A/N: Okay, I know you're out there reading this, (that's right, I can see through the computer screen!) so review, before I send rabid dogs to your house! Or something not as crazy and eccentric… But you never know what I'll come up with…

Chapter 5, The Thunderpath

The next morning, Icekit had a hard time waking up. She was tired from staying up waiting for her siblings to come back. When they did, Icekit tried to ask them about everything, but didn't get many straight answers.

"What did it look like?" She had asked.

"Four huge rocks, covered with cats, with a rock half the size of the others in the center." Blackpaw said, yawning.

"What did the leaders look like?"

"Like our leader, I suppose." Skypaw answered unhelpfully. "Big and important. I can't remember their names."

Icekit eventually gave up and went to sleep. She dreamed of going to FourRocks with her brother and sister.

When she woke up, her mother had already left. She stepped into the clearing, and saw that she had slept way passed morning. It was nearing sunhigh already.

Over at the apprentice's den, Icekit watched as Blackpaw and Skypaw ate, then went out through the entrance of the clearing. Icekit followed them out, and then waited till they were out of site. She was going to try and track them.

After Blackpaw and Skypaw were completely out of site, and Icekit couldn't hear them at all, she lowered her head and sniffed. She immediately picked up her siblings scent. It was a scent she had grown up with, and she could have named it anywhere.

Icekit followed the scent into the trees, through the forest, and into a clearing she had never visited. She wasn't too worried about getting back; she figured she would just follow her sibling's scent back to the entrance of the Clan camp. Right now, she wanted to know about the clearing Blackpaw and Skypaw had led her into.

After hearing voices, Icekit quickly scrambled up a tree. She didn't want to be discovered this far from the camp. Looking down into the clearing, she recognized Blackpaw, Skypaw, and their mentors.

"Now," Honeybadger was saying to Blackpaw, "how is a mouse different from a rabbit when you're hunting?"

Blackpaw sighed. It was obvious that she had heard this before. "A rabbit will hear you coming but a mouse will feel your steps before it even hears you." She said in one breath.

"Exactly." Honeybadger said. "You need to work on your mouse-stalking technique." Blackpaw sighed, but crouched into a hunting position, and snuck up on an invisible mouse. Icekit turned her attention to Skypaw and Snowpelt.

"What are we doing today?" Skypaw asked, jumping around his mentor. He was obviously very exited.

"We're patrolling the borders." Snowpelt said. "I know we did that already, but it won't do any harm to refresh your memory." Skypaw nodded solemnly and bounded out of the clearing. Snowpelt followed, going slower, and shaking his head good-humouredly at his apprentice's enthusiasm.

Icekit climbed down from the tree, and decided she had better get back to the Camp. Her mother would start to worry. She found her siblings scent again, weaker then it was before, but still noticeable, and followed it away from the clearing.

As she followed, she came to a spot where the smell branched off in two different directions. She didn't remember this from when she had come here first, but that didn't mean it hadn't been there. She followed the stronger scent.

After a few minutes, the smell of her brother was replaced by a stronger, unfamiliar scent. Icekit raised her head and sniffed hard, and still didn't pick up anything but the hard, dirty smell she had come across. Curious as to what could make such an awful smell, Icekit pushed her way through two large bushes. What lay in front of her scared her, but inflamed her curiosity even more.

It was a long, black patch of hard-looking earth. It looked like nothing Icekit had seen in her life, and she creped slowly closer. The filthy smell hit her nose with such a force that she nearly gagged, but she kept going towards the patch of earth. When she got to the edge, she looked to one side, then to the other, and saw that the path stretched as far as she could see in both directions. Cautiously, Icekit reached out with her paw, and touched the black ground. It was hard and hot, and she took her paw away immediately. She didn't like her new discovery.

Suddenly, there was a sound like none Icekit had ever heard. It was a roaring so loud, she was sure that it was the loudest thing the world had ever known. She crouched down and laid her ears flat against her head, but the sound still wormed its way into her ears and nearly deafened her. She squeezed her eyes shut, and just as she was sure whatever was making the sound would bear down on her, something grabbed her by the scruff of her neck and dragged her away from the black patch. She didn't struggle. Awful smelling wind snatched at her fur, knocking her to her side. She just lay there until the sound had disappeared into the distance, leaving her very shaken. Slowly, she opened her eyes.

"What were you thinking?!" Someone shouted above her. Very slowly, Icekit looked up, and saw the green-blue eyes of Lionsky looking angrily down at her.

"S-sorry," Icekit stuttered, still very shaken, "I d-didn't know that thing would come!"

"Well, you're very lucky I decided to patrol the Thunderpath border, or you could have been killed!" Lionsky looked angry for a second more, then her look softened into one of relief. "Thank StarClan you're okay." She muttered.

"What was that thing?" Icekit looked nervously towards the black ground, the Thunderpath.

"Come on," Lionsky seemed anxious to get back into the forest, "lets go back to the camp, I'll tell you on the way."

Icekit was too shaky still to move on her own, so she leaned up against Lionsky on her way back. "What was that thing?" Icekit muttered, looking behind her.

"A Monster." Lionsky said grimly.

Icekit shivered. "A Monster?" She squeaked, hardly louder then a mouse. "Why was it there?"

"That was the Thunderpath." Lionsky told her, "That's the Monsters territory. You shouldn't have been anywhere near there." The angry tone was back in her voice.

"I'm sorry," Icekit said, looking down at her paws, "I was just tracking Blackpaw and Skypaw. Then I tried to follow their scent back to the camp, but it branched off, and the one I followed led me here!"

"You shouldn't have even been following your siblings. It's no wonder you got lost…"

"But I didn't get lost!" Icekit said, looking up at Lionsky for the first time since the Thunderpath, "I found Blackpaw and Skypaw in a clearing, training!"

Lionsky looked down at her, looking slightly shocked. "You followed them to the training clearing?" she asked. Icekit wasn't sure what she meant, but she nodded anyway. "That's far from the Camp," Lionsky muttered, thinking.

They didn't talk all the way back to camp, but when they did get back, Redflower rushed to meet them. She looked mad, to put it lightly.