Driftfire's pregnancy hadn't been an enjoyable one. The whole time she'd just been consumed with the fear that she would end up just like her own mother, that Tumblefoot would somehow be taken from her before the kits were born just like the father she had never known, that she could and would lose her kits. Tumblefoot and Whispermoon had been constantly by her side with their unwavering support, but it wasn't enough to push through the cloud of depression that had settled over Driftfire's mind. It was worse than it had been during her kithood and apprenticeship; while back then she'd been happy to just grit her teeth and keep her head down, nowadays she couldn't even fathom how she would manage to make it through at all.

When the first pains of labour came, Driftfire made no move to alert the medicine cat to come and help her. She just endured the pain quietly, stayed lost in her own thoughts for the last time before she became a mother, almost relishing the pain she was convinced she still deserved after Brookcloud's death. Eventually though the pain did become too much to ignore with a straight face, but she still refused to cry out. Whispermoon would be by to check on her at some point during the morning, she could just tell her then that the beginning of the end had come.