THE PLAGUE -- open, devlopment follow-up

//follow up for this post:

The day was overcast and dull, the air dry and so still that it was suffocating. It was a horrid day to fly, but Noelani could barely stay away from the Rift any longer. BlizzardClan now harbored the location of another nightmare, and she couldn't stand to think about it. Possibly, it was the proximity to the sky that had brought it on. Possibly... Or maybe he- no. No, shut up! Noelani pressed her talons to her head, vision swimming with pain. Blood trickled down to the sea as she flew on, eyes half-closed with exhaustion as her wings beat rapidly in the dead air, each movement bringing her closer to home. Home? This wasn't home, either. SunClan, yes, that was home. She had just visited, but she wasn't a member anymore. Could she go back, and have a dual membership there? No. Well, she could, but it wouldn't be the same. So she went back to the Rift.

Noelani was visible winging towards the islands as fast as she could, her satchel clutched in her talons and her eyes wide. Her breath rasped in her throat terribly with her pain, the pain that had literally burned into her back. She thought that she had lost the marks - the marks of a bleeding sun, branded into her skin. The flash of memory replayed in her head and she flinched as if struck, falling a few feet before fighting to ascend again. The new home of the Rift slowly emerged from the blue sea, rising up to greet her in all of its glory. The trees surrounding the new Grecian city, glowing faintly from the sap in the grey light. Noelani felt herself choke up with relief, the burning on her baeck increasing, getting hotter and hotter - she was on fire.

She fell from the sky like a comet, leaving a blazing trail behind her as she plummeted to the ground. The impact send a cloud of dust and smoke into the air, the light of the fire flickering through the trees and eventually burning out. Noelani lay there, still awake, her breaths rasping in her throat and smoke spewed from between her jaws, curling off of her body. The smoke from the spot on her back was black, and Noelani twisted in the smoking rut in the ground as she tried to claw at it, to get it off of her body, to end the pain. Memories kept shoving themselves in her face, bringing back the horrors and the pain and everything she had tried to so hard to bury and forget. But she had kept the hatchet, so to speak, and she had kept the memories and she had kept the bitterness and the utter hatred that she harbored for no other soul. The avian let out a gurgling scream, her claws scoring marks into her own skin and making blood spill forth onto the soil. No, no, no, she didn't want this. She didn't want to feel this anymore! She wanted to get out, get out, leave and die somewhere he'd never find her, peaceful. But he would - she knew it. Freeze and Talib and Amaro - they'd all find her and slaughter her. Or maybe they'd leave her to rot in the darkness again. The thought of it made her want to scream again. She didn't want it. She didn't want any of this!

The Knife. She still had it. She could burn it, melt it down, and maybe the memories would stop. But she couldn't bring herself to conjure it, to look at it again. Her memory of it was hazy with blood, but she remembered it. She remembered everything she had made. It was curved with a long grip, the blade like that of the instruments that butchers used to gut animals. Writings were engraved in it in a harsh, unknown language, a single black stone glittering in the pommel. It was her finest creation, and it haunted her. Because it had been used to kill, and kill. Not for a reason, but only to kill. Noelani clutched at her head, nausea surging forward from her stomach as she clamped her jaws shut; if she opened them, then surely she would never stop screaming. The brands burned. Her head reeled. Her stomach was howling, her skin on fire, her eyes squeezed shut as the memories pounded behind them, screaming and howling to get out, let them out. Noelani curled in on herself, the smoke still spewing out, her eyes shut, ready to die.

Noelani felt the need to actually die when a voice spoke, gruff and low, and her eyes shoot open. It was him, oh gods, was he here? Her neck twisted around slowly, and she felt a little bit of terror seep from her aching body, singed feathers laying flatter - but not completely. She needed to talk...? No, she didn't want to talk anymore. But the hellhound before her didn't seem like the type to take kindly to something like that, so she managed to croak out one word: "Hurts." Noelani rasped, a bit of smoke rising forth and making her cough wretchedly, her claws pressing to her face. It hurt, so much, so very much. She couldn't take it anymore. She had come here to stop the hurting but it had gotten worse. But she didn't want to leave.

She felt guilt rise up in her stomach like bile, and she cracked her eyes open just barely. "Sorry," she mumbled, glancing down at Mal's burned paw momentarily before closing her eyes again. They shot open a moment later, feeling panicky as she started to reach out, but then stopped. No, she would only burn them again. "Rift?" She asked brokenly, urgent. "Here Rift?" Noelani had been so, so proud when her speech had started to get better - but here she was, back at the beginning, on the language level of a toddler. It was demeaning, to say the least, and momentarily she had forgotten her physical state before sinking back down to the ground, clutching at her head as her back shook. "Hurts." She repeated, barely a whisper, unable to breathe as she retched up another lungful of smoke.

Noelani could barely hear them, could do nothing but curl up and whimper, nothing but hope that it was going to stop. At Cain's touch and absorption of the pain, she sucked in a breath as if she had just been allowed to breathe, coughing up one last plume of smoke that eddied around her teeth. Now the leader was asking questions, and she tried to sit, to breathe deeply and focus, wide but bleary gaze lingering on the three who had appeared.

"What happened?"

What had happened? Could she even explain it? Noelani took a few more breaths before responding, her tremulous voice barely lifted above a whisper. "I-I-I was i-i-in Bli-i-zzardClan-n. I-I f-f-fell asleep, a-and I had th-this awful n-n-nightmare... B-But it w-w-wasn't just a n-nightmare. I-It was a m-memory. I h-h-hurt people. Th-They hurt m-m-me, too, a-and I rem-member g-getting this." She twisted around to show the new brands, wincing as it hurt to move her spine. The marks were harsh, somehow seeming old and new at the same time. It was an image of a bleeding sun, and she vividly remembered the sensation of the cherry-red iron burning away at her skin and she closed her eyes. "I-I w-w-woke up... I-I had m-moved into the f-f-fire of m-my forge... I p-p-put it out, b-but these came b-back. I-I don't know how... I g-g-got them o-on my l-last body... I r-r-ran, I-I could o-only think a-about c-c-coming back... I-I th-thought that h-he was ch-chasing me..." The avian trailed off, her eyes still closed, but she forced them open. It was worse if she let her mind make up what was in front of her.