Cobrastar- Lol, thanks!

Jaydomination- I didn't think of that! :D

Now onto the chapter!

A copper-colored tom was crouched beside the body of a dark ginger she-cat, wails of grief coming from his throat. A black she-cat sat watching, giving the tom time to mourn. Gracefully leaping down, the she-cat licked the tom over the ears, a comforting purr in her throat.

"She's dead, Ebonyshade. I can't believe she's dead!" he wailed, burying his face in the black she-cat's chest.

Ebonyshade glanced over the tom's shoulder at a spotted golden tabby tom, her mate-to-be, and sighed.

"We all lost cats we love today, Copperblaze," she murmured.

"But why my sister? Why Firefawn? You're lucky you were a kittypet," Copperblaze mewed. "There's no one in the Clan for you to miss."

Again, the dark she-cat glanced at the spotted tom.

"Maybe not as much as you, former apprentice," she conceded. "But ShadowClan has offered me love that I wasn't able to find in my kittypet life."

Looking up with multicolored eyes, Ebonyshade surveyed the destruction. The branch where Ratstar had made announcements was nearly about to fall off, the splinters of wood poking out from the broken branch. The limp bodies of their clanmates were strewn everywhere, along with chucks of soil and rock.

"I don't understand," Copperblaze's voice shook, "what did we do to deserve this?"

Ebonyshade shook her head slowly, her heart heavy with grief. "I don't believe it was anything we did, more something StarClan couldn't control."

Copperblaze seemed to agree with Ebonyshade that there were no more words to describe what they felt, or what they were going through. The two of them sat in silence, still in stunned disbelief after what had happened.

Suddenly, Copperblaze's rust-colored ears perked up, and his slouched form straightened. "I hear something- actually I think it's someone!" He gasped, "It must be our clanmates from the gathering, they're okay!"

Though Ebonyshade desperately hoped for the copper tom's assumption to be true, she had learned to hope for the best, but expect the worst. "Wait a second..." she muttered, stiffening.

Copperblaze, not hearing her, and acting by emotion instead of common sense, rushed toward the sound. The glossy black she-cat watched as the tom who had once been her apprentice skidded to a halt, his amber eyes widening in surprise.

"I thought..." he stuttered, appearing completely lost, "What- what are you doing here?"

Two cats had emerged from the shadowy pines, both long-furred and smelling strongly of fish. One of them, a tortoiseshell she-cat with amber eyes gasped, "Great StarClan, it happened here as well!"

While the she-cat surveyed the destruction through wide eyes, the second cat stepped forward. His fur was mostly white, though he had brown tabby markings on his ears and tail tip. His pale amber eyes, though concerned, seemed strangely calm for the circumstances. "We came here searching for a place safer than RiverClan's camp, though that doesn't seem to be the case," He began. "But, may I ask, are there other survivors?"

Ebonyshade regarded the RiverClan tom curiously. He seemed not to want to hurt their pride, or to bring up the sorrow they had just experienced. He wasn't blunt about the question; he was careful.

"I'm afraid not," she responded smoothly, her pride not letting anyone see her true emotion. "That is, unless the cats who went to the gathering are still alive."

The tom shot an uneasy glance at his clanmate, whose attention seemed to be focused somewhere that wasn't the present. "They aren't," he began slowly. "We could see the island on our way here. It's destroyed; there is no way anyone there is still alive."

Copperblaze let out a loud sob from where he was standing beside Ebonyshade, "So many innocent cats are dead. None of them deserved this!"

"Snowhawk," the RiverClan she-cat, who apparently had heard some of their conversation, sighed. "This means that your father is dead."

"I'm aware," Snowhawk said, his voice suddenly cold. The message appeared clear to Ebonyshade: he didn't want to discuss it.

"So what do we do now?" The RiverClan tortoiseshell asked, her voice wavering.

Ebonyshade looked at the three other survivors, her odd eyes holding a grim light. "It's obvious, isn't it? We check the other clans for survivors."

There you have it, the third chapter! What did you think, and out of who you've met, who is your favorite character?