Racing through the forest as fast as his legs could go brought back old memories to Slade Wilson. He recalled back when he had been in the army and was forced to train inside insect infest jungles and woods to accustom him to where he and the other soldiers would be fighting. He could almost hear the sounds of people shouting, gunfire ripping across the air and the feeling of adrenaline rushing through his veins. It was one of the few memories that he actually enjoyed visiting.

'This is not the time to be stuck in the past,' Slade thought to himself, pulling a knife out of his boot and using it to mark a large tree as he ran by it. 'Right now I need to find a way to locate where I am and how this land looks. Once I have an idea of the lay of the land, it will make it easier for me to eliminate areas where such a powerful device could be held.'

Deathstroke came across a small rive and knelt down next to it, taking a moment's reprieve to reach into his armor's compartment and pulled out a small, magical tracker device. He active it and pointed the tip of it in every direction, but he barely got a reaction out of the device.

"I must be too far from the source to be picking up a signal," Deathstroke muttered as he shelved the device. "Of course I would end up as far from the source as possible. Damn that Wade Wilson, I'd kill him if I was able to."

As Deathstroke took off running again, he found his mind being drawn back to the red clad mercenary, whose powers and abilities made Deathstroke pause for a moment to think. He had never feared an opponent before, be them hero or villain. The only hero he was nervous around was Superman, but he had plans that could deal with him. The only villains he feared were Darkseid and Doomsday. He knew there was nothing in his arsenal that could stop them.

But Deadpool was far different than the other mercenaries that he had to deal with in the past. He was insane, that much Deathstroke could tell with ease. After being around Joker, Deathstroke could tell when someone had lost their mind. It wasn't Deadpool's mental state that concerned Deathstroke, but instead it was his insane ability to heal faster than Deathstroke could wound him.

'I've come across people before who can heal, myself included, but never anyone that can heal as rapidly and without side effects like him,' Deathstroke thought as he continued his run, using the sun overhead to determine where he was going. 'I cut the bastard in half and he just sticks himself back together. I blow his brains out and all he does is start talking funny. He may be a problem down the road. I should have killed him then and there.'

'Damn that pony for interfering,' Deathstroke snarled to himself as he came to a small clearing in the trees, a place filled with all sorts of insects the likes of which Slade had never seen before. 'I would have found a way to keep Deadpool dead had she not shown up. She should thank my employer that he paid me nearly triple of what the mission was worth to not kill any of them.'

Deathstroke then looked down at his arm to see that a butterfly had landed on it, a butterfly with wings that changed color depending on the way the sun stuck it. For a brief moment it looked up at Deathstroke, before it flapped its wings and took off to the sky. Deathstroke watched it go, before he shook his head and continued running along.

'Strange world. Far more magical than Earth,' Slade thought. 'Perhaps that's why the source tracker isn't able to pick up anything. All of the magic that's just floating around in the air is blocking it out. Perhaps if I can get to a higher location I can get a better signal.'

Deathstroke spied a tree that stood above all of the others in what seemed to be the end of the forest, so without a moment's hesitation he took off towards it. For nearly an hour he ran, until he came across a small stream. Deathstroke looked down at it and narrowed his eye. He ran a little further along, until he came across a tree with a slash mark across the side of it. Deathstroke whipped out his knife and held the blade against the mark, noticing that they matched.

"I've looped around," Slade muttered to himself as he sheathed the knife, before looking up at the canopy with an idea coming to him. He hurled himself onto the nearest tree, scaling it with little effort as he headed up towards the top. Yet the moment that he got close to the top of the trees, hundreds of branches shot out and obstructed his path.

A snarl left Deathstrokes lips and he reached back to grab his sword. He pulled the blade out and began to slash away at the branches, but to his annoyance he found that new ones grew faster than the old ones could be cleared away. After trying a little longer to cut through the branches, Slade gave up and hopped back down to the ground, noticing that the branches retreated once he did so.

'This is not an ordinary forest. I keep going in a circle and if I try to climb out, the trees block my way. Pain in the ass forest,' Deathstroke snarled to himself before he glanced down at the weaponry he was carrying. 'I could just burn this forest down to the ground and be done with it...but then again, this place is magical. It may not burn and then I've trapped myself within an inferno. I'm going to have to solve this forests riddle if I want to get out of here.'

Slade reached up and took of his helmet, taking in a deep breath as he did so to take in the scent of the forest. All he smelled were trees and plants, nothing out of the ordinary. He then tilted his head towards the direction the wind was blowing, taking careful note of where it blew from. He then began to walk forward once more, keeping careful track of the forest around him as he did so.

Once more he came to the small clearing where the insects flew around. He paid no mind to the bugs as he once more took in a deep breath, yet everything smelled the same. A butterfly flew up to him once more, but this time he sidestepped it and allowed it to continue on its way. He watched as the small insect flew off this time and when the butterfly got close to the tree lines, Deathstroke noticed that for a brief moment it was blown in a different direction than the way the wind was blowing.

He dashed off towards where the butterfly was flying and once he reached the spot it had been he felt the wind shift, blowing towards where his internal compass told him was north. He followed the direction the wind was blowing, heading north along with it.

Eventually he reached a point where the wind started to blow from the west, so Deathstroke turned and started to head east, following the wind once more. He did this for each new time the wind began to blow, making sure to take careful note of the environment as he did so. And each time he changed direction based on where the wind blew, he found that the scenery around him changed each time.

As he was clearly following the right path, Deathstroke continued to follow the wind until he reached a stranger part of the forest. There was a hallway of trees, with all of them so tightly interlocked that Slade wouldn't have been able to squeeze through if he tried. He walked forward through the hallway, unable to feel the wind anymore. As he reached the end of his hallway, he found himself standing in a small area with three other tree hallways that went off in other directions that all held darkness within them. A small, wooden sign was the only thing that didn't belong, so Deathstroke walked over to it and knelt down to read what was inscribed upon it.

'You are not far from the exit, but there is one more test you must take. There is danger down these paths, a danger none can overcome. If you must press forward, then that danger shall meet you head on. Take the path that is safe and you shall arrive at the exit. All others shall be your end.'

Deathstroke read over the words once more before he rose to his full height and looked around at the three paths, thinking carefully about what had been written on the sign. He walked to one of them and peered into it, narrowing his eye after a moment. He could sense danger in there and his senses were warning him to stay away. He did the same thing with the second hallway of trees, only to find that his senses warned him of death in that place as well.

But at the third hallway he didn't sense anything. No smell of blood or feeling of danger down that hall. It felt empty to Deathstroke. Slade slowly placed his helmet back onto his head and thought about his next course of action for a few moments more, before he turned and walked back towards the hallway he came from.

He headed down it's straight path, before noticing that this time it turned left instead of right. He made the left turn and found himself staring at a clearing in the trees, with a massive field of flowers before him. Slade walked out of the hallway and out of the forest at the same time, smirking to himself as he looked behind him at the forest.

'Well done.'

Slade looked around for who had spoken, but he couldn't find them. "Next time, make it an actual challenge," Slade replied before he took off once more, heading towards a large hill over the ridge.

[DS]

"Dammit. I knew I should have taken that left turn at Albuquerque," Deadpool said to himself as he held a map upside down in his hands, trying to figure out how the map got upside down. And also how he and Pinkie had managed to get lost in a forest that Pinkie had no idea existed. "See, this is what happens when we don't leave breadcrumbs to know where we've gone. Now we're going to come across some wicked witch in a candy house, which we'll have to kill and then eat. Dibs on the thighs."

"Ooo! Do you really think there'd be a house made of candy?! Do you think it's all tasty candy or is it going to be made of black licorice?" Pinkie asked as she stuck out her tongue.

"If her house is made out of black licorice then she will truly be the most evil being I have ever fought. I mean not only are you trying to eat kids, but their last meal is that crap. Hell has a special place for people like that," Wade replied as he finished folding the map, placing his new sailor hat atop his head. Pinkie looked up at it and giggled. "So any ideas on how to get out of here, my little pink friend?"

"Well, we could try to tunnel out of here? Or maybe we should fly out of here! I can inflate my head like a balloon!" Pinkie said before she started to inhale, getting her head to begin to inflate and grow larger and larger. Before it could get too large Deadpool poked Pinkie's head with the end of his sword, cutting a hole in the side and sending Pinkie flying around as the air came shooting out.

"That's no bueno, mi amigo," Deadpool said as a deflated Pinkie fell to the ground, where she popped back up perfectly fine a moment later. "See those branches overhead? They're going to stop us if we try to fly out of here like that. A balloon won't cut it."

"How do you know the branches will try to stop up?" Pinkie asked. For a brief moment a flashback went on in Deadpool's head, one which was filled with screaming, gunfire and images of thousands of trees waging war on the human race. Then he shook his head and raised a middle finger to the branches.

"Because all branches are pricks. They fall on your car, eat your kite and drop leaves in your lawn. Why do you think we burn them?" Deadpool asked Pinkie, who had never considered burning branches as a form of retribution. Deadpool then reached far up his ass and pulled out a rocket launcher, which he flipped around in his grasp and pointed it right up at the trees. "Clearly there is only one reasonable way out of this situation. I must kill all the trees."

"Hold on a moment!" Pinkie exclaimed as she threw herself on the end of the rocket launcher. "I have an idea."

"That's one more than I've ever had."

"What if instead of using the rocket to blow up all of the trees, we ride it out of here?" Pinkie put forward as she raised her eyebrows. Deadpool looked to her then slowly to his rocket. He then slowly flipped it around in his grasp and gingerly pointed the rocket end at the ground.

"I'll have you know that this rocket launcher has been used to knock the Hulk onto his ass," Deadpool told Pinkie.

"Does that mean my idea won't work?"

"It means that I can't see any way this plan can go wrong! Hop on!" Deadpool exclaimed as he held the rocket launcher between his legs, getting a cheer out of Pinkie before she hopped onto his shoulders. "Come on butt master 3000, don't fail me now!"

Deadpool then squeezed his cheeks and fired the rocket launcher, creating a massive explosion right under Wade's ass that hurled both the merc with a mouth and the pink pony high into the air. With the speed they were launched the were hurled past the branches before the forest had a moment to realize what had happened.

"WWWWHHHHEEEEEEE!" Pinkie exclaimed as the two sailed through the sky far above the forest.

"My butt is flaming!" Deadpool replied as smoke was pouring out of his ass.

The initial momentum of the explosion quickly came to an end thanks to wind resistance and a moment later both the pony and the mercenary went plummeting down towards the planet below. Both Deadpool and Pinkie clung to each other before they slammed into the ground with enough force to kick up tons of dirt and stone. Their impact created a massive crater in the ground, but unbelievably the pony and the merc were perfectly unharmed.

"We're alive! Haha, suck it God! You won't get me that easily!" Deadpool exclaimed as he raised his middle fingers towards the sky.

"I can't believe we're okay! You think that we would have a scratch or something," Pinkie pointed out.

"I think something broke our fall," Deadpool replied before he and Pinkie both looked into the crater. There, laying face down with half of his body submerged into the ground, was Deathstroke. Both Pinkie and Deadpool blinked twice as realization dawned on them and then slowly turned to look at each other.

"Think he'll be mad?"

"No Pinkie, he won't be mad. He's going to be furious."