In a manner of speaking, James was right. Two days later Scootaloo was fully healed and back to her usual self. James was pleased to see that Scootaloo hadn’t let the bike crash slow her down, as a result of Dart sleeping next to her from the past two nights Scootaloo had become somewhat attached to him. Dart soon became attached to the Crusaders and the Crusaders were really interacting and playing with him more. James liked this because soon, they could take him on walks and play with him in the backyard more often.
A week later James got a phone call, it was from his commander. He told James that a dangerous gang of drug makers had taken refuge in a hotel and James’ team was to observe the gang and then move in to apprehend or terminate the drug makers. This was James’ first mission as an Enforcer, James left his house with his dad. But before he left the Crusaders each hugged him and told him to stay safe and to promise to come back home. James then was gone.
Six hours passed and there was no news about the gang being broadcasted, James’ parents were worried about James, but nowhere near as worried as the Crusaders. They feared about what would happen if James didn’t come back and then they would have to leave without seeing him one last time, the mere though of this brought tears to the Crusaders’ eyes. They were beginning to think that James wasn’t coming back when a thundering crash rung through the house.
“I’m baaack!” James yelled.
The Crusaders raced toward the front door and saw James standing in the doorway, he had an M4 carbine slung over his shoulder and a small bag in his hand.
“Are you going to say ‘hello’ or not?” James asked. Scootaloo ran forward and threw her arms around him, Sweetie Bell and Apple Bloom followed. James returned the hugs and didn’t let go.
“We though you weren’t coming back,” said Apple Bloom.
“I though I wouldn’t be as well,” said James.
“Was it scary?” Scootaloo asked.
“It was more of a joke,” said James.
“Why? What happened?” asked Sweetie Bell.
“I’ll tell you once mum and dad get here,” said James.
Dave and Katherine then came into the hallway.
“Hi James,” Dave said hugging James once the Crusaders got out of the way.
“How was it?” Katherine asked.
“Rather boring,” said James.
“Why was it boring?” Dave asked.
“Before I say anything I must say that the FBI is probably the most irritating organization in the US,” James said.
“Did they have something to do with the mission?” said Katherine.
“Let’s just say they never let their dogs off the leash until they think everything is going how they want it,” said James.
“So what happened then?” Dave asked.
“Can it wait until dinner? I’m quite famished.” said James.
Dave started up the grill outside and James took the time to help his dad out while the Crusaders helped Katherine and played with Dart. Once Dave had the food cooking on the grill he tried to get more information about what James had been doing for the past several hours on his first mission.
“So James,” he said, “What happened while you were on your little mission?”
“Bugger all,” replied James.
“Anything interesting happen?” his dad asked.
“I found something that I was allowed to take,” said James, “A spoil of war, if you will.”
“What did you get?” Dave asked.
“What I got is this bag and everything in it,” said James.
“Are you going to show everyone once we sit down?” said Dave.
“There’s a little something for everyone here,” said James.
Soon after all the food was cooked, Katherine made the choice for everyone to sit on the back porch. Everything was there and it was close to the grill. James was halfway through a cheeseburger when his mother wanted to talk to him.
“So James,” she said, “How was your first mission?”
James swallowed the lump of burger and looked over to his mother.
“Boring,” he said.
“How was it boring?” Sweetie Bell asked.
“All we did for six hours was sit in the hotel opposite and just watch the gang make drugs,” said James.
“You sat in a hotel room for six hours?” Scootaloo asked.
“I wasn’t in any danger,” said James.
The Crusaders looked rather relieved after James made that statement.
“Anyway,” James continued, “Me and the squad sat in the top floor and waited for the FBI to show up, once they did they didn’t give us the order to engage. They said that they were going to wait until the drug makers had lowered their sense of security and then we would rappel into their room and take it over. Sadly, these guys were professionals and we sat with our sniper rifles trained on their window. But before we got the chance to shoot they drew the curtains and we had no idea what they were up to, pretty much couldn’t tell if they were trying to escape or they had the feeling that someone was watching. After about another hour we were sent up to the roof, the zip lines were set up and we rode the lines into their room.”
“Wow,” Scootaloo said, “That sounded so cool!”
“Well it would be if I wasn’t flying over twenty stories into a room full of heavily armed drug dealers,” said James.
“What happened next? Apple Bloom asked.
“Needless to say I was quite surprised at what I saw after I landed in the room,” said James, “All of the gang were dead. Dead from overdose.”
“They took all the drugs they made?” asked Dave.
“I would have been really annoyed if I wasn’t laughing at how ironic the deaths were,” said James.
“Were you the first in the room?” Sweetie Bell asked.
“I was and I was the first to report the situation, and get a little something,” James said as he picked the backpack up for the floor.
“What’s in there?” Apple Bloom asked.
James took the bag and dumped the contents on the table, there was a mix of knifes, guns, ammo, jewelry, and a large wine bottle.
“This here is for you mother,” James said handing the bottle to his mother, “From what I can tell it’s very old and expensive.”
“Thank you James,” Katherine replied taking the bottle and reading the label.
“Dad I knew that you broke your watch a few weeks ago, so I got you this one,” said James. The watch was a Rolex with a multiple functions, from a flight computer to a barometer the watch was very valuable and rather rare according to James.
“Now for myself I claimed these guns,” James said as he pulled an Uzi out of the bag.
“Good thing the safe is large,” said Dave as he strapped the watch on his wrist.
“Hey, what about us?” Sweetie Bell said.
“I didn’t forget you three,” James said, “All the jewelry is yours.”
The Crusaders took some necklaces and rings from the pile, Sweetie Bell looked rather happy whereas Apple Bloom and Scootaloo were just glad they had got something from James.
“Where did you get all this?” Katherine asked.
“Well I didn’t find all of it on the table,” James replied.
“What do you mean?” Dave asked.
“The watch I found on the leader’s wrist,” said James.
“You took this from a corpse?” his dad asked.
“I didn’t take it then one of the guys would have,” James said.
“The other Enforcers took stuff?” Katherine asked.
“Everything but the bodies and the drugs,” said James, “We evenly distributed the loot.”
“What did the other Enforcers take?” Sweetie Bell asked as she put on a long gold necklace.
James tapped the table with a small pistol as he thought.
“Well I think Hector took the wallets of the dead gang members, Biff looted the hotel room safe and got some gold rings, Jed was the luckiest because he found the money stash,” James said as he counted off his squad members, “Ricky got the AK-74s and Adam basically just took the free soaps and coffee from the hotel rooms.”
“Why did he do that?” Dave asked.
“Maybe it was because he has too much stuff from the Gulf War,” said James, “Probably was short on caffeine and shampoo.”
“He sounds funny,” said Scootaloo.
“Adam really is a good soldier,” said James, “Kept us entertained while we stalked out the druggies.”
An hour later James was sitting in the den with his laptop next to him, the Crusaders crept in while he wasn’t looking. James however saw them out of the corner of his eye and let them sneak up on him.
“Whatca up to James?” Apple Bloom asked.
“Nothing much,” said James, “Just keeping up to my hobby.”
“What is your hobby?” Scootaloo asked.
“I do computer animation and video editing in my free time,” said James spinning the laptop to the Crusaders so they could see what he had created. It didn’t look like much, just a few tanks rolling through a desert.
“I know it isn’t much but I have improved the dust trail effect,” said James.
“Wait, you made all this?” Sweetie Bell asked.
“Just this alone took me about three weeks,” said James.
“Have you done anything else?” Scootaloo asked.
“I did an entire space battle if you want to see that,” said James.
“Can we see it?” Apple Bloom asked.
James pulled up the file that had the starship battle, two massive armadas of starships clashed in a different solar system. As the Crusaders watched the amazing work of James Rogers take place, James got up and opened up the cabinet that contained his Xbox games. He rifled through the lot until he found the game he based the animation off of.
“This,” he said holding the box up, “Was what inspired me to make that little movie.”
“Are you going to play it?” Sweetie Bell asked.
“Sure am,” said James, “I’m going to see if there are any more ships I can try and replicate.”
James let the Crusaders play the movies that he made on his laptop. James then told the Crusaders how he got into CGI and video editing, he told the girls on how it started in a game called “Garry’s Mod” and a copy of Sony Vegas and soon, James was making short funny movies and posting them on YouTube. It then snowballed into proper animation and eventual CGI. As the Crusaders looked up his videos on YouTube, Scootaloo saw something rather interesting in one of the related videos.
“Hey James look at this,” she said.
James took the laptop and looked at the video name, ‘Soldier and young street dancer master DDR’.
“I have a very distinct feeling about this,” James said.
He clicked on the link and he couldn’t believe what he was seeing, it was him and Scootaloo playing DDR on the day James became an Enforcer. James rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn’t imagining this. Scootaloo leaned closer to the screen.
“James,” she said, “We’re famous.”
“Very famous according to the view count,” James said.
“How many views are there?” Apple Bloom asked.
“Well over fifteen million,” said James.
He and the Crusaders watched the video until it ended with James and Scootaloo bowing for the crowd. James leaned back and scratched the side of his head, he couldn’t believe he was famous on the internet. He decided to not show himself in public in uniform unless he was on a mission for the Enforcers. Also he didn’t want to have Scootaloo draw any attention to herself in case someone recognized her, but James would be by her side from now on for her safety and to ward off the mad fans. James, in order to shake Scootaloo off of her fame, showed the Crusaders the video editing and stop motion animation he did when he was twelve. The Crusaders were amazed at James’ talent with a computer and some animation programs.
“If you were in Equestira then you would probably have an animation Cutie Mark,” said Sweetie Bell.
“Nah, this isn’t my true potential,” James said.
“What is then?” Apple Bloom asked.
“That’s the thing,” said James, “I don’t know what I am good at.”