A Broken Peace is written by 7-4 .
Canon Status: Canon
Main characters[]
Summary[]
Ivan Marks gets thrown into Equs and begins his new life as a zebra, travelling the world with his ship, the Scourge and his new... crew? Friends? Family?
History[]
Ivan used to be a bit of a sadistic bastard. As a human, by the ripe age of 17, he had driven a girl to suicide and driven everyone around him away except for a single friend.
Lonely, and not acknowledging that he was, he spent his time feeling superior over everyone else and secretly plotting out the demise of most people he knew. Possessing a large deal of intelligence, he felt that nothing could touch him. You know, your average cocky teenager.
After an accident involving another teenager dying, a tiny bit traumatized Ivan found himself on the island of Rej as a zebra. He was quickly enslaved and spent a time between a month and a few weeks trapped in the tunnels as a Canary, a zebra forced to determine whether the cave was safe or worth it to mine in. During this time he picked up on the fact that zebra magic is cast through totems, and obtained the spell find gem.
He is briefed on the mine rules by a rather large griffon by the name of Terror, who lives up to his name by terrifying Ivan.
He broke free, and began to lead a slave revolt, taking control of a group of Canaries. His second in command, taking the name Canary, became an almost mentor of sorts, even while Ivan puzzled over how to kill him. On a related note, Ivan became under the impression that Canary was Gay.
In the process of taking over the island, Ivan slew an Alpha, killed a good friend in cold blood without a second thought, got drunk and participated in a musical segment, met the giant spider in his head called Malice, befriended a swordsdog by the name of Boss, and had the island of Rej under his ownership.
For an entire day.
The very next day, while he was still hungover from drinking, a dragon attacked the island, along with an eldritch horror only hinted at by a massive griffon by the name of Terror. Flipping out, Ivan was told that everyone in his group was dead except for Canary and Boss. Running towards the dragon in hope of a glorious suicide, he snapped on to a random idea desperately, playing the song September with such force that a dragon blew up inside. Upon seeing this, and without missing a step, Ivan drew Disconsolate, a dagger with a hunk of his soul in it, and used it to partially enslave the dragon. The dragon, turning on the airship giving it support against a blob monster, proved to be a semi invaluable ally in that it literally pushed them off of the island and to the nearest port.
Sadly, the dragon was attacked and eaten by the Shoggoth blob thing Eldritch horror. Said Eldritch horror went in pursuit of the airship Ivan flew off of, the ship being renamed 'The Scourge'. Being of the more classic gas bag style of ship, it was rather slow.
On the port of Oblivion, Ivan, still freaking out over the fact that he attacked a dragon and got away with it, met a beautiful griffon by the name of Catastrophe, and once again had a nervous breakdown upon the realization that Malice was forcing him to like the griffon.
Catastrophe, reveling in the challenge and actually quite disgusted by Ivan, signs on to pilot The Scourge, Boss making the negotiations and signing them up into an airship race. Ivan ended up getting challenged by a hotheaded green feathered griffon and barely defeated him with a few blasts of Fireball. He looted the not dead griffon and walked off with a nose wound. Catastrophe took 'care' of him that night, though not in a sexual manner. The next day or so, the shoggoth arrived at the port of Oblivion and began to start killing people, destroying there souls and generally making a mess of the place. In a way that Ivan and the people involved cannot generally remember, Disconsolate was broken, Catastrophe was saved, and Ivan was rendered more than partially insane.
After getting over his condition for the most part, Ivan found himself on board The Scourge once again, bound for a small city on the border between the volcanic wastes and Equestria.
There, in the city of Mustang, he tried to recruit a few beings, only to find that most of them was failures. Marty, a fellow chess piece, listened in and approached them, and in the process of talking Ivan figured out that Marty was a human at one point in time. The resulting discussion cemented Marty and Ivan as being friends/allies.
Later that night, in a fit of boredom from Malice, Ivan found his soul drifting free over to Catastrophe. In a panic, and weakened by his conflicts with the shoggoth, Ivan found himself forced back into his mind by Catastrophe's will power, and an unwilling bond formed between them. Catastrophe knew that Ivan was a human.
Later on, in an indeterminate time frame left up to who really cares, Ivan met Missy, the sort of boss of Marty. Missy invites him to help out a sort of back organization dedicated to stopping slavery and he sort of accepts.
He has a mental break down when Catastrophe confronts him with the knowledge of his humanity and in the process they form a pact to create earth devices for their own gain. Fleeing from Mustang as Ivan is under the impression that Marty might not like what he is thinking, The Scourge crashes. In a manner involving Ivan devouring souls he converts the entire ship to steam, thus allowing them to use the nearby lake as fuel.
Canary, growing tired of Ivan pushing himself, confronts Ivan. Boss begins to train all of them in some vague form of combat.
Ivan, arriving back in Oblivion, finds himself welcomed as a hero at a local bar and gets highly drunk. After singing the song Neon Pegasus, he passes out, to the amusement of his comrades. He is forced into a minor drug deal with the natives of the town to pay off a debt and is surprised at how well it went. The next day, an attack by a small colony of diamond dogs almost kills him, though he awakens the ability to cast directly through his soul, showing off the ability by blowing up several heads by an allocation of the force field spell. After collapsing with blood streaming from him because he over used his magic, Catastrophe fights against a diamond dog beta who tricks her at the last second, driving his blade into Ivan.
Ivan barely survives and is left without magic. He begins to plot out his escape from the ship, terrified that the narrative would begin to kill off his party members in an attempt to keep the story more entertaining.
After a month and their arrival in Los Pegasus, Ivan escapes. Catastrophe, growing desperate for a myriad of reasons, stoops to asking for help from Marty, who was in the area on errand of his god(s). Marty and Catastrophe began to look for him.
Catastrophe began to grow more and more pissy at the snake as he represented most of what she hated; someone strong, yet polite, someone nice, yet not a push over. They eventually find Ivan, and in the exchange of blows and words Ivan kisses her, confirming that they do indeed like each other in some way or form.
Meanwhile, back in Las Pegasus, Boss and Canary get kicked out of a few casinos for winning too much.