Meta Gamer in Equestria: Champion's Folly

by reflective vagrant

Honor Among Thieves. (Stemming the Tide, Part 4.)

Author's Note:

And I'm back, partly. I still have some items to deal with in RL, but I've got enough taken care of to spare the time for this. Hopefully more will be following sooner than later.

I thought Scraps would have to walk him to the edge or have him yell out his defeat, but nothing like that happened.

Instead, as soon as the pole arm finished clattering to the ground, Scraps simply stopped grappling the alpha, backed off calmly and sheathed his sword. The fight was apparently over, but in a much more casual form than as it had started.

The alpha turned around and faced Scraps. Scraps went a bit submissive, but did so with no sense of tension to it. The alpha looked angry, but Scraps wasn't showing any of his usual signs of fear. He simply kept his gaze to the ground and his ears limp while he waited on the alpha.

The alpha pulled a paw forward and offered it to Scraps. Scraps was a bit hesitant, but managed to put a paw out to match.

The alpha grabbed it in an aggressive manner and gave a far firmer than normal shake, throwing Scraps off balance a bit in the process. All the while this firm shake took place, he glared at Scraps with a sense of contempt.

As soon as the alpha howled a deep bellowed howl, I could feel the paws that had been holding me down suddenly let go.

"What's going on?" I asked Archimedes as I scrambled out of the hole. "I mean, he won obviously, but... The glare on that dog could kill a man, yet their shaking hands... Well, paws."

"Scraps did win, but he won with techniques that are considered dirty fighting. A diamond dog's challenge circle isn't meant for dirty fighting. If they wish to keep the respect of those that serve under them, no alpha may fight dirty in a challenge, besides slaying their opponent. This is even more true the greater the span of ranking between the alpha and their opponent. That's why Scraps never had any fear of his sword being stolen like before."

I saw the diamond dog that had stolen my amulet present it to the alpha. The alpha, in turn, gave Scraps another glare then pushed the amulet back to the one that had stole it.

"They have a funny sense of honor." I called out to him aloud as he landed on my arm.

Shaking his head vigorously, he commented again.

"Out in the field, it's different for them. Anything is fair game and they understand their enemies will do the same if need be. But when they enter the circle, it is for stature and respect among the community. A challenger fighting dirty is a sign of weakness and dishonor. Scraps hasn't gained any standing or climbed in stature among them from besting the alpha. If it were not for the fact that he is already at the bottom as an omega, he would have actually lost stature among them for doing what he did."

He leaned over and listened to the snarls, growls and yips that were their native language.

"If I am hearing this right—I am not well versed in their tongue—we have the been granted the privilege to pass without being harassed further, provided we don't start anything, but they are refusing to give the amulet back, claiming it was fair bounty at the time. That is not surprising, given the outcome of the match."

I shook my head and turned to Mandible's approach. "Then it sounds like asking for it back is a good way to start trouble..." I called to him as he flew off to rejoin Mandible.

"Oh, and look out behind you." He called back to me in an almost mischievously smug tone.

Turning around, I saw my three main teammates approaching.

In a voice of cheer, I called out to them as best I could in my rough Equestrian, "Hey, guys. We won. Good.... job??"

By the time I had finished addressing them, I had noticed the fuming sense of anger coming from them.

"Oh shit!" I cried out as I turned back to run.

I barely had time to launch into my sprint by the time Speaks with Talons had tackled me to the ground. This time, however, I felt myself being launched downward at full force. Instead of his protective tackle I had come to know, I felt the wind get knocked out of me from my landing.

Next thing I knew, I was being pinned to the ground. Scraps was wailing on my head as hard as his fisted up paws could muster, causing more disorientation than damage, while Tempest made up for him in that department by pounding on my body with her hooves like she was playing a xylophone.

Through it all, they were holding back enough to where I could tell they weren't aiming to kill me, but dang it they sure were doing a good job at giving me a solid fonging for my slip up.

The worst part, however, was after Fluttershy managed to get them to stop. She was doing what she could to tend to the bruises, but the look she had on her face when she looked at me was just as painful as the collective bruises I had just acquired. The only glance she sent my direction the entire time she and Mandible tended to me wasn't one of anger, just one of disappointment that stung me even worse.

It was in that moment I recalled my old D&D campaigns. Most any starting group had at least one of "that guy." The guy that screwed things up for everybody else. The player that would take a torch to the webs in the treasure room, burning up the wood room and destroying the treasure in the process. A bard would attempt to get a hostile group of about a hundred orcs to let the party pass by befriending them, only to have "that guy" pull out their weapons and start lopping off heads just as soon as the party was smack in the middle of the orcs.

Yea, today I just got a taste of the backlash that came with being "that guy." I definitely didn't like it.

* * *

A short rest to finish getting myself patched up and in good order later, the diamond dogs had largely cleared out. The Alpha lingered just enough for his slash to be treated but left with the rest of the patrol as soon as that was done.

Tempest and Scraps were still giving me the stink eye, but otherwise they had returned their focus on where to go from here.

When I looked over to Speaks with Talons, his expression was more one of frustration than anger. When he saw me looking at him, he tapped his temple with the knuckles of his talons in question.

I instinctively reached for my amulet to respond, but found my hand hitting only the organic scales of my armor.

I think he saw the feeling of loss I had as I looked down at the absence of my amulet, because he took his talons and made a tearing motion over his heart, then repeated the temple tapping.

With this, he got up, and gave me a few signals I was more familiar with. He gave the signal for a sunrise, indicating tomorrow, then moved his talons similar to how one would move their hand to mimic talking. After that he pointed to his eyes, and then out to the direction Tempest and Scraps were debating about.

That much I was able to discern for sure. He was still a little irritated at me, but we'd talk about it later. We needed to focus on the mission for now.

---

We traveled a ways further with a small escort of the locals that lingered behind. We ultimately found our way up a small ways into the mountain into the upper parts of the diamond dog village.

I had to say upper parts, because I could tell that there were tiny structures that I could peek at to see were just entry ways to a larger space underground. I didn't know how far down they dug, but there wasn't enough room in the structures above the rock surface of the mountain to hardly house a single diamond dog while sleeping.

Some of the diamond dogs watched us with leery eyes. A few yips between them and the ones escorting us and they backed off a bit, but kept their eyes on us.

Scraps and Tempest seemed to be trying to get more information, but they clearly had no particular respect for Scraps, nor trust for the rest of us.

Meanwhile, I noticed a few half grown pups staring at me from one of the underground entryways.

When they saw I had noticed them, they quickly ducked down and out of sight. A few seconds later, they carefully peeked out again, yipping softly among themselves.

All but one of them went back inside, leaving the biggest one to come scampering over toward me. As she approached, she submissively went down more and more into a haunch position, slowing her pace and keeping a careful look out for any indication of me not liking her approach.

Getting close enough, she slowly brought her paw upward and only barely grabbed the bottom most edge of the armor that protected the upper part of my leg. Not enough to do anything aggressive. Just enough contact to let her gently tug at it.

She yipped pleadingly at me, with a slew of emotions in her eyes, both hopeful and fearful.

With Speaks With Talons at a loss as to what she was saying too, he just shrugged and gestured the two of us to follow her.

With a slow pace of her tugging at the bottom of my leg as she kept yipping, I just about pulled out the crystal from my pocket to hear what she was saying, but realized exactly what it was she wanted when I saw the other pups return, carrying what I presumed to be their elder sibling, as he was just about full grown but still clearly young. The thing that cued me in on what they wanted, though, was that he was in really rough shape.

He had some serious bruising, like he had fallen down some stairs, but he also seemed to be really sick with some kind of fever.

Speaks with Talons and I looked at each other in worry at this.

I went to put my hand in front of me to start my cure wounds spell, but quickly found it being grabbed by a talon.

Speaks with Talons shook his head with a serious look on his face.

After a moment of thought, he let go and pointed back the way we came.

"Flut-ter-shy," he carefully pronounced, gesturing me to go fetch her and bring her to the pup.

When I hesitated for a moment, unsure as to leave the injured pup as I was the one able to heal him readily, he tapped his temple again with that look of irritation coming back on.

I got the hint, or at least second hint this time around. I needed to trust my teammates' calls.

I nodded and went to get Fluttershy as fast as I could without making a scene.

* * *

The caretaker of the pup, who had come back while I was gone, was found hunkering over the pup just outside the entrance of the den by the time we had gotten back.

With Scraps in tow as a translator, we managed to get her hesitant permission for Fluttershy and Mandible to approach, but she looked like she was ready to pounce at any time.

Speaks with Talons, carefully gestured me and Tempest back, and Scraps seemed to keep just enough distance to not put her on edge but also keep the translation up.

After a while, they had his wounds treated and wrapped up. On top of that, Mandible threw together a cold tea like medicine from his stash of herbs for him that seemed to be bringing down the fever.

Beyond that, though, Fluttershy and Mandible seemed a bit worried, and called us over.

Fluttershy made a signal to me by tapping her neck where I had healed her in the past, then lightly tapped the sick pup.

"He's out of tvenope. His body is stretched thin between healing his wounds and fighting the giwis."

The look in her eyes showed me the many facets of emotion running through her face. Fear in the quiver of her lip, hope in the perking of her ears, and that spark of compassion in her eyes, devoid of judgement.

She knew I couldn't cure the illness directly, but I could help with the wounds. Maybe I could help even better now than before, now that they were properly cleaned and dressed. She was hoping I could heal his wounds and save his body more energy to better fight the illness.

I was about to come over and help, raising my hand back into position again to cast my cure wounds spell, but found all the other pups coming up out of the den again with bones and toys of all sorts.

When they started yipping and pushing the toys towards us, I felt Speaks with Talons grab my other arm again.

Turning to him, I saw a raw passion in his eyes, both of the caring kind that I saw with him as a servant of the Animus Mundi, and a yin-yang like counterpart of raw irritation, bordering anger. Something had triggered him.

"A healer is not moved by greed," He called to me in his slow Equestrian again.

He then gestured me back, and pointed to himself, making his equivalent to my gesture of the cure wounds spell.

I backed up a little, but reached out to get his attention with an open hand. I knew better than to grab him when he was triggered.

"Are you... certain?" I called to him, taking an extra second to get the right word out of my memory. "You failed... before."

Most of the spells I was showing the servants of the Animus Mundi were capable of being performed with enough practice on getting used to the immediate demand and the resulting drain. It was difficult on them, compared to the way they normally cast spells, yet manageable. But healing spells moved against the flow of entropy. At least that was what Starlight theorized. Whatever the reason, they were far more demanding. Out of all the servants I had tried to teach my style of casting to, only Zecora had enough skill and power to pull off any healing spells so far.

On top of that, as good as a warrior he was, Speaks with Talons didn't have the best connection with his magic side as a servant. He was still pretty young compared to Zecora and he openly admitted he was only about half as good as most that were around his age.

He shook his head, but swelled his chest forward with what I recognized as his sense of honor. He then answered me in a firm tone.

"No."

His words were open with me about his odds, but his tone gave away he was going to give it his all anyway.

He carefully approached the pup, knelt down and took a moment to brace himself, then brushed the bones and toys that the other pups had brought forward back to them.

He brought his dominant talon forward like before while planting the other one firmly on the stone beneath him.

His tongue spoke a quick syllable heavy in that magical tone flexing as he brought his talon forward and touched the pup's forehead.

"T^ep_u!"

With a flash of light, Speaks with Talons gave a last ditch effort of a shove with his planted talon and fell over, landing clear of the pup.

Fluttershy managed to unwrap one of the bandages over one of the larger wounds. It showed the wound was mostly healed, well past the point of needing any special care, though not fully healed.

I came up and looked at Speaks with Talons. He was awake but in a state of extreme exhaustion. I looked into his lazily held open eye.

I gave him a nod and a solid double pound of my fist over my heart in respect.

"Well done. Good. Job." I repeated in translation as best I could, bringing my hand forward again. "I'll take it from here."

I knelt down and did a similar gesture to the pup, this time finishing the process.

"Partner, please, ^he_lp."

The wounds finished healing with another flash of light, and I stood up and backed off so that the pup could be carried off to finish resting.

The dogs took a pause at me standing, surprised at it compared to Speaks with Talons. When they came to, the eldest two of the healthy pups came and took the sick pup back inside, but the rest of the pups started running off, yipping and hollering, as did the small number of adults that had gathered and watched.

My eyes went wide as I realized what this meant.

"Oh dear," was all I could think of to say when I looked sympathetically to Fluttershy and Mandible, both of them also recognizing the oncoming tide.

Comments

[Golden_Reflection]

"Oh dear,"

Oh dear indeed!