…I am so sorry for not updating sooner. I blame Rise of the Guardians.

Disclaimer: I don't own Ice Age.

Soto gave a long snarl. "So you are that fat mammoth and that stupid sloth."

"I'm not stupid!" Sid complained.

Manny ignored him and glared at Soto. "It's poofy, not fat."

Soto rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Why are you and your filthy friend here?"

Keeping a stony expression, Manny replied, "It's none of your business. Now beat it."

Soto gave a dry laugh. "You think I'll just step aside just because you said so? Dream on, mammoth. You took my life, and I'm always one to return the favor."

Diego watched the exchange between Manny and Soto from a distance. His attention was fully focused on them, and he didn't even notice all eyes on him.

Ellie shook him out of it when she said, "I don't know what's going on here, but we shouldn't stand here and do nothing when we could be over there helping."

"You're going to have to get past us first."

Everyone, including Diego, was not expecting the new voice. Three other sabers suddenly appeared, glaring at all of them. Diego, instantly recognizing them, groaned. "Not you three…"

"Surprise!" the middle one, who was the speaker before, muttered sarcastically. "Did you miss us?"

"As a matter of fact, no."

"That was meant to be rhetorical," the unknown saber growled. "Not that that's a big deal, because all of us sure as hell didn't miss you."

"Hurtful, Oscar," Diego replied snidely.

"H-H-Hey, look, guys!" the hyperactive saber on the left piped up, looking at the herd. "Another walking buffet!"

"Congratulations, you found dinner. Just by looking at you, I can tell you need it," Shira muttered, referring to Zeke's scrawny figure.

"Watch that mouth, sabers," the third one warned dangerously. "You're a female, and we're all males. We'll be able to take you down within a second."

Shira started mumbling about how male sabers were a sexist lot before retorting back, "Don't you mean your comrades can take me down? I seriously don't see how you're capable, considering that you're obese."

Lenny snarled. "I'm serious when I'm telling you to watch it."

Shira simply gave a dry, slightly taunting smile.

"Okay, so you're Diego's, um…friends," Peaches said hurriedly, making a failed attempt to maintain peace. "Anyway, we're in a hurry, and my dad's over there, so-"

"Absolutely not," Oscar snapped sharply. "Your precious father won't even be alive by the time our leader is through with him."

Zeke chuckled crazily. "And he gave us the honor of taking out all witnesses!"

Tanner, having lost a paw and shamefully sitting on a mammoth cow's back, was not in the best of moods, to say the least. Growling impatiently, he hacked up a loogie and spat it down right in Zeke's face. Diego failed in masking his amusement.

Zeke wiped his face with his front paw disgustedly. "You are so going down for that!"

Tanner smirked and slid off of Ellie's back. "There, I'm down now. Happy?"

"Not until I slit your throat first!" Zeke lunged for Tanner, and they both rolled around on the ground, biting and scratching.

Zeke's tackle was like the fuse on a bomb that had been lit. For at that moment, the entire herd had attacked Diego's three former pack mates, desperate to reunite with Manny and Sid.

Manny and Sid (mostly Manny) were trying to fight Soto off, but to no avail. Things were repetitive for a while now; Soto kept on lunging at Manny, trying to go for his throat, and Manny just kept on evading and dodging. Sid just uselessly flung dirt at Soto, who ignored the sloth who was practically of no threat. He'll just deal with him once the mammoth was taken care of.

Howie was having an internal battle within himself. All that time, it was Soto, not Uncle Dee-Dee! That gazelle and Amarillo must have been thought I was talking about him!

His thoughts were interrupted when he heard a female voice cry out, "DADDY!" behind him. That diverted his attention, as well as the other three's, and they all turned toward the voice.

Manny froze once he saw the sight. He saw his daughter, much to his joy, but a lot of that relief disappeared when he saw her cradle a fatally wounded molehog in her trunk.

The fight was going in the herd's favor, due to them massively outnumbering Zeke, Lenny, and Oscar. Tanner had been assisted by Ellie and Peaches (once again with Crash and Eddie rooting), and Shira had easily taken down the overweight Lenny, with Granny occasionally clonking him on the head, nagging him about eating less (It surprisingly served as a nice distraction for Shira to gain the upperhand). Diego was facing off against Oscar, and it was safe to say that the latter was quite pissed off at the inability to overpower his former pack mate. Louis, however, was standing motionlessly, not knowing whom to help.

"Whatsa matter, Oscar?" Diego asked condescendingly. "You don't seem too happy."

Old habits (or attitudes, in this case) die hard. Out of the corner of his eye, Oscar saw that molehog standing, still lost on what to do. He inwardly smirked to himself, suddenly realizing Diego's weakness: the safety of the herd. Before Diego could react, Oscar had made a long leap in Louis's direction. By the time poor Louis noticed a giant tiger racing towards him, it was already too late. The next thing he knew, an extended claw plunged itself into his stomach, and traveled down to the base of his neck. He screamed in pain. It was probably the loudest he ever screamed in his life.

Oscar took his claw out and faced Diego with a sneer on his face. "Looks like your weak point just put you in a tight spot."

Peaches, having heard her best friend scream, turned to see Oscar standing above a gutted Louis. She cried out, "No!" and hurried to her friend's side with unshed tears.

Diego shook out of his stupor, not believing what Oscar just did. He knew that Soto would undoubtedly sink that low, but Oscar? He couldn't believe the nerve of him. Furious, he let out a deafening roar and knocked the evil tiger to the ground.

Soto, for one thing, looked extremely pleased to see the horrified looks on the mammoth and sloth's faces. He prepared himself to leap at Manny, but suddenly, something shoved him out of the way. He recovered himself to see that other mammoth – the zombie one – tower over him.

"Go," Howie said in a shaky voice. "Your pack mates have done more than enough."

Soto sneered. "Fine. But this is far from over. Till we meet again." He then barked to Zeke, Lenny, and Oscar. "Boys! Time to go. We'll deal with the rest of them later."

The other three obeyed with no protest. Once they were gone, Howie went over to Peaches. "I'm…really sorry."

Peaches sniffed. "It's okay… It's okay…"

"Hey… He'll turn into a zombie. So he'll kinda sorta be alive," Tanner tried to cheer her up.

"Tanner, not helping," Diego hissed and glared disapprovingly at him.

"Hey, just trying to look on the bright side here."

Manny and Sid had also approached the group. Diego diverted his attention from Louis to both of them. "Hey, guys," he said, giving them a small smile.

Manny gave the same kind of tiny smile back. "Hey… Diego."

...I hate this chapter, which is another reason why I didn't update sooner. And no, it's not because Louis died. I wish I could write more, but I'm running out of time ARRRRGGGGHHHHH

So I updated this and both of my Rise of the Guardians fics all at the same time. I'm gonna go to bed after this, and something tells me that my inbox is gonna get ambushed by the time I wake up in the morning. 'Cause seriously, the Rise of the Guardians archive is crazy. Unless if you guys check out Rise of the Guardians fanfiction, you probably don't care.

I'm going to Vegas tomorrow, so I'll be gone for the next three days. Hopefully, I'll have the next chapter by then, and I won't take so long to update this time.

Again, I blame Rise of the Guardians. Jack is hot. That's such an oxymoron.

I also busied myself with the Rise of the Guardians video game and the Continental Drift DVD. By the way, there wasn't any kiss scene in the deleted scenes section, just to let you guys know.

Please review!