My blood stone was shattered. I had about six hours before I crashed from sleep deprivation and over exertion. Things were bad even while they were good. I was knee deep in swamp water and after being chased for three days, I was hopelessly lost. Without my bloodstone, I had no chance of getting back through the swamp. I had three days between me and where I hoped my camp was. My chances were looking bad. Add to that the sunning certainty that the three pegasi, including that annoying augment, were probably going to figure out that I ditched them soon. I knew i shouldn't have gotten those magic sensing implants! My ears were still buzzing from the amount of energy that the augment had been throwing around. Did I forget that for however long you used the bloodstone you would feel weak for that long after? Should've remembered that...

Long story short, I was going to have to use my one and only teleport if I wanted to get out of this alive. My best shot at this would be using the teleport and making sure that where ever I landed would be good enough for me to live in until I got my strength back. It was a horrible plan, but seeing as how it was midnight and no sane species would stay out this late during a war, it was my best shot at living. I could only hope that if I got teleported into a populated area that most of the inhabitants would be asleep.

If I just stood there debating whether or not I should teleport I was going to lose my window of opportunity! that thought snapped me back to what was really important. I snatched my satchel up and pulled out the small hexagonal blue gem from it's depths.

"Now what were those magic words again?" I didn't remember the code word that well. Well more like code phrase. Or song line. I hummed a few bars of the griffon training song before he words came to me.

"Once a scout and always a scout our wings will fly us far. Our speed will be unmatched, for that is who we are." I hoped that was the right line. The horror stories our resident haiku speaking zebra fed us gave me pause and I watched with the certainty that an ad lib in the song I had accidentally made, whether or not I had, was going to doom me to a horrible death via magic. I hated magic.

I stared at the hexagonal gem until I realized that I was unable to wrench my gaze away. From the corner of my eyes, which my flight eyelid came down over, I saw he area around me turn to white as the world folded. It unfolded and left me there, the gem in my talons spinning and vanishing back to the main war office. My ears buzzed like a thousand angry bees. I knew I shouldn't have gotten those stupid magic sensing implants! I shook my head in an attempt to clear it of my discomfort.

I was in the middle of a town square. Thick cobblestone beneath my feet, looking new but unevenly set, made my talons click as I walked on it. The buildings looked like they had all been assembled from the same stone that were beneath my feet. The moon cast an awkward shadow from a weather vane high up on the tallest building in town. It was a pegasus weaher vane and told me all I needed to know about the town. There were no candles lit from behind shuttered windows. I think I teleported to a natural ley line intersection.

There was one other detail in the town square. The town well stood unattended. I poisoned the well and just for good measure, threw the bottle down with it. With the splash I heard a small gasp behind me. I turned and froze.

A young earth pony, maybe eight or nine of years, had a look of complete surprise on his face. I think he was out looking for a late night drink or something. As much as my morals disagreed with killing children, I could have no witnesses.

"I'm sorry kid." I pounced upon his shocked form and muffled his face with my wing. I slit his throat with my left talons, then drug his body into an alley. I winced at the amount of blood the kid had managed to spill on my feathers.

Is that going to stain? Stained feathers was not a laughing matter, let me assure you. Especially with blood. Imagine having every feather forceful plucked from the stained region and then being force grown through the skin! It hurt like nothing else.

I had maybe five hours until I passed out for a while. Conveniently enough, the alley way that I had drug the kid into had a door that opened into a house.

"Bless my luck. Something going right with the world." I said out loud. My voice echoed across the sparsely decorated room, the many pictures that hung on the walls doing little to affect the vibrations. My voice did awaken the sole occupants in the room, and drawing the bladed spear, I sank it into the stallion's throat. He gurgled out and died. I wiped he spear off on the stallions impeccably white coat. His wings were red with his own blood, and I gave a wince when I realized I had killed what was probably the only weather controller in the town. Without him, the feeble ponies crops would fail and the town would die off in a year.

Considering that I had poisoned the well and already killed twice, I think there were worse things to worry about. Like what I would do to pass the time it took for the blood stone to wear off completely. Or worry about whether or not I had actually ditched my pursuers. Or wonder if anybody from my camp had made it back to the main base to tell them that the massive attack force was coming. Maybe Discord would send dragons? Or maybe the newborn general himself would arrive. Cacophony had been trying to get his son bloodied in the war.

I locked the door and dragged the child in with me, eating about half of the child until I wasn't hungry anymore. With the door locked, I fell asleep after another few hours.

I woke when the screams started. The pounding on the door didn't help either. Nor did the smell of meat that was going to spoil.

"FleetFoot! Have you seen my son?" A mare's voice came through the door frame. I looked down at the half eaten remains of her child. He still looked tasty. I hen looked at the white pegasus beside me. Could I fake his voice well enought to make her go away?

"No I haven't, I've been stuck in here all day with a cold." I added a layer of congestion to my voice, the natural raspiness of a griffon's voice furthering my ploy.

"You don't sound so good FleetFoot. Are you contagious?" I was hungry, and I think the mare might have gotten suspicious if I started eating on her son again while she was there. You know, I never realized how good pony meat tastes before... Sort of sweet and savory... Wonder how good it would be with a little salt and butter?

"Ye-Yes.." I added a cough for dramatic effect. I wonder how good pony fur is for spear upkeep? I knew that I was going to have to wipe the blade on something before it decided to rust on me. While so far it had been surprisingly easy for me to live behind enemy lines, it would only take a single slip for the soldiers or even the local militia to come after me. Which would be bad.

"All right... I'll look else where..." I heard the mare's hooves clop against the ground as she walked off. It occurred o me that I needed to get out of their pretty quick. When they realized the well was poisoned and when the bodies started to smell, they might call down the militia. There was some more shuffling from outside the door and I paused from pondering the future.

"What do you mean my son's in here?"

"That's what the spell says, madam." An ice cold pang of fear ran down my spine. Wow, looks like that weakening spell on my spear is starting to go out. I've got to watch that, if it goes out completely I might end up with a terrific case of PTSD. I considered the magic that had lead them here. One of the two ponies at least was a unicorn, and if I didn't get out of there shortly I would most assuredly have something bad to worry about.

"Is there anyone else in there Star Swirl?" Shells! That's a unicorn name if I ever heard of one!

"Your son is dead I'm afraid. The griffon in there has most likely killed him already. I'll return the favor in a second." I heard a thump as Star swirl sat down. "That well water gets nastier everyday..." A burst of hope, bright and almost tangible sprung up. The moron had drunk the water? It was a slower acting nerve poison, one which took a few minutes before it would start working. But how could I use that to my advantage?

"STARSWIRL!" Is he dead? More importantly, is there any way out of this situation?

"Zen smite him! He's poisoned the well." A third voice, this one with a tang of country in it joined the three. I felt mildly proud of myself, to get the enemy to invoke their god's name in vain.

"It-its o-o-o-k-k... I-I-I al-already -ca-called the augments." And I was back to being terrified. I dealt with my emotion as my training bade me to; lock it up until you can deal with it. I opened the door and pushed passed the civilians.

"Stop! Murderer!" And that was when I realized that there were no other flying creatures around. Nothing stopped me from flying as high as I could and avoiding pursuit. I flew as high as I could before my wings made me descend to about  stories up. As I swore at myself for not trying to do some wing stretched while I was trapped with the two carcasses, I observed something which took my breath away.

The night had hid from me the actual city. All around me, as far as the eye could see were buildings. Grey in color and stone in construction, I had been teleported into the slums of it. The ground was crawling with more earth ponies than I could count. The fact that I had augments, as in more than one of them after me, told me that it was a big city. A BIG city. There was only one city as far as I knew that could be that big; the earth pony strong hold Gaiavale. The sight of all of the cold grey stone unnerved me and a shattering feeling overcame me. I looked to my spear and saw that the purple line on it that symbolized the weakening spell was gone. I was free from danger. Well, kind of.

As long as I was forced to fly over the city, I decided to try and convert as much of the city to memory. As long as I had a map of the place in my head, I could probably use it to advance my rank or something. I looked down on the city and wondered just how far the place went on. Here and there, Earth pony slaves, the large black magical tattoo on their back screaming to all the world just what they were, labored in amongst the fields that haphazardly littered the city. Slavery was very much against the entire griffon way of life. Take no prisoners, do not make others do what you yourself could do and achieve your purpose in life, not what others would have be your purpose. The griffons at camp Silent taught everybody what happened if you failed at your purpose. You went to hell. And then you were reincarnated as something other than the magnificent griffon.

"How big is this city?" I said to nothing in particular. The pleasing rasp of my own voice was a different change from the chatter that emerged from below me. I received the answer to my question shortly.

"Halt, griffon scum!" Was all the warning I got before the earth pony augments attacked. A few pegasi augments swooped in from the right of me, constricting the room I had to dodge the incoming fire balls. Deep inside me, my self preservation yelled at me. I pulled my wings to my side to plunge myself out of harms way. This had the unfortunate effect of straining my wings even further when I snapped them out to stop my fall. I counted four fire balls that went over my head and a single fire ball that happened to kill the transfixed slave controller next to me. The magical tattoos that used to wrap around his bodies were in exact accordance with the ones inked out on the slaves. When the controller died, the slaves were freed. They formed ranks in front of me, a leader at the front. Said letter was a stout Earth pony, cutie mark that of an axe crossing over a shovel. The lead one yelled out at me.

"We'll hol' off the ground troo'! Rebels don' go down dat easily! Just fly!" And just like that, twenty ponies sacrificed themselves to hold off the augments just that much longer. I gave a winged salute, then snapped back to getting away from there. I tossed the magic disrupter from my pocket back to the head of the self proclaimed rebels. It seemed like a good idea in the heat of the moment, and the small black sphere was caught almost immediately by said earth pony. He nodded back at me, and I in my confused state ignored it and tried to put as much distance between me and the pegasi augments as possible.

I was without any support other than that of the few slaves I had inadvertently freed. My wings were about to give out on me and even on a good day I couldn't out fly pegasi augments. In short, I was probably going to die.