Crossing Anthology Two

Patience wore thin as Jonah chipped away lead paint from the outside wall of the sheriff's office, and as Cole grinded the worn heels of his shoes into the muddy earth. Princess Luna stood with a stern look; she was clearly on the brink of hunting Jonah and Cole’s friends down herself. Silence is among them, and all seems so tranquil. Jonah breaks the atmosphere,

“Where the hell are they at?”

Princess Luna replied with;

“They’d better be here soon, the more time we waste could be another life lost.”

Cole’s interest sparked, and he asked;

“Is this serial killer really that much of an issue?”

“Yes, very much so. The last time I checked the casualties, he had taken roughly one hundred and thirty victims.”

“What’s this guy’s backstory?”

“We have no backstory to tell, information regarding him is extremely scarce.”

“A name at least?”

“No…”

“What does he look like?”

Luna took a moment and pondered her memories,

“… Well, he wears a metallic mask; it looked very shiny with three glass plates.”

“A third? Is this guy deformed or something? Like a third eye?”

“Some victims who survived his attacks claimed to have seen him levitating his weapon so he must be a unicorn. My assumption is that the third plate of glass above the two eye plates is for his horn to channel magic. Though it raises the question, why would a unicorn want to kill other unicorns?”

“What is the weapon he is using?”

“We haven’t quite identified it; it’s a long metal and wooden stick like weapon, with two holes on the front of it that fire our small metal pieces. After his first murder, the witness described it as a ‘long metal tube’ and that it made a loud ‘BANG’ noise.”

Jonah could recognize the weapon Luna was describing, and suggested;

“That sounds like a shotgun, or some kinda gun.”

Luna thought for a moment, she knew she had heard of the term ‘gun’ from someplace before. Her eyes widened as she remembered;

“Oh! A gun! Now I know. A gun… Sorry, it’s just I haven’t heard of that term in centuries. We Equestrians never found a need for guns; we had magic to protect us.”

Jonah was confused, he asked Luna;

“Don’t any shops there sell guns?”

“No, and considering that it took me as long as it did to remember just what a gun was, I would not think that hardly anyone now knows what a gun even is!”

“Sounds to me like murder ain’t a common crime on your planet.”

“It certainly isn’t. We don’t even use murder as a punishment, the worst form of punishment we have is banishment to either the moon, or the sun.”

Suddenly, a feminine voice, yelling out to us broke our silence;

“Hey!”

Cole sat up at the familiarity of such voice, and yelled back;

“Halie!”

Cole laughed a little to himself as he ran to Halie; Jonah rolled his eyes with a smirk as he watched. Cole was finally in a meters range of Halie. Halie greeted herself to Cole with a high five while saying;

“Cole! Haha, what’s up?”

“A new adventure is up! And you’re coming with us.”

“Oh really, so what kinda business are we doin’?”

“We’re hunting down a serial killer on a faraway planet.”

“I bet it ain’t gonna be half as crazy as your last adventure.”

“Yeah well, the three year one had a lot to it. This time it’s just one guy.”

Cole motioned Halie to the Princess and introduced her;

“Halie, this is Princess Luna of planet Equestria, she is the one in charge of this operation.”

Princess Luna presented her right hoof to Halie, and said;

“Charmed…”

Halie shook the Princess’ hoof with her hand. Halie saw Jonah; he was still chipping away at the lead paint on the wall he laid on. She walked over to Jonah and said;

“Hey Jonah, long time no see!”

“Halie, how’ve ya been?”

“I’ve been well, I been good… Talkin’ to Cole so much lately has got me in a much better mood than before.”

“That’s good; I was worried about ya for the longest time.”

Then out of seemingly nowhere, Jonah felt something heavy land on his lap. He looked up;

“There’s my dumbass!”

It was his girlfriend, Mina. She was sitting on his lap with her arms wrapped around him, after her greeting she planted a quick kiss on his cheek. Halie saw, and then glanced quickly and quietly at Cole. Halie looked back at Jonah and said;

“We ought to talk more Jonah, I feel like I haven’t seen ya in years.”

“Same here.”

Jonah focused back on Mina and asked her;

“Ya ready to go?”

Mina smirked and mimicked Jonah’s country accent with;

“Sure am budday!”

Jonah caught on;

“Oh ha-ha…”

“Haw-haw!”

“Mina please…”

“Meynah please!”

Princess Luna interrupted Jonah and Mina’s conversation with;

“Hey! Sometime today?”

Luna pointed a hoof to a portal she had conjured up with magic. The four teens watch with amazement, they each approached the portal slowly. Jonah asked;

“Is it gonna hurt?”

Cole rolled his eyes with a chuckle and said,

“Puss-puss…”

Cole began to move closer, Jonah retaliated laughing;

“Shut up, Cole! I ain’t a puss!”

Luna rolled her eyes, at the boys, skeptical about the decision she made. Cole came closer to Jonah’s range.

“Puss-puss!”

Cole was an inch from Jonah’s face continuing to smile, Jonah laughed a little;

“You go in first!”

Cole jumped back;

“No you!”

“You!”

Cole playfully pushed Jonah;

“You!”

Jonah pushed back;

“Okay! Okay, we go in together!”

“Okay.”

Jonah and Cole staggered to the portal laughing; they were a mere couple of feet from entering. They hesitantly counted down together;

“Five-“

“Four-“

“Three-“

“…Two-“

“…One!”

Jonah and Cole remained stationary. Jonah then let go of a gust of air in his lungs and asked;

“Ah, what if there’s no oxygen on this damn planet. We were lucky to get it here on Mobius!”

Mina smacked her palm against her forehead and said;

“Oh for Christ’s sake!”

She put one hand on Jonah’s back and one on Cole’s. She used all her strength to push the two husky boys into the portal with a fast velocity.

Jonah and Cole went flying through a long colorful passage screaming in shock. They calmed down and observed all the twists and turns the passage had every color and flash, it was unlike any sort of power the boys experienced. Jonah then said;

“Wow! This is somethin’! These ponies certainly got some strong powers!”

“Yeah! This must be what crack feels like…”

Cole waved his hand in front of his face; he observed the trail being left in the air as it moved. Jonah noticed the trail he himself was also leaving. Jonah stated;

“I can tell these ponies have much richer power than we do, we best be on our toes if we’re goin’ up against a magical serial killer.”

Jonah and Cole heard a large howl-like noise; they looked forward and saw a bright light in the far distance of the portal. It was coming fast, like a subway train. They could feel the portal growing smaller and vibrate faster as the light began to swallow them.

Here they are, on the road to a new world. What could possibly be waiting for them on the other side? To quote Jonah, "what if there's no oxygen on this damn planet?"

And what is next for Cole and his friendship with Halie? Is there a budding rose on this mysterious planet, ready to bloom with the feelings that possibly BOTH of them share with each other...?