Author's Note: Yay, this is my first fanfic! Please give me reviews for this, I worked hard on it! =D Any new ideas are welcome!

Chapter 1

The forest was alive with screeching and fighting. Night was grappling with a yellow tom, his collar studded with sharp dog's teeth. It clumsily stumbled away, only to leap on top of Night unexpectedly, trapping him underneath his claws.

"What do you think you're doing, Night? Have you gone mad?!" The yellow cat spat furiously at him. "Scourge let you in, and this is how you repay him? What's gotten into you?!" He raked his claws across Night's face.

Night bunched his hind legs up and pushed, heaving the tom off of him. He then stood on his hind legs, overpowering the tom, and pinned him down.

"I'm not going to live my life like this, cowering in fear of having a family and friends in case Scourge finds out. I'm not about to be cast out because Scourge is afraid I might overthrow him, and neither are my kits!" Night hissed, and scratched the cat across the nose before jumping over him to help an unusually spotted golden she-cat battling Bone, the massive black and white deputy of BloodClan.

"Leopardstar, watch out!" screeched a gray tom behind her. The golden she-cat turned around and pounced on Night, clawing him.

"This will teach you to drive out the Clans!" she screeched, clawing him over and over. Night twisted out of her reach and stood, panting, before her.

"No! I'm not fighting for BloodClan!" he yowled, and leaped onto Bone's back, clinging to his fur while biting his tail and scratching his back. Bone hissed and twisted once in the air, shaking Night loose and nearly shredding his ear. Night let out a low growl and jumped on Bone once again, digging his claws into his pelt. "That's for my kits, you mangy furball!" Night screeched, clawing Bone's underbelly. Bone yelped and managed to get loose from Night's strong grip, running towards a fluffy white tom.

Night licked his wounds clean and looked up to find Leopardstar staring at him. "I have no wish to fight for the side of those traitors who would let a starving kit go without food," he meowed.

Suddenly, a terrible wail rose about the chaos of the fighting cats.

"Scourge!" it cried. "Scourge is dead!"

All fighting ceased. BloodClan warriors stopped in their vicious brawling and stared at the cat who had let out the horrible cry of defeat. Then, their blank gazes turned towards the source of their leader's death, a flame colored tom with green eyes. In an instant, they all turned and fled back to the twoleg place. To Night, the fleeing cowards no longer looked like the horrible warriors they had been when they came to defeat the Clans, but mice who were escaping back to their dark holes where they belonged.

Night looked at the clearing, filled with Clan cats chasing out the BloodClan cats. A hiss sounded behind him. "Run, kittypet!"

Night whipped around to face three cats - A black and white tom with a long tail, a tortoiseshell she-cat and a mottled dark brown tom, and all of them were pelting towards him. Night stood his ground, hoping that they would slow their pace, but they continued charging towards him. He let out a strangled mew and fled from them, their claws barely a tail-length away.

What did I do to deserve this?! Night thought, panicked from the chase. I fight on their side and they chase me out!

Running as fast as his legs could carry him, he came to a sandy moor that smelled of Clan cats. Ahead was an old, used thunderpath. Night didn't have time to see if any monsters were coming, so he sprinted to the other side, praying that a monster wouldn't come out unexpectedly and crush him underneath its huge paws.

The scent of the three cats who were chasing him became weaker. Night turned to look behind him and saw that they were satisfied that they had chased him out of their territory and were padding towards the forest. Night took a few more weary steps away from the thunderpath and collapsed. He surveyed the land around him. To the left of him was the thunderpath, and in front was a cliff. At the bottom of the cliff was a dark looking cave. The sky was a hazy gray.

He thought about the cat with the flame-colored pelt who took away Scourge's life and freed the BloodClan cats. Scourge had taken him into BloodClan when he was a very small kit and had given him the name "Night" for his pitch black pelt. However, even though Scourge gave him shelter, he didn't feel any debt owed to him. Scourge was a terrible leader who would turn on any of his Clanmates in a heartbeat. He heard stories about how Scourge wasn't always the feared leader he used to be, but had a hard time envisioning anything other than hate and cruelty in Scourge's life.

When he looked at Scourge, he always looked at him with fear and hate. But when he looked at Scourge's murderer, he saw what a leader should be. He saw the determination to preserve one's Clan's territory and the binding loyalty that held him to it. The other Clan cats in the clearing looked at the flame cat with respect and trust, almost the opposite of what BloodClan looked at Scourge with.

Night got up to his paws and shook the dirt away from his fur. The gray sky let loose small droplets of water, and they clung to his pelt. He shook them off and leaped down the cliff. Perhaps the cave would be a good sanctuary in hiding from the rain.

Padding into the cave, he noticed that it seemed to swallow him up into darkness. Rain was still seeping into the cave, so he went further in.

Now there was only darkness everywhere. Night grew panicked, not knowing which way to go. Behind him, the small circle of light that indicated the entrance to the cave was gone completely. The eerie silence didn't help his problem at all.

Night sprinted forwards only to hit a cave wall. A dead end? He felt with his paw a passageway leading to the left. As he approached the new cave opening, he noticed a faint glow from inside. He walked faster, leading himself in. Then he gasped.

There was a stone in the middle of the cavern, and it was emitting a glow. He padded forward, suddenly feeling the urge to lie down and sleep. As he came closer and closer to the glowing stone, he felt sleepier and sleepier until he collapsed at the foot of it and fell asleep.