Warriors Short Stories

Four ~ Hope

Cleo breathed out in relief and pulled her kit's closer with her tail, memories of last week hitting her like a wave.

Her kitting had been successful, no cats died... Thanks to the furless. If they hadn't been feeding her, she could've starved, and she would've been much weaker, and a weak cat kitting usually doesn't end well.

Robin looked up at her with wide blue eyes. "Who's our father?" She asked.

Tears welled up in Cleo's eyes as she thought of the kits' father... "What's wrong? Why are you sad?" "Is our father dead?" Shadow guessed. Or should I say fathers? she thought bitterly.

"Hello? Mother?" Pumpkin frowned. "Why are you looking at us like that?"

"Oh... It's not your fault, darlings." She smiled. "You see... You have three fathers." Cleo admitted with a sigh.

"Three fathers? How?" "It's not important. Why don't you get some sleep?"

"But I wanna know who my father is!" Shadow persisted, his siblings chiming in.

"All of them. There was a big ginger tom, a silver one, and a little white one." Cleo winced at the memory.

"Pumpkin, you're ginger, like one of the toms, but you're also white, like another tom... Shadow, you're a brown and white tabby, like me. And Robin, one of the toms was silver. Like you." She explained gently.

"Why don't I have any white on me like Pumpkin and Shadow?" Robin wanted to know, puzzled.

"Because that is how the world works." Cleo smiled gently at her kits. "Rest now, kits. We have a big day tomorrow." Within minutes they were asleep.

...

"Shadow? Shadow, wake up silly! Shadow?!" Robin's mouth opened in a shrill wail towards the end of her sentence.

Cleo's blood ran cold as she stared at the one moon old kit. Or his body, at least.

"Kits." She announced, her voice thick with grief. "It's no use. He can't hear us. We can't do anything... He's dead."

Pumpkin stared at her fearfully. "What happened?"

"The furless got him." She whispered. "The furless whom I thought were my friends... Or, somewhat, anyway."

Robin's blue-gray eyes closed. The wound was clean, a small hole, but the bleeding, not so much.

"Come on. We must bury him." Cleo decided, picking up the body. She padded back towards the den, her kits trailing after her.

Once they reached their nest, Cleo gently laid the body down, and started digging a hole in the soft soil.

Robin crept up behind her, her tail tucked between her legs. Something fell from her mouth, but Cleo continued digging, ignoring it.

Finally, she was finished. "Kits!" She called softly, bringing them closer. But Robin wouldn't come.

"Robin?" Cleo frowned. "Come on, little one." Robin turned away and picked something up before padding forward.

Cleo stared at her. Flowers. Robin carried three perfect flowers in her mouth. A pink, a yellow, and a blue.

She sat down, dropped them, and started tearing up the pink one and the blue one. Rose and iris petals fell to her paws.

"I'm ready." She whispered quietly. I can't believe I forgot the flowers... With a sigh, Cleo picked her dead kit up, preparing to lower it into the hole.

His tabby and white fur parted as the breeze drifted past, revealing the bullet wound that killed him.

Her eyes sparkling with grief, she dropped the body, and with a dull thud it landed at the bottom.