Author's Note: New story guys. :D

And yeah, just before the first chapter, this is really borderline T. There's quite a lot of coarse language and in future, I think there may be a few sex references and stuff: also, there will obviously be violence because it's warriors. You have been warned.

Burning Sky

Chapter One:

I stared forward monotonously at the front of the classroom. My teacher, Mr Harris, stood with his back to me, brandishing a white board pen dramatically in the air, while he desperately tried to make the my least favourite subject (namely history) interesting. It was a habit of this teacher to do stupid hand gestures while trying to explain shit, like how the Normans invaded Britain, and how Napoleon took over China- I think it was China anyway. As you've probably guessed, I don't give the teacher that hates me much attention, when I could be using it for much more important things.

Chatting, for instance.

I turned my head to look at my friend. His name was Dominic, but I called him Dom because quite frankly, I was too lazy to pronounce his full name. He was Hispanic, with dark brown eyes and messy black hair that fell lazily in a quiff over his forehead. As it happened, he had a stupid habit that was equally annoying as that of Mr Harris; even so, we were friends anyway. The said quirk of his was to chew his pencil, which he was doing now.

When he saw me, he took the well chewed pencil out his mouth and smiled broadly. 'Hey Jack,' he whispered, nodding to the front of the classroom. I followed his gaze to see that he was pointing towards a piece of graffiti on the board just above Mr Harris' head. I hadn't noticed it before, but I smirked. It said, "Read me!" And upon looking underneath it, you realised it said, "Anyone who read this is on crack.'

Dom had always been a little bit childish: whereas I had tactfully just smirked instead of laughed, Dom's giggle echoed through the classroom, alerting Mr Harris. He spun around and glared daggers towards me and Dom. He didn't need any briefing on who had made the giggle. After all, we were always the source of any distraction in any class we were in.

'Jack,' he snapped. He looked on in annoyance through his rounded spectacles. 'What's so funny that you just had to disturb my class?'

'Wasn't me sir.' I said smoothly, with an aura of confidence. To be fair, I was actually telling the truth, even if it meant selling out my friend. Dom was shaking his head, signalling the clear message of don'ttellhimori'llgetadetention, from behind.

'Really?' Mr Harris retorted. 'Then would you like to tell me who did laugh?'

Okay, maybe I'm no the kindest person in the world, but I'd rather it was my friend in detention than me. I turned around and made an apologetic face towards Dom, who groaned. 'It was Dom sir.'

Mr Harris diverted his evil stare away from me and towards Dom. 'Is this true?' He asked.

'Yeah,' Dom replied, hotly, before raising a big accusing finger in my direction. 'But- but he was the one who showed me something funny that I had to laugh at! I tried not to.'

Now that was a complete lie! He was the one that showed me the graffiti! Mr Harris turned back to me, and I was about to speak, when all of a sudden, the teacher interrupted me. 'Would you like to tell me what you said to him?' He asked me, just as coldly.

'I didn't say him anything.' I said, with teeth gritted in anger, before pointing towards the crack joke above his board. 'Dom just pointed out that thing above your white board.'

And that was how both of us ended up in after school detention.

Admittedly, me and Dom were no strangers to the concept of after school detention, but either way, this particular one was really harsh on us. I didn't physically do anything wrong, but of course, Mr Harris was convinced that I had written the graffiti, so he'd dumped us both in the pot. And it was all thanks to Dom. If he hadn't caved in, I wouldn't be in this detention!

We sat with our hands on our laps, lazily strewn over our chosen chairs. The teacher on detention duty, Mrs Brown, had ensured we were a good distance away from each other so that we couldn't speak. She sat in the teacher's desk, typing away on her computer, and I sat with a book in my hand-

Yeah, a book. I know you're surprised that such a bad kid like me would ever touch a book, but it's not like I ever let anyone know about the fact that I actually do read. When we came in, Mrs Brown told us we were allowed to read or doodle if we wanted, and besides it's not like I read obsessively. I only read one series of books.

The books are called the Warriors series by the Erin Hunters, and personally, I'm a massive fan of them. I've written so much fan mail to the authors that I think their mailbox must be overflowing by now, but like I said, no one knows, and no one needs to know that I'm in love with a series of books about cats that live in Clans and fight each other.

My favourite character is this she-cat (Clan terminology for female) called Cinderpelt. Her story is really sad; she's a cripple who got hit by a car because of a trap set by the the main protagonist. She wanted to become a warrior, but her leg was too injured, so she had to become a medicine cat.

In the detention, I was reading The Forgotten Warrior, which is the fifth book in the Omen of the Stars arc. Hollyleaf had just come back and I was so excited for the Last Hope that I thought I was going to die.

Suddenly, there was a noise from the other side of the room. I looked up to see Dom pointing at the book and grinning with silent laughter. Quickly, I snapped it shut. He was the only one who knew I read the Warriors books, but he didn't tell anyone because as it happened, a I knew a few secrets of his as well.

Dom looked over to see whether Mrs Brown was looking; she wasn't. He quickly picked up a piece of paper, scribbled on it, scrunched it up into a ball and then rolled it across the floor of the classroom over to me. I glanced over at Mrs Brown's desk once more, before picking it up and opening it to see what it read.

It read, It never stops to amaze me how you can be interested in such a babyish book.

My fists instinctively clenched together, and if I really was a cat, I'd be emitting a long, low growl at this point. I took out a pencil and wrote down my answer, before rolling it back across the floor to Dom. He picked up it up and read it, smirking, but then his cheeks began to burn a bright red colour.

My reply was, It never stops to amaze ME how you can be interested in such a slut.

And that was how I managed to keep Dom quite all this time. I guess I could have worded the reply a little kinder, but I was angry and I wanted to put him in his place. Dom fancied this girl called Lucy, who was to say the least of low intelligence. She was quite pretty, but it wasn't my fault if she was a slut. I mean, she was! I couldn't help it.

In the end, I guess it profited us equally. Neither of our secrets got found out, and I wasn't about to change that.

Suddenly, I was surprised by the ringing of an alarm clock. It took me a few sends to realise what it was, before I sighed in relief and leaned back in my chair. Mrs Brown always brought an alarm clock to tell her when the end of the detention was.

Mrs Brown didn't look up- she just nodded and pointed towards the door.

Me and Dom got up quickly, collected all our bags and dashed through it and into the corridor. It was practically deserted except for a few people sitting against the walls, looking lost. Most of them were younger years- Year 7 and such. Me and Dom were Year 9 at that point, and we knew our way around the school well.

We walked together in silence towards the exit of the school. We didn't want to talk about what had just taken place, but I certainly wasn't going to be the one who broke the quiet first. Dom allowed himself a sidewards glance towards me, but I kept my cold, icy glare straight at the floor.

Together, we reached the school reception and strode out onto the concrete of the school car park. Sunset was well under way, and I guessed my mother would be proper angry about the fact that I was back home late from a detention again. My eyes narrowed and I shook my head. I don't care about that, I told myself ferociously, she's just a stupid old woman who sits around feeling sorry for herself all day and preening over Sally.

Sally was my kid sister. She was four years younger than me, and hadn't finished her primary education yet: she had extremely blonde hair, almost on the verge of white, and it ran down in silky waves all the way down to her shoulders. I was no idiot. I knew that Sally was going to become beautiful when she grew up, whereas I could hardly say the same about me. My greasy brown hair was always a mess, and I liked it that way. Sometimes, I made it especially untidy just to frustrate mum. But Sally? Oh no. Mummy's perfect girl to the max. Always making sure her homework was done on time; never late for school. She did whatever mum wanted her to do, and seemed to take pride in driving me round the bend.

It had been like that ever since dad left.

'Hey Jack?' Dom said, a little hesitantly. I didn't look up to address him, but he carried on anyway. 'You won't tell anyone about Lucy will you?'

I clicked my knuckles before looking up at him, a sharp look in my eyes. 'We've been through this Dom.' I replied, sustaining my cold demeanour. 'As long as you don't mention the… the books, I don't mention Sally. Alright?'

He agreed, before his eyes widened and for the first time since we'd left the school, his trademark smile appeared. 'Oh by the way, I forgot!' He opened up his camo green school bag, reached inside ad removed a ten pound note.

I looked at it in interest. 'Where'd you get that?'

'Stole it off this Year 8 girl,' he said, before waving it teasingly in front of my face. 'It was a laugh! She dropped all her books, and this fell out of her pocket. No one was watching so I just grabbed it and took off.'

'Nice!' I echoed, and before Dom could react, I snatched it out of his hand and stuffed it into my pocket. 'Very nice indeed.'

'Hey?' Dom said, angrily. 'Gimme that back!'

'Make me.'

All Dom did was stare, and I smirked back (my own little trademark). My friend had learnt through bitter experience that I was easily the strongest and the fittest out of the two of us. Situations like this happened all the time, but they rarely escalated to fights.

However, this time, I had to admit, Dom really did look like he was on the verge of snapping. Obviously, the way I'd sold him out to Mr Harris earlier had gotten under his skin, and now me stealing his stolen money was just pushing him over the edge. 'Give it back now, you fucking bastard.' He snarled.

I could've tried to defuse what was going on that moment. I could've just been respectful towards my friend and given him back the money… but then again, the money would've been useful. Added on with the cash I already had, it was just about enough to get the new X-Box game I'd been wanting for ages.

So naturally I decided not to.

Dom knew me well enough to see that I wasn't going to give him the tenner back. His face was contorted with rage, and he looked like he was about to explode. I thought for a second that he would take a pop at me, but instead, he start inhaling and exhaling heavily. 'Look,' he said, attempting to remain calm. 'Look- Jack, please give me the money. I promise I'll pay you back at a later date.'

I ignored him and carried on walking, before just realising we had actually reached Dom's street. He lived on the other side of town to me, and I still had quite a large amount of ground to cover before I got home. 'I believe this is where we part.' I stated, in a mock posh accent. 'See you tomorrow.'

Dom didn't say anything, before he huffed and crossed the road onto the opposite side of the pavement, clearly giving up on the cash. 'I'll get that back from you, Jack!' He shouted from the other side of the road. 'Don't forget it!'

This sounds like the script of an Eastenders episode, I thought, throughly amused. 'I will get my revenge!' I said, mimicking Dom's tone, before looking up at the sky. It was a deep pink colour, a sharp contrast to the jet-black clouds splattered over it. Dusk would soon be casting it's foreboding shadows on the town, especially since it was nearly winter. Sometimes, I ended walking up to my house in complete darkness those days.

Shrugging off what Dom had said, I continued walking, turning the note over and over again in my pocket. I liked the feeling of money; it made me feel like I was in possession something. Something more important than an object. It's hard to explain, but sometimes, I just felt… lost.

After about a hundred yards, I reached a country stile that led into the park. To be honest, it wasn't much of a park. Most of it was just covered in thick, dense woodland, but it was a short cut all the same. I didn't always take this route back to my house, but today I felt like doing so. Call it destiny.

I jumped over the stile and into the park. There was a small, winding dirt path that led through the expanse of trees and back into the suburban cul-de-sacs on the other side, and I started walking once more. The twisted branches of the conifers reached upwards and upwards and upwards, shrouding whatever remaining light was being cast on the world. It set the scene for something deadly and malevolent. Something mysterious.

I allowed my mind to wonder as I carried on. Almost instantaneously, I discovered myself on the subject of Warriors. I couldn't wait to get back to my house and finish the Forgotten Warrior. Then I'd be able to start reading The Last Hope! I managed to prevent myself from reading any spoilers about the last book in the Omen of the Stars, like I had for the sixth book in The New Prophecy, but I already had tonnes of predictions. I was certain Cinderpelt would make some kind of special appearance in StarClan, even though she had been reincarnated into Cinderheart, and I had an inkling feeling at the back of my mind that this would be Firestar's last battle.

And it was then that my life changed forever.

I heard a noise. I couldn't identify what it was: somewhere in-between the sound of an aeroplane, and a helicopter, except much more quiet. Like whatever was making the noise was spiralling just above the ground. I turned my head to look around the surrounding undergrowth. 'Is anyone there?' I called out gruffly. 'Dom?'

Then I saw something out of the corner of my eye. Quickly, I spun around, and discovered the source of the noise. It was a disturbance beside one of the shrubs. Something was glowing a bright blue colour, and then right in front of my eyes, it transformed to red. And then green. And then pink! A hue of thousands of different colours splashed together in one giant palette.

I blinked in confusion. What was going on? Was it alive? What was it? The questions spread through my brain like wild fire. As far as I knew, you were only supposed to see colours like this when you were high, and I definitely wasn't. So what the-

Curiosity replaced my previous confusion, and when it comes to cats, you know what they say about curiosity. I took a hesitant step towards the bush. The colours only seemed to glow brighter. I tilted my head to one side, unsure of what to do, but eventually I decided to continue my approach.

Now, I was only inches away from the shrub. The colours were no longer changing. It now remained a deep scarlet. The same colour as blood.

Well here goes nothing, I thought, before pulling the bush away and looking to see what it was.

The only thing I can remember about what happened next was a strange feeling. Like I was flying.

Either that, or I was falling into oblivion.