Warrior Cats: Icetail's Enemy (COMPLETED ✔️)

Chapter Twenty Three

Edited ✔️

Sorry for the delays, everyone! It's just that my baby brother was recently born so I was spending a lot of time with him and I forgot to update. But here!! :) I made time for you all!

Icetail quickly unsheathed his claws and grabbed onto the hard rock, his breath catching in his throat. His claws managed to cling on the rock, but he knew that it wouldn't hold for long. Sharptail's eyes widened and he scrambled after his Clanmate.

"Be careful, you stupid furball!" he shouted, inching closer down the slope.

Icetail snarled. "This is no time to be insulting me! Help me!" cried the gray-furred warrior. His back paws tried to help give him a boost up, but there was nothing to climb on to. The slope was very steep. If Icetail fell, not even StarClan would know what's down there! He could fall onto hard rock, for all he knew, and die!

It sickened and panicked him just by the thought of it.

He felt Sharpfang's teeth sink into his scruff and haul him up. Icetail couldn't breathe under the pressure for a brief moment, until the senior warrior spat him out onto the forest floor. Both of them were panting while Squirrelpaw trembled with fear in the background.

"You useless apprentice," muttered Sharpfang. "He should of at least helped me."

Icetail didn't retort back to Sharpfang's mean statement. Squirrelpaw didn't seem like he even heard it, and Icetail was too winded to speak.

"N-now how are we going to see what is down there?" asked the apprentice with fear. "Maybe it's too steep for whatever is down there to come up . . ."

"You don't know if it can grow wings and fly out," snarled Sharpfang. "It's a mission I must carry out."

"We all must carry it out," coughed Icetail as he caught his breath. He staggered upright, and coughed again, clearing his chest. Then he peered down in the hole again and gulped. The darkness had almost swallowed him. The thought came back to his mind, one that haunted him for long; what if the prophechy was literal darkness? Would this be it?

"You sure you can go down?" Sharpfang asked. "You just fell. And now I know where this dumb hole is so I do not need your help."

"I never asked for you to concern yourself over me," snapped Icetail, already stepping back in. "I know my footing better. Let's go."

Sharpfang gave a long sigh. "I suppose so. Squirrelpaw, stay behind me. Keep your nose on my tail, or something like that. I need to know you are there."

" 'Kay," mumbled the apprentice, sticking close to Sharpfang.

"Go on, hero," growled the warrior. "Don't fall this time."

"I know that!" Icetail's tail lashed in annoyance. "And don't call me that." Sometimes he felt like he just wanted to shred Sharpfang, but obviously that was out of any question. It was beyond his ability, and hurting a Clanmate would be the ultimate wrong he could ever commit.

Icetail padded forward down the slope, carefully, but this time did not slip. He took a deep breath, and looked around. There was a platform with a nearly-smooth stone top. He turned to Sharpfang and motioned to it. "I'm going to see if that is safe," he announced. Icetail prepared himself, then leaped, landing right down onto the platform as he held his ground for a moment.

"Is it safe?" Sharpfang called impatiently.

"Calm down," Icetail snorted. He tested the platform by jumping in place, and when it did not budge, he nodded. "Okay come on now. One at a time."

"Go first," Sharpfang told Squirrelpaw. The apprentice nodded, and decided to leap. He landed right onto the platform, and scrambled up, rushing over to Icetail and pressing himself close. Sharpfang came next, and landed right next to Icetail with grace.

They looked down. The slope wasn't steep anymore; they were safe.

"Look," gasped Squirrelpaw, pointing with his tail. Both warriors tensed and glanced over to where the apprentice was pointing as if a badger was waiting. "There are two tunnels. So that's what's down here!"

"We still don't know what's in there," mumbled Sharpfang. "We should split up."

"But Sparrowheart put us three together for a reason," Squirrelpaw immediately interrupted. "I mean, err—I don't think it's safe—"

Sharpfang cut him off. "Don't be such a scaredy-mouse!"

Icetail stepped up to Squirrelpaw's defense yet again. That apprentice had better stop getting on Sharpfang's nerves! I can't defend you forever! "Sparrowheart did put is together for a reason. Squirrelpaw is small and could be used for small spaces and you are a good fighter. So we should stay together."

"Come on, then!" he sighed. "We might as well move along because you two don't want to separate. This could be a waste of time."

Icetail snorted with annoyance.

"You're as defiant as your mother," muttered Sharpfang.

"Don't talk about her like that," snapped Icetail. "What do you know about her, anyways . . ." He remembered his last memory of her, dying on the borders of DarkClan and MoonClan. She's brave, strong and fierce, he recalled. She was the best mother in all the Clans.

"I know a lot about your mother," he meowed. "We were apprentices together. You should be the one talking."

"Humph," said Icetail, pushing past the two. "Let's just continued. I want to get this patrol over with."

"I smell something putrid," Squirrelpaw piped up.

Sharpfang sneezed with disgust. "Something like a Thunderpath. Again, it's that Twoleg monster scent."

Icetail considered what he said. They're right! Something does smell bad.

"Whatever it is, it must not be good," said Icetail. "This is the worst scent I've caught in days!" He wrinkled up his nose as Squirrelpaw bounded up ahead in the darkness. "Watch where you are going," Icetail warned. "There may be another slope."

Squirrelpaw froze in his spot from up ahead. "You might want to see this."

Sharpfang stopped for a moment before he nodded and ran up ahead. His fur bristled as he took his spot beside the apprentice. "StarClan. . ." His eyes were wide as he stared.

Icetail ran up ahead. The air became denser and more stagnant the farther he traveled down the tunnel. It also became strangely lighter and easier to see, as if there was daylight waiting on the other side. But what he came to see was nothing  as comforting as daylight. Instead, a large cave, perhaps the size of the MoonClan camp itself—or even larger—towered above and below them. All around the cave he could see Twoleg things, from giant monsters to things that looked like tree-cutters, including other contraptions that he'd never seen before. Twolegs stood around the cave, shouting things to each other he could not understand; sitting inside the bellies of the monsters as if the monsters were waiting for their instructions.

Icetail could understand now that below the forest, something was stirring other than the battle with DarkClan. And it was not something good.

Above the putrid smell of the Twoleg monsters, he could also scent something else.

DarkClan!

His fur bristled. What are they doing here? And what are these Twolegs doing to our forest?

So, finally, an update!!! I've been making things shorter, because, as you know, I am becoming a busy, busy person :|

IF YOU DIDNT KNOW;
monsters are things like cars. Tree-cutters are bulldozers. And those extra contraptions are more human things that are meant to destroy.

Stay tuned for chapter 24 :)