TIRED OF PUSHING DAISIES ★ private

*:･ﾟ✦ The medicine cat den within Thunderclan’s fortuitous camp had never been unoccupied for more than a moment or so. It was always abuzz with activity; apprentices complaining of thorns in their paws limped in regularly, and queens often carried their sick kittens over in order to catch a few poppy seeds or force their children to ingest a bitter feverfew poultice. Even when there was no one in need of direct medical attention, Copperkit was always there, and Cherryburn there too by association. Copperkit enjoyed the brief moments of silence oftentimes, as the constant flurry of pawsteps and voices all around her tended to exhaust her more than usual, but the kitten also yearned for social interaction beyond complaining to Cherryburn of the newest batch of symptoms.

Sometimes the company did come, and Copperkit found herself enjoying the brief bouts of mental gymnastics any conversation put her through, but today, she was alone. The cold wind curled it’s frosted tips around the den and gusted through the cracks in the thick foliage, blowing a gentle tune and whistling with every strong push. Every puff was accompanied by Copperkit’s tiny, dark body shivering in response, and everytime her body shook, she could hear her teeth chatter in her head. At this point, Copperkit wasn’t even sure she wanted to survive leaf-bare, but a strong force inside her urged her to prove her peers wrong by making it through the coldest months.

Aspenkit

*:･ﾟ✦ The wind prevailed and proceeded, whisking past the barriers of sage brush and thorn walls and swirling about the small space for a medicine den. Copperkit's body, rendered unable to control her body temperature accurately, shivered and shivered until her paws grew numb and her head swam. She could hear her teeth chattering within her head and the incessant beating of her heart, and they filled her ears with the flow of blood and bone against bone. They offered distractions from the distant sound of paws crumpling grass, and when a large, flame point kitten poked his body into her gaze, the sickly she-cat startled and nearly leapt from her nest. Maybe she would have done so, if only her bones didn't threaten to break if she even just stood. Her heart now threatening to beat from her chest, Copperkit watched Aspenkit with wide yellow eyes, which offered stark contrast against her patchy sepia fur.

He greeted her and stepped closer, and Copperkit resisted the urge to recede further back into the den and press her body against the thin, thorny walls by the advancement. He seemed friendly enough, of course, but she could never be too sure. Her wide eyes glittered as she tried to discern what motive Aspenkit had for visiting her, but when she could see none but sincerity within his own gaze, Copperkit relented and her shoulders sagged. She offered a weak smile, but her body was soon shuddering with a violent coughing fit. Once it had passed, she finally looked back up and offered her own name. "Hi, I'm Copperkit," she murmured softly, and her voice seemed comparable to the wind. "I-It is kind of lonely down here... Why are you down here anyways?" She hadn't wanted to sound rude, but she was rather tactful. It was just that not many actually came into the medicine den, they rather just waited outside.

*:･ﾟ✦ He came closer and stood before her, and Copperkit strained her head to fully take him in her yellow gaze. Slowly, carefully, she rose from her nest so that she now sat, and it was incredible how much he dwarfed her. Aspenkit didn’t even need to puff out his chest to seem bigger because it was already painfully obvious how meek and tiny Copperkit was. Other cats had told her often that she didn’t grow too much because all of the disease that constantly passed through her. They said her body just hadn’t been allowed time to grow. When they said that, Copperkit liked to wonder when exactly her legs would stretch out and her bones would grow. Sometimes, she began to think they never would.

"M-me...?" she wondered, but quickly grew flustered when she realized what a stupid question that was. “Oh, uh, I’m just really sick all the time. Some cats were saying that I have a, uh, imm-immuno-something disease. I don’t know what that means though."

*:･ﾟ✦ "Well, yeah," she responded, making a small move to gently rub her forepaw, as if she were embarrassed of the fact. "It's really boring in here... I-I'm not complaining, but sometimes I wish I could playfight with the other kits too." She sighed softly after the fact and made an effort to avoid Aspenkit's gaze, as eye-contact had been hard for her ever since she had been somewhat permanently confined to the medicine den along with Cherryburn.

On Aspenkit's offer to play with her once she got better, Copperkit had to make an effort to seem excited, for she knew deep inside that her health would likely never improve to the point she wanted it to. "Yeah, I'd like that," she began, unable to hide the awkwardness and anxiety lacing her words. Even just thinking of her condition made her shake. "Berrykit said he made a game for me though. I wonder what it is?"

*:･ﾟ✦ Copperkit couldn't seem to laugh at the joke either, but she offered a giggle out of politeness. "Well, no, but it would be more exciting than just sitting and sneezing all day," she responded, trying to return his smile with the same intensity, but unable to do so due to a bout of shivers that raked over her small body. As if on cue, she let out a flurry of violent sneezes and coughs, hardly able to recover enough to respond to Aspenkit, although she did manage a blush at the compliment. She hoped she didn't get him sick, she would hate to see someone so nice and thoughtful become afflicted. "O-oh, I'm glad someone nice came in here too! Not many visit, I think some of them are too afraid to get sick."

Her last words were laced by a hint of melancholy, but Aspenkit's eagerness to please her seemed to remedy much of the potential depression brought on by overthinking her situation. She laughed readily at his antic, finding all of it quite charming. She took only a moment to think before bursting out with her favorite type of game, slightly surprised by the excitement in her voice. "Oh, I like games where you pretend! A lot of the other kits make it all about battles and stuff though, but I think if they put their minds to it, they could find something better to be!" she offered, her flaxen eyes suddenly sparkling with an energy nearly unseen in her often jaded gaze. In an unspoken thought, she knew that she would love to be anyone else for just a day.

*:･ﾟ✦ Copperkit desperately hid the cringe that threatened to break her features as Aspenkit noted how his little joke didn't go over well. She had not wanted to let him know and keep him in the dark about it, but he was rather perceptive; she supposed that was a good thing. Something deep inside of her wanted him to know anyways. "W-Well, it's just a sore subject! It's nothing wrong, y-yo-you're okay," she stammered in a scramble to reassure him, her almost imperceptible stammer growing slightly worse as she grew more flustered. She was quick to change the subject however, as she seemed noticeably ruffled by the notion that she made Aspenkit feel bad for making a joke, even if he didn't seem all to offended by any of it. "I mean, I think that's how it works, but I don't know too much about it either, other than me being in here always," she admitted, glancing to him briefly then looking away. She seemed embarrassed about the fact that she didn't know everything about something that affected her most of all.

Even so, she was glad for the distraction he offered her. Feeling as if she had more time to speak in that moment than in her entire lifetime, she began to spill, feeling comfortable enough to talk around Aspen without growing conscious of his eyes on her. In fact, him looking at her felt relaxed, as if she didn't have to worry about anything else in that moment. "I mean, you don't have to imagine anything you don't want to, but I like to imagine I'm a bird. They can fly away from anything; they don't have to deal with anything they don't want to, and they can pick and choose their battles. Imagine flying through the trees too!" Copperkit gushed, her eyes now glazed over with wonder and awe. She had always wanted to fly away from everything, and even if it was oonly a momentary comfort, daydreaming offered an escape.