Getting a lay of the land was harder than Slade thought it would have been. Not because there were strange landmarks or that the land was filled with things that didn't make sense. He could deal with that. What he was having trouble dealing with was the fact that there were so many damn trees in the land, which meant even more forests that he had to run through. Like the one he currently found himself charging across.

That wasn't to say that there were dangerous beasts or carnivorous plants that tried to kill him at every turn. Wolves made out of lumber and plants that shot out of the ground with maws filled with teeth each tried their luck at killing the greatest mercenary known across many worlds. But like everyone else that had tried to kill Slade, they quickly discovered that it was not his life that was at risk. It was there's.

A timberwolf leapt out with fangs glistening, aiming itself so that it would be able to tear Slade's throat out. Slade caught the movement and reached out with his hand, grabbing the wolf out of the air and grasping it by its own throat. The beast had just a moment to try to comprehend what had just happened before Slade tightened his grip, crushing the throat of the beast. He then ripped its head from its body, tossing the body away before examining the head for a moment.

'Interesting creature. Despite seemingly having no brain or organs of any kind, it manages to function like an actual beast of prey,' Slade thought as he glanced over the severed head, before he heard more rustling around him. He glanced over his shoulder to see two more wolves leap out from behind the bushes, lunging towards him with similar intent as their fallen brethren.

Slade chucked the head of the dead wolf into the face of the wolf that was closest to him, knocking it out of the air. Slade reached behind him and drew his blade, taking a moment to delight in the sound of the metal scrapping across the scabbard before he lashed out with the weapon. Despite being made of the toughest of bark, the blade cleaved the wolf straight down the middle as if it was made of paper. The two halves fell to the ground without a sound, leaving Slade free to turn his attention to the final wolf.

The last timberwolf wasn't any smarter than the rest of its pack. It took a step forward to attack Deathstroke, only for Deathstroke to make the first move and lung towards the wolf. The predator took a moment to wonder why it would be attacked when it was the attacker before Slade's blade impaled itself in the center of its head. Deathstroke ran his blade all the way through the wolf before the tip of the blade came out the end of the wolf. Deathstroke moved the weapon up and split the wolf in half, yet this time both halves were still attached at the bottom of the wolf.

'Even the interior is made of wood as well,' Slade noted as he knelt down an examined the inner working of a timber wolf, noting how the beasts organs were all made of plant like material as well. He couldn't figure out how it managed to function, but he was beginning to understand certain things about it. 'Doesn't look like it has a nervous system either. So they can't feel pain. Explains why they were so quick to throw themselves to their deaths.'

Vines and limbs moved behind him and a plant with a gaping maw thrust its head towards the orange clad mercenary, taking advantage of the fact that he was distracted. It was until Deathstroke had already sliced the plant into three separate parts did he fully realize that he had been attacked. He glanced down at the three pieces of plant that used to be a living organism, amused by its attempt at a sneak attack.

Before he could start to examine the remains of the plant, a massive explosion rocked the forest. Deathstroke had to brace himself to avoid falling over, while the shockwave caused numerous birds and animals to flee from their hiding places in terror. But while the lesser animals ran away from the sound of the explosion, Deathstroke ran towards it.

'Wherever there is an explosion, there's normally a fight. And where there's a fight, there's someone willing to pay good money to make sure I'm on their side of it,' Deathstroke thought to himself as he ran, cutting through anything that was foolish enough to stand in his way for more than a few seconds. Within a matter of minutes he spied black smoke billowing into the sky, giving him a clear destination to head towards. With his body's enhanced physical capabilities, it took him less than two minutes to find the source of the explosion...and take in the battle going on.

Down below him, far from the edge of the forest where he now stood, lay a train made entirely of crystals. The tracks ahead of the train had been decimated and a black crater resided where the rest of the tracks should have lay. Yet what drew Deathstroke's full attention were the two creatures battling it out near the train.

On one side he saw ponies in armor, along with a pink pony with both wings and a horn, using their magic to battle against a swarm of what Deathstroke could only identify as gem spiders. The creatures had eight legs and two sections of their bodies, like normal spiders, but it was those bodies and legs that confused the merc. Their bodies were either bronze, silver or gold in color, while their eight eyes were filled with rubies, sapphires and other rare gems.

The ponies were horribly outnumbered by the spiders, but as Deathstroke watched the battle progress he saw that the ponies managed to fend the creatures off. Well, one of the ponies did and that was the pink alicorn who flew over the battlefield, raining magic down upon the spiders, who were too far out of reached to have any chance of striking back.

'The ponies are outnumbered, but they are fighting together and pooling their skills to fend off the larger number,' Deathstroke thought as he gazed over the battle, before he glanced towards the spiders with a shake of his head. 'As opposed to these beasts that simply attack with reckless abandon, using not their minds but their sheer volume to try to prevail. It is clear that only one of these two sides has any intelligence.'

'Yet you are who is the true star of this battle,' Deathstroke thought to himself as he gazed up at the pink princess, who continued to rain meteor like spells down upon the battlefield, decimating spiders every time one of her spells connected. 'Princess Mi Amore Cadenza. The princess of the Crystal Empire. I've read your fill as well. You're one of the strongest beings in this land, aren't you? Well, it's clear why after seeing this.'

Slade began to debate with himself whether or not he should enter into the battle, as the ponies seemed to be able to handle themselves fine enough him. He also didn't want to get to close to the princess and be thought of as an enemy. Even with his armor, skills and weapons, he knew that picking a fight with her when he knew nothing about her weaknesses had the potential to end badly for him. So he sat back and studied the forces on both sides, making sure not to interfere unless his potential paychecks were in grave danger.

One of the ponies in armor made a fatal mistake in moving too far away from the rest of his group and for his foolishness he was pulled into the sea of spiders. With his terrain advantage Deathstroke watched as one of the spiders sunk their fangs into the pony, causing silver to begin to spread across his body. The pony let out a single scream before he was completely covered in silver, causing him to resemble a statue of terror and agony.

'Interesting,' was all Deathstroke thought as he watched the pony be carried off by the spiders. With one of their number having been struck down, the ponies began to fight even harder than before, yet the spiders seemed to sense that it was time for them to attack. Their rushed in on all sides, trying to use their numbers to simply overwhelm the ponies. The ponies retaliated by using the magic to construct a massive barrier around themselves, but Slade knew that was only a temporary fix. The spiders would get through that soon enough.

Just as he had predicted, the spiders used their sheer mass to break through the barrier, causing the ponies to fall back to where the train was. One of the ponies, a white one with a blue mane, was swatted in the side of the head by one of the spiders limbs and was sent tumbling across the ground. Cadence saw this and turned away from the fight to call out to him, leaving her completely vulnerable.

The spiders that she had been fighting raised their heads towards her and fired webbing made of bronze, silver or gold threads towards her. The threads wrapped themselves around her body and quickly entangled her, causing the princess to come crashing down to the ground. He heard her cry out when she hit the dirt, which drew the attention of all of the spiders.

The princess fought to free herself from her bonds, but even as her magic began to cut through the threads that bound her, her eyes widened as she saw the swarm of spiders rush towards her. They could sense her power and they wanted it. Princess Cadence closed her eyes and gritted her teeth as the spiders closed in...only to snap her eyes open once more when she heard the sounds of metal cleaving through bodies. When she opened her eyes she was stunned to see a human standing before her, a human that was armed to the teeth and hand a large sword in his hand...with numerous spiders laying in pieces at his feet.

"Who...who are you?" she asked the man, who turned his armored head to look back at her, getting her to gasp when she saw that he only had one eye looking out at her from the orange half of his face mask.

"Someone who thinks you would be more valuable to me alive," Deathstroke replied before he turned back towards the spiders, a smile spreading beneath his mask when he gazed at their eyes and bodies, calculating how much they would all sell for. "As for you creatures...I am certain that you would be far more valuable to me dead."

(DP)

The sun shone down on the lone rider who headed forward with no destination in mind. His head was shielded from the rays of the harsh sun by a large, brown cowboy hat. The blowing winds did their best to claw at his face, but a black bandana that was wrapped around his mouth prevented them from touching him. And upon his vest shone a single, silver star, one that showed all that looked upon it that he was the law around these parts.

He rode upon a valiant steed, one who was both loyal and true. Who had gotten him into and out of trouble all the same. Despite her pink man and pink coat, all who looked upon her would be struck with fear, because they knew that wherever the pink horse of mystery went, the man that rode her was soon too-

"Are you making up a story in your head as we go?" Pinkie asked Deadpool, who glanced down at the horse that he was riding on. "Because I don't like how you described me as a steed. Shouldn't I be your partner?"

"Have you ever heard of a story where the cowboy and his horse are partners? No no no, either the cowboy works alone or he has a sidekick, mostly a native American, who tells him all about the wonders of the land before they take a bullet for him in the end," Deadpool corrected Pinkie, pushing up the rim of his very tiny cowboy hat as he stared at the town that had just come into view over the horizon. "Now come along little doggie. It's time for us to clean up this one horse town."

"Actually, there are a lot of horses in that town. Would probably make more sense if you called it a one dragon town, because Spike is the only dragon there," Pinkie pointed out, before gasping as an idea came to her. "Wait, since the cowboys in your world ride horses, shouldn't that mean the cowponies in our world should ride humans? Trade places with me, I want to try this out!"

"Eh...sure, why not?" Deadpool said with a shrug before he hopped off of Pinkie and got down on all fours, allowing Pinkie to leap up onto his back.

The sun shone down on the lone rider who headed forward with no destination in mind. Her head was shielded from the rays of the harsh sun by a large, brown cowboy hat. The blowing winds did their best to claw at her face, but a black bandana that was wrapped around her mouth prevented them from touching her. And upon her vest shone a single, silver star, one that showed all that looked upon it that she was the law around these parts.

She rode upon a valiant steed, one who was both loyal and true. Who had gotten her into and out of trouble all the same. Despite his red spandex and crash mouth, all who looked upon him would be struck with fear, because they knew that wherever the red merc of mystery went, the pony that rode him was soon too-

"Yeah, I don't think this is working," Deadpool said as he stood up, getting Pinkie to cry out before she grabbed around his neck to keep from falling off. "I wouldn't so much call myself a merc of mystery as I would a ladies man, kinda like James Bond or Austin Powers. Also, I'm not a fan of you sticking spurs into me."

"Well then I guess we're partners then, since neither of us wants to be the steed," Pinkie said to Wade, who couldn't argue with her bullet proof logic. Pinkie then turned her head towards the town and a large smile crossed her face. Her eyes relaxed as a gentle breeze gently kissed her face, getting her mane to flutter gently in the wind. A sigh of happiness escaped her lips "We're here. We're home. Ponyville."

"So this is it, huh? Where all of your little pony friends are?"

"Yup. Twilight, Applejack, Fluttershy, Rarity, Rainbow Dash...and too many others to name," Pinkie said. "Now remember, making a good first impression is essential to helping others become friends with you. You need to be calm, cool, collected and act in a way that makes others think 'Hey, they'd be cool to hang out with'. You know what I mean?"

"Already on it!"

Pinkie turned to look at Deadpool and her eyes went wide. The merc was sitting in the center of a shopping cart that had rockets strapped to the side, with a banner saying 'Please be my friend' written in rainbow paint along the side. "Think this will make ponies want to be friends with me?" Pinkie took a long moment to drink in what she was looking at, before she gave Deadpool her answer.

"Yes."