A New World and The Journey Home

Hey, I’m Vincent Chambers. There’s not a whole lot to my life. I’m just a simple school boy trying to survive. Everywhere I look; it seems that the world I live in never seems to change.

I live in California, and let me tell you, it’s not always sunny and bright. It’s not where your dreams come true, to me it’s all filth. The town I live in is small and stifling. I felt trapped about where I live; the school was bleak, the sky was gloomy, and the people were just boring. Nothing exciting ever happened, until that one day.

One day, it changed everything; my entire perspective about life, as I know it, changed because of that one day. I mysteriously came across this strange mystic book filled with spells. So I read it and, out of nowhere, it transports me and my friends to another realm. Another strange, bright, and colorful one; filled with ponies!

I know it sounds crazy but hear me out. I should probably discuss how it all began; but first a little about me.

I’m 16 years old, I’m a junior at Sacramento high school, and I live with my aunt Val. She’s just your typical aunt, looking out for you and making sure your safe and that you have a bright future. She’s been looking after me since my mom’s in the hospital, she’s been sick for 6 months now. I really hope she’s ok by the end of this.

I also like to listen to rock music and I have long dark brown hair. One of my favorite bands is A Day to Remember and my hair is about shoulder length and is kind of messy. Anyway, my alarm clock went off one day, and I was just getting ready for school.

“Vincent, you’re going to be late for school”. my aunt said to me.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine”. I replied.

“You want breakfast?”

“No thanks, I’ll just get something there”.

“Do you have your keys?”

“Yeah”.

“Ok, have a nice day!”

“Thanks, bye”.

I waved goodbye to her, grabbed my blue jacket, got on my motorcycle and headed to school.

I also love to drive motorcycles. Once I got my driver’s license, I decided might as well get my motorcycle license. So I passed the test and purchased a motorcycle with the money I make from doing chores around the house.

I ride just a standard black motorcycle, it’s not really special, but whenever I ride it I feel relaxed.

I made it to school, just in time. I parked my bike and headed into the school. It looked the same as ever dirty, depressing, and just pathetic. I walked in and strolled through the hallways. I was also wearing my headphones listening to The Downfall Of us All by A Day to Remember, trying to block out all of the outside noise.

Everywhere I looked there was always a couple making out or a kid getting beat up or something, some school. But, I suppose it’s not all bad.

I made it to my locker, and my personal thoughts immediately went away when I felt a sudden hand on my shoulder. I looked over and saw that it was just Den, my best friend.

“Hey, what’s up, fool?” he asked jokingly.

“Dandy until you showed up.” I joked back.

His full name is Den Michaels. Den and I have been best friends ever since I moved here. We went to the same middle school and now we’re at the same high school. He wore an orange shirt, had short light brown spiky hair, pale flesh skin, and had one of those flashy attitudes where it’s just too much for you. He also had a silver stud earring on his left ear and tattered jeans.

“Hey, how was your match last week?” I asked him.

“I’ll admit, it was difficult, but I pulled through until the man couldn’t stand".

“In other words?”

“I won”. he answered while wiping the tip of his nose with his thumb while giving one of those cocky smiles.

Den is a young mixed martial artist at the school. Our school doesn’t have a mixed martial arts class, but sometimes after school he would hit the gym and practice some of his fighting moves. Then sometimes at the end of the week or so he would go to a stadium for young fighters and throw down. He’s even taken down guys that were three times his weight.

Even though we're the same age, Den’s the strongest guy I know, especially when he can attack you with different fighting styles. He has this dream to become the youngest mixed martial artist there is and maybe fight in the UFC. To me, that sounds like a death wish.

“That’s great.” I replied.

“Yeah, so where were you?” he asked, curiously.

“Studying.”

“Again? Dude, you got to get out more. Don’t you want to see the world, explore what’s out there?”

“You’re asking the wrong guy.”

As we were joking around, the bell rang and we had to run to our first class, Coordinated 2 science. In other worlds, life science.

We made it in time and took our seats as we watched the other kids walked in. Then I spotted another one of my friends who just walked in the class, named Kira Valentine.

She was tall, wore an emerald green coat along with short shorts, had long luscious blonde hair, slender figure, and had bright pink eyes. Kira was a very close friend. I only met freshman year, when Den and I were new at the school and she was a fellow loner and decided to join us, and so far we’ve had a very stable friendship. She’s like one of those friendly people, who always want to stick by you.

She walked past me and Den and took her seat. Pretty soon our teacher, Mr. Jones, came in and told everyone to sit down.

Then he spent to whole period talking about the life cycle about several insects and what their purpose in life was. Then when the bell was about to ring, he announced that we had to do a project.

“Alright class, this week you’ll have a project due. You have to create a poster for a life cycle for an insect. It can be any insect, no arthropods or anything else. You need step-by-step drawings, along with facts written underneath each graphic, and you’ll need to color it. You’ll need three in a group and it shouldn't take long at all. So pair up.” he directed us, and then sat down at his desk.

Everyone got up and searched for partners. Den and I paired up, no surprise, and we had to find someone else.  But before we had a chance, the bell rang and every one ran out.

Luckily, Den and I didn’t get trampled. It was break now so we needed to find another partner.  We were walking towards the lunch tables and then we saw something. We saw a group of guys harassing and hovering over Kira, getting in her face, grabbing her backpack, and trying to kiss her.

The tall leader who wore a red jacket that was bothering her was Gamble, the school thug. Alongside him we’re his goons, Jake and Jack, who mostly wore brown and purple. The other different was that one was fat and the other skinny with his hair in his eyes.

Gamble would do anything to get his way. Selfish and greedy, if you ask me he’s more like a dragon than a human.

I decided to go over there and do something, i hated it when guys badger my friends. I felt like I had to help her out, she always goes through with this kind of crap everyday. Where almost every guy tries to hit on her. I grabbed his shoulder and turned him around.

“Hey, Gamble leave her be.” I demanded.

“Hey, guys it’s biker boy! You think you’re s tough with your motorbike?” he tried to tease.

“No, why would a motorcycle make me seem tough?” I questioned, “Look just leave my friend alone.”

“Hey now, I was just asking if she wanted to be my partner for the project.” he responded.

“It looked like you were molesting her.”

“Well I wasn’t. So why don’t you screw off.”

“You’re so pathetic, Gamble, instead of doing the work yourself or getting your own money, you have to rely on others to give you what you wish.”

“What you say?”

He said while poking me in the chest. But I took no notice to it.

“You think you can say that to me? huh?” he said.

Then out of nowhere, he punched me right dead in the shoulder. The impact made me fall on the floor, it started to hurt a lot.

“You think you can say that to me!?”

Then he started to kick me repeatedly. Right in the stomach, it hurt like hell.

“Hey, that’s enough!” warned Den who stepped in.

“I can take him!” said Jake, the fat one who wore the brown jacket. He approached him and attempted to punch Den. But when he threw his punch, Den caught his arm, and then elbowed one of his triceps which made Jake squeal a bit. He then turned him around and restrained Jake’s arm behind his back. Then he shoved him towards Jack, the other one who was wearing the purple jacket, who tried to approach him.

They both fell on the floor defeated. Then Den looked at Gamble who was still kicking me. Gamble saw what Den did to his thugs, but he wasn’t intimidated by him.

“Is this going to be a problem?” asked Den.

“You don’t scare me. Just because you defeated my friends, doesn’t mean……”

But right in the middle of the sentence, Den punched Gamble in the chest bone, knocking him on the floor. Den went over and helped me up, I felt pretty beat up. Gamble got up and stared at us both.

“You won’t be so lucky next time.” he said. And he and his friends ran off, while he was holding his chest to make the pain stop.

“Bastard.” I commented.

“I know, right. But c’mon, you do you have to run off your big mouth like that?” asked Den.

“You ok?” Kira said, as we turned to her.

“I think I’ll live.” I replied to her.

“Well thanks. You know, it’s been like this a lot. Every time some guy spots me they just have to annoy the hell out of me.” continued Kira.

“That’s how some guys react when they see a pretty face.” said Den smiling, and then I elbowed him.

“So what did they really want?” I asked.

“Aside from helping him on the project, he was asking me to be his girlfriend.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry, Vin, I’d rather be dead than to be with him. The only boys I need are right in front of me.” she said refereeing to me and Den.

I looked down at her feet, and noticed that there was a blank white sheet near. I decided to pick it up and hand it to her. I turned it around and noticed that there was a bright green field and a village with small houses painted on it.

Kira is an amazing artist. She can paint from using water colors to acrylics to oil; she’s really talented at what she does.

“Another masterpiece?” I asked.

“Yep, who else could paint that?”

“This is your best one yet.” commented Den.

“Thanks, Gamble knocked it down while he was asking me to work with him. Are you sure you’re ok, he kicked you pretty hard.” she asked showing concern.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.” I replied.

“Ok, since I turn him down and that I don’t have a group yet, and if you guys don’t have a third, could I join?”

“I think the answer is pretty obvious, Kira.” I responded.

“Right, I think break is about over.”

And right when she said it the bell rang and everybody went to class.

Pretty much the rest of the day we were just walking around from class to class talking about the project, the day seemed to last forever. We decided that the insect we were going to do our project on is a Dragonfly, plain and simple. So after school we would all meet at my house to get started on the project.

After a few more classes the bell finally rang and everyone was going home.

I walked out of the building and head towards my motorcycle in the parking lot. I hopped on, strapped on my helmet, and started the engine. It made that loud starting sound and was ready to go. I lifted both of my feet off the ground and began to move. I rode out of the parking lot and started to ride home.

Sometimes, as I was riding, I would ponder to myself why I’m still here? The world I live in is too bland; I know we can do better. As I was riding down the road with the wind blowing around my body, I started to think about my mom. She’s been in the hospital for a while now, I just hope that her illness gets cured soon, and she can come home. I don’t even know what happened it was Saturday, I was watching cartoons, my mom was making eggs and bacon, and then out of nowhere she collapsed. I really don’t know what happened, I called an ambulance and they took her away.

My aunt told me she had some sort of attack, I can’t remember what, and said that she was going to take care of me until she felt better. So my aunt moved in and has raised me ever since.

I finally made it to my house and parked my motorcycle in the garage. Then I went inside to get started on the project. I told my aunt Den and Kira were coming over and she seemed fine by that.

I ran upstairs and looked through the bookshelf in my room to see if I had any on insects. I only had about one or two books on bugs but they were mostly kid books and told very little information. I searched for 5 minutes but no luck.

I heard a car driving up from outside. I looked out my window, and noticed that Den parked his car next to the sidewalk. Both he and Kira stepped out and were walking towards the door. The door then knocked and I heard my aunt calling me.

“Vincent, your friends are here!” she informed me.

I came downstairs, greeted them, and lead them upstairs into my room getting ready to start the project.

“Your room’s kind of messy. Same as always.” said Kira.

“Sorry about that. Just can’t find any books on insects. The only thing that’s close is these children books.” I told them, then showed them the two books. One of them was an Eyewitness book on insects and the other was Insects Everywhere book.

“Well, whatever works.” said Den.

I removed my laptop from my desk and cleared everything else off, leaving a big space.

“I think this is where we should draw the diagram, and write in facts beside it.” I started to explain.

“I can get started on the Dragonfly?” asked Kira.

“Sure, and I’ll see if I have any other books.” I said.

And so Kira got to work and began to draw the Dragonfly, while Den was just standing around practicing his punches.

“Hey, Den, quit fooling around. We need to work on the project”. I said to him.

“Alright fine, I got another match in a matter of days and I want to make sure my blows will be hard enough”. He replied.

“You’ll be fine”.

“You know, sometimes I wish for a better challenge. Maybe fight a professional fighter that’s actually in the UFC.”

“You call it a challenge, I call it suicide”.

“Pfff”.

“Why do you challenge a heavy fighter anyway?” I asked him

“Why is it that you ask questions you already know the answer too?” he responded.

“I know that, but is there like some complicated motive you have behind it all?"

“I have my reasons”. That was all he said.

“Well, I’ll have to ask what your reasons are later, because we got to….”

I then noticed something on my bookshelf. One of the books on it was suddenly sparkling. I grabbed it and pulled it out of the shelf to look at it more. I looked at the cover, and it seemed to have a horse’s head on it.

“Vincent, I didn’t know you like horses”. commented Den.

“What? This isn’t my book. I didn’t even know I had this book”. I replied confused. Then Kira stood up and walked towards us.

“Hey did you find any other books on…….what’s that?” she asked.

“Some kind of book I found”.

I opened it up to see what lies within it, all that was there were a bunch of words pressed together, as if they weren’t even spaced.

“This some kind of old timey book?” asked Den

“I’m not sure. And I highly doubt there’s any information in here about dragonflies.” I answered sarcastically.

“Hey, look at that”. pointed out Kira. There were some words written down, but these words were glowing brightly, brighter than the others. I read aloud what the words said, that turned out to be my big mistake. The words read, Lleps Latrop Cigam. I was so curious enough to actually read them aloud.

Right when I spoke those words, a strange portal appears out of nowhere and is now in my room. I guess curiosity did kill the cat. We all stared at it with awe and fear.

“What the hell?” Den asked with many confusion.

The portal was large and violet, many swirls and lightning bolts is what it was made up of.

“How did…you do that?” asked Kira.

“I don’t know. I don’t like the looks of it”. I answered.

We all decide to get a closer look so we all leaned forward and squint our eyes to see if there was anything. But, we got too close, and the portal pulled us in.We were suddenly swirling round and round. We didn’t scream, we were all too speechless of what’s happening, we didn’t know how to react. I then saw a light ahead, and it’s not the light we’re all familiar with. When we got closer to the light, I felt that we all hit something hard.

I felt like we were lying on the ground. I felt motionless. I then opened my eyes slowly, my vision was blurry. But from what I could make up of, it seemed we were all in a forest or somewhere with nature. My vision finally cleared, and noticed that we were on some kind of path.

“Oh god, my head hurts”. I said to myself.

I rubbed my head with my hand, but something felt different. My hand felt flatter than normal, and I couldn’t feel my fingers. I pulled my hand down in front of my face to get a better view, only I realized…….I didn’t have a hand anymore. Instead, I had a hoof!

“What?”

I raised my other hand, only to see that it also became a hoof. I was really starting to freak out now. I looked to my right, and noticed a small pond nearby. I then began to crawl towards the pond. When I made it, I looked down into the water to see my reflection. And, I was horrified; to see that……I was no longer a human. I suddenly had a snout or muzzle or something and noticed that I had a blue coat.

“What the hell is going on!!!” I shouted

I became a small horse! I’m not screwing around, I am now a horse!

I turned around and saw that my friends were waking up as well, only to see, that Kira and Den have also became horses. They woke and stared at each other and saw what they are now, they were both paralyzed with fear knowing what they have become. Kira then turned her head towards me with a scared expression on her face.

“Vincent?.....” she said scared .

“Guys, don’t lose your minds, but I think that portal took us somewhere. And turned us all into equines”. I told them.

Shocked with this new reality, Den only said one thing, “Bullshit”……