Getting Home

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

I looked over to the girl who has been my girlfriend for a little over two years. “I guess you’re right Deryn,” I looked up to the night sky; the stars were clearly visible and the moon was full. “You know, lying here with you on this grassy hill, looking up at the night sky; it’s moments like these that make life worth living.”

Deryn playfully punched me in the shoulder. “Oh, you’re just saying that!”

“You might be right.” I looked over to her, “but I still enjoy the time that we share.”

Deryn started to blush. She looked stunning in the moonlight. “Oh, now you’re just trying to compliment me!”

I was about to say something back, but instead I felt her wrap her arms around me. “You may just be complimenting me, but I love you all the same,” she stated while embracing me.

Love.

“D-d-Deryn… I- you’ve never said-” She stopped me mid-sentence. “Love? I know, but now that I’ve said it, I’m wondering why I’ve never said it before now.”

I couldn’t help but be in shock at her declaration. Love.

Love. Do I love Deryn? I already knew that I liked Deryn, but do I love her? Would I spend the rest of my life with her? What am I saying?! I’m a player! I’m not supposed to be falling in love! But then again… for the past two years, Deryn has always been there. She helped me when I broke my arm in a bar fight, helped DJ, she even ran my club for me when I got food poisoning at that bad sushi restaurant! I know that Deryn would, and has, done all of these things for me. But would I return the favor? Would I do all of these things for her? Ugh, that’s why I was a player. I get to be with the girls and if anything serious broke out, I just backed out, and went on with another. I- I can’t decide this now! I need to think, that means an excuse.

“I-I-uh, hey Deryn? I just remembered that I needed to…. DJ! Tonight! A-at the new club! Yeah, that’ s it.” I stood up, practically throwing Deryn on the ground in my haste.

I tried my best to avoid eye contact with her.

I failed within three seconds.

“I, I just…. need some time to think. Okay, Deryn?”

I was trying to be calm, but Deryn was on the verge of tears. “It’s okay, I see how it is…” She stood up and started to walk away, but turned around her eyes beginning to water. “They told me that dating you was bad from the start. That dating a celebrity is never a good thing. They kept saying that you were a player that couldn’t keep a steady relationship for his life. I didn’t listen to them, and what do I get? Two wasted years and a broken heart!” She angrily stomped off, tears freely flowing down her cheeks.

“Deryn! Wait!” I began to run after her, pleading. “Deryn! Hear me out! Please! All I ask is a minute more of your time!”

Deryn stopped walking, but she still looked angry. “You have exactly one minute to explain yourself.”

I let out a deep breath, and started explaining. “I’m sorry Deryn. I truly am. It’s just that, I can indecisive at times and-,” I stopped in mid-sentence. I looked down at my feet, which had started to glow a brilliant white, and the glowing was already creeping up my legs. I tried to move my legs, but everything that was covered in the light wouldn’t respond to my commands.

“Leaf! What’s happening!?” Deryn had gotten over the argument, and her eyes began to widen.

“I don’t know!” I started to panic a little, and soon people that were walking by were stopping to see what was happening.

The glowing was now at my chest, and was quickly reaching my head. “Deryn! If I’m going to die now, I’m dying letting you know that I lo-.” The glow had reached my face, and my entire body was glowing a bright white, unmoving.

The crowd started to form around me. I started glowing as if I was radioactive. Several seconds later, my entire body shattered like glass and the light dissipated, leaving behind nothing but a residual image of the space that I once occupied, and a weeping girl that had a boyfriend not ten seconds earlier.

Good luck solving this one, NCIS.

************

“Tia, I have felt a disturbance in the force,” said a petite young woman with pitch-black wings and clothing.

“Lulu, I do believe you’ve been watching a little too much Galaxy Wars again,” said the young woman’s older sister.

“One can never watch too much Galaxy Wars!” the dark clad woman exclaimed while striking a pose. “But in all seriousness sister, I felt an odd magic appear and then almost instantly disappear near the city of Ponyville. Just inside of the Everfree Forest.”

“The Everfree Forest you say? Oh Lulu, those occur all the time within that horrid forest. Pay attention, we need to go over this one last time. The Griffin people have finally sent an ambassador to negotiate a peace treaty, but it won’t work if that ambassador feels like we’ve insulted him.” The older sister stated while hitting a whiteboard with a floating yardstick.

“Ugh, fine. We don’t like this… but we’ll do this for the safety of our subjects!” the black clad woman exclaimed.

The older sister smiled. “There you go, now you’re thinking like a true leader Luna. Now, remember that the Griffin people eat meat much more often than we do…”

**********

Ow…

Wait… I still feel pain… Pain is good. Pain means I’m still alive.

I slowly pried my eyes open. “Well that’s no help.” I croaked out, “it’s dark as hell out here, wherever here is.”

Okay, I can use my eyes. Now, how about everything else? I can still move my hands, that is always a good thing. Legs? Responding, but a little sluggish. They’re still working though, which is good as well. Now for the moment of truth. I slowly stood up. On my knees and elbows first, then onto just my knees, until finally I pulled myself up and stood shakily on two legs.

“Okay, I can at least stand. Even if a little wobbly and groggy from whatever hap- OH SHIT! Deryn thinks I’m dead!” I started to look around panicked, until I realized where I was.

“How the hell did I get into a forest?!?!?!!”

“God dammit all. Not only do I have to go find my girlfriend, but now I’m in a god-damned forest as well. Ugh, the universe hates me.”

“Well, no use standing around here. I might as well go and try to get out of this stupid forest.” I said as I started off, hopefully towards civilization.

I walked for what seemed like five hours, until I decided to stop at a fallen tree to rest. “This shouldn’t be happening! People don’t just go and get sucked up into a random forest in the middle of nowhere-,” I stopped when I heard a growl from behind me. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.”

I slowly turned around and what I saw shocked me “a wolf made of wood! Not only do I get dropped into an unknown place, but the wolves are made of wood too!”

“Ggggggrrrrrrrrr”

“I’ve had just about enough of this shit,” I pulled out my trusty M1911 handgun. “Silly wolf, don’t you know that a DJ like me always packs heat?”

I guess the wolf knew a little about what a gun was, because it started to back off slightly.

“Wolf, meet gun; gun, meet wolf. Play nice now.”

BANG BANG BANG
Tink tink tink

I pulled the trigger three times on the semi automatic firearm, the copper projectiles shredding three .45 caliber holes into the wolf’s head, killing it instantly.

“Don’t fuck with a DJ with a gun. Damn wolf.”

I walked over to the now dead wolf and inspected it. “Well tickle me pink and call me Elmo. This thing is made out of wood entirely! There’s not even blood coming from its wound!”

I slowly stood up as I remembered one key fact from my science class back in high school.“Remember class, wolves are, and always will be, a pack animal.”

Just as I remembered that, three more wooden wolves jumped out of the brush, their glowing yellow eyes seemed to follow my every move.

“Oh, fuck me.”

“Three wolves versus one famous DJ and an M19? I’m sorry gun, but the wolves got you beat this time.” I made a mock salute to the wolves. “So long, bitches!”

I would like to say that I did what they did in all the movies where the hero is running though the forest like a boss, and I was leading the wolves to a place where I could pick them off one by one with my pistol.

Needless to say, I didn’t do that.

I ran like a pansy, screaming bloody murder the entire time.

“Someone fucking help me!!!”

It’s amazing that I’m able to outrun these wolves, even though I was unable to outrun my girlfriend a few hours ago! Apparently when your life is on the line, you tend to run like hell.

I dared a look behind me, “shit!”

The wolves were uncomfortably close for my liking; I could even smell their pine fresh breath. Then I remembered that I have a gun.

I unholstered my handgun once again. “Eat lead bitch!”

BANGBANGBANG

The second wolf fell just like the first one, with three .45 caliber holes in it.

What did I feel each time I pulled the trigger on these poor, hungry wolves?

Recoil.

The third of the stupid wolf squad broke out of the tree line and into my line of fire.

BANG

“Boom, headshot.”

The final wolf ran at me like a bullet from hell. “Stupid wolf, you’ll just die like the rest.”

Click. Click. Click.

“Oh fu-,” the wolf hit me like a freight train, knocking me down, but I didn’t feel the ground.

The damn thing tackled me off a cliff.

And I screamed the whole way down.

**************

“C’mon Vinyl! Camping in the Everfree Forest would be like, twenty percent cooler than just staying at home all weekend!”

“Uh… I just want to sleep… hangover…” The hung-over DJ moaned.

“Good! Then you can’t do anything if I do this!”

“Do what-AH! Rainbow! Put me back down on the ground!” The blue haired girl panicked.

“Not until you agree to come camping with us.” The rainbow haired girl prompted.

“No! I am not going to go camping!”

“Oh, then I guess I’ll just have to do- this!” Rainbow Dash catapulted into the air another hundred feet, holding onto the famous DJ with only one hand.

“Rainbow! Stop! Stop! I’ll do anything, just stop!”

Rainbow gave Vinyl a smug grin. “Even come camping with us?”

The DJ wore a look of defeat. “Fine. Now please put me down!”

Rainbow Dash smirked. “Heh, knew you’d wanna come.”

The DJ rubbed her temples, annoyed. “Yeah, it just took you dangling me up two hundred feet in the air.”

“Yeah! You should have seen your face! You were all like, oh no, Rainbow’s going to kill me! I swear, it looked like you were going to piss your pants!”

Vinyl’s face blushed with indignity, “That’s not true! I’m just, scared of heights is all.”

Rainbow crossed her arms, “I don’t think that’s all… but I’ll take that for now.”

Rainbow Dash flew off toward the town’s library, where the rest of the Elements of Harmony were located, getting ready to go camping.

The famous DJ sighed. “Ugh, now I get to go camping all weekend. Oh joy.”

“Hey everyone! It’s DJ PON3!”

“Oh shit.”

******************

“AH!!!!” I screamed as the wolf and I tumbled through the air.

I looked down to see a welcome sight. “Yes, water!!!!”

I righted myself into a more aerodynamic, pole-like position so I wouldn’t hit the water like it was hardened smart glass; and that stuff was harder than titanium.

I may have been in a position that I would live and not break anything, but it would still hurt.

I hit the water. Hard.

“H-h-h-o-oll-lly s-h-h-ii-tt!” I tried to scream, but all that came out were bubbles.

I realized that I was running out of air, quick. The screaming my lungs out didn’t help. I swam as fast as I could toward the surface, thankful for having joined the crew team in high school.

I broke the surface of the water and sluggishly swam to shore. “Uh, man.” I looked around. “Did anyone see that? Because I will not being doing it again.”

I sat on the shore letting my eyes wander my new surroundings. “Damn, I kind of feel bad for the wolf, if it wasn’t the thing that just pushed me off a cliff that is.

The wolf in question, post cliff jump, was now a scattered pile of branches floating in the water, “I would normally feel bad for something dying like that, but I have no more fucks to give after it just suicide jumped me.”

I walked back over to a nice warm patch of sand on the shore. “Now, let’s see what I have with me.” I felt around my pockets and pulled out two spare clips for my M19, my, now crushed, music player, my wallet, and my smart glass holo-phone. “Well this sucks. I have money, my phone, bullets, but no music!”

I reached my hand toward my holster but all I felt was air. “Aw crap, I must’ve lost it in the fall- never mind, there it is.”

I got up and walked over to the silvery firearm. “And to think, even after four hundred years, it’s still one of the most reliable handguns you can get in the system.”

I picked up the weapon, dropped the empty clip out, and replaced it with a fresh one. I pulled the slide back with a satisfying click.

I sighed, “I might be in a weird forest full of fucking wooden wolves, but at least I have a gun, even if it only has another fourteen shots left.”

I bent over to pick up the rest of my belongings only to feel a searing pain erupt in my left arm. I finally looked down at my sleeve to see it covered in crimson blood, “Well fuck me sideways. When di- oh right, the wolf tackled me.”

I tried my best to bandage the wound, and being a DJ that didn’t go outdoors much, wasn’t that extensive. I’d have to find a hospital at one point, or I’d most likely die from infection or blood loss.

What a stupid way to die. I could see the gravestone now.

Here lies Leaf Disqe. AKA DJ INS4NITY.
2452-2474
He died of blood loss in a random forest.
RIP

“That would be pretty damn embarrassing. Scratch that, it would be embarrassing if anyone found my body!”

I looked out onto the stream. “Well, if I remember anything from my world history class in 9th grade, it’s that where there’s water, civilization isn’t too far away,” I looked at the stream again, “Huh, now. Right, or left?”

To the right were dark menacing trees and to the left was a meadow of some kind. “Screw The Wizard of Oz, I’m going left!”

*****************

Vinyl sat leaning against her front door. “Damn fans and paparazzi. What’s it take to get just one person who won’t go insane by just being near me? Meh, I guess I’m just too awesome for everyone else.”

“I guess I have to go pack now.” Vinyl stood up and made her way to the stairs. “Damn Rainbow, why did she have to go camping? And drag me with her?”

Five minutes later, Vinyl was finished. “OK, I have my Epod, my Solar Republic headset, some random clothes, and a bottle of vodka,” Vinyl paused, “I really need to drink less, but today is not that day!”

Vinyl put on a navy-blue hoodie and took off her sunglasses, “heh, with me wearing a hoodie and without me wearing my signature glasses, no one will recognize me.”

Vinyl got ten steps outside.

“It’s DJ PON3!”

“You have got to be kidding me.”

Another hour delay later.

“YES! Finally! I’ve never been so happy to see the public library in my life!”

Vinyl reached the door and pulled it open as fast as she could, closing it behind her. “Hey Vinyl, what took you so long? You were supposed to be here an hour ago.”

The DJ looked up at the librarian while putting her purple aviators back on. “Well, excuse me for being run around town by crazed fans.”

“I don’t care if a pack of timberwolves were chasing you, we’re going camping now!” Shouted an enthusiastic Rainbow Dash.

“Fine, let’s just get this over with.”

“Alright girls, I’ve triple checked the checklists,” Twilight made a gesture to the excessive pile of things being held up by a small boy. “And I brought plenty of gear!”

“Hey, uh, Twilight?”

“Yes, number one assistant whom would break my heart if he were to ever complain about his work?”

The green haired boy sighed. “Never mind.”

“Excellent!” she clapped her hands together. “We’re ready to go!”

“Hurray!” said five voices simultaneously.

“Oh joy,” sighed one disgruntled DJ.

*************

“Alright girls, I think this should be an ideal camping spot!”

“Ugh, finally! That hike felt like it would never end!” complained Spike.

A tired DJ walked into the area. “I second that notion.”

Twilight pulled out a clipboard. “Okay, we’ve got tents to pitch, a fire to build, and wood to gather. Rainbow, and AJ, you girls will pitch the tents. Rarity and Fluttershy, you two will get the fire started once Vinyl and Pinkie gather the wood. Any questions?”

Vinyl raised her hand, “I have one. Why do I have to get up and gather firewood. I could easily start a fire instead.”

“Because Vinyl, Rarity won’t go into the woods and get her clothes dirty, and Fluttershy is too scared. You couldn’t care less if your clothes got dirty and Pinkie just laughs at everything.”

“Hehehe, it’s true!” Giggled Pinkie Pie from the branch above them.

Vinyl sighed as she started off into the woods. “Fine. C’mon Pinkie. Let’s go get some wood.”

“Hehehe, that’s what she said!” Laughed Pinkie.

“This is going to be a long weekend.”

*************

“I should have listened to The Wizard of Oz.” I looked at the four dead wooden wolves that lay at my feet. “The meadow was the wrong way to go.”

I heard someone scream in the woods. “That might be Deryn! And she might be in trouble!”

I ran as fast as I could while holding my left arm and my pistol in my hand. The screaming came again, but this time it sounded like two women.

“Okay, so maybe it’s not Deryn, but someone, or some people, may need my help!”

I finally reached the tree line and I slowed down a little as to not trip over the underbrush.

“RAWR!!!”

“What in the name of all things unholy was that?” I pushed the thought out of my mind. “Doesn’t matter, what ever it is, I’ll pump it full of lead and kill it like those goddamned wolves.”

I looked farther ahead of me. I could make out two figures pinned against a rock face. I began to run faster as more and more adrenaline was being pumped into my system, until I finally broke the tree line and into a clearing with a girl with electric blue hair wearing purple aviators, and a girl with fluffy pink hair. I looked to what they were scared of. “Okay, the wooden wolves was just weird, but now this! This is just on a different level of strange.”

Standing before me was a lion, scorpion, bat thing. Being once again reminded of my high school mythology class, “I can take wooden wolves, but a manticore? Really?!?! Those don’t even exist!”

The manticore broke my derailed train of thought “RAWR!”

“Oh well, I’m putting you back into the mythology books.” I said a line I’ve always wanted to say, “Hasta la vista, bi-”

The manticore lunged at me with its scorpion tail, jabbing my already injured left arm. “GAH!”

I lifted up my right arm while the big bad manticore was still attached to my other arm. “Checkmate, bastard.”

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANGBANG

I emptied the entire clip in the damned monster’s face, once the slide stayed back once it was out, it was hardly distinguishable from what it once was.

“Ha, don’t… fuck… with a… DJ.”

The manticore must have had some kind of poison in its tail, because after that I was out like power in a hurricane.