And so Brinepaw stood in a ring of fire, desperately considering his options. He stopped crying for help and straightened up. The gaze of the forlorn apprentice was drawn inexplicably to the sky. More specifically, to the moon. Its heavenly light broke through the shroud of smoke and fell upon Brinepaw's face.

          He reveled in the feeling of the midnight wash on his fur. Brinepaw closed his eyes and allowed himself to just feel.

           Even though it was so hot, the moon chilled him to the bone. Brinepaw shivered as his eyes shot open. There was the flickering orange fire in front of him. There was the glowing volcano penetrating the dark of the night. The picture of destruction.

          Brinepaw felt suddenly fearless with the moon watching over him. He breathed in pure, crystal serenity, and with his exhale he pulled water from the air. With deep focus, Brinepaw brought the water into a sweeping stream which he used to extinguish the surrounding flames. When his path was clear, Brinepaw hopped away from the approaching lava and hurried to the beach. His Clan needed him.

          The full moon beat on with Brinepaw's heart, lending him strength. And although he could not see the stars, Brinepaw felt that StarClan was there too. He imagined Rainflight viewing him from above, wishing for the safety of the Clan. I won't let you down.

          Brinepaw sprung onto the sand and sent it spewing across the beach. The fire had already swallowed up much of the land, leaving dead blackness in its wake. The beach, too, was under assault from the merciless flames. Brinepaw saw the dark shapes of his Clanmates up ahead. They seemed to have arrived safely, but the area around them was all ablaze.

          So he dodged to left and right as the flames jumped at him. Soon he came upon an impassable wall of fire, so he pulled the tide of the ocean forward and took a path through the water.

          Finally he stood on the outskirts of where the TideClan cats were gathered. The majority of them had waded into the sea and now stood huddled together, shaking in the briny water. But three cats still stood on the wet sand: Almondstar, Heronstrike, and Covestorm.

          "Brinepaw!" exclaimed Covestorm as Brinepaw approached.

          "I couldn't even get onto WaveClan territory," Brinepaw reported.

          Covestorm nodded. This was unsurprising news. Brinepaw knew that as far as his mentor was concerned, WaveClan had been dead since the volcano first erupted.

          The earth trembled and shook. Both Covestorm and Brinepaw raised their heads to watch as more lava spewed from the distant volcano. Plumes of smoke and ash gathered overhead and as the ash fell, it accumulated on the water turned the ocean gray. 

          Almondstar jerked her head between them, "Where is Burnetpaw?"

          Brinepaw lowered his head and said nothing.

          "Brinepaw, I need to know. What happened to my apprentice?"

          Brinepaw ignored her for a moment, turning to douse some of the nearby fire with a well-placed wave. Then he turned back to his leader and sighed, "I'm not sure," he admitted, "He went down the other side of the volcano and I haven't seen him since."

          The apprenticed peered past Almondstar's distraught expression to the disturbing image of nearing lava. Covestorm followed his apprentice's eyes and raised his tail in alarm.

          Heronstrike and Almondstar turned to see the lava creeping in and covering the beach. Together, all four cats backed away into the ocean. The water lapped at their chest fur and slammed the shoreline, intensified by the fullness of the watchful moon. Protected by the water, Brinepaw felt he could resume talking.

          "We're just going to have to trust that Burnetpaw is okay. He can take care of himself."

          Brinepaw believed what said. As long as Brinepaw had known him, Burnetpaw's spunky personality had served him well. It granted the young tom a sense of bravado, which he carried with him through any situation. Burnetpaw had always been outgoing, eager, and startlingly brave. Brinepaw had wondered where it all came from. How could an orphaned kitten grow up to become so confident?

          It all made sense now. Burnetpaw was a spirit. And the spirit of a volcano, nonetheless. What did a volcano have to fear?

          As it turned out, it seemed that the only thing Burnetpaw was actually afraid of was the volcano itself. The prospect of going back to where he came from. Brinepaw recalled how his friend had run from him. He pictured the flash of betrayal he'd seen in those mixed hazel eyes.

          Heronstrike was the next to speak up. "So, now what?" pondered the great warrior, "Are we just going to sit here until the volcano decides it's finished throwing its tantrum?"

          The others chuckled a little bit at Heronstrike's wording, but Brinepaw recognized the truth behind the way Heronstrike had phrased it. The volcano was throwing a tantrum. It had lost something long ago, or rather someone. And now it wanted that someone back. But, Brinepaw realized, he had let that someone go. Had he really ruined his only chance at restoring balance to the world?

          As usual, he was so terribly confused. Right down to the end, Brinepaw was confused. He never felt sure of anything, and this was an especially muddled case. What exactly was he expected to do? Murder his best friend in the name of saving the world?

          The cruelty of his position was truly unfathomable. Brinepaw hoped there was something more to it. There was just so little substance to the problem he was meant to confront. How could he make a logical decision when so little of what was happening was actually based upon logic?

          "Yes," Brinepaw said at last, "That's exactly what we're going to do. We need to wait this out. Nature is settling."

           Covestorm considered the ambiguity of this statement. "What do you mean by that, Brinepaw?" he questioned.

          "Don't you see? Everything weird we've been experiencing has been leading up to this. The war, my powers, Fleetwater's death... it's all the just groundwork for something bigger."

          Heronstrike narrowed his eyes impatiently, "You're going to have to explain better than that, young one."

          But Brinepaw wasn't convinced he could explain it in a way that would make sense to the others. As he fought for the right words, there was another low rumble and then a hiss as the lava reached the water and began to cool. The viscous liquid solidified on the shoreline, transforming into jagged black rock.

          Everything dimmed in comparison to the brilliance of the fire and lava. Brinepaw fell into a trance as he observed the ruin that lay before him. Beyond the bleak, gray water was the beach. Only it wasn't the beach anymore. Every tail-length was covered in dancing flame. Every tree in the forest was burning. Even TideClan camp was completely flooded with lava.   

          The colors green and blue seemed to have been erased from existence. There was nothing to suggest that life inhabited the land in front of them. Brinepaw couldn't draw in even a single breath. His home was a wasteland.

          "Brinepaw," Covestorm murmured.

          Brinepaw walked slowly away from them, heading straight for the beach of flames.

          "Brinepaw!" called Covestorm.

          But Brinepaw wasn't listening. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. As the lava cooled into igneous rock, it provided a platform for more lava to travel towards the ocean. Then, that lava would reach the water and cool and the cycle would repeat.

          The lava was building a new shoreline.

          Pretty soon, the volcanic shoreline would reach the TideClan cats and bring the lava and fire upon them.

          Brinepaw raised his paws out of the salty water and pushed huge waves onto the lava. But no matter how quickly he worked, the lava just kept coming. Soon he was backing away again, driven back by the encroaching shoreline. Brinepaw could hear the panic of his Clanmates rising behind him as they looked on.

          The fire was spreading towards them. Brinepaw narrowed his eyes and brought forth a wall of water. He glanced back at Covestorm. The big tabby was watching the flames with haunting acceptance. He made no effort to run, nor to protect the others. He simply cast a very long, sad look at Brinepaw and then shut his eyes tight. 

          On Covestorm's eyelids Brinepaw saw all of his failures play out in front of him. He saw the laziness he'd possessed in the early moons of his training. He saw the siege on TideClan camp. He saw the decimation of WaveClan.

          Brinepaw turned away from Covestorm and howled into the flames. He snarled and swirled his tail, feeling a surge of power coarse through his veins. Above him, clouds began to appear and spiral around where he stood in the sea. They grew in size and shape until the entire sky was covered in one enormous storm cloud. Brinepaw grunted with the effort as he filled the clouds with more and more moisture.

          Now there was a heaviness in the air. Brinepaw could feel the humidity. With a nod of his head, he brought the rain down upon the land. It was barely possible to see through the sheet of water that poured from the open sky. The only thing distinctly visible was the ever-present white shine of the moon. The space in front of Brinepaw's face became nothing but moonlight illuminated droplets.

          Brinepaw squinted through the storm he had created and lumbered through the water, back to the shore. He could walk now without getting burned; the rain was doing its job in putting out at least some of the fire.

          He gritted his teeth and dug his claws into the razed land, bringing more rain down from the sky. Everything was washed in the eerie glaze of the rainstorm. The flames shrunk in size and disappeared from some places, but the fire ultimately persisted. Brinepaw ignored the shrieks of terror as it descended upon his Clanmates. He squeezed his eyes shut and raced through the rain, knowing very well what he had to do next.

          He went to the place where the beach sloped upwards towards camp. He remembered when he'd last been there—not too long ago. He'd been heading home after a training session with Almondstar.

          Sure enough, there was a dark figure standing in the silver storm. The cat was bent into the sand with his head in his forepaws. There was a deep boom of thunder as Brinepaw pounded up to meet him. The cat raised his head and withdrew from Brinepaw, bronze eyes flashing.

          "Listen!" Brinepaw gasped, "Listen to me!"

          The image of himself was shaking violently, looking confused and afraid.

          "You have to listen!" Brinepaw cried, "You have to push him in! Do you understand me? Brinepaw! Brinepaw! Do you understand me?"

          Another clap of thunder. 

          "Burnetpaw," Brinepaw said. His searched the eyes of the cat in front of him for some sign of understanding, "You have to push him in. It's the only way."

          "What do you mean?" said the past Brinepaw. He shrunk away back onto the sand.

          Brinepaw clamped his jaw frustratedly. Here was his past self, so blissfully unaware of what awaited him. Brinepaw knew that he had been a coward. He hadn't been able to do what was needed of him, but perhaps this Brinepaw was different. Maybe this time, he would have the courage to make the right choice. Brinepaw stared upon him with great intensity, and the other Brinepaw stared back. 

          The ground underneath their paws vibrated with the noise of more thunder. Then, abruptly, the other Brinepaw disappeared from where he lay on the sand.

          "No!" cried Brinepaw, jumping forward. He pounced on nothing, ramming into the ground.

          He stayed there, drenched by the very rain he had summoned. He felt that he became one with the dirt, unable to get up. Unable to go on.

          For, truly, what was there left to do?

          He had fought for his Clan. He had tried to protect them. But he had failed.

          Now, just as he'd received it, he'd passed on his knowledge to another Brinepaw.

          Brinepaw realized with great despair that this timeline was over. All he could do now was hope that the next one turned out differently.