“Just move quietly,” Snake murmured to the other apprentices. “You’ll stir up the sand.”
Half-Sun nodded in silence and whisked her tail into Blizzard’s mouth just as the other apprentice opened it to complain. She could practically hear his complaints about Snake taking control of the patrol – after all, he had whined about it all night after Dark announced Snake would be in charge.
“A target,” Shadow called softly from the yucca tree above, causing the others to perk up. The young tom was perched under the shade of a palm fan, his dark fur casting him in total darkness, and had been scanning the horizon long enough that the sun was slipping below the horizon.
Half-Sun turned to Snake. He was studying the distant black pinpricks closely, his unsettling blue eyes practically glowing in the light of the setting sun. “It doesn’t look like they’re moving. What do you have planned?”
“What if-” Blizzard tried to speak up but was abruptly cut off when Shadow landed neatly beside the group.
“Snake’s in charge today,” Shadow reminded Blizzard calmly. His voice was pleasant as ever, but Blizzard still scowled.
However, Snake barely seemed to notice. “We should try to ambush first and foremost,” he began softly. “Then we can cut whoever looks weakest off and mob them until they flee.”
“I doubt the others will let that happen,” Half-Sun replied calmly. She didn’t like arguing, but she liked going into battle without a solid plan even less. “It would be more effective to divide and conquer them.”
“There are three cats,” Snake’s left ear twitched. He didn’t have a tail, and Half-Sun had noticed his ear had taken up the role of indicating when he was irritated. “We’d have a harder time one-on-one with two cats.”
“We could-” Blizzard tried again, but Half-Sun cut him off.
“You and I could take on a cat each,” Half-Sun insisted, “and then Shadow and Blizzard could team up against the third cat. We have the numbers advantage; we should make use of it.”
“When they see us approaching, they’ll get into defensive positions. It’ll be almost impossible to separate them.” Snake argued back. “If we had a good hiding spot, we could ambush them like you want, but if we all try to hide in the tree, they’ll see us!”
Half-Sun dug her claws into the coarse sand beneath her paws. Snake was absolutely right about not having a good vantage point for ambush, but she still didn’t think his plan would work. “What if we follow them and wait for a good opportunity? Even if they see us and run, we can give chase.”
“Snake and Blizzard could keep up with a ScorchedClan cat,” Shadow reminded Half-Sun gently, “but you and I… would fall behind very quickly.”
Half-Sun winced. It wasn’t Shadow and herself; it was just herself. Unlike her Clanmates, Half-Sun was considerably slow. She appreciated Shadow pretending it was the both of them, though.
Blizzard’s tail lashed once. “Can I-“
“Would you butt out already?” Snake’s old temper flared to life, as it always did when Blizzard was involved. “You always just want to chase them down!”
“Not this time.” Blizzard’s eye had a gleam to it that Half-Sun didn’t like.
Snake was equally suspicious. “… have you thought of something?”
“We could use this rabbit tunnel I’ve been trying to tell you guys about,” Blizzard said smugly. “My mother and I hunt in this area, so I have them memorized. This tunnel will take us right next to where they’re hunting.”
The rest of the apprentices were stunned into silence. After a minute, Shadow finally blustered out, “H-huh?”
I’m never going to hear the end of this, Half-Sun thought as she peered through the rabbit tunnel’s exit. Just as Blizzard had said, it led straight to where the ScorchedClan cats were. Up close, Half-Sun could recognize Aphelion, Charred, and Burning.
Half-Sun could sense the toxic levels of smugness radiating off Blizzard beside her, but she chose to ignore it and instead turned to Snake. He used a paw to indicate Burning, then nodded to Half-Sun. That would be her target. Aphelion would be Snake’s opponent, and Charred would be relegated to Blizzard and Shadow to fight together.
Half-Sun tensed and crouched down, making eye contact with Shadow and nodding once. After a moment’s delay, Shadow and Blizzard burst from the warren and tackled Charred. The she-cat shrieked with rage, causing her two companions to turn around in surprise, and Half-Sun took the opportunity to fling herself at Burning.
The ScorchedClan tom was stunned initially, but he quickly pulled himself together and tried to back away. Half-Sun didn’t let him, though, and plunged forward to grapple the warrior. Raven had drilled it into her head enough times that ScorchedClan cats attack like snakes – getting distance and striking out with weak attacks, waiting until their opponents were stunned before bringing them down.
It was unfortunate for Burning that Half-Sun was nearly twice his weight already. She may have been much younger, but Half-Sun was a behemoth even in her own Clan. Using her size to her advantage, she wrapped her forepaws around the tom and slammed him into the ground, using her back claws to shred the tom’s spine fur.
Burning began bucking wildly, trying to throw Half-Sun off, but she sank her foreclaws in and clung on harder. After a short while, the tom was panting from the exertion. Do I really weigh that much? Half-Sun thought glumly as she maneuvered Burning around until she got her paws on his head and could slam it into the ground several times. ScorchedClan cats were famed for their endurance, but she had exhausted this warrior practically by sitting on him.
“… oh,” Half-Sun stopped slamming Burning’s head into the ground, realizing the tom was dazed and bleeding from the nose. “Ah. I can’t kill you. Sorry, you should go on home now.” Ignoring the fact that Burning likely couldn’t hear her with the concussion she had just delivered, Half-Sun turned to see how the others were faring.
Snake and Aphelion were tussling on the ground, both too stubborn to give up the fight. If Aphelion struggled out of Snake’s grapple, they would sprint around until Snake caught her again. He’s going to exhaust himself like that, Half-Sun thought grimly.
Blizzard and Shadow were tussling with Charred on the other side of the field. The she-cat was spitting venom at them, screeching about everything from their appearance to their dubious birth origins, but Shadow was expertly bringing her down repeatedly. Meanwhile, Blizzard was being just as nasty, using himself to trip up the warrior every time Charred escaped Shadow’s grapple before she could flee.
“You fight like weasels!” Charred spat, lashing out at Blizzard with her claws. He nimbly ducked away, saving his face, but his ear was torn in the process.
Blood dripped down Blizzard’s face as he shouted, “Oh, is the weird little snake cat getting mad?”
“Do you want me to rip your other ear off, you gnat?!” Charred screeched, just to be tackled down by Shadow again. “I’m going to crush you!”
“Oh no,” Blizzard said in a sickly-sweet voice, “what are you going to do? Copy our fighting style? ScorchedClan copied our names; why not everything else, too?”
Charred gave an enraged yowl and began shouting at Blizzard, but Half-Sun tuned them out. I feel bad for ScorchedClan. She thought as she turned back to Snake. That one’s like Blizzard but worse.
To Half-Sun’s surprise, Snake and Aphelion were crouched about a fox-length apart, hissing at each other between breathless pants. Snake’s stamina was nowhere near the other apprentice’s, but Aphelion was covered in a myriad of scratches that were definitely sapping her energy.
“Hey,” Half-Sun spoke up as she approached. “You should just… go.”
Aphelion turned a frosty glare to Half-Sun, but she backed away in silence. After a moment, she disappeared into the darkness that had fallen over the desert during the fight.
Snake limped over to Half-Sun, his eyes locked on the fight going on behind her. “Are they…?”
“Arguing.”
“They have the energy?”
“Blizzard will always have the energy to insult people.”
Snake shook his head incredulously and said, “They’re just… too much. Will you stop them?”
“No.” Half-Sun glanced over to where Charred and Blizzard were screeching at each other. It seemed they had devolved into increasingly creative insults and threats.
“That ScorchedClan cat sure has some lungs on her,” Snake sighed before padding over. He waited patiently before lunging at Charred and dealing several rapid blows to her face with unsheathed claws. The she-cat screamed in pain before blindly bolting off into the desert, with Blizzard loudly jeering after her.
Half-Sun sighed. Can we go home now that they all ran away? However, as she stood up to leave, she noticed that Burning was still sprawled out on the ground, his eyes glazed and his breathing slow. “… are you alive?”
Burning nodded dazedly.
“Can you get up?”
Burning shook his head.
With a deep sigh, Half-Sun gingerly picked up the warrior. Dragging him to their camp… it’s not gonna be fun.