Youth: Finchstar's Patrol {closed}

Skid marks bled from Sandpaw's sides when Elmskip put her down. Thank StarClan the apprentice, despite her age, was still apprentice sized. Her neck really hurt. From the fox's teeth and from Elmskips. Oh and her head... She was still foggy but it was fading... Slightly. The spotted she-cat attempted to stand, on wobbly legs before falling down again. Too tired, she resigned herself to laying at Finchstar's feet, blue gaze staring off into the fog almost as if she was dead herself.

The grass was a blur as the leader crashed through the moor. His paws had never moved faster, ears slicked to the sides of his skull, yellow eyes wide. Raventail and Deerhawk followed closely behind, senses heightened as they prepared for the worst. And then the tang of blood came. Shadows through the mist, outlined by the hazy sun. But they did not stop, they ran with the force of beasts, and for a moment, Finchstar thought they were too late. A shape collided with Raventail, sending him sprawling. The leader skidded to a halt and set eyes on the bloody shape, claws raised for an attack. But the blue eyes that meant his were not of a fox, but of Grousefrost, covered in crimson, pelt torn and ragged. His voice came in gasps, speaking something about a tunnel before the fatigue overtook him. Terror throbbed in Finchstar's head as he spun around wildly, tracing the other shapes as they came. This one was slow, its three-legged gait could only belong to Elmskip. And the stars had not spared him wounds either. Face bleeding, carrying Sandpaw in his jaws. Finchstar almost forgot to question the apprentice's presence in the chaos. But she was not supposed to be here. She was never assigned to the patrol.

"What happened?!" Finchstar yelled, eyes wide as he tried to process the scene. Sandpaw collapsed at his feet, and Elmskip explained the situation through wounded gasps. It was the foxes, it was always the foxes. Frantically, Finchstar began to take note of the present cats. Grousefrost was here, alive. Elmskip spoke before him now, and Sandpaw clung to consciousness with bravery. But stars, where was Barleytuft? The tortishell warrior before him didn't seem to know either, and Finchstar was flung into shock. It reminded him of the sink hole all those moons ago, trying to wake Brookclover after her death. His body had been numb then, senses dulled. The leader could not bear the weight if he knew he was the one to send Barleytuft to his death. "I'll find him." The tom gasped, determined now to save his friend from fate itself. He nudged Sandpaw to Raventail, mewing to him and Deerhawk both. "Help them back to camp. Aspenheart will tend to their wounds. I need to go find Barleytuft." Fighting back the fear, Finchstar raced away into the mist once more, going against all his instincts to run and hide. The sun was eerie now, a yellow orb cutting the air into glittering particles. Time seemed to slow as Finchstar rounded a clearing, tail lashing in frustration as he spun his head to and fro. "Barleytuft! Barleytuft where are you?!" Stars, be merciful.

Each pounding pawstep as Barleytuft fled from the brutal battle scene scent jolts of pain down his side or through his limbs. At one point as he fled he stepped on something sharp - thankfully it had fallen out after a few steps - but he could feel his paw already swollen on top of everything else. The pale tabby tom was sprinting for his life, panting hard with his gouged sides heaving desperately. Grousefrost, Elmskip, Sandpaw - where are they? He gathered bits and pieces of their scents as he ran and tried to glean the right path from that; he could only pray he was running in the right direction, for he couldn't risk leading the foxes to camp, and he could not possibly risk trying to fight them alone. He'd already lost horribly to them once.

Finchstar's voice ahead caught the warrior's attention, and immediately the exhausted tom shifted his direction slightly, stumbling over a jutting out rock. Barleytuft hissed but caught himself, continuing to limp along. He yowled hoarsely, "Finchstar!" A few fox-lengths away the form of a cat began to take shape in the mist, and Barleytuft recognized the frame as he drew closer. "Grouse...frost... and Elmskip... He has... Sandpaw," Barleytuft panted as soon as Finchstar was within earshot of his wheezing breaths.

His eyes widened as he realized there were no other cats around. "Finchstar, you can't... be out here alone," he panted, and immediately he began to try orienting himself with his limited surroundings. Barleytuft thought too much, yet not at all, of the pounding pain in his face from where the fox's claws had raked through his nose and lip only a short time before; the blood that poured down his face would be a horrifying, grisly sight for anyone to behold, but the crimson clotting his muzzle and chest barely registered in the terror of being so vulnerable to four foxes.

Raventail spotted the hazy outline of a beast in the fog far too late to evade it. Its charge knocked him to the grass easily. He came up on a sharp hiss, claws out once more until he realized neither Finchstar nor Deerhawk were fighting, and blinked at his attacker only to find it wasn’t an attacker at all. Grousefrost. Trails of blood cutting through his silver fur, breaths fast and ragged. Though Grousefrost wasn’t able to string a sentence together, his wounds and the pawful of words he’d thrown out were more than enough for Raventail to fill in the gaps: having killed their first target, the predators had taken to a different set of tunnels. “Sand” didn’t make much sense, but Raventail put that aside. His instinctive fear had receded in favor of a fear less wild and every bit as harrowing. Grousefrost turned back toward the fog. Raventail, at a loss for how to stop him, meowed, ”Wait, don’t—where’s everyone else?”

Only moments after the words left his mouth, one more figure (one, why only one?) appeared in the mist. This time, Raventail kept his claws hidden, daring to believe it might be one of the tunnelers. Sure enough, Elmskip broke through the mist, crimson trickling from a gash on his face, and dropped a sand-colored tabby before them. Sandpaw. Not part of the patrol. Elmskip explained what Grousefrost hadn’t. Sandpaw had joined their patrol without their knowledge. And Barleytuft… Standing on tiptoe, Raventail stared into the mist. There were no more shadows.

Suddenly, Finchstar was issuing orders. Help the survivors, however badly he wanted to throw himself into the fog in search of his friend. Finchstar vanished before Raventail could voice any objections—not that he could have anyway. There was no time to stand around, nor was there time for a second search, not with the way Grousefrost, Elmskip, and Sandpaw looked. If the foxes had tracked the tunnel patrol this far, would Deerhawk and Raventail alone be enough to fend them off? "Your nose is better than mine," the dark tom said as he turned toward Deerhawk, a tinge of defeat in his tone. He could only hope they would walk slowly enough that Finchstar (and Barleytuft, he had to be alive, Raventail refused to think otherwise) could catch up. ”Mind leading us back? I’ll take Sandpaw.” He looked to Elmskip as if to ask permission; then he picked up the barely-conscious Sandpaw, muttering an apology into her fur as he adjusted his grip. Later, she would have to explain herself. He couldn't be truly angry with her yet; after all, she wasn't the only cat present guilty of dragging her Clanmates into danger.