality, a different… me. It certainly sounded appealing. No longer would I have to be an abandoned city kit. I could take control of my life, mold it the way I wanted it to be. Maybe I could even wipe away the memories of my kithood, maybe I could get that innocent, joyful spark back in my eyes. Suddenly being unknown sounded much more appealing.
My toes found the edge of the train, but surprisingly I didn't care much; neither, for some reason, did Rowanpaw, as he crept up beside me, paws very close to the edge of the train. I almost reached out a paw into the breath of some set of monstrous lungs, but common sense insisted I'd probably overbalance if I leaned forward much more. And besides, batting at the snow was probably a kit thing, anyway. I couldn't go acting like a kit anymore.
Even so, I couldn't help but be transfixed by the delicate, tiny flakes, caught in the whirlwind of air coating the train. Now, of course, I realized the point of snow. It wasn't practical or useful, no, but it was beautiful. The point of snow was beauty.
I've been waiting to write that last sentence for several chapters now, ever since Raven was introduced to the idea of snow.
I'm actually going to do two QOTDs today (shocking, I know!), so you can answer one or the other or both or neither, whatever you want! It gives you a little more of a choice and I was, surprisingly, able to think up two for this chapter.
QOTD1: Thoughts on snow?
AOTD1: I think it's really pretty and I love when it closes school. It can be slightly annoying when the pantry starts running out of food but otherwise I really enjoy snow.
QOTD2: What do you think is going to happen next chapter when they arrive at the city?
See you next chapter! ^^