xMelting-the~Icex [Flamey]

[Barketh]

Falling silent, he listened quietly yet with an intensity that would surprise most others. Ears standing as if on stilts, his eyes were blank, without any readable emotions as he payed close attention.
Her words confused him and threw him for a loop, but he began catching on. Two-legs. The two-legs had done something to the she-cat.
He had never really liked the animals, but they were living creatures too, and he knew that, while they could be cruel and merciless, often harming others for no reason other than pure enjoyment, they were also capable of great compassion. Once, Blacky had broken his paw and when the family went to search for him, he was gone yet twoleg scent lingered in the air. They'd all assumed the twolegs had captured him, but less than a moon later, he'd returned, paw healed, and he had told them about how the strange, clumsy creatures had nursed him back to health.
Yet this didn't seem the case. Deciding it was better to wait till the story was done, he remained silent, only listening as the she-cat's words drifted through the otherwise empty air.

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[flamexcat]

Hardly moving in the silence that followed, Minx swallowed hard. Now what? Did he tell him everything? She could tell he was listening...waiting, but he didn't interfere. Unsheathing her claws and digging them deep into the soil, the scarred she-cat continued. "The whole place, everything, it smelled of blood and death. Everything was dark and what little light there was in the room, well it was as unnatural as the two-legs themselves, or at least that's why I could guess...I mean I'd never seen the sun." Almost to reassure herself, Minx glanced upward, as if thinking that perhaps the sun had gone. But like always the glowing yellow orb was there. Breathing quitely she began again, "I knew there where others there as well. Cats...all of them. Old, young...she-cats expecting young...kits who had barely opened there eyes. None of them where exceptions to the suffering. Of course, I couldn't see them. But I could sure as hell hear them. Day and night...night and day there screams and moans came to me. At first I tried to block it out. I was scared...foolishly scared by what I heard....and eventually...it just became part of the background..."

[Barketh]

As she spoke, he tried to picture her memories as though they were his own. A cold, dark place. However, as hard as he tried, he could come up with nothing. Confused at first, it soon sank in. The tom had never experienced being alone in the darkness. No, he'd grown up in the shelter and security of having a family. He'd known who he was, but Minx had never had that. His eyes narrowed slightly, and he wondered if he had ever even stopped to think about what other cats' lives had been like.
Not until after I lost everything did I realize what I had.
His eyes remained distant, yet he tuned in on the she-cat's story, determined to hear what else she had to say, almost like a kit straining to hear the rest of an elder's story.

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[flamexcat]

Watching expectantly out of the corner of her narrowed eyes, the black she-cat's ear tip flickered when she noticed him watching her as if she had morphed into a fox. Snorting at the idea, Minx looked away, stomach upset and tieing in angry knots as she forced herself to go on. "For a while the two-legs just watched me, every once and a while switching my food up, well thats if you can call that mouse-dung food anyway," the crazy loner made a face when she recalled the taste of the dry, hard pellets fed to her on a regular basis. At least they had remembered to feed her, much more than she could say for the others. Quickly she picked up where she had left off, "but eventually they moved onto...other things." "They made me run, stuck strange objects into me, cut me with metal claws and poked me with sharp needles. Sometimes they would force me to breath in strange air...awful, stinking air and before I knew it I would be unconscious. Often I would awake to find that I had a new wound, or I would be sick, for days and days...and when I finely recovered, they would do it all again." Recalling the horrible feeling, Minx's jaw clenched, eyes dancing with green fire. Than suddenly remembering something, she turned so that her right side was facing Night and forcefully grasped some of the unkempt black fur and pulled it back. Marked deep into the skin and surrounded by various claw marks from other cats, was a strange, yet unmistakably straight scar that began at her shoulder blade, and ran all the way to her belly. "There, you see?" she hissed between the fur clamped in her teeth, "that is only one of the marks the two-legs gave me."

[Barketh]

The tom stiffened slightly as her voice took on an even harsher tone, but he managed to remain calm, gaze falling on the unmistakeable scar that ran down her torso. His eyes flickered, and images flashed through his mind. Blood, and the horribly obscurred bodies of his family. Cut to ribbons in a way that they were left unrecognizable. And only the scent had lingered.
Maybe I should be happy that I can relate in some way, yet at the same time I've realized I've lost something irreplaceable. Something that Minx never even had in the beggining.
His eyes narrowed slightly, but he reamined silent, beckoning the she-cat to go on despite the venom her words seemed to release into the air.

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[flamexcat]

Releasing the fur in her mouth, she let it fall back to cover the scar before turning so that she faced Night once again. Now the fire in her eyes was beginning to calm again, but still her shoulders stayed tense as she continued speaking. "Don't ask me how long I was in there...because I lost track of time. But I do know it was long enough," Minx growled, her tail twitching in irritation. Letting out a long sigh, her eyes seemed to brighten when she recalled the last bit, "I thought I was going to die there, every other cat had, but one day I escaped..." ""I ran...until I fell in the middle of a forest. That was moons ago..." her voice dropped into a whisper as she finished, eyes flickering away from Nights gaze.

[Barketh]

The tom stared at his paws. His thoughts were twisted; a tangled web of information that he could not comprehend. If she had been experimented on by the twolegs, that would explain her current appearance, but he was unable to understand how it had turned her personality so bitter. Perhaps after being surrounded by screaming, agonized cats, she'd grown used to it, and that sound had become like a drug to her. If she could not hurt, she could not live.
That would make sense... But there must be something I can do.
Looking up, he stared at the she-cat with a pained look in his eyes. He wanted to help her, and it was killing him to realize that there was nothing he could come up with.
Come on, Night! You can do better than this. She needs someone, and all you can do is lay here helplessly.
Then a thought sparked in his mind. It seemed foolishly ridiculous, but it might just work. Abruptly, the tom jumped upright, staring down sincerely at the she-cat. Violet eyes cast reflectionns, and his look was grim yet one-hundred percent genuine.
"Minx, why is it do you think you're the way you are now? Why do you think you turned out violent?"

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[flamexcat]

Fighting the urge to flinch as his wide, curious eyes seemed to burn holes into her pelt, Minx stayed hunched over, ears laid flat. "Minx, why is it do you think you're the way you are now? Why do you think you turned out violent?" Instantly the she-cats scarred black head shot up, the fur along her spine standing on end. "Because why should other cats get to live freely knowing who they are, never quite knowing the meaning of pain, when I was forced to under go living torture!" She yowled in reply, fangs bared. Than quickly she added, "you are alone, are you not? I am not stupid...there must have been some cat in your life you wish dead! Why not them all?" In her rage, a blurry sense of insanity overcame the loner. Now her blood boiled and she had to use the little bit of self-control she had left not to swipe Nights head off.

[Barketh]

The tom flinched visibly at her words, and his eyes widened in shock as she spoke directly to him. Her voice sent briars into him, and he was stunned, staring at her.
To wish... Death upon someone?
He had never thought of it. The only time he'd ever killed was when defending his family, when a bloodwrath had overcome him. Thorn was the one who had done it. The cat who had arranged his family's assasination. Did he want Thorn dead? Did he wish for Thorn to be killed?
"I.... I don't know..."
His voice trailed off, and his vision blurred as his head throbbed painfully. He felt dizzy, and he was no longer sure. Of himself, or of anything. He didn't want Thorn dead, did he? But why was he running? To escape from Thorn's murderous intentions, or to keep himself from murdering his last remaining kin? He hadn't thought of what would happened if Thorn ever caught up to him. Would they fight? Most likely, but he'd never considered what would happen if he himself actually won.
Would I commit murder again? Would I end his life to save mine?
"What do we fight for? Vengance, salvation, honor? Cats fight for different things. Aren't the twolegs the ones who hurt you, Minx? Other cats have experienced suffering and painful solitude, and I can understand that you resent the fact that you were placed into a horrible world where everyone but you got a happy ending. But there's no such thing as a happy ending. There's pain and hurt everywhere, and what do you think you'll get from trying to hurt those who had nothing to do with your pain? It won't change what you went through, and it won't change the fact that everyone is thrown into different situations. You were hurt, and I can't take away that pain, but that doesn't mean you have to give it to others."
His eyes had grown distant, until they hardened again. This time, he neither seemed kind nor angry, rather, it was as though he was drifting within the confines of his own mind.

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[flamexcat]

Like pale razors, Minx's green orbs narrowed and flickered angrily to meet with Night's odd far off look. "You..." She breathed quietly, bitterness scorning her voice, "are no better than any of the others. I was blind by your helpful intentions..." Snorting, the she-cat let out an amused breath of laughter, "how could I expect a cat so soft to understand?" Now she rose awkwardly to her paws despite her injury and stumbled closer to the black tom until the two where standing only a mouse-length away from each other, Minx's tail lashing. "I have told you what you want to know...now you must answer me. Truthfully!" She spat. Than after a few seconds she continued, "answer me this....why do you follow me? There is more to it than my injury, now tell ME!"

[Barketh]

[>x3 This is interesting. -laughs wickedly- >=]]

The tom stared at his paws before finally looking up at the she-cat, violet eyes wavering slightly until he managed to steady them.
"How could I expect a cat so soft to understand?"

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Her words stung, yet he had already pictured her saying them. Her next question took him by surprise though, and his eyes widened and he froze, his voice and thoughts halting in mid-motion.
Why.... I wonder....
Memories of his family passed through his mind. Raven and Scree scolding him not to run off, wrestling with Streak to see who was stronger- lazing about on cool afternoons beside Leaf and Claw and watching dandelion seeds drift on the wind. Those moments he had cherished; the good and the bad. Whether he did or didn't enjoy them whilst they took place, they made him into a whole now, and he wondered for the first time if it was because they were his family, and he loved them.
He had never thought much about the word love]. When he was a kit, he'd asked his parents why they were together, and they said it was because they loved each other. He'd grown up casting love aside as a mere way of liking someone or something more than just in a friendly or enoyable manner. Yet he'd never been able to relate it to anything, because he didn't know what you were supposed to feel like when you were in love. But when his family had died, the memories had crashed down on him, slicing a hole inside his heart, and he had felt hollow and empty for the first time.
Was that what it felt like to lose the one you loved? All the warmth he had collected when he thought of them; was that love? Then why had he only felt it after their death, when he took the time to remember them? He had felt content in their presence, yet now as he tried to piece together the shattered remains, it stung in a bittersweet manner, and he wondered if love was supposed to hurt so much.
His eyes clouded briefly, and he blinked, staring Minx straight in the eye.
"That's because..."
His voice trailed off and was followed by a silence that dropped to the pit of his stomach.
Because... To me... She is...
Rain. Moon. Claw. Leaf. Streak. Blacky. Static. Raven. Everyone.
He loved them, with every strength in his body mentally, emotionally, and physically.
"I love you."
He felt his thoughts die down, and his brain went dull, as if in standby mode. Years seemed to tick by in his head, and he wondered if what he had just said had actually left his mouth. He'd though it in his mind, but suddenly his memory would not return to him, and he was puzzled as he tried to recall whether he had told the loner that he loved her.
The tangled web had broken; been blown away by the wind that had grown irritated by the numerous memories. And suddenly, he could think clearly without some other thought intruding in on him.
Because I was too slow to realize it earlier... That this cat... Means as much to me as my family...
Suddenly, he felt a painful aching in his chest, as though someone had cut him open all over again.
No... My family is most precious to me. I can't... I can't replace them...
Fear trembled inside him. How could he let himself betray them like that? He wouldn't forget. He couldn't let himself forget about them and let them slip away again. He loved Minx, he loved his family... Yet he didn't know...
I... Just don't know...[/size][/center]

[flamexcat]

"Get on with it!" Minx felt the urge to roar, watching barbarically as the tom seemed to hold his tongue, eyes locking onto his paws. Throat vibrating with an impatient growl, the she-cat glared challengingly at his lowered head as if daring him to say something she would disapprove of. "Ha! What could he possibly say to me that's worth anything more than a rats tali?" She mused mentally, joyous to the fact that he seemed to be struggling before her.
"That's because..." Ears laying flat, the black cats piercing green eyes narrowed even farther. He had nothing! Ha, she could get him to leave, she would never have to look at him again, she-
"I love you."
Blinking rapidly, Minx stayed silent, shoulders stiffening. He what? Brow furrowing, she continued to stare down at him. "You...what?" She replied. But they weren't the words of a cat filled with emotion. They where not filled with care, excitement...or even anger for that matter. Instead they seemed colorless, and generally confused. What was he talking about?

[ooc: Aww poor Night! Minx doesn't even know what he's talking about. Dx]

[Barketh]

[Dx Awww, poor Night!!! xD Lol, Minx's reaction is roflmao.]

The tom blinked once slowly before his eyes fogged over. Her words chilled him slightly, but he stared straight at her, forcing himself to see her clearly.
"I love you... Even if you hate me, or want me to go away, or wish I was dead... That doesn't change how I feel..."
Her voice was confused, the way he'd felt, and he wondered if perhaps she understood as little about love as he did, possibly, maybe, even less. Right now, he could see the cat filled with bitter memories and long-standing grudge; her hatred rotting her from the inside out as her own resent lashed out at those around her. Yet, he could stand even that if it meant being with her. He looked deeper; saw a confused, paranoid cat who didn't know who trust. Still, he peered deeper, and he found what he had been looking for. A she-cat who was lost and tormented by her past; alone, afraid- not of being alone, but of trusting anyone. She had been broken, and her only way of gluing the shattered pieces together was by using the blood of others as her masking tape.
So that I can see the beautiful cat hiding inside.

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