Hey everyone! Thank you so much for your kind words and follows! It means a lot to me and I hope you continue to enjoy! Also, it turns out you can update too frequently! Did you know ffnet won't update what day you post a new chapter if you do so within 24 hours? Well, I forgot!

The visage of Mumm-Ra was one of grey skin pulled taut over sharp bones and a sunken, hideous nose like that of a short-nosed bat, with pure red eyes glaring down at them through the blue flames that wrapped around his emaciated, sharp body wrapped in ancient linen and swallowed by a tattered and torn cloak that seemed to drip blood.

Above him, the sky roiled angrily, a swirling vortex of dark clouds and purple magics. At its center: Mumm-Ra. Lightning crackled in the eye of the storm.

Without his disguise concealing him, Leopara was pulled under the surface by the overwhelming malice, lashing out and wrapping around her, and evil suffocating her.

Her vision swam, filled with spots.

She saw without seeing, struggling in her own mind to oppress her "gift."

Dots streaked across the sky, moving impossibly fast. Mumm-Ra turned to them with a malicious grin full of sharp teeth. "You are but insects," he unfurled his cloak gathering energy at an alarming rate that exploded as he continued to speak in his rasping voice, "to the power of Mumm-Ra, the everliving!" The wave of purple consumed all but two of the dots, one having leapt up and pulled the other down.

As they landed on the root of the tree, as she saw Cheetara cradling Jaga, Leopara realised…

Those dots had been the clerics. Sunda, Sundara, Cheetaro, Jaggen…

And the wave of purple that rippled over the skies had killed them all.

The malice and evil let go of Leopara as icy cold horror surrounded her. She cried out, "No! Jaga!" On unsteady legs, she ran to them- or tried to. A gun pointed directly at her, herding her back to Lion-O and Tygra. More and more lizards streamed into the coliseum, surrounding them more and more. Leopara's magic felt dead in her fingertips, needles of ice tingling in her skin from the agony.

As she looked all around she could see the orange glow of fires in the sky, thick plumes of black smoke. "Thundera has fallen!"

The lizards raised their guns and fists in uproarious cheers.

She fell to her knees against the rough bark, numbed once again.

Tears stung Leopara's eyes as she was pushed into the floor besides Jaga.

All of the signs had been right there, but she let them slide through her fingers like sand. She hadn't wanted to pursue them, so she lived in anxious ignorance and suffered the consequences.

The disgusting stench of Mumm-Ra filled the room. The smooth marble floor was stained with smoke and cracked from the head of Cat's Lair being toppled, and his evil presence only profaned it more. The only light was two small sconces that burned dirtily, polluting the air even more.

"These three are all that remain of the fabled guardians of the crown." A lizard, dark murky green and muscular announced, pushing Jaga down beside her. He strained against its foot, but it won.

Jaga was too physically weak to withstand the pressure for long. He groaned in pain and exclaimed as the lizard ground his head into the sooty stone out of spite before waltzing away.

Leopara's back and ribs still hurt from the same treatment. "Jaga!" she shouted in a whisper, breathing heavily. She squirmed, trying to reach out towards him. A useless effort, for her arms were bound behind her.

Cheetara hung from the pillar, chains circling around her and more holding up her hands, wrapping around her feet. It seemed so heavy.

"You are Jaga," Mumm-Ra gestured with a hand, the other clutching the arm of Claudus's throne, "-sorcerer to the dead king."

"And you are even more grotesque than the stories suggested."

Mumm-Ra grinned with gleeful malice. His teeth were yellowed. "Did your stories neglect to tell you that the stone in that sword is mine?" He reached up to grasp the grip of Omens. The magics protecting the Sword of Omens flared to life, the Eye glinting. Lightning crackled around it, lashing out instantly and furiously against the hand of Evil that dared to attempt to touch it.

"Aaaaagh!" Mumm-Ra screamed in pain, staggering away. He recovered, hissing. "I want it back."

"I'm afraid an ancient spell prevents the sword from being touched by the hands of evil." Jaga said with some petty satisfaction in his voice.

"That is why you are going to remove the spell!"

"Never!"

Mumm-Ra eyed Jaga gleefully. "Then I will just have to find another way!" He reached into his cloak, then flung up his arms. His mummification wrapping surged towards Jaga, whipping and fwip- ing through the air. They wrapped around Jaga, lifting him into the air.

"Jaga!" Leopara cried out again, struggling. A heavy foot slammed into her back and her head cracked against the stone. She gasped in pain, struggling for air with the foot crushing her.

Mumm-Ra laughed maniacally and outstretched his arms. Lightning of purple, crackling around Mumm-Ra, arced towards him.

Purple light lit the room as Leopara watched, horrified. Jaga grunted and groaned in pain, resilient to the torture. Mumm-Ra let out an otherworldly roar and channeled more magic into his lightning. Jaga screamed in pain. "Ah." Mumm-Ra said in satisfaction.

"Stop… stop it!" she screamed through the pain. The lizard moved his foot to her head and she cried out again as he pushed against her skull. Her head throbbed where she had smacked into the stone.

She didn't hear the lightning anymore.

Leopara opened her eyes to the sight of the wrappings setting down Jaga. "You also wear the sorcerer's cloak." He observed. The lizard stepped off, but the disgusting, filthy bandages wound around her, and she was lifted into the air. Her ribs ached and protested, she groaned. "You are his apprentice, Leopara. How rude of me not to attend to you." Leopara's head spun as she looked down at the floor. Confused, she raised it to look at Mumm-Ra. "Perhaps if your master will not be swayed by his own pain, yours will suffice!" he exclaimed with glee as he pointed his hand towards her. Her body went cold as the purple lightning raced to cross the distance.

Blinding, searing pain scattered through her fur. She screamed, loudly she was sure, but she couldn't hear anymore. Her vision blacked out, nothing but technicolored spots against a world of black for a moment.

Just as abruptly, she fell beside Jaga, hitting the ground hard with a whimper.

She heard Mumm-Ra hiss in anger, but her senses were slow in returning to her. The lizards opened fire against something or someone, but it wasn't her. Jaga? Leopara turned her head to look towards him, vision swimming. She saw three of him, spinning in a nauseating circle until her eyes finally focused.

No, he wasn't getting shot at.

Cheetara?

She craned her neck. Cheetara was still in chains. She also wasn't being shot at. Who…?

"You took my father's life, but you won't take his sword!" Lion-O shouted. Lion-O? "Thunder, thunder, thunder! Thundercats ho!" Red light flooded the room as she struggled to look up. A beam of red energy burst forth from the Eye of Thunder, blasting into Mumm-Ra and hurtling him through the wall.

She could hear Mumm-Ra's voice, steadily growing in volume as he led into, "Mumm-Ra, the ever living!"

Leopara looked up, tired, head pounding and body aching, and looked towards the hole in the wall, just as sunlight began to filter through. Sunrise. The sun was the literal and metaphorical enemy of evil. She felt relief, amidst all her emotions.

Two shots from a gun blasted Cheetara's chains, freeing her. She leapt into action, kicking her lizard guard in a smooth action, then standing at attention.

"Cheetara?" Tygra asked, shock and relief in his voice

Leopara closed her eyes and focused on her aches and pain, and drew, with tremendous effort in her exhaustion, to let the healing magic flow through her. She took a deep breath, finding no pain, and sighed.

She drew into that well again and focused her attention on her bindings, willing them to come undone; and the ropes binding her wrist frayed and unraveled. Leopara yanked her hands apart, snapping the rope, and with an angry yell, twisted to slash the ones binding her ankles before panting heavily. Rage welled up inside her, unlike she had felt before. She took a deep breath, and then crawled to Jaga and cut his bindings.

"We need to go!" she shouted over the din of combat, the blasting of the lizards' guns as reinforcements, draping his arm over her shoulders. They stood together. She couldn't say definitively if she helped him up or if he helped her.

But once they were both standing, they sprinted towards the sullied throne. Cheetara picked up the gauntlet, holding it close to her chest. Jaga ran ahead, turning the sconce.

The wall shifted, sliding back and up.

"Quickly, through here." He pointed inside. Snarf ran in first, followed quickly by Cheetara and then Leopara, hurrying hastily into passage with the princes hard on her heels.

"After them!" Mumm-Ra shouted.

She stopped to look back at Jaga, waiting. "Jaga, hurry!"

He took no more than two steps inside, his stride hastened by urgency, than the lizards swarmed around the throne, firing their blasters.

Jaga exclaimed quietly in pain as her eyes opened wide. She rushed to him as the door slammed shut. "Jaga!" He slumped against her, groaning in pain. "Come on, Jaga, just a little further… you'll be alright." Cheetara slipped under his other arm, steadying him.

The room trembled and small flakes broke free, crumbling around them.

"Before we go further, there is something that must be done."

"It can wait." Cheetara said.

Jaga shook his head and took his arm from Cheetara. "No." He took his arm from Leopara as well, struggling for a moment to balance himself. "It must be now!"

Lion-O circled around in front of them, peering through them towards the wall.

"Your left arm." Jaga asked. Lion-O blinked but complied. From Cheetara, Jaga grabbed the gauntlet and slid it onto Lion-O's arm. Lion-O flexed his fingers, inspecting them. Jaga kneeled and Leopara followed his example, as did Cheetara and Tygra. "For the Eye of Thundera and the Sword of Omens." Jaga tapped his staff lightly against the metal.

The dull gray glistened to life and glowed gold, illuminating Lion-O's shocked face.

"Now, Lion-O, Lord of the Thundercats, go." Jaga commanded in the most exhausted voice Leopara had ever heard from him.

"We're not leaving you behind!" Leopara protested.

"You're coming with us, Jaga." claimed Cheetara.

Jaga stood weakly, clutching his staff. Leopara stepped forward to support him, but he brushed her away. "I will only slow you down. At least this way, I can buy you time to get to safety." Jaga lurched towards Lion-O, clasping his shoulder. "The Book of Omens lies at the foot of the setting sun. You must find it before Mumm-Ra does."

"I can't do this alone." Lion-O pleaded with him.

"You won't have to. You have everything you need, Lion-O. Whatever answers remain, the answers are in the Book of Omens. Find it. Now go!" Jaga shoved Lion-O and pushed his staff into her hands.

"Jaga!" Leopara exclaimed. "You won't survive without this!"

The wall shattered to bits at Grune's mace struck it, green, crackling discharge scattering through the smoke and dust.

"Go!" Jaga shouted.

"But-!"

Cheetara grabbed her arm and pulled her. "We have to go, Leopara! Now!"

She craned her head to watch Jaga, flashes of green and blue, rumbling thunder as he made his last stand. How was he channeling his magic?

Tears rolled down her face, even before the yellow explosion and green lightning collided with him. He screamed in pain, flung back-

Another door slammed shut just behind her.

They ran for what seemed like eternity, even longer than the night before. Leopara cried most of that time. At some point, she yanked her arm free from Cheetara. "We can't just leave him!"

"Leopara, he's gone. It was his final wish we leave!"

They had continued running, but it was a struggle for her to keep up between not being quite as fit as any of the three and choking on air through hiccuped sobs.

To a beautiful sky, light blue and dotted with wispy clouds, they emerged.

The radiant sunlight shone down on the wreckage of Thundera. Billows of black smoke still arose amongst all the white marble. Once beautiful trees and gardens, lush and green and full of life, were blackened, the ash from their leaves and bark staining the once crystal-clear, cascading pools of water grey and sludgy.

The long stretch to Cat's Lair was shattered in several places. The palace's blue head lay cracked and broken on its side amongst broken marble.

Mockingly, the coliseum was untouched.

"This is only the beginning." Lion-O said as they all stared down at the ruins they once called home.

Leopara looked down at Jaga's staff in her hands. It was ancient, smoothed by the hands of generations of sorcerers. Atop the staff rested two light-and-dark swirls, one unfurling and curling into the other. At the bottom, the dark staff unraveled into several thin strips that twisted and rejoined to spiral tightly to a round point, also a mix of light and dark wood.

It was not meant to hit things with. It was a focus, an old and ancient one that magic thrummed through.

She tightened her grip. The staff creaked slightly and she closed her eyes.

Jaga… why?

She took a breath and sighed softly, willing it to alter itself. The length of the staff retracted, gliding across her fur like a rope slipping through, and it began to shrink. She reached up and put it into her hair, entangling it so it secured a bun. A messy bun, but a bun nonetheless.

She would keep his staff safe.

Tygra and Lion-O glanced at her, then gazed back out at Thundera.

She did not need magic to know how they felt. The rage, the sorrow, the helplessness… but also the steely determination settling in. Leopara could feel it for herself.

But it was good she did not need her "gift" to know, because she could not sense anything around her. In her inner world, it was a barren land of snow all around her. Cold, desolate, and numbing. A few snowflakes fell around… but in real life, those snowflakes were flakes of ash.

"We should keep moving. Find supplies and start to follow the sun." she suggested.

Wordless, Lion-O turned and led the way. Up high in these cliffs, there was a trail winding down to the city below.

"We should find Father." Tygra said quietly. "He deserves a proper cremation."

Leopara nodded and looked at Cheetara. "We could go to the cleric hall… perhaps there will be supplies still there?"

"Yes…" Cheetara agreed, looking out over the edge of the path where their home once was. "We could look for survivors." They both knew there were no survivors of the adults, but perhaps the younglings escaped or hid themselves. "And get clothes."

Leopara looked down at her cloak, so similar to Jaga's in color and design. It was tattered and stained. She looked at her "tunic" and leggings, her gloves. They were smudged with soot and stained with King Claudus's blood.

More than anything in that moment, she wanted nothing more than to cast them all into a fire, put the cloak to rest in honor of all those who had died… the clerics, Jaga, Claudus, the innocents and the soldiers… so many. Too many. She looked out at the sunny streets, a broken memory of what once was. Shattered stone walls and dreams, hopes and desires.

All snuffed out in a single night.

It was too much.

They reached the city in the evening and traveled together to the cleric's hall. Where the statue of King Claudus had once stood outside the palace, was now a shattered effigy.

Like everything else, the cleric hall was cracked and broken in places. The doors creaked too loudly in the silence as she and Cheetara pushed them open. Leopara ran her fingers over the studded wood, a part of her life for so long.

She had never noticed their creak with the sounds of life in the streets and training room.

The pendulums stood still and the hall empty. She climbed the stairs to the right, creeeee, creeee, creeee, with every step, and gently made her way down the hall. She raised her fingers and dragged them against the stone wall. Her eyes studied every detail.

Everything seemed so grey now. Lifeless.

She wanted to remember it as it was, bright and full of life even amongst a storm. Chatter and laughter once carried through these halls. Younglings ran quickly past, chastised by their elders and mentors, while others chuckled heartily at their youthful energy and enthusiasm. She had shaken her head in affection before, sometimes sighed wistfully. Oh, what she would have given at times to run the way they did.

Her claws scraped against the doorframe of her bedroom. She paused.

Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and imagined her room the way she left it. Neat, organised. Ambient light filtering inside.

She stepped inside, opening her eyes.

The mirror of her vanity was broken, shattered pieces scattered around. Everything was disorderly from the shaking of the ground and stained by smoke that came in through the window. Her curtain had fallen and so had her armoire. A thin crack raced through the stone floor.

Leopara carefully stepped through and to her armoire. Grunting from the effort, and joined halfway by Tygra, she pushed it upright. One leg was broken, so it wobbled. The door was cracked and broken, and the top of the frame splintered, from falling.

"Thank you." she said, shoulders sagging.

Tygra merely nodded and handed her a sack before he meandered out. Leopara opened the armoire. The door snapped from its hinge completely in her hand.

Sighing, she tossed it to the side and looked inside.

Her clothes were all in disarray, but they weren't stained by smoke or blood, so she considered it one, tiny little win amongst all the loss.

She peeled off her gloves and poured a little water from her waterskin, all the way across the floor from where she had left it- cats get thirsty at night, and she still hadn't slept properly since the morning of Lion-O's ceremony- into a small bowl with a chip in its lip and a crack running down. Miraculously, it didn't leak.

Leopara washed her hands with a wet rag. Claudus's blood had dried in specks on her fur, mixed with ash and soot. She stripped from her clothes and washed the rest of herself with that rag, before pulling on her dress, sleeves, and stockings,

Into her bag, she put another one of her dresses, extra sleeves and stockings. A hairbrush, ribbons for her hair. Wash rags.

Leopara looked around one last time. Ash had settled in her room, over her broken and caved bed, over the floor and the back of the armoire and the vanity. Soot stained the shards of the mirror on the floor.

She hoped she didn't cut herself on a piece as she left.

She returned downstairs, where Cheetara was kneeling and looking through a sack. Lion-O and Tygra stood near. She murmured, "Food, water… this is everything."

Had she even changed clothes or gone to her room?

There was still room in Leopara's sack.

"I want to look around some more. I won't be long." She could see Lion-O's impatience strain, but he clenched his jaw and said nothing.

Leopara slipped through the hall towards the library, but turned to the clerics rooms. She had been to Cheetara's bedroom before, a long time ago. She smoothed her hand over the cracked wooden door, splintered and barely held together, before pushing it open. It dragged harshly over the floor.

Cheetara's room was in disarray in much the same fashion as Leopara's. Dust and grits of stone fell from the ceiling.

She approached the armoire, carefully stepping over splintered wood and broken glass. Hers was on its side. She opened it. There was a nicer outfit inside, the same cleric brown and with leather, but untattered or torn. Leopara grabbed it and a long leather cord, and into her sack they went. She paused, and grabbed the other ankle weights Cheetara trained with, and the accompanying leather straps and gird.

With that, she made her way into the library. Shelves were toppled and collapsed, pages from the tomes were scattered everywhere, thrown from their bindings, and scrolls were unraveled, some torn. Tables were broken from the force of a heavy shelf falling into them. Chairs were tossed, on their back or sides, many missing legs or back, or splinted and cracked deeply.

Leopara picked her way through the mess, her heart heavy. It was unrecognisable.

A shelf blocked her way into the turret. She groaned and exclaimed from exertion as she climbed between it and the wall to push it. It scraped painfully over the floor. Splinters from it stuck to her fur as she straightened, panting.

Leopara plucked them before she opened the cracked door. Like everything else, it was too loud. It creaked and whined more than she had noticed before.

The shelf in the turret had fallen over forwards, smashing into the table, now broken and collapsed, and the chairs. She pushed it up, grunting. Its contents were spilled over the floor.

Leopara crouched down and picked up a small leather bound tome. Her prize.

She put it into the sack.

No one asked her what she had searched for. With only, "Is that everything we need?" and Cheetara's answering:

"For now."

They left the cleric hall. The rest of the city was just as battered or worse than the hall- all save the coliseum. Smoke stained its sides, but it stood otherwise untouched. A beacon of negative memories.

Birds had begun to circle overhead. Carrion creatures that would scavenge the dead… an unfortunate and necessary purpose in nature, but upsetting nonetheless.

As they entered the coliseum, the glow of its water vanished in the daylight, a couple of carrion birds hopped on the branch towards Claudus. One nipped at his hand as if to ask "hey, are you alive?" Its beak caught in his fur. Stiffly, but limp, Claudus's hand flopped towards it. They hopped backwards.

"Hey!" Lion-O roared, charging. He slipped his hand into the gauntlet and drew the Sword of Omens. "Get away from him!" He swung at them.

They squawked indignantly in alarm and flapped their great wings, taking to the skies.

Tygra hurried to catch up and knelt beside their father's body. He raised a clenched fist, trembling from anger. "He didn't deserve this… to be left for the carrion feeders."

"Let's take him somewhere with shelter, to light his pyre." Cheetara said calmly, resting her hand on Tygra's shoulder. The prince looked up at her and nodded, his eyes closing and some of the tension draining from his body.

Not far from King Claudus, she spotted her scepter. Leopara wandered to it, carefully grasping the handle and turning it over in her hand. Satisfied it wasn't cracked, she settled it against her hip.

The brothers carried their father in Leopara's cloak, stretched between them. Fitting.

Not too far, there was an alcove.

Leopara still hadn't seen any sign of survivors.

"Here will be good." Cheetara said, gesturing. "It was a shrine to the gods." The brothers nodded and set Claudus down, standing guard while Cheetara worked to build the small pyre using the supplies they had gathered. A slightly magical pyre, built with the interwoven staves that had remained in the cleric hall. It had been easy enough to fit them all in one bag, and she expanded each one to its full length for this purpose.

Leopara wandered away, not to far, and climbed a pile of rubble. A stone slipped under her and she nearly tripped. At the top, she looked around. It was dusk now. She could neither see lizards nor mecha, nor any movement that was not the birds swooping down and taking flight. She couldn't see any other cats.

It couldn't be just them, could it?

There had been no younglings at the hall, but neither had there been bodies.

They had seen plenty of buried bodies on their way here, crushed under the rubble and debris and burned horribly.

She cupped her hands around her mouth. "Helllloooo!" she called. The ruins carried her voice, but she heard no response. "Is there anyone there?!"

A hand jerked her shoulder. Tygra. "What are you doing?" he hissed.

Leopara brushed him off. "There could be survivors!"

"There could be lizards, too, and you'd be telling them exactly where we are!" he growled.

She swung her arm wide open and gestured. "Do you see any lizards, Tygra? Their army has left! If there are survivors, we need to find them now!"

"If any cats survived, they've already left too."

With that, Tygra turned away and stalked back to the shrine.

Leopara looked out over the devastated city and sighed heavily. Maybe Tygra was right. The younglings weren't at the hall, so they must have left. Any cat sane would have fled, too, and those that didn't… surely they were already dead.

With a heavy heart, she sighed again and dropped her head. Reluctant, she turned away from the city and rejoined the three and Snarf.

Little did she know, a she-cat trapped under rubble struggled to hold onto life.

Hi guys! This chapter was a little shorter than the previous couple, but I wanted to start the next chapter with Ramlak Rising! Special thanks again to The Night Whisperer and Heart of the Demons! And poor Frankannestein, for whom I updated too quickly XD

For those familiar with me (by my old user name Mooncloudpanther), you may have noticed an easter egg for my old, now sadly deleted, fanfic, Ruins We Call Home. *winks*