Author's Note: I'm going back to my old format. I realize Chapters Ten and Eleven were a diversion from this. I also realize that that was a mistake. A horrible, horrible mistake that shall never be made again. Also, I'm sorry for the overly long delay on the submitting of this chapter. Life happens, and it took my muse along with it (mainly because I've been working on something more original, and the research for it has been a real time-eater and pain in my behind, but that is a story for another time).

However, for this chapter, I'm back now, and hopefully won't go away for so long ever again (I mean it, I don't even know what I was planning for this story). On another note, let's see what's going on with Hollypaw.

Chapter Twelve

The sun had barely made its presence known above the horizon before Hollypaw was sneaking out of camp, slinking behind the nursery and scaling the rock walls of the camp to avoid detection by Sorreltail, who was on guard duty. She'd never gone this way before, but she had noticed that the cliff-face on this side of camp seemed to have more paw-holds than anywhere else in camp, and besides, it was the perfect way to go if a cat wished to avoid being seen. Which Hollypaw did. Very much so.

She knew what she was doing was against the rules. She was, in actuality, painfully aware of that fact, her conscious willing her paws to turn right around and pad back into the apprentices' den, to await orders from her mentor, Brackenfur, which is what all the good apprentices would be doing. However, her curiosity pulled her forward. Silverfish had promised to tell her things, things she could never hope to discover on her own, and she had every intention of learning them. Her heart ached that, for just this once, she wasn't going to be the good, obedient cat she wished to be. Was, she reminded herself. But even the warrior code had to have exceptions for the pursuit of knowledge.

Grunting, she pulled herself precariously up the cliff-face, almost slipping once or twice when she placed her paws on a non-existent ledge. It was harder than she would have guessed, and she had to keep fighting her urge to look down. Getting completely freaked out and unable to move would not help her.

Almost there. Almost there. She kept saying this to herself, her own private mantra, until she managed to hook a paw over the top and, with a lot of grunting and near-silent cursing involved, pulled herself up to the forest floor. Sitting down heavily, she let out a sigh of relief and allowed herself a moment to regain her breath and take stock of her surroundings. This part of the forest was thicker than that that the cats encountered when they left camp the usual way, and when she looked up, the first thing she noticed was a huge block of trees staring her down. They seemed taller than she remembered, and the fact that they were surrounded by early morning mist didn't help her impression of them at all. Nervously, she began backing up, that is, until she felt the ground begin to disappear from under her paws. Hastily, she lurched back forward, and gave herself a shake to rid herself of her sudden irrational fear.

You're just nervous, is all, she told herself, proceeding forward with a haste born of hesitation. She had never done anything even remotely like this before, and her guilt was making her jumpy. She wondered briefly where she was to find Silverfish, exactly. He had promised her that he would hang around somewhere where she would be able to find him, but he had never told her where. Thinking that a patrol would definitely find him if he remained anywhere on Clan territory, Hollypaw decided that she would begin her search at the very edge of ThunderClan territory.

At first she started at every small sound, whether it be caused by squirrel, mouse, or even a slight breeze blowing through the trees. At one point, she accidentally stepped on a twig and caused herself to jump up quite a few feet in the air. It was painfully obvious by this point that she really wasn't meant for sneaking around, but her curiosity pulled her forward, and she was loathe to stop, despite what all her common sense was screaming at her.

It wasn't long before she was far enough from camp for her noise not to matter. And that was a good thing, for the way Hollypaw's nerves were acting up right now, she wouldn't be surprised if the whole of ThunderClan could hear her. Jumpy as she was, she managed to keep her head and focused on her goal. She crept through the forest, her nerves calming the farther away she got from the camp. She was had almost reached the edge of the territory when she heard a voice, soft and muted, hissing her name. Startled she whirled to face it, and found herself nose to nose with the very cat she had been looking for.

"Silverfish! What are you still doing on Clan territory?"

"Waiting for you, of course," answered the silver tabby, his voice calm and smooth despite the fact that he was trespassing. He saw the look of aghast incomprehension on Hollypaw's face, and chuckled softly to himself. "Don't look at me like that, Hollypaw. This is a free world and I'm a free cat, able to do as I please when I please. And that includes setting paw wherever I happen to want. Every cat is born free. No one owns us but ourselves, and as such no one has a right to tell us what we should or should not do. Now, what do you think about that?" He sat back on his haunches and looked at her as he asked this question, straight on, with a friendly and encouraging blink.

Hollypaw looked at the ground, suddenly unsure of herself. That question had made her nervous, and the fact that she was sitting here talking with a stranger on ThunderClan territory didn't make her feel any better. She felt her staring at him, awaiting an answer. Suddenly it felt rather hot under her thin black pelt.

"I-I suppose that's true. Of Clan cats at least. Not kittypets. Kittypets are just slaves to their twolegs." She made a disgusted face as she mentioned the kittypets. How any cat could allow themselves to have their lives so completely controlled by another being, and by a twoleg at that! She could never understand.

"But wasn't your own leader once a kittypet?" The question betrayed nothing except a quiet curiosity. Hollypaw glared at him anyway.

"How did you know that?" she asked, taking a step or two away from him. This had not been a good idea.

"Never mind how I know," he said, trying to put her at ease once again. "Let's just say that we have mutual friends, your grandfather and I." He blinked again and smiled, as though to tell her that that would be the end of that. "Now, about Clan cats being free." He smiled again. "You don't really believe that, do you?"

"Why shouldn't I?" demanded Hollypaw, the fur along her back and tail rising. This whole interview was making her feel really uncomfortable, and she began to wish that she had never set paw out of camp this morning. "We are free. I think you had better leave our territory. Now."

"But why should I?" asked Silverfish, sounding rather bemused, turning her own question against her. With his typical serenity he looked around them, at the lush forest with all the sounds of prey filling the air. "This is a very nice place. And who are you to claim it for your own, and deny it to others? Don't you see, Hollypaw? That is why you are not free, despite your claims. You Clan cats are too tied to your rules and your hierarchy and your dead ancestors to be truly free. Tell me, Hollypaw. Would you like to be free?"

This last question was more than Hollypaw could take. She forgot about wanting to learn things from this cat. She forgot about how he had saved both Lionpaw and Leafpool's lives. She forgot everything except that she was a ThunderClan cat on ThunderClan ground, and Silverfish was an intruder. With a yowl more desperate and confused than angry she launched herself at him, aiming for his neck with claws unsheathed. He moved a split-second before she would have hit him, and she landed hard, scattering fallen leaves about her.

Confused, she whirled to look for him, and found him staring at her from a couple of paw-steps away, his own harmless smile still playing about his face. "Really Hollypaw," he began, not even pretending to sound hurt, "was that really necessary?" Before she could make a reply, or even think about making one, he was attacking her, and it was all she could do to fend off the worst of his blows. She was small and quick, but none of that seemed to be making any difference in this fight. This is the same cat that killed a rabid fox, she reminded herself, giving ground with every swipe he made in her direction. There's no way I'll beat him like this!

Never before had she wished that she was as good at fighting as Lionpaw. This fight would be easy for him. For her it was terrible. His blows hit her more often than not, and she had no room and no time to make any counterstrikes of her own. It was time for her to try a different approach. Considering quickly, she waited until he had both forepaws off the ground, intending to pin her down, and instead she ran straight into him, bowling him over with the force of her charge. He took the hit and was sent rolling, but before she could make a clean break, he wrapped his forepaws around her, hugging her to him. She was trapped.

Their directionless rolling soon turned into a roiling, screeching ball of fur and claws and teeth as Hollypaw fought desperately to free herself, kicking biting and scratching wherever she saw an opening, and Silverfish fought to keep her. At one point Hollypaw found herself biting her own leg in the confusion. With a frustrated howl she struggled and managed to free her head from his crushing embrace. Faced with this sudden freedom, she made an immediate lunge for his throat and managed to catch hold of it. Silverfish went limp.

Wary of a trick, but unsure of what to do next, Hollypaw risked loosening her grip to ask, "If I let you go, will you leave ThunderClan territory and never come back?" After a pause of a few tense moments, she felt him nodding weakly. With a sigh of relief, she released her grip on him and, seeing him fall limply to the ground, she turned to leave, feeling her duty done. She never heard him until it was too late. And by then, she was already falling, falling deep into a hole in the ground she had never known existed. The last thing she remembered before the sudden burst of pain of hitting her head on a rock was a long, long tunnel with light at the end of it, and at the end of the light, Silverfish's silhouette, leaving her behind.

Author's Note: And we now get to discover exactly what happened to Hollypaw. Good, innit? I read The Fountainhead recently, and I do believe Silverfish is channeling Howard Roark. Also, sorry if there's an abrupt change in style in here. I've been writing more for comics than novels recently (not to mention the fact that I haven't written for Warriors since I put this on hiatus), and I think it shows.

Also, just to be clear: This chapter sort of wrote itself this way, and I'm honestly fresh out of ideas to how else it could have gone, plus I had to reread through my entire story just so I was refreshed on what was going on (and God! the errors! I swear I will fix those!). So, yeah. The ending was a surprise twist for me too. I think I'm beginning to see what I was getting at when I called this story Twisted... Gah! The things about this that I no longer remember!