The Moonlapse [ABANDONED]

III

Bristlefrost led Rootkit out of the grass, out of the sunny haze of green woodland and into a closed den. The mahogany-toned walls wrapped around them as they stepped through the fern drapery and into the warm cavern, a deep red shading them as asphodel-tinted light burned through the entrance and onto the rocks like the fiery glow of an ember. 

He felt tiny under her gaze. Bristlefrost walked like a white lion around him, her muscles rippling beneath her thick pelt as she sat down on the grassy carpet. She stared down at him, making Rootkit feel as though he was looking up at a gigantic mountain as he sat down too.

"You're scary," Rootkit meowed as he looked up at her. 

"Did I choose to be scary?" she meowed, her gaze hard and emotionless. "Now, tell me what you saw."

"I...saw," Rootkit paused, timid. "A cat. Well, I didn't see them. But when I fell into the Moonpool they dragged me out and they brought me back to my den. But then they just disappeared."

Bristlefrost, for once, expressed emotion; intrigue. "Right. And do you know why they vanished?"

"Uhh...what does 'vanish' mean?" Rootkit asked. Bristlefrost put her face in her paw and clenched her teeth in frustration, but stopped and sighed. 

"Rootkit," Bristlefrost meowed solemnly as she bent forward, tucking her paws beneath her chest and laying down. "If they vanished, they could be some kind of...ghost. A dead cat. And you fell into the Moonpool when this happened." She stared to the side for a moment, as if she was feeling some kind of hidden guilt. "The cat I loved died in the Moonpool. I believe he died twice, but...maybe he's still alive as some sort of spirit. Maybe he's still out there."

Bristlefrost stared down at the ground again and released a deep, fluttering sigh. Rootkit felt overwhelmed with the feeling of mystery, stirring up a hurricane within. What had Squirrelstar said back then? She knew Bristlefrost loved some cat, but who was it? 

Then he remembered. Rootspring! Of course. He was the cat Bristlefrost had loved. "So, Rootspring is a ghost from the Moonpool and he somehow saved my life?" 

A chill ran through him, as though a freezing breeze was passing right through his form. He didn't know why. He wasn't scared. Bristlefrost's eye began to glimmer as she stared to the side with an expression he could not read. She blinked as tears began to gather on her lids, running down her face. "Yes," she sounded desperate, but her lips curved into a slight smile. "He's still here, I know it."

Rootkit wanted to open his mouth and tell her that he thought the same about the ghost, but his jaws were sealed shut. He tried to stand up, and yet his paws were rooted into the grass. His muscles felt like rock. He was heavy, immobilized. 

What's happening!? His blood turned to rapid waters, panicked waves tumbling through his body. Why wasn't he able to move? Rootkit's jaws suddenly dropped open, falling down against his will. His throat vibrated as he tried to cry for help, and words fell out of his mouth and into Bristlefrost's waiting mind. But they were not the words he meant to say at all, and the voice he spoke with was not his. 

"I'm still here, Bristlefrost," the low voice meowed using his tongue.

Bristlefrost's head immediately rose, her eye wide in surprise. But then her ears fell back, and her eyes narrowed. Her massive claws curled from their talons and pierced the earth in hostility as she growled. "That's not his voice."

"I haven't forgotten about you." The words in that nameless voice dreaded their claws through his throat again. Rootkit felt the chilling feeling of that frozen ghost seep away from beneath his skin, leaving him warm and animated again. He gasped, feeling as though he'd just been holding his breath all that while. His lungs had been letting out all the air without his will. 

Rootkit found his muscles twitching. The feeling of being frozen, being puppeted on heavy strings, it was torturous. It didn't feel like he would ever move again. When he lifted his paws, he felt like he was carrying a stone attached to his limb, not like he was moving a part of himself. His mind was a whirlpool, a tornado of thoughts and confusion that could never rest for a second ever again.

When he finally gathered enough awareness to speak again, he screamed out, "What the hell happened!?"

Bristlefrost stared at him in clear terror, clear concern. "You were possessed!" she snarled.

He heard a voice whisper in his mind, echoing through the caverns in his brain. Don't worry, it spoke. I'm not here to harm you.

A wave of nausea rolled over the kit. He was gasping for air, an infection laying sick in his chest. His head spun, his vision blurred, his ears rung and his blood turned black. Rootkit could not walk anymore, the den was lurching and turning, the ground was distorted. There was no flat, still place for him to stand.

Rootkit stumbled as he realized he couldn't breathe. He sensed a feeling of death filling his mind. He lost his grip on the ground and fell back into an abyss, before Bristlefrost caught him. She hissed something to him, but it did not meet his ears. He heard no words.

He finally collapsed. His senses ran away into a void encompassing him, and all he knew became a blur. He fell from her grip, plunging past the ground, past everything. Past all that existed, and into a foreign, dark world.

-

Needleclaw waited with Squirrelstar. The shades of green around her rustled and turned in the warm breeze, sunlight burning from the deep blue sky and turning into frenzied golden light that dappled them both. She felt bored out of her mind, completely immobile and listening only to the silent whistling of the wind through the leafy canopy and the wordless voices from the den.

"Rootkit! Can you hear me?" Bristlefrost's deep, panicked voice rose from the cave. Needleclaw's head whipped around, ears erect as terror started to drum in her ribcage. 

"What's going on in there!?" clear terror laced Squirrelstar's voice as they stared at the den. Without thinking, her mind torn apart from the electrifying fear, Needleclaw bounded forward and burst through the ferns draped over the entrance.

When the mahogany shade of the cave swept over her, she was shocked by the emptiness. The cavern was completely vacant, not a soul dwelled within.

Bristlefrost and Rootkit were gone.