No matter what Mira had done, the mud had stubbornly jammed itself beneath her fur. She had felt double her weight clad with the pasty stuff. The instinct to groom herself had been cancelled out by Proxima's many prior warnings on ingesting it. She was glad it had, at least, smelled like normal mud. Mira had shared her misery with the rest of Yonder Five, who she had left to scout down the south bank of a wide river for a crossing.
It was less a river than a path of sludge creeping to the south. What Mira imagined were once lush fields of grasses and trees were now sickly patches and hollow tree trunks. The dead grasses she walked through even stuck to her paws, leaving a perfect record on where she had gone. Her thirst only grew in the harsh, pinkish-hazel daylight that only grew hotter at the top of the short cliff they had climbed to reach the river.
Mira sighed in relief she finally reached her not-so-far destination. A silver pole stuck out from the middle of the mud river, topped by a blinking, red light.
"Proxima?" Mira called out, ears flicking away new specs of mud. "I see the pole, but no bridge?"
A single disc-shaped drone, colored in natural greens that would've blended into a healthy riverbank, hovered precariously over the mud, bathed as much of the river as it could in blue light, and suddenly dropped into it. Mira sighed as a red light flickered on an identical drone following her. "That was the bridge," Proxima's voice said through the drone. "The mud clogged the lift mechanism days prior."
"Then we have to go further north and find another," Mira sighed.
"The river has been this way since an orbital strike hit its headwaters. Further north is too dangerous, even if any bridges are left standing. Further south is a growing mountain of toxic debris. And wading here is impossible."
"The Star Covenant envoys must've crossed before it was this bad." It pained her a little to remember the agonizing fate the three cats had met nights prior. "If they knew poisonous rain would do all this, they would've traveled through the nights."
"I will need to fetch a temporary bridge. Wait with the others."
The red dot on the drone flickered off, but it kept close. Mira sighed, wishing Proxima would bring some water while she was at it. She made the mud-sodden walk back to Yonder Five's resting spot, taking her time to avoid growing even more hungry and thirsty. She noticed the shoreline grew a little smaller as sludge washed over the bank like a tiny wave that never receded. It pushed up nothing and consumed everything. Mira dared not touch it, and neither did the others. Beyond their rest, she spotted a young tom flanking Hydran returning from the south. His cream-colored fur was just as dirty as hers and he calmly spat mud from his missing fang.
"There's nothing," the old tom struggled to say between picking mud from his mouth. "Nowhere to cross."
He eagerly looked in Mira's direction, as did the other cats. "The bridge can't be raised," Mira said, to their dismay. "Proxima will fetch something we can cross on. But it must be as soon as she gets back. The river is swelling."
"The sooner we get out of here, the better." Leea grumbled, a bundle of fur curled on her back and out of the mud.
Mira plopped herself under a hollow tree, though it provided no shadow or rest from the mysterious heat. The drone extended arms and plucked at the largest bits of bramble. Hydran had his fur brushed by a pair of elders. Leea rolled onto her back, mimicking what the other queen had done earlier, to nurse Aza without letting him touch the ground. The kit, too young to utter a word, looked like he would sink right in if she let him go. Mira hoped the mud wasn't as dangerous as Proxima made it seem.
Further from the banks, the older kits were sitting in a rare patch of hardened ground. Hosta kept a watchful eye over them, keeping one tom a little younger than herself close. The others looked thirsty or weary, but Hosta and the tom just looked tired. Though she had been given accountability over her peers as the oldest of Yonder Five's youths, Mira had witnessed her receive her new responsibilities just days prior. And, no less, on the day she found out her mother had been killed and she would be leaving the only home she knew. She was no more mature than those she was asked to guard.
The waiting was excruciating, the sky barely indicating any passing time. Mira waved off the drone when it started digging through the deepest grooves of her fur, pointing it in the direction of the queens. It did not obey, hovering motionless above her. Just moments after standing she heard a crack. Leea's good ear perked up in time to watch a tree collapse to splinters over the other queen and her three newborn kits. The rest of the tribe was only alerted when it was too late. Before Mira could call Proxima's name, a paw burst from the center of the splinters. Tiny gusts of wind eroded the dead bark to dust.
"How?" Hydran whispered, not even processing the queen's supposed death.
The shaken queen emerged, the tree dissolving and floating away as quietly as it fell. She handed her kits to a waiting trio of mollies who began cleaning them as they wailed for their unfinished meal. Other cats brushed the dust from her fur with light strokes of their claws, mindful of the burns she had received days ago protecting her kits from poisonous rain.
"It's like the tree was made of wind," the queen said to Mira, still shaken. "How is that possible?" She and others turned towards Mira, who just shook her head without answer.
"Maybe StarClan is protecting us?" Hosta uttered her first words that day.
"Perhaps," Mira said. "They certainly haven't abandoned us."
"My vision didn't end here," Hydran chimed in. "If Mira says we are being protected, I believe her."
"Well they've certainly abandoned this land," a young tom snorted, kicking up a clump of mud.
The kits were given back to the queen and kept nursing as if nothing happened. Those resting at the base of trees slid themselves out of their way and closer to the riverbank. Mira pushed a paw against another tree and it effortlessly crunched through. She wondered why they had no scent, not even like they were dead or burned, or how the ground could be muddy without any water to keep the trees alive. The drone, preoccupied through the collapse, extended a blinking rod and faced Mira.
Before she could ask a question, the ground began to rumble. The drone hovered close to the riverbank and bathed blue lights over the hills on the other side. All ears swiveled behind their group as a new, sterile scent emerged. Trees were being pulverized by a massive treaded monster quietly rolling forward. Its dull hum echoed through the mess it created to reach the riverbank. Mira held up her paw to reassure the others this was Proxima's doing and approached it.
"What is this?" Mira said, sniffing the green-and-gray-fatigued monster.
"A pontoon bridge." Proxima's voice was muffled over the monster's chatter holes as it unloaded a symmetrical pair of flexible poles. "They are kept close to permanent bridges in case of emergencies. But they were designed for water, not sludge, so cross immediately."
Some of the cats meowed with joy. They began gathering to the side of the monster, but not nearly as close as Mira stood. The poles it unraveled were longer than she thought, extending multiple tree-lengths to reach the other side of the river. Two loud pops startled the group; A massive cylindrical bag inflated the length of each pole and held them above the mud, joining them together with interlocking silverwood planks.
Despite its bobbing, Mira leapt onto the makeshift bridge without a second thought. The monster disconnected itself from it and tried rolling back the way it came, but it was quickly bogged down. The remainder of its payload, spare flexible poles and silverwood planks, spilled onto the riverbank. With all its lights dimming and the chatter holes clicking off, it died a third of the way sunken into the ground.
"Is it safe?" Hydran called out.
"Yes." Mira was a third of the way across, the disc-shaped drone hovering at her side. "But we should cross now, like Proxima said."
They shuffled the elders, led by Hydran, onto the floating bridge first. They were apprehensive, but sped up when they felt the wobbling for themselves. Mira stayed halfway across just in case. The youths were shuffled on with them. Hosta kept her cool, but moved slower than the elders. None seemed to mind, though, as they kept themselves in a tight pack flanked by a pair of adults.
The shaken queen leapt onto the bridge next, carrying two kits by the scruff while the third instinctively clung to her neck. Hydran offered to help, taking the kit pressed against one of her burns. Leea came next, but couldn't grasp a squirming Aza by his scruff, so she plopped him around the back of her neck and told him to hold on tight. Each step she took seemed to rock the bridge, frightening the cats who had already crossed.
"The river is surging," Proxima's voice called out loudly. "Mira, to your belly."
Mira dropped to her belly and latched her claws into the silverwood planks' grooves. Hosta and the other youths did the same, as did the queens. Those who crossed could only watch as the river seemed to rise unevenly. Every creak was more unnerving than the last and brought more and more pain to Mira's already weary paws. Then it was replaced with a horrifying shriek from one of the cats behind her. Aza was face down in the river of mud, struggling in vain to right himself.
"Do not jump in—" Leea had already jumped into the sludge. Both were at least two tail-lengths out and the distance was only growing. "Do not jump in, Mira!" Proxima seethed, seeming to read Mira's mind. "That sludge cannot be swam in."
"You expect me to leave them?" Mira growled.
"The deployment drone is inoperable and this drone cannot hover over the sludge. They are lost."
On both riverbanks, tribe cats yowled and begged for their co-leader's safety. Hosta had to be held back by the ball of youth anchoring themselves to her, the elders urging everyone to finish crossing. Leea had managed to catch up to Aza, but her paws were stuck downward. She struggled to keep either of their heads up.
Hydran was at Mira's side, ushering the others to cross quickly. "There must be something we can do!"
Mira's eyes darted from the slow-drifting pair to the other side of the river. Just as much dead grass was on the hills as the forest they crossed from. Any branch would turn to dust just like the tree. But the monstrous drone's contents were still spilled nearby.
"Grab that!" Mira shouted, pointing towards the pole. Over a dozen strong cats stayed behind to follow her instructions, but they only managed to slide the pole deeper into the muddy bank. When they seemed to lose hope of moving it, a loud pop inflated a bag under the length of it. Mira nodded. "Bring it this way."
Leea was growing tired and Aza wasn't moving. Mira ran to the pole and gripped the inflated side with all the strength her jaws had, helping guide it towards the middle of the bridge while the others pushed from the back. She was glad it was thick enough for claws not to puncture it. It wasn't effortless, but the whole thing was lighter than she thought it'd be.
"Get ready to pull," Mira said, catching her breath. "I need one of you to go out there with me." The smallest of the cats among them nodded. Leea was keeping her kit's head up in expense of her own. The black molly shoved her end into the river and let it flow just past the two cats. "Now, pull!" Mira shouted.
The warriors gripped the inflated pole with claws and fangs to counter the flow of the mud. Mira leapt onto it and motioned the small tom to follow slowly. Their fur was nervously on end as the pole bobbed about, even with over a dozen cats holding it. When they reached the edge, Mira bent down and stuck her paw out. With all her strength, Leea shot one of her paws above the sludge and hooked Mira's shoulder. She winced but carefully moved herself backwards, letting the other cat grab her scruff and drag her to safety.
The exhausted cats let the river carry the pole away when the trio was safe. Leea, still hacking up mud, was the first to bound across and collapse on the bank, panting. Mira and the drone were the last to finish crossing as the rest of the tribe cheered. Mira wasn't doing so. She never saw Aza move, and it didn't take long for Leea to realize.
"Aza?" Leea's wail broke their cheers as she pressed on the kit's chest. "No, no, no, please make a sound. Please!" The elder mollies had flattened a section of mud for the unresponsive kit to rest on, making space for Hydran, Mira, and Proxima's drone. The kit's eyes and mouth were pinned half open and his chest was hard as a rock. Ears and tails began to flatten when they realized what was wrong. "Small paws? We need someone with small paws."
Even the adolescents' paws were too large for Aza's throat. Hydran waved off tribe cats and rested his tail on Leea's back.
"Proxima?" Mira mewed.
"The kitten is deceased," Proxima said coldly through the drone. "My deepest condolences."
Proxima's drone floated above the crowd of upset cats and over the hill. Mira didn't let her anger with Proxima distract her from trying to comfort the queen. "Leea, I'm—"
"Don't!" The leader's voice was as sharp as her claws. "You saved me. I couldn't save him."
"It wasn't your fault. You did nothing wrong."
"We will wait for you at the bottom of the bluff," Hydran said, waving away most of the tribe. As they cleared out, Leea let herself break more and more, curling her kit's body around her as if he would start nursing at any moment.
"What will happen to him?" Hosta said, approaching alone as the other youths were led away by Hydran. Leea continued brushing her kit's body of as much mud as she could without a word, but her tail lashed angrily. Hosta was nervous, waiting until everyone was out of earshot, but Mira knew the question was important to her. "Will he be welcomed in StarClan, even if he didn't know—"
Leea hissed at Hosta and glared with angry blue eyes. "You knew nothing of this clan a few days ago. Missing your mom does not give you the right to be this naïve, and it doesn't give you the right to guilt me into believing so you can justify doing so!"
Hosta took a few frightened steps back. "I—I'd never do something like that—"
Sorrow replaced Leea's anger. "My kit is dead. Your mother is dead. Accept it and worry about the tribemates you have left…." The last part trailed from Leea, as if she didn't believe what she just said.
Mira growled low. She wanted to snap at the young leader, but couldn't find the anger with her dead kit lying nearby. Leea seemed to know she was in the wrong as Hosta stayed away, her amber eyes heartbroken. She pinned her good ear to the back of her head, her own eyes sapped of all their anger and strength. Leea lifted Hosta's head and nuzzled her cheek.
"I'm sorry," she mewed, looking at Aza's body. "You didn't deserve that. And it isn't true."
"StarClan sees cats," Mira started, calming herself, "whether they knew, or believed, or not. I believe so, at least." She was nervous to say anymore.
Leea paused for a moment, just looking into Hosta's eyes. The adolescent's newfound faith seemed to give her permission to believe in something she couldn't see, something Mira wasn't even sure was anything like the stories she'd heard, even if just for some immediate closure and never again. Leea's coughing fit of dust and mud seemed to bring her back to reality, though, and she gently grabbed Aza's body by the scruff and motioned Hosta to stand by her side. "I will stand vigil for him tonight," she mumbled.
The two mollies walked side by side up the hill, Hosta breathing a sigh of relief when she made it to the top. Mira was grateful for Leea's wisdom and followed them. Her spirits lifted when she saw a wide and lush valley of pine trees starting at the bottom of the bluff. The rest of the tribe was still somber, but she could hear some happy chattering during their descent.
Hydran and the drone approached and pointed to a distant, black spire towering over the valley's center. "That's the place from my dreams," he said.
"That is also our destination," Proxima said through the drone, her voice somber. "One of Skhul Terra's primary command centers. We may be able to move the ringworld from there."
"After we deal with the Star Covenant," Mira said.
"I doubt they could even enter the facility."
The drone followed the path the rest of the tribe used and its chatter holes clicked silent. Hydran led Leea and Hosta after the drone. Mira still felt bad for the young leader, who was holding back as much of her sobbing as she could despite Hosta's comfort. She couldn't imagine having to carry such a burden in front of a scared tribe who was counting on her. Despite being over a dozen rotations younger than her, Leea carried herself like a cat of Hydran's age. She realized why Hosta always sought her opinion, perhaps from the friendship she had shared with her mother.
Mira looked back at the wavering bridge. The monster that had deployed it sank even deeper into the bank. On her side, a pair of cats appeared at the base of the hill. Mira almost called out to them before realizing they weren't part of the tribe, their pelts alight with stars. The gray and black tabby tom and the short, brown-furred molly missing an ear sat close with their tails intertwined. They nodded before fading with a gust of wind.
Mira had shaken her fur clear of as much mud as she could and had brought some life back to her tried legs. Part of her had believed it was just the fatigue, but she had seen the same cats before she had stumbled into Yonder Five's camp, and again when she had found the body of the Star Covenant envoy. She had known they were her visions. She had hoped they were there for Aza.
O O O
"Are you sure you do not need to rest?" Proxima's voice was low over hidden chatter holes.
Mira shook her head. "I thought you said it's best to be out of here as soon as possible?"
"We can rest inside another ship. Dombaystar cannot track your location in real time."
"I feel like I've been asleep as long as you said I was. I'm ready to end this."
"Okay."
The chatter holes didn't click off, but Mira breathed a sigh of relief when the questions finally came to an end. They were non-stop since leaving the twoleg medicine den. She desperately wanted to ask Proxima why she was acting so different, but kept her questions to herself. It'd been nice to see a mood shift, but it did feel a little suffocating how much she suddenly cared.
Mira was being lowered into the large, white shell that made up the outermost layer of her protection. Her constricting bodysuit and padded vest were both a bright orange and gray fatigue, each bearing a patch of the ringworld being eaten by an angry three-headed dog. Mira wondered if the patches were meant to intimidate other twoleg warriors, thinking back to the similar one on Lilii Borea's suit from the Shattered District.
"This EV suit will have less mobility than any you have previously worn," Proxima said. "There will be nothing to walk on or jump to. I will have to control your movement."
"That's okay," Mira said as the white suit sucked in around her back and legs. The mechanical arm helping her clipped a flexible but heavy hump to her back. "I don't think cats were meant to walk among the stars. Not literally, at least."
"It will take several hours to reach Dombaystar's ship. It also lacks gravity, so it will give your body time to acclimate."
A see-through dome inflated around her head into a seamless, hard cylinder further from her muzzle than previous suits. Scentless air flooded her nostrils, which was no better than the sterile air of the star-monster. Mira lined her paws up with four red dots blinking on the floor. Her new sleeves vibrated several times, but the suit kept her upright where she would have collapsed. More dots beckoned her to one of many doors on a massive wall, the only one surrounded by light. It opened to a tiny, pitch-black den when it closed behind her, prompting lights behind her neck to click on.
"Once I begin this process, the decision is final." Proxima's voice said through chatter holes behind her neck. "He will know you are here."
Mira nodded, somewhat eager to see the ringworld from such a height. "I'm ready."
"Please relax your legs. Leaving will be rough."
A small window high enough for an adult twoleg let in no light. Mira took long, deep breaths to keep calm, reminding herself she'd been in suits like this dozens of times before. Air began to hiss against her sides, some sides feeling more pressure than others. Mira winced at the aches remaining from her recovery, but it all vanished when the door blew open in silence and sent her tumbling into the black sky. The only sounds she heard were her own panicked breaths.
Mira instinctively flexed her torso to regain balance, but she never hit anything solid. Her body moved on the whims of air spurts coming from the hump on her back. She wasn't falling or in trouble and focused on waiting to be reoriented. She still felt disoriented, but it was helped by the suit rotating her body wherever her head looked.
When she looked back at the star-monster Proxima had said they were on, it looked more like a loosely-terraced spire than what she imagined. One end had several moveable, charred panels while the other had a large, see-through bubble housing a more traditional twoleg nest layout. Surrounding the exact middle was a rotating torus not dissimilar to the ringworld itself. The bright white star-monster bore massive red crosses on its sides and on the torus.
"They look like those really tall twoleg nests." Mira whispered in awe.
"They come in many shapes and sizes," Proxima said. "Military vessels are also named for historical figures. You just left the Saint Gianna Beretta Molla, which is a hospital ship for missions of peace."
Mira figured the name Proxima gave was the same one scribbled near the front in twoleg-speak. "I always liked twoleg names. Is Dombaystar on a similar star-monster?"
"It is the exact opposite. The Elliot Turner is a warship purpose-built to bombard the surface of planets. It is poor luck such a weapon endured the supernova with its weapon systems intact."
Before Mira could ask another question, the star-monster she emerged from begin to vibrate. The red crosses and rotating torus blended into the ever-clearer background of the ringworld's surface. It had become much smaller than before, small enough to fit in her field of view. She shook her head as much as she could, but she wasn't hallucinating it. "What's happening to it?" Mira asked.
"You have drifted many kilometers from it, now," Proxima said. "Near Ajax, light is twisted and absorbed, messing with what you see. From where I am, Skhul Terra appears as a fiber of light impossibly far away."
The white star-monster never truly disappeared from Mira's view, but it faded enough to be mistaken for a beam of light. What did emerge made her jaw drop. Massive black star-monsters were messily floating about. Some were long and terraced like the white one while others were tall with many needle-like protrusions. The closest revealed the needles were massive thundersticks. Most of them were aimed at the sun, her view of it blocked by the largest star-monster in the group. Debris didn't spin and star-monsters never moved, as if frozen in time.
Mira panicked when she thought she might collide with a very small one, about the size of a wheeled monster, before slowly drifting past it. It had a see-through bubble near the front like her own helmet and bore a patch on an upright fin identical to the one on her suit. The inside of that bubble appeared to be filled with ash and scraps of woven pelt in the rough shape of a twoleg. Whoever was inside the monster met a violent fate, and it made Mira want to see what could do such a thing up close.
Finally, the star-monster blocking her view came to an end and Mira could see Ajax itself. Its center was a mass of perfect black that looked no different from an empty spot in space, if not for the vicious disc of light spinning around it. Each beam of light sprinted around the sun several times a heartbeat. But the violent ring only rotated around the center. The rest of the sun was outlined by an uncountable number of rings forming an inert halo of light.
Mira wanted to look away from the unnatural chaos, but she didn't have to since the light was so soft. She was mesmerized by the monochrome ball of darkness and wondered, somberly, if this is how others saw her colorless eyes. All that time hidden behind the ringworld's hazel sky, and Mira couldn't have dreamed of a more horrible and enthralling sight. It made her feel smaller than any twoleg object she'd ever lay eyes on.
A gentle static snapped her trance. "You are as close as I ever wish you to be to Ajax." Proxima's voice was oddly clear, as if she was directly behind her.
"I didn't expect it to be so…," Mira juggled between being mesmerized and finding the words. "Odd. This doesn't look at all like the pictures you've shown me."
"It always looks different in person. Unlike other cats, you see color as humans do. It may look a little different to everyone."
While she appeared to return to her normal self, Mira was still put off by Proxima's politeness. She explained things, as she always had, but her tone changed. More of her accent came through in its solemnity and there was rarely any assurance, even though Mira had no reason not to believe her facts. And she wanted to know why.
"Are you okay?" Mira didn't want to upset Proxima, so she thought on her words, "You seem more shaken. Like you're trying to hide something. It's just like how I sounded when you left me to recover with the hill cats."
The chatter holes were silent for a few moments. Mira thought of elaborating more before static popped in her ears. "Fifteen years ago, I watched my daughter die not far from where you just were."
A pang of guilt made Mira tense up. "Oh. Sorry."
"I realize I have never told you, in all the time we have worked together, how it happened."
"It must've been hard," Mira said, trying to disarm her tone. She settled her vision on the remnants of star-monsters and other odd shapes, most of which were still in-tact. "I hope this isn't rude, but I've never been able to understand it on your level. How a star dies or why you are trapped. I've tried not to think about it, then actually think about it, but…."
"It is your curiosity, a good thing." A holographic ball of light appeared inside Mira's dome. Mira somewhat remembered the display from her youth. "Sometimes, a star dies violently. In less than a second it expands and collapses, releasing enough energy to destroy everything around it." The holographic ball of light began warping and bubbling before expanding beyond Mira's vision and collapsing into the same dense, white-ringed ball dominating her view. "It is a testament to human engineering that Skhul Terra has survived for twenty years still, let alone being obliterated outright by the supernova."
Mira's eyes returned to the pulsating rings of light. "Long ago, you told me you survived by being close to it when it happened."
"I was on assignment, a test of my intelligence, rather, to study Ajax alone in a vessel purpose-built for the task. I was teaching my daughter how to operate my vessel's equipment, when something threw me into a wall hard enough to break my bones. My ship survived, but the equipment was ruined. When I removed the blackout shade from a window, I saw strands of fire and an impossibly small view of Skhul Terra. I saw the remnants of the armada and any orbiting structures. One moment, I was teaching her words in sign language. The next, she was nothing."
Mira felt how hard it was for Proxima to talk of her daughter while guiding her through her tomb. The weight of it made her think of StarClan, and a mysterious anger. "You didn't even get to say goodbye."
"I occupied myself with my own rescue for a time," Proxima continued. "The first thing I did was fix the vessel's backup radio. Hundreds of millions on the surface perished, and billions more were blinded by the sudden flash of light. Anything airborne violently decompressed, entire forests were incinerated, seas raged and evaporated. The communication band between the Sasquatch and Yaga Districts shattered, preventing Skhul Terra from being jumped to a neighboring star. I must have been, logically, assumed dead. No matter how much I focused on hacking into systems and learning security procedures, I was still looking out that window at where she died. Having you up here is both a terror and a relief…. I will never see you with my own eyes, but maybe you can spot me."
Mira's ears perked up. "How? Where are you?"
"Look at Ajax." Some energy returned to Proxima's voice. "Among the many bands of light, one is impossibly askew. It is where I reside."
Mira focused first on the halo of light around the black sphere, then on the violent ring rotating around its center. She kept her eyes on it and waited. After dozens of rotations and just a few heartbeats, she found a perfectly shaped hexagon static among the bands. Just as pitch black as the sun's center, it only appeared when light crossed its path from behind. "I'm guessing I can't stop by for a visit?" Mira said, trying to keep her companion's mood light.
"There is no food or water, so you would have to be contingent to life support mechanisms," Proxima said. "Even if I could safely navigate you here, you would be trapped with me."
"That wouldn't be so bad," Mira said, a smile rolling across her face. She waited for an answer, but Proxima stayed silent. "After all, I'd still be in a cold box in some twoleg den if not for you."
"Maybe that wouldn't be so bad," Proxima mumbled, as if ashamed to admit it. "But, even at my age, I will still outlive you by many years. I must be content with my situation as is."
"Well, when we beat Dombaystar, it won't be the end of us," Mira said confidently. "You'll still have a place in my life, just as I've had a place in yours. Right?"
"…Right."
Mira was certain of the guilt in Proxima's voice. She didn't think it came from talking about her daughter, as she had done so before. But she didn't want to pry any further. Proxima seemed upset enough as it was. An unnaturally dark spot Mira drifted across blocked her vision of the sun and the dead star-monsters surrounding her. It reminded her of just how long she'd spend in the cold darkness.
"How long do I have left out here?" Mira asked. "I'm feeling really small all of a sudden."
"Exactly seven hours and twenty-two minutes," Proxima said softly, "or about noon to night. It will not be safe to sleep aboard the Eliot Turner, so I suggest doing so now."
"I think I'll do that," Mira said, "assuming I don't just stare at everything the whole time."
"I will give you your privacy."
Proxima's voice clicked off. Mira looked where she had drifted from moments before. She was still in a dark patch and couldn't see anything. Just as she was about to brush it off, a single stone floated past her helmet. Specks of dirt and a few blades of grass were still around it. Mira remembered Proxima describing twoleg experiments on objects from the ringworld, but also remembered her explaining how short-lived those objects could be in this environment. The stone was washed smooth by water and the blades of grass were frozen but looked freshly cut.
Mira saw more oddities: a blob of water that chilled her just floating past, a few planks of rotting wood held together by small spikes, patches of fresh snow. The head of a decapitated cat with its jaw pinned open made her gasp, unsure if Proxima could hear what she thought was a dream. Things stole space from her reality to make way for their illusion. It had to be StarClan, but nothing looked hollow and bright like it did when she communed with Fleetheart or Dovewhisker. These things looked real. Just like the cat who appeared when she faced herself forward.
"What do we have here? Another living cat in a place like this?" An all-white molly spoke in a shrill voice with a hint of envy. Mira's muscles instinctively tried to leap back while her fur stood on end, only for her paws to flail in the weightlessness of her real location. "Are you," she sniffed towards her, "something else? You have an odd scent. Not quite kittypet, not quite wild?"
Her outside shell and see-through bubble were gone, but she could still breathe. The vest, the bodysuit, even her new leg sleeves were gone. Mira felt odd without the suit's sensation, but helpless without her sleeves. Certainly, only StarClan could create such an illusion. Her fangs bore with anger she didn't know she held. "Where were you when we needed you?" Mira hissed. "You promised me!"
"I did?" the molly questioned. "Your comrade mentioned you and a molly? I wasn't there for that."
A mysterious snow began falling and chilled her more than the cold of the now-absent suit already had. The rocks and grasses and water had settled into the snow-laden bank of a river encased in blocky ice. It was tucked away under a large, silverwood bridge with walkways running the length of its underside. The bridge itself even looked frozen by a mist thinly covering everything. Mira was briefly in awe, but couldn't explain one important detail: the molly before her looked alive.
"There are no stars in your pelt," Mira said.
"This isn't StarClan," the molly said bluntly.
Mira felt her mysterious burst of anger subside. Lilii Borea had been turned around before she remembered begging StarClan for something, but she couldn't remember what. It was just her and Lilii Borea. She thought how, or if, she could've grown so attached to the lynx in just a quarter-rotation. She shook it off, though, with more pressing matters to face.
The white molly was just half her size with a tail longer than her body. Her pretty face accentuated her striking, pink eyes and her unhappy resting face. She was slender and toned, even more so than Fleetheart, but her weak posture hid this well. Hints of pink were visible around her face and near her paws. And, despite her fur being well groomed, she reeked of blood.
"Who are you?" Mira whispered through her growing dread.
"I'm Blackleaf," the albino molly said. "I guess I'm not who you were expecting?" Mira tried stepping back, but her paws flailed above the ground, as if she were still tumbling through space. "Even so long after death, cats still remember me as a monster," she growled.
Blackleaf walked from under the bridge and up the river's steep bank to a set of twoleg nests. Mira paddled her legs to follow, finding herself automatically doing so as if a tether connected them. Her fear was replaced with nervousness, remembering her mate's story of the infamous medicine cat's humiliation and banishment.
She cleared her throat. "I'm sorry I snapped at—"
"I'm not a kit, so don't treat me like one," Blackleaf snapped.
"I didn't—"
"Just shut up!" Blackleaf spun around and growled right into Mira's face. But she immediately softened and looked away, ashamed. "No, no. She's the first cat in I don't know how long. Just stay calm, just stay calm." It was as if Mira genuinely wasn't there, the way Blackleaf talked to herself. She took a deep breath and continued over a stone border fencing off the twoleg nest's yard. "You said someone from StarClan made a promise to you. Are they still talking to the clans?"
"As far as I know, cat clans don't exist anymore. It's complicated, what I'm doing and where we are, but a medicine cat named Dovewhisker—"
"Dovewhisker?" Blackleaf's ears perked up before she flattened them again. "What, um, anyone else?"
"Another medicine cat named Fleetheart. She mentioned you, and many others, by name. Some I knew from the stories my mate tells me."
"I see."
Blackleaf walked through the snowy yard of the twoleg nest, Mira helplessly floating behind her. Everything seemed so dead but so real; She felt she would've forgotten where she really was if not for her floating. In their silence, she became fixated on the absence of the ringworld's curvature she was used to. She knew twolegs, and cats, didn't begin on the ringworld and she'd seen pictures, but still was in awe at the sky being an unbroken shade of gray.
The twoleg nests themselves looked rotted enough to fall over. A hole for water drainage large enough for cats was off to the side, along with a small shack near the river, more nests opposite of a nearby silverpath, and a large, gray structure that seemed to be their destination. Two large drapes of woven pelt covered its opening but did little to contain the bitter scent brewing within. Its odd slopes and lack of windows brought Mira's unease right back.
"Where are we going?" Mira finally asked.
"I never know," Blackleaf mumbled.
"Have you been wandering like this for over a thousand years?"
"A thousand what?" Blackleaf seemed more angry than curious.
"Sorry. Proxima says that's how long it's been since my mate's stories about you. That would be thousands and thousands of rotations."
"First time I remember seeing another cat and she might as well be speaking in tongues. Thousands, rotations, years, you sure you're not a StarClan cat?" The albino molly shook her head and mumbled to herself again. "No. If you were, it wouldn't be a punishment. I'm alone."
The closer they got to the odd twoleg structure, the more the smell of death encroached. Mira scrunched her nose at it mixing with the blood scent hanging in the air, forming a concoction of decay fitting the lifelessness around her. She wanted to avoid bringing it up, remembering enough about Farstrider's story to believe it inappropriate to ask.
"Why here?" Mira asked, plugging her nose best she could as they entered the odd nest.
"I come here whenever I need to remember something. It never works." The cold echo of the den's walls did little to hide the heartbreak in Blackleaf's voice. "Every time I come here, I see nothing but that night. Maybe you'll see something else?"
Mira floated right through the fake-fur, feeling nothing as it parted. A ramp gently sloped into the odd, subterranean den. The ceiling was caved into a tall pile of rubble in the center. Every surface was flat, textured stone made a deep gray from wear and tear. Each tapping of Blackleaf's claws echoed from the walls but added to the unnatural silence persisting since her arrival.
There were no bones, no dead animals, no disease. The disgusting scent seemed to come from everywhere. Near the front corner to the left, frozen herbs were carefully organized with twoleg-made vials and jars. In front of all of it was a satchel made by twolegs like the one Fleetheart wore, but tinted dark green with a red cross. Their lavender scent was just a tiny waft compared to the stench now overwhelming her senses.
Mira stomped her legs at the base of the ramp, finally having enough. "What is that smell? I don't see anything."
"You don't?" Blackleaf raised a brow. "They're everywhere."
"Why do I smell so much blood on you?" Mira pressed. "Your fur is spotless. And it hangs in the air outside, but there's no one else here. And in here all I smell is—"
She paused, eyes wide in terror. Blackleaf nodded and led her through the den and past body after body. The young molly didn't take a second glance. Each cat was torn to shreds by claws and fangs too big to be any cat. Bellies ripped open and spilled out, limbs snapped clean, faces crushed into tangled messes. Blood lined the walls while bile covered the floor. Mira wanted to bolt outside, but couldn't. She wanted to look away, but nowhere was untouched by the indiscriminate slaughter.
"I take it you see them now?" Blackleaf mumbled.
"Why are you showing me this?" Mira mumbled through a tightly closed jaw.
"You think I want this?" Blackleaf hissed before talking to herself, again. "I don't know what I want. I don't know what you want."
"Can't we just go somewhere else?"
"We are, don't worry."
The pair headed towards the back of the den, where an opening connected it with a hall going right. That hall turned left into a broader, well-lit hall with a shorter ceiling than the previous den and several doors to the left and right. Blackleaf lingered a bit on the only open one closest to them and made no attempt to hide her distress. Mira finally let herself breathe, the young molly's scent of blood easing.
"It gets harder for me to see them every time," Blackleaf said glumly. "Maybe because, after as long as you said it's been, it's only gotten worse as no one forgets?"
"Bringing me here was a mistake." Mira's voice was firm as she tried pushing the nightmarish scene from her mind, and tried to leave. "Not just that den, but where you are. I'm sorry you ended up here, but please wake me up, or send me back, or whatever you have to do."
Blackleaf faced her with her tail between her legs and fresh pain in her eyes. "Are—Are you sure? You saw nothing that helped you?"
Mira shook her head. "Nothing I wanted to see."
"That's not nothing," Blackleaf padded up to her, spirits raising a bit. "Was it anything in particular?"
"No! It was just death. Carnage and death. Why did you think this would help me?"
"Because I'm supposed to be a medicine cat. Being here shouldn't change that."
"We aren't here. Not literally. I'm floating through silverpelt right now, surrounded by twoleg star-monsters and the only star I've ever seen. And so are you."
"No," Blackleaf mumbled. "My prison is here. But if you stay a little longer…? Please?"
As the blood scent was replaced by Blackleaf's fear, Mira sighed. "This place is many rotations gone. But maybe being this close to a star, even a dead one, could let a StarClan cat come here—"
"I said no!" Blackleaf hissed. "They can't come here. I've already tried. And I can't abandon them."
"Abandon who?" Mira growled back. "They're all dead. You've been through enough. Your vigil is over."
"How dare you! You don't say when I abandon my comrades. No one does!"
Blackleaf backed the much larger molly into a wall, her nose pressed against hers with a hiss. Mira was more angry than threatened, but she couldn't deny Blackleaf's circumstances. She only had details from a story so long ago from just one source. She reminded herself of that over and over until her anger subsided, resting a paw on Blackleaf's cheek. "You can't let this haunt you forever, and your memories won't be gone forever. I promised Fleetheart and Dovewhisker that. When your spirit fades away, is this all you want to have remembered?"
Blackleaf smacked Mira's paw away. "It's all I deserve to. Windstripe, Leaftail, Solestar, Flyfoot, I bet they put me here in the first place. So I couldn't rot StarClan from the inside out like I did to my clan. I bet that Star Covenant kit was angry I didn't live up to her expectations!" She turned away. "I watched Solestar kill you, Rye. You probably hate me for it."
"Maybe enough time has passed for them. Or they were wrong. If they see what this place has done to you—"
Blackleaf reared up and slammed Mira into the wall, nose-to-nose with another hiss. "I was always like this and I'm not going anywhere!"
"Well, I am." But Mira struggled to do so, still feeling herself floating and unable to put her legs on solid ground. She couldn't even unsheathe her claws, trapped by the bodysuit she couldn't feel. The scent of blood flooded her nostrils again, bringing a new wave of fear and anger. "Let go of me! You can't keep me here."
Blackleaf pushed her paws into Mira's chest, claws cutting through her thick fur and threatening to slice her open. Mira struggled more and more, until she hissed and struck the young molly in the face. Blackleaf didn't even wince, but her stubbornness diminished with the soft blow. In the flash before the putrid world around her dissolved, she even noticed something in her eyes she thought Blackleaf was holding back since they met: desperation.
"Mira? Are you okay? Mira?"
Mira heard Proxima's familiar voice through the chatter holes in her dome, her suit and surroundings returning. The sight of Ajax's violent bands of light didn't feel so unnerving, anymore. "Yeah, I'm fine," Mira lied, calming her breathing. "Did something happen?"
"I briefly detected a cease in cardiac function. But your heart could not have stopped like that…" Mira's eyes widened. Was it even possible for a dead cat to kill her? But how else would Blackleaf have forced her to stay? "Were you sleeping? Did you just have a nightmare?"
"Yeah. Something like that." Mira waited for Proxima to press further, trying to find an excuse aside from StarClan, something Proxima never accepted. But no other questions came. "No follow-up?"
"Only if you wish to discuss it," Proxima said. "Your suit is functioning optimally and you are nearly in perfect health."
"Oh." Mira didn't mind Proxima's new demeaner this time. "I don't really want to talk about it, anyway. How long was I asleep?"
"A few hours," Proxima said.
Mira almost blurted out her shock. Her time with StarClan passed with her, but this prison seemed to go by its own rules. She felt a tinge of relief that Blackleaf might have experienced less time reliving the worst parts of her life than she thought, then a bit of horror at the idea it may have passed swiftly just for her. Mira wasn't any more or less rested than before the encounter, but was newly invigorated by the molly she felt—regardless of her temperament—was excessively punished and for too long.
A terrible boom shattered Mira's thoughts and rattled her head. Light flooded and escaped her vision in a heartbeat, leaving a trail of red-hot particles above her. She turned around to find the mysterious light's destination was where she had spent hours floating from. It had ballooned into a rumbling halo that couldn't compete with the sun, but was bright enough to outshine the other blurry star-monsters.
"My Stars…." Mira trailed off at a loss for words. "What just happened?"
"Dombaystar is onto your presence," Proxima said, her coldness and confidence returning. "He has destroyed the Saint Gianna Beretta Molla. The Elliot Turner is just ahead. Be ready to slow down."
Mira swiveled herself back around, surprised by a massive, black spire ahead. Despite being some distance away, she could make out each harsh line and jagged plate of silverwood. Twoleg-speak was scribbled all over the surface in several ways. Long and thin barrels jutted out from the superstructure in pairs. The glowing ends of one revealed it as the perpetrator of that beam of light. It wasn't as sleek or elegant as the star-monster she'd just left, or any in the area. It barely had a shape to focus on, even as the suit's hump rotated her to make the star-monster horizontal instead of vertical.
It was a tool, a principal weapon manipulated by a chimera she still had trouble believing was just another cat. Mira wondered why such a weapon could survive nearly unscathed while its inhabitants couldn't. Why Proxima's daughter had to perish, but not these things. But, with Blackleaf's anger and fear fresh in her mind, she didn't care and was all too ready to face Dombaystar.