"What do we do now?"
The first time the question was asked, Hero had elected to ignore it, and though few words were exchanged as the group of cats started away from Haven after a brief farewell to Estelle and Ray, the inquiry continued to plague the minds of the cats who followed in Hero's paw steps.
"Hero," Lilypool began gently, matching his crestfallen pace to walk next to him, "we need to talk about what to do next-"
"I've already made that decision," Hero interrupted, without turning to look at her. "I'm taking you all back to the Clans."
"Taking us back to the Clans," Lilypool repeated, the corner of her mouth twitching into a frown as she seemed to pick up on his meaning, "You're not going to come back."
Hero exhaled; he should have expected Lilypool to pick up on his decision. "I can't live like that," He began to explain, and though he suspected she already understood his point, he continued to clarify, "It was fine for a month, being in the Clans, and I thought tedious Warrior duties would be enough to keep me busy. Turns out it wasn't. Ever since I woke up with these abilities, I can't stop recklessly investigating every mystery I come across. I can't stop thinking any more than I can stop breathing."
Lilypool nodded in understanding, and Hero watched her gaze drift to the ever-ticking watch fastened over the slightly matted fur on his neck. "Ironic, isn't it? Wearing something to remind you that time is constantly moving, and that you've got to move with it," she murmured, and Hero smiled in amusement at her remark. "So you're going to stay here, in the city. You're going to accept Bling's offer."
Hero decided not to interrogate her on how she knew about him and Bling's previous allegiance, and instead continued to issue a reply. "I don't know yet," he admitted, "but I failed the one mission Thistlestar gave me, and I know I can never be happy in the Clans, so I don't see much of a point."
Lilypool smiled faintly, though it appeared to be out of empathy rather than sympathy. "Hero, there's something I want to-"
"Hero! Lilypool!" Snowpaw suddenly cried, and Hero whirled around towards the sound of the apprentice's voice.
Without their noticing, several cats had materialized from seemingly nowhere behind the group, and it took approximately two seconds for Hero to recognize Tags near the head of the group. Without missing a beat, Tags had stepped between Snowpaw and the group of cats, laying her unsheathed claws against Snowpaw's throat. The apprentice trembled, and he struggled to keep his composure, as the overwhelmingly pungent scent of East District cats overpowered Hero's senses.
"Let him go before I tear out your throat!" Swiftpaw threatened, shaking with anger as the hair along her back began to bristle.
"Not before I rough him up a bit," Tags snarled menacingly, though Swiftpaw didn't so much as flinch at her venomous tone.
Smokewhisker attempted to step towards the spotted she-cat, but Thug immediately stepped in front of him, growling a warning.
"You're not talkin' your way out of this one, Timekeeper," jeered the fluffy white tom who'd padded past Hero's flank, though he didn't make a move for fear of endangering Snowpaw.
Tags, Thug, Zero, Bravo, and at least four other cats milling about in the shadows. Hero's team was outnumbered, injured, and exhausted. They couldn't fight back without getting themselves killed. "What do you want?" Hero hissed, instinctively stepping in front of Swiftpaw and the rest of the group.
"Honestly?" Tags laughed, locking Hero in her gaze, "I want you dead. But our Sunshine's got other plans."
"Which we aren't privy to," Bravo added, and Zero cuffed him over the head with one of his paws.
"We're not going anywhere with you mouse-brains," Swiftpaw spat, lashing her tail.
"Swiftpaw," Lilypool murmured sternly. She knew Hero already had a decision in mind.
Hero stared cooly at Tags while Snowpaw fell silent, and Swiftpaw continued to watch him, unwilling to break her gaze.
"Take us to your leader."
<——————>
The East Faction's camp was, to put it simply, vastly intimidating. The brick walls and arches were lined with patrolling cats, and the buildings cast long shadows across the street they walked down. Haven's courtyard and amphitheater paled in comparison to the enormity of this place, and Hero found it no less impressive than he'd always imagined. It was obvious from the sheer number of cats entering and exiting the camp that there could be any number of patrols and teams heading out at one time; Hero had always been curious as to the ranking system of Factions, though on all of his expeditions he'd never encountered anything quite like this.
"This place is huge," Snowpaw commented, nearly tripping over Swiftpaw for the third time since they'd left the comfort of the alleyway. Since Tags had threatened to take a bite out of him, Snowpaw had become oddly reliant on Swiftpaw's protection, and was now walking mere inches away from a cat half his size while simultaneously trying not to trip over her. Snowpaw had grown quite a bit during the days they'd been away from camp, and it quickly came to Hero's attention that despite Snowpaw's lighthearted nature, the tom was more than old enough to become a fully-fledged Warrior.
"Where exactly are we meeting Sunshine?" Hero asked Thug, who padded a few steps ahead of him.
"Just over there," Thug replied simply, nodding towards the gaping stone archway that marked the entrance to a large building with at least four stories, as far as Hero could tell. A large window depicting some sort of human scene cast colorful shadows onto the ground before him, and as he surveyed the area, Hero realized that many similar colorful additions had been made to the dim scenery. "This place used to be some historical building of some kind, it was condemned a while back by humans and the East Faction settled in soon after."
Jayflight stared at each dappled patch of colored light, seeming intrigued by the swirling patterns, and every time they passed one Zero would have to have to nudge her forward along with the rest of the group, much to her distaste. All of the cats were uneasy; not even the East Faction patrol knew exactly what was going to happen during this meeting, so the rest of the walk up to the building was relatively silent.
"Thug," greeted the large golden-spotted tom posted outside of the entrance to the building, along with a smaller but equally intimidating brown bengal she-cat.
"Teeth, Beak," Thug dipped his head respectfully to the two guards, "how are the kits?"
Beak, the she-cat, seemed to laugh under her breath. "They're a pawful, and Teeth is obviously no use," she teased, and the tom smiled back fondly, "he's too soft on them both. Bones convinced Chase to come on some exploration mission with him while we were on watch this morning, she got stuck in a barrel for two hours and Bones got lost and took half that time just to find his way back."
Hero's team shared glances. It was an odd feeling, knowing that cats you'd always considered your enemies had their own lives and trials and emotions.
"It's a shame you're not here more often, you're much better at watching your siblings than Shada is," Teeth began, and Hero realized that he was speaking directly to Tags, who had now ducked her head seemingly in embarrassment.
"We can talk about this later," Tags muttered, pointedly trying to end the conversation. "Can we go past now?"
Tags had a family. Two mischievous siblings and two dutiful parents. Hero had never seen her as anything more than his rival, and as they entered they building with Beak and Teeth's go-ahead, he begun to recognize the circumstances of all of his confrontations with the East District. He had never had to do anything for anyone else until he joined the Clans, and now that he had, he seemed to understand Tag's allegiance to her Faction.
Thug led the group into the shadows of the building, lit only by the tinted light cast across the stone beneath their paws. They soon reached a spiraling staircase, and the further they ascended, the more beautiful the place became. The courtyard could be glimpsed from the windows at certain intervals, and even Swiftpaw smiled in spite of herself at the breathtaking view.
The city lay sprawled before them, every detail etched against the horizon as far as the eye could see. As they reached the final floor of the building, Hero could hardly keep himself from imagining the view at dusk - the ashen fringes of night beginning to grip the scenery, laced with starlight and the reflection of the moon painting the cobblestone walls with watery silver light. He was so caught up in the landscape's beauty that he nearly didn't notice the jet-black tom seated on a stone podium, the shadows warping around his form with every breeze that drifted in from the open window to ruffle his fur. The tom's piercing yellow eyes rested on each of the cats in turn, and with unsettling elegance for a cat his size, Sunshine approached the group.
"I had to hold an audience with you and your company, I apologize for the methods utilized to do so," Sunshine addressed Hero and the cats who stood warily behind him, and with little more than a twitch of his whiskers, Sunshine dismissed his own cats, save for Thug, who seated himself at the base of the podium.
"If you're not trying to kill us, what is this about?" Smokewhisker asked calmly, when Hero seemed to hesitate in his response. He'd only met Sunshine once before, when he was much younger and had been attempting to steal a bracelet from his personal collection - he hadn't much wanted to talk then, and he found himself in the same position now.
Sunshine exhaled, draping his tail over the edge of the platform. "I have brought you all here to ask a favor of you and your Clan."
There was a long silence.
"You what?" Swiftpaw snorted in disbelief, and Snowpaw slowly pressed one of his paws to her face in an attempt to stop her from offending the cat who held their fate in his paws. She swatted it away after a few awkward moments of accusatory glaring.
"Tensions have been rising here in the city, and I have held off these hostilities from opposing Factions, but I cannot continue doing so for an interminable amount of time. The South Faction has expressed their opposition to domestic bloodlines, and the North Faction and Enclave have claimed their same beliefs, allying with them purely for their convictions and the territory than can be declared for their own Faction," Sunshine began to explain, though as he curled his tail around his paws, Hero knew he was far from done. "We disagree with their proclamations, and have found our own allayment with the West Faction, who are fighting in part to protect the cats of Haven and the other Minor Factions that have been established here in the city. But even with their help, they outnumber us two cats to every one of ours."
Hero cleared his throat as he noticed the expressions of the cats around him. "To put it simply, the South Faction thinks kittypets and loners should not be allowed into Factions, and are threatening to overtake the city along with the help of two other Factions to enforce their beliefs. Sunshine wants us to help prevent this from happening."
"Alright, big shot," Swiftpaw scoffed, though Sunshine didn't appear to have any particular reaction to her tone, to Snowpaw's relief, "Not to offend your great majesty or whatever, but the way you're putting this doesn't make it sound like it's our problem - or any of our business, for that matter."
"You haven't allowed me the chance to explicate," Sunshine continued, and Jayflight groaned impatiently before being silenced by Lilypool's shove. "Many years ago, when your Clans settled the plains outside of our territory, there was a conflict between the Clans and the original cats of our Faction. Blood was shed, and our dispute was eventually solved by the creation of a peace treaty. The plains were bestowed unto the four original Clan leaders, and the East Faction returned to the city, where the treaty served its purpose and confrontation was avoided for many years after."
However, a cat by the name of Ash, who had been the one to convince her companions of our Faction's proposal, wanted to thank us further for the service we had done them. Despite the warnings of her brethren, Ash met with one of our own cats in their new territory to discuss an act of gratitude. It was decided that a call-to-arms agreement was in order; if ever the cats of the East District found themselves faces a seemingly unbeatable enemy, the cats of the Clans would come to their aid.
Unfortunately, the cat who made this agreement met with an abrupt and untimely death, with no living heirs to carry on this message to future generations, and so this agreement went unfulfilled. Until the present day, there was little to no mention of such a consensus, until I was finally able to obtain the information regarding it."
The cats waited with bated breath as Sunshine turned, removing a weathered and yellowing piece of paper from where it had been laid in the depths of the shadows. He stepped towards the cats and set it gently at Hero's paws. In faded ink, two paw prints had been pressed onto the surface - one large, and belonging to a city cat, judging by the condition of the pads of their paws, and the second much smaller. As he looked more closely at the smudged edge of the print, it became apparent that this cat had an extra toe, making six in total.
"Six toes on the left paw," Smokewhisker noted aloud, having become an expert on AshClan lore due to the frequent leadership positions of his ancestors, "It fits with her description, and the document is obviously ancient. This could very well be Ash's signature."
"What do you say, Timekeeper?" Sunshine inquired, after Hero had finished his inspection of the paper. "You hold our lives in your decision."
Hero turned back to the cats, who stared at him expectantly. "I realize that you may not feel obligated to, but-"
"Hero," Lilypool laughed, cutting short the speech the tom had been prepared to give, "We're all with you on this. If you want to save the city, then there's no way we're letting you do it on your own."
Each cat nodded in agreement with her statement, and Hero was suddenly flooded by the warmth of their approval. He looked back at Hero, and the tom dipped his head towards the tabby tom. "Thug and Tags will escort you to the edge of your territory, I trust you can make your way back to the plains from there."
The walk down the staircase was a blur of color, and for the duration of it Hero was completely lost in his own thoughts. The Factions were on the brink of his war, the fate of the city was on his shoulders - in his anticipation, it was easy to forget the trials and hardships he had experienced over the past few days. Tags and Thug fell in beside the group as they reached the courtyard, and while Tags remained fairly silent, Thug took every possible moment to express his newfound gratitude to the Clan cats.
"I was born a kittypet," Thug had admitted during one of his ramblings, having caught them all off-guard with his sudden talkativeness. "The East Faction took me in when I was barely three moons old. I've spent my entire life trying to repay that favor."
As they passed underneath the shadow of the great stone arch, with Jayflight still marveling at the architecture, they were unexpectedly joined by a third East District cat - a small calico she-cat who seemed to have had a bit of difficulty catching up with the group.
"Wait!" She exclaimed, rushing up to Hero with her fur fluffed up in excitement, "Wait, I'm coming with you."
"Roach," Thug murmured, and judging by his timbre he knew the small cat well, "What are you doing? Shouldn't you be with your brother?"
Roach shyly flicked her ears, but seemed to gather up enough courage to reply. "Zero belongs to this life - and I appreciate everything he tries to do for me - but I don't," She looked from Hero to Thug, eyes pleading. "Please, you can't tell him, he'll try to come with me. He needs to be here - he should be here."
Hero shared a glance with Thug, who sighed quietly and nodded. "Roach, you understand that finding you a new Faction could be difficult," Hero tried, though the she-cat seemed to already have made up her mind. "You can't be accepted to Haven because of my Faction ties, and Enclave would kill me if they had the chance. We could bring you to Serendipity, but-"
"But you have more pressing matters," Roach acknowledged, "I don't want to be a burden."
"We can take you back to AshClan," Snowpaw suggested, looking back Lilypool, who he had deemed to have the most influence over Hero.
"That's not a bad idea," Lilypool confirmed. "Thistlestar has taken in non-Clan cats before."
"Fair enough," Hero agreed, then turning to the rest of the group, "We don't have much time to waste. It's time to return to the Clans."
Two updates in a row. As usual, I hope everyone enjoyed, please tell me how you like it in the comments!
I kind of ship Snowpaw and Swiftpaw too much. Somebody stop me.
~Frost
Edited by Annco