Summary: Leaders are guided by the founders. The founders don't care about the fact that they're dead, just that they need to be ones to lead their clans.
Flashback-y chapter today.
Sorry bout the wait. I have the usual low motivation and full-time job to contend with, but my family and I have been watching the live-action One Piece every night, Teal Mask came out, and we had a scare with our cat. She's okay now thankfully.
I really had to fight myself to get this one out. And I'm on the fence whether I like it or not, but leaning towards... not.
Reviews are appreciated!
"Out!" Firestar yowled, tail waving towards the gap in the wall of the barn. He watched gratefully as Sharpclaw sprang forward to help Cherrypaw, who had fallen on her side after a rat had blind-sided her. Hauling his stunned apprentice to her paws, he clawed a way through the horde of rats, driving them back like leaves in the wind. With relief, Firestar saw mentor and apprentice disappear through the gap.
For a heartbeat he thought that only he and Sandstorm were left in the barn. All he needed to do was get Sandstorm out, and then he was free to do what he needed to do.
Then he spotted Rainfur still two or three fox-lengths from the gap, in a circle of rats that was gradually closing on him. Rainfur glanced back to see where the gap was, and at that moment a huge rat leaped at him and fastened its fangs in his throat. The Skyclan warrior vanished under a heap of squirming bodies.
"Get out!" Firestar ordered Sandstorm. "I'll help Rainfur."
He tried springing forward, but his limbs felt heavy and his paws were weighing him down.
'Why won't you let me help him?!'
He almost didn't expect an answer back.
"Because he's not Thunderclan."
Thunderstar's voice crackled with lightning, so clear in his head, yet so far away.
Bluestar had always been so tired, even when he joined the clan. She was always weary, like just having a conversation with him was akin to a full-blown battle. She would pause for multiple heartbeats at a time, listening to some unseen voice.
He thought he had done something wrong. Or maybe she just didn't like him. Why did she bother to accept him into the clan?
He observed her more closely than he would have liked.
She would be filled with vigor during battles, or defending her clan. But once the battle faded into the background and she interacted with her clan… it was like something had switched off in her head.
How could such a fierce warrior, so full of energy and drive, dwindle down into something so… capricious? Sometimes she was meek and soft-spoken, other times she would suddenly turn cold and calculating. Her mood was never consistent.
The elders and senior warriors would tell him it was just stress from being leader; that Bluestar had a life harder than most.
That her powers of lightning drained her.
Leaders were gifted with the power of the Founder. For Thunderclan leaders, the Founder's power would grant them control over lightning, even generating it from their bodies.
But Bluestar hadn't been the only leader who acted in such a way.
"Pinestar and Sunstar acted like that too," Smallear had mused one day, the other elders nodding in bemused agreement.
They suggested it was just the burden of leadership that was weighing them down.
"Maybe that's why Pinestar left-" Dappletail had said, before snapping her jaws shut. He wanted to know more about why a leader had abandoned his clan, but the elders became tight-lipped over Pinestar since then.
He decided he didn't want leadership.
Rainfur was barely visible under the mass of rats. They split apart at the sound of Firestar's furious, almost desperate yowl. Rainfur scrambled to his feet, only to be pulled down again.
Firestar landed among them, clawing and spitting. He bit down on the neck of one rat, and it slumped to the floor. Another fell back, writhing and squealing, its blood spurting as he raked his claws across its eyes and muzzle. He had almost reached Rainfur when more rats surged around him, and a weight landed on his back, carrying him off his paws.
He grit his teeth, muscles tensing as sparks started dancing along his spine. The rats were thrown off him, leaving the scent of smoke and something burnt to waft through the air.
He followed Darkstripe as the tom led Bramblekit and Tawnykit towards the Shadowclan border. Fireheart had to wait for them to climb the slope beyond the stream before he dared to emerge from the ferns and follow. By the time he caught up they were approaching the border. The strong reek of Shadowclan reached Fireheart, and he saw the kits stop and start sniffing the air.
"Yuck, what's that?" Tawnykit squealed.
"Is it a fox?" asked Bramblekit.
"No, it's Shadowclan scent," Darkstripe replied. "Come on, we're nearly there." He led the kits across the border, Tawnykit complaining that she was getting the horrid scent all over her paws.
Growing angrier still, Fireheart slid into the shelter of a hawthorn bush just on the Thunderclan side, where he could watch without being seen. Close by, Darkstripe had come to a halt. The kits flopped down on the grass, exhausted, only to spring to their paws again a moment later when a clump of bracken rustled and another cat stepped into the open.
The newcomer was Tigerstar.
Fireheart froze, though he was hardly surprised. He had guessed that Darkstripe had been hoping to curry favor with Tigerstar by bringing his kits to see him, but the Shadowclan leader's prompt appearance suggested that this meeting had been arranged all along.
Except instead of Tigerstar's usual appearance, where he would exude confidence, was fatigue. The Shadowclan leader looked exhausted, and he moved like his paws were being held down by someone.
"Is leadership really that hard? You look so tired?" Bramblekit had innocently asked.
Tigerstar had opened his jaws to reply, only for them to snap shut, frustration gleaming in his eyes.
"The burden of leadership is never a light one," he instead replied, voice flat.
And then there was Tigerstar's final words to him.
"Take care of those kits, Fireheart. I'll be keeping an eye on them." He was talking to Fireheart, but his eyes were wandering away, unfocused.
"Of course I'm going back for them! You can't stop me!" he suddenly hissed. He stared off into space for a heartbeat, before he gave a heated hiss of "Be quiet!"
His head twitched violently afterward. Fireheart was alarmed by Tigerstar's sudden grunts of pain. The shadows around the Shadowclan leader were twisting and bending around his paws.
He got out of there before Tigerstar could do anything.
Fireheart had the feeling that the shadows weren't meant for him, but rather they had come alive to turn on Tigerstar himself.
A wave of exhaustion hit him as soon as the streaks of lightning dissipated from his body, enough for him to stagger on his paws.
He didn't understand why using his powers had taken so much out of him. He had never felt so tired using them before! He had lit Scourge up with plenty of energy to spare!
"That was in the interest of the clan. Why bother helping the descendants of father dearest? He and his clan cared more about themselves. I'm just returning the favor," Thunderstar rasped.
'What?! This whole time, you've opposed my helping Skyclan because of your dad?!' he cried out to him, but he received no answer.
It was the opening the rats needed to attack.
His head struck the hard floor of the barn, stunning him. For a few heartbeats he scrabbled with his paws, trying to get up. Then sharp claws fastened themselves in his throat, and his whole body spasmed with the pain. Evil rat eyes stared into his, glittering with malice. A voice rasped, "Die, cat!"
Firestar struggled to sink his claws into the body that was pinning him down. This must be the leader of the rats! Kill him, and the battle would be over.
But there was no strength in Firestar's limbs, and the moonlight seemed to be fading, leaving him in a cave of echoing darkness.
"You've continuously disobeyed me. Consider this punishment."
He felt like he was drowning, and Thunderstar was pulling him down with him.
"You need to leave, right now," a gray-tom spoke to him. He staggered back, dizzy from the weight of receiving his nine lives.
The gray-tom's pelt was absolutely filled to the brim with stars of varying sizes, his eyes a pure glowing white. It was lie staring into a smaller, more compressed version of Silverpelt. Only instead of the sky, it was all inside a cat.
"Come on, let's go," he said with urgency, nudging Firestar to his paws. He didn't understand what was happening; was this a part of the ceremony?
"I think not, Gray Wing," another voice hissed with the voice of thunder, accompanied with the crackle of lightning.
The ranks of Starclan parted furiously. He could see many of them had their eye's blown open in fear.
The cat who strode forward wasn't a cat at all. It was in the shape of a cat, but with a body of lightning, sparks leaping of its frame.
"Thunder, no. I can't let you and the others keep doing this to your successors!" Gray Wing cried.
His eyes widened. His successors? Was this the fabled Thunderstar, founder of Thunderclan?
"Doing what?" Thunder scoffed. "Making sure they take the right path? Doing what is best for Thunderclan?"
"Taking away their freedom?" Gray Wing spat.
"They are in service to their clan. They don't get any freedom," he said, before gesturing to the cats behind him. "Isn't that right?"
With a start, he recognized Bluestar as part of the group of cats he was pointing to. Her head was bowed, standing next a ginger tom whose head was also bowed in submission. Each of everyone of them looked tired and weary.
Thunderstar pushed Gray Wing away with a streak of lightning, surprisingly gentle as Gray Wing only stumbled back a few steps.
"Every cat who accepts leadership accepts my guidance. You will be imbued with the power that Thunderclan represents. You will accept my will. Don't accept, and I'll strip each life away and kill you, and find someone better suited to lead Thunderclan to its rightful glory," he meowed airily.
"What? You'd kill me? Is that what you tell all your successors?" he gaped, not believing what he was hearing. "I was told you were a noble cat that always did what was right!"
"Right for Thunderclan. Not for any other clan." He was surrounded by a cage of electricity now. "Don't think for a second that I haven't been watching what you've been doing. With my guidance, there will no more of this… helping the other clans nonsense. Your duty is to Thunderclan, and Thunderclan alone."
His eyes flitted over to Bluestar. Was this why she punished him so heavily, even though she struggled to say the words clearly? Because she was against it and Thunderstar had forced her? Was this the reason why she was always so tired?
Was the life of a leader nothing besides fighting Thunderstar for control?
"I don't know what happened. They used to be good cats. But ever since they got those powers, they've been obsessed with making sure their clans are made to fit their expectations. It's like they need to make sure they're still leaders," Gray Wing rasped, angrily looking down at his paws.
"Either you make the right choice, or I'll do it for you," he said.
"Just do as he says," Bluestar whispered brokenly.
"Just do it."
"Just do it."
"Just do it," Starclan was speaking in unison, making his ears go flat from the noise.
Any sound of protest he made died out as Thunderstar broke apart into streams of light, swirling around him in a fierce wind. His fur stood up on end.
All he knew from then on was that Thunderstar held a grip on his actions, and his presence filled his body.
"You can't… stop me… from doing… what's right," he gasped.
Then night closed down over him, and he knew nothing more.
So the founders go to Starclan, get their powers (kind of like elementals) and their minds get screwed up and think that they need to be in control consistently.
Sooo... Evil!Starclan AU maybe?
I never specified whether Tigerstar was dead or not. I'll leave that to your imaginations. It's not just Thunderstar that has a grip on the Thunderclan leaders...
Honestly, I feel like this is missing a lot, but it's just a fleeting idea I had going in my head. I actually wanted to do something inspired by the Dragon!Firestar AU MAP that came out on Youtube like a month ago, but again... low motivation. Maybe next time.
Tell me how I did.