Horhe was staring death in the face. Not an entirely new situation for the hot head fire dragon. This was the first time, however, that the end he was staring at was so absolute. Sure he had given and received the typical teenage argumentative death treats. But to be here now, his snout firmly held by an ape taller than him and a large war hammer held above him, ready to deal the death blow. That was new.

Horhe's only regret was that it was because he was trying to show off. And he always called his little brother an idiot.

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Mashal was unsure if what he was about to do would work, but he had to try. No one had died on his watch yet; he was not about to let that change. This was primarily because, and the wind dragon hated to admit this, but Horhe was irreplaceable as a leader.

So, already rapidly advancing towards the general, Marshal took a breath.

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Cynder had known this was a bad idea; if she had known it was this bad, she would have fought harder. The injuries they were going to take, and probably already had taken, would hamper them as much as any damage they were giving out would interfere with the apes.

But now, they were about to lose the strongest fire dragon they had because he thought he could take on the general! Not if she has anything to say about it.

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He should have listened to his; you know he had not quite figured out what to call Cynder and his relationship status. It's not like the guardians had explained much of anything about courtship and the like. For now, he would simply go with "partner."

Spyro knew he should have listened to his partner. He had been as into the idea of this type of attack as the rest, while she had not. After all, it was not something too far from what he would typically do. But he should have listened, even with a lot of her past blurry memories; even those blurry memories were better than any ideas he had on warfare.

If he had listened to her, maybe they would not be in this situation. An Ape General was bearing down on a dragon about to deal the killing blow. Welp, time to do what the purple dragon did best, throw a stick in the cogwheel.

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Khan's grin was predatory. The first kill of many to come, by his paw.

The ape general started to roar in victory as he began to bring his war hammer down towards its victim.

Before his weapon could indeed start its journey, the ape general was blasted back.

For almost any other creature, the three attacks which hit the ape would have been a tremendous amount of overkill.

After all, Wind Breath from Marshal tended to uproot trees (as long as they were not the trees of the Giant's Forrest).

A Shadow Breath from Cynder could rip flesh from bones.

And a Fire Breath from Spyro had shown its ability to melt even metal.

So the fact that the ape general was only blasted back a few feet, and was still on his feet, showed just how formidable the giant ape was. And the three, despite being completely uncoordinated, did not relent even after the ape had been blasted back.

Three dragons hovered above, breathing with all their might. Cynder and Spyro were flanking Marshal, possibly the three strongest dragons of this young group. They had converged on the general with the most hostile of intent.

And yet, the great ape was not dying. While he most certainly had been taken by surprise from the triple attack, surprised enough that it was only thanks to the enchantment on his armor that he did not sustain a significant injury. The enchantments had held out long enough for him to use his own internal magic and energy and channel it through his weapon to create a shield. While not wholly destroyed, the enchantments on his armor were now next to worthless. The armor would have to be replaced once this campaign was over.

But for now, he had to hold out against the fierce assault before him. Growling and near roaring in rage, Khan put everything he had into his defenses. He would outlast these dragons and then destroy them.

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Marshal was unleashing every last bit of air he could. The tornado of a Wind Breath he was throwing at the ape before him was kind of ridiculous, in his opinion. But it, along with the unexpected additions of the Legendary Couple, was doing very well at their job of keeping the general away. That the ape was still up and holding against the combined attack was a little surprising.

Marshal noticed Spyro and Cynder looked at each other, then at Marshal. Spyro motioned with his eyes back towards the still fighting force of dragons behind them. Then the two of them proceed to drift in clock/counter-clock around the general.

Marshal figured they were trying to keep the general occupied, which was good because he was running out of breath. He still had not figured out how to unleash his breath attack and still be breathing at the same time.

So, stopping his attack to breathe quickly before shouting out, "You'll only need to hold him for a few moments!"

The wind dragon noticed a quick thumbs up from the purple dragon as he banked around to the other dragons. It was time to get the hell out of there before the general could break away. They could not let him wreak havoc again. And while they may have him pinned now, Marshal could already see the rest of the army regrouping.

They could either try and kill the general but probably lose many dragons/foxes, or they could remain a fighting force but leave the general alive.

Marshal would always choose the option which saved more lives.

So he turned, looking dead at Horhe. Said dragon, looking both scared shitless and surprised he was not dead yet. The fire dragon did not have time to get over his not being dead though.

Marshal flew to hover over him, the downdraft of his wings buffeting the older dragon and starting the work of bringing him back to awareness. Yet, it was not fast enough. So Marshal yelled as soon as he was stable in his hover, "Horhe! Grab one of the injured and get the hell out of here!"

Still not fully processing his situation and definitely in a shock, Horhe could only nod before doing a stumbling turn to comply. The shell-shock expression firmly on his face.

Seeing the fire dragon finally acting, Marshal redirected his attention. He scowled slightly at what he saw.

They had thought that dropping into the army's center would allow them to cause the most damage. They had forgotten the dangers of being surrounded.

That was the current situation; at the center of the dragon hoard was a small group of foxes armed with bows and a few injured dragons using their magic to conduct long-range attacks. But all around them was a ring of dragons, some with boomerang armed foxes on their back, fighting a never-ending tide of apes and dreadwings. From the looks of things, the dragons had yet to take actual injury thanks to the element of surprise, but they were quickly losing that as more and more of the army was converging on them. And that did not even consider the small dent in the circle that was where he currently was.

The dragons the ape general had hit had still not gotten their bearings. It was so bad that even as Horhe was grabbing at one of the unconscious ones, fresh apes started to jump into the lack of fighting.

Seeing this, Marshal growled and unleashed another wind breath at the attacking apes. The breath did the job of creating a pillar of death to give just a bit more time. It also caught the immediate attention of the dragons there.

With those dragons looking at him, just as shell-shocked as Horhe, who was just starting to take flight with his new load. Marshal took a quick breath and infused his voice as he shouted, "Retreat! We're being surrounded! Get out, Now!"

He noticed an ape out of the corner of his eye jumping at him, so he ended his shout and unleashed a roaring Wind Breath. Before he stopped his attack, Marshal also started to beat his wings heavier, trying to gain altitude and get out of range of any other leaping apes. When he ran out of air in his lungs, he took another breath before unleashing another attack, this time a Wind Cannon, at a group the closest group of apes. He repeated his attacks, alternating between breath and cannon as he started to move away; each attack aimed to try and give just a little more cover to those having trouble getting out.

It was time to leave; actually, that had been a few minutes ago when the general had attacked. Marshal just hoped that Spyro and Cynder could hold the general long enough. He wanted to help them. Not because Marshal thought he could help in any meaningful way, but because the wind dragon hated leaving others to fight alone. But Marshal had a more important job right now: Making sure everyone else could get the hell out of there.

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Spyro could see everyone starting to fly off. Those at the center had gone almost as soon as Marshal had roared out. Then it was those closest to the wind dragon as said dragon started to blast any ape/dreadwing too close to a dragon. The retreat was in no way orderly; it was every dragon for itself as they scrambled to escape their poorly thought-out plan.

Sadly, as much as the purple dragon wished, he could not follow the other dragons' examples. He had to deal with his own poorly thought-out idea.

Cynder and himself were still concentrating their Breath Attacks on the general. And although they were both now opposite sides of the ape, he still held up his shield! At first, Spyro had been unsure which would give first their ability to keep up the single attack or the general's shield. He now knew.

The both of them were nearing their limit for how long they could keep up a Breath Attack. While the general was struggling, the ape was still holding firm from what the purple dragon could see through his attack. It quickly progressed to the point where Cynder and himself would have to stop their current attack and switch to something else.

Given how some of the apes were positioned, they would likely have to swap to snap casts. Very much a delay tactic, and against the general, there was a chance it would not work. But they had very few options.

So with a shift in how he was flying, Spyro cut off his breath attack. Cynder noticed but kept up her attack a moment longer. Just long enough that Spyro was able to catch a quick breath and unleash Earth Shot. Cynder stopped instantly after he fired, took her own breath, and let loose with a Poison Blob.

The two started alternating their attacks and which element they were firing. As they were doing this, they began to fly erratically. There was a general pattern to their flight, Away. But other than that, they would move closer to the general, fire, then move away for the other to get closer.

It was very rapid and hard to notice, but they were getting away.

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Khan growled as he batted at another elemental attack. They had been coming fast and heavy; it was at such a speed that it was difficult to do anything other than striking them aside. And yet, the ape general preferred this state of being to the previous. It took far more magic to hold up a shield than it did to swat aside actual spells.

He could tell his enemies were leaving, if slowly. While this aggravated him, he was also alright with him. Being denied his chance at a kill pissed him off far more than this effort to defend himself.

As the attacks against him started to taper off, he could finally take in how his forces were doing. Since the attack had come near the camp's center, more troops had been lost than would have been if they attacked at the edge. But it also meant that the most crucial part of his forces was defended.

Khan had expected an attack similar to the night before, and in a way, he was correct. The night before and this attack was a centralized strike, all of the dragon's forces in one spot. To combat this, he had spread out his supplies around the camp. He had also ordered his commanders to spread throughout the edges of the camp so that they could respond quickly. This had left his center with very little in the way of competent fighters, but again that was a part of the plan. Those in the center were his reserves for any fighting that might have happened.

So while he did lose a lot of apes and dreadwings from the initial ambush and even more from the scrambling of those not under any competent command, it was no more than he had been expecting to lose either way.

So even as he swatting aside the last of the attacks heading for him, Khan stood where he was, glaring at the rapidly retreating dragons as they fley into the newly night cloaked forest. He would give no orders to chase. Instead, he planned and readied for sunrise.

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The dragons and their fox companions would make it back to where the convoy had camped that night in silence. No one had wanted to speak as they flew; no one wanted to admit what a cluster their attack had been.

When had arrived, however, that was a different matter. Almost as soon as they touched down, the more vocal of their number began to complain. The response had been virtually instant, and soon arguments had started up.

Those that had not participated in the attack had watched nervously. Kean and those he had roped into helping him treat the injured kept quiet as they worked; they were more worried about making sure no one died. Meanwhile, the fight started to grow as sides began to form, old rivalries began to come back, and old grievances began to make their appearance.

Marshal would have tried and calmed everyone down, but he returned to the convoy as the arguing was starting to heat up. He had banked back to make sure Spyro and Cynder had been able to get back. And when he did get there, he instantly went to Kean to make sure the injured were being taken care of.

So by the time full-on shouting matches were going on, several dragons were getting ready to come to blows. Marshal was only just becoming aware of what was going on. He had not even come up with an idea on how to bring things under control when a shout came from the most unlikely of sources.

Horhe had been in deep thought the entire way back. Even after he had given up his load to Kean and his "medics," the fire dragon had been quiet.

Now though, now he was done with the bickering. "Will all of you just shut up!"

The roar of the fire dragon caught everyone's attention. But it did its job, and he was not done. "All of you need to shut up. Yes, we fucked up. Yes, things did not go to plan. Yes, a few of us almost DIED!" He took a few breaths before he continued, "I stared directly into the eyes of death." His admittance shocked a few, but then Horhe continued. "But we are still here. We fucked up; several of us got injured. Some more than others. But we knew that! Every single one of you knew the risks. Marshal has been more than clear on that every step of the damn way! And yet here you are complaining like a bunch of babies! I don't want to hear it; from any of you! We are alive! We are alive despite, not because. Despite our shit plans and our shit ideas of taking on a force that so wildly outnumbers us, we might as well be trying to drain the fucking ocean! So unless you have a better plan than just rolling over and die, shut your yaps!"

The fire dragon was huffing and glaring many a dragon down. A few averted their gaze, ashamed. Most were just quiet. After a few moments, Horhe snorted out one last huff before turning to get something to eat. He was hungry and tired and ready for the day to be done.

The rest of the dragons shuffled around for a little bit before slowly breaking up to do the same thing. They had had a long day and were ready for it to be over as well.

AN: Yes. I had fun. No, this whole thing was not planned. I just started typing and found I loved it way too much. What I had initially been aiming for was to simply cover day three. Instead, I finished Day two. Oops.

So that bit with Horhe...yea, he kind of broke for a little bit. But then again, he just learned he is nowhere near as powerful as he thought he was AND had to be saved, in part, by a person he still felt had stolen from him. Yes, he worked with Marshal, but he did so only because Harlid was dragging him along and because Marshal was using a lot of logical fallacies to manipulate the fire dragon to a degree. I'm trying to work on the dude; I just hope I portrayed it correctly.

The big motivation for this chapter was Khan. I don't know why, but for some reason writing him is helping me expand on this little arc a lot more than I had initially thought. Trying to show multiple days of combat in writing is very difficult. But having the perspectives be on both sides of the fight is changing any plan I had for this part. This is also why I don't do detailed brainstorming; it leaves me open to do all sorts of things.

I do hope you're enjoying it. If anyone has any idea how to make combat better without going into a painful amount of detail, I would be happy to hear it. Or if you just want to leave a comment in general, I will never turn that down. ;)

Anyways, Until we meet again, Happy Reading!