Okay, in this chapter there is action. The last chapter probably bored you because it was just Sunpaw thinking. It was a filler chapter. This one should be more interesting.
Disclaimer: I do not own Warriors, if I did I would tell you, honest!
A high-pitched yowl, snapped Sunpaw out of her dozing. Her head snapped up to face the entrense of the apprentice den. The milky dawn sky gaze just enough light for her to see what was happening. Several pairs of eyes glimmered with hatred through the slight darkness, and figures that were clearly cats swarmed into the camp. Sunpaw heard Mousepaw whimper beside her.
"It's an attack!" she hissed.
Tigerpaw raced up beside her, eyes wide with a mixture of anticipation and fear. Mousepaw seemed outright afraid of the much bigger cats that could kill her probably just by stepping on her. Sunpaw felt sympathy for the kits.
"Don't worry," she soothed. "You don't have to fight if you don't want to. Just stay and here and out of sight, so that the bigger warriors don't see you as-"
Tigerpaw cut her off. "Are you joking, Sunpaw? I want to fight! Our first battle and we are only four moons old! That will be a great story to tell our kits when we are older warriors!" He gave a laugh that made Sunpaw's whiskers twitch in amusement.
"I don't know," she said, feeling more serious. "They are three times your size. It would be dangerous for you to go out there."
"But we trained," he shot back. "We know just as many battle move as you do. Since when does size matter anyway?"
Before she could say anything, Tigerpaw shot from the den, brushing past her shoulder. Mousepaw hesitantly followed, moving slower than him at first, but once she made it a few tail lengths outside, she broke into a sprint.
Sunpaw ran outside to the battle, both to search for the young apprentices and attack a heartless WindClan warrior. Her eyes stretched wide in surprise. She had expected a whole Clan to be after them. But what there was, was actually ten or eleven cats and they were from different Clans. Most of them were WndClan, for the scent of rabbits and grass was the strongest. But there must-be been one or two cats that were RiverClan and ThinderClan. She even recognized Blackfire, ThunderClan's deputy amongst the group.
Smokestar was rolling around with Ivystar in a flurry of snapping teeth. Cloudwind and Curvefang were battling side by side at three large toms. Soottail was being pinned by a RiverClan she-cat, Furledwhisker was leaping at a WindClan warrior.
Sunpaw launched herself through the crowd, trying to find the apprentices. A ThunderClan she-cat lunged for her, but she dodged and kept running. If they were to be harmed, then ShadowClan will have no warriors for a long time, and when she did pass her assessment, things would be no different than they were then. Plus Scarletfur, would be horrified to find that her kits were drowned in a pool of their own blood.
At long last, she spotted the ginger fur of Tigerpaw and the light gray pelt of Mousepaw standing in front of a WindClan apprentice. He was bigger than Sunpaw, but appeared to be the same age. In his eyes, there was confusion. He was murmuring something to them. As Sunpaw crept closer, a scowl formed on his face and he snarled, "If it weren't against the warrior code, I would shred you two right now. Go find your mother, kits!"
"We aren't kits!" protested Mousepaw, rearing up on her hind legs. "We are apprentices!"
The tom snorted. "Yeah, and hedgehogs fly. Go away, now!"
Tigerpaw hissed and reached up, slashing his claws across the apprentice's nose. Blood dripped onto the ground and the apprentice jumped back in surprise. When he recovered, his eyes slanted and he raised a paw, claws unsheathing and glinting in the faint dawn light. Sunpaw didn't wait for anything else to happen. She ran and leaped in front of Tigerpaw and Mousepaw just as claws slashed across her side. She screeched in agony as blood pulsed from her wound. When she landed, the apprentices yelped and scattered into the battle to torment some more warriors.
The WindClan apprentice, curled his lips back and placed his paw over Sunpaw's shoulder, pinning her vigorously to the ground. "I guess I should thank you for preventing me from hurting those to pests," he growled. "Killing a couple of kits won't do you ShadowClan softies any good."
"Softies?" demanded Sunpaw, ignoring the throbbing pain in her flank. "Tell me, you rabbit-eating frog-brain, is this soft?" She pushed herself up, and twisted to her paws, and the apprentice lost his grip on her shoulder. As he stumbled she kicked her back leg out and struck him hard on the neck. He gagged and flew backward, landing in a cloud of dust from the ground. Sunpaw whirled and lunged for him, sinking her claws into his hind leg. Blood oozed from the scars she made, and he winced in pain, still coughing from the impact on his neck. She pinned down his shoulders and kept her hind paws on his legs to keep him from getting up. She aimed blows to his ears, and only stopped when he spoke again.
"Hey, you are the kittypet from the Gathering, aren't you?" he growled, voice hoarse.
She nodded. "Call me what you want, but am I a kittypet right now? Am I wearing a colar? Am I in the arms of a Twoleg? No, I am fighting you, and it looks like, this so called 'kittypet' is beating you."
The apprentice struggled but he could barely fidget under her firm grasp. Only when he lay panting did she let go.
"Go crawl back to your medicine cat and get some cobwebs already," she snarled. "You are a disgrace to your Clan here."
The apprentice coughed one last time and fled.
Sunpaw stared after him, studying his brown and white fur. Hmm...
Before she could allow her thoughts to go any further, a cry shook the camp. Sunpaw searched the area, trying to find a Clanmate in danger. She saw a flash of dark ginger fur and realized that Scarletfur was cornered by two cats. She was horribly wounded; a cut ran from her shoulder, half way down her foreleg, and blood splattered the ground where she stood. Sunpaw raced over and sank her teeth into one of the cat's leg. He yowled in pain and tried to shake her off. Before she could lose her grip, another cat crashed into him and all three of them went tumbling. Sunpaw felt fangs dig into her scruff and she was lifted off of the tom. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Pouncefoot attack the tom. Before he could really harm him though, a low yowl racked her ears and the amushers fled, leaving the camp within heart beats.
"Is that it?" Cloudwind asked. "Did we win?"
Smokestar parted his jaws to answer, but before he could, another battle cry sounded, and more cats ran into the camp. Sunpaw thought is was strange that they would leave and come right back, until she noticed that every cat this time was different, and most of them were ThunderClan, led by Cherrystar. Sunwide gaped when she realized what was happening. "They are sending in new warriors with all of their energy so that the others could rest. We are exhausted and wounded," she said to Pouncefoot.
"I know," he replied sorrowfully, "I know."
ShadowClan plunged back into battle. Sunpaw felt the sudden urge to sink her claws into Cherrystar's throat. She couldn't believe what they were doing, it was like they were at their strongest attempt to drive them out. That would be unwise...wouldn't it?
She didn't know what to think. Part of her wanted to scream to the early morning sky and run, she didn't know where, just anywhere but there. She had gone too far to go back home. The other part of her wanted to fight until every hair on her pelt was drifting through the air and her name was but a memory. The time she was there was short, but even though a silent voice within her was screaming at her to flee and leave it all behind, she would never leave her camp, not unless she was in pieces on the cold hard ground.
She was right. This was not easy. It had been only hours since she had came to that realization, but it had already come to effect. She was having trouble remembering her knowledge of her battle training because thoughts of her destiny and the prophecy, and Radiantmask pushed it away like it was no longer significant. Enemies kept landing blows and with each moment gone by her eyes grew heavier and heavier, and her legs were like they were made of honey.
"Sunpaw!" Pouncefoot called to her, after striking a RiverClan tom across the nose. "Go to Strompaw! He will help you! We will handle everything!"
She ignored him. She didn't want to give up. A tortoiseshell she-cat hissed at her and leaped at her flank. Before she could make a scratch, Sunpaw maneuvered to the side, so she barely missed and bit down hard into the tortoiseshell's shoulder while clinging onto her back with thorn sharp claws. For a long time, she just remained there, almost like to catch her breath, and the position she was in was to an advantage in which the larger warrior couldn't reach to attack back.
At last, Sunpaw grew tired of the tortoiseshell's fidgeting so she dropped down and tackled the she-cat to the ground. During the brief moment that she had her down, she took a claw and slit open her belly. The tortoiseshell screeched as blood poured from her wound and jumped up, swiping at Sunpaw and getting her in the head before turning and fleeing the camp, drops of blood fish showing her path.
Until the late morning, Sunpaw fought. Many times over, a new group of attackers came to replace the last. Smokestar had lived up to his vow, he didn't surrender to them. They would fight until they fell. The kits stepped out after the second wave, tired up running around and being treated like kits that belonged in the nursery. Scarletfur was unable to continue after her fatal wound in the shoulder, who Stormpaw used almost all of his cobwebs on. Sunpaw knew he would do what he could to keep his mother alive.
If only I was old enough to protect my own mother, Sunpaw thought as she slashed down a tom's nose, then I wouldn't be in this mess.
If this battle is just against the other three Clans, than she couldn't imagine what the battle would be like against The Black Horror. Midnight and his gang had muscles that rippled like lake water on a windy leaf-fall day. They could last days it seemed.
As the day wound into the afternoon, Sunpaw noticed Ivystar atop a tree that shaded the camp. Her eyes were narrowed in suspicion. She looked over the camp until she must have reached into each cats' soul. At long last, she yowled and the fighting stopped.
"WindClan," she called, voice drowned in disappointment. "Retreat."
"ThunderClan," Cherrystar said next, "Retreat."
"RiverClan," Fishstar hissed angerly. "Let us not waste are time with these ShadowClan warriors who are not worth it."
Sunpaw knew he was trying hard to conceal his defeat.
The camp began to empty quickly. Cats began to reluctantly follow their leaders, shooting glares at ShadowClan as they passed. Sunpaw sneered at a young RiverClan apprentice as he padded by her.
Triumph bubbled in her veins and her lost energy coarser through her veins. But then she looked around. Cloudwind white fur had turned red and cuts covered her flank. Furledwhisker and many other warriors were collapsed and panting on the ground. Smokestar's legs buckled as he lost consciousness and fell to sleep. Even Pouncefoot was horribly wounded.
She gazed at her own battered up body. Blood was caked in her fur and dripped from her paws as she walked.
Perhaps they had lost the battle, but they lost the fight.
Well there you have it! A little action in this story finally! Please tell me what you think in a review! Almost sixty, yay!
Vote on my poll for Sunpaw's warrior name
~Destiny