Paradise Now
We were just five high school Bronies, and friends as well. We've come a long way since then. The winds of change brought us to this magical land, a place we've come to love. Since we were friends we shared a 'magical' connection, to ourselves and the show. I guess you could say it's how we ended up here, but I don't think I'll ever know for sure. My name is Dustin and this is the story of how unfortunate occurrences brought me and my friends to paradise.
'goddammit' I thought. 'It's brighter than usual.'
I was laying down in what felt like grass, but I couldn't look around because the sun was trying to blind me. So I kept them shut for now. Taking a deep breath I noticed how fresh the air was, it was stimulating. Fortunately the sun wasn't as hot as it was bright, rather it was warm, comfortably warm. I skipped right to the next sense and focused on what I could hear. I listened intently trying to focus on everything around me. I could hear birds chirping in the background, something about it seemed strange though. I tried to listen keenly to the beautiful chirping the birds were making. It was nice, almost as if it were choreographed.
'Whatever' I thought as I shook those thought still. I had to think about the now, not about the birds.
I heard leaves rustling in the wind off to my left.
Wind, the wind felt nice, like a mother trying to comfort her hurt child. Softly, it danced around the grass. I skipped to the next sense and focused on the grass my hands were touching. It wasn't coarse like 'normal' grass, it was soft and felt immensely more natural, as if it had been growing there for centuries.
I soon noticed that I wasn't squinting as hard and decided to, once again, open my eyes.
As the blinding white light light from hell dissipated, I pushed myself to a sitting position. An over exaggerated grunt escaped my face hole as I peered around. Everything looked normal so far, trees, birds, a giant city on a mountai-
"Ohhhh shiiiieeaatt" I slowly whispered. A nostalgic feeling rushed over me. Something about this place seemed familiar, although I couldn't quite think of it. I quickly took a visual note of my surroundings.
There was indeed a tree off to my left. It was a fairly large oak tree complete with leaves whirling in the wind.
At that moment a leaf landed ever so gently upon my head and...
I had a miniature freakout. Jolted to a standing position, I swatted my hair for the antagonizing.. thing. The leaf fell to the ground. I felt relieved, glad that it wasn't a spider or some other 'demon from hell'. I also felt disturbed at my reaction to such a petty event, as if I was in shock from a more traumatic one. 'But now is not the time to dwell on such things' I thought to myself.
Now standing I gazed upon the land I found myself in. looking as far as I could I peered at what could be described as one of the most beautiful landscapes I'd ever seen. Green everywhere. The cascading green hills formed the bases of massive mountains that soared into the bluest sky ever. Complete with otherworldly clouds that glided along the serene skyline. This place I found myself in was intensely beautiful. The city on the mountain was like the icing upon the cake. Although I couldn't see it well enough, I could tell it was glinting. Like a crystal diamond floating in a pool of fresh spring water. This world commanded my full attention, but it wouldn't matter as another thought slowly drifted into my conscience...
Home.
'Where am I?' I thought. 'How?...' I stopped myself
I continued to stare into the relaxing world around me, I thought about home. Inhaling sharply, almost as a need for that intoxicating fresh air. I thought, and thought, and thought, all in vain. Although I could remember my home clearly, I didn't remember how I arrived here.
"Not good" I sighed.
I looked down at my clothes. White shirt tattered jeans. 'my god I look awful.' I deemed. I slackly stared at my clothes and noticed something different. I pulled off my ragged shirt staring in awe at something I beheld as 'nothing but awesome'. Pecs, deltoids, biceps, triceps, etc. I was built, quite average, not massive but still pretty large. The muscles comfortably bulged under my skin as if they have been there for years.
'But these had never been there' I told myself. I wasn't a fat bro, but at 21 years old I wasn't exactly a gym goer either.
As the situation I found myself in continued to mindrape me, I again looked up to the horizon.
A small hill ahead only allowed me to see a portion of my strange new world, the city, and the mountains. Curiosity getting the better of me I wanted to know what was behind it in what I presumed was a valley . I tied my shirt around my waist and started off walking. Shortly thereafter my newly discovered muscles coaxed me into lightly jogging.
Agility, speed, endurance... although the hill wasn't far off, I discovered some things that were new to me on the way there. It felt good to run. 'kinda like how you stretch after a long nap or whatever' I thought to myself.
A few minutes had passed as I effortlessly navigated the landscape mastering it's natural beauty. I had finally reached the hill deeply breathing in that fresh air. I eyed the land ahead and it didn't take long for me to see a comfy looking town amidst the hypnotic scenery, almost as if it was a puzzle piece in an artist's treasured painting.
My eyes 'eye-spied' a single meager river flowing down the center of the world. It flowed past the hill into a forest, but in the other direction it passed the town and disappeared beside the city clad mountain. I turned my attention to the ominous looking forest, sure it looked slightly creepy, but it also looked like it belonged there. It belonged there like evil belonged with good, and good with chaos, and chaos with harmony, the never ending circle of life. I stopped philosophizing for a moment as a burning sensation caught my throat. I was very thirsty, and upon seeing the river, the sensation of thirst arrived right on time.
Starting down the hill, my legs unconsciously guided me towards the sparkling waters. As I slowly walked down the hill I took time to continue asking the questions I had asked for the past thirty minutes. 'Where am I? How did I get here? Which way's home? ', and now 'Where did these muscles come from?'. I doubted that I would find those answers anytime soon. In fact, a part of me felt like I already knew the answers, but when I thought deeply upon them... The answers eluded me, as if an invisible hand pushed them further from my conscience. Along with that I still had this feeling of nostalgia to deal with, as if I'd been here before. As I thought upon these feelings the wave of nostalgia subsided... for now.
I reached the edge of the river, dropping to my knees almost immediately. I cupped my hands together and brought the sweet substance to my lips drinking it greedily. I must have drank at least a pint of water before I was satisfied. I looked down into the glistening water, and gazed upon my reflection. Staring right back at me was a stranger... I looked slightly older, at least four years, with brown hair, eyes, and stubble to match. I admired myself for a moment, not with pride, but with curiosity. 'Maybe I had a bout of amnesia, and am only now recovering?'. Before I could dwell on that thought I was interrupted by the most menacing growl I've ever heard. I scurried around and clamored to my feet closely eying all directions. Then I looked down, sighing once I realized that it was my stomach. I was obviously hungry, but I've only just realized it. 'Maybe I should see if that town has any food.' I told myself, as I started walking.
Just then I heard an actual growl across the river, followed by several more random forest noises. At least the forest was on the other side. On my side of the river there were trees but they were spread out upon the grassland more evenly. I walked in the direction of the town, on a dirt road conveniently placed along the bank of the river. My trashed sneakers made virtually no noise as they softly tread across the ground, but my conscience was screaming hundreds of questions at me. I tried my best to ignore them, only resulting in a brand new headache clawing at the front of my cranium.
'I'm hungry, tired, and now I have a headache' I told myself, trying to make the situation sound intense and dangerous. Unfortunately it only served to make it sound more annoying than life threatening.
As those thoughts brushed upon my psyche, I came across a bridge leading into the forest. The dirt road I had been traversing forked into two different directions. 'Across the bridge into the daunting forest, or into the valley towards the town.'
"Looks like I'm going this way" I quickly sputtered, as I strolled towards the town.
I must have been walking for at least thirty minutes, during that time I tried my best to enjoy the view, as the sun still dangled high.. in the sky. 'Must be around two' I pondered 'My god I'm hungry. I wonder if there's a Pizza Hut nearby, or a Dell Taco, or a bunch of hot chicks bathing in chocolate.. dude, that would be one hell of a party, a party isn't a party without chicks, chow, and my bros.'
I hadn't thought much about my friends, 'I wonder what they're up to right now?' Sure we stayed in touch, but it kinda fell apart after high school. Robert joined the police academy after his sister was murdered, he said "It's something I need to do Dj." I haven't really talked to him since then. Brandon moved to California to go to college, he got a scholarship because of his swimming and only comes to Utah once or twice a year. Jake finally made up his mind and joined the military, and has, "been shooting shit, then blowing shit up to pass the time, but not always in that order." And finally, Sean moved back home and we were roommates. All of us as fiends had something in common, but I cant remember what that was.
The town was still quite far, but I made well enough. The road evened out further down and I could make out a dark figure heading this way. It was but a pinprick at first but it slowly materialized closer. As it got to, say.. a hundred yards away I could see that it was a donkey of sorts. 'Perhaps a farmer or someone misplaced their livestock' I thought as I decreased the space between us. At about ten yards the donkey stopped and started staring at me. I came closer and noticed that this donkey was very strange looking, with large eyes and hairpiece to match. 'Maybe I'm in Mongolia or something?' Strangely it put its front leg up to its chin and made a curious facial expression. Realizing that animals almost never do that I grinned and brought my hand up to my chin to say.. "What dafuq?" almost laughingly.
I must've scared the shit out of it because it made a weird ass noise.
"hee haw!" it shrieked quickly clamoring back towards the town, and periodically stumbling.
Mocking it I yelled back "Yeah well... donkey's don't wear hairpieces anyway!" Still laughing I shrugged and continued towards the town. I then realized the gravity of how weird that whole situation was but.. 'Mongolia.. or Russia.' I was still worried though, not convinced that some.. thing could look as god awful as that thing looked.
I was practically starving as the town came closer into view. With luck the dirt road arrived at an apple orchard, then coincided along the orchard towards town. I could stand it no longer. Groggily I managed to lazily crawl over the white fence. I reached a rather massive apple tree and, wanting to test my upper body strengh I slowly, but surely, climbed to one of its upper branches. Sitting my ass down I reached for a nearby apple, grasping it with exigency. Leaning back against the trunk I sunk my teeth into the destitute apple and..
My irises enlarged as I was once again the subject of a brain fuck.
"Whoa.." was all that I was able to say before I stuffed my face with the apple. More followed suit, as ,one after another, I devoured the sweet narcotics. Needless to say they were the most flavorful instances of food to ever humble my taste buds. It was like taking Jesus, and putting Jesus into apple.. but not really.. basically... it tasted really. fucking. good.
Ten or so minutes of stuffing my face later..
Satisfied I sat back against the tree and took in the fantastic view. I thought once again of home and my family and friends. But a loud "THUD!", paired with the shaking of the tree and apples falling around me stirred my conscience. The vibrations caused me to slip off the branch and fall at least fifteen feet. My luck apparently had run its course as a conveniently placed rock sideswiped my conveniently placed skull.
I heard a unsettling noise before I blacked out.