The Moonlapse [ABANDONED]

I

Note: This is a sequel to The Sunlapse! I'd recommend you read that book before you read this one, because it might be confusing without the context of it.

Winds rode the somber twilight. The birth of a cold autumn stood before them, but summertime still protected the land. The shadows of the trees were lengthening upon the forest floor, the sun blazing upon the rose-toned horizon and bathing the woods in a deep orange glow. The golden-green leaves rustled in the light of the sunset, wrapping around Rootkit and his mother in a protective den from the humid air. 

"Mom," Rootkit mewed as he laid nestled in her bushy tail. Needleclaw simply yawned. 

"Mom!" he repeated. "Can I ask you something?"

Needleclaw sighed as she stared at him with dark, tired eyes. "What is it, sweetie?" she replied in a weary tone.

"What's with Rootspring?" he asked. Thunder seemed to flash in her eyes as her teeth clenched. 

"Who told you about him!?" she hissed. Rootkit flinched, feeling tiny under her furious gaze. "Your dad?"

"No!" he hissed back. "I saw some apprentices talking about the war and stuff, and one of them said I had an uncle called Rootspring. Do I?"

"Rootkit, you aren't old enough to be listening to talk about that stuff. Now, go to sleep," she growled as Kitescratch stepped into the nursery. 

"Oh, Rootspring? Legend has it he's still in the Moonpool," Kitescratch meowed.

"Shush! We agreed not to tell him about it!" Needleclaw spat. "Now, sleep!"

Rootkit watched as his mother laid her head on her paws and so did Kitescratch. But he felt parched by a curiosity. It overtook him like a fever, sucking him dry and leaving him breathless. Who was he? Why was he such a legend? And what had he to do with the Moonpool? He had to know.

-

Rootkit rose to his paws, staring out at the pitch black sky. His parents laid still beside him, and so he kept his feet as light as possible as he stepped out from the den. The night wrapped itself around him and threatened to keep him in the darkness forever, only broken by the moon which hung timid in the midnight.

He made his way into the sleeping forest. Cicadas broke out in their chorus of the night, and the silver rays of moonlight did nothing to shine on the blinding mass of silhouettes. Rootkit had never wandered out by himself, let alone in the dark. He felt so small, so isolated, an obscured speck in a blanket of shadows. 

Where is the Moonpool?

A squeal burst from his lungs when the black soil suddenly gave away beneath his paws, sending him tumbling forward into abyss. Mud soaked his pelt and smeared across his skin as he dropped to the bottom with a burst of muck. He gasped, the slush of rotten earth and insects sticking to his skin like a swarm of slugs. Rootkit looked up, pulling his way up to the edge until he stood on flat ground again. 

The moon's sickening light was no guide. It simply stood in the sky, a pale flash to contrast with the endless blackness. The freezing gusts of winds whirled around him and threatened to take him away to be eaten by the beetles and the wolves. Piercing thorns grappled onto him, slithering snails slathered in glue-like slime squelched and crunched beneath his paws with him having no way of seeing them.

Rootkit found his heart drumming, his fur standing up, his skin electrified by gooseflesh. He'd wandered out too far to turn back again, and he didn't know which way to the Moonpool. He weaved around a huge tree trunk, stricken when endless moors rolled out in front of him rather than more trees. A hillside opened up before him, the huge, black skies standing clear above it.

The young tom pricked his ears as he bounded down the curve, dropping to the bottom of the moonlit moors. Cold, humid gusts of wind teased the grass, and Rootkit continued spiking his ears up to listen for any sounds. When he noticed the sound of rippling water, it sent him running across the hills towards a round shadow on the earth. He found himself looking down at a deep rift in the ground, stepping down and feeling that this was a spiral staircase, making his way to the bottom.

A huge pond opened up before him. The waters looked so dark, they felt like they were a vortex. A hole to a void, to a land of the dead. Rootkit stepped forward to stare in. His reflection looked like a ghost, some kind spirit standing in some sort of abyss. He walked on further, only for the ground to give away again when he set his paws into the water. 

Water droplets flew out and splattered all over the rocks as a huge splash exploded around him. Rootkit screamed as an ice-cold sea engulfed him, sealing his bones in frost. His skin became hard and pale, he was weightless and frozen as he plunged into the coldest ocean. 

His eyes and nostrils burned as the surface smothered him. The dark waters stung his flesh, his nose and eyes burning. The temperature froze him, feeling like daggers tearing into his skin. His heart burned in panic, but whenever Rootkit tried to scream, he simply babbled and the air bubbles rushed up to the surface. He couldn't move, or breathe, or think. Help me! 

A hazy feeling began to take over his mind. He found himself drifting away from the black sea and laying in the fields in his mind. It stopped when something gripped him, and Rootkit was suddenly pushed up back to his world. The surface shattered, and the feeling of sleepiness was broken off as the winds carried him up above the ground.

Something was holding him by the scruff. He was frozen to the core, soaked and dripping in icy water. He coughed up a surge of dark liquid, which splashed into a puddle on the ground as he gasped for air.

"Thank you!" Rootkit yelped to the cat who had saved him. They didn't speak, they just walked silently. They carried him up the spiral pathway, along the hills, through the woods and back to his den. Rootkit hadn't even realized he was shaking. The sudden fall into the Moonpool had been so sudden, so quick, it didn't even feel real. Now he was left dazed and shattered. 

The mysterious cat laid him down on the ground. Rootkit tried to shake himself of his soaked pelt, but was still sopping wet. He turned to the cat, his heart bursting with gratitude. "What should I do for you?" he yelled, causing his mother to twitch from its volume.

But the cat had disappeared completely.

Who were they?