PROLUGE
Night was beginning to fall, and the only light was the crescent moon, hanging above the hollow, like a guardian watching over them.
Owls and birds sang in the safety of leafless trees, just out of reach from any cat in desperate need of food.
It was Snow Moon, and times couldn't be harder. Prey was scarce, and everyone-everything seemed to be hostile and merciless.
A black tom, brown tabby and a russet tabby stayed hidden in the cold, dark safety of the shadows.
They watched with seemingly glowing eyes which shone in the silver moonlight that bathed the camp as if saying, everything will be okay, you will make it. But now, any reassurance seemed forced. There was no way to escape the freezing days of Snow Moon; even for Fire Tribe cats.
Three smaller cats watched safely from the shadows, their gaze fixed on a small crowd in the middle of camp.
"We have to try and start a small fire!" A ginger tabby she-cat was protesting desperately from the crowd.
Suddenly, a dark gray tom stepped out of a small hidden hole in the hollow's dirt-stone walls, every rib visible under his gray pelt.
The crowd's heads towards the stormy-gray tom.
"Fire?" He echoed the ginger tabby's words, pushing through the crowd, his intense blue eyes shifting from cat-to-cat.
The ginger tabby she-cat nodded, her green eyes bleak and desperate, starved of hope.
The gray tom leaned closer, his eyes like furious blazing fire.
"Do you remember what happened to Honey Bush?" The gray tom snarled, barely a whisker away from the ginger tabby.
The ginger she-cat slowly backed away with a terrified whimper.
"We'll die, Dark Sky!" Another cat meowed from the crowd, their voice trembling as if they were shaking.
"No, we won't!" Dark Sky shouldered his way through the crowd to find who had spoken; it was a russet tabby she-cat.
"What about my kits?" A brown tabby tom challenged from the russet she-cat's side. Dark Sky paused, as if he couldn't think of an answer.
We're doomed...