Darkstorm padded through the small forest, her clan trailing behind her. Although the forest was beautiful, it held little prey, and therefore wasn't meant to be their new home. Darkstorm froze. "Look," she whispered. A tuft of dark grey fur had caught on a thorny bush.

"That's Arrowheart's," Orangetail guessed. "Isn't it?" The black she-cat nodded.

"We're... close." Thorntail flicked his ear. "There are a lot of cat scents." Darkstorm nodded again.

"Arrowheart's. And Thinfur's," Shadeflight stepped in front of them. "They're really, really near here." Darkstorm bounded after the scent, once again her clan following. Her ears perked up and she skidded to a stop.

"Thinfur!" she and Shadeflight yowled, hearing familiar footsteps and smelling a familiar scent. Thinfur came dashing out of the bushes.

"You're here," he meowed. "You're here!" The two littermates nuzzled their father happily, purring.

"Where were you?" Shadeflight asked. 

"By myself. Why?"

"Arrowheart got banished, too!" Darkstorm explained. "You didn't see him?" Thinfur shook his head, licking hers.

"No. But you'll find him. My kits are resourceful. What's this?" He flicked his tail at DarkClan. Darkstorm looked up at him. 

"My- my clan. DarkClan. Our deputy is Thorntail. We're the cats who want to change the code." Thinfur's eyes locked with Sparrownose's, and they glared at each other. "Stop, Thinfur!" Darkstorm protested. "We forgave him, we forgave Sparrownose. Even Coralfall after Finkit."

"You... have to catch me up on everything." Darkstorm blinked and gazed at her clan.

"Patrols," she muttered.

"Tenderleaf, Sparktail, Hardclaw and Troutfin, hunt?" Thorntail asked. The chosen cats scampered off. "Ravenfur, lead Grassfang, Orangetail and Bushpaw and scout the area. We'll make a camp here for the night. The rest of you, gather moss. Yowltail, can you and Snarlfang go for herbs and water?" Again, the chosen cats left in their  patrols. Thinfur yawned. "I'll go help with the moss." Darkstorm watched him pad away.

"So Darkstorm got fed up and finally spoke against the leaders," Shadeflight began excitedly. "And so then she said she was leaving, and a bunch of cats went with her." Thinfur's eyes narrowed.

"Wait. What- what happened to your eyes?" Darkstorm took over as Shadeflight quieted.

"Well, before we left, we fought two dog foxes. Strong ones. One scratched Shadeflight's eyes, and we couldn't help him. I... I lied and said that he would be able to see again one day. I shouldn't have, but I didn't want him to always be miserable. I tried to give him hope."

"I was mad. I'm sorry," Shadeflight mewed solemnly. "I was worried."

"Go on," Thinfur encouraged. Darkstorm flattened her ears.

"Beechleap died. He was old- he couldn't take the journey." Thinfur winced. "And then Featherheart attacked Coralfall- she's Coralfall now, even though I'm not Darkstar. He tried to kill her, but she ended up killing him." His eyes widened. Darkstorm watched his expression as she continued. 

...

Darkstorm blinked and got up. Thinfur had reacted well to the news. She took a mouse and padded over to Snarlfang and Orangetail. "Share?"

"Sure." The three cats chewed the mouse slowly, nourishing the delicacy. Darkstorm sniffed the air and heaved to her paws.

"The cats we scented,"she hissed. "DarkClan!" she yowled, glimpsing white fur behind a bush. "We're under attack!" The clan scrambled to their paws. A white-and-grey tom stepped out from behind the bush. 

"You saw me." Darkstorm raised her hackles as he spoke. His green eyes glinted like Twoleg silverthorn. 

"Who are you?" she demanded. The tom blinked.

"I'm Cometstar." Several cats slunk to his side. "This is MoonClan. Our deputy is Moonglow." A white she-cat lifted her head proudly. "Why are you in our forest? You're obviously a clan." Darkstorm's eyes narrowed.

"We are DarkClan," she explained curtly, holding his gaze. There's another clan? "We'll be out of your territory now. We hadn't known it to be yours. Maybe freshen your scent markers." Cometstar's nose flared.

"You're another of those petty warrior-code-clans, aren't you?" His claws, silver like moonbeams, ricocheted against the stone he was sitting on. His cats unsheathed theirs, baring their teeth.

"We're not, actually," Darkstorm retorted, her clan mirroring his. She tapped her claws on the dirt. "We're DarkClan, and we left the clans because of their petty code." she sneered, her voice like his. "We're going. Either you'll let us go in peace, and we'll never see each other again, or we'll fight, and DarkClan will win." More cats padded out of the shadows. There are a lot... But we still outnumber them. She glared at Cometstar.

"We aren't scared of you!" Her lips peeled back in a snarl. "Will you really lead your clan into a fight that you'll surely lose?"

"Surely?" Cometstar spat. "I think that we'll be the ones who 'surely win'!" Darkstorm glared at him. "MoonClan, attack!" Darkstorm flung herself onto Cometstar's shoulders, clawing his back. He ran. What kind of trick... Comfreytail sped after him, faster as she originated from WindClan. 

"Give up!" Darkstorm snarled, as Comfreytail pinned Cometstar down and batted his muzzle. The black cat ran to help Bushpaw, who was struggling with three much older warriors. They had knocked Orangetail over, which was surprising, given the young warrior's determination and strength. A third warrior, the one that was slashing a claw across Bushpaw's belly, was the one who had been trying to attack Orangetail. Snarlfang leaped over and helped Bushpaw, while Darkstorm held off the two bigger warriors. One was a lithe tabby tom, and the other a silver tom. The she-cat Bushpaw and Snarlfang were attacking was yellow, with white paws. 

The tabby bit Darkstorm's tail with a surprising strength for one so skinny, while the silver tom sliced at her muzzle and raced off to help a smaller brown and white she-cat. Darkstorm ducked a hard blow and slammed the top of her muzzle to the tabby's belly.

"Speckledfur! Help!" a black tom yowled. Speckledfur, the tabby, narrowed his eyes at Darkstorm.

"Hang on a few heartbeats. Gingerheart, can you help Nightpaw?" He launched himself at Darkstorm, biting her paw and leaping beside Nightpaw and an orange tom. Darkstorm clamped her teeth on Orangetail's scruff and dragged her to a leafy tree. She winced, licking her bloody paw.

"Orangetail!" Snarlfang screeched, stopping at her side. "Darkstorm, bring cobwebs. And you know how marigold looks, yes?" Darkstorm nodded quickly, remembering picturing a frilly orangish flower in her mind. "Find that, too!" Darkstorm raced into the forest, finding cobwebs under a dead bush. She rolled it up into a wad and stuck it under her chin, her head pinning it to her chest. She continued looking for marigold until she found it, holding it in her mouth and running as fast as she could back to Snarlfang.

"I have it!" she yowled, stopping as she reached Snarlfang. "Wha... What happened?" MoonClan was gone.

"We won," Snarlfang explained. "They left."

"But-" A horrible thought entered her mind. "What if they were the moon we had to find?"

"About that." Snarlfang snatched the marigold and cobwebs from her. "StarClan visited me in a dream. Actually, Spottedleaf did. She was once a ThunderClan medicine cat." Darkstorm's ears twitched. "She said that the 'moon' was the place where we would have to leave new cats behind. She said these 'new cats' were a clan- they were supposed to be one, but beside breaking the code, they abandoned StarClan. She said I would know who these cats would be when I met them- they're MoonClan.

"She also said that once we've found the moon, our journey isn't done. We'll stop when we find the clans, again in the direction of the brightest star, and journey a bit after that."

"And then?" Darkstorm prompted. Snarlfang shrugged.

"I don't know. She didn't say."

"No, Brambleberry said that after that, we would reunite with the clans! Maybe. She said maybe, maybe, maybe maybe. Maybe is fun to say!" Starkit chirped suddenly, rolling in the grass. "And maybe the code will be changed, the warrior code!" Duskkit frowned.

"Yeah, but Yellowfang said that ShadowClan and RiverClan would have new medicine cat apprentices soon. And that maybe we would find a new home?" Darkstorm froze.

"You... you two spoke with Yellowfang and Brambleberry?" Shadeflight demanded. Duskkit shrugged.

"Yeah, they also let us play with a gray and white kit. She was so friendly! I think her name was Mosskit?" 

"Yeah, she was a ThunderClan cat, I think?" Starkit added. Duskkit nodded. 

"That's what the blue cat said. They had stars in their fur! It was so pretty! Do I have stars in my fur?" Duskkit purred.

"No! Open your eyes and you can see for yourself!" Starkit sniffed herself.

"In that place, I did see!"

The kits tumbled after one another, playing, and the other kits joined them. Darkstorm watched them.

"Starkit has to be a RiverClan medicine cat," Coralfall mewed. "No doubt about it. And Duskkit... Maybe a ShadowClan medicine cat? I mean, RiverClan and ShadowClan will have new medicine cats, yes? That's what StarClan said."

"Yes," Shadeflight mewed slowly. Snarlfang growled.

"Those kits must be. Look, it's nothing to be over ourselves about. They're meant to be medicine cats, that's all. And we knew that we would be reunited with the clans- at least we hoped." Thorntail mewed something. Darkstorm blinked, and walked over to Orangetail, who had been given cobwebs and was stretching.

"Orangetail. You must be out of practice," Darkstorm joked. "Being beaten!" Orangetail snorted. "Arrowheart wasn't here. But he must be nearby. I mean, we scented hi-"

"Help!" Yowltail's screech interrupted her, and Darkstorm bouded over to her, shocked to see a limp shape. "It's Grassfang! Grassfang- he's dead!"