Run Away Bravely (Stormwind)

“I bet I don’t look like him now,” Lionblaze purred in reply, raising his full-length tail and swishing it around in an exaggerated arc as he playfully bopped her nose in return for her insult. The male then locked eyes with the female earnestly. “I did it,” He mewed, almost with disbelief. “We can be together now!”

“You look like Berrynose like that,” Heathertail informed him, attempting to pop his ego.

“Then our first vote is unanimous; from here until the territory of the four clans has been recovered, we are one, and we are Darkclan!” amidst cheers from his supporters Lionblaze hopped down off of the tree, padding up to Heathertail. The Tom was beaming proudly, his chest puffed out to make him look and feel even more important.

Heathertail’s eyes widened in surprise and gratitude at his suggestion for the new Clan’s name, a small, soft smile forming on her muzzle. Meanwhile, the other three leaders grudgingly agreed, knowing a losing battle when they saw it.

“I will not become a leader of any sort.” Lionblaze mewed out. “Instead, all major clan decisions will come to a vote between the four current leaders, in recognition of the power and title Starclan granted each of them previously. If, and only if, there is a tie, I will cast a fifth vote to break it.”

Glancing deliberately at Heathertail, the golden brown tabby continued. “Firstly, we need a name.” He smiled widely down at his mate as he mewed “I would like to suggest Darkclan, as a recognition of the trying times we find ourselves in, possessing a shadow of our former power, but also recognizing our refusal to simply roll over and die.” The tom glanced down below him, eager for the leaders to vote.

Firestar dipped his head, recognizing this was what the majority of his clan wanted. “I vote in favor.”

The leaders were impotently furious but seemed to realize that they could not go against that many cats, even with those that didn’t support Lionblaze’s plan.

(Busses and goals... WTF? Lol!)

Lionblaze cast his gaze down to the leaders on the branches below him, daring any of them to challenge him in the face of so much support from their cats.

(*snickers* Busses and goals... omg lol. I’m giessing you meant hissed and yowls?)

Heathertail casually stepped on Antpelt’s tail when he tried to lunged forward, probably to try and attack someone.

Lionblaze tucked his tail beneath him to avoid leaving it dangling for Mistyfoot, who still looked somewhat infuriated. Seeing that he was winning over some of the other cats, Lionblaze continued: “In the past, the clans have been able to overcome terrible odds by coming together as one. The scourge of Bloodclan was only defeated because the four clans came together under one name, and one goal. I believe that now is our time to do the same, to firstly survive, and secondly, to take back what is rightfully ours!”

Cheering greeted Lionblaze from the cats on his side, which now drowned out the detracting busses and goals of disbelief.

(Mistyfoot*. Leopardstar is dead)

The cats looked around at the new empty spaces and several that had not been in-the-know seemed to agree, bringing the numbers of cats that agreed up to over half of all of them (not counting the kits, of course, lol).

Lionblaze cast his gaze all around him. Leopardstar seemed to be measuring the jump, Onestar and Blackstar were glaring daggers, and Firestar was looking up at his grandson with barely disguised interest.

“Look how much more space we have now!” Lionblaze yowled, pointing out the new empty expanses that they could move into without the barriers in place. “Tearing down what has divided us has made us better off, and stronger. And I suggest that we continue to tear down the barriers between our clans, and not just the physical ones.”

Heathertail joined in on the triumphant yowl, but still kept a wary eye just in case on of the more hot-headed cats decided to attack them for daring to get rid of the barriers.

While Jayfeather had known about the plan, he hadn’t actually been a part of it and so just listened, tilting his head to the side.

Lionblaze found a good branch, visible from all around, sturdy enough for him but slim enough that the other leaders wouldn’t dare follow him up to silence him. He waited until his cats had succeeded in pushing every remnant of the barriers off of the island before he let out a powerful, triumphant yowl, the other cats in his plan joining him once they noticed it over the din that they had created.

The rest of the cats continued with their job, flinging the barriers into the lake and a couple of them having to block the other cats from attempting to stop them.

Leafpool and Jayfeather left their den and Leafpool stared in alarm even as Jayfeather breathed a sigh of relief.

Firestar pinned his ears back as caterwauling suddenly rose from all four corners of the island, emerging from his nest in the tree to investigate.

“Fling it all into the lake!” Yowled Lionblaze, tearing off a woven branch and chucking the stupid thing into the water. He then bounded away from the wall, scrambling up the tree in He middle of the island before any of the four leaders could stop him, going higher than any of them usually did.

The WindClan cats started to as well, and the sudden flurry of movement as they attacked the barriers, quickly bringing them down, caused cries of alarm from all those that could see it happening, drawing more cats out to see. Meanwhile, the RiverClan and ShadowClan groups were bringing down their own barriers.

Without further ado, Lionblaze began to attack the barrier, and the rest of Thunderclan followed, tearing it apart with their teeth and claws.

(Copperpaw is female)

Heathertail nodded to Copperpaw before leading her own cats towards Lionblaze’s group, casting a glance around for anyone that might have caught sight of their odd behavior.

Lionblaze then sent his signal to Riverclan, who passed it to Windclan. Each group formed in their clan’s clearing fairly nonchalantly at first, pretending to gossip with one another or be gathered by sheer coincidence. After a moment, however, Lionblaze nodded to Heathertail, who knew that she needed to now nod to Copperpaw, so he could not to Whitewater. After starting the message Lionblaze led his group of cats up to the hastily assembled wall of tangled branches that represented the border between Windclan and Thunderclan.

Firestar was tending to something else, not noticing the strange behaviors of some of his warriors and apprentices just yet.

Heathertail met Lionblaze’s gaze and gave a slight nod before getting to her paws and padding off to gather up the cats in WindClan that were in on the plan, which was a little over half, which still wasn’t that many, considering WindClan was the smallest Clan. As soon as she could, which was shortly after sunhigh, she led them to (insert wherever they’re starting it here).

Despite his grief over the presumed loss of Hollyleaf, Lionblaze had signaled the previous night for a meeting with his most trusted representatives in each of the other three clans: Copperpaw in Riverclan, Whitewater in ShadowClan, and of course Heathertail in Windclan.

He had told them what their plan was, and the other important information for each of them to disperse among their sympathetic clanmates. The golden brown tom estimated that about half of the clan cats were in on the plan at this point, and while it didn’t include many of the cats in power or senior warriors, he hoped that the cacophony of voices would sway the leaders into implementing his change.

Now, the tom glanced over at the Windclan Camp, waiting to meet Heathertail’s gaze. It was sunhigh, and now it was go time.

(Mmkay)

Four days later, there was tension among the cats in-the-know and mostly confusion among the rest of the cats. Lionblaze’s plan was about to be implemented, which, unfortunately, would firstly involve a mostly-hostile takeover of the Clans so that they could be combined.

Hollyleaf had not been seen since she had fled the island, and by this point it had generally been decided that she was dead, to the sorrow of multiple cats. The obvious grief that Leafpool showed had cooled some of Jayfeather’s anger towards her but not a lot, only enough that he would interact politely with her during their medicine cat duties. At this moment the two medicine cats were sorting through the herbs, though Jayfeather was obviously distracted, well-aware of his brother’s plan.

Heathertail was one of those in-the-know and while not fully approving of the plan, she was going along with it for the simple fact that it would make being with Lionblaze easier.

(I would suggest three-five days. That’s when Lionblaze’s plan is finally gonna go into action.)

(How long do you think?)

(Sure)