Chapter 2: Death
Author's Notes: Please Read and Review! Also, Beta reader needed!
After the dread-filled gathering, Lightningpaw felt like he was going to collapse. His paws felt like they were made out of rocks and were going to fall off as he trekked through the dense undergrowth of Thunderclan's forests on the way back to camp. He was both physically and mentally exhausted. His normally alert sense were dulled as the thoughts of what happened a few moments ago truly hit him. "The clans are going to die" he thought with a too grim look on his young gray face as he followed the cats in front. When the group finally arrived at the fern covered entrance of camp, he shoved his way through the mass of cats and briefly said a muttered "good night" and "tomorrow" to a curious and sleepy denmate, Duskpaw, as he flopped unceremoniously into his welcome mossy nest and promptly fell into the world of dreams.
In the dream world
Lightningpaw crouched down, pressing his belly into the soft, whispering grass of the clearing as he stalked slowly towards the mouse. He could tasted its blood on his lip already. He slowly slinked forwards as not to startle it and quickly pounced, ending its life swiftly with a quick kill bite to the neck. Suddenly, he heard a feminine voice behind him. "Hunting now, are we?" Lightningpaw swiftly turned around to meet the intruder of his delectable meal. He was taken back at what he saw. Before him was a cat, but just not any cat. It was a white she-cat with a ginger tail and patches with stars in her thick, well-groomed pelt! "A Starclan cat!" whispered the gray apprentice in awe. He looked up and saw her face. He almost flinched On one side, the mysterious she cat was missing an eye and half of her face was gruesomely mauled and cover horrendous scar tissue that lacked any furry protection upon it."Its rude to stare so much young one." meowed the mysterious cat before him with a hint of amusement in her voice. Her voice broke Lightningpaw out of his shock. "Why are you here?" questioned the young cat with barely constrained curiosity in his voice. This went unheard by the starry cat. "Remember my story. It will aid you in the future in a deed that must be done." was all she said as she started to fade away. "Wait what does that mean!" exclaimed the still startled Lightningpaw as he tried to pounce on the white and ginger she-cat without luck in an attempt at keeping her here in his dreamscape. Shaking his head after the maneuver, he turned around to finish his mouse before he heard someone calling out his name."Lightningpaw! Wake up! It's time already sunhigh you big furball!" "Who's there?" meowed Lightningpaw. He sighed mentally. "This dream just keeps getting weirder and weirder." he thought as suddenly, he felt like someone was shaking him by the shoulders.
Real world
Lightningpaw sleepily opened his eyes and was greeted by the face of his best friend, Duskpaw, who was still shaking him by the shoulders, oblivious to his friends awakening. "Duskpaw! Will you quit that! I'm awake now!" murmured Lightningpaw as he rubbed the sleep out of his emerald orbs, the dream forgotten at the moment as all things are as one wakes up. Duskpaw stopped shaking him. "I heard about the prophecy..." Duskpaw trailed off. "Do you think that the end of the clans is reallly going to happen?" All he got was an uncertain shrug from his lightning marked friend. Duskpaw sighed. "I can't believe this is happening!" exclaimed the black tom. "I know" replied Lightningpaw. The two sat like that in silence thinking about the fate of the clans and the unknown enemy that they were about to face until Silverstrike came in the apprentices' den. "Come on Lightningpaw, Ashwhisker wants us for hunting patrol." "Okay," meowed Lightningpaw, "Just let me clean up a bit, 'kay?" "Fine, but you only have one minute. I know yesterday was your first gathering and all and there was some pretty scary stuff said yesterday but we still need to keep the clan strong to face whatever enemy that we are going to face, got that Lightningpaw?" "Yeah, got it." Lightningpaw replied as he busied himself with cleaning up.
After a little clean-up, Lightningpaw padded outside to join his mentor, Lightfang, Softfur, Maplebreeze and Mudstripe in front of the entrance to the camp. "Okay, everyone is here." Silverstrike meowed, and being the leader of the patrol, led the hunters outside towards the middle of their territory. "I think we should spilt up here into pairs so we don't scare all the prey away." meowed Silverstrike. "I'll go with Lightningpaw, Lightfang with Softfur, and Maplebreeze with Mudstripe." "I know I'll get the most prey!" bragged Mudstripe, a new warrior with dark brown stripes. "I know you will." muttered Maplebreeze sarcastically with a roll of her eyes. "I know, I'm awesome right?" meowed the egoistic warrior, oblivious to another eyeroll from the brown and teal she-cat and the fact that it was a sarcastic comment. "Okay, warriors, there is no time to waste, lets split." meowed Silverstrike before Maplebreeze could make a comeback. The assigned groups then wondered off into the thick forested undergrowth to find prey.
Lightningpaw padded after his mentor who was heading towards the abandoned two-leg nest in hopes of finding mice and an occasional bird who might have taken refuge in its rafters. Lightningpaw looked around. It was so peaceful. In the distance, he could hear the singing of a robin and the crunch of dry leafbare grass underneath his paws along with the scuttling of mice underground. "It would be impossible to know that the end of the clans could be near..." thought Lightningpaw as he took a breath of the crisp wild air in search of prey as the duo arrived at the twoleg nest. "Let's go" commanded Silverstrike as he padded silently towards an opening in the nest. Lightningpaw followed behind in the same manner. Once inside, he stopped for a moment to adjust to the sudden change of light. When his eyes got used to the dimness inside the abandoned building, he looked around. Old cardboard boxes filled the place and littered the floor, great hiding spots and potential nests for mice and rats, while the musky scent of rotting wood was wafting around in the air. Lightningpaw settled into the already familiar hunter's crouch and softly stalked the mouse that he sighted, careful to stay hidden behind the blockade of cardboard boxes and out of view. The fat, grey-furred mouse suddenly stopped nibbling on the seed that it was eating and scouted around, waving its snout around in the air and sniffing vigorously. Seeing that it was supposedly safe, it returned back to its meal and Lightningpaw crouched and jumped, just missing the mouse due to a box clipping his foot and making him stumble. The unsuspecting prey squeaked and turned and ran while Lightningpaw gave chase and pounced on it, this time landing where he was suppose to, on its neck, quickly killing it. After giving a quick prayer to Starclan for the meal and thanking Silverstrike for his lessons on speed, he turned around and caught two more mice. After there was a sufficient amount of food, he padded outside silently with his mouth full of mouse, leaving no trace of the kills other than a few drops of blood.
When Lightningpaw arrived outside, he found Silverstrike waiting for him with a whopping 5 mice. "Let's head back to camp." Silverstrike suggested to the apprentice as he picked up the 5 pieces of fresh kill. Lightningpaw responded with a nod as the duo started trekking through.
On the way back to camp, Lightningpaw heard something big crashing through the bushes. Signaling with his tail to the silver cat behind him, Lightningpaw stepped into the bushes with his mentor following close behind. Dropping his load onto the hay-like grass in front of his paws, he pounced on the intruder just as the cat entered into the clearing. Looking down at the fallen cat, Lightningpaw widened his eyes in shock. "Tigerpaw?!" He quickly climbed off of the darkly striped orange cat as he let his denmate catch his breath. "What happened!" Lightningpaw demanded after the younger apprentice could breath half normally.
"You see, I was on another hunting patrol" began Tigerpaw, "I spotted this really juicy squirrel away from Softfur and the others. Okay, I know it was a bad idea to let go try and chase it, but I did anyways because it was so tempting. When I tried to pounce on it, it managed to escape. I tried chasing after it but was stopped by this really bad scent. I thought it was crowfood. I followed the scent and decided to investigate in case I happened to find the kill of a rogue on our territory or something like that. I continued tracking the scent until I found the source..." TIgerpaw trailed off and then shuddered as if he had seen a Dark Forest warrior. "Well what was it?" Silverstrike pressed lightly. " Tigerpaw shuddered once more before gathering up his resolve and replied, "It was a ripped apart half-eaten cat."
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