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Catland, a place of peace and plenty, a land where the cats rule. A beautiful place where humans don't exist. A place where humankind hasn't left a single mark, hasn't destroyed it, because this, is a fantasy place where humans, aren't around.

From the dark green forests to the deep blue ponds and the long, flowing streams, Catland is a very beautiful place. Cats live here happily, in freedom, and they don't harm a single creature that won't harm them. Not a single creature has harmed them ever, so far.

This though, is about to change. The entire face of Catland will become dark with war. A bad thing is about to happen to Catland, and a hero, will show up. One who is naught but a little kitten at the time. One who will have to go through very hard and difficult times to free Catland, and rid them of the evil that invades.

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The time, was a sad one. Catland had been invaded by the evil rats of the Eastlands. They left a trail of death, destruction, and slavery, winding through Catland.

In a forest, in a small cozy house, lived two cats with their small kitten, Glint. He was named for the 'glint' in his eyes. Light reflected off and sparkled in his neon green eyes. He was a small gray striped tabby. His father was a mighty fighter. He had a great blade, the sword of the stars. The metal came from a great comet, that blazed across the sky one night when he was only a kitten the age of Glint. His father found the metal and shaped it into a mighty weapon. One only for the true warrior. Before he passed away, he gave it to Glint's father, who promised always to fight for good, not evil, and take good care of it. He has always protected Catland from harm with the sword. Soon he would pass it on to Glint, once he proved a true warrior.

Ten rats burst into the house. Glint's father drew his sword and stepped forward. He had no chance of winning, but he defended his family and all of Catland. Metal clanged against metal, as blade against blade, they fought. The cat was a great swordsbeast and felled a rat. Another one stepped forward and took it's place. Glint's father fought on and on. The enemies blade coming threateningly close to him. He blocked it and shot out with his blade. There was a huge metallic clang as the dagger fell from the rats paws. He got down to pick it up. The cat needed no better chance. His blade shone against the light. And with lightening speed, he thrust it forward at the rat. The rat fell. Then the cat turned to the next rat that came forward.

"CATLAAAAAAAND!!!!!!!" he yelled his battle cry. He now went tottally mad, swinging out with the sword. All he saw was the rats. Two more fell. As more proceeded, hedealt them a similar blow. Soon all but one were slain. This one was obviously the leader of this small group. He was an excellent fighter, and far better than the other rats. He also had long lasting endurance. There were huge bulging muscles on him. He took out his weapon, a sword like the cat's. They locked together in combat. They both took several injuries. Then the cat fell to the floor. The rat, noticing his moment, swung out with his sword. The cat quickly blocked it with his sword and got up. The rat swung out and gashed him deeply. Blood oozed out. The cat collapsed to the ground. As he did so, with the last of his strength, he swung his sword. The rat fell, dead.

The mother walked to her dying husband. He said his last words.

"I have protected you and Glint. I have succeeded, but will not live. At least, I shall die knowing I have defended Catland. I have slain those rats. But there will be more, a lot more. Pass the blade to Glint when it come time. He shall be, the protector of Catland." He closed his eyes, never to open them again.

Tears rolled down Glint and his mother. His father was a very brave cat who had died defending them. Glint cuddled against his mother. They were both very sad. Never again would they see him. Glint closed his eyes, and went to sleep.

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The sun slowly rose over the horizon. The birds chirping in the trees, not knowing what horrible thing had happened the night before, and not caring, woke up Glint and his mother into sad reality. Unlike the wonderful dream world, whatever happened in reality was real and stayed that way. In dreams, you can do anything and it doesn't matter what you did, good, or bad, or even embarrassing, it never affects real life, because it never really happened at all, it only existed in the mind. These are little fantasies your mind makes up, usually based somewhat on what happened the day before, and your mind makes it seem so real, yet so strange.

Sadly, the death of Glint's father was not a dream, and really happened. It is sad to be with somebody your whole life, and love them, and then they just aren't there when you wake up one day. That is what it is like for Glint. Losing his father is one of the worst things that have ever happened to him, but later, it will get worse. There is no real time to bury him until the rats are ridded from Catland, which is a very unlikely thing to happen. The rats are here to stay, to torture the cats, make them slaves, conquer the lands, and make their slaves build great fortresses. Unless some hero shows up and makes the rats take flight and leave Catland forever, never to return.

Glint's mother, threw the dead bodies of rats outside. She started making breakfast from some food they had stored in the pantry. As she was making it, tears would just keep falling into the food that she was trying to cook. She turned and hugged Glint. She saw not sadness in his eyes, but pure anger and rage about his fathers death. He would get his revenge on those rats some day! The rats that killed his father! They would one day have to face the wrath of Glint!

After the food was cooked, they ate in silence, both knew what the other was thinking. Thinking about the sad death of Glint's father, and how brave he was. He had died for them, to protect them. They went about their daily chores, never saying a word. It went this way for several days, but you can never live your entire life in silence. Gradually they got over it, but their lives would never be the same.

"He wouldn't be happy if he died for us and all we did was be sad all day long! We should be proud of him, and glad of what he did for us. He was very brave!" said Glint's mother.

Glint nodded, he was still sad, but mostly mad at the rats. "I will get my revenge one day!", he yelled,"Someday I shall pay those rats back for what they have done!"

"You have the spirit of your father in you, Glint. All of your family have been great warriors, and so will you. I'm sure of that, I can see it in your eyes." Said Glint's mother, "One day you will get the sword, it was passed to your father by his, and will also go to you, once you have proven a true warrior."

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Not far away in Catland, was the large group of rats that the ten that killed Glint's father had come from. There were hundreds of huge, evil, mean, rats. The leader, a rat called Sharpfang, was giving orders.

"Just a little further, we'll make camp over there, in that forest where there is some shade." He pointed in the direction of the forest where Glint and his mother plus many other families lived. The entire group of rats marched over there. Once they arrived, Sharpfang orderred, "Bluntclaw, take twenty and search for slaves to build my fortress. The rest, stay here and make camp, come on, step to it!"

Bluntclaw, one of the captains, quickly selected twenty mean looking rats, got out the slave chains, and set out in the forest, looking for slaves.

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As the slavers passed through the deep shady forest, a large bird of prey, a falcon, watched from overhead. He then quickly flew away. The falcon, who's name was Quicktalon, went to a dwelling of birds, way up in the trees, where lots of birds of prey lived together, kind of like a village. He reported what he had seen. Then flew away in search of prey.

The prey was sighted, a small bird. Quicktalon flew higher, and out of view of his prey. Then he folded his wings and dived down at the small bird. As he fell like a rock from a cliff, he picked up speed. He then extended his sharp talons and as he zoomed by, caught the small bird. He then quickly unfolded his wings and stopped falling. He carried his prey off, live, to his nest at the dwelling of birds to devour it.

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The slavers trekked on and on through the deep, never ending, forest. They were hot, thirsty, hungry, and tired. But they were too afraid to disobey orders, they all knew that the penalty for that was death.

"Hey, listen, what is that?" said one of the rats. They stopped and listened. It was a little trickling sound of water in a stream. They instantly were running in that direction. Before Bluntclaw could stop them, they all had jumped in the cool fresh waters of the stream. He did too. The water washed across thier sunburned backs, soothing the burning pain. They drank some. It was good. Their luck was finally running good!

To make the rats luck even better, a rat called Bloodpaw, found some berries. They all hungrily ate them and drank some of the cool water. They packed some berries into large sacks and filled their canteens with the nice fresh stream water. Then, throwing the sacks across their shoulders, they set off again through the deep dark forest that many creatures called home. They continued searching for slaves.

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A bird messenger flew to several cat's homes to warn them of the slavers. He rapped his beak against the door of one house. It was opened by a female cat.

"Come in, Swift," she addressed Swift, the bird, "Come in." she repeated.

He walked into the small house. There was a little kitten playing with a red rubber ball. He threw it in the air, then watched where it would land, and ran excitedly across the floor to neatly catch it in his small paws as it slowly fell to the floor. Then he would raise his paws above his head and throw it again, watch it, chase it, and catch it. He seemed to be having a lot of fun with this ball. Swift perched on the end of an old chair and spoke quickly, as if in a big hurry to move on.

"Ahem." he cleared his throat, "I, as you know already, am Swift, the birds messenger. I come to warn you of the rats. They are in this forest and even now, as I speak, are searching for slaves. Now I must go to warn others, goodbye!"

Swift, the hawk that had come to warn them, flew out the open door and disappeared in the heights, way up above the treetops.

"We must warn others!" said the female cat to herself mainly, since the little kitten hardly knew how to speak. She went to get her husband, who was fishing at the stream. "Stay here," she told her kitten, "I won't be gone for long. I'll be right back!" She walked outside and carefully shut the door, so as not to disturb the kitten's playing.

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The slavers walked alongside the stream, following the banks so they wouldn't get lost. Suddenly a large male cat leapt out at them. He was holding a long fishing pole with a live wriggling worm on the hook. He used it as a weapon. He whacked a rat hard with his pole. The rat fell back, blood coming from a deep wound in his face. The other rats drew their daggers and were after the cat, who was running rapidly through the forest, forgetting about the bucket full of fish sitting on the stream banks, that he had worked so hard to get.

Suddenly the cat tripped on a large root sticking out of the ground. The rats were on him in a flash. They grabbed him and chained him up. He was their first slave. Though they were looking for younger ones, he was a strong full grown one. He would do well in building their fortress. They knocked him out and dragged him away in chains.

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It was getting dark in the forest. The female cat had not yet found her husband. She searched up and down the stream banks. Then she saw the pawprints, first a cat's. Near where the cat's pawprints began, there was a large circle pressed into the ground that was probably from a bucket that had been sitting there. Further up, the cat's prints joined up with 42 prints, obviously made by 21 rats. There was a small patch of blood, near where the prints met up. She followed the pawprints. The cat's prints went towards the forest, further apart this time. She assumed that the cat had been running. The rat prints followed it to a large root sticking out of the ground. Then the rats' prints continued, but instead of cat pawprints, there was a long, wide, line following the rats' prints. The cat must have been dragged along. The cat could be no other than her beloved husband! At first she wanted to run to his rescue, but decided that she couldn't fight twenty one, war trained, rats alone. So she walked home to check on her kitten. Plus, it was dinnertime anyway.

When she arrived, she couldn't find her kitten anywhere! He had disappeared! She would never forgive herself for leaving him all alone. She started to cry.

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The rats that were slaving trekked wearily on. Finally they reached the camp. Bluntclaw went to Sharpfang's tent to tell his report.

"We got two slaves, sir. One kitten, and one full grown. We also found a fresh water stream and berries. Plus, we got this." Bluntclaw held up the bucket of fish that the cat, now their slave, had caught.

Sharpfang smiled. Bluntclaw was relieved, his leader was in a good mood. Without warning, Sharpfang drew his sword and pressed it against Bluntclaw's neck.

"Next time get more slaves, you worthless little brat! You don't deserve the title captain, but I will leave you your position. This is your warning, next time your head will be off! Don't come back here until you get more slaves, you hear me! Now go! Get out of here, and don't come back empty pawed. I want the fortress to start construction tomorrow! I'll be seeing you!" Sharpfang threw Bluntclaw out of his tent. He was enraged about the tiny number of slaves he got.

Sharpfang said to himself in a dumb tone, "Ooh, looky, we got two slaves, sir. I'll two slaves him! That Bluntclaw nobrain should realize that two aint enough! What does he want built with just two? A toy house?!"

He started ranting and pacing around his tent. He was very mad. He needed slaves, hundreds of them. He would build a great fortress with a castle in it's walls. He would start a large empire, expanding the borders throughout Catland. And what does Bluntclaw bring back? Two, puny slaves, one too old, and one too young. The time will come, he thought, sooner or later.

His kingdom shall rise high and conquer the lands. Rats would live there, leading rich lives, with lots of slaves to do all the work. And, after he conquered Catland, he would explore further south into unknown territory, or maybe sail further west. The more he thought about it, the happier he got. An evil grin spread across his mean face. He started laughing evilly, "Hahahahaha! Yes! I shall soon rule the world!" he said aloud to himself.

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The slavers, now tired and hungry, wandered through the darkening forest. A whistling wind blew by, chilling their blood. Trees became monsters, their hands reaching out at them. And everywhere they went, there seemed to be eyes, watching them, following them, haunting them. They kept bumping into trees, and jumping with fright. They didn't like it here, there was a spooky feeling about the place at dark. They were scared. They wanted to go to the camp. But, orders were orders. The would obey. They continued stumbling blindly on.

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Someone was watching them. It hid in the lush trees. There were two glowing green eyes. They were actually a pretty dark shade of green. It was very agile and silent. It knew the forest well, and could see easily, for it was used to the dark, and had special glowing eyes. Eyes that gave it night vision, taking in what little light there was, and using it to see. It was a black cat.

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Glint and his mother were asleep, softly snoring. Their pantry was now empty, they had finished the last of the food at dinner. Tomorrow they would have to go out and collect berries and fruits, catch fish, and kill small birds, and bring them back to store them in their pantry.

Glint was having a dream. In it he had the sword of the stars. He was fighting the rats, and making them run away. He was laughing. The rats retreated to their ships and sailed away, back to the Eastlands. Then everything became blurred, and he saw his father. He spoke. Melting words into rhyme

"Beware the slavers in the wood.

Stay away from them, I warn you,

Protect the others with your sword,

Seek help from the black ones, eyes so green,

Listen to the advice from the feathered ones of prey,

I will always live to guide you. . . . . ."

Then Glint woke up. He yawned and stretched. He remembered nothing from his dream the night before. His mother and him went outside to gather food.

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The slavers, who had found a comfy spot, had slept the remaining hours of night, having terrible nightmares. They dreamt of a great cat, with a sparkle in his eye, who had a great sword. They were winning the battle, but all of a sudden they were scared. They were running as fast as their paws could take them. The cat was gaining on them. They got on their ships and sailed away, in terror. Then they saw the face of another, older, and more experienced cat. He spoke to them.

"Leave this land, leave it now. For the cats will win in the end. I am the great warrior, whom ten of yours slew. The ten rats your leader sent to check out this woods, your ten scouts. They are dead, but so am I. Now leave this place, and beware my son."

Then they saw Sharpfang.

"Don't listen to him! I am your leader, not some cat, you will do as I command! We shall rule a great kingdom. We are rats! The evil ones, the torturers, the mean. We aren't cats, scaredy cats!"

They then woke up, and didn't remember their dream. But they were scared and shaking and sweating from their nightmare.

That morning the slavers searched on. They found a house and surrounded it. It was a cat's house. They would keep them trapped in their. Then they would walk in and chain them up. It was Bluntclaw's plan. The rats liked the idea.

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The house happened to be Glint's. But, they were not home, they were gathering food. Glint walked to the stream to get water, while his mother fished. Glint found the same patch of berries that the rats had on the previous day. He collected some berries that were ripe, and got some water. His mother had caught plenty of fish and even a bird. They started walking home.

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The slavers walked in, weapons drawn. The house was deserted! They looked around and saw a sword. Something about it gave them a bad feeling in a quick memory that disappeared instantly. They took the sword and left. Suddenly they met face to face with Glint and his mother. They reacted quickly, grabbing them and chaining them up. Glint and his mother were knocked out by the rats. Then dragged away, chained up with the other two.

The slavers stopped to eat, eating all the food Glint and his mother had gotten. For the rats were numbering twenty one. Glint and his mother were only two. And two eat a lot less than twenty one, so the food would have lasted Glint and his mom weeks. The rats finished it in just one meal.

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The black cat who had spied on the slavers, walked to his village, deep in the forest. It was a long walk. Finally he arrived. He walked in the gates of a new wall, just put up recently to keep the rats out. He was met by another black cat.

"What's your report, Blaky?" asked the other cat.

"Twenty one slavers are in the forest, they are getting slaves. They come from a main group of rats who have set up camp in the forest. There are thousands of rats. They show no sign of leaving, sir!" Blaky reported and stood smartly to attention.

"Good. Only a couple thousand! Haha, that is a nice challenge for our warriors! Lets see, we number about fifteen, they number, lets say one thousand five hundred. Hmmm. The odds would be more than a hundred to one! We'd need lots of help, but we could do it! Contact Brushtail the squirrel, and ask him if his squirrel troops could help. The squirrels are great archers, up in the trees shooting down, they could make one, seem like twenty!"

"Aye, sir!" Blaky went to find Brushtail and his troops.

The other cat, who was the leader of the village warriors, wasn't really as sure of himself as he sounded. He knew that they were facing trained warriors, his cats had never even seen battle before. They had formed a group of warriors to fight the rats, but weren't so sure. "Oh, well," he thought, "They could at least try." Meanwhile they would just keep on spying on the rats and wait. Wait for the time to fight, to come.

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"We still need more slaves." said Bluntclaw, "four will never do while Sharpfang is leader."

One of the rats piped up, "Who said he had to be our leader? He has sent us out on to many difficult tasks, and always been mean. I say that it's time for a new leader! Come on, lets go back to camp."

"Idiot! Do you know what happens to rats that disobey orders?!! Sharpfang'll just take 'is sword, an slit your gullet!" Bluntclaw said.

"Huh, he won't do that to me. I will to him. I'll be the new leader!"

"Then you're making a big mistake. Several rats have tried mutiny, and none have succeeded." Bluntclaw warned.

"Well I will succeed! Come on, back to camp everyone, we're taking over leadership. Who's with me?" The rat started walking away towards camp and eighteen followed him. One of them stayed behind with Bluntclaw, Bloodpaw.

"The fools 're gonna get themselves killed."

"Aye. Lets continue getting slaves."

Bluntclaw and Bloodpaw continued, searching for more slaves.



To Be Continued........................................................

E - mail me your comments: wonderb@bellatlantic.net