H.O.M.E.

H.O.M.E., its civilians in distress and the criminals that rule it only get more powerful as the days go by. Its a wonder on how those civilians survive in such a environment.  Darling continues thinking this to himself as he looks at a mirror on the wall in a small metal room of the large aircraft that was transporting him to the city known as "Home."

The name made him scratch his head a little.  "I wonder who thought up such a name for such a violent city....?" he shrugged and continued to look at himself in the mirror, his entire body color consisted of no more colors other than pink and somewhat a darker pink that outlined some layers of his puffy and fluffy mane along with his tail having the same details. His body was healthy and muscular, though he was rather small for a full grown male earth pony.

Not like it ever really bothered him, any pony that would tease him about his size or looks usually ended up with their head in the ground. But those were older days, he now works for the Equestrian government, a large group of royal blooded ponies who, in his personal opinion, have their heads up their own asses as far as he could tell.

He never figured out why he got into such business, most likely because he didn't want his years of training going to complete waste. When he was little, he was always pushed around by bullies and his own family.

His father would always tell him "I can’t believe you let such little brats push you around like that! I expect better Darling!" Then his father would turn away and leave Darling to sulk in the shame that was put upon him. Darling would try to turn to his mother for comfort though she was never any different than his father.

Eventually, the day came when the small, pink, weak and hurt pony got sick of it all. He promised himself that he would grow up to be a fighter who would be ruthless and powerful and would stand for those who couldn't stand for themselves.

As time went on, Darling soon dominated all bullies in his school, then he fought down the criminals who sought nothing but power and greed but soon after that, nothing.

Life was peaceful in his town.

Soon after, Darling saw that he couldn't put his talents and skills to good use here. He didn't know what he should do but a shine of hope from the Equestrian government showed him that his talents didn't have to go to waste. He took hold of that opportunity, doing whatever dirty work the government wanted him to do.

The things he saw on his missions, the things he fought, the things he did. It was all new, yet not for him. The time soon came that the government wanted him to take care of something big, so big that they doubted him. They wanted him to go into a city filled with hatred and death, crimes everyday, around almost every corner, there was a rat to be found. It was a big city, too.

After all, size matters.

Darling himself had a bit of doubt on this mission, but he couldn't resist. He wanted to take this mission. He wanted to help the civilians who were suffering in the crimes of others. Now here he was, thinking about his past and how it led up to where he is now. On a aircraft headed to the city that could be believed to be hell in disguise.

"Five Minutes till landing sir!" said the pilot on an intercom speaker built into the plane above his door. Darling nodded and quit looking into the mirror, he went to his closet. He opened it to find his most favored attire for battle.

A purple silk tuxedo made with a strange type of magical thread that is harder than steel but light as a feather. It could hold against most magic and projectiles such as bullets, but gave a glossy finish to it. He put on the white button up dress shirt that he wore under the whole suit.

He buttoned up the neck and then applied his tie to it. The tie was pure black and long. He tightened it as tight as he could, or at least to the point where it covered the button at the neck and was perfectly aligned in the middle of the collar of the shirt.

Finally came the final touch. The purple dress pants and dress jacket. He put on the clothing then finished up with the tightening of his black leather belt. "Feels good to wear this..." he said to himself with a small smile. "Shit, I look good too."

He smiled more while looking back into the mirror on the wall and examined his own looks. He brushed his puffy dark and light pink hair to the side and nodded. "That's better." Darling put the brush into one of the two suitcases he had packed, they both contained ammo clips for his gun, money, clothes and small fashioning supplies such as his small mirror and hair brush.

Darling never understood why but he was always attracted to the 'fancy looks' as ponies would call it. There was never a day when he didn't look nice while going out somewhere, whether or not it was a mission.

"We are now landing, sir!" said the pilot. Darling quickly picked up what appeared to be a large scroll case and his magnum that he quickly hid in a pocket that acted like a holster for his weapon. There was one thing missing, though. Darling scanned the room with his bright violet eyes, his sight took hold of a single, golden watch attached to a golden chain. The watch sat on his desk in the small makeshift room.

Darling went over to it and picked up the shiny, ticking watch. He opened it up with the push of a metal button on the side of its body. A small hologram of a digital clock, four blue bars that had words on them.

Record, Call, Scan and Map.

The watch was designed to look completely inconspicuous. The golden object was actually a small supercomputer that could hold over a thousand bits worth of information. It could allow darling to make calls to others, scan a person and load up certain records of their life. It could take photos, and record audio and video at the touch of a button.

The fine piece of technology was the best of its kind. Darling shut the lid of the watch and put it into his pocket.

"Sir we have made contact with the ground. Exit when ready!" Darling takes a breath and picks up what he has packed. The wall made a hiss and opened up into a giant door and touched down, leading to the ground. Darling left the ship and walked outside. The air was sweet, the sky was ever so black with the night, the only light was the shine of the moon and the bright buildings of the city that stood before him.

The city called HOME.

Darling entered the city through its two tall gates, rusted and scraped from years of damage and wear. The spikes at the top of them were twisted and sharp, jagged in certain places to deter robbers.

Normally this would unsettle a casual being on the spot. Darling was never usually disturbed by such things, for he was not normal.

It actually made him feel happy. It made him feel like this was going to be a fun mission. After passing the gates, Darling looked up at the tall buildings that were full of life. Lights shined bright through the windows, shadows moving at a rather fast pace in the windows and plenty of noise to listen for.

But the streets were another story. The streets were mostly empty, only a few ponies walked out and about in the night. It was clear of most traffic and there was some thick fog that lived on the brick ground.

"My, my, this certainly is a sight you’d never see back in my hometown....I like it." Darling said to himself with a big grin. He crossed the street, looking both ways before he did, it felt quite funny to do so when the streets were empty for the most part. Upon reaching the other side of the street, He met with one of the many tall buildings. The mid section of it held large metal letters that read "The Twisty Inn." The building lived up to the name. It was yellow and seemed to be turned in one direction like a twisted root that grew from the ground up. It made Darling wonder how one would even build such a thing. He shrugged and entered.

The inside had lights that glowed a dark purple, they were decorated with silver chains that hung them and a spiked ring around the core of the glass bulb. Darling looked down at the floor.

The floor had a diamond like shape pattern all over it, each tile had a nicely painted silver pony skull in the middle. He looked to his left and saw a long desk that cut off at the end with a opening to get behind it. The desk held a small lamp with a white square shade on it, some paper work, and a large box of tissues.

Sitting behind it was a mare. She had long silver hair with brown highlights through it. Her fur was a light shade of red and some grey spots on her visible body parts.

She wore a pure black leather vest with a green dress shirt under it, a yellow tie and some silk red dress pants. A rather unusual combination of colors in Darlings personal opinion. Though it was nice. Her eyes seemed to glow silver as darling looked into them.

“May i help you?" She said in a light, sweet tone with a bright smile. "Yes, i need a room for tonight. Or actually... several nights if that's alright?" Darling never asked to stay no more than a night or so on his missions, but he could already tell that this is going to take more than a simple night to get done.

"Of course sir, we have a few rooms available, but, are you sure about several nights here? Its quite costly." Darling smirked. "Oh don't worry." Darling pulled out a large handful of cash with a Five-hundred dollar tag wrapped around it. The mare's eyes widen at it. "Will this do?" The mare shook her head and nodded.

"Yes it will, thank you for staying at the Twisty inn." Darling smiled. "Here, take this as a tip." Darling pulled out another five-hundred dollar tagged wad of cash. "For being sweet and kind." Darling handed it to her. The mares jaw slightly dropped before she quickly stuffed the money into her inside pocket of her leather vest.

Darling began to walk away but was stopped by the mare yelling something to him. "I almost forgot, here is your key to your room, sir!" Darling turned towards her direction and held his hoof out, gesturing her to toss the key, she tossed it. It twirled through the air and landed into darlings hand. "Thank you little miss." Darling continued walking and made his way into an elevator. The doors closed.

The elevator had a casual design. The insides were metal with wooden grips everywhere, then there was a panel with glowing blue buttons, all glowing blue. There was over 50 different floors. "Hmm.....I wonder.." Darling examine the metal key that still sat in his hand. The key read. "Room 345, floor 10." He smirked. "I suppose that's rather helpful." Darling pushed the tenth floor button and the glowing light went from blue to bright purple.

The elevator shot up causing Darling to stumble, he wasn't ready for such a push of force. "God dammit...hell of a rush!" The fast movement stopped and the doors shot open, revealing a long hallway with doors up and down its sides. He quickly left the elevator and frantically looked for his room number."Come on, it's here somewhere..." Darling went down a bit further down the hall and eventually found the three hundred numbered doors. "There we are..." He soon found himself at his room.

He used the key and turned the knob, it easily turned and made a loud squeaky noise. He slowly opened the door to only see what should be expected. A small room with little decoration to it but it smelled nice and it was nicely taken care of, though its contents were few. One bed in the center of the room, a work table to the far left corner of it, a small bathroom and a single small television on a desk in front of the bed. "Not much, but it will do."

He closed the door and set his suitcases next to the bed. He yawned and stretched. "Damn, i would love to rest, sadly the night isn't quite over yet for me." Darling pulled out his golden watch device and pressed the button to open its lid.

He began updating on what his mission was exactly.  A blue holographic face appeared on the watches surface. "Hello Darling, did you make it to the city of H.O.M.E?" The face belonged to general Munku, a retired griffin war veteran that now serves the government as an information giver and holder.

"Yes general Munku, i have just reached a motel of some sorts, known as the Twisty in. Looks like this will be my main base of operation."  Munku smiled. "Good to know you made it there safely, now, about your mission here in Home.

There are two targeted suspects, we are not entirely sure about their whereabouts or who they are, we do know that they are the leaders of one major gang that call themselves the "Silver Diamonds.", Quite silly if you ask me."

Darling shrugged. "Its somewhat creative." Munku laughed. "My grandchildren come up with better names for things, anyways. It would seem like this gang in specific is the one causing all the trouble there in Home.  You need to find out who these ponies are, their plan's, any other places where their gang may be, then eliminate them."

Darling nodded. "Oh and general Munku, one last question, why can't the government just send in their military and wipe these guy's out?" Munku chuckled. "Come on kid, think about it, you're on foreign ground, in a foreign country, we can't just send in our troops like it was our own property,

We could end up starting a huge war, that's why we sent you in, its the safest way that the government could think of to help the ponies in the area. Silently take care of the problem and save the people from the endless crime there, country's a horrible place, they don't ever take care of their people." Darling shrugged.

"Shouldn't be that much of a problem. Gangs are just adorable, trying to be threatening." Munku didn't laugh nor even smile. "Don't underestimate this one Darling...they are a powerful bunch, there have been over five different spies sent in, all powerful, all gone without a trace.

Be careful, do what you must to stop the gang causing the trouble there in the city. General Munku, out!" The hologram faded down as Darling closed it's lid and then stuffed it back into his suit pocket.

"Where to look first.....shit i don't even know where i should go looking for answers, city's so damn huge..." Said Darling as he looked out a window, taking in the view  from the high point of the building he was at.

"Maybe i should just go to a bar, there is always some asshole there that usually would give some answers, but i don't even know who to ask. Fuck i don't even know any clues that lead to this gang other than their name..."

Darling went from the window to the bathroom's mirror, he stared at it, stroking his chin in a thinking manner. "Must be something, there must be something...." Soon darling found himself laying on the bed staring at the ceiling.

"I should go through the data logs on the mission, i might find some information to latch onto." Darling yanked the golden watch from his pocket and said "Mission information." The holographic display showed blue letters saying "Loading'.

Soon after it brought up pictures, worded documents and other information that wasn't very helpful. Darling read the worded documents to himself, nothing, he began examining the images then quickly notice something in one of them.

There in the picture was a changeling holding up a gun to a civilian shouting, but other than that, a tattooed symbol was on his arm. It was a clear outline of a diamond, silver color. "Pretty simple but at least i got some kind of lead other than a name." He put the watch into his pocket then got up. "I suppose ill start the night off by simply exploring the city...and look for this...diamond symbol..."

Darling left his room and went back out into the hall. He quickly made his way to the elevator. He pushed the button to go back down to the lobby floor.

After a fast ride like last time, the doors flew open and Darling met with the lobby yet again. Though this time, there was a little more excitement going on. There was shouting, screaming and the sounds of several footsteps.

Darling quietly left the elevator and hid behind a wall that was close enough to what was going on.

He looked over his shoulder and took a peek.

There standing by the desk, were four tall, grey, ponies with black Mohawk style haircuts, brown leather vest, black undershirts, blue pants, green eyes and armed with HK21' machine guns and butterfly knifes.

"Look bitch, we want the money!" One of them yelled. He seemed to be the leader of the small group, his appearance was slightly different from the rest of the punks. His hair was green rather than black like the rest, his vest was silver and he held a RG-6 grenade launcher as his weapon of choice.

"I gave you all that we own!" Shouted the mare at the desk.

"Bullshit!" The green haired stallion shouted back.  "I know about the money that, that little pretty boy gave you!" The stallion smacked her, a loud noise emitting from the impact, she went down to the floor holding her face where a red mark slowly began to appear.

"Now give me that fucking cash before i decide to blow your FUCKING BRAINS OUT ONTO THE GODDAMN PAVEMENT OUTSIDE!"

The mare screamed at the volume of his voice. She quickly reached into the inside pocket of her vest and pulled out the five-hundred dollars.

"Good, now was that so hard? Stupid bitch!"

The green haired stallion laughed and began to walk away. "She's all yours boys."

He said as he went outside laughing. The other stallions all looked at each other and grinned. "Oh, i am gonna make you squeal like one of the whores down the street." One of them said.

"Look at her, she looks just like one of my first one's." another said.

They began to approach her, towering and casting a dark shadow that made her shake with fear.

"No, get away, please no!" She pleaded but they only giggled and got closer.

"I think that's enough, the little lady asked you to leave her alone..." Darling came out from behind the wall he hid behind, walking towards them with a small smirk on his face.

"Who the fuck do you think your talking to!?" One of them shouted while quickly walking towards darling.

Darling kept walking in his slow pace. barely giving a notice to the tall stallion that rushed towards him. "Just another little punk with a foot up his ass." Darling simply replied.

At that moment, the punk stallion was within arm's distance of darling, the stallion took the opportunity gladly with a smile. "I am gonna enjoy beating that little pussy face of yours!" The stallion swung his right arm with a fist at the end towards Darling.

Before the stallion knew it, all the motion in his arm suddenly stopped, right in mid air. Darling caught the fist in his palm, he gripped it tightly. Darling was looking down, his face hidden by his puffy mane.

"The last person who said anything bad about my looks...ended up with their head in the ground." Darling looked back up with a grin.

Darling pulled the stallion towards him with a attack of his own waiting. Darlings fist met with the soft skull of the punk's. The stallion went dazed as Darling pulled three more nearly impossible to see swings with his fist.

All making contact with the stallions face.

A few teeth and lots of blood came flying from the stallions mouth and nose. Eventually the stallion fell to his knees and with what looked like a painful and bloody goofy look on his face. Darling finished him with a knee to the nose then a kick to the back of the head that forced the stallions head to slam into the floor.

"Well...not exactly into the ground...but it works for me..." Darling looked back up at the other group members.

One of the shorter stallions shouted "Fill his ass up with lead!"

They all aimed and fired their guns. They didn't know what they were exactly hitting, only if they killed their target, they didn't care. The part of the room they continuously fired their guns at, quickly dusted up. Soon the gun clips emptied. The group of punks all laughed. "Dumbass! Why would being your fist to a gunfight!?" one of them yelled out of the random.

They all heard footsteps moving towards them quickly. Out of the dusty air came Darling, his magnum in hand and ready to fire.

"Who said i didn't bring a gun!?" he said as he laughed.

He aimed his gun and at the moment, time felt like it slightly slowed down.  Darling fired, a large fiery blast coming from the barrel of his gun with a large bullet coming out of it. The bullet made contact with the head of one of the punks, his head exploding causing his brains to burst outward and onto the walls.

Darling fired again before the next stallion could react, this bullet made contact with his head as well, causing the blood splatter of brains on the wall to only multiply.

The last standing stallion of the now non existent group was the short one. He stood there shaking with his gun that was not aimed nor loaded.

"Well, it would seem like you have come to meet your end little one." Darling smirked as he aimed his gun at the center of the short stallions head. "Any last words?" He asked.

The short stallion fell to his knees and began to cry, he dropped his gun to the floor as he did so. "I don't want to die!" He screamed.

Darling took a breath and began to slowly walk towards the short pony while keeping his aim pointed at his head.

The little stallion looked up to find darlings tall shadow towering over him like a dark monster that was not of his world. He shivered in fear and held onto his head as if it would protect him.

"I can tell you are still young and learning...." Darling said while putting his gun away. "Tell me young one.....how many people have you killed already..?"

The short stallion looked back up at him with a bit more relax expression. "None yet....if those bullets i fired hit you...you were the first person i even tried to fire at!"

Darling chuckled. "Then there is still hope in that mind of yours child....keep that kill count at none, unless you have to add to it. Now run along...and don't return to this...gang life...it will never get you anywhere." Darling pat his head and helped him up and out of the building.

The short stallion looked back at him and smiled. Though Darling couldn't hear it, he could tell the pony said thank you as he ran off.

"Children these day's...oh its amusing sometimes." At that moment he heard quite small footsteps behind him. He quickly turned around to find the mare that worked at the desk.

"That was very...brave of you..." She smiled, rubbing the hand mark on her face from being smacked earlier. Darling nodded and walked up to her, he rubbed her shoulder.

She gave him a happy look before wrapping him up in a tight hug. Darling jumped at this and quickly calmed himself.

"I can see that your extremely thankful for my help little miss."

"Well...of course, you saved my life from those...bastards."

She took a breath and let go of Darling.

Darling stretched. "It's just what i do."

"If that's what you do, well then, you are surely to be busy here....there are to many to count in this gigantic city that would love to harm others and each other"

Darling gave her a rather curious look. "Do they now? Then it seems like i will be having a lot of interesting entertainment here."

The mare's eyes slightly closed as a hungry grin appeared on her face. "Trust me sir....there is plenty of entertainment to go around....." She said while slowly stroking a finger up his chest then up to his chin ending the movement with a flick.

"If you want me to thank you in a much more...pleasant way....then don't be afraid to come here and find me..if you catch my drift.." She giggled.

Darling blushed as well has coughed. "How could you offer me such a thing after i...splattered the brains of someone on the wall...right in front of your very eyes?"

She shrugged as her grin slowly died. "Its actually a normal thing to see in this city....I've just gotten very...use to it,  Sorry."

A few things went through darlings mind at that moment when she said that. It slightly reminded him of well, himself. He remembered how he got use to those type of things after seeing them so much. It kinda bothered him to think about, soon reality came back to his head and he saw the mare just staring at him, expecting some kind of answer.

"Yeah...i suppose i can relate to such a thing."

The mare's grin came back up. "As can many others in this poor excuse for a city."

She began to walk away and looked back to say something.

"Names Lustica." The young mare entered the elevator and blew a kiss and said. "See ya around cutie." As the elevators doors closed.

Darling stood there trying to piece together what just happened. "Lustica...lust...Oh, so that's why she was.....my, my." Darling shook his head and headed for the entrance doors that led to the streets of home.

"Back out into the streets.....it's been awhile since i have done a mission this exciting...." Darling opened the doors and entered the city.