Waking up, I’m starring into ‘Post-it’ notes, with eyes drawn on two of them, looking at me. I had gone to sleep with the motorcycle helmet on. The visor is down and my boys have post-it notes all over it, for me to see.

“Laser Tag” one reads, while “I’m going on an Adventure” reads another, with a little stickman waving. “Mom’s Mad” with an angry face, is stuck right in the middle of my view.

It’s still dark, but I need to go to the bathroom. I sit up and start pulling off the post-it notes. Sitting on the side of my bed, I pull my helmet off and immediately know where I am.

Pulling lightly on my chain, “You suck!” I tell it. The chain is still screwed down to my bed. I look over for the key, but it’s not in the grass anywhere that I can see, where it would have landed. Yes, I’m back where that white troll thing used me for a golf ball.

Looking back over my shoulder, I can see a few hundred feet away, the tear back into Community Farms. Why that little shit made that while we were fighting, I don’t know. I can see dead goblins laying around. Two hulks. Some other bodies. Seems like some light fighting was still going on after I left. Nothing is happening now. It’s pretty quiet except for the noises that I would expect from a forest at night. Without the helmet on, I can hear much better.

Looking around, seems like the bed and everything came with me. Well, almost everything. I don’t see the laser pointers anywhere.

Sitting here, I’m kind of underwhelmed. “Thought I would feel different about being back here.” I say to myself.

Looking down at myself, I’m wearing the ghillie suit over the camouflage suit with all the equipment strapped on. I think I could have, should have, made better choices. It reminds me of wearing a heavy snow suit, then trying to get your keys or money out of your pants pocket. It can be done, but easy access it is not.

I get one of the machete’s out. It’s not the traditional style of a machete. These have more of a weight-forward design and are wider, heavier at the tip. I pick up my helmet and dig a small hole on each side of it, so I can hear. It’s a full-face helmet with a clear visor. Digging into it, it seems to be made of resins or plastics.

Satisfied that I’ve done about as good a job as it is going to get, I snake the machete back under the ghillie suit and into its sheath. Looking around, there still doesn’t seem to be anything happening. I put my helmet back on, put down the visor and flip the ghillie suit hood up over it all.

I still got to go. I’m not out in the open. More off to the side of the clearing from where the tear is, and the dead are lying. I grab onto the side of the bed and try to quietly drag it over by one of the bushes, more into the trees, to relieve myself.

As I’m finishing up, I hear something, but I’m not sure what. Looking around I freeze. There is a goblin standing about five feet from me. He is saying something. Pointing at something behind me and is very agitated about it.

I slowly flip up my visor and hear him telling me “Stay! Go Back! Bad! You go back now! Bad!”

I couldn’t hear him with my visor down. “Go Back! Bad! Go Back!”

He is not yelling. He is trying to keep it quiet. “Bad! Go Back! Bad!” he keeps telling me, pointing back into the clearing.

This goblin is different from the others that I have seen. A little larger. A little stronger-looking and better equipped. “Bad! Bad! You go back now!”

I hear another voice in the distance. I can’t make out what it said. Looking around, I don’t see anything either. My helmet pointing, and me looking at just the right location, I can hear what the other voice is saying. “No Touch. I told you, No Touch. Shamans be mad you Touch.”

I’m looking right at where the voice is coming from, but I don’t see anything. This one before me keeps scolding me like I’m a bad dog “Go Back! Go Back!”

Slowly I start wrapping the chain around my hand and wrist until I’m back against the bed. I don’t want to be caught trying to fight with one hand chained. I reach back with my left hand, trying not to make any sudden movements, and find the crossbow. With my right, I have wrapped enough chain around my hand to take up the slack and have a firm grip.

I see the other goblin now, closer and coming towards us. This one is clearly in charge of the first. “No feed it! No Touch it! I tell you!”

“I no feed it! I no Touch it! It not listen! It not Go Back!” Turning back to me “Bad! Go Back!” pointing back to the clearing.

Crossbow now in hand, I slowly bring it towards me and test the strength of the chain in my right hand. Crack…The wood of my bed gives way as I pull the wood screws out. Both goblins stop their quarreling to look at me.

“Ahhh.” The first one says with both hands going up in the air.

“I tell you! You did this!” The one in charge accuses.

“I not Touch it! I not Free It!” The first goes back to defending himself.

I let the chain slowly unravel out of my hand as I quietly bring the crossbow around to fire on the one in charge.

“You did this! I tell you! Now your problem!”

“I not Touch it! Not my Problem!”

I can hear many more voices now. They all are getting mad about the commotion and telling these two to be quiet. I think twice about firing on the one in charge. Not that it would have mattered, as I look down at the crossbow. It is not loaded, not even cocked.

“Shamans ask, you talk.” Says the one in charge, disappearing into the darkness much sooner than he should have at this distance.

“Bad! Down!” The goblin now moving behind the brush I relieved myself at, waving his hand at me to get down. “Down!”

I can see a couple of people coming through the tear like a modern swat team. I kneel and look over my bed thinking ‘Yes, no one will see us and this bed here’.

Looking back at the goblin concealing himself behind the brush, I don’t have the same hatred for these things like I did at first. Still mad at them, yes. Ones like that little shit I first encountered, I would probably go out of my way to rid the world of those. Maybe they are like an infestation and need to be exterminated, but maybe not. Not sure at the moment, to what extent they need to be dealt with and what safeguards need to be in place to protect ourselves. Maybe it’s just me, looking at it all as an outsider, emotionally distancing myself from it. Maybe I’ll still try and kill them all. I know I’d never forgive myself if something happened to anyone in my family.

I see the goblin start moving back towards where I heard the other voices, farther back in the forest. I get up and start to follow. It is more of a calculated risk that I think it will be safe enough for me to follow. They haven’t attacked and I’m guessing that it’s because they didn’t see me as an enemy. And didn’t attack before, until they saw me as a real threat.

Following this goblin, I can see that I am just giving it an abundance of grief.

“Go Back!” It waves me off. “Ahhh! Bad! Down!”

I have to admit, tormenting this goblin by following it through the forest, is making me happy. No way it is going to outrun me and I stay just close enough to aggravate it.

Not sure what I was expecting, but coming over a small hill I see a walled town with this goblin headed straight for it. Other goblins and humanoid-type creatures are also converging on it, including those hulk things I saw before. Most are using the dirt roads leading up to the entrance, but some are coming randomly out of the woods that I am currently in.

I hold up and retreat back into the woods a little way, keeping the town in view. The town is walled with what looks to be large wooden stakes, the size of small trees. A palisade if I remember the term correctly. It is not something small either. The town takes up the entire valley and extends beyond what I can see.

Taking a little better cover, I bring out the binoculars and scan over what I can see. Looking at the entry gate, it looks large and formidable, even though only being made out of wood. There is one of those hulk monsters standing by the gate and an assortment of people coming and going. I say people because there are more than just goblins. I see humans and other races I would only guess at, as from a dark fantasy world.

I watch as the goblin I was tormenting enter into the town. I don’t think I could pick him out of a crowd, but if I ever have the opportunity to do it again, I’m going to try.

Smiling, I turn and head back to the way I came. The goblin had taken a fairly straight trek through the woods and it was fairly easy to find my way back. Now that I had seen the roads leading into the town, I can see that some of the clearings off to my side are dirt roads as well.

The tear shines like a small beacon in the distance as I crest one of the hills. Even through the woods, it makes a small glow in the night.

I decide that I am going to load this crossbow before I get too close. Better safe than sorry. There is a little crank handle in the stock. Stepping over to some cover, so I’m not a sitting duck out in the open. I take the crank handle out and attach it to the winding mechanism on the side of the stock.

The way the loading mechanism works is that there is a latch, that slides down the barrel of the crossbow and ‘latches’ onto the string. The bowstring is a metal cable. When you crank the handle, it winches the latch back to the trigger, to cock the string and hold it in place. Load the bolt. Aim the crossbow like a rifle. Pull the trigger to release the latch and fire the bolt.

“Something else I didn’t think through,” I say to myself. “No way I’m going to be using this in combat.” It’s just too slow. No wonder you would be using one of these on top of a castle wall.

Another thing I realize as I’m putting the crank back into the stock, it was far too easy to crank. The sales manager had me cock and un-cock the crossbow a couple of times, so I would get the feel of it and to be sure I could safely unload the bolt. The cranking was hard but doable. Just now, it was barely anything. Looking down at the ring I won off Guts’, I wonder how much strength it is adding and how I could measure it. Maybe I could cock the crossbow without the winch?

While I’m lost in thought, a man passes through the trees across from me. Pauses. Signals. Then crosses to the next. He was dressed like a combat version of Officer Trailbreaker. A ranger type. I watched and didn’t move. He didn’t look my way, and I heard nothing.

Covering myself up better, I waited. A moment later, others follow, this time on the ground. I wasn’t sure if the Ranger was an Elf or not, but these are neither. Trained soldiers or some other advanced unit. I swear some look right through me as I watch the tactical unit move with caution through the woods.

I wait for a few more minutes, after thinking it is safe enough to move. I load one of the bolts making sure the safety is on. I reasoned that the safest way back to Community Farms is to backtrack the route that the soldiers took. It would most likely be cleared of any enemy units unless they were being hunted. I move with caution and hide for a moment at each new location, moving from cover to cover, back the way they came.

The trek back is slow and I’m taking my time in being cautious. Too many times I could have been dead in this world. The glow of the tear and the soldier’s tracks verifies that I am headed in the right direction. Being in the silence of the woods for a while now, my hearing and awareness of the surroundings have increased. I do hear the occasional fighting in the distance now and my eyes are more acquainted with the darkness.

Like a Predator movie, I see a familiar shimmer pass before my eyes and stop at one of the tracks I had just passed. “Not a child.” I whisper.

In an Instant. As if you startled a cat stalking its prey. The shimmer is gone from that place. Whirling and leaping in the air with a single motion, I see Stag out and drawing down rings of power on my location. As she softly lands to the side, I still cannot see her through the shimmer. Only Stag, with a hand on its riser and an arrow drawn on its rest.

The way she is sweeping the bow slightly back and forth, I can see that she does not see or target me. Although she is looking, knowing that I am there. “Not a zero.” She replies.

Now I am sure that it is Jenn. “Your mother would not approve” Her aim now adjusted so that I am looking directly down its shaft. Not more than 25 or 30 feet away, she cannot see me.

Lowering her bow, the rings of power fading as she relaxes the draw. I see the shimmer fade as I hear her start to cry and reveal the rest of her downcast features.

“Jenn, I..” as I start to move to comfort her.

“EEK!” she cries out, targeting me once again. “WHAT ARE YOU?”

“Clothes! They’re just clothes.” Realizing that I’m scaring the crap out of her with the ghillie suit.

Taking a step forward, she takes another one back. She hasn’t lowered the bow.

I stop. Put the crossbow between my knees to hold it. Pull the hood back off my helmet. Then take the helmet off and give her a little smile.

“Hehe” she lets out a little giggle.

I take a step forward, she takes a step back, shaking her head no, with a smile.

“Whatever.” I say, putting the helmet back on, leaving the visor up. She clearly doesn’t like the suit.