"Nooooooo!"
Smokepaw scrabbled desperately at the rough edge of the cliff face before him. He had to get a hold!
But no, even as he tried to grab hold, his paws were slipping away into nothingness. The last thing he saw was Russetfur's face peering over the edge, having tried in vain to reach him in time.
And then, he was falling, falling, falling, the air whistling through his fur as he continued his descent into the chasm.
For a moment he instinctively reached his paws down to grab onto something, but there was nothing to grab hold of.
Then suddenly, there was a loud thud! and he really was thrown into nothingness...
...
"No!" snarled a voice, as a black tom scratched at the rough terrain beneath his paws, which were covered with stars, "Not now! Not when Shadowclan needs its strength!"
"Calm yourself, Nightstar..." said a voice.
A regal looking blue-grey she-cat, whose muzzle was frosted with white, stepped from the swirling of fog. The Starclan cats had been wandering this mist ever since they left their old home and who knew when they would come out of it.
Nightstar glared at Bluestar, who was the cat that had spoken. Bluestar returned the gaze steadily.
"Yours is not the only clan that suffers for want of apprentices." she said, brows knitting together in worry.
"Smokepaw was different!" Nightstar snapped, then he sighed, looking down, "He is my daughter's son..."
Bluestar jerked her head up at this, and her eyes filled with compassion. She knew what it meant to watch your kin die below... She had, after-all, witnessed Stonefur's death. She frowned in thought, wishing she could help, when:
"There is a way..." she said thoughtfully, looking up at the swirling blackness that surrounded them.
Nightstar looked up at Bluestar, hope dawning in his expression.
"Yes," he said, sounding excited, "Yes, yes there is!"
"But he will be your responsibility." Bluestar said, seriousness in her gaze.
"Of course." Nightstar said, calming down now that a course of action had been presented to him.
Bluestar nodded and turned to pad away, disappearing into the darkness which swirled where she had last stood.
Nighstar remained behind, frowning down into a small pool in whose depths the image of a cat was reflected, a cat whose destiny was about to be taken in paw by Starclan itself.