Scourge felt the rush of pride that overwhelmed him as the battle waged before his eyes. He could see the writhing dark forms of cats as they tore into each other, he could see flashes of color in every expanse of his vision. Cats screeching with the heat of battle and following the rhythm of swiping, the tango of the fight. He could see his own against the pitiful forest-fools, he'd always been stronger. He'd killed Tigerstar, he'd gutted him like the slimy fish he had always been. He'd watched the fearsome brown tabby fall to the ground with a satisfying thud at his paws, so much for Starclan saving these useless mites, he almost felt bad for poor little Firestar. The tom would soon find that his precious little Starclan wouldn't be of much favor to him in death, he could still see the flame colored body in his peripheral vision.
The wide green eyes, the pathetic little shocked face as if he couldn't believe who had just put an end to his meek existence. He was almost had time to sneer at the broken corpse but not before a white tom drove into him and barreled him backwards. His spine met earth and it scraped into his back. He didn't like the feeling of the earth battering into his back, it brought back memories that he would have rather not relived. The white tom wasn't the largest he'd seen of the forest cats, he'd seem to have the more delicate build that he was prone to seeing in the twoleg place cats. Come to think of it, Firefool had been built much of the same. He didn't let the thought distract him from tearing his claws along the white cat's flank and hearing the shriek of agony that he released. He threw him off and began to step towards him, his claws raised to show the blood staining his white paw. He leaped and his claws were soon battering away at the younger tom.
He found his grip on the white scruff and sunk his fangs in, shaking his head from side to side. The blood was clean in his mouth, the taste of salt slick and delicious on his tongue. He could hear the caterwauls piercing his ears as the tom start to slump. This one was going to be easy, he'd killed rats who'd put up more of a fight with him. Though, for the oddest reason, the dumb white halfwit had his teeth in his leg and wouldn't let go for all the hope in the world and it was really starting to anger him.
"Scourge! Turn and face me!" a dreadful rumbling of a voice snarled behind him. He felt confusion making his head spin as he dropped the tom's soft scruff and turned swiftly on one paw and stared. It couldn't be. Firestar was standing there with fury in his green eyes, the tom as stark as his name. That couldn't be, it just couldn't be but there he was, he stood tall with his broad shoulders and his head held high. He looked like he hadn't even been touched, like he hadn't just had his throat torn open. He was standing like he wasn't dead, like Scourge hadn't just watched him die. He'd killed him. He'd done to him just as he'd done to cats in the past, none of those cats had ever gotten up to look him in the eye again. He felt a sickening hammering began in his chest. He was surprised he could still feel fear after feeling nothing for so long.
"How. . . I killed you," he was dumbfounded, how had the fire colored moron survive such a blow. How had he lived through a swipe so precise? Scourge hadn't simply imagined it, it had happened in such a manner that no cat could have imagined it. He'd killed the firey tom.
"You did," he spat, his green eyes were blazing as if something was lighting him up from the inside out. "But I'm a leader with nine lives who fights alongside Starclan. Can you say as much?"
Something gripped Scourge, he was suddenly terrified. Those were just kit tales, they weren't ever anything more than that. There was no Starclan, there couldn't be a Starclan. It wasn't logical, it didn't make sense, it couldn't be. He wouldn't let this preachy tom make him doubt everything he'd come here for! He spun and got a final blow into the white tom, he watched the body slide across the grass and hit the oversized stone that towered in the battlefield. The great orange fool was charging at him as quick as lightening and he sucked in a breath right before claws raked along his side, he swiped but the orange tom dodged it quicker than he could have ever expected.
He'd match his speed with his own, he'd take down this annoying ball of fur if it was the last thing he did. He leaped forward, aiming for a blow up Firestar's underbelly. He'd gut the foolish cat just like the other leader. The tom just barely avoided spilling his intestines all over the forest floor and he was backing off a bit, he didn't want to get swiped. He was just staying close enough for him to try to get blows in on Scourge. Scourge wasn't paying enough attention because Firestar's teeth sunk into the base of his tail and he screeched. Suddenly the two were rolling in a ball of spitting fury, he was lashing out with everything he had and blood was speckling the green of the grass. Firestar pulled back and Scourge felt a hiss escape his own jaws.
The other tom had crouched as if he were admitting defeat, his sides heaving as breath entered him and escaped him. He looked up at Scourge with unreadable green eyes and Scourge felt triumph surge through every bone in his body and he stretched up onto his hind paws and yowled it to the sky above him, he hoped their Starclan had enjoyed the show, now it was time for him to step up where he'd always belonged. He'd earned this victory. This was what he'd been searching for all along, the thing that would finally melt the ice around his heart and let him be free to lead his clan to higher places. This was it, this was it! He was choked short in his cry as a body barreled him over. No, no, no. This wasn't happening, this wasn't happening. Teeth shredded his ear and he yowled, scrabbling at the shoulders of the larger tom and trying to batter him off.
His teeth found Scourge's throat and his fangs shredded into the flesh. Scourge could do nothing the break the grip of the powerful tom above him and he felt blood spilling through his fur to the ground. He could feel himself growing weaker as red spotted his vision, just like blood. Just like the blood that he had been so infatuated by for so long, it splattered his vision as he felt blackness swirl in his mind. He hated this tom, he had ruined everything, he'd destroyed everything. He'd made a mockery of everything Scourge had worked so hard to build, he felt Firestar release his grip but it was much too late. Blood was choking him and blood was all he could see. A haze of red covered Firestar's face until finally, darkness consumed everything. He could feel it, the blood bubbling in his throat and the stinging wounds on his body.
He couldn't even growl his last words, he could do nothing. He felt like his eyes were still open but he couldn't even see the cursed stars.
He felt loneliness wrap around him one last time before suddenly he could feel no more.