V. Alpha

Blood trickled down from below Diego's nose to the floor. He'd dropped his face in reaction to the impact, and gave off an increasingly audible snarl, still able to suppress any impulse involving a physical attack. As Diego slowly picked his head to level with the other animal that put claws on him, he viewed the animal from their toes up. Looking at the paws alone, Diego recognized that the animal who struck him was in fact, one of his own kind. But why? What would motivate a tiger to attack one of their own? He continued to stare up the unknown tiger's body before being distracted by its voice.

"You've gotten quite soft. A snarl isn't going to make an animal bigger than you scurry away."

Diego's growling intensified for a moment before dimming away as he looked at the tiger, face to face. The tiger had a dark orange coat with a white undercoat, and was very well built. It also had hair distinctly protruding outward in the facial area, similar to Diego's face. After hearing the very familiar voice and eyeballing each individual feature of the still tiger, Diego stood motionless -- unsure of what to say. He had put a name to the face but wasn't entirely confident in his decision, that is, until he caught a glimpse of the tiger's right side of his body. Five sharp distinct scars, covered an area from the lower part of the neck to the shoulder; it was clear to Diego who he was currently associating with. His previous dreams told him to feel remorse for his former leader, but a slash to the face was not a well-received welcoming. After noticing the injuries, Diego readied himself to speak with a malicious intent, ready to strike if need be.

"I have to hand it to you..." Diego looked at the other tiger's eyes, as it seemed unfazed by what began as a compliment.

"...Soto..." Diego spat out the name in disgust.

"...it's nice to see a leader who can lead in so many situations. You led your half of your family to get killed by humans, you led a failed attack clearly out of revenge, and nearly led yourself to your grave. I must say, you did a great job 'leading'." Emphasis was obvious sarcasm as Diego grinned after voicing his thoughts; Soto's shortened his eyes and gave a menacing glare while giving a threatening growl, while Diego sat with a smirk on his face, waiting for the inevitable retaliation. Members of the same tiger pack generally gave each other respect based on their rank in the pack, meaning the leader always received utmost respect for anything they had done, regardless of the consequences that followed. Implications of disrespect were never taken lightly; Diego knew this quite well being the beta of his former tiger pack, only below the tiger who stood one foot in front of him.

"I knew it was better not to trust you. Do you think I would send someone I trusted off to find an infant?" Soto launched himself at Diego; the heavy impact caused them to roll together in unison before they reset to their attack positions.

"Child's play." Soto grinned at how far he had relocated his target as Diego stood back up, indifferent toward the surprise tackle.

"You're pretty strong. Now try hitting me when I actually stand my ground." Diego didn't move a muscle from his position. The strike initially caught him off-guard, but the ferocity was noticeably different. Soto's once insurmountable strength as a leader had faded away with isolation and injury; Diego's confidence skyrocketed knowing that he could actually put up a fight against his former leader.

"We were family, Diego." Diego stared right into the eyes of his former leader; normally, he would show absolutely no emotion to Soto, whether it be happiness for praise, or sadness for a defeat. Even through the roughest of times and toughest of situations, Diego always had at least an ounce of respect towards his leader. While most would be overcome with joy upon acceptance into a family, Soto's previous words combined with the mention of family enraged Diego beyond control. Any respect that existed between them two had disappeared with the mention of family. Diego's face became solid like stone as he casually took a few steps forward; he was filled with pure anger but maintained his composure as he stepped forward.

"What family...you would send your own brother out to do your plans of revenge?" Diego leaped toward Soto at full force; pinning him down to the floor. He lifted his right paw while keeping him held down with his left, and extended his claws toward the trapped tiger, scratching him across the forehead. The brisk wind combined with a newly opened sore caused Soto to growl loudly; he violently stirred under Diego, causing the grip to break free. They both stood at attention, strafing counter-clockwise in a circular pattern, waiting for each other's next attack.

The sun gleamed through the thin clouds not only brightening the area around the herd, but also offering a soothing warmth around them. Ellie was unable to sleep long with the constant pain from an imminent mammoth's birth; despite the almost sedating air radiating from around them, Manny was able to wake from his slumber. He turned to where Ellie was sleeping to make sure she was still there, and then smiled. Ellie flopped her trunk from Manny's direction back to her body, signaling her to come near her. Although a bit groggy, he knew better than to not refuse. Manny took his trunk, gently rubbed near Ellie's stomach and smiled brightly. Ellie forwarded her trunk and affectionately wrapped it around her mate's for a moment, before separating and asking Manny about his past.

"You know...you never told me the story of how you all became such good friends."

"Who?"

"You and Diego, and Sid for that manner. You told me something last night about how he would fight until the end for someone he cares about?" Ellie was somewhat saddened by the fact that she too, took his presence for granted; she wanted to know how an animal as fierce as a tiger seamlessly fit into a family such as their own. Manny let off a deep sigh and turned away from her, realizing that rehashing some of the past may change her opinion of Diego not only as a friend, but also a guardian. His eyes soon met back with Ellie's as he was reluctant to delve back into the past.

"I just want you to judge Diego the way he is now; not for what I'm going to tell you." Ellie grew more confused by each passing moment, but Manny did not break his face from her.

"I'll listen."

"Diego's past isn't exactly the cleanest..." Manny found himself struggling to tell Ellie some of the things Diego had to do under another saber's lead. He looked upward into the white-blue sky.

"...I'll start by saying that his plans didn't involve me and Sid, at first. I won't go into too much detail with Sid...other than saying he needs to watch himself around animals much bigger than him." Ellie giggled knowing that Manny's inner demeanor was a nice and caring one, one that saved her life once before.

"Sid started following me, probably because he knew he wouldn't become lunch if he did."

"Manny, that's not a n--." Manny challenged Ellie to say different by giving her a almost serious stare. She tried to keep a straight face, but chuckled almost immediately. Manny took the moment to laugh alongside of her mate.

"That's not a nice thing to say!" She continued snickering as Manny tried easing the laughter to continue telling the story.

"But you know it's true. Anyway, on our travels, a human had drifted in the through a river, with a baby. It was almost like...a last request. She put the baby on the shoreline away from herself. I looked at the mother, and then put my attention on the baby for a moment. When I peeked back up at the river's edge, the mother was gone."

"So you took the baby?" Manny didn't know how to respond to this, as it was Sid's idea to have the infant tag along.

"I'll be honest with you, I didn't want to take the baby." Manny knew full well that this would shock Ellie; he'd been protecting her and watching over her as much as physically possible because of a baby.

"At the time, I didn't even want Sid by me. But Sid seemed so overly determined to get the baby back to its family -- he was going to try and climb an entire cliff with the kid in his arms. In fact, he was surprising me for a moment, getting about halfway up...but then the baby fell out of Sid's grip." Ellie continued to stare blankly at Manny, visually imagining the past times, word for word.

"I was about to catch it with my trunk. While I didn't want the baby to tag along with me, I wouldn't want it to suffer any sort of pain either. So, the baby is falling and I'm readying myself to catch it, and then...Diego, out of nowhere, leaps in the air and grabs the baby in his mouth. I know he didn't want to eat the baby, I found that out later. I won't dig into that because it isn't important. Obviously, at this time, we didn't know each other. I hit him hard with my trunk and the baby went flying out of his mouth and into my trunk."

"You hit Diego?" It came to Ellie's attention that they didn't befriend one another immediately.

"Well, how often do you see a tiger grab anything smaller than itself not do anything bad?"

"I wouldn't know being that Diego was the only tiger ever around me, and he was...nice." Ellie frowned again realizing that she never lent an ear for Diego to talk into.

"His family, wasn't quite as understanding. Diego, Sid and I started traveling in hopes of meeting the kid's father. Along the way, we took two breaks. The first time we stopped, I wasn't sure what to expect spending the night with a tiger, so I lightly slept. Diego looked to be sound asleep as well, so I didn't think anything of it. The following morning, the baby was gone."

"Diego didn't take the baby, otherwise you two probably wouldn't be together right now." Ellie's inference was indeed accurate, they stood together as a herd for quite sometime, unaware of the previous problems Diego had lived through.

"Sid took the baby somewhere, apparently he found a few sloths that liked him. But when I took the baby back, the other sloths left too. I don't entirely know what happened, but the next time I found Diego, he had Sid in his mouth."

"Diego tried to eat Sid?" Manny pushed his trunk to Ellie's mouth as her words were considerably louder than before. All of the other mammals shifted around, but continued drifting aimlessly in their sleep.

"He spit him back out, who knows where that sloth could have been. Besides, you promised you wouldn't judge him!"

"That was before I found out that he tried to eat one of our family; he's got some nerve."

"That was in the -- look, let me explain to you how we grew as friends." Ellie wasn't fond of Sid nearly becoming a hungry tiger's lunch.

"We kept traveling toward Glacier Pass, which is where Diego and I both where the father would be. Sounds chilly, doesn't it? Well, we were passing along a snowy area...and long story, short, it was essentially melting below our feet."

"Like the meltdown?" Ellie felt like she could relate to the situation being the survivor of a near-apocalyptic natural disaster.

"Essentially might be the wrong word. Let's try...literally. There was a pool of lava erupting below us. We were walking through and the snow started melting around us. I shot Sid across with my trunk because he was absolutely terrified, going as far as running in his own place.

"So, you all shared a moment where you all had to work together? Sounds like a great way to make friends with each other." Ellie began to smile thinking that the conversation was over.

"Well, I shot Sid pretty far when I hit him with my trunk, he was perfectly safe sitting where he was. Diego stood back for a bit too long and had to reach us by doing a jump of his own. Funny thing though..." Manny began to grin for a moment.

"...it was the one time I could say that I sensed fear coming from him. He was rushing me, telling me to move faster."

"Diego did seem like the leader type though...when the ground was collapsing below all of our feet, I remember him telling us what we needed to do...like locking trunks." Ellie nudged her trunk over to Manny's again and wrapped it around for another brief moment of affection.

"The snow in front of us disappeared and we both had to make a jump. I made the jump without too much of a problem, but the gap turned huge. I didn't even realize what was going on until I noticed Diego wasn't directly behind me...he was hanging on for dear life on the edge of the gap. By that time, I felt like Diego and I were good friends, we had gone through a few side tracks together and there was something there. I wasn't going to leave him behind."

"That's so brave of you." Manny, caught in the moment, continued talking past the compliment. Ellie didn't seem to mind as it had been the most he'd talked in a while without mentioning the incoming baby.

"So I slowly moved across the snow and ice, moving closer and closer to him when ground below him collapsed. I threw my trunk out there and wrapped it around his paw. He wanted to get out of there as badly as I did, so he put his claws into the middle of my trunk." Ellie came up next to Manny's trunk and examined it; the scars from that ordeal, still mildly visible, served as a trophy to him and Diego still living.

"It really stung, and my next reaction was to toss him off of my trunk and into safety. So I whipped him toward Sid's direction and got him off of me. The ground then collapsed below me and sent me toward the lava." As Manny talked more in depth about how Diego and Sid became part of the herd, Sid broke out of his sleep and decided to listen along.

"Wait, nuh-uh. Do you honestly expect me to believe that you survived falling into a river of lava?" The story started to seem a bit more farfetched than first planned, but lucky for Manny, the witness to all of these events had migrated over, and listened.

"Manny did survive a fall into a river of lava, but he had the help from some hot water and steam." Sid joined in the storytelling circle as Ellie remained perplexed to the situation.

"A geyser shot me up into the air and back on to land." Manny was somewhat embarrassed.

"And pretty hard, I might add. I wasn't sure if Manny was even alive to begin with." Sid tapped Manny on the shoulder, receiving a glance of presence before moving on.

"I think that was when Diego realized that he had someone who cared about him. But what I'm about to tell you is something Diego probably regrets ever going through, for more than one reason. You promised you wouldn't judge him." Manny looked back at Ellie who had a worried look on her face. She nodded back to her mate as he went on.

"We reached an area just before Glacier Pass, in fact, it's just ahead of us. Diego mentioned it being called Half-Peak. When we got there...he didn't want to go anywhere. He told us that his plans were to ambush me and Sid, and to take the baby too." To Manny's surprise, Ellie didn't seem fazed by this newly revealed side of Diego, but on the inside, she was infuriated with the fact that he had plans to kill them at first.

"I had plans of just fighting through with Sid and beating the other tigers, but he said that the pack was too strong. He told me to trust him, for what he thought would probably be the last time -- and I did."

"Diego is quite the smart cat, he told me to hide the baby somewhere and then made me lead the tigers with a fake baby to Manny." Manny dropped his foot in disapproval and rolled his eyes at the poor description of an irrelevant event that happened, causing the two possum twins to wake up.

"As Diego signaled for us to leave the peak, his pack leader showed up. Both of them started advancing toward me. That was the one and only time in my mind where I regretted trusting Diego, but...he turned toward his leader and gave him a warning to back off."

"Wow! Diego turned his back on his leader?" Crash hopped excitedly.

"He fought...with his leader. His leader tossed him like a rag doll into a rock and knocked him out cold. Somehow though, he was able to wake up and throw himself in front of me when his leader tried going for my neck, to kill me. He took the hit, for me. When I said that Diego would fight for you until he could not breathe anymore, I wasn't kidding." Manny put his face down in shame, replaying the harsh words he gave to his best friend two days earlier like a broken record; essentially giving Diego the clear to walk out anytime he felt was necessary. Ellie was frozen with shock and emotion; the potpourri of feelings poured out from her heart but yet, she found herself unable to shed a tear. Manny sat up with a frown on his face, and while Sid and the possum twins weren't entirely surprised as Ellie, they all shared the same understanding.

"Sid brought the baby within sight, but the cry of the baby caught the leader's attention. So, I launched my trunk to him, and knocked him into a boulder. Last thing I remember was some icicles falling on him and that was the end of it. The other tigers of the pack ran off. Diego was still on the floor, barely moving. We all talked one last time, and stood with him until he shut his eyes. Sid and I thought that was the end of it. The child made it back to his father, and the father gave me some sort of bracelet that, until this day, I don't know what happened with. Sid and I planned on heading south when Diego came back and met up with us. He went out of his way to be with us, had one single problem that we could have worked out, and all I had to say about it was to not let my domestic life hit him on the way out." The warm and sedative air slowly replaced itself with a chilly sadness, causing everyone to get an occasional shudder. Diego was in fact the one who conquered his fears just to save mammals he hadn't known for more than two days. The group of animals that considered Diego a family came to a grim agreement that they may never see him again; the presence of the herd was no longer completed without the shadow of a missing saber.

"Ma--", Ellie stopped mid-word in reaction to more pain coming from the unborn child. All of the mammals were now aware of Ellie's labor being imminent.

"We need to find Diego before we never see him again." Eddie immediately stood up and broke his silence.

"We can't go with you about to have the baby, Ellie." Manny's typical over-protective nature caused him to worry; it was well justified fear as he wanted to be the father of a perfect healthy child.

"Manny...you said Half-Peak was just ahead?" Ellie's voice was heavily restrained by the intolerable pain. "We can make it."

A highly flammable air loomed over the two sabers, with resentment being the catalyst. Diego and Soto pushed deeper into the atrium of Half-Peak, shifting directions near a cliff's edge ever so often to keep each other unpredictable. One of the pack members, Oscar, returned from his daily hunt to see a tiger he hadn't seen in a fair amount of time. The current co-leader of the pack held a deep jealousy toward Diego; his cocky attitude would typically set the normally serious Diego into an irritated state, and Oscar always felt that he was more deserving of second-in-command. After getting a fairly long glance of the traitor to his kind, Oscar bolted towards Diego and attempted to tackle using all of the momentum picked up in his dash. A new contender in the middle of a fight involving morals and the past was not something that sat with Diego; he almost instantly broke the grip that Oscar had, who was clearly the weaker of the two sabers. Diego unpinned himself from Oscar's feeble grip. Ideas crossed his mind to counteract with an attack of his own until Oscar momentarily addressed Soto.

"You need help with this waste of fur?" Diego's face lowered and his ears peeled back, ready to lash after the disrespectful words, but he chose not to drop to that level. Instead, he aimed much lower, in an effort to not only bruise Soto's ego, but also to even the playing field in a battle. A tiger's ego meant everything; most never considered it wise to challenge a carnivore as strong as a tiger in a battle, other than another tiger fighting for position in a pack. However, with Diego being an exile to this pack, he had absolutely nothing to lose.

"Oscar, you couldn't beat me even if Soto threatened your life." Diego was well aware that he passed the line of disrespect. Oscar was never one to show an angry face, but Diego read the concealed anger like the fear from his prey, and had a feeling that an impulse would get the better of him. No sooner than Diego's train of thought brought him back to staring at his old pack member, Oscar was in mid-air. Diego nonchalantly side-stepped, expecting nothing more than a breeze of wind passing to his right. He continued to address Soto.

"Oscar can't lay a finger on me, and neither can you. It's a shame that your strength was once unsurpassed. You tossed me into a rock like if I was a helpless mammal, but now, I can put you beneath my paws and hold you down." Neither tiger was appreciative of the sheer confidence Diego was carrying, but that didn't stop him from talking.

"The funny thing about it all, is that I left my herd...my herd, not tiger pack, because I couldn't keep up with a young gazelle." The two sabers turned around and teased him as he said this, but he used their attempt of an insult as one of his own.

"Laughing at me only makes you look worse, because neither of you couldn't drop a tiger who actually failed at a gazelle capture. I've spent the last few weeks demeaning myself and I can take a little bit more. Can you?" Diego sat there grinning as the two tigers were squirming in their positions.

Diego began strafing to his right again as the tigers followed, keeping their delta formation, inverting the order so that he was facing the cliff's edge. Once he was in a comfortable position, he halted his steps, as did the other tigers; keeping this triangular setup made it so that they could see one another, although Diego had a slight territorial advantage with their backs to the edge of a cliff combined with his brute strength. He moved closer to the edge of the cliff knowing that the tigers could not step back any farther. With a clear advantage in power, Diego took the chance to corner both of them at once.

"I find it amazing that you've allowed someone as weak as Oscar fight alongside of you. You actually need a partner to help immobilize anything now because you can't do it yourself." Soto's rage overtook any sort of rational thoughts as he began to crouch for another pounce. Diego stood at attention, not ready to flinch from something he was able to hold down with only one out of his four paws.

"I shouldn't have to tell you this, unless you've changed that much. Be rational. Do you want to live, or do you want to run through your best moments before you hit the bottom of a cliff?" Diego showed his sharp fangs before diverting his attention to a familiar voice. He angled his body in a slightly different direction to see a large, brown-complexed figure out of his peripheral vision.

"Diego! What's gotten into you!?"

"Manny?" Diego did not break his stance as more figures began to piece together within his eyesight. The possum twins were stunned watching their friend corner two tigers his size. Diego desperately wanted to move by his true family, the group that he had spent a few nights with, not worrying about the tensions of rank or the battles between humans, but he could not retreat from his spot on the peak; he was sure that this would put the rest of the herd in danger. A very weak, pain-subdued voice caught Diego's attention.

"M-manny..." She eased her stomach to the floor and laid flat on the ground. Out of impulse, Oscar bolted toward Ellie to go for an attack. Manny stepped in front of Ellie, and planted his feet to the ground below him.

"Ellie!" Diego's quick thinking had gotten out of him out of difficult situations before. With Soto still cornered, Diego finally found a way to demoralize his ex-leader one final time while testing Oscar's loyalty. Diego abruptly jumped toward Soto, with the force causing an uncontrollable roll to the cliff edge; Diego tightly grasped Soto's arms as he dangled from the mountain edge, while Diego comfortably had a surface to balance on, with total leverage.