The Aftermath of Dawn to Dusk

Chapter 3

A soft breeze rolled through, carrying some leaves with it. The leaves that still clutched to the trees held small remnant of dew from the storm a day previous. Small bits of this rain water even let gravity take them towards the ground while the sun was slightly going down. On this quiet evening though, a lone cat was walking through a forest, a limp body on his back. The brown tom started to climb his way up a hill with the body still on his back. As he reached the top of the hill, he leaned the body against a tree. He looked around before starting to dig into the ground.

The tom finished the job quickly and dirt lined his white underbelly. He looked over to the lifeless corpse before opening his mouth to speak, "You remember what you said a while ago, Gust?" the tom asked the body now dubbed 'Gust'. "You said you wanted to have your body laid to rest on a mountain so you could watch over everything, a guardian of sorts," he mewed. "Now this is no mountain," the tom chuckled, "But this should do, right?"

 The tom's facade of a contemptuousness shortly fell, a sad, distant look soon strewing across his features. He dug his muzzle into his fallen comrade's fur. The body was cold but he didn't care. The tom let out a loud sob that was muffled by Gust's fur.

 The tom wanted to stay like that for a while, he didn't want to leave. But he knew it couldn't last. The cat stood up, before continuing the job that he trekked up this mountain for. With hesitation, he picked up Gust by his scruff and dropped his corpse into the dug hole.

"You were always the careful one, you'd always say to me 'Lark, be careful!'" he chuckled to himself "Never thought I'd be the one to bury you." He looked down sadly at Gust, "I'm gonna miss you, dude." With one last look at Gust's dead corpse, he started to fill the hole with dirt. Once Lark was finished, he started to make his way down the hill. He looked back every few tail lengths though, almost as if he didn't want to leave at all, which of course he didn't. Lark looked up towards the night sky, before continuing on.

It wasn't long before an old, familiar scent drifted into his nostrils. Lark looked around frantically, he didn't realize he got this far! 'This is ShadowClan territory,' he thought to himself, 'It's just the outskirts, but it's still dangerous.' Lark was nervous at first, but the stale border scent was reassuring, in his mind if the border wasn't a strong scent, he didn't have anything to worry about. Lark continued to walk through, he didn't have to go around an empty territory.

Lark got decently far into ShadowClan territory without a hitch, he couldn't even scent a single trace of ShadowClan cats. He didn't know if he should be relieved or disturbed. Lark looked around, more nervous then he was at the border. "T-they can't all be gone can they?" he asked himself, "They can't be!" 

 Lark jumped as he heard a fluttering noise to his left, in the darkness he saw the small outline of a bird. Lark sighed in relief, he was jumpy tonight. He walked into the center of a clearing a head. He sat down, looking around, he couldn't see much, Gust could though. Gust could see nearly perfectly in the dark. Lark shook those kind of thoughts away and shifted his body to lay down, his head rested on his paws.

Lark's eyes started to close and his breathing soon slowed. Before he could fall asleep though, he heard the loud snap of a twig. Lark's eyes shot open and his body stood up as fast as possible. Lark looked around drearily, he was tired but he needed to stay awake. Lark's vision was dark, he couldn't see a thing around him. Lark crept forward, his paws were falling down lightly. 

 As Lark approached the source of the snapped twig, he couldn't hear anything else. Not a single sound. Lark felt vulnerable, he couldn't see, he didn't hear anything around him, and the scents around him were as normal as ever, if there was a cat around and they attacked him, he probably would lose. Nothing happened as he stood there though. Lark looked around at the darkness confused, what snapped that twig?

 Lark turned back around and padded back to his spot in the center of the clearing. He continued to look around before laying back down and closing his eyes again. Snap! Lark's eyes opened and he sprung back up again, but before he could get back up to his paws a cat jumped onto his back. Lark yelled in surprise. The cat, still on Lark's back, pushed Lark down into the dirt.

"You're trespassing on my territory," the cat hissed into Lark's ear. Lark's eyes widened, he knew that voice. That was the voice of ShadowClan's leader, Pigeonstar.

 "P-pigeonstar?" Lark asked the cat that was pinning him down. Pigeonstar's grip on Lark weakened. Lark took that chance and flung Pigeonstar off of him. Lark bolted to the opposite side of the clearing before turning around to look at the leader. The moon was at its peak currently, and moonlight shone down into the clearing. Lark could see the leader's scarred face, it was full of shock. 

Pigeonstar spoke, "You're that one ThunderClan warrior right, what was it..." the tom thought for a moment, "Larkcloud?" Lark shook his head, "I was a ThunderClan warrior, I go by Lark nowadays."

 Pigeonstar nodded, "I don't really like the name Pigeonstar anymore here honestly, you can't really be a leader when you have no clan to lead," Pigeon said with a sad undertone.

 Lark looked at the former leader, "Is everyone really gone then?" he asked, "How about the other clans?" 

 Pigeon shrugged, "We haven't had a gathering in almost two moons. I don't really know, sorry," he apologized.

"It's fine, I didn't expect much," Lark looked around nervously and then asked, "Could I possibly stay in ShadowClan camp for the night? Just for one night?" 

 Pigeon paused for a moment before answering, "Alright, it's just for one night though. You'll be gone soon then?" 

 Lark nodded quickly, "I just need to get out of this darkness." Lark padded up to the leader. "Well then, I'll let you lead the way,"

 Pigeon looked at Lark then turned around and started to walk quickly, "If you fall behind it's your fault, I'm not stopping." Lark laughed at that. 

 "Understood," Lark said with amusement in his voice. They walked in silence the rest of the way to ShadowClan camp