Sparrowtail was average. Painfully average. This would have been fine, but Sparrowtail was born with an identical twin brother, named Starlingclaw. Starlingclaw was far from average - he was first. Sparrowtail was an afterthought, the “and” after his brother’s name. Always. It was fine. It was normal with siblings to have your names called in a particular order, especially as twins. They were equal, supposedly. He never hated his brother, but as one’s accomplishments grew at the other’s expense, Sparrowtail became… jealous and resentful. While his brother did try to properly attribute their actions, it was never enough.

On a border patrol with the two brothers and a few other cats, they were suddenly beset with a pair of hungry foxes. In the ensuing battle one brother was killed, and the other retained heavy injuries. Both were brought back to camp. So covered in blood were they that no cat could tell them apart, so they waited for the surviving brother to regain consciousness.

“Who are you?”, they asked.

“What?” Came his weary voice.

The cat before him had never been very patient, nor did they have much tact. “One of you is dead. Which one are you? Starlingclaw or Sparrowtail?”

In all truth he had wanted to say, “Starlingclaw is dead?”, but all that could come out was his brother’s name before the cat swiftly turned around and announced,

“Sparrowtail! Sparrowtail is dead!”


It was an odd thing, to participate in his own funeral. “Starlingclaw” stared down at his brother’s corpse with nothing but apologies falling from his tongue.

-

Life became easier for the remaining brother. He gained Starlingclaw’s successes and the love of his mate, and lost every embarrassment and slight he experienced as Sparrowtail. He lived as Starlingclaw for many moons, believing that he had finally found peace and happiness, even if he never heard his real name except in passing. However, StarClan did not look kindly on this deception. They sent a sign to the clan’s medicine cat. Of a cuckoo tossing out the eggs of a starling to replace with its own. After much deliberation, they confronted “Starlingclaw” out in the territory and told him the nature of this sign. Perhaps someone was planning on attacking his newborn kits.

Sparrowtail heard none of this. He immediately knew what StarClan meant. They wanted to out him and take away everything he had. In a fit of blind panic he lunged for the medicine cat’s neck, killing them so quickly they hardly had the time to blink. After a moment, he realized what he had done and in an attempt to hide this deed, he lashed and beat both himself and the medicine cat’s body. But he was interrupted.

Starlingclaw’s mate came out of concern after seeing both cats leave camp looking much distressed. “Starlingclaw, [redacted], what is going on?” She froze at the sight of the before her, and Sparrowtail lunged to silence her as well, but even as he pinned her she lashed wildly at his face and neck in a desperate attempt to fight him off. She was lucky. Her claws caught his throat in just the right way, and he collapsed on top of her. He seemed to be staining the whole forest red. On his dying breath he cursed her, his brother, his Clan, and finally, irreversibly, StarClan. And so he was destined to an eternity of darkness.

Jaggedthorn is a large, ragged, spiky-furred, dark tabby maine coon. He has a well-muscled physique and rather broad featured with a few angular points. His pelt is unkempt and seems to stand up around his back and neck. His paws are larger than average and his claws are unusually long. He has deep, soulless golden eyes that can bring chills to whoever stares into them. Scars and old injuries litter his face and body. His most notable are: The one across the bridge of his nose, his torn left ear, a scar running from his left shoulder to his upper back, and a large, horrible scar going from one end of his neck to the other— the source of his demise. Overall, a rough and frightening tom-cat.

Since his early kithood, Jagged had always been a tom of little words and more actions. He was always on the bigger side and used his size and intimidating aura to his advantage to get what he wanted from others. Being the first born of his single mother's first litter, he was tasked with the care of his younger siblings whenever she was too busy to— which irritated him to no end. However, he most certainly took advantage of that and in secret, tried to shape up his siblings to be strong and domineering, like him. He often pushed them to their limits which usually resulted in injuries but he held no remorse for his actions. If they wanted to be the top family in their clan, they needed to start training and acting like one.

The medicine cat was often left baffled as to all their sudden injuries but quickly shook it off as kits being kits. As to not have any of his siblings tell on him, he reassured them all that it was all for their own good. If they wanted to be great warriors or even one day leader, they needed to be tough and ready for anything. They took his word and never said a peep to their mother. That was when Jagged realized that he could be a real convincing sweet-talker if he wanted to be.

One day, two or so moon after his mother had her second litter with another tom, Jaggedpaw— who had been an apprentice for a little over a moon at that point— had decided on testing out his new kin's strengths. He was quite adamant on not having any weak links in his "brigade" after having spent so much time strengthening up his own littermates. So, while his mother was occupied with her duties, he led the little kittens out onto the territory with the hopes of holding a trial to see who was actually worthy to be considered "family".

However, things took a turn for the terrible. During his testing, he never once treated his young half-siblings as kits. In his eyes, they should already be able to hold out on their own like he and his littermates could. So, all throughout the day, the young kits were subjected to intense training and assessments. From battling with their claws unsheathed to climbing trees to the very top, Jagged never allowed them breaks or even time to gather their bearings. It was during a sparring session where everything went wrong. Jagged was fighting with one of the little she-kits when he miscalculated the swing of his paw and sliced her neck. She had died.

He felt a tiny bit of panic but pushed it away. She hadn't been strong enough to endure than and he didn't want to kitsit any weaklings. However, the rest of the kits were crying and frightened and Jagged didn't want them to bring any unwanted attention. Quickly thinking of what to do, he decided on telling the kits that she would be fine and that he would take the she-kit to the medicine cat so she could get patched up. In reality, he would be disposing the body where nobody would stumble across it. Once he did so, he returned to the others to continue their training. However, his harsh methods quickly proved fatal once again when another kit, this time a tom, suddenly collapsed. He had gone unconscious due to exhaustion. He reused the same reassurances to once again calm the kits and took away the kitten to an isolated area. He quickly killed him and found another place to bury the body. In that moment he knew that he would get found out soon if the other kits told anyone of what had transpired throughout the day. So, as a way to cover his crimes and rid of any witnesses, he decided then and there to get rid of the whole litter. "They were weak anyway." he had told himself to squash any guilt that may be creeping up on him. That day was when he realized that he could potentially get away with anything if he was clever and careful enough.

Slowly but surely the litter's numbers dwindled down. He had started with six then five. It then dropped down to four then three and so on and son forth. Once he was left with none and their bodies had been effectively hidden away and any trace of his doings erased, he quickly hunted a mouse then a vole to bring back to camp as to disguise his previous outing as innocent and fruitful. He made his way into camp— in a rather obvious way as to show off that he had been hunting to as many eyes as he could, and deposited his catches like nothing had ever happened.

It didn't take long for his mother to figure that something was not right. When she went into the nursery to feed the litter, they were nowhere to be seen. In a fit of panic, she had raced out of the den and called out to anyone that could hear that her babies where missing. Quickly, the clan went around and searched every den then every nook and cranny of the camp but to no avail. Everyone was questioned, including Jagged. However, he was quickly cleared as many attested to seeing him enter the camp with freshkill. The search went on for many days but was eventually ended with no success. Jagged had hidden them well. Despite how many innocents he had reaped lives from, he no longer harbored any guilt for his crimes but rather enjoyed the feeling it gave him knowing that he had weeded out some of the more fragile future warriors before they had even begun their training. It was then that he had decided to dedicate his life to helping strengthen his clan to the max. He was growing power hungry and it was the worst thing that could happen to the clan.

Later that same moon, his mother had passed away due to starvation. She could never bring herself to eat due to her unending grief of her lost kits. Jagged didn't feel remorse for that either. While his siblings genuinely mourned her death as well as their younger siblings, he himself wept crocodile tears. They just wouldn't come naturally, even if he wanted them to.

Moons passed after the "travesty" and Jaggedpaw was doing better than ever. He had managed to complete his apprenticeship quickly and earned himself the suffix, "-thorn". He felt like it suited him and was satisfied. Little by little his siblings also joined him in warriorhood. He congratulated them with faux pride. He no longer cared for them as he once used to. The whole clan was his "family" now and he cared for his future plan the most.

Three moons passed before he was given his first apprentice. By then, the whole clan had respect for him and held him highly. That had not come from nowhere. He had worked hard to earn it all, bringing in as much prey as he could carry or defending the clan valiantly from intruders. However, what Jagged wasn't expecting was being given a fragile apprentice. The young tom was a snivelly little thing. Weak. He was weak and Jaggedthorn was not happy with the decision. He had debated on marching right up to the leader and asking for a new one but stopped himself. It would make him look bad and he already had a good image. He didn't want to throw away all his hard work. Instead, he decided to plan out how he could get rid of the apprentice without getting the blame placed on him.

After a few days of putting up with his ward and mentally planning said apprentice's demise, he had finally concocted something he was satisfied with. It was now time to put it into action. First, he had to "befriend" a warrior that was a mentor. That came easy since he was already rather familiar with his denmates. He chose a young tom who appeared to be quite gullible. A perfect future scapegoat. After getting all buddy-buddy with the warrior after a few days, it was time for phase two.

Soon after, Jagged proposed they both give their apprentices an assessment together and the warrior agreed. They both led their apprentices into the territory very early in the morning and begun the assessment. It was finally time. However, by that stage in his plan, Jaggedthorn was thinking of ending all three of them then sneaking back to camp. He had no use for friends, his own apprentice was too weak to be of use later, and the other apprentice was being trained by a rather dense tom so there was no hope for her either. It was best to purify the clan from such disgraces.

At first the assessment had started off without a hitch. At first, the apprentices were doing well, all things considered. However, as expected, it all went downhill. It started with Jagged's apprentice wandering off farther than instructed. This was perfect for Jaggedthorn. He allowed the younger tom to walk further before carefully following him. The poor apprentice had no time to react before Jagged pounced on him and in an instant, bit his neck. The apprentice was dead. Jaggedthorn quickly picked up the body by the scruff and buried it with no remorse. His main goal was finished. He got rid of his unwanted apprentice. Now, he needed to finish off the others.

First thing was to kill the other warrior. The warrior was keeping a close eye on the remaining apprentice and Jagged couldn't have that. Just as he had done with his apprentice, he pounced on the warrior as quickly as he could. However, this time, the other put much more of a fight. They tousled and screeched at each other— pure betrayal and fury on the others face when he realized that Jagged was the cat attacking him. It went on for a bit and the noises attracted the attention of the apprentice. When she got to the scene she was more than frightened. She watched as Jaggedthorn finally pinned down her mentor and bit down harshly on his neck. He held on for as long as the other moved. He let go as soon as he noticed he went limp and slowly turned to where the apprentice last was. She was gone. He hadn't been as careful as he'd hoped. It was over. He had failed.

Before Jagged could turn tail and run away, a force crashed into him and made him tumble away with a gasp of surprise. He shakily got up onto his paws and sneered at his attacker, long claws out and ready to fight. There stood his clanmates, fury and rage in their faces. They hissed and growled at him, claws unsheathed. If this was what they wanted, he will give them a fight they'd remember.

And fighting he did. they all slashed and bit while he dealt them their own bites and scars. Eventually, he was overwhelmed, already tired from having fought the other warrior prior. It was during that small moment of total weakness when he felt a something rip open his neck. He gasped and gurgled, golden eyes wide in surprise. He was dying. He snarled and faced his clanmates, body swaying as he fought his incoming doom. He cursed them all. He did so much for them! He did all the dirty work of weeding out the useless and weak. They could've been a strong clan! With the last bit of stubborn energy, he spat blood in from of their paws, eyes cold and full of hatred.

At last, he collapsed. It was over. He was gone and his dark and twisted spirit was sent to reside in the solitude of the Dark Forest for the rest of time... or so it was thought.