Rat

Rats are medium-sized, long-tailed rodents. They are extremely vicious and clever creatures. Rats often live and travel in packs of a considerable size.
==Description==
:Rats have narrow faces, cruel eyes, snakelike tails, sharp claws and an overwhelming stench of rotten things. They have wedge-shaped heads, which squeak with sharp, yellow teeth. Their naked tails coil and flick like snakes. They are extremely vicious and clever creatures.
==Relation to Clan cats==
Colonies of rats are usually dangerous to cats, as they are aggressive and tend to attack them. Episodes of rats attacking groups of cats are described in several books. They also carry diseases that can spread to cats, causing severe illness, and sometimes death. For this reason, rats are generally not hunted as fresh-kill.
In the old forest, colonies of rats lived at a trash dump in ShadowClan territory, called the Carrionplace by the cats. The first ShadowClan medicine cat, Pebble Heart, realized that the rats were a source of infection. Raggedstar fought a violent battle with the rats that kept them from bothering ShadowClan for many moons. His deputy, Foxheart, was killed in one of these battles. A single rat contaminated the whole of ShadowClan during Nightstar's brief time as leader.
===Known deaths===
This is a list of cats, ordered chronologically, who were killed by rats.
==Book appearances==
===In the Dawn of the Clans arc===
====Thunder Rising====
:After catching a rabbit, Clear Sky and Thunder encounter three large rats on the moorland. The rats fight the cats over their prey and flee when they are overpowered.
===In the The Prophecies Begin arc===
====Into the Wild====
:Bluestar, Firepaw, Graypaw, Tigerclaw, and Ravenpaw are attacked by rats on their way back from the Moonstone. Although the rats are defeated, they are able to take Bluestar's seventh life. 
====Rising Storm====
:Several ShadowClan cats get sick after they eat diseased rats brought to the fresh-kill pile from the Carrionplace. Nightstar and his deputy Cinderfur die of the sickness.
===In The New Prophecy arc===
====Midnight====
:The six questing cats are attacked by rats near a trash dump in the big Twolegplace. Tawnypelt gets an infected bite on her shoulder, and limps painfully for most of the time. Her wound eventually heals, after being treated by Midnight, and later by Teller of the Pointed Stones.
===In the Power of Three arc===
====Outcast====
:When the Clan cats travel to the Tribe of Rushing Water, Tawnypelt tells Brambleclaw how she remembered the rat bite she got while visiting Midnight the badger.
:Later, Lionpaw, Hollypaw, and Breezepaw are exploring and they come across a rat. Lionpaw kills it with a bite to the neck.
===In the Omen of the Stars arc===
====Fading Echoes====
:Dovepaw's senses reach out to ShadowClan, and she can envision Ratscar choosing a rat from the fresh-kill pile and eating it.
:Later, Blossompaw hisses at Ivypaw for scaring off a rat she was hunting during her assessment.
===In the Super Editions===
====Moth Flight's Vision====
:When Silver Stripe is trapped in a rabbit burrow, her brothers fret about badgers, but when they are told that the tunnel is too big for badgers, White Tail worries about rats.
====Tallstar's Revenge====
:When Talltail goes into the Twolegplace in search of Sparrow and the greenleaf visitors, he eats a poisoned rat.
====Yellowfang's Secret====
:
====Crookedstar's Promise====
:When a RiverClan patrol is searching the Twoleg barn for dry grass, a swarm of rats attack them, wounding Sedgecreek and causing Hailstar to lose his last life.
====Bluestar's Prophecy====
:Leopardfoot mentions that Hailstar lost his ninth life to a rat bite.
====Leopardstar's Honor====
:The events of Crookedstar's Promise happen once again, but from Leopardfur's perspective.
====Firestar's Quest====
:It is revealed that after the original SkyClan were driven out of the forest, a huge colony of rats attacked the gorge where the Clan had set up camp and drove them out. The surviving cats became kittypets, loners, or rogues. In the caves, the rats scratched the walls, leaving deep horizontal scores to mark their victory and ownership of the gorge. Firestar at first thinks these were from kits, and makes it the nursery.
:Many moons after the attack, Firestar and his mate Sandstorm come on a quest to rebuild SkyClan. As the Clan starts to rebuild, they set up a patrol. On this patrol, the rat leader shows up and informs the cats that his kind killed the previous SkyClan before and they would now kill them again. The rats attack SkyClan, and the warriors fight fiercely. The leader of this pack stays in the protection of a mass of rats so every other rat takes orders from him. When the SkyClan cats begin to gain the upper hand in the battle, he orders the rats to retreat.
:SkyClan attacks the old abandoned Twoleg barn where the rats live, knowing someone would have to attack first. However, the rats seem to have anticipated this and surround the cats as they enter the barn. The warriors put up a fight, but are eventually forced to retreat from the rats' increasingly overwhelming numbers. The SkyClan warrior, Rainfur, is swarmed and killed by the rats, and Firestar loses his second life to the rat leader.
:Having been cornered by the rats in a tree, the warriors form a new plan: to find the rat leader and kill him. The cats try to trick the leader into showing himself, but he is too clever to fall for the ruse. With Spottedleaf's spirit to guide him, Firestar realizes that the mass of rats are taking commands from the leader through small movements, such as a twitch of the tail or brush of fur. Firestar traces the movements to the center of the pack and identifies the real rat leader. Without warning, Firestar attacks and kills him, with a squeal of shock coming from the leader. Without their leader to guide them, the remaining rats flee.
:In addition to Rainfur's death, another warrior, Shortwhisker, gets injured by the rats and realizes his future as a kittypet.
====SkyClan's Destiny====
:Leafstar, Patchfoot, Ebonyclaw, Frecklepaw, Cora, Shorty, and Snookpaw go to reset the border markers. As they set the markers, Patchfoot starts heading for the Twolegplace and suddenly stops to taste the air. His fur rises, so Leafstar tastes the air for herself and smells the stench of rat. They discover that the rats are back. However, the four cats from the Twolegplace happen to eat rats and know how to kill them, so they set up a plan to attack the rats.
:Their plan is to try to block some of the holes, then scare the rats, making them flee to the open holes so the cats can attack. All of the cats are eager to kill the rodents, as they tried to destroy SkyClan after their first victory with the original SkyClan.
:The plan succeeds, although Waspwhisker is badly injured. The SkyClan cats return to camp.
====Bramblestar's Storm====
:Purdy tells Amberpaw that he will tell her a story about he once killed a whole nest of rats.
====Ivypool's Heart====
:When Dovewing advises that leftover prey should be discarded so that scavengers like rats are not attracted, Slate mentions that he and Beach had found a rat and eaten it recently. Ivypool points out that rats have diseases and will bite.
===In the Stand-Alone Graphic Novels===
====Exile from ShadowClan====
:
===In the Field Guides===
====Secrets of the Clans====
:Rats are mentioned in the section for other animals. They are described as brown-furred, beady-eyed rodents with long, naked tails and sharp front teeth. They are not much bigger than kits and live in garbage dumps like the Carrionplace in ShadowClan territory, or anywhere they can scavenge Twoleg food. Rats live and travel in packs. Although they pose no threat to cats individually, their numbers are often overwhelming and bites can cause infection. A single rat contaminated the whole of ShadowClan during Nightstar's brief time as leader.
==Official art==
==See also==
*Rat leader
*Carrionplace
==External links==
*
*Rat
==Notes and references==
de:Rattees:Ratafi:Rottafr:Ratpl:Szczur (stworzenie)ru:Крысыuk:Щури
Category:Creatures