Cloudtail woke while the sun almost finished rising the next day. His exhaustion from the vigil had kept him asleep throughout the entire day. He yawned, then leapt to his paws and padded out of the den.

A few cats were already awake. Cloudtail could see Darkstripe eating fresh-kill with Longtail. Whitestorm was returning into the camp. The great white warrior shot his gaze to the awoken deputy.

"Cloudtail!" He continued when the pair met in the center of the camp. "We have a problem."

"What's wrong?"

Whitestorm hesitated. "Swiftpaw and Brightpaw are gone."

"What?!"

"They've been missing since this morning," He continued, "and that's not all. The dawn patrol reported seeing RiverClan warriors on Sunningrocks. They fled when they challenged them."

"We'll just have to send out extra patrols there. I'll lead one now." Cloudtail wasn't too concerned with RiverClan. If he could hurry and finish with the Sunningrocks issue, then he could focus on looking for Brightpaw.

"Who will you take?"

Cloudtail pawed at the ground in thought. Since they didn't know how many cats Leopardstar would send, it would be better to have too many rather than not enough. But what if she sent a patrol to attack the camp? They had to have a fighting force ready here, too. "Mousefur, Thornpaw, Dustpelt, Sandstorm, Darkstripe, and Brackenfur."

Whitestorm blinked in confusion. "Are you preparing for a war?"

Well, yeah… "Odds are that Leopardstar will attack. She knew that we had a patrol running during that time and wasn't afraid of letting her warriors be on our territory." He let the truth of his words sink in. "You stay here with the rest of our warriors. If Leopardstar attacks while we're away, then we need to have cats ready."

"Then I'll go tell the clan." While Whitestorm raced away, Cloudtail kept himself occupied with thoughts of Brightpaw. Why would she run away? It made since for Swiftpaw to do that. After all, he was older than Cloudtail and not yet a warrior. He would probably go out to do something rash so Bluestar would make him a warrior.

"Wait a minute…" Cloudtail whispered to himself. ThunderClan was facing four problems right now. One was Bluestar's condition. There was nothing that any cat could do about that, though. The second was Tigerstar and third RiverClan. If Swiftpaw thought that he could do something about that, though, then he was even more mousebrained than Cloudtail thought.

The fourth, though Cloudtail didn't want to think of it, made perfect sense. It was a stupid thing to do, but Swiftpaw would go and do it. Brightpaw would follow to protect her clanmate and try for her warrior name.

Swiftpaw and Brightpaw, Cloudtail knew, went to try and kill off the dog pack.

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"Hurry up! We don't have all day!" Cloudtail was racing through the trees of ThunderClan's territory as fast as his legs would take him. Every wasted second was a second that the dog pack could kill Swiftpaw and Brightpaw.

"Cloudtail," called Mousefur, "this is foolish! We'll be too tired to fight off any cats!"

"She's right! Slow down!" Thornpaw was at the back of the group panting heavily.

Darkstripe chimed in. "I told you the stupid kittypet would make a bad deputy."

Cloudtail slid to a halt and faced Darkstripe when he caught up. "Leopardstar is more than likely stealing our prey as I speak. Swiftpaw and Brightpaw have gone after the dog pack and there's a chance that they are dead. So I don't want to hear about your exhaustion or my poor deputy skills. Go ahead and walk to Sunningrocks. Crawl for all I care, or don't come at all. I'll just tell Bluestar that you didn't want to fight! With the way she is now, you'll be exiled. You'd like that, wouldn't you? A chance to see your great Tigerstar again!" He raised his voice and addressed the rest of the patrol. "Time to go!"

"Wait!" Sandstorm managed to stop Cloudtail before he returned to bolting thorough the trees. "Listen, Cloudtail. I understand that you're worried about Brightpaw and Swiftpaw. We all are. But how will rushing into a battle while your warriors are exhausted help them? How will being killed because you rushed into things keep them safe?"

"Well…" He sighed. "You're right. I'm sorry, everyone. We'll take a quick break." As everyone else flopped to the grass underpaw, Cloudtail began pacing back and forth. Though he had run faster and farther than the other cats, he didn't feel tired in the slightest. When everyone was ready to go, Cloudtail ran at a normal pace until they reached the Sunningrocks.

"Greetings, Cloudpaw." Leopardstar was on top of the Sunningrocks; a challenging gleam in her eyes.

"It's Cloudtail," he spat. "What are you doing on our territory?""Your territory?" She echoed. "We're not on ThunderClan territory. You are on RiverClan's."

"Foxdung!" Cloudtail was about to make the signal for ThunderClan to attack when Leopardstar raised her tail. RiverClan warriors seemed to stretch out forever. Cloudtail didn't see one missing warrior. Even Graystripe, a former ThunderClan warrior, appeared. Leopardstar didn't even trust him.

"Thornpaw, run back to camp and tell Whitestorm to gather all available warriors." Cloudtail tried to keep Leopardstar from hearing him. "I'll distract Leopardstar as long as possible."

"Shouldn't you do it?" Darkstripe hissed. "You seemed to be running faster than all of us when we were coming down here."

"This is no time for that!" Cloudtail snarled. He turned back to the RiverClan warriors in time to see Leopardstar's eyes follow Thornpaw as he headed back for the ThunderClan camp.

"Attack!" Leopardstar howled.

"Hold them off until Thornpaw returns!" Cloudtail mewed to his warriors. He felt a sharp pain in his hind leg. Turning, he saw a brown tabby knock him to the floor. Cloudtail hissed and scratched his back claws against the cat's belly. The tabby hissed and winced. Taking advantage of the moment, Cloudtail slithered out of the RiverClan warrior's grasp to give him a hard bite on the shoulder. The cat raced away.

Cloudtail glanced around the clearing. He spotted Graystripe looking uncertain as to witch side he should fight on. It's his own fault for mating with a RiverClan cat. Taken by his thoughts, Cloudtail didn't notice Leopardstar crash into him. He was flung against a tree like a rotten piece of prey. The deputy was too dazed to move from the RiverClan leader's next attack. She gave him a fierce bite on the neck. Cloudtail yelped in pain, but she didn't release her teeth. The ground began spinning and blurring.

I'm going to die here! Brightpaw, I'm sorry… Oddly enough, the pressure on his throat lessened. Cloudtail collapsed onto the ground and looked up. Graystripe hissed at his leader and ran his claws across her muzzle.

"What are you doing, traitor?!" Leopardstar was furious.

"You were going to kill him!"

"So what?"

"Cloudtail is Fireheart's nephew, and Fireheart is my best friend. Also, we're fighting for territory, not to kill one another!" Graystripe lunged at Leopardstar. She barely avoided his blow by jumping to the left. Graystripe fell into the dust, but wasted no time getting onto his paws.

It was then that a fierce yowl shot through the air. Whitestorm, Longtail, Frostfur, Thornpaw and Willowpelt raced into the battle. Whitestorm wasted no time aiding Graystripe in fighting off Leopardstar. Graystripe would attack Leopardstar, she would dodge him, and Whitestorm would be waiting with a blow of his own.

The RiverClan leader snarled in fury. She knew that she was outnumbered. "Retreat, RiverClan!" The cats began fleeing across the river, some not escaping a blow or two from ThunderClan.

"Don't think this is over, Cloudtail!" Leopardstar threatened him before lunging into the river and darted into the bushes.

"What's he doing here?" Darkstripe, shaking away the blood falling into his eyes from a cut, narrowed his eyes at Graystripe.

Cloudtail stood shakily. "Relax, Darkstripe. He saved my life."

"Why? He's a RiverClan warrior.""Not anymore." Graystripe sighed. "I tried my best, I really did. But I just wasn't happy over there. Either way, I betrayed Leopardstar. I can't go back… And my kits…"

"Come back with us," offered Cloudtail. "You saved me, after all."

The gray warrior's eyes lit. "Are you sure?"

"Quite. But first we have an errand to run at Snakerocks." Cloudtail knew that that's where the dog pack was. He remembered smelling it while on a hunting patrol a few days ago.

"Can't it wait? You're hurt pretty badly." Graystripe padded forward and let Cloudtail lean against him.

"No, it can't." A sting sharper than Leopardstar's claws shot through his back leg. Cloudtail turned his head. Willowpelt was applying a few herbs to his wounds.

"I got really ill as an apprentice and learned a few herbs from the medicine cat while I recovered. It won't be as good as Cinderpelt helping you, but I can do enough to let you go to save the apprentices."

"Thank you, Willowpelt." While the she-cat began wrapping his wounds with cobwebs, Cloudtail worked on figuring out which cats should head back to get their wounds treated and who could come save Brightpaw and Swiftpaw. Darkstripe seemed to be okay, but he was the last cat Cloudtail wanted to do another patrol with. Mousefur had a nasty cut on her side, and Brackenfur was limping. Whitestorm's patrol was all fine since they did the smallest amount of fighting.

"Sandstorm, Graystripe, Willowpelt Longtail, and Whitestorm, I want you to come with me to Snakerocks. The rest of you can go back to camp and get treated by Cinderpelt. I'm very proud of all of you."

"Woo hoo," Darkstripe whispered to Longtail. "A kittypet is proud of us." Cloudtail chose to let it go this time.

Once Willowpelt finished, the new patrol turned and raced for Snakerocks. Cloudtail's wounds still hurt, but the herbs were helping him keep his strength up.

I'm coming, Brightpaw. Hold on… And please be okay.