Echo: The Kits Take A Stand

Chapter 9

Echokit opened her eyes again. She was no longer sleeping beside the Moonfall, instead she was standing in a lovely field of flowers, with bright stars shining above. Falconkit was next to her, gazing around at the sights. A white-gray she-cat with stars in her pelt padded towards them.

"Greetings," she meowed. "I am Dovestar. I was leader of PondClan before Hazelstar."

Echokit was delighted to be greeted by such an amazing cat. "I'm Echokit, and this is my brother Falconkit."

"I know," Dovestar's voice was calm and beautiful.

"We're here to ask how to cure the sickness that's going around in PondClan," Falconkit told her.

Dovestar's green eyes were understanding. "It is quite a terrible breakout. It's very awful to see, especially for young kits like you. No Clan has ever faced such a terrible breakout before, with more than half of their warriors being sick. It is lucky that the sickness is not one that kills often."

"It's only killed two warriors, you're right," Echokit agreed. "But not a single cat has been cured of it, and the medicine cats have tried every herb and remedy they know! Please tell us how to cure them!"

The StarClan warrior looked sad. "Even I do not know how the sickness can be cured. But I do know that your Clan will get through this. You will find a cure when the time is right. Go back to your Clan, dear kits."

Echokit felt as if she were about to cry, but she murmured, "Thank you," touched her nose with Dovestar, and left.

As Echokit rose to her paws, she was in the living world once again. Without a word, she and Falconkit turned and made the long journey back to the nursery, and at long last, went to sleep.

The next night was the Gathering. The kits had no intention of sneaking along, and instead decided to have a training session that night as usual. Since it was Gathering night, though, the session would have to be cut short. Most of the Clan would leave in the evening, and the rest of the Clan would go to sleep. The kits would sneak out and have their training session, but when the Clan returned from the Gathering a little after moonhigh, they would race to the nursery and act as if they had been sleeping the whole time.

"Today, I want us to practice attacks. Leaping, lunging, reaching, pushing, all that kind of stuff," Echokit announced to the other kits. As if on a silent command, Swiftkit sprang at Falconkit the minute she finished speaking. Startled and confused, Falconkit had not time to react, and he helplessly fell over and was pinned down by Swiftkit.

"Ha!" Swiftkit yowled in triumph. Echokit shushed him and hissed, "I didn't even tell anybody to attack yet!"

"It was a surprise attack!" Swiftkit protested. "I'm pretty good at it, aren't I?"

"I suppose we can do surprise attacks," Echokit mumbled. She was immediately attacked by Blossomkit, but Echokit dodged the tortoiseshell's attack, got up, and turned around. Blossomkit swiped for her tail, but Echokit swished it in the other direction. At some point Rockkit barreled into both of them. It turned into a free-for-all of kits attacking each-other out of nowhere. During the fight, a strange smell entered the camp, causing the kits to stop and look into the middle of the camp.

An enormous creature, three times the height of a warrior, was in the camp. It had the shape of a cat, but with a very long muzzle and strangely bushy tail. His mouth was open and his eyes were hungry. He had an orange and red pelt, black paws, and a white tail tip. Echokit had never seen an animal like this before, but he matched the description of a beast that she had heard about in elder's stories: it was a fox.