The plan was incredibly simple; wait until a Guard patrol emerged from their base and then wait a minute before attacking in an ambush.

It really wasn't my best plan but I was pretty sure it was going to work.

I looked around our ambush point that Canary had suggested. We were standing in an alleyway that was not quite collapsed around Government street and every single one of the flock that could was armed with rocks.

Yes. Rocks. I was indeed commanding rock wielding savages.

This was a last resort, mind you. I had expected to either die or emerge triumphant with the Compounders but instead I had emerged with almost half my flock dead and the Compounders regrouping back at their base.

Desperate times called for desperate measures.

And that's why I was going so low tech. I to, had a rock balanced on a hoof.

Honestly, trying to describe the process under which I could hold the rock was something that made my head pound. In my case, it was magic and that was about how far I was willing to go into the issue. I was just happy I had some method of throwing something that didn't involve my mouth.

Floyd shifted slightly. I had promoted him to being just under Canary. Skinner was just below Floyd.

Faintly, I could hear what we were waiting for. The nice swish of light armor on fur and the light clanking of ill-fitting heavy armor.

Floyd smiled widely and got ready to throw. I turned to him and glared. "Not yet." I mouthed.

I motioned to my group and we pressed ourselves against the wall of the alleyway. The wall itself was heavily cracked and I was surprised it haven't given way yet. I stared at the patrol as they passed.

They were all Diamond dogs. One carried a nasty looking knife while the rest carried shortish swords. The one that lead the other four had on plate armor that almost seemed like it had been fitted. I assumed he was the leader.

I waited for a few seconds until the Guard patrol had passed by our hiding spot and motioned at them. "Aim for their heads."

I stepped out of cover and hurled my rock against the back of the very back guard. He went down without a sound besides his body thumping against the ground.

I felt like a bad ass.

The rest of my group commenced stoning the patrol; fifteen stones later the only one still standing was the heavier armored dog.

"Boss, your go. We can't take him out easily." Giving orders in battle was a bit easier than I thought.

Our dog stood up from the shadows. She was about a head shorted than the other dog and I wasn't as confident in her as I wanted to be.

And if you were following, you'd realized I had made a mistake.

She tackled the other dog instantly and knocked his blade out of his sloppy grip.

She howled in his face and forced him back a step from her tackle. I could tell that the impact had hurt her though; she was panting and her eyes were unfocused.

I shook my head and ran over to help her. I had a few spells prepared ahead of time.

"HEY! Have some of this! FIREBALL!" The large ball of fire bounced off the back of his armor and ricocheted directly at my face. "Shit."

I barely dodged out of the way of the explosion. As it was, it hurled me away from the fight and I landed on my side on a pile of sharp shrapnel. I stood up and began to gently nudge the bits of rock out of my side.

"Ha. Puny Zebras spell are no match for armor!" He laughed and then slugged Boss across the face.

She really wasn't the best brawler.

I let out a little whimper of pain and ran back towards the fight. I jumped on the back of the fighting armored dog and bashed my hooves against his face.

In hind sight I should've called the flock to take care of him.

He paused from slugging Boss to throw me off of his back. Which left him wide open; Boss took full advantage of this and scraped across his face with her claws. Blood sprayed off of his face.

"Oh? The little bitch is going to use claws?" He howled loudly. I tried to discern the reason for his howl from my position on the ground. I really didn't want to get back up but Boss was our only hope of dealing with anyone remotely strong. I fought my body and stood up again.

Boss took the opportunity to score his face again. He turned red and pulled his secondary sword. "This no longer duel. This be fight."

I groaned. Was he going easy before that?

Boss sprinted away from him and grabbed the dog's previous sword. "You're right, this is a battle." She brandished it threateningly in front of him.

What followed next was almost a blur of combat. About the only thing I could really make out was that Boss was hacking and that the other dog was parrying and countering just as easily.

And then with his superior strength, the other dog forced her back further and further.

And then he laughed and I saw my opening. "FIREBALL!"

I'm really not sure why I shouted that. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

My spell impacted against his face and he was set on fire.

Boss easily defeated him in his panic and sliced off of his head.

And then razor pain seared through my back and everything slowed down.

The jerk that my head gave to look behind me seemed to take minutes rather than an instant.

The downed dogs snarl as it plunged it's wicked knife into my spine seemed to go on forever as I watched him.

The world seemed to lose color and all I could focus on was the intense pain.

The intense pain and the knowledge of my failure.

I looked back to the battle. The Flock was cheering at our apparent victory and I saw just barely how Boss looked in my direction and saw the dog.

In our fixation on watching Boss's battle, we had forgotten to kill the downed dogs.

And now there was a knife in my spine.

Boss slowly bounded over to me.

Figures. She probably saw the dog while fighting and let it kill me.

My eyes shut before she was halfway.

And then they reopened.

And the world was still.

I had almost perfect vision of the world around me.

And then something whispered in the air.

It was poetic.

I took out a bit of your soul

and placed it in this blade

Because you have survived so far

And this game shall be played.

It will cut through most metals

And stick to you like glue

But if your will should suffer,

I would rather not be you.

Take over this island, Ivan

And you I shall reward,

For you are my gamepiece

You are my iron sword.

That was it.

And it came from all around me at once.

The verses burned into my mind.

And my back erupted into literal fire and my wounds stitched stitched themselves together and scarred in the manner of burn marks. It was a nifty pattern that was almost reminiscent of a river of pain winding it's way through my back.

And the dog's knife fell out and hit the ground and glowed faintly.

And then time restarted and the dog behind me looked around for where his knife went and found the newly enchanted knife only seconds before Boss tore his head off of his shoulders.

"Damn it Ivan. I need you alive!"

Oh. How cute. She needs me alive so she can kill me later.

Canary ran over to my side. "He's ok. I think... he just almost blew himself up with magic.

It was curious. I had the oddest feeling of not having something. Like there was something that had always been there that was not quite whole. And then I reached down and nudged the blade and there was a sensation of being whole again that was almost impossible to fathom.

It was a good feeling. I never wanted to let go of that knife. Said knife was faintly glowing at my contact with it and I tried not to sigh at relief. Nine inches of pure awesome.

Dear god that sounded so wrong.

I didn't want to part with it.

And oddly enough, I could sense that it wanted the same. It was a knife that ached sickeningly of myself.

I fell over on my side and closed my eyes and tried to ignore an odd searching sensation that enveloped my being shortly after I realized it was somewhat sentient.

It was like someone was searching my body for just the right spot to stick a pin into and was prodding every square inch of my flesh to make sure that he or she was prodding just the right spot.

And then the knife fell from my hoof, whatever mysterious process that had bound it there failing.

And I felt empty. And lonely. And cold.

"Hey. Ivan. Are you going to make it?" Canary prodded my side and my eyes shot open. The world didn't seem as warm and all of the colors seemed muted.

"Yeah... what... happened?" My tongue seemed slightly numb.

Boss shrugged out of the corner of my eyes while Canary opened his mouth. "I think you had an extreme adrenaline reaction and triggered off a burst of magic that cauterized your wound. I've seen it before in the mines. A Canary would hit a pocket of poisonous gas and just explode with magic as he or she tried to get out of there." Canary lifted me onto his back. He laughed a little. "You could stand to lose a few pounds. Are you sure you were in the mines with all of us?"

Boss chuckled. "You scared me there for a minute. I thought you were a goner for sure."

I squirmed off of his back. "Canary, drop me. We have to take out the Guard now. If we don't before they realize that their patrol is dead they will be expecting us." I hurriedly ran over to where the knife was and grabbed it and instantly my head felt better.

Canary sighed. "Are you sure we shouldn't do this another time? You did just get stabbed in the back, after all."

I glared at him. "No. FLOCK." I shouted.

Canary assembled with the rest of my zebra troops. Boss stood over to the side. "Now I made a big mistake today." I walked over to the nearest Diamond dog and slit it's throat with the knife. I ignored the sensation of the blood of my arm and tried to ignore the faint feeling I was getting from the knife of slicing open something.

"I left these dogs alive so I could watch a one on one battle." I nodded and walked to another dog.

"But that's not the only flaw in my plan. We sat and watched Boss get the shit kicked out of her instead of helping. We are all part of the same flock and we will team up on enemies. There will be none of this one on one foolishness." I slit another throat and tried to ignore the skin crawling sensation.

Boss nodded her head in agreement. Canary smiled at me.

"From now on if I find anybody who is stupid enough to want to fight something without help, I will punish them severely." The last dog was for sure dead at this point.

"As it is, the spoils of this battle go to the people who helped the most. Boss, you get first pick. Canary, you get second. Floyd, you get third." I nodded and wiped off my new knife on the dead body of a dog.

"The rest of you? I'm sorry. We are about to go into an enemy base that is most likely not friendly in the slightest with the bare minimum on equipment. If anybody has an issue with that, please leave now."

Not a soul moved on that ruined street. I smiled. "Good. I'm proud of all of you. Now. FLOCK!"

The mostly mindless zebras straightened to attention. "Right. Do all of you know how to make a barrier?"

"YES SIR!" I smiled. It felt really good to be in charge.

"How many charges do you have of fireball prepared?"

"TWO SIR!" Most of them shouted, though Canary shouted three.

"Boss! Take your pick of the spoils."

She bowed to me and walked over to the corpses and looked thoughtfully. She tugged off a leather piece from one of the lesser dogs and put it on. It fit rather well. She stole the lead dog's sword so she could have a matching set.

"Canary! Take your pick."

Canary walked away with a sling and a large feather that had been tucked into one of the dead dog's armor. I tried not to wonder what it was for.

Floyd took his pick and ended up in the lead dog's plate armor.

And then I walked forward and stood in the center of the carnage. "Flock. You may take your hats."

I looked away from the disgusting squelching noises as Skinner did his job. I idly wonder whether he could skin an entire zebra and wear it like a costume but almost vomited at the thought.

Skinner looked around. "Who wants hats!"

I had my eyes shut so I didn't see it coming when he placed the scalp of a diamond dog on my head. It was still faintly warm and gooey and clung to my head like some incredibly nasty animal had decided to try to snack on my head.

I looked around and saw that every other member of my flock with the exception of Canary and Boss had put one on. I smiled and nodded.

"Skinner, thanks for the hat."

I figured I had to wear it to keep morale up.

I turned to Boss. "Go get your group together. We will be attacking in ten minutes."

She nodded and looked vaguely impressed. "Nice speech." It was almost sarcastic, but not quite. She took off in a sprint down the street.

Canary watched her go and gave me the feather. "Levitation." He confessed.

I took it from him and channeled a bit of magic into it. It was a new spell, as simple as that. I could lift a few pebbles just a few inches off of the ground. "I see." My disappointment was written across my face. My dreams of lifting boulders were quite a bit further than I was hoping.

He smiled. "Relax. You'll get stronger eventually."

I looked down at my hooves and wished I had hands. And then did a double take. The knife was literally stuck to the front of my leg.

"What?" I asked out loud and lifted my leg and shook it fiercely. The only change to the blade was that it was now affixed to my left hoof.

Canary was watching. "Looks like that knife is soul bound. You aren't getting rid of that anytime soon."

"You're kidding, right?"

He shook his head. "The ladies are going to love your scar."

I hoof palmed and immediately regretted it. Solid hoof hitting you in the face hurts. "Soul bound. What is this, WOW?"

He didn't get the reference and I supposed that I shouldn't be dropping too many of them.

I sighed. "So... it's stuck to my leg?"

He shook his head. "As long as you keep it near to you or in whatever you are carrying it should be alright. You just have to let it know that you are moving it."

That sounded incredibly stupid. I reached my leg up near my face and whispered to the knife. "I'm putting you in my satchel now, you knife... thing." It made an odd shiver that made me think it disapproved. And trust me, of all the weird things I had seen, a disapproving knife is way up on the top of my list.

He sighed. "You have to treat your weapons with respect. All of them, from your biggest blade to your dullest knife. You might as well name it while you are at it."

I grit my teeth at how cliche that was. "Really? Name my blade, huh? Fine. This knife shall now be known as Disconsolate.

For whoever gets in the way of its blade is not worth consoling." The blade seemed happy at that and let me brush it off into my satchel.

I thought about how I got the knife and shook my head. There was no time to think about it.

I looked around at my troops and smiled.

Ten minutes until we battle.