Hi, it's Queen Of The Pens! You can call me Queen if you want to. I am Coqui's partner-in-crime or co-author. As Coqui might have explained earlier, we're both sick of seeing so many Mary-Sues in the Warriors fandom, so we decided to create this guide on How Not to Create a Mary-Sue. We received quite a few questions as to whether Starmoon (who is silver tabby she-cat with spaaaaaaaaaarkling rainbow eyes, by the way) would become Starstar, but you'll just have to wait and see. So, into the action, which shall reveal another aspect of Starmoon's Mary-Sueishness.

Coqui: As a note, you may find that some spellings are different than mine. No worries, it's only because I live in America while Queen is Australian. I kept these spellings because I find I quite like them.

Chapter Two: Prophetic Dreams & Prophecies

Three moons had passed since she'd been born, and Starkit was, although the death of her mother weighed heavily on her shoulders, beginning to become attached to her adoptive littermates. Although the other kits were a half-moon older than her, Dappledleaf made sure that they all treated her fairly and evenly. She was happy that they all let her play with them and welcomed her warmly whenever she tumbled outside and challenged them to playfights. Her littermates, Birdkit, Skykit, and Soaringkit, were the only other kits in the nursery, and once they moved out, she'd be alone again.

All these thoughts buzzed through her head as she closed her rainbow eyes slowly and her breathing became slow and lethargic, accompanied by similar sounds from her littermates and her exhausted mother Dappledleaf, who barely managed to snatch the slightest sleep during night or day.

She opened her eyes again, but in a completely different place - a large, vast expanse of field, shimmering silver in the starlight, was frosted with a silver-white snow that gleamed and shone, a glance of purity where the long shadows stretched out over the field. Her eyes stretched wide, amazed by the sheer beauty of the area, unaware that the moonlight touched her eyes in a way most becoming for her silver fur.

"Young one!" an old, weathered voice rasped.

Starkit jumped, looking around for the source of the voice. It was strange, she thought - there was no-one else in the field.

And then, she saw the cat - an old grey she-cat, ears ragged and torn and yellow eyes glittering meanly out from her patchy, pushed-up face. But despite her meanness, stars glittered in her fur, and realisation made Starkit's breath catch in her throat. This was no ordinary cat; this was a StarClan cat, one spoken of in legends.

"I have travelled far to tell you this, young one," the grey cat hissed, her foul breath making Starkit recoil. "Not all things in this world is just butterflies and sunshine. No, there are deeper, darker things, ones that lurk in shadows. Cats that will stop at nothing to bring out the worst in every tom and she-cat around. These cats are ruthless, uncaring; and there is one that no-one could have guessed, basking in the darkness of your Clan. I have come to tell you, though, a prophecy. A prophecy about you."

"About me?" Starkit stuttered, amazed, and wondering how she'd found her voice so quickly.

The grey cat closed her eyes and crouched down to the ground, as if drawing strength from the chinks of starlight that littered the silver grass. Then, all of a sudden, a chill wind picked up into a howling storm, but somehow, the gentle hiss of the grey she-cat's voice made its way to Starkit's ears.

"The soaring hopes of one shall bring destruction to the Clan; the bird and the sky, kin of each other, will aid the glittering path of moonlight and starshine, to help create peace, harmony, and restfulness in the Clans once more."

Then, the dream blurred around her, fading into a grey swirl, yet the prophecy remained, ringing in Starkit's ears,

"The soaring hopes of one shall bring destruction to the Clan; the bird and the sky, kin of each other, will aid the glittering path of moonlight and starshine, to help create peace, harmony, and restfulness in the Clans once more."

And she knew, from that moment on, that her life would be far from ordinary.

Ω Ω Ω

And so, that is Starkit's very first, but not her very last prophetic dream.

Medicine cats and leaders should be the only one to receive prophecies, realistically, but Mary-Sues seem to want to steal all the limelight. The truth is, they just want to be the most perfect cat around.

In order to not create a Mary-Sue, eliminating the presence of prophecies and prophetic dreams is very important; also, another aspect that helps a cat be even more Mary-Sueish is being told that they have a) a great destiny or b) will save the Clans. Either one just screams 'here comes a Mary-Sue', but a prophecy about them, on the other hand, is just the icing on the cake. Especially obvious prophecies.

Okay, let's dissect my obvious prophecy -the soaring hopes of one shall bring destruction to the Clan; the bird and the sky, kin of each other, will aid the glittering path of moonlight and starshine, to help create peace, harmony, and restfulness in the Clans once more. First things first, the soaring hopes of one shall bring destruction to the Clan; how much more obvious can that get? I carefully planted the names of her littermates in the chapter, so you'd be able to work it out as you read. So, Soaringkit is Starkit's evil counterpart, the one she'll be fighting with heart and soul who will be eventually exiled and killed. The bird and the sky, kin of each other, are Birdkit and Skykit, who 'will aid the glittering path of moonlight and starshine' which is our great friend the Mary Sue, also known as Starmoon. The rest of the prophecy basically tells us that she'll be saving the Clans.

Every Mary-Sue has an amazing destiny, which always means she'll end up saving the Clan/s. There are, sadly, a lot of obvious prophecies trailing after Mary-Sues throughout the fandom, and not only Mary-Sues, but circling around other cats who are trying very hardnotto be Mary-Sues when it isn't exactly working out.

A prophecy is probably best to be shunned, but if you really want to have one, and if you really want your cat to have prophetic dreams, you can always make the prophecies indirect and hard to work out, and the dreams confused and extremely hard to get a grip on the meaning. That way, your cat is less likely to be accused of being a Mary-Sue, and it also means that it keeps the reader in the dark a little bit, therefore giving a more suspenseful and exciting feel to the story.

Queen: So that concludes my chapter. I want to let you know that I might be answering your reviews to this chapter, but Coqui might be as well. If you're lucky, you might get two, from each of us! Now how good does that sound? XD

Coqui: Really, Queen? I barely read anything funny. Oh, well, slow chapters. What are you going to do? This chapter's wonderful non-Mary-Sue-story goes to Unwritten by Dawnfrost96.

~Queen Of The Pens and Coqui's Song