Posts by Jenner

Asher

(The Unlikely Candidates- Bells)

Scartooth waited by the door and shook his head. Would I feel differently if he wasn't my cousin? Probably. Yes, but don't go there. You shouldn't have gone there.

He flattened his frustration.

"Viitar, we're comin' in." Are you even still awake, or did you pass out?

When Scartooth entered, Viitar was sitting alert on the bed, his legs crossed and his cane resting beside him. There was a stream of red which stained the white sheets, trickling out from his side and onto the ground, where it pooled.

"We?"

"Aye." Scartooth nodded. His eyes caught the blood. "Did ye e'er think... maybe..." He raised his brows and pressed both paws to his side. "Mmmmmm?"

"What? Oh. Oh! Cover it! I forgot I was bleeding!"

--

The branch Cringe had lifted snapped between his claws.

He went quiet.

Scartooth went and fetched a wet rag and held it out to Viitar. "Hold this on it," he ordered, moving stiffly around the rat-mouse.

Viitar did as he was told. "Is that a hedgehog?" he hissed. "I didn't expect them ta look like that. The spikes are... amazing."

Scartooth tensed.

"He's gone, okay?" Cringe bleated. He threw the sticks down the ravine. "He isn't coming back. He's dead."

"Don't talk about Aura," said Scartooth, "She really doesn't like you."

Viitar opened his mouth and then shut it. "Golly... my bad."

"Mhm." Scartooth bent to get some bandages out of the storage chest under the bed. He held them up. "Move the cloth, let me see."

Cringe turned around. His eyes were rimmed red. "There's no way he could possibly be alive because he doesn't want to be," he snarled. "I gave him a locket, and he'd run amok at night and try to take it off like one possessed. He's dead. He's been dead for weeks. Nothing I can do or I'd have done it."

"It's fine," Viitar said, holding the rag away.

"Is it?" said Scartooth.

"Sounds like him, but it's not him. Don't bother looking. There's some other creature... inside of him." Cringe shook his head.

"I tried." By that Cringe meant Twofang tried and he followed, since he couldn't smell. "We couldn't find him anywhere."

"I gave up. That's the closest I would ever get. I'm not about to risk my immortality for..." Cringe ground his teeth. "Fine. I'm coming with you."

"I said that I'm coming with, not that I'd get involved in any danger there might be," said Cringe.

"Got th' herbs, Aura?" Scartooth asked.

You agreed to this, Scartooth thought, but he couldn't blame her. He kept purposely looking around Viitar, or near Viitar, but not at Viitar. Despite the changes that came with the rat-mouse's wounds and the relaxed expression that the real Viitar never would have made, this creature was still the same one that he'd watched stick a blade into Mia.

Cringe slunk after her. "I'm coming, Frosten, and you won't deter me."

"Looks like it," said Scartooth.

Viitar pokes his claw into the sheet. "No way, the bed's not cleaned up."

"She's not talkin' about the bed..."

"But it was very nice and now it's ruined. I feel so bad. I can't believe I didn't notice..."

Scartooth opened his mouth and then shut it in baffled silence.

"Sure." Cringe whistled sharply at Twofang as they passed him.

"Oh, come on!" exclaimed the rat, rushing up behind them. "Why do I always have to join your stupid wildcat goosechase?"

"You don't," said the stoat, "I ask and you choose to. Come on."

"Really? No way..." Viitar barely heard Scartooth ask him if he knew how to do it, but he took the bowl from him anyway and started trying without much thought.

She really doesn't like me... He gritted his teeth and withdrew his paw, flapping it.

"Ah! This stings!"

Twofang followed a bit before stopping completely and pressing both paws to his face.

"No... that's impossible. Wait one second."

When the container was empty, Viitar looked extremely on-edge, but forced a shaky smile.

"Thank y'," said Scartooth, taking it from him.

Twofang remained silent except for an exhasperated little sigh that escaped him. He passed Frosten, shaking his head.

Cringe, on the other hand, was completely stunned. His lack of smell hadn't allowed him to tell whose blood this was, and he hadn't thought he'd care.

"Viitar's dead. Asher said so."

"Move your forelimbs," Scartooth instructed, so he could apply the bandages.

"It wasn't only him. Everyone thought so." Cringe shook his head.

"So does everybody here hate me?" Viitar whispered, staring at the swinging door.

Scartooth shrugged. "Probably." He pulled the bandage around his cousin's side and tied it tightly. "I mean certainly, yes."

"Do you?"

"The real you, yes."

Viitar's ears drooped. "This is the real me."

"It ain't." Scartooth snapped the extra bandage off.

Viitar shook his head. "I just find it so hard to believe that I would do that... I'm scared of creatures that do that..."

Frosten was right about one thing. Twofang agreed to see Cringe later.

"How close are we?" Cringe asked.

"And where were you when you saw, uh, Viitar? The forest?" Cringe was no longer behind Frosten but rather at her side. "Perhaps Drizzle attacked him for me. He knows I hate that little wretch."

"That's..." Cringe furrowed his brow. "Not right."

Molan and Cormac raced in, nearly crashing into Rowe and Valence. "Something's wrong!" Molan hissed, flapping his wings. "I--I don't know-- what's happening..."

"I don't know why it would happen to him but not me or Chandra," said Cringe.

Molan rapidly shook his head. "N-N-N-No..."

Cormac hissed. "You."

"Oh, a long time." Cringe stepped over a giant tree root, curling his lip in distaste. "He was acting very strange. I thought I already told you that. Like one possessed..."

The bat and rat both followed suit. Molan was quiet save for the chattering of his teeth, and Cormac would occasionally slap him and hiss at him to stop it. It didn't work.

"He would run off at night like someone was controlling him..." Cringe shut his eyes. "And scream."

"TURN AROUND!" Molan screamed, flapping his wings violently. Cormac didn't so much heed this as was forced by Molan going over his head to turn and run in the opposite direction than Valence.