[Dark]

Chapter 5: Darkfall -- I've Been Dying to Live, but Living to Die
Warning: This post contains mentions of self-doubt, suicidal thoughts, feelings of helplessness and hopelessness, dissociation, and depression. Please proceed with caution.

Some time had passed since Larkfire had effectively ended things with him. She had said things like “she still loved him” or it was “a break”, but Darkfall knew what it truly was. She didn’t need him anymore. She didn’t want him anymore. She was better off without him.

He had known this of course, before he had even asked, that she still held feelings for Sleepykit’s father, “Prince” she had called him, but some part of him wanted to believe that eventually, that would go away and only feelings of him would remain. It was a selfish, inconsiderate thought. One that he felt disgusted with. Even in the time they were together, it was all he could think about. Was he doing enough? Was he doing things right? Was she happy with him? Etc. The large tom constantly found himself compared to the invisible tom that was seemingly out of the picture. He found himself wondering if this “Prince” would’ve handled things differently. If he would’ve kept Larkfire contained within the camp during both of her pregnancies. If he would have not his head and lost almost all of his memories. If he would’ve been better for her.

It was all so bad that often times if it wasn’t the fear of his ever-present nightmares, then it was the feelings of self-doubt and worry that kept him up. The fear that one day Larkfire would decide that she was done with him and would leave. It was something that weighed heavily on his mind even before everything bad started happening. During the initial days, he would find himself waking up in the middle of the night, gasping for air, and then heading to the nursery to make sure that she was still there. It was hard to believe that she would settle for someone like him, and oftentimes he would have to nibble the end of his tail to make sure he wasn’t dreaming.

It got worse after she became Elmshadow’s apprentice. She hardly had any time left for Sleepykit, much less him. They’d tried to make time for one another when they could, but with wildly different schedules and duties – her being the medicine cat in training, and him being one of three enforcers at the time, it just made things hard. He tried to do small gestures like bringing her prey, or stopping by if even for a moment, but their relationship had already begun to crack under the pressure from what was going on. These cracks were small, hardly even noticeable, and even if he was paying attention, he’d have missed it.

Things got worse after he hit his head. Even to this day, after recovering most of his memories, those two weeks were very foggy for him. It was ironic to think that one of the things that led to the downhill of their relationship was his attempt to bring her back a gift. He wondered if she still had it – the owl feather. He was not confident enough to ask with everything that had happened since, but if she did still have it, it’d make him feel a little better about himself. Of course, he would understand if she no longer kept it, hell, he wouldn’t even blame her if she would’ve tossed it out. In his eyes, it was just a reminder of his failures. His failures as an enforcer, his failures as a mate, and his failures as a dad.

He was a failure.

Every day was a reminder of this fact, every day was a reminder of his shortcomings. Even after his recovery, he never fully went back to his enforcer or his guard duties, he was slacking. He felt terrible. He gained most of his memories back in the aftermath of Larkfire being blinded and renamed and then subsequently had his daughter kidnapped within the following days. Each day he could feel the burning disappointment not only from Dawnstar, but from others as well. Though he was trying got do better, his own sons and daughters for the most part looked at his as if he were something not even the crows would feed on.

It hurt. A lot.

Feeling like he was letting everyone down, feeling like he wasn’t doing enough. It didn’t help that Larkfire took an apprentice of her own. She seemed to devote more time to Mossfreckle than she did to him or the kits. He understood she had a duty to train the next medicine cat, however, some of the kits felt neglected, and it was hard for him to be with all of them at all times on top of his own duties. He could get over the fact that he wasn’t receiving much attention, however, the kits were his priority, and it felt like Larkfire just didn’t care all that much about them sometimes when he knew she actually loved them more than anything. It was something he struggled to come to terms with, but he tried his best to see things from her point of view.

Darkfall didn’t know when, but somewhere along the way he had begun slipping, and now he was tumbling headfirst into the deep end. Everything around him started crumbling and he was scrambling to pick up and salvage the pieces. He had begun losing his sense of self, his identity. Larkfire leaving him was the final nail in the coffin. ”I need to find myself again, Darkfall.” she had told him ”Without you.”

The cloudy-eyed she-cat’s words had done nothing but solidify everything he had been thinking and feeling for the last few moons. She didn’t need him. She didn’t want him. She was better of without him. After everything was said and done, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of regret. If only he had acted faster, choosing to be closer to her instead of distancing himself the year prior. If only he had stayed in camp instead of disappearing for a moon in an attempt to find his apprentice, filling the void in his heart with a knock-off copy of her. If only he had never talked to her again, leaving her be when coming back instead of trying to find ways to talk to her, to go back to how things were before. He should’ve known, and he should’ve never expected that things would go back to how they were before. It was impossible. His actions after their respective warrior and enforcer ceremonies had already sent things along an irreversible path of ruin. He should’ve known that no matter what he did, her heart no longer belonged to him, but to another.

He messed up.

She didn’t need him.

She wasn’t coming back.

Though part of him wanted to hold out faith that he would somehow be able to prove his worth to her again, a larger, more dominant part of him understood that after she “found herself” as she called it, she would want nothing to do with him. He wanted to tell himself that it was fine, that it was okay, but he knew deep down that it wasn’t. It felt like burning claws of fire had pierced his heart and were tearing it apart. It felt as if the very fabric of his being were being unraveled and thrown back together over and over and over again. With each passing day he found his sense of self slipping, often times he would wake up unsure of who he was or what he was here for. On such days he would go out of camp with Mistlewhisker, or spend time with his kits in an attempt to feel something. Some days it would work, and others it was just a numb sensation, one that felt like there was static in his head. Then other times still, he felt like an emotional mess, like he was able to flood RiverClan with his tears and would cry until he couldn’t cry anymore or he’d have brief moments of inexplicable anger. It was a rough time for him, a time where he was holding on by the narrowest of strands.

Almost every night, before turning in for the night, the young tom would remind himself over and over again that he was Darkfall, that he was not only a warrior, but also an Enforcer of ShadowClan. He told himself over and over and over again that he was not weak, that as a member of ShadowClan he was strong. It was hard to believe though, as he didn’t feel very strong. He felt like a weakling, he felt like he was worthless and didn’t matter. Sometimes he felt like giving up, just so he didn’t have to feel the hurt anymore – to feel like this. He’d only been alive for 25 moons up to this point, but it felt like he had lived three times that with all of the loss and pain he had unfortunately suffered.

Life was becoming too taxing and at some point he acknowledged that if it weren’t for the kits that hardly even tolerated him, then there was a good chance that he wouldn’t even be here, much less remain in the clan. He had reached most of his dreams and aspirations, having become an enforcer, becoming mates with Larkfire, and then starting a family. What else was left for him? He could get his crap together and aim to become deputy maybe, but could he really handle that right now? That was just more work, more opportunities to disappoint everyone.

He didn’t know what to do anymore, what to live for.

He wasn't good enough for anything or for anyone.

This very tom who had been struggling and having these thoughts for the past few moons, watching everything he knew and loved be snatched from him bit by bit was sitting at the edge of the river that ran through ShadowClan territory. This very same tom had been sitting in silence for hours, hardly moving a muscle as he just watched the water pass by. After all this time, Darkfall finally spoke, voice hardly above a whisper in the wind.

”... Please… help me…”