> The Impossible Journey Part 1: The First Encounter
>  by Decimatore123
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Prologue: A Brief History
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Prologue: A Brief History


EDI_historical_archives                                                            File No: 88829
Subject: Astro anomalies                                                          File status: Classified
Location: Human resistance outpost 3 

A journey to Equestria, by all physical and logical means this kind of trip should be impossible. At least that's what I thought until I found myself there, quite by accident you might say, but this part of the journey is not about me. Sadly I was not the first human to set foot in this wonderful world, but rather one of my pilots beat me to it. If I told you my perspective first, the story wouldn't make sense in all honesty, besides I honestly found his side of the story to be much more interesting, if only he knew what was in store for him. After my journey I believed his story and wished to have him submit to a memory examination that only I would see, this is his story.

Our story begins in the year 2122, it has been two years since the development of the slip space drive. This piece of technology allowed mankind to travel millions of miles in under a few seconds at the touch of a button. With the development of this technology it finally brought mankind to unite itself as they began to colonize the vast void of space. Many colonies were established within a short period of time on far away worlds, and their armies only grew, they were no longer known by their countries but simply as E.D.I Earth Defense Initiative. Sadly even though unity was on earth, some of the colonies seemed to disagree, and began to rebel against EDI. A terrorist group was formed and abused the chaos for personal gain, lead by a man simply known as “the Snake.” They began to terrorize the most distant colonies using guerrilla tactics frustrating E.D.I’s military staff. Even with defense stations in place he had the firepower and the tech to break through them. I was at this time demoted from commander to sergeant because I failed to defend a colony known as Utopia against over whelming odds. I chose to put the people first and save their sorry butts from certain destruction at the expense of the EDI armed forces. So some other lunatic was leading my armies so I had no say in this matter, and the Snake had chosen to strike the planet Irentos.

By the time our forces showed up on the scene the station had already taken a serious beating: most of its defensive systems were offline, its shields were down, and had multiple hull breaches. Our fleets went into engage but we underestimated the Snake. He had reinforcements waiting for us just one system away. More ships came bursting forth from the black void. Eventually command saw this planet as a lost cause after two days of fighting. The retreat order was given near the end of the second day, only one capitol ship remained six frigates, and five fighter divisions remained out of the many ships that were sent in from the earth defense fleets. Among the five fighter divisions was one in particular known as the “Night Hawks” In Earth’s fleets there are three squads I would rank the most dangerous Night Hawks rank number two. They were led by a man named Jacob Samuel Fischer, a brilliant pilot and skilled squad leader, and he’s what this part of the story is all about

> Chapter 1: The Crash
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 1: The Crash


As I switched neural imager I heard loud voice come over the intercom of all the remaining ships, and over the transmitters inside the cockpits of the fighters, “Attention all squad leaders, new orders from command. They have deemed this situation unsalvageable, and have ordered a complete withdraw of space forces from this system.”

Instantly there was uproar amongst the pilots and com channels were flooded with annoyed shouts to stay and fight. They had the courage the guts, but command was unwilling to yield to their requests.

The voice came back on sounding more irritated than before. “Hey you all want to be court-marshalled?!” There was a long silence that followed over the com channels. “That’s what I thought. All of you form up behind the Patriot we are jumping together.” 

This didn’t sit well with Jacob. He knew some of the garrison on that planet, and did not like the idea of abandoning them to the Snake. “Sir, what about the civilian population on the planet?”

“For now they’re on their own.” 

His heart sank. He was abandoning his friends to “freedom fighters,” but they acted really like pirates. The terrorists' leader, the Snake, envisioned himself as Robin Hood in stealing from an oppressive government but in reality he pilfered for the thrill. He raided colonies to sustain his ever growing fleet. Infamous for his colony raids and refusal to give quarter to prisoners, he became a real threat to EDI forces. Jacob feared greatly for the garrison down on the planet, and he lay uncertain if they were equipped to handle an attack force this size. 

The remaining ships all lined up on the far side of the planet. Left alone, the space station’s anti-gravity systems were hit and it began to fall into the planet.

“Commencing slip space jump procedures.” Jacob looked down at his navigation systems everything seemed to be in order his coordinates matched up with those of the nearest friendly system. 

Now the fighter Jacob was piloting was a Javelin H-30 gunship. It had amazing speed for the amount of firepower it carried as well as high maneuverability. The problem is it required a three-man crew, and sadly all the other ships in his squad required only one or two pilots and were slightly smaller. Because of a shortage in manpower, Jacob was sent with two bots I built. Their names were Michael and Jiggs. Jiggs was about 5’11” and he adopted the speaking habits of an Englishman and a heavy Yorkshire accent because of an English program the science division tested on Jiggs earlier. Designed to be the ultimate nerd, he channeled all his nerdiness into science and weapons design and production. Michael was designed with the same chasis and proportions as Jiggs, save for Jacob using the normal language program on him, and he spoke well by the standard of the science division “normally.” He is not as crazy as Jiggs and way more subtle when it comes to killing things; he was designed to be an assassin, and like all good assassins he valued clean, efficient and silent takedowns. It came as no surprise that he favored swords, blades, axes—any kind melee weapon really—over those hideous, inelegant, uncivilized and noisome blunderbusses called "guns". In fact to this day he begrudgingly carries three firearms, and even then he avoids guns. Today, he only came with one gun: his single-barreled shooting wrist cannon. He could control the rate of fire by directly dialing into the gun as well as the barrel angle so really if he wanted to, he could use this like a mini auto-turret but I made it so that Michael could not, for safety reasons, angle it over 45 degrees—otherwise he might harm himself. Michael is an assassin, not a gun nut. Yet he is obsessed with ammunition. He would literally lock himself in a room and do nothing but build bullets that have long gone out of production or are hard to obtain. He keeps the long chains of bullets on his back at all times, so he can pick the ammo he wants on the spot. His wrist cannon was designed to use all ammo types using adaptive barrel-and-chamber technology.

Both bots were very intelligent and Jacob would trust them completely with co-piloting and manning the turret in the back, but Jacob didn’t seem to confident trusting his ship to AIs. How could he, especially after what they did?

“You all set back there Michael?” Jacob called back.

“Yes sir, ready for slip space.” Michael said as he fired another shot using the cannon mounted on the back of the ship to blow down a fighter behind him.

“What about you Jiggs? You ready to get sucked into space?”

“Look mate, I was born ready. How dare you ask such questions!” Jiggs said from the co-pilot seat, and flipped a few additional switches readying the engines for the jump.

“Alright, we’re set then.”

“Commencing count down: 10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…” Jacob’s expression immediately changed as he saw a horrible event transpire before his eyes. A massive beam of light cut straight through the hull of the Patriot, and the explosion that followed blinded him for a few seconds. This shot sent the remainder of the fleet into a panic with the long range artillery ships of the Snake firing on what big ships we had left. Instantly another voice came over the transmitter. “This is the Patriot…retreat is still a go…get your…outta here…engines sustained heavy damage…” Before he could finish a second beam cut long ways through the ship, slicing straight through the ships reactor. The ships exploded instantly in a massive wave of fire and light. The explosion destroyed the Dreadnaught, as well as the Shadow, the two frigates that were guarding the Patriot’s left and right sides. There was nothing left of the Patriot and the Snake’s forces were coming in to finish the remaining ships off using the confusion and chaos to their advantage.

“Debris is too thick to make a jump. We gotta get clear of the debris field first.” 

“Yo Jake ,this is wing 12, 16, 5, and 11. We’re behind you all the way buddy.” The four fighters formed up behind him ready to charge through the field."

“Did anyone else make it? 

“As far as we know, most of the remaining frigates did. The moment they saw the Patriot go up, they jumped the gun and left us for dead. Now it’s every man for himself! Most of the squad hopefully already made the jump but we're not sure about the others.”

“We don’t have time to search, we have to move! Thanks for the support gents.” 

“Anytime squad leader.”

Most of the frigates had already made the jump, but it was a nightmare for the fighter squads. They had to clear the debris fields before they could make a jump due to their small size. Meanwhile the Snake’s fighters simply came in and picked them off one by one. There were only two squads that made it out of that mess: the majority of the Night Hawks, and a few from the squad known as the Steel Wings. The five ships charged into the debris field, and Jacob was feeling confident as he navigated through the wreckage. When he looked down, he saw several signatures on his radar.

“Gents, I got something behind us, stay loose back there wing 16 and wing 5.”

“Copy that squad leader.” A few seconds later a yellow laser sliced through one of the fighters at the back of the line. “This is wing five, I’m HIT REPEAT I’M…” and the fighter's loud throe disappeared into static. Jacob watched in horror the fighter spiraled out of control into a piece of space debris. “This is wing 16 wing 5 is down, repeat wing 5 is down. I count 3 baddies behind me…take ‘em out Jonny.” The rear turret of wing 16 flared to life and shot several hot blue bolts at the persuing fighters. The bolts sailed through their formation and managed to hit one of the leading fighters sending it off into the torn hull of the Patriot. The others broke formation and began to go after the remaining Night Hawks. “Heck man, I count 7 baddies— WHOA!” A rocket flew straight in front of wing 11’s viewport and impacted on wing 12, destroying it instantly.

“OH, YOU DID NOT JUST SHOOT MY WINGMAN!” Wing 11 broke formation and began to go after the Snake’s fighters, revenge clearly his intent. “YOU SCREW WITH THE HAWKS MAN, I’M GONNA BEAT YOU SO BAD YOUR GRANDCHILDREN WILL COME OUT WITH BOOTPRINTS ON THEIR BUTTS!”

“WING 11 BACK IN FORMATION NOW!” Jacob called out over the comm.

The pilot didn’t listen to Jacob, and raged like the old Norse berserkers if they had laser guns. “OH WHAT, YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE HEAT?!” Jake watched as the super-heated, blue bolts tore up the fighter in front of the pilot’s ship, causing it to explode “Ohhhh baby, those explosions are just beautiful. Two down five to go.” 

“WING 11 BEHIND YOU.”

Jacob saw the two fighters forming up quickly behind him. “I got these wussies under control baby, just hang loose, leader.” He pulled up quickly as one of the fighters fired. The laser missed him by mere inches, but the fighter continued to adapt to the situation. “Dang, these boys are good.” The pilot of wing 11 continued maneuvers, however, he was quickly running out of them. He took a hard left, flying straight into some hollow debris, letting the fighters follow him. “Let’s see how you dance in here.” 

The piece he chose was a large part of the Patriot’s hull, it was riddled with debris on the inside, once-sturdy support beams now floating bars of steel, and it was narrow enough that if any of the debris got in his way, he wouldn’t have the time to turn and go back—this literally was a one way street. Jake saw the glow of the fighter’s engines fade as it flew into the hollow ship. Jake watched as small explosions erupted from what remained of the hull. “Crap…weapons lock…Don’t lose your cool, Frank, that’s the quickest way to get blown up, breathe.” 

A few moments later, Jake saw a massive explosion burst out from the further end of the hull, and Frank hit what I am guessing to be the remains of the ship’s fuel cell supply for powering their defense craft.

“YEAH BABY, YOU JUST GOT PLAYED BROTHER!” He said in a loud voice into the com, “I’m home free everyone, just give me a sec to get back. Yo Jake, I’m staring at a way home! Request permission to go slip space.” 

Relieved that the pilot was still alive, Jacob pressed the transmit button on his communication set and exclaimed: “Granted. Get out of here man!” 

“Alright then, later bro see you back at the base.” It was over for but a few moments before he heard Frank’s voice come back on the com. “WHOA WHERE’D THESE CREEPS COME FROM!” Frank hadn’t reached the other side of the hull yet, and sadly Jake didn’t see that, so I can only make an educated guess about what happened. I am guessing several fighters were waiting for him on the other side, and trapped him in the hull.

“TAKING FIRE TAKING, CRAP I’M HIT GAAAAAAAAAAAA!” Within a few seconds the com went dead silent on the remaining ships.

“Wing 11, are you there?” Jacob called out into the mic, expecting an answer, praying for an answer. “FRANK ARE YOU ALRIGHT?!” Silence.

No answers came from wing 11.

“Sir he’s gone…..we have to keep moving.” As cold as it sounded to Jacob, wing 16 was right.

Jacob searched desperately for a way out the debris field, it seemed endless and the Snake wasn’t far behind. He flew over, under, and through the pieces of debris in front of him but found no clear path he could use. “This is wing 16 I have a clean shot for a jump, requesting permission to go slip space.”

“Granted…” Jacob responded “…get outta here buddy.”

With a flash of light, wing 16 darted off to another system that left only Jacob, leaving him as far as he knew alone with the Snake. He quickly searched around for any way out of this. His computer detected more fighters quickly closing in on him. 

“Do either of you see a way out?” Jake said to the bots sitting both next to him and behind him.

Michael was the first to respond. “Sorry boss, too much debris; I can’t see much considering I am watching out back.” 

Michael was the third pilot; the specific fighter Jake was piloting as a failsafe allowed the gunner to pilot the ship should anything happen to the pilot and the co-pilot. Thankfully that situation has never come to pass, most of the gunners would have to learn how to fly a ship right on the spot—if that ever were to happen. It would also explain why even though the ship has enhanced attributes and better performance than most standard designs, the Javelin is extremely unpopular amongst the armadas.

“That’s not the only thing you should be watching, Mike.”

“If I don’t, I’m not the only one who gets to be blown into oblivion” 

“Well, you’re going to have a lot to put up with if we don’t get an exit soon.”

“I have an idea boss,” Jiggs said as he pressed a few buttons from the co-pilot seat.

“Go ahead Jiggs.”

“My magnetic scans reveal there is a piece of debris that contains an abnormally large hole in it, big enough for this fighter. At its current speed the wreckage will be in view in a few minutes, and for a split second this hole will be exposed and we will have an exit.”

“Can you calculate the jump correctly to match the window?”

“Accountin’ for the time delay, the small millisecond it takes for the ship to move…yeah I can do it, but…” he paused for a moment, “…this ship will have to remain in this exact position till our window.”

“Well I don’t see a cleaner way out of this. Alright we’re doing it your way Jiggs. Killing all power to the ship…we’re in space, so hopefully we should stay still if we don’t feed any power to the engines. Playing dead should give us a little bit of time. Mike, kill everything you got up there, and whatever you do don’t move the turret I want them to believe we are down, go it?”

“Yeah boss I got ya.” The lights in the small ship powered down one by one until the ship was almost completely dark, with the exception of Jiggs’ control panel. The Snake’s fighters circled like vultures around the debris field, searching for weakened prey, and Jacob was right at the center of the circle praying for a clean escape. As the time for the jump grew near, the anxiety in the small cockpit grew. Jacob knew he was going all-in and relying on a machine I sent with him to save his life. Again, he wasn’t too comfortable with that, but he knew he had to live with it for now because the other option was getting eaten by the metaphorical vultures. 

“Alright…calculations are set. On my signal I want you to give me full power. I have already transferred pilot control to my console.”

Jacob was slightly unsettled that he took control of the piloting controls without his approval, but figured at this point it was for the best. “I’m ready here.”

“Good, Mike get ready to fire the moment we turn the power back on; they want to blow us up real badly.”

Michael put his metal hands on the controls for the turret. “I’m set up here.” Everything was falling into place. Jacob, even though he couldn’t fully relax because of the situation, felt slightly more secure knowing the plan was going well so far. 

“Alrighty, gents, give me full power on my mark…” Jacob hovered his hand over the dark green button that, when pressed, would return the ship’s power levels to full. “…Mark.” He hit the button and instantly the ship’s lights returned, and Jiggs started the jump. Michael quickly opened fire upon the unsuspecting ships flying above them. “Alright just a few more seconds…” The ship began to move forward slightly. The hole came into view.

“…HANG ON GENTS!” 

He hit the button initiating a slip space jump, and saw, just as he hit that button, a pile of debris slowly made its way in front of their exit. Before he could even say anything the ship shot straight into slip space. It impacted the debris and altered the course. They didn’t hit it dead on, otherwise Jacob wouldn’t be around to tell me about this, or the memory wouldn’t be around for me to analyze later. Instead, they hit it at an angle, causing them to shoot off in another direction. I only got bits and pieces of the ships log, whatever was copied onto both Michael and Jiggs’ memory units. From those units I can tell for sure they were in slip space for several minutes, because the ship tried to self-correct its course. Both left and right engines were offline, however, due to the impact the only engine remaining was the primary booster, which at that point was functioning at less than 10% of its normal performance, and the computer was going nowhere. Eventually the fail-safe kicked in, which prevents the drive from being active for too long and taking the pilots and passengers too far if they lost control of their ship. But they were on the outer colonies, so they were on the border of unknown space. That jump shot them out of the known universe. When they came out they were staring down at a planet that looked very much similar to earth.

“Is that Earth?” Jacob asked curiously.

“There’s no way, I mean just LOOK AT IT! We shot off in a totally different direction from home. Sadly, I can’t tell where we are, since the computers gone all funky on me.” Jacob looked over to see Jiggs’ console was black with a huge crack in the screen. “Look, the continents are all off, and where the heck is Zion? There is no way one of the most heavily-defended space stations just disappeared without a trace. There’s not even any debris. And look at the North Star, it’s on the other bloody side of the sky! There’s no bloody Australia and Antarctica! Is twice it’s normal size and 7,000 miles off from any map of earth I have ever seen. No, there is no way this is Earth. It is too well defended they would have spotted us by now and the land marks are all off.” 

“Well alright, what is it then?”

“I have no idea mate, but whatever it is we’re landin on it. Engines are down, the booster isn’t functioning enough to get us out of the gravitational pull, and the navigation system is offline. We ain’t goin anywhere any time soon. Oh and you might want to buckle-in, because as of ten seconds ago we’ve lost our stabilizers as well.”

Jacob quickly pulled the black straps over his chest and put them into place. The ship entered the atmosphere and fire began to appear around the ship as it fought its way through the upper atmosphere. Eventually they cleared the atmosphere and got their first looks at the planet’s surface. It was far too green to be Earth; Earth was now heavily polluted and had trouble maintaining its normal weather patterns because of this. This world was still thriving with plant life, and had a perfectly sustainable ecosystem. The sky was actually blue rather than the crude grey they usually got on Earth. Jacob now had no doubt, this wasn’t Earth or at least the Earth he knew. Sadly the ground was only becoming bigger, and the three crew members would have to eject since they had lost control over most of the ship. Michael and Jiggs ejected safely and shot up into the air, their parachutes deploying perfectly.

Promptly after they ejected, Jacob pulled the lever that was supposed to launch him into the air. He pulled it and nothing happened. He tried again and again but with the same result. 

“Jake, what’s going on in there? You are about to past minimum safe distance.” 

“My seat isn’t releasing, I’M STUCK!”

“Alright boss, don’t panic there should be a lever to the left of my console.” Jacob leaned over and looked around the seat and noticed a lever that was covered by black and yellow stripes.

“This one that looks like it could potentially do something dangerous?”

“Yep that’s the one. I want you pull back hard on it.” Jacob was hesitant at first, but Jiggs had gotten him this far, and he did as instructed. He pulled back hard on the suspicious looking lever and instantly wings popped out on the left and right sides of the ship, and a tail popped out back. “You should have manual flight control now…” Jacob looked down and a joystick popped up from underneath the stick, “…since you have no engines you’re gonna have to glide that bird in…good luck to you Jake.”

“You have now passed minimum safe distance for ejection.”

“SHUT UP MIKE, AND LET THE MAN FOCUS!”

Thankfully for Jacob’s sake they were quiet after that. He pulled up on the joystick, leveling out the ship. He searched hard for a clearing he could land safely in, but none were to be found. Just endless trees despite the speed he was going he knew he was going to crash in the forest. He kept the ship level for as long as he could then tilted the nose of the ship up a bit. When he hit the ground, immediately the left wing was gone as it hit a nearby tree. The ship jerked to the left as it grinded against the forest floor. Jake continued to try and keep the ship under control even though he had lost most of his ability to keep himself sitting up. The ship eventually began to roll, breaking off the right wing. Jacob had officially lost all control over the ship and had to ride it out. He couldn’t tell which way was up or down; when he looked out the viewport, all he could see was a blue and green blur. As he rolled through the forest the only thing holding him in place were the belts strapped across his chest but that wasn’t enough to keep him conscious. Eventually the forces being exerted upon the ship caused Jacob’s head to fly forward: his belts held his body in place, but his head slammed against the console he used to fly the ship, breaking the screen, and causing him to black out instantly. The ship eventually came to a stop at the end of a long trench left behind by the body of the aircraft, along with a trail of debris. For now he had landed and was still breathing.    

> Chapter 2: Accepting an Impossible Truth
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 2: Accepting an Impossible Truth


Jacob didn't know how long he was out, but when he opened his eyes he found his hands dangling in the air, and felt as if all the blood had been rushing to his head for quite some time. He looked at the viewport and saw nothing but dirt. He was incredibly disorientated and had a splitting headache and  felt he would black out again. He heard the metal of the once battle-hardened ship creak and turn. Soon, he felt his hands fall back into place and blood flow down  through his body. The light of day began to come in through the viewport, but in all honesty he probably would have rather stayed upside down when he discovered what was causing the ship to roll. When the ship finally stopped its slow roll, he went from disoriented to wide awake in a mere second, probably the fastest time I have ever seen a man recover from that state. The creature he was looking at had the body of a lion, the tail of scorpion, and the wings of a bat. It was at least twice the size of a lion from earth, and it was practically drooling over the front of the ship. It didn’t take long for him to realize he was having a staring contest with a manticore. “Oh gosh…why me…” Jacob thought silently “…breath, and don’t panic maybe it hasn’t noticed me.”

The manticore stared straight at him, and let off a massive ear-shattering roar as it began its assault on the remains of the ship. It took its left paw and smashed it against the glass standing between it and Jacob. E.D.I equipment was decent when it came to starships and the reinforced glass, and held up against the first strike. The second one \hit the viewport again and caused it to crack. Jacob unbuckled himself quickly and looked around the ship. The weapon systems were offline along with all power to the ship, making that route useless. He then spotted the ejection points of Michael and Jiggs. Those looked promising. He grabbed his old .357 Peace Maker, unsure if it would do anything against that thing, but it was better than going out with nothing. He moved to the back of the ship to Michael’s ejection point, just as the manticore jabbed its tail through the viewport and punched a hole through the glass. Jacob quickly climbed up out of the open hole in the back near the rear turret, just as the manticore ripped its tail out of the wreckage. It didn't plan on letting his prey get away so easily.

“That is a mythical creature…there’s no way it EXISTS I READ ABOUT THEM AS A KID…made up stories that’s all they were…what kind of planet did I just crash into?!” Jacob thought as he continued to panic. 

He jumped down from the back of the ship and took to a full-on sprint into the forest, followed closely by the manticore. He hurdled over the bushes and ran through the trees. He could hear the beast getting closer and closer as its heavy steps grew louder and louder. While running, he pulled out the Peace Keeper, popped out the cylinder that held the bullets and noted it was fully loaded. He quickly put everything back into place, and continued to run. His body grew tired from the endless sprint, but he ignored the aching in his legs, wiped the sweat from his brow, and kept running. A few moments later he found his face in the ground because he didn’t see the tree root that had worked its way onto the surface of the ground. Attempting to scramble to his feet, Jacob felt something hit his back hard, forcing him back to ground. He heard the steady growling behind him and felt his left arm become wet as the manticore drooled over it. As the monster raised its tail to give the finishing blow, Jacob prepared for the worst.However, the manticore  fell over, limp. He heard a crash and opened his eyes to find he could move the paw that was holding him in place. He turned to see its eyes closed as if it had just fainted for no reason. 

“Brilliant shot Mike,” Jiggs said aloud.

“Why thank you,” Michael said, accepting the rare compliment. 

“Just out of curiosity how did you know the proper dosage for the trank?” 

“I didn’t…..” 

Michael and Jiggs walked out from the brush. Michael handed the trank rifle back to Jiggs; he had used enough tranquilizers to knock out a full grown elephant, so they all contended the manticore would be asleep for a while. They took advantage of this fact and decided to get as much distance from it as they could. Jacob hadn’t fully shaken off his disorientation and had some other injuries he needed to tend to so his companions both helped him walk through the forest. Eventually they reached a fair distance from the manticore and tended to Jacob’s injuries.

“You sir are the luckiest man to walk the face of the Earth.”

“Oh?” Jake responded curiously.

“Well you managed to survive a crash that should have killed you, and you came out with a mild concussion and a couple of bruises. You’ll be walkin’ straight in no time! All you need really is a day’s rest.” Jiggs took out a small syringe from his left side and put it into a vial of clear liquid. “This is just gonna hurt a small bit, I’m givin’ you a shot of the knock-out juice you need the rest. While you’re out I’m goin’ back to the ship. I’ll salvage what I can and Mike’ll keep an eye on you till then….” He put the needle into Jake’s neck and pushed all the liquid from the syringe into his body. “….Pleasant dreams mate.” 

Jake was out within a few seconds of him saying that. When he woke up again, he found that a day had passed. Jiggs had returned with whatever equipment he could find.  It wasn’t much; he brought back some food rations he found and a spare pack which held all kinds of firearms. Jiggs made the pack and designed it to hold virtually any firearm despite its size, using something called dimensional displacement. He stole the idea from the EDI special science division before it was shut down, because the scientists literally went  insane trying to complete their designs. The specific design he stole was for the ARCH storage device, or more simply known as "the pack." I have no idea how it works and personally I never want to; it probably would cause my brain to explode because of its complexity. This was my personal pack he had found, and I entrusted it to Jiggs for this time, figuring if it came down to it, despite his vast arsenal he already carried on his back he could use the extra firepower. Seeing as Jake was a little bit more needy at this time, he gave the pack with the weapons to him. Despite the bulky contents of the Pack, it was incredibly lightweight. He at this time didn’t even know what was inside it. The last items he found were two jetpacks designed for Michael and Jiggs before I installed flight modules within their metal bodies. After he finished scavenging, the ship promptly blew up without warning or explanation.  It was clear that they had to find another way home. As painful as it sounded, the three began to make their way through the forest looking for intelligent life. They walked for several hours until they found what looked like a dirt road, intentionally placed by someone else. Suddenly there was hope as they figured someone built the road. But, they kept their guard up as they had no idea if they were hostile. So they followed it from the brush along the sides, allowing themselves time to hide should they encounter any other travelers. Eventually they made it out of the forest to an open field near a small town. 

Jacob’s eyes went wide as he saw it, “Jiggs quick question…..is dimensional travel possible while in slip space?” He saw the town and recognized it immediately, but he couldn’t believe that he was this close to it in person.

“It’s possible, but highly unlikely a dramatic event would have to occur while in slip space. Hittin' some debris shouldn't cause something like that to happen. But then again no one really knows what’s happenin' in the space around them while in slip space.”

“What kind of event?”

“Flying through a black hole, wormhole, rift in the space time continuum, the list is endless, but all the events have one thing in common.”

“And that is…?”
“They don’t bloody exist! Okay, so maybe black holes exists, but as for the others, mankind has yet to document any of them, and the ship’s fail-safe took us to the nearest habitable planet. I’m rulin' out black hole; there is no way that ship could survive going through one…” Jake carefully examined the town with Michael and Jiggs from a distance. What he saw only confirmed his suspicions. “…The architecture suggests primitive intelligence, far from mastery. I am seeing a lot of animals present in the town yet…..” Jiggs paused for a moment as he took a closer look “….I see horses loads of em yet no riders…”

“Being here is not physically possible.” Jake said aloud

“Oh and why is that?” Jiggs asked back

“Because I know this town, and I know there’s no way it could exist in our realm.”

“Well alright then, what’s the name of the town? Since you seem to suddenly know it so well.” 

“Oh that’s easy, Ponyville.” 

“Ponyville?” Jiggs asked in a confused manner

“Yep, we are in the land of Equestria.”

“Equestria?” Michael asked

“Did Richy tell you anything…”

“Nope,” the two bots answered in unison. I gave them the choice of watching My Little Pony, but they chose not to. Looking back, I probably should have made them watch it; it would have saved both Jacob and me a lot of grief.

“Well alright, I’ll fill you in best I can then. Equestria is a land of mythical creatures, which explains the blood thirsty manticore we encountered earlier. It is also home to talking ponies…”

“Ok just stop right there,” Jiggs said interrupting Jacob. “….You’re being serious, aren’t you?” There was a small silence amongst the three “…Alright I’m re-examinin' your skull. Mike, put him out!”

“Wait, what…I feel fine!” Jake began to panic slightly as he watched Michael load a trank round into his wrist cannon. At this time Mike only had one barrel on the wrist cannon. Later I would upgrade him giving him four, but for now one did the trick and unlike when he had four, you could tell which barrel the bullet was coming out of.

“I’m not putting him out. His vitals all read normal. He sustained no injuries that would suggest loss of sanity." Jake felt relief knowing someone in his presence still possessed some form of sanity.

“Fine I’ll do it myself.” Jiggs brought up a small pistol from his pack, sadly Jake wasn’t off the hook that easily.

“Hey wait a min-” before Jake could end his sentence he heard a small puff of air and felt a fine needle pierce his skin. He had a moment of bright light before his world went dark. When he regained consciousness he awoke to both of my bots arguing over his condition.

“…He’s fine, look at your scans!” Michael shoved the screen in Jiggs face ensure he saw the results.

Jiggs simply refused to believe them. “Did you hear anythin' that he was sayin'? PONIES DON’T TALK MIKE!”

“As illogical as it sounds, he is still the highest ranking officer here and I trust his judgment no matter how crazy it may sound.”

“Oh, so if he told you to jump off a cliff would you do it?”

“Depending on the height of the cliff and if there was reasoning behind it yeah, I probably would.”

“You see Mike that’s the problem, THERE’S NO REASONIN' BEHIND THIS!”

“On the contrary he currently possesses the most knowledge on this world, and if you think about it does actually make sense. I mean, you saw the indigenous population in the town, nothing but horses!They had no drivers or riders and they looked as if they were communicating to one another through verbal speech.”

“I know…” Jiggs began to cross his arms and pout “…I know what I saw, I just can’t believe it.”  Jiggs is what we call a “skeptic.” The weird part is I went through his memory banks and he has no recollection of this event, which was weird until later when I found out why. He was, shall we say, too much of a geek to accept the place he was in right now, which I don’t blame him. The first time I crashed into Equestria, I nearly shot myself cause I thought I was dreaming and I had a deep desire to wake up.

Jake moaned as his senses began to return to him “…uuuggggghhhhhh…hey, a little help down here,” Jake called out weakly barely lifting his hand.

“Dang he’s awake already.” 

“Odd, thought I gave him a dose to keep him out for longer.”

“Apparently not.”

“I gave him three hours! It’s been only one and a half! The man’s a bloody juggernaut. He has already had a brush with death, why should a little sedative keep him down?!” Jiggs reached down his hand and helped Jake to his feet. “Sorry about that mate, I just had to be sure you were alright.”

“….I appreciate the concern, but do that again without my approval and I will tear out your CPU and give it to my cousin who will use it to play Call of Duty 11, 24/7.” After that, there were no more unexpected medical examinations performed by Jiggs. Jake wasn’tspecifically angry with Jiggs, but  rather annoyed with his odd actions. Even if it had good intentions, it did involve putting Jacob out without his approval and that didn’t sit too well with him. Jake knew that taking a straight route into town would be a bad idea even though the ponies were perhaps some of the friendliest creatures in the known universe. Humans don’t exist in their world. He figured directly approaching the town would generate a lot of unwanted attention. Now unlike me, when he crashed into Equestria he had, to a degree, an element of stealth that he could use to his advantage. So the three split up and snuck around the perimeter of the town, spying out every possible entry point, as well as basically how far out the ponies settled. That’s where Jake got his “when in the pony universe he was.” While out exploring the outside of the town, he came across some ponies having a picnic in an open field, all mares. He counted carefully: six were present, all of which he recognized. With the blonde mane that apple cutie mark, it could be no other than the apple bucker herself, Applejack. He looked and nearly fainted. Rainbow dash was sitting mere feet away from him, the fastest being to fly the face of the universe. He saw a carefully placed purple mane, a white coat, and a diamond cutie mark, and there was no mistaking it was Rarity the perfectionist, still looking as stunning as ever. He looked beside her, and with the pink mane, yellow coat, and butterfly cutie mark was Fluttershy, the only Pegasus that fit the description. He saw another pink mane a slightly darker shade of pink and took note of its crazy arrangement on the head of the one who possessed it, he contended there was only one pony crazy enough to have a hairstyle like that: Pinkie Pie. And last but certainly not the least, Twilight Sparkle. He quickly noticed her star for a cutie mark and her purple and pink mane. The unicorn was enjoying herself along with her friends, and as much as he was sweating and trying to refrain from going nuts like a good fan boy, Jake still kept his low profile.

Just as he thought his day couldn’t get more awesome, Spike came running along with a message. The purple dragon was panting, out of breath, and he collapsed onto the mat the six ponies were eating on, clinging to a message in one of his claws. At first Jake just thought it could be any other message until he burped up another, and within a few moments of being read, Twilight began to sing “Big Brother Best Friend Forever”…right in front of him. Live performance by Twilight Sparkle. I am truly envious of him. In my opinion he got the better trip, but that is a matter of opinion and is not relevant to this story. I will try to do my best not to bring my journey into this I shall save that for another time. Anyway, he couldn’t believe the world he was in right now, he was at the end of season two, just in time for Twilight’s brother Shining Armor to get married to Twilight’s foal sitter Princess Cadence. His timing in my opinion was beyond amazing. He couldn’t hold out, that information was just too much for his brain to process and he passed out…again. Thankfully this time it was of his own accord, and he passed out in some bushes so nobody could really see or hear him. When he recovered from his sudden blackout Michael was standing over him.

“Sir, are you alright?”

Jake blinked trying to put his eyes back into focus. “…Ouch…” He said as felt the pain return from his sudden collapse, “…what happened?”

“Well sir, from the looks of things you fainted and hit the ground rather hard.”

“I see…” Michael helped Jake to his feet, and by that time the Mane 6 had cleared out and it was growing dark across the sky. Jacob realized then that he had been out for quite some time. Despite everything that had happened, he needed more proof to assure him he really was in Equestria. “Mike I’m going into the town, tell Jiggs I’m alright…”

“I thought you said going in there would be a bad idea.”

“If we are seen, it would be a bad idea…this is going to be tricky. I doubt all the ponies will be asleep at once, and going in on foot is going to be maddening.”

“Well I have something that just might help you with that,” Michael reached into one of his back panels and pulled out a small metal circle. “This is a stealth emitter. My creator gave it to me so I could a low profile, or make a speedy escape should I ever need to go unnoticed. There are currently only seven in existence and it may a little bit glitchy considering it is the prototype, so use it only if you need to…”

“…It’ll do Mike, thanks…” Jake firmly attached it onto his wrist, this emitter I built was designed to be worn like a bracelet only it looked a heck of lot cooler than that sissy girly jazz you call bracelets. “…uh, Mike”

“Yes sir?”

“How do you turn this thing on?” Not too bright, I see. I only put one button on it.

“Oh, that’s easy man here let me show you.” Jake moved his wrist into Michael’s metallic hand. “See this button right here on the side…press once…” Michael pressed it and Jake looked at his hands both of them were gone as well as his whole body for that matter. “…and you disappear, press again…” He pushed the button again and Jake could once more see his own hands “…you reappear.”

“…Whoa…cool.” Of course it’s cool it was made by yours truly.

Before permitting Jake to leave, Michael gave him some last minute tips and advice; I did originally build him to be subtle and went with him on several smash and grab missions, as well as assassination missions. He was a highly qualified assassin: he knew how to move, where to move, and when to move to avoid being seen. “Just be careful, this thing is unstable. I would not recommend keeping it active for longer than ten minutes without at least a thirty second cool-down in between uses, otherwise it may short out and you will be exposed. Use the darkness and the alleyways to your advantage. From the looks of things, after the sun goes down this town is full of them. Avoid the buildings unless you ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO GO IN THEM. You don’t know the layouts, you could be running yourself into a corner, they can box you in, and you get caught. Above all else, if seen, pretend that you weren't. Yeah sure, you have to run and stuff, but since you’re probably the first human these beings have seen, they will be too afraid to chase you, based on your description, and they will be too afraid to talk about you to the local authorities, because of the fear of being rejected and called ‘crazy.’ Ultimately, I personally believe this to be a very easy mission. You sure you don’t want me coming with you just in case you run into any trouble?” 

“Thanks for the advice Mike, and no, I need you to make sure the insane one doesn't do anything stupid.”

“Alright I’ll go take care of the crazy one, good luck to you Jake.”

With those final remarks Michael headed back towards Jiggs’ position and Jake began his walk into town. The sun was setting when he started. As he walked, he began to think about all that had happened so far; all of it seemed so surreal. While being in this world alone seemed surreal, he didn’t know what truth to believe. Even though he was a fan of the show, this was a bit much to handle in day. Oh he had accepted that he was in Equestria, and it was nice to have a break from the warzones of space that he usually fought in. But then his thoughts drifted elsewhere. He knew if the humans discovered it, it would redefine their reality: at this time they would view this world as a threat to mankind, as it had become so paranoid for its own survival that it wouldn't trust a bunch of kind-hearted ponies for its survival. So how was he to explain his disappearance? Personally in a battle between mankind and ponies, I would believe mankind would lose horribly simply because the ponies have magic more powerful than our guns. Wagging war on the Equestrians would end horribly, assuming anyone actually took his original story seriously. By the time he reached the town the sky was dark. The only light produced was within the houses, and by the moon. Jake concluded this was the perfect time to begin his search. His target, Twilight’s Library, he had to know, if this really was the Equestria he knew, and not just a cheap mock up. This was the final piece to the puzzle, in his mind at least, and he activated the stealth emitter and proceeded into town.

> Chapter 3: The Library
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 3: The Library


Night life was just settling on Ponyville, and the streets weren’t as crowded as they would be during the day, seeing as the majority of the ponies had gone indoors for the night and only a few remained out. I am not sure what Jake was thinking when he thought finding Twilight’s library would be easy, on the show they don’t actually show the layout of the town, and when they show the overviews, they are very broad and don’t show how to get from one place to another really. The only thing he really had going for him was when he found the library it would stand out since it was, well you know…a tree, the only tree, smack dab in the middle of a town, so he didn’t have to go searching through every house door by door. 

He used the emitter Mike gave him to get into town, but after that remembering his advice, turned it off and used the alleyways between the buildings and deserted streets to move around. He had left his flight jacket with Mike and Jiggs. He was wearing a black tank top with a black hawk outlined in white, giving the illusion that it was glowing, and had the words “Night Hawks” written on the back with the same white glow effect. To be honest, their squad shirts looked manlier than most; so simple, yet so effective. He was wearing his army-issued pants, a pair of black cargo pants, and the boots of course. The only thing protecting his face from discovery was a black ski mask he put on shortly after entering the town. It was a silly thing that he kept from how the Hawks went around as gangs messing with other squads They would go out in all black, wear black ski masks, and really nice pairs of sunglasses and basically play pranks on other squads. Personally being commander of all of that for a bit was honestly very entertaining, and I was sad when I had to discipline them and put it to an end because it was a “disturbance” to others. Jake was very glad he kept the mask, at least if he were to be discovered he would still have his identity hidden for the span of time it would take them to remove the mask, assuming they caught him. Jake continued his walk through town,  randomly guessing which road to take and hoping he would end up in the right place after a while of searching. He felt that Twilight’s library would be easiest to find in this town, due in no small part to the fact it was the only building made entirely out of a plant. Guess that’s why he chose to go search her library rather than search for the other Mane 6 residence, even though personally I believe Rainbow Dash’s or Fluttershy’s home to stand out the most. Fluttershy would have   been the easiest house to search, considering she lives alone on the edge of a forest, but I  doubt Jake had the stomach personally to break into Fluttershy’s home and search it thoroughly. Jake went through several alleyways and down several deserted roads, and had no success in his search. He had been doing such a good job so far at avoiding detection that he had relaxed his guard a bit. BIG. MISTAKE. A young colt saw him and pointed him out to his mother. Now, if you saw a man wearing nothing but black, with a ski mask on at night in your neighborhood what would you think? Well I’m not sure what you would think, but the mare saw him and let out an ear-piercing shriek, (let there be unwanted attention). Jake booked it out of there as quickly as his feet could carry him into another alleyway. Sadly, a nearby cop both saw and heard the incident and ran after Jake. Now let’s be realistic for a moment. Horses on earth are naturally faster than humans; that’s why we used them for transportation before we invented cars. So as you can imagine, Jake had a hard time shaking off the stallion chasing him. Jake looked in front of him. To his dismay, the alley ended in a dead end, and he had nowhere to run. Jake quickly activated the emitter allowing him to disappear from the sight of the cop.

“Alright kid, where are you?” The cop flipped on his light. The bright rays of light spread across the alley revealing Jake’s shadow, he may be hidden from sight but he was still there nonetheless. Jake quickly got out of the spotlight hiding himself, and confusing the stallion at the same time. 

The cop held the light straight and randomly jumped to the left after spotting a flitting shadow. “OH NO YOU DON’T!”

The cop’s efforts proved to be worthless, as he missed, but not by much. Jake lost a piece of pants on the back hoof of the cop as he ran away. The cop quickly shook it off his hoof seeing it as insignificant, and ran down the alleyway after Jake. Jake saw the end of the alleyway but the guard was very persistent, and very keen on capturing him, so he did directly what Mike told him not to do. He rounded a corner, picked the closest door and ducked inside. The guard passed him by, but Jake didn’t want to take any chances with the guard and chose not to leave through that exit. So he went further into the building he just entered. What he believed to be the front door was locked; breaking out that way may be a bad idea. He looked around the dark building. From what he could tell it was some kind of bakery. There were shelves upon shelves of cakes, bread, pastries of all kinds just sitting there right in front of him. He practically had to slap himself to keep himself sane since Equestria’s pastries are legendary for their deliciousness, at least by the fanbase anyway, so resisting the urge I will admit is impressive. The temptation of eating just one cupcake was just unbearable. All the windows would be hard to access, as they were either near the front of the store or too small for him to exit from. Frustrated with this Jake tried upstairs.

He could hear snoring upstairs, and suddenly he began to sweat, realizing someone was still in the building, not only that but sleeping as well. He was glad he kept his emitter active. He couldn’t even begin to think what would have happened if he had turned it off, and whoever owned this place just randomly walked downstairs…it was an ugly thought. He avoided the room with the  loud snoring and proceeded to enter another room nearby. He opened it and saw a window big enough for him to fit, but he also noticed two cribs carefully placed near the window. He took note of the two foals inside the cribs; one was a pegasus, the other was a unicorn. He personally thought they were adorable, but marked them as potential land mines. If they let out as much as a peep guess who comes running, no other than mommy and daddy. He took extra care to be as silent as he could be when he went over to the window to open it. A small *click* was the only noise he made as he released the latch to open the window, he was about to escape when the unexpected happened the foals began to cry uncontrollably. 

Jake froze for a moment with fear. “Don’t panic Jake! You can’t think straight when you panic,” he thought to himself. As he tried to calm himself down, he heard movement down the hall. Someone was approaching the little room. He pushed on the window and found it moved nowhere, sweat began to soak the portion of the ski mask touching his forehead as he rapidly searched for what was holding the window in place. He looked up and noticed another bolt on the top of the window holding it in place. He reached for it, just as the lights flipped on and the door swung open. Jake simply froze. All of his muscles locked in place, afraid to give off any movement and alert the stallion that just walked in the room.

“Hey, what’s wrong, everypony daddy’s here now...” he took one sniff of the crib and winced with disgust “…smells like some ponies need their dipper changed. PINKIE!”

Within a few seconds a Pink pony rushed through the door. Jake couldn’t believe who he was staring at right now: Mr. Cake owner of Sugar Cube Corner and Pinkie Pie, the famed destroyer of all laws of physics. Suddenly all the cakes downstairs made sense and he deeply regretted not taking one. But when he really thought about it, he contended that stealing from the Cakes would send the wrong message.

“Could you go downstairs and get some fresh diapers for the twins please?”

“Sure thing Mr. Cake.” 

And as quickly as she came, she was gone. Mr. Cake remained, doing his best to calm the two foals down while Jake desperately looked for a way out. He knew that if he tried to go for the bolt he may make too much noise and give himself away. He tried to find a way past Mr. Cake without disturbing him but he had positioned himself in such a way that there was no real clear way past him. Jake was now deeply concerned, and he was rapidly running out of time on the emitter. Jake looked down and suddenly noticed he could see his hands. “Screw you Mike! That was only eight minutes.” were his thoughts. Mr. Cake still had his head turned away from Jake, the sweat continued to drench his forehead making the mask very itchy to the point of being unbearable…removing it was so tempting. If Mr. Cake just stayed down there for another twenty seconds he could reactivate the emitter for another eight to ten minutes. He made it to ten seconds before Pinkie came back through the door it took less than a second for her to notice him.

“I’m ba….HEY, WHO ARE YOU?” She pointed a hoof directly at Jake, and the diapers went flying off her back onto Mr. Cake’s face, and the floor.“ Pinkie I said to get diapers not throw them at me…” He turned to pick up the diaper and he made eye contact with Jake. “….WHOA! Who in the great world of Celestia are you?!” Mr. Cake picked up an old rolling pin took it in his mouth and pointed one of the ends at Jake, immediately began to bombard him with questions. “HOW DID YOU GET IN HERE?! WHAT ARE DOING IN MY HOUSE!?”

Jake responded trying very hard to retain his dignity although he had pretty much lost most of it. What he said here would matter a lot. He didn’t know how skilled the ponies were at hand-to-hoof combat but didn’t want to figure that out. He had his Peacemaker on him at the time, and could shoot them if he wanted to but he wanted to avoid that option at all costs. Killing a man is different from this. “Look, I know this looks bad…but it’s not what you think.”

“OH IT’S NOT?” Mr. Cake said as he shoved the pin closer into Jake’s face. “THEN WHAT IT IS IT?!”

“….I’m just looking for some answers ok….” Jake said still breathing heavily as the stress of the situation increased.

Then what he defined as the strangest thing ever happened, Pinkie Pie stepped in between him and Mr. Cake. “EVERYPONY JUST CALM DOWN, SHEEEESH!” She proceeded to examine Jake a little more closely without either of their approvals.

“…Pinkie…what are you doing…” Mr. Cake asked from behind her. She gave him no response as she stared straight into Jake’s eyes. Jake felt as if she was staring into his very soul.

“He’s not evil…” She said as she continued to stare at Jake.

“…Pinkie…he broke into our house…” Mr. Cake said rolling his eyes, pin still in his mouth.

“…Well yeah, but if he wanted to steal anything he would have done it already, I mean think about it, he made it all the way up here, and was able to stand right over there,” she gestured over to the corner Jake was standing in, “and stare at you without you noticing for Celestia knows how long. He’s too good at stuff like this to get caught while stealing…and Twilight did say another would be coming.” She continued to stare at Jake’s face.

“Another,” Jake thought to himself he was now more puzzled than ever, but for the time being he just decided to play along.

“What are you looking for?” Jake asked, still trying to keep the situation under control while maybe getting info out of Pinkie.

“I’m trying to figure out who you are…there have only been three of you so far, and the third one was the first one’s first time so he really visited twice, but we haven’t seen any for a pretty long time so…it’s a long story, and I’ll tell you the whole thing as soon as I figure out who you are. But it’s hard to tell who you are with that black thing over your face.”

She reached out her hoof to remove the ski mask from Jake’s face, he wasn’t thrilled at all about that. He reached out his hand to stop her hoof. “Please…don’t do that.”

“Why not? No pony should be that ashamed of what they look like.”

“You don’t get it. It’s something far more different than that.”

“Hey get your hooves--or whatever those are off Pinkie!” Mr. Cake took a swing at Jake, Pinkie quickly turned and stopped it from hitting Jake by holding the pin with her hoof.

“Mr. Cake STOP!” Pinkie tried to reason with Mr. Cake, but Jake couldn’t wait any longer. He quickly seized the opportunity to escape, undoing the latch and shoving the window open.

“PINKIE YOU’RE LETTING HIM ESCAPE!” 

“HEY WAIT!” Pinkie released the roller, trying to stop Jake from leaving “I JUST WANT TO TALK!”

Without even looking down, Jake jumped out of the window and down to the street. He hit the ground legs-first trying to absorb the blow the ground would exert on him with his feet. Sadly there was nothing but pavement beneath him, so it was a very rough landing. Two stories up wasn’t too bad of a landing, but still painful. He didn’t hear any cracks after he hit the ground but pain coursed through his feet and legs up to his thighs. He tried to stand, despite the pain he was in. He bit through it and got to his feet. He reached into one of the many pockets on his pants and pulled out a small bottle of pills marked “pain killers.” He couldn’t run in this condition and he knew it, so he limped over to an alleyway and took two of the pills. Immediately the pain lessened, but as it did he heard a voice.

“HEY MR. BLACK MASKED PONY…WHERE ARE YOU!?” Jake hadn’t shaken Pinkie yet, and to the best of his knowledge it would be physically impossible to do, but no one ever said he couldn’t try, in fact before him as far as he knew no one had ever tried. He activated the emitter and began to run down the alleyway, but he was still in pain and neglected to watch where he was stepping. He kicked cans and debris on the alley floor. He generated enough noise to give Pinkie an idea on where he was. She took the lantern that was in her mouth and directed its light down the alleyway revealing Jake’s shadow. “There you are,” she said as she began to trot down the alleyway after him. Jake didn’t look back. The more he thought about it though, the more he realized one of the Mane 6 was actively chasing him, and he knew he couldn’t stop, but his fan boy instincts wanted him to stop and see what she wanted. Thankfully he did not give in, and randomly the light from Pinkie’s lantern disappeared. He was relieved to be rid of the pursuer, but realized it was too easy, and immediately turned to make sure she was really gone. A few seconds later a door to his left swung open and Pinkie was standing directly in front of Jake. How did she know? …Who knows? She’s Pinkie Pie folks. Jake immediately turned and ran the other way. Pinkie Pie saw his shadow begin to run, and a few doors down she popped out again, stopping his advance. He repeated this process several times until he almost got past her, and she pounced on him to get him to stay still. She couldn’t see him though, and unknowingly only pinned half his body so the moment she lifted the hoof holding him down, he rolled out of her hold, stood back up, and ran. He could hear her chasing after him again, but it was different this time, he could hear her…hopping after him. This is something I like to call the “hop of death,” because she may hop everywhere, but when she is pursuing someone and she is hopping you can run as fast as you want and no matter what she will always catch you. Rainbow Dash had to figure this out the hard way, and Jake was about to as well.

He may have gotten a head start, but could hear her not too far behind. He pushed whatever power he could get out of his legs, as they were already running at full strength, and even with the painkillers he was still in  large amounts of pain. He desperately wanted to escape; he had already pushed his body beyond what it was capable of and she was still gaining on him very quickly. Within a second, he found the buildings and alleyways passing by him, and the lights of the streets were nothing but streamers that rushed by him, so he stopped himself. He was a in a completely different place from where he was a second ago. He turned around he had indeed gone in a straight line, but the distance he was looking at was at least three football fields long. Jacob had to guess where he was originally, but he crossed all that distance in a little under a second. What had just happened to him, a stroke of luck he thought to himself, was, in reality, that he was discovering his abilities. We both received them when coming to Equestria and found we could only use them in Equestria. He had discovered the first of them, but right now he didn’t know how to use it or if it was permanent or not and for all he knew he just had an amazing stroke of good luck. He saw a small lantern in the distance and assumed it was Pinkie, and that he had left her in the dust. He let out a sigh of relief and turned to walk away, but as he took his first step, he stopped immediately. There standing in front of him was Pinkie Pie and her enormous smile. At this point, Jake gave up on logic and simply let Pinkie speak.

“You know you are really are a tough colt to catch, but I found you and you’re back so YIIIIIPEEEEEE!”

“Hold on Pinkie, back…back from what?”

“You just randomly left us one day…”

Jake didn’t recall ever traveling to Equestria before, and honestly he didn’t care right now. He needed to focus on getting his answers, getting back to Michael and Jiggs, and then looking for a way home. “Look Pinkie I don’t have time for this…I’m looking for…”

“Twilight’s library?”

“…how did you…”

“It’s over there silly.” She pointed her hoof down the street. Jake took a look in that direction and sure enough, there was Twilight’s library. His random running through the streets served him well after all.

“PINKIE! WHERE ARE YOU?! I WANT MY LATERN BACK!”
“Oh…I gotta run! Mr. Cake still needs help with the foals seeing as Mrs. Cake is out this evening, anyway BYE!” With that she took off down the street in the direction of Mr. Cake’s voice. 

Jake was grateful but at the same time puzzled. How did she know he was heading to the library? “There were others? I randomly leave and she speaks as if she knows me and other humans. I need answers.” He dismissed the thoughts for now and headed towards the library hoping for some answers, activating his stealth emitter. His mission to simply confirm that this place was indeed the Equestria he had known, had suddenly morphed into a quest to  understand what Pinkie was talking about. Since she knew where he was heading, Jake figured that the library may hold an answer or two. He walked up to the tree-like structure and looked inside one of the windows. The lights were all off except for the ones upstairs; Twilight may have been doing some midnight studying, so Jake would have to go in quietly. He tried the door, but it wouldn’t budge. It was locked for the night probably. He thought about it, and maybe he could try that speed thing he did back in the alleyway, but he wasn’t sure how to do it or if he could still do it. But if he could, all he would need is the door just to crack open. Or he could just ram it down with the speed. He thought for a long while, seeing as he couldn’t break down the door; that would be both vandalism as well as a huge noise generator. Right now he was trying to be subtle.

He then remembered one of the oldest pranks in the universe, the  classic “ding dong ditch.” Since he had the emitter he could actually pull something like that off, but he would need the speed to get inside. If he was too close, Twilight might notice the small shadow the moon gave him. He had three minutes before the ten minutes of stealth would be up so he had to work fast. He slammed his fist against the door. He backed up a bit, waiting for it to open. If Spike answered the door he could simply jump over him, but if Twilight answered it he would have to get her to come outside, which he preferred not to do. Unfortunately, the door opened revealing Twilight’s face behind it. This was where it would get complicated. Somehow he needed to get her outside, and this is where his luck also fell into play. She actually walked outside and looked around the tree, giving Jake the opening he needed to sneak by. He began to sprint for the door, and his world became sharper this time as his speed increased. He made it inside before Twilight even turned around to go back inside. Jake had actually activated his speed a second time, and was proud of it. This time though he could actually see where he was going, as if his eyes were adapting to the new levels of speed. He waited patiently for Twilight to come back inside and walk back upstairs.

After a few minutes she did go back in, and walked back upstairs, slightly irritated, but quickly dismissed the incident as she went back to her studies. Jake de-cloaked and took the opportunity to take a look around. He turned on his torch and began his search. Most of the place was filled with what he expected: loads upon loads of books, scrolls, quills, anything a young scholar would need in the way of supplies. He explored the room further, checked a back storage room, opened all the cupboards and carefully searched them, and put everything he touched back exactly the way he found it, leaving no trace of him even being there. He paced about the main reading room for a moment, trying to figure out if he missed anything. The only place he hadn’t examined was the floor. Jacob pointed the flashlight at the floor and began examining it. Most of it was just normal floorboards, nice solid wood, until he came across a strange symbol engraved into the floor. It was a picture of hawk flying across a metal shield. Jake squatted, getting a closer look at the symbol. He compared the hawk to the one on his shirt and they were exactly identical in shape. Of course, the one he was looking at was smaller, but what was with the shield? He brushed some of the dust away, and a small metal panel slipped open revealing a hand scanner, retina scanner, and keypad. This was most defiantly not pony tech. The hand scanner was in the shape of a human hand, and the retina scanner as well as the keypad was much too small for a ponies use. However the display for the keypad read “Manual override engaged.” He looked down at the bottom of the panel and noticed a keyhole with a key inside, it as well as a red button beneath it. Naturally, it’s a big red button, and who can resist pressing one of those? Jake didn’t think twice. He pressed the button and heard a few clicks and snaps. They stopped within a few seconds and he saw a handle appear to his left. It looked like a handle to a suitcase that jutted out haphazardly in the floor. He pulled on it with little strength, but found he couldn’t lift it, so he applied a little more, until he found himself pulling with all the strength his muscles had to offer. It turned out the handle was attached to a massive slab of metal, which opened up like a trap door, and had to be opened manually. He finally lifted it up to the halfway point, and then slowly, using the remaining strength, he gently lowered it to the ground to keep the noise making to minimum. When he was sure it would not move, Jacob looked down what looked to be a shaft leading somewhere. It was surrounded by a concrete like substance; the weird part was that the ladder looked much too narrow for a pony to easily use, yet one could use it if one had to. This looked very promising, something out of place and really secretive looking, and he couldn’t resist the urge to climb down it and explore what lay below.

He climbed down the ladder, and found himself it what looked like an entryway. The doors were shut and had a heavy layer of dust, creating an ugly grey color on what at one point could have been pure white. They looked as if they hadn’t been opened in years. He was glad he brought the ski mask because he knew he would be coughing up a storm right now if he hadn’t. He pushed open the doors, which were unlocked, but the place was still pitch black. He slowly moved his flashlight across the room. It looked like the central hub for getting around the complex, and he noted 6 rooms branching out as well as a wide open middle as if it was designed for something big. He looked at the lab coats hanging near one of the rooms, and figured the area was for construction or experimentation. Nothing was in the center of interest so he went forward with exploring the rooms, most of them were empty, but he discovered there was a room that looked something like a firing range, as well as room labeled on the door “security.” The rest were bare, but the evidence of someone being there was overwhelming. Nail holes, used staples, lighter patches of dust on the wall indicating something at one point may have been hanging there: someone had most defiantly been there but they had left long ago. The only items he found were an old drum set, rock guitar, and soundboard. He examined them and they were completely normal, figuring whoever was here must have really liked to rock out cause these were quality instruments. The firing range had nothing really going for it that would suggest giving off any clues related to the creators of this place, so he decided to go for the security room first. He sat down at one of the terminals and brushed off the heavy coats of dust from the monitors. He took off the mask which was now soaked with sweat. After he gave it a hard squeeze and watched the moisture drip onto the floor, he placed it on the terminal desk. He powered up the system, wishing he could get a little more light in this entire place. When the operating system booted it read “Welcome to EDI security software version 22.1.”

“Odd, we are still on 15.6…what is this?” Jake thought as he observed the colorful welcome screen. The system finished booting, and he instantly had access to cameras all around the library. Despite how cool this was to him, he dismissed them and went straight into the root files looking for anything that would reveal more information about this place. He reached the command interface and began typing commands.
“command_reveal_name/” he pressed the enter button on the keyboard the screen immediately began spewing out text. 

“computer name: “BOSS”

Location: “equestrian laboratory, Twilight’s library”

Primary function: “Lab security and defense management”’

“Lab security eh, now we’re getting somewhere.” Jake began to type out more commands hoping to get more answers. “command_reveal_archives/”

“Access Denied.” He had just tried to pull up the video records off those cameras both within the lab, and around Twilight’s library, to no avail. He concluded that whoever was here must have blocked it so no one could pry sensitive information from the terminal.

He figured a lab must have an inventory, and therefore must have records. With the next command he could at least get an idea of how old the lab was.

“command_reveal_transfer_records/”

“Access Denied.” He was thwarted yet again; frustrated, he tried something he believed to be low priority, hoping for answer.

“command_reveal_instalation_date/”

“Data unavailable; files may be corrupted or deleted” He couldn’t believe it why would someone delete the date of the installation of a computer, after that he went straight to something he knew they could block no matter how hard they tried. 

He decided to find who built the place; maybe he would recognize the names or the corporation that built it. “command_reveal_lab_designers/”
“Lab Designers= 4

Designer 1_

Name: Jacob S. Fischer

Current Occupation: Captain of S.S. Armageddon

Age: 32”

He fell back in black rolling seat he was sitting in not sure what to think. “This is…isn’t possible…I’m only twenty-five! How…how is this place already built? Why did I build it…WHAT WAS I DOING HERE?!” He thought about what he was looking at, and couldn’t figure out how without coming to the impossible conclusion: somehow his future self comes here and assists three others in the construction of this place for whatever reason, and they just abandon it for whatever reason. “If only I could access the archives…” Those videos would have indeed offered him valuable insight, but he wasn’t going to figure it out that easily. He scrolled down the screen to look at the other names, was surprised but not in utter shock, and suddenly the shield he saw upstairs made sense because the name he saw next was my own. I am not going to reveal myself just yet, but for the sake of those who are wondering the significance of the shield, I will tell you that too, so not to upset some of your minds cause I know some of you won’t give a rip, but others…stuff like this just bothers you so much, and you must know otherwise your brain will EXPLODE. I used the shield as basically my insignia; all the weapons I built, all the ships I designed, even the bots I sent Jake with, somewhere on them was engraved into their metal; a picture of a shield if I remember correctly it was on the hand. I put it there to serve as a reminder that they are for our protection, not tools of slaughter, and should be used as such. He knew for a fact that I had been demoted and wasn’t going into a major leader position like that anytime soon. He looked at the other two designers, the names were Michael and Jiggs. Turns out the bots I sent with him had a role in this as well. 

Jake decided to try one more command. His mind was exploding with questions but he had one in particular.

“command_reveal_structure_purpose/”

His finger hovered above the enter button he was about to press it when he heard the lab door open again.

“ALRIGHT, WHO’S DOWN HERE?!”

Jake quickly turned off his light and shut off the screens. He peeked out the open door of the security room, and saw a small light illuminating from what he could guess was Twilight. He hadn’t come this far to simply get caught now. He put his mask back on and activated the emitter. He walked back into the lab as slowly, and as quietly as he could, but each step he took seemed to echo off the walls, giving away his position. Twilight began to lose her patience and became more paranoid with each noise she heard.

“SHOW YOURSELF! I KNOW YOU’RE HERE!”

Jake still refused to reveal himself and continued o sneak towards the entrance, but Twilight could hear his footsteps growing near. She didn’t like the idea of an intruder she couldn’t see.

“I AM GOING TO GIVE YOU ONE MORE CHANCE! SHOW YOURSELF OR I WILL FIND YOU!”

Jake remained silent, doing his best to get to the entrance, but no matter how quiet he tried to be Twilight still knew he was there.

“Fine have it your way.”

Twilight’s horn began to spark and spew energy as she put more magic into it. Suddenly what looked to Jake like magic dust colored pink began to move from her horn and about the room. Illuminating the entire room, Jake had lost the cover of darkness and was about to lose the power of the emitter as well. The dust began to spread to even the darkest of corners of lab, lighting them up. The dust began to settle on Jake, forming a pink glowing outline of his body for all to see, and the emitter was now useless.

Twilight let out a gasp. “You!”

Jake made a dash for the exit, using his newly gained speed ability to charge out the door, and began to quickly climb the ladder.

“WAIT STOP!” Twilight yelled up after him, “I’M NOT HERE TO HURT YOU!” The door began to close above the shaft, Jake had mere seconds left to escape, otherwise he would be trapped in the shaft and forced to reveal himself to Twilight. (Which if you ask me wasn’t such a bad idea, but he wanted to avoid that if at all possible.) He climbed out and back into the library, and just as the door clicked shut, he yanked the key out of the keyhole and slid the wooden lid back over the panel, hoping to slow Twilight down. He didn’t know how long that would keep her inside. If he designed the place most likely he knew better than to make it only open from the outside. He ran for the exit knowing it was probably still locked, and simply planned to break it down. He ran at it full speed and was outside within a second, yet there was no painful blow, no sound of splitting wood, and no debris all over his arms which he used to shield his face; it was if he just ran straight through it. He would have stayed to investigate what had just happened a little longer, had he not been still glowing a wonderful shade of bright pink. He ran all the way till he had gotten clear of the town. He knew he would have to get the dust off him before going back to Mike and Jiggs, and he smelled horrible. So he went for a bit of a swim in a nearby pond. Sure he was soaking wet, but it washed the magic dust right off and he could hide again. On his way back he stopped and sat on a long for a moment, pondering everything that had happened to him that night. “Mike and Jiggs…my commanding officer and friend…and myself built that place…IN TWILIGHT’S LIBRARY!? But what was the purpose…? What was the point…? Maybe I should ask Richy when this is all over, maybe he has some answers? No…no he was older in the lab records, and those are made during the first days of a lab’s design.” Jake decided to think about something else, seeing as he was getting himself nowhere in this debate with himself.

For the moment his thoughts drifted away from that puzzle, and down to his legs. He couldn’t figure out where the ability to run that fast came from, and whatever he just did at the library was something else. He picked up a small rock and held it in his hand and sat there just staring at it. Slowly, he felt its hard surface moving about his palm, then it just fell through his hand as if it wasn’t even there. He stood up from the log and carefully examined his hand, he felt it, and touched it against the log. It was as solid as solid could be, yet that rock just fell through his hand as if it wasn’t even in existence. “What…am I?” He walked over to a nearby tree and put his hand against it, he was able to feel the wood but then intentionally tried to make his hand go through it. For a few minutes he had no success, but after what seemed like the 947th try for Jake he was finally successful and moved his arm freely through the solid wood, even walked through it, proving that he did indeed walk straight through the door. After this revelation he continued on his quest to find Michael and Jiggs. On top of leaving his coat with Michael, he also left his com set and the weapons pack. As he continued to walk the pain killers he took earlier began to wear off and the pain from the wounds he had received earlier were returning. After aimlessly wondering around the town perimeter he finally found the two near the edge of the forest they had worked so hard to get out of, they spotted him and helped him into the camp. 
        

> Chapter 4: The Train
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 4: The Train


Jake woke up early the next morning.He moaned in pain, feeling the pulsing ebb of groaning life in his wounds. 

“Mornin', Sunshine,” Jiggs said cheerfully.

“…'Sup man...” Jake grunted, 

As he tried to sit up, he felt searing pain tear through his back. He turned to see what caused this pain and found he was leaning against a rock with jagged edges. He wanted to think he hadn’t been laying against it all night but he recalled that he fell exhausted from his newfound abilities.

“…So how bad do I look?” Jake asked Jiggs .“Well, we took a look at you last night and….. I honestly don’t understand how you managed to run this far with a dislocated femur, a broken ankle, or a fractured pelvis. I mean, those pain killers are powerful stuff, but not that powerful. I must say, you sir have an incredible tolerance for pain.” 
Jake believed, the hot pain no doubt a strong reproof of Jiggs's claims. Jiggs pulled out another small syringe, and began to suck a green substance into the chamber of the syringe. When it was full, he attached a much longer needle to the syringe. Jake rolled his eyes.

“Oh gosh…not this again.”

“Relax mate, it’s not that bad….Well ok, you’re gonna have a very painful few seconds. Basically this stuff will increase your blood pressure dramatically). You see, usually the injuries you have sustained will take weeks, or even months depending on the severity of the wound. I don’t think you want to wait that long. The idea behind this stuff is that it will shove the bones back into their normal positions, the second part of the solution causes cells to regenerate on a massive scale.But this is still  in its clinical trials., It will cause temporary paralysis as the bones are shoved back into their regular positions. You can think of it as reseting a computer to its factory settings for repair.. You’re gonna hear and feel all kinds and of creeks and cracks throughout your body, and did I mention this is gonna feel extremely painful?”

“Yeah…I think we covered that point already….so what happens if the bones don’t align properly?” 

“They will…this drug has done miracles for every squad I have been a part of….why do you think my squads have the lowest death rate?” Jiggs pulled out a series of metal bars and a small sheet. Jake watched for a moment and realized he was assembling a stretcher.

“What’s with the stretcher?”

“Well you see, when I inject you with this serum, your bones are goin' to go as stiff as a piece of petrified wood. If you’re not layen' flat, you could injure yourself further so I’m gonna finish this and then all you have to do is lay down on it.”

“Sounds simple enough…” Jake winced as the pain intensified, his alertness delivering the full feeling of the injuries. Jiggs slid all the pieces into place and the stretcher was assembled. Jake slowly moved to the stretcher,  sat down and then slowly tilt his body back into the appropriate position. He turned his head and saw Michael with another needle coming towards him this one had clear liquid in it, looking almost like water but Jake knew exactly what was in it. “OH NO YOU DON’T!”

“But sir this will make you…”

“I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT IT DOES, AND I DON’T WANT IT!”

“Suit yourself,” Michael put the needle away, and went back to the trees, he began to look for a place to perch on to keep a good look out for anyone who may come by the procedure. Jake had already had his fair share of anesthetics for the week, and decided to just suck it up this time around, rather than feel the awful half-dead consciousness the later hours would bring.

“Besides, Jiggs said it would last a few seconds.”

“Oh yeah, eh boss when I said that I may have been exageratin'….a little….”

“What!?” He didn’t get to say much else Jiggs jammed the needle into Jake’s arm and shoved the strange green liquid into him. Jake’s world began to spin, feeling his heart smash against his chest. Immediately he felt stiff, unable to move his body, not even his mouth to protest Jiggs' methods. It was over in about seventy seconds but felt like an eternity to Jake. Jake could feel his heart rate going down again. When the rush ended, he felt much better. When he sat up, he heard every bone in that part of his body crack, breaking the stiffness that once held him so tightly. After a few moments of basically standing and moving his limbs around Jake felt amazing. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he was glad Jiggs did that.

“So, how’d your raid go last night?” Jiggs asked.

“It went well. Didn’t run into too many problems.”

“I can see that…” he snarked, leafing through the x-rays of Jake’s skeleton before the procedure. “You find what you were lookin' for?”

“Yeah…” Jake replied. “Maybe a little too much of what I was looking for” he thought silently. He was about to tell Jiggs everything, but then hesitated on what to tell him. Everything that he told him or Michael would most likely get relayed back to me, so he chickened out figuring this was best left till later. I still cannot fathom why he insisted on secrecy, but I think I will find out soon enough...

“So then…what does this mean? Do you now know for sure where we are?”

“…yeah…” Jake thought for a  moment, and realized since this was the season 2 finale, he was in a very unique position. He could go to Canterlot and actually attend the royal wedding. Past the needed cloak and dagger antics and eventual battle with the changelings, he saw a once in a life time opportunity was upon him. He then wondered about the lab. He reasoned that it would remain there, and he could always resume his investigation. After a few moments of debate he made his decision.
“Mike, Jiggs, did either of you discover any railroad tracks during your sweep  of the perimeter?”

Michael jumped down from the branch he was perched on. “Yeah…we found a set leading out of the town.”

“I want you to follow them until you reach a station, when you find it I would you to be on the lookout for 6 mares and a dragon.” He described the mane six in meticulous detail. They both seemed to be alright with the mares, but when it came to Spike neither of them liked the idea of being near a dragon, despite the fact that Jake did his best to make him sound harmless. He was still their commanding officer so they did what he asked them to do, albeit reluctantly. Mike gave Jake back his coat, weapons pack, and com set. Michael told Jake to keep emitter since Jake explained he would be boarding the train. Sadly this left Michael without a stealth emitter, but thankfully Jiggs had a spare, as he always brings two of everything in case one goes bad. He handed the spare to Mike, and then they both headed into town.

“Sir, when we see them, what do you wish for us to do?”

“Just tell me. I’ll be there in a few seconds.”

“Sir, with all due respect, that is at least a mile, it only takes a few seconds for a train to get up to speed. A normal human can’t make that distance.”

“Well, I’m not a normal human, now am I? Trust me Mike, I’ll be there. Just let me know when they show up.” Jake didn’t know what day the mane 6 were planning on leaving Ponyville and heading off to Canterlot ,so he put Michael and Jiggs near the train station and had them keep a careful watch. He couldn’t miss this train, as it was the only train he knew of and the only way they could penetrate the security measures. The massive force field protecting Canterlot kept out an army of changelings, each one with probably more strength than Jake will ever have. Stealing into the city on foot was too risky. Once on the train he would have ten minutes to find a place to hide. Since he had some control over his new phase abilities, they would most certainly help him get out of a tight spot if he needed to. His plan was foolproof.

Jake waited for several hours. When the sun began to move to the other side of the sky signaling the start of the afternoon, he decided he felt well enough to try practicing his powers again. He decided to take laps around Ponyville to improve his speed control and he would walk through anything along the way getting practice with both abilities. He did this all afternoon successfully wearing himself out. Nightfall finally came, and he was ready for some rest. He slowly shut his eyes as all his muscles relaxed.He lay confident that the ponies wouldn’t leave during the night, allowing him some time to relax. Jake fell into an odd dream. He found himself in an empty shell of Ponyville. It was mae only of blank skeletal structures radiating with a sickening glow. He could see the ponies in the buildings, and hear their conversations. “What is this place?” Jake wondered as he marched through the town. He could feel the emotions going through each of the pony’s minds If anyone ever possessed Alexis de Toqueville's mind of god, Jake felt he was such a person; he could understand each pony completely and at a glance. He felt nauseous, overwhelmed by the information. He tried to speak but no words came out They seemed to ignore him, anyway. Each pony seemed to have a glow around his or her coat, as if they were giant living glow sticks. Jake felt like he was in some place he wasn’t supposed to be, and began to run to escape the town. As he ran, the glows around the ponies begin blur as his speed increased, but no matter how fast he ran he couldn’t escape the town. Every time he got to an entrance the moment he ran past it he was put on the opposite side of town as if something was keeping him there.
After his 5th attempt to escape town, he was teleported back this time to the train station. His vision was covered with a rainbow caul, able to see figures in the distance but not the time of day. He assumed it was day since there were so many but he didn’t know. He reasoned the glows were auras of each of the ponies, for he couldn’t think of another word to describe it, and it seemed as such to me. There were two outlines across the street on the second floor of what looked like an apartment complex that struck his interest,.Michael and Jiggs were machines so supposedly they shouldn’t auras since they aren't alive. Jake could only see their outlines blended in with the buildings with the same basic white outline and no fill.

“I don’t know mate…he seems like he’s losing it a bit…”

“Well he’s been right so far about everything really. The talking ponies, the magic, their entire civilization... I find this fascinating.” Michael was taking this despite the strangeness of it all.

“Well that’s good for you. Argh! You know the old man ain’t gonna believe this when we get back.” Jiggs said taking another look out the window.

“It is uncertain. He used to talk about this place a lot, if you remember correctly.”

“I do….I just didn’t think it actually existed. If I did, I would have brought bigger guns.” 

“You know Jiggs, that’s your problem...” Michael pulled off a metal rod from his back “… you are not subtle enough.” Instantly two axe heads popped out of each side of the rod forming a double sided hatchet. 

“What is it with you and killing people quietly?! In my opinion, if you want to kill someone, make as many people as you can aware of it! That’s how you scare 'em the fastest.”

“It is also a really quick way to get notoriety and get your sorry metallic face ripped off by a bunch of water sacks.” 

“Look, you can use my way in all situations. I bet there isn’t a problem in the universe that can’t be solved by a couple of .50 calibers. I mean, what can you do with  that…that…whatever you wanna to call that.”

“…This!” Michael threw the axe right at Jiggs’ face, Jiggs quickly raised his arm to block it, the axe dug its blade deep within the metal outlining his armor.

“Oi mate! WHAT YOU DOIN'!” When Jiggs put his arm down from in front of his face, Michael was nowhere to be seen then he heard a small *tap tap* against his neck joint, he looked down and there was a very sharp knife at his mechanical throat. 

“And for your information, it’s called a hatchet.” Michael whispered into Jiggs’ audio receiver.

“Well played my good friend. But I hold one thing against you…”

“Oh?What might that be?”

“Your stance is way off.” Jiggs spun around very quickly and using his feet caught Michael off guard and swept Michael off his feet. He hit the floor hard. Jake could see the other pony one floor below becoming slightly disturbed at that loud noise.

“Nice, you got me distracted…” Jiggs ripped the axe out of his arm revealing a small crevice created by the blade.

“You see mate, you ain’t got a chance against me. Ya see these? I got abs of steel mate.” He threw the axe back at Michael. Michael grabbed the handle while it was in midair catching it before the blade could impact him. 

“We are robots man…we don’t have abs!.” He threw the knife and axe at Jiggs. The knife pierced his left wrist, pinning it to the wall and the axe dug itself into the right wrist and the wall itself pinning the right hand to the wall. Michael pulled out a short sword and walked over to Jiggs, drawing the blade inches away from his neck. “I don’t think I need them to beat you though.”

“You sure 'bout that?” Michael heard a small *click* and looked down. Jiggs, using only his right foot, removed the magnum on his left holster, and still using the same foot to hold it was pointing the barrel at Mike’s face. 

“Touché….” Michael said as he lowered the sword from Jiggs throat. Jake just shook his head at the sight. Michael yanked the knife and axe out of Jiggs’ body and Jiggs quickly began to tend to his wounds. He immediately began to solder the few snapped wires in his wrists back together. He then proceeded to weld all the cracks in his armor back to their normal positions, he was done in record time since Michael didn’t hit anything to important, or hard to fix.

“Ahhhh, that was fun mate….. We should do this more often.”

“We shouldn’t have done that we could have missed our objectives.”

“Oh, come on mate, we do nothin' but work all time for our creator. I think he wouldn’t mind if we took a moment to enjoy ourselves.”

The conversation didn’t much further seeing as right after Jiggs said that there was knock at the door of the apartment they were hiding in.

“House keeping.”

“Dang it Jiggs, didn’t you put out the do not disturb sign?”

“Uhhhhh……was on mah to do list, I swear.”

“Gah, now we have to deal with this….” He handed his sword to Jiggs “…here I’ll take care of this.” He came close to the door. “We don’t need any service right now, come back in the morning.”

He heard the hooves trot away from the door and considered his mission a success. They continued to watch over the station diligently as instructed. It was mostly a silent evening; they talked a bit but nothing after the little training fight they had in the room hours earlier. 

“You sure the big man’s alright? We haven’t heard from him in a while.”

“Relax mate, he’s fine….probably sleeping right now it’s early morning after all. After all, he’s been through I say we let him sleep for the time being.”

A few hours past, and the sun began to rise bringing its rays of light to the town. Jake saw the black world he was in turning to white as day became more and more apparent. The outlines also changed from being outlined in white to being outlined in black so he could now see them despite the change of color of the entire environment. 

“Crap man!Look, there they are!” Michael pointed to a small group of ponies who were wondering up to the train station, they took careful note of all the ponies in the group and the small dragon that accompanied them. “Wow, thought it would be bigger….” Michael had observed Spike’s small size and was disappointed  with it.

“Well, we’d better alert the boss then.” 

Jake’s eyes immediately snapped open to the sound of Jiggs’ voice coming off of his receiver.

“Boss we got 'em…” There was a moment of silence as Jake’s body continued to wake itself up. “…Jake you there?” He was hoping all of this was a coincidence. Jake’s mind couldn’t take much more of the bizarre fantasy. He eventually convinced himself what he saw in his dream last night really was a dream.

“Yeah I’m here. What do have for me?”

“We got your train and from the looks of things it’s about to leave in a few minutes.”

“More than enough time. I’ll be there in the a few.” Jake stood up, activated the emitter, and began his run towards the station. He now had less than ten minutes to get on the train and find a good hiding spot before the emitter shorted out. He began kicking up the dust on the ground as he ran, he became concerned quickly as the dust rose, so he decided to slow down a bit but would be there in just a few minutes all the same. The world speed passed him as he focused on where he needed to go. 

“Sir where are you? The train is departing.”

Jake was too well focused to answer at the moment. He saw the smoke coming out of the train as the locomotive in front powered up and gained speed. Jake pumped his legs faster and harder, kicking up dust in the process.

“Sir…is that you? Mike come take a look at this....”

“Whoa! Dang dude he is running much faster than we can.”

“You’re tellin' me! He’s clockin' at least 150 miles per hour, if I’m readin' this right.”

“You are not. That one is really a four.”

“FOUR FIFTY MILES PER HOUR!? ON HIS OWN MUSSLE?! IMPRESSIVE! How’d you do it boss?”

“I’ll tell you the story another time Jiggs.” 

“I’m lookin' forward to that tale.”

Jake found the exact measurement of his speed fascinating, but still continued to focus on overtaking the train. At long last and soon he saw his opportunity to jump on. He was a few feet away from the caboose the last car of the train. Using the momentum he had,he jumped into the air and grabbed the handle bar on the back. He pulled himself up and onto the back of the train.

“I’m in, gents.”

“Good to hear Jake.What about us? Do you wish for us to board with you?”

“Negative my friend. I want you to follow the train, and hide yourselves in the cliffs outside the city. Make sure no one sees you and I want you to let me know if you see any trouble coming. There will be a force field around the city, so you may find it very difficult to get in if you are not on this train. Don’t try to force entry.”

“Very well. Come on Jiggs, let’s get moving.” 

“From here on out radio silence. I want this to be a quiet journey.” Jake knew that it would be very hard to talk while on the train if he wished to have a low profile, and the more stuff he brought with him the harder it would be hide and maneuver while on the train. He carefully checked the caboose. As far as he could see, no one was in it. Jake slowly opened the door and walked into the car. He decided to take a breather there. Jake opened a small storage closet that wasn’t big enough for him, so he dropped his weapons pack inside and used a sheet like fabric in the closet to cover it. With that taken care of, he shut down the emitter and let it recharge in case any ponies came to the back of the train while he was there. He settled in the top compartment of the caboose, a place that was slightly elevated allowing a view of the top of the train. He looked out over the long line of cars attempting to guess which car Fluttershy was in. He did this for several minutes before the entire train turned to outlines, like in his dream the night before only this time he knew he was awake. He touched the window which was now no more than a rough outline. It was still there, all the structure remained he could just see through it as well as see the auras surrounding all the ponies on the train. For some reason, he could pinpoint which car Fluttershy was on, and even feel the excitement she was experiencing. But this was too much for him and he tried to shake himself out of the world he was currently in. He didn’t know if he could be seen while in the world, but he didn’t care. He wanted out and he got out a few seconds later. The color in everything returned as well as all the mass that should be there rather than just outlines that appeared transparent, but the location of Fluttershy stayed with him, as well as the emotion she was currently feeling. He couldn’t believe it. He had to see if he had sight beyond sight, and to test it, he would see if Fluttershy was there. 

He left his weapons pack behind because he knew he wouldn’t need them here; even if he was discovered he could still make a speedy exit with his other abilities. He grabbed the emitter and switched it on, and decided to phase through the walls. It would eliminate the need to open a door. If his instincts are correct, she would be in the third car from the engine, so just a few cars in front of him, he felt very confident he could make that distance, confirm her being there, and return in under ten minutes. He could have gone over on the roofs, but they might hear him, so he figured this may be better. He entered  the first car. Rows of seats to his left and right, and one empty isle down the center to allow for passengers to move in and out of the car. This was where it became tricky; he could control what he phased through because the objects up until now were stationary, but he couldn’t predict when a pony would randomly stand up and block his path or move their hoof up to stretch. He couldn’t leave the phase powers active all over his body and phase everything. Otherwise he would fall straight through the train. He decided to leave his upper body phased in case of stray hooves and would take his chances with the lower body. He couldn’t get the power to go to specific limbs, if he had that he could simply phase everything except his feet allowing him straight passage, thankfully he could control what he phased through when he wanted to phase through something, this is how he could walk on the train without falling through the train and onto the tracks and still walk through the car doors on the train. Sadly he didn’t have the knowledge or the experience at the time. So he made the journey quick and painless he bolted through the first car only a small breeze left by his speed gave him away but it didn’t seem to disturb the ponies so he knew he wasn’t going too fast. 

“One down, three to go.”

Jake focused hard as he entered the next car. There were more ponies on this one than the last one. He performed the same drill as before and was glad he phased his upper body because a hoof went straight through his face. He ran a little faster that time and some of the ponies noticed the abnormal amount of wind traveling through the car, but dismissed it. Jake now knew he was pushing his luck with the speed, even if he was getting through the car in just a few seconds. The next two cars he slowed down a bit, and did trip while running through the last one startling several ponies. Thankfully, he was able to recover and use a fallen suit case as a scapegoat allowing him to get away clean. As he approached the door to the last car he was feeling extremely worn out, he didn’t know why.

“Maybe my body just isn’t used to running that fast...No, then it would have collapsed on me earlier while I was practicing…” He stopped phasing his torso and let him recover his stamina. Jake checked the door. There was no window and no way of seeing what lay beyond this door. He sighed in frustration as he realized he was in eminent danger from exhaustion. Then out of nowhere he was put back into the dream world again, everything went bright white just like the dream did when the sun supposedly came up. The door was once again an outline and he could see its contents of the car much more clearly than he could from the back of the train. He looked at his hands and saw they were glowing a bright white, as well as the rest of his body for that matter he didn’t bother to notice back in the caboose. He didn’t know why he was glowing white. His aura was also very different from the ponies, for it looked as if he was on fire with ember jumping off of him onto the floor.. He didn’t understand and tried not to think about it too much. He figured it was just another question to add to his list. He looked at the emitter which was now also an outline. He had seven minutes remaining and his sixty second rest period was up. He counted six ponies, all of which by this sense he received were all the ones he knew. Some felt tired, while others were having thoughtful conversations with each other. He also sensed a seventh entity who he concluded to be spike which even though he was a purple dragon but radiating a green aura. Jake found this to be quite interesting because the auras, the other ponies were giving off matched the colors of their coats making them all easy to identify. He still needed to make sure what he was seeing was actually there he was going into the car regardless of what he was seeing now; if it was correct, Fluttershy would be in the 5th row from the back having a conversation with Pinkie who according to what he was seeing was sitting right next to her in the 5th row from the back. He readied himself to go through the door, the rest period did help but not much the feeling of being exhausted persisted and Jake barely made it through the door. He knew if he did that again he may or may not make it through the object he was trying to go through without blacking out, this would complicate getting back to the end of the train.

He was still in the strange world of light that he still couldn’t explain. After a few moments Jake was able to get his vision to return to normal, and sure enough there was Fluttershy with Pinkie 5th row from the back. He didn’t care how fatigued he felt he wanted to faint, he was gaining more and more power he couldn’t explain. “The applications are endless! This could help EDI annihilate the Snake, I could be an assassin….” He had accomplished his mission, and was now ready to return to the caboose, but he failed to consider the fatigue he felt whenever he went to phase through something now and he learned the hard way by trying to phase through the door he had just come through. He couldn’t activate it for a second without getting terrible headaches and extreme disorientation. He almost fell over face first when trying to get out and he hadn’t even started to go through the door yet. He couldn’t leave the car that way and he had only three minutes remaining on the emitter. He had to choose quickly either Hide, or find another way out. None of the windows were open, and each door was in sight of at least one pony. If he tried to open either the doors or the windows, he ran the risk of being noticed by one of the passengers and this car being almost deserted didn’t help. He no longer had large crowds of ponies to use to his advantage when moving around. He honestly never thought he would ever run into the real versions of the ponies or get them alone in a room for that case, but he never would have guessed if he ever did he would be trying to escape them. 

Jake walked over to a nearby window, the ponies were pretty evenly spaced throughout the train but the largest space was in between Twilight who was sitting alone reading, and Rarity and Applejack who were sitting six rows in front of her, it beat the other side because spike was on it and there was only a three row difference. He could try for the back but he feared them actually hearing him and Rainbow dash was facing the rear while talking with Spike, he didn’t want to run the risk of her noticing the window because she would most likely draw the most attention to it out of all the ponies. The majority of the ponies were facing front, making going for the windows positioned towards the front of the car even harder to access. Twilight was looking at her book and was heavily concentrating on reading it, and AJ and Rarity were too much into the conversation giving him the moment he needed to escape, once outside he could go for the roof and make it back to the caboose that way.

He began to slowly open it. Twilight’s ears perked up at the sound of the window moving he could see her sitting up and starring straight at him. Jake froze and quickly released the window, it remained motionless. The window was barely open, not nearly enough for a noticeable breeze to get through Twilight looked at her friends and around the car for a moment and then promptly went back to reading her book. Jake looked down at the emitter he had less than two minutes to get that window open and get out before he lost his stealth abilities. He continued to as quietly as he could open the window, he got half way before Twilight sat up again once again starring him down, this time she was squinting as if trying to make out something really hard to see, Jake panicked and began to sweat like crazy, “What if she knows I’m here….” Jake saw her horn light up, and he braced for the worst. “Well, better get ready to run” He prepared to be noticed by the entire car, his anxiety began to peak not knowing what would happen when they figured out he was in the car this whole time. He thought harder “What are they going to do…Are they gonna scream…oh gosh if they scream I could be arrested, Dang I’d rather not get arrested by equestria authorities! I WON’T SURVIVE IN AN EQUESTRIAN PRISON…” Just as he thought his head was going to explode with panic he heard the window click shut, and Twilight went back to reading. Jake felt his heart slow down drastically as she went back to starring at her book, he let out the air he was holding in as his body began to relax a bit. Unfortunately that soon changed he looked down at the emitter and less than thirty seconds remained on it. 

Jake began to rapidly look around the room for anyplace he could hide for just thirty seconds. The only two doors were in the front and back, and there were no sharp corners in the car to hide behind it being a normal passenger car and all. His best bet was hiding underneath the seats, they were larger than the ones on earth since they needed to accommodate a larger body so he had  more space to conceal himself. The only two drawbacks to this plan was the seats were designed so that if one was to crawl under he or she could only crawl out by going backwards or forwards because of a support holding the seat firmly to the ground going out sideways into the isle was not possible. The second drawback was there is nowhere  to run if anyone looks under while he is cooling down the emitter they will see him immediately and he won’t be able to escape too easily. Ten seconds remained, he didn’t see any other better options so he got down and crawled under the seats he was able to lay flat  long ways perpendicular to the direction of car without showing any of his limbs, he began to breath slower as he watched the timer slowly countdown to zero, he could once more see his hands. Jake looked at the emitter channeling all his energy into keeping himself from panicking “thirty seconds……”

“Hey Fluttershy, check this out.” He felt movement on the other side of the car, and heard a familiar hop. It became louder and louder but he couldn’t see anything on the other side of the car since the seat support was blocking him. 

“What is it, Pinkie Pie?”

Two sets of hooves settled to the right of Jake blocking his primary escape route. “Look, it’s a flock of doves.”

“Oh my…Pinkie they’re beautiful.” The hooves remained in place, just mere inches from Jake. 

Jake looked down at the emitter. “Nineteen seconds left.” Jake didn’t want to go out in the open and be seen but Jake feared being boxed in he didn’t want to be trapped like this the whole ride, he looked to his left and began to crawl slowly towards the row of seats behind him, and hopped to hide under them for the remainder of his cool down period. Just before he was able to the see the rays of light from the sun hit his hand a set of blue hooves blocked his path. 

“What are you all starring at? WHOA THAT’S A LOT OF BIRDS!”

“They’re  doves, Rainbow Dash, and they are so sweet and adorable. Many of them made their homes near me and are some of my best animal friends.”

“If you say so Fluttershy, but why are there so many?”        

“They must be migrating, but  I have never seen this many before migrating in a flock this big.”

Jake continued to watch and saw Rainbow move closer to the window allowing a small opening to get to the row behind him, but he also noticed Twilight’s hooves had left their place in the back, within a second of him noticing this another set of hooves appeared in front of him these ones were purple. “Well this is awkward……” He thought to himself as his hand retreated.

“Hey Twilight.”

“Hello Rainbow Dash so what’s every pony starring at?”

Jake got back into his flat position and hit his head in frustration against the floor as he lay on his back again.

“Hey did you hear that?”

“Hear what Pinkie?”

“I heard it.”

“It sounded like a some pony hitting their head hard against a slab of wood.”

Jake realized what he had just done and starred at the timer, sweat dripped down from his forehead as he watched the seconds countdown the longer he starred the longer the seconds seemed to last.

“..and it sounded like it came from beneath this seat.”

“3…..2…..1” Jake activated the emitter and disappeared from sight just as not one but four pairs of eyes began to stare straight at him. Jake crossed his fingers and put them behind his back and began to pray. “Don’t reach your hooves out…don’t reach your hooves out…please don’t reach your hooves out…” Twilight from Jake’s perspective was still suspicious she didn’t fully get over the window randomly opening and the sound she just heard both which happened to be coincidentally in the same row to be just a figment of her imagination or her friend’s for that matter. She reached out her hoof, it passed over Jake practically brushing the black shirt he was wearing she moved it left right up and down practically torturing him, she never made her hoof explore the space near the floor.

“What are you doing Twilight? There’s nothing there.” Rainbow said to her unicorn friend.

“I know I didn’t just hear that noise. This is all way to complex to just be coincidence.”

“What is Twilight?” Twilight withdrew her hoof and hesitated to answer he friends question, Jake could finally wipe away the sweat that was collecting all over his face and creating a small puddle behind his head.

“Nothing…” she sat back down in the row behind Pinkie and Fluttershy, each of the ponies quickly lost interest in the event that had just occurred and returned to their normal seating positions, for now Jake was in the clear. Sadly, he was also boxed in Twilight and Rainbow to his left and Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie to his right. His only move at the moment was to try and wait this out, he was now deeply regretting not going to hide on the other side of the train with all the ponies on this side of the train he would be able to escape while they were all starring out the window. Every ten minutes he had to go through a very stressful thirty second period where he could be seen, but he learned from his mistake and didn’t make too much noise. 

Every hour or so he would try to use his phase ability, the fatigue and disorientation were still present but he found as time went one they became less intense, he was glad to be recovering. To pass the time he listened to the conversations of the ponies, or practiced his what he now believed to be x-ray vision, but he also noted he couldn't see nearly as well during day as he could at night. The elements of his new power better suited to hunting in the dark, so in a way it was like a cross between night vision and x-ray vision. In the end he decided to come up with the name "night sight" it was catchy and it wasn't night vision. He was able to get it when in moments of great distress, but he figured right now he had plenty of time and would try to make it so he could activate it on command like he did with his phase ability and super speed. Naturally the first few tries were horribly unsuccessful his vision remained normal and unaffected by anything. He was about to hit his head again in frustration when his vision changed, he was suddenly able to see the auras of Pinkie and Fluttershy above him and Twilight’s and Rainbow’s behind him, and all the others that were present in the car. He switched it on and off over and over again until he was certain he had mastered it, the hardest part was figuring out how to activate it, once he could do that repeating the process was easy. After figuring that out he began to listen to the conversations of the ponies that were near him. They were casual pony conversations. Debates over which wonder bolt owns the most, Pinkie’s cupcakes being amazing, the exciting wedding they were about to attend. Twilight was still very displeased with her brother for leaving her out of the loop with his decision on who to marry. Jake even though he found these conversations to be entertaining and loved figuring out how to trigger his new ability he was still mad at himself for getting into this situation, he had a long time to reflect on his decision because he was stuck there for the rest of the trip. He finally let out a breath of relief when the train finally came to a stop and the ponies exited the car. He got out from his hiding place and stretched for a moment. He had made it to Canterlot, and gone virtually undetected by anyone. He felt relieved to finally be in the clear, and decided even though he had probably killed his immune system by stressing so much over being discovered on the train, he concluded it was so worth it, but he also concluded that he would never try this ever again because he looked down and not only did he smell like sweat he needed to change into a spare change of undies cause he took a wiz in his panic and didn’t notice till now.
    
	

> Chapter 5: 24 hours of pain
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 5: 24 hours of pain



I felt a bit of sympathy for Jake, but he walked headfirst into his problems and there was nothing I could have done about it.

Jake checked his emitter.  He had a few minutes left before  it needed to be switched off. He figured that it was more than enough time to hurry back to the back of the train. Most of the ponies already left the train, but soon he needed to foray into the city for supplies. Because he wasn't exactly into urban exploration and didn't know the layout of the city, he, for some unfathomable reason decided to follow the mane six. He opened the door and climbed to the roof of the train to avoid all the ponies on the platform and ran to the end of the train where he found the weapons pack still under the sheet he had put over it just hours ago. This was an older version of the pack so you actually had to press a button to open it. He opened the pack, hoping to find that I had a spare change of pants in there. Wandering about in wet pants isn't exactly comfortable; he looked and smelled like he had gone swimming in a lake filled with his own sweat. He pressed a silver button located on top of the pack on the upper right corner and a screen on the side of the metal pack. The pack would dimensionally distort the items placed inside it in order to carry more equipment in a small space Jake was astonished with my device and quickly figured out the basic properties but he still had much to learn about it, and he had some investigating to do.

He stuffed his uniform slacks in the pack, and changed quickly. He knew he wouldn’t have the train to himself much longer and the mane six probably ventured far into the city by now. He took a look out the window. He still couldn’t believe he was actually in Canterlot, the capital of Equestria, a hitherto imaginary country. It was truly a sight to see, for the city was up on a cliff haranguing all of Equestria with grace and aplomb. The surface grace belied the fact that the city was also a fortress that could withstand a long siege and that a goddess-queen called it home. The emitter finished charging and Jake had the urge to run outside, a welcoming activity after being stuffed under a seat for hours on end. 

He opened the back door to the caboose and felt the fresh air pass over his face; he took in deeply and it felt like water that is found in a desert. He reveled in this sensation for several moments before beginning his search. He looked around the platform and observed that it was extremely crowded with ponies of all kinds; business ponies, the royal guard, tourists, and many more. The objects of his search, the mane 6, were nowhere to be seen. He figured they couldn’t have gotten very far, he hadn’t been in the train for all that long . Twilight probably went off to harass her older brother, while the rest had probably gone off to get ready for the wedding that was to take place. Jake didn't want to wander aimlessly until he bumped into one of the main six. He moved through the station clearing the platform and searched the lobby of the station. He found no trace of them, so he walked outside into the city. The streets were even more crowded than the platform; which is to be expected in the busling streets of a major city. 

Crossing the street was a nightmare; even with his super speed he had to time his bursts of speed just right otherwise he would run into a cart or one of the ponies. Jake played a game of Frogger with the moving carts to avoid a head-on collision at 250 meters per second. He had to remember instead of being in Ponyville he was now in a highly populated metropolis, and moving about wasn’t going to be as easy as it had been. He couldn't phase through the objects because he was afraid he would tire out too quickly and that the ability would "short out" when it was really needed . So he could use it to run through a closed door, or solid wall if he had to but he had not fully recovered from the incident on the train yet, so if he could, he kept himself from using his phase ability until his body had a chance to fully heal.  

After aimlessly walking through the massive city for several hours and having several close brushes with the ponies, he finally encountered Rarity. Jake spotted her purchasing some fabric and decided to tail her back to her room . Now I know that sounds really creepy, but he was just trying to get his bearings on the city . I can fight for him. Jake does not have a dirty mind and is not a creeper, he just made the rare and admittedly odd decision to act like one while he was in Equestria. 

He followed her all the way back to her room in the Canterlot Castle, carefully memorizing the path he traveled along. Thankfully, he allowed the emitter to cool down before continued following her and had the full ten minutes  to take only one minor break in an alleyway. After memorizing the pathway to Rarity’s room he found a small corner that peered into the room and well-hidden for him to rest in. All he needed to do now was to wait for her to leave the room or one of her friends came into the room. It was one of the reasons he was glad to run into Rarity first. Rarity was one of those ponies who blocked out the entire world when she worked on her latest dress, and Jake briefly considered peering over her front flank to see. Luckily Jake decided against that. 

Jake waited for several hours; time seemed to pass slower than usual when he was following someone. No one was coming. Chances were that all the other ponies were off taking care of their own preparations for the wedding and he was better off searching building by building for them. He decided to wait a few more minutes before setting off on the search again. He designated Rarity’s suite at the castle as his safe house since he could hide in it very easily. Just before he decided to head out there was a knock at the door. 

“Coming,” Rarity trilled.

She put down her sewing needles and trotted over to the door. Her horn lit and blue magic surrounded the handles as the door pulled opened. Jake took careful note of how much time remained on the emitter, and saw that he just finished his thirty second cool down and could last another nine minutes and forty five seconds plenty of time to get out if there were to many at the door. To his relief there were only four ponies at the door: Princess Cadence and her bride’s maids. This made it so he couldn’t move around the room as easily anymore, but it wasn’t impossible, so he waited a little longer to find a way to de-cloak in the room without anyone seeing him. This sudden appearance of Cadence looked promising from his perspective, seeing as for the last few hours nothing had happened. 

“Oh my, princess….you’re early.” Rarity commented.

“Yes I know," Cadence responded,  "all my previous appointments did not last as long as I expected so I found myself with a little extra time. I believe I am here for my fitting.”

“Oh, why yes, of course you are. Please come in.” Rarity gestured for the princess and her bride’s maids to enter. They all walked in, and lined up next to each other. Rarity dressed the bride first while the others stayed back, each waiting for her own turn. Rarity opened a small drawer from a dresser near where Jake was standing with her magicand pulled out a tape measure and began to measure the length and width of each mare, taking careful note of their sizes. She recorded the measurements on a small piece of paper and then did so for each. The appointment didn’t take long and Jake only had to duck under the bed, which was a better hiding spot seeing as there were more ponies in the room. They were out in short time and Rarity rolled up the tape measure and stuffed it back in the drawer from which she had taken it from and began to sketch her designs for the four mares. The dresses were gorgeous even though they were just rough sketches. He took extra care to step lightly as he walked over to Rarity for a closer look. Fashion isn’t really his thing but he couldn’t resist giving it a look. He got to where he was virtually touching Rarity,  but stayed back enough to make the virtually still apply and have her not notice him while he could still get a good look at her sketches. He was surprised how quickly she came up with these designs; it hadn’t been five minutes and she was already done with one. She used her magic to roll up the piece of paper and set it to the side by the window. She then picked up another giant piece of sketch paper and began to draw another. She began to draw but then promptly stopped.

“Oh no, this most certainly will not do,” Rarity groaned.

She crumpled up the piece of paper and tossed it to the side. She pulled up another and began to sketch again.

“Yes, that is much better,” Rarity sighed with approval.	

She finished her sketch and was deeply pleased with the result, and Jake was somewhat amazed with her skill, for she came up with an original design within such a short time. Sadly he didn’t get to see much more; he had to de-cloak and needed to duck out for a bit. He hid under the bed because Rarity was now moving about the room preparing to go out for dinner. Rarity began to exit the room, and Jake followed after her. This was the opportunity he was waiting for.   

He put a little more distance between him and her as he walked down the long flights of stairs leading up to Rarity’s suite. Eventually he made it out of the castle grounds, slightly winded but undetected. He followed her to what looked to him to be like a coffee shop. It had a simple layout with tables out front and inside, small size in general, and it was on the corner of a street allowing it to be seen from most angles of perception. Rarity walked up to a table with all the other members of the mane 6 sitting around it. They conversed and caught up with each other's progress and Jake knew this was going to be a problem considering he was out in the open and there was no way to allow his emitter to cool down without being seen from this distance. He looked around the immediate area and found that there were no alleyways that he could really hide in without some pony being able to see him from some angle. Although it was late out, there were still many ponies out and about. He phased through the coffee shop door looking for a place to hide . Thankfully the shop was mostly deserted inside with the exception of a cashier and the manager. The room was well lit , allowing Jake to observe every detail of the interior; he noted a giant door with a plaque with the word "MANAGER"  behind the cashier. He noted three bathroom doors and felt that while it could work as a hiding spot he was in danger of losing track of the mane six. Jake looked at the third door caution tape was all over it, Jake took a closer look at it and noticed there was a sign with faded letters on it. It took a few moments to make out what was written on it “Roof…Access…PERFECT!” Jake bit his teeth together bracing for the journey through the door. He walked through it and almost blacked out, he collapsed on the stairs his head fell directly on the edge of one of the stairsand he split his forehead and received several splinters. He hadn’t waited long enough before using his ability again and paid the price. Thankfully at the top of the stairs the door leading out to the roof was unlocked. The door opened easily and he was able to walk out into the night air. He felt a horrible throbbing in his head, and put his hand on it when he brought his hand back down it was red and wet. He was now bleeding. 

Jake saw his blood drip on the ground. He assessed that he wasn't bleeding too badly, but he would need to tend to his wounds later. He brought the pack he was carrying down, and opened it again. He went to the med category and brought out some bandages and medical tape. When he bandaged his wounds, the splinters reminded him of their presence with sharp, spiking pain into his forehead. I hadn’t packed a mirror in the pack so Jake was on his own for this one. Suddenly the bathroom seemed more appealing. He found a spot where water had collected into a sizable puddle which he could use as a mirror and pulled out the tweezers. Thankfully none of the splinters managed to make their way into his eyes or  near them. One by one he plucked them out and felt a small pinch each time he removed one. After a time, the pain of the splinters intensified as he grew sensitive to pulling them out. 

After several minutes of constant pain, most of the small chunks of wood had been removedand he removed the bandages he used to apply a counter-pressure and saw that they were drenched in blood. He quickly wrapped the bandages around his head and used the med tape to made sure they didn’t fall apart or off his head. He now had the time he needed to walk over the edge and observe the six poniesand he tunred the emitter off. The sun was now completely downand was not visible from the roof. He peered over the edge and saw them, They were still talking non-stop the same way girls did back home. He missed his home dearly, for he hadn’t laid eyes on it since the end of World War III. For the past few years, he explored other worlds and the vast reaches of space. He shook his head and focused on trying to find a place to stay for the night. He would choose one of the ponies who was a heavy sleeper, at least in his opinion. Rarity was an adequate choice, but the only place he could really sleep if he chose to stay with her for the night would be under the bed and that was a little too close for comfort, especially since he didn’t know if he snored or not in his sleep. Fluttershy was instantly taken off the list; even though she was quiet ,her hearing was amazing and she wasn’t a heavy sleeper. Jake considered Twilight for a moment she would be horribly stressed and have loads on her mind exhausting what little brain power she had left, but after thinking about it a little she is trained to stay up late, and wake up with no alarm clock . She is highly observant, hiding from her would be difficult especially after that last move he pulled on the train.

Jake was running out of options. Applejack was a working  mare, so she would probably be tired from cooking all day and managing the kitchen and,  from what he saw on the show, slept soundly unless disturbed. Jake did not want to take his chances with Pinkie Pie because he didn’t know her sleeping habits and honestly didn’t want to. She has unbelievable amounts of energy, and probably wakes up at the oddest of times to do Celestia knows what. She was too  unpredictable and he didn’t like that. The last choice was Rainbow Dash; she had been working out all day and a good athlete knows they need their sleep and she had most likely been dedicating most of her time to training for the sonic rainboom. The final option was to look for some deserted place in the city where he could sleep, which simply wasn't viable because of the high population density and the fact that he was too tired to exert himself. If only one of the ponies discovers him at least he would have to run from a pony rather than several. The life of a transient was not for the faint of heart, and Jake considered himself faint in this matter. Jake thought long and hard about all his options, weighing them all with their positive factors and the negative ones. He cut his thinking time short when he saw that the ponies were leaving, and he rashly decided to tail Applejack. He made note of the Canterlot tower, where the ponies were staying. He still couldn’t believe he was actually looking at it. It was a gorgeous tower andhe never thought he would ever be this close to it.

He followed Applejack all the way back to the castle reinforcing his belief that they all had castle suites, but Applejack's suite was located on the other end of the castle from Rarity. It was also located on the ground floor ,closer to the kitchen allowing AJ to get there quickly from her room. He followed her down the long and elegant halls of Canterlot Castle. Unlike the journey to Rarity’s room, the journey to AJ’s room was a mostly indoor hike with much fewer stairs. Jake was glad he could rest his tired legs after all the walking. Eventually, he found himself standing outside a door etched and oiled in fine wood with a white finish. Applejack opened the door and switched on the lightHe suite was quite large and empty in comparison to Rarity's walk-in closet of a room, easing Jake's worries for the night. There was plenty of room for him to move around ; although it was smaller than Rarity's room in terms of square-feet, it had more than enough room for him to move about. He could easily hide in the deep closet without being noticed but didn’t want to run the risk of her opening it and discovering him. Jake’s eyes moved back and forth as he looked for a way to hide himself in the closet in case Applejack decided to open it. Behind some of the hanging cloths he found an old wooden storage box that was longer than him and the only way to access the interior was a sliding cover. He could easily fit in it. With the clothes  hiding it and the closet door shut if he closed the box door he would easily be able to sleep without waking up Applejack . This was the best option, and he could already hear Applejack snoring in the other room. He rolled up the hoodie for a pillow. Jake slowly opened the sliding door covering the entrance to the box, and found that there were clothes inside for padding. “It's not what I wanted, but it'll do.” He crawled inside the narrow box, his body stretched all across the long stream of clothes and was asleep within a few moments.

“WHO THE HAY ARE YOU!?”

Jake’s eyes shot open, the shock drove his body to immediately want to stand up. He forgot that he was still inside a wooden box and his head collided with the top of the box. The blow aggravated the injuries he had received the previous day. Arg…it’s too early for this, Jake thought silently.

“HEY! I ASKED YOU A QUESTION!” 

Jake suddenly remembered where he was. Even though he had an urge to face the pony who was talking to him who sounded to become more aggravated every second, he refused to answer her questions. But he remembered he was exposed right now she would be able to see his face. He quietly pulled out his mask and slipped it on. She couldn’t see his face but could still drag him out of the box if she wanted to. 

“I KNOW YOU’RE NOT JUST A LUMP OF CLOTHS IN THERE! I COULD HEAR YA SNORING FROM A MILE AWAY!” 

“Dang, do I really snore that loudly?….Wow…When I get back to Earth, I will do something about this.” 

“COME OUT NOW, OR I’M GONNA DRAG YOU OUT!”

I wouldn’t doubt AJ when she makes a threat, especially one as simple as this one. Jake falls under the category of intruder even if he was just looking for a place to spend the night. He mustered up the guts to try his phase ability again because it was his only shot right now. He tried activating it and found that the feelings of fatigue and disorientation for the most part had left, but he didn’t want to experiment with his limits right now andwanted to get out of dodge. AJ jumped back as she saw Jake roll through the door without breaking. He jumped up and ran literally straight through her and the closet door. The look on AJ’s face as Jake ran through her was one of utter shock and astonishment. Jake ran for the door and tried to activate his emitter all he got was a red screen reading “ERROR- BATTERY CELL NOT CHARGED!” then it promptly turned black. Applejack burst through the closet door yelling after  Jake. He opened the front door and bolted out into the hallway and slammed it shut just as two guards were walking down the hallway carrying massive metal spears, blocking the route he took to get to the room.

They both stopped, slightly startled at the sight of Jake, but quickly broke free of the shock and pointed the tips of their spears at Jake. A tough looking unicorn was the first to speak up. “Halt what is your business here?” 

Jake wasn’t sure how to react. He was scared to speak; if he did he would have to be clever and make up something that would be believable without removing his mask. He looked behind him and the hallway behind him looked very promising as an escape route. Applejack flung open the door to her suite and ran into the hall. “THIS VARMIT BROKE INTO MY ROOM AND I FOUND HIM SLEEPIN' IN THERE!” Jake was relieved he wouldn’t have to have that conversation with the guards, but now he had to put up with out-maneuvering them. He could try and break through one of the many windows to his left, but if he didn't hit it at just the right angle he would fail and he didn’t know if it was clear of anyone who might see him. It looked like the sun was just rising but without the emitter running around the city would still be extremely difficult at this time. His second option was taking his chances with AJ and the guards and run about the halls of the Canterlot castle, blindly hoping he would  come across an exit. And the last one was taking his chances with the guards, they were armed and if they ran him through it was all over for him, but he had no intent of being captured even if that was the only way he knew for certain lead outside. 

After a few moments, he charged at Applejack. He ran at full speed with his speed power blasting through, but she jumped right in front of his path at the last moment. He ricocheted off of her and fell to the ground.  “Where….Did she….Get reflexes like that…?” Before he could get back a hoof forced him down to the floor and the guards pointed their spears at him . 

“Thank you miss, we’ll take from here,” a guard said. Jake needed an escape plan. He could phase through the floor but the movements would be unpredictable so if he did that he would have to do what he did on the train, and preferred not to risk it . Applejack just continued to stare into his eyes similar to what Pinkie was doing.

“Hold up a moment fellas.” Applejack began. Jack grew terrified as Applejack stared into his eyes.

“Miss," the guard said to Applejack,  "we need to get this guy out of here. He is clearly an intruder and must be questioned.”

“I know y'all, but could you give a girl a moment?I haven’t seen his kind  for quite some time now.”

One of the guards raised an eyebrow and looked at Applejack. “You know what that thing is?” He asked as he motioned to Jake.

“I suppose I do….but I REALLY DID NOT LIKE THE IDEA OF Y'ALL SNEAKING INTO MY ROOM! NOW, WHO ARE YOU?!”

She reached to remove Jake’s mask. “Please don’t," Jake pleaded, "not yet anyway.” The guards backed off for a  moment in disbelief.

“It can…talk?!” 

Applejack's eyes grew wide and stared at Jake, as if she remembered him from some far-off memory and was taking in his face for the first time.. “Your voice," Applejack said quietly, "I’ve heard it before...But you’re not…”  In that moment, she unconsciously removed her hoof and the guards had given Jake a small opening to stand up. Jake decided now was his chance and sprung through the opening. They were pulled out of their stupor and gave chase.

“HEY! HE’S GETTING AWAY! STOP HIM!”

As Jake sprinted down the hall, his mind raced and he made the split-second reflex to go right. But he found a line of guards waiting for him at the door and they prepared to do battle. Jake was up a creek without a paddle. He considered using his phase ability until he noticed the seconds line of guards come up behind the first, he and he realized how much he didn't want to be skewered on a spear. He whipped out his peacemaker and pointed it at the window. He pulled the trigger several times, punching several holes through window and ran towards it. He jumped straight window, shattering the glass cover separating the inside from the outside world. It wasn’t a long drop and most of the guards followed him through the window. The moment his feet hit the ground, he began to sprint for the gate since he had his speed ability. He outran the guards in no time and reached the gate long before the order could be given to close it. Jake watched and laughed as the guards frantically tried open the gate, but his expression changed when he saw half the guards spread their wings and take to the skies. Jake ran out into the streets completely exposing his alien form to the ponies. Predictably, he got a wide variety of reactions to his appearance from the ponies. Some screamed, others were fascinated, then others simply let him pass by, wondering what all the commotion was about after seeing the hordes of guards running past them. 

Jake couldn’t use the any of the alleyways because they were easily sealed. At this point, Jake felt that he would invite the attention of many large armies to capture him. Apparently breaking into the castle was a “serious felony.” His speed allowed him to gain the advantage until unicorns began to use their magic to obstruct his path and trap him. He was able to put a considerable distance between him and the mob but guards were stationed throughout the city. You would have thought Jake just pulled off the crime of the century with all the guards chasing him. Every time he would run through a courtyard or round the corner of a street, more guards almost teleported to his location. 

Eventually, Jake began to notice massive defensive lines forming in the streets to form large detours. They had their lances pointed straight at him and began a slow advance creating a box around him that was slowly shrinking. Impressively, they had to seal off one-fourth of the city to capture him. There were still civilians and officers chasing him within the box, making it all the more difficult to try and escape. He thought about hiding in a nearby structure but that would be suicide as well especially since they could surround it and he had no use of the emitter. Eventually, two of the defensive lines blocked in the front and the back, and he couldn't run in any direction. The pegasi were constantly were dive-bombing onto Jake in attempts to knock him down. He was still exhausted and constantly running at incredible speeds wasn’t helping. The pegasi were quickly gaining on him as well as getting better and better at lashing out at him. 

As Jake saw the two massive lines approaching him, lances pointed straight forward he had a choice to make; take his chances with the alley way or surrender. The second option was looking more and more appealing every second but he knew he couldn’t take that option; not now anyway because he couldn’t risk them figuring out his identity, even though he was receiving several hints that they already knew. "No. I can’t take that chance. I just...can’t." He ran down the alley as fast as he could but the pegasi were faster and planted themselves at the other end, they spread their wings across the entry way effectively blocking it. Jake turned to go back and try another way but the guards had already blocked off the other end. 

One of the guards stepped out of the crowd. It was a white unicorn who Jake assumed to be the leader of the guards. It removed its helmet, revealing its dark blue mane. Its cutie mark was a white shield. “I am Shinning Armor, captain of the royal guard. Surrender and come with us willingly and you will be treated fairly in accordance with Equestrian law.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Then we shall take you by force.” 

Jake was flattered he had caused so much commotion that even Shinning Armor was hunting him, despite this being the week of his wedding. "Guess breaking into the castle was slightly more of a big deal than I anticipated"  he thought as he stared at the razor sharp tips of the spears pointed directly at him.

“Answer us now, or we will take you by force.”

“I am sorry gentlemen," Jake replied,  "I am going to have to decline your offer.” 

He answer caused some of the guards to burst out laughing, while others just gave him a more serious look, curious as to what he tricks still remained up his sleeve.

“There’s nowhere for you to run. We have you boxed in.”

“You see, that’s where you’re wrong.” 

“Oh…?” Shinning Armor raised his eyebrow. 

Jake took a deep breath and phased through the wall to his left, leaving the alleyway and more than likely loads of confused looks on the faces of the guards.  Jake switched to his night sight so he could see who all was in the buildings. The first one was deserted, but he knew he couldn’t stop. He looked behind him and could see all the guards now scattering.  It was only a matter of minutes before they caught him. He continued to run, running and phasing through walls trying to put as much distance between him and mob of guards as possible he was doing well despite the screams he received every time he entered a populated building and ran out the other side. He thought he was going to succeed with his plan until his face met the flat side of a burning hot frying pan, he phased through a wall and wasn’t paying attention to what was in front of him and he failed to prepare for the pony holding a dirty hot pan. She had just finished cooking a fresh meal for her family and was just holding it upright preparing to clean it when Jake ran into it. 

As if his head wasn’t throbbing enough, now it had a burning sensation all over it and it spread to all over his face. "Oh what I would do for an icepack right now." He tried to get to his feet only to get beaten back down again. 

“I’LL TEACH YOU TO BREAK INTO MY KITCHEN! HHHHIIIIYAAAAAHHHH!” She bucked Jake square in the gut.

Jakes vision went normal again, as he felt the pain soar through his upper body. “Lady…..”

“WHO YOU CALLIN' LADY?!” She grabbed him by the shirt with her mouth and threw him across the room. Jake hit a shelf with several glass items on it. It shook for a bit and then the glassware fell on him, shattering as they hit both him and the floor. "What kind of mare is this?" He looked at the cutie mark, it was a block of sushi didn’t think equestrians ate sushi but I guess you learn something new everyday.

“Get it mommy! Get it!” The little foals chanted as the mare went over to picked Jake up again and threw him out the window into the street.

“AND STAY OUT!”    

Jake tried to stand and almost fell again. This day was just getting worse and worse. His body pleaded for rest but he heard a guard yell from down the road, “THERE HE IS! GET HIM!”

Jake had run far enough through the line of buildings to break free of the defensive line in the streets, so now they would have to reform it before they could trap him again. Jake needed to take advantage of what little confusion remained in the guard and look for a building to lay low in for the time being. He tried to reactivate his vision but something was preventing him from doing so. The more he concentrated and tried to activate it, the more his head ached with pain. He also lost could not sense the other ponies around him. He tried to use those abilities, but he found that his attempts made him bleed from his forehead. His wounds had reopened and probably worsened after his encounter with that mare with the frying pan. He needed to change his bandages but he needed to find cover and fast. He ran through the streets hoping his lack of direction would make him unpredictable for the guards to capture him . He ran behind a long row of buildings for cover because they all looked identical. He tried to activate his night sight but it would not activate. He was truly lost.

The pain in his head grew worse and worse until he felt ready to faint. He tried to phase through another building. But the moment he phased through, his night sight returned and he guessed it to be a bedroom, one that was occupied. Standing in front of him was a strange creature with a lime green aura flowing around it. Jake immediately recognized the shape as a mare who was brushing her mane. Jake quickly deduced who the mare was, an she realized that she was not alone in the room.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" She screamed, " WHO ARE YOU AND HOW DID YOU GET INTO MY ROOM?! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!” Jake flipped out his peacemaker.

“BACK OFF AND SHUT UP!” Jake fired off a shot of peacemaker at the wall near where the creature was standing. The creature went silent.

The creature dropped the brush she was using and slowly backed into a corner. W-w-w-what do you want?” She asked as she shivered in fear. 

“Shut up you monster!" Jake threatened, "I know what you are.” 

“What? Please don’t hurt me, I would never do anything to harm any of my subjects.”

“Subjects? LIAR! YOU THINK I WOULD FALL FOR A CHEAP TRICK LIKE THAT WHEN I CAN CLEARLY SEE YOU RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME!”

Jake was about to shoot the creature when he recognized he was about to shoot Princess Cadence. But the aura and shape of the creature he saw a moment ago didn’t match that of what he was seeing now . He tried to read her mind but his head trauma prevented him from doing so. "GAH, what do I do? There is a possibility the real Cadence is here in front of me, but my vision showed her as something different! What do I trust? Do I run the risk and trust my eyes? I can’t do that. What if she’s the real thing? My legs are about to give out; if I run I won’t get very far and SHE’S SEEN ME. No, I won’t harm her. Not until I know she’s the fake." Jake was split he didn't know whether to shoot. In the end  he couldn't do it he lowered his pistol and saw Cadence began to smile. She walked over to him and put a wing around his shoulder. This was way too friendly considering what Jake had just done for his comfort level. 

“You say you know what I am..Well what am I? Why don’t you remove that mask and let me see your face?” Jake did as he was told, even though every brain cell he had screamed at him in protest. He stuffed the mask into his pocket and Cadence snickered. Jake became more suspicious of her by the second. “Here," Cadence cooed,  "come with me. Your injuries look just awful and require tending to.” He caught his reflection in her mirror and saw the blood trails on his face and his bandages were soaked. "No wonder I have been feeling light headed. But she is being way too nice, even for Cadence. I just threatened her with a lethal weapon. I don't think anyone, not even someone with a heart cutie mark, would easily get over that." 

Every cell in his body told him to run out of this house to another, despite Cadence offering care. He was compelled to follow Cadence. She walked up the stairs and lead Jake into what looked to be an upstairs storage area, but there was a sink, a desk, and a wide variety of other objects on top of being a small storage area. It seemed as though it was also used as an office. She lead him into the sink area and aimed her horn directly at him. 

“Don’t worry, this will only hurt for a second.”

Jake saw her eyes flash green and a beam of green magic flew towards him. He was petrified with his hands just a few inches from his revolver. He knew he was tricked . “DANG…IT”.

She began to laugh at him. “Wow, that spell I used on you in the other room worked more efficiently than I thought. You fell for every word I said, even though your will is incredibly strong and your sense of logic even stronger . Now, hold still darling, you seem to know a little more about me than I would like and it's horrible that you know so much about me yet I know so little about you, and I am dying to know every little tidbit there is to know about you.” 

He saw his field of vision go lime green and could physically feel her trying to pry her way into his mind. Jake began to resists her using whatever will he could muster.

“Hmmmmm," Cadence said. She stared into his eyes, or rather through his eyes.  "What is this?  Usually breaking a mind is easy…I’ll figure you out. Just you wait.” She assaulted Jake's mind once again, her power almost feeling like a saw cutting through his head.

“No…you’re… not……going….to get….in here!” He fought off her attack and then reflected her magic back at her, breaking free of the spell and threw her across the room. He had full control of his body back and was now able to seize his revolver and pointed it straight at her. She quickly scrambled out of the debris back to her feet when she saw the barrel pointed at her. “Now, where is the real Cadence, changeling? Or should I say Chrysalis?”

Chrysalis looked back slightly shocked but her expression quickly changed as she turned to answer. “You are in no position to ask questions, pitiful boy. What chances do you think you have against me?” Her horn lit once more and she prepare to fire another shot of magic.

“I’ve taken down dudes twice my size and blown crap up at least 100 times more powerful than me. I think I can handle you.” Now just to give you an idea of Jake’s feelings towards Chrysalis, she is probably the one entity that exists in Equestria that he has a desire to actually physically harm . Chances are, if given the chance he would not only pull the trigger  and watch her fall to the ground, but he would pull it a couple more times just to make sure she’s really dead . 

“You are so sure of yourself, yet you bring no means of protecting the very body you possess.” She cast a spell before Jake could react, throwing him back against the wall and he fell to the ground. She walked over as the smoke cleared and each step seemed to echo throughout the room. Jake faked being unconscious and waited for her to get close.

“So pathetic…Such courage, yet no strength behind it.”

Jake didn’t waste his chance. Carefully, he moved his left hand up and pressed the barrel of the gun against the temple on the right side of Chrysalis’ head. “You obviously don’t know me very well.” He pushed it harder against her head insuring he wouldn’t miss. “Funny isn’t it; you have such powerful magic and claim to be able to beat me easy yet you brought nothing to protect that wonderful head of yours.” He pulled the trigger and heard a small click. “You have got to be kidding me…..” Ammo is like water in a dessert: it’s never around when you truly need it. He  tried to bring his fist up to punch her but she blasted him point blank with her magic, hitting him square in the chest not enough to permanently injure him but just enough cause him loads of pain, weaken his body, and scramble his senses. She kept him pinned and then surrounded him in a ring of green fire. Jake recognized the ring same as the one on the show. He was going to be thrown underground or destroyed he didn’t know if the ring only dragged people underneath Canterlot. All he knew is Twilight got surrounded by it and was shoved into the caverns underneath Canterlot.

“You two check those buildings. The hounds picked up his scent; he must be close.”

Chrysalis walked over to the window to observe the commotion going on outside.

“Oh my, don’t tell me it’s you they’re looking for.” Chrysalis taunted. Jake said nothing as he began to lose he senses one by one. “Maybe I should hand you over. After all, you did break into my house. But then again, you know who I am and I would be giving you a chance to tell all of Equestria. But nobody would believe you, a fugitive alien creature who dragged my 'fiancé' on a wild goose chase on his wedding day. Eh, why take the chance? I’ve come too far to be stopped by someone like you.” He felt himself moving down into the ground, soon the light of day was gone as well. Jake was powerless to move. He felt himself beginning to gain speed as he watched the stolid rock pass him by. Chrysalis wasn’t going to be as gentle as she was with Twilight. He knew exactly where she was putting him and knew in the condition he was in. Getting out wasn’t going to be easy, and his speed continued to increase until he found himself in complete and utter darkness. He felt like he was in free fall and hitting the ground came as a massive shock but he welcomed something solid. He wanted to immediately get up and explore his surroundings and knew this area may not be safe but body was exhausted. The only thing he was able to do before blacking out again was take a look at the watch he was wearing, which read the time of 10:15 A.M. He had been in the city of Canterlot for a full twenty four hours and already he felt like dying. As he blacked out, he had a few moments to dwell on the situation. How do I get myself into these kinds of situations?…Well it isn’t every day that I get to travel through Canterlot or get chassed around by Twilight’s brother…Twenty-four hours later, and I still don’t have a single answer to any of my questions. What a shame . I wonder how bad my injuries are…Hopefully I won’t die here there. I still have things I wish to do in life, but then again this was something I never imagined myself doing oh well…This….I contend…has probably been the most…interesting trip…I have ever been on… And he felt nothing more.   

> Chapter 6: From the Dark to the Light
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 6: From the dark to the light


I shook my head. This was just going from bad to worse and  I honestly wondered how Jake made it through all this. All the more reason to keep watching, I suppose. However, I was still uncertain whether or not curiosity would kill this kitty. 

When Jake awoke, the area was so dark he couldn’t tell if his eyes were open. He could feel his muscles moving and his eyelids open, yet he couldn’t see anything around him. He tried to stand and found himself quickly losing his balance and collapsed to the ground again. He remembered everything that had happened prior to his capture and knew he needed to tend to his injuries, but he also knew he couldn’t do squat without light. He reached down into his pocket for his flashlight and pressed the small black button in the back. Nothing happened. “What the heck? ” He began to twist the back slowly. He removed the back and tipped it over to dump out the dead batteries but he didn’t hear anything hit the floor. He put his finger inside the small cylinder confirming the obvious that nothing was in there. “Odd. I don’t remember using this in between the time I visited Twilight’s library and now…Did someone else have access to my tools? Argh, I don’t have time for this.” He reached into another pocket for spare batteries which he always kept on him in case of emergencies and found nothing. He searched his other pockets and found no batteries to spare. He knelt down and removed the backpack from his back and began to search through it using the small display that glowed slightly in the dark. 

“I hope you packed spare batteries Richy…” He mumbled. He tapped through the Other category. “…You don’t have batteries?…Of course you don’t…” 

He powered down the display. I didn’t pack a light because I always had multiple spares on me and I rarely travel alone. Jake sat down against the hard rock floor and began to think. He tried using his night sight, but the moment he did, a massive amount of pain surged through his head. It was unbearable and he felt his forehead bleed again. He desperately needed to replace the bandages on his head. It was at that moment his aura sensing abilities began to kick in and he sensed one aura. It was very weak but he didn't know if that was because it was very far from him or if his powers were fading because of his injuries. When on the train he didn’t notice a difference with the car closest to him and the car furthest from him when sensing the auras of the ponies on the train, but it could have been they weren’t far enough away from him in order for him to notice a difference. He needed to get to them if he wanted to survive. He concentrated harder, trying to identify the source and maybe learn a little more about it. His head ached as he tried harder and harder until he couldn’t bear the pain in his head and stopped. He could only make out a direction of which the aurora was coming from.

He stood up and slowly began to make his way toward it but found a rock wall blocking his path. Until he could get some light he wasn’t going anywhere. He let his back hit the rock wall and then slowly slid down to the ground. He didn’t want to give up, but he didn't want to wander around aimlessly in the dark. For now he decided to be still and his body began to relax as his mind wandered to some place better, hoping to escape the darkness. He went to sleep and dreamt of his home: that little suburb on the edge of the city, the bright blue skies –  when he was a child the skies weren’t nearly as polluted as they were now thick smog clouds covered most of the earth. He walked inside his old home and saw his two brothers and parents there waiting for him. He reached out ,trying to grasp the memory being presented to him only to see it fade away. His eyes opened slowly and he was again greeted by darkness. 

“Why is it always the good dreams that get interrupted…?” He muttered to himself.

He was in horrible pain and felt as though he hadn't eaten or drank for days. Of course, army food wasn’t the best but at least you had something to eat. I had packed emergency food supplies in the pack, but without a heat source and water there was no way to eat most of meat packed in there. This limited his options but at this point he wasn’t picky. There was beef jerky and a wide variety of crackers, along with anything I could stuff in there. He opened the pack again and used the display light to see the contents of the bag. He tore the top off the beef jerky and even though he could barely see he ate greedily. After eating a few strips of the jerky, he felt much better. He brought out the crackers and devoured them in two seconds. His stomach wasn’t full but he knew he should save some of the food because he had a feeling he would be trapped for a while longer. He found a canteen for water in the pack as well but drank little to conserve water.

He sealed everything back in their assorted bags and cases and then placed them back in the pack.  He tried to locate the aura he had sensed earlier. He was able to sense it still there, and the pain was much less intense but it continued to intensify the longer he tried to locate the aurora. He still could not identify the specific entity that the aurora was surrounding, or if it was even a living being anymore it. “I’m never getting out of here…” He looked at his watch. It was 7:26 PM. He didn’t know how long he had been out. For all he knew it could be the next day, the same day, or even a week later. Down where he was, there was no other measure of time besides the watch he had. 

“Wait…my communications device!” He remembered that he never took off the earpiece . He crossed his fingers hopping to hear something, then static came over the earpiece and he exhaled. “…Thank you!” He set the headset to broadcast on all channels, hoping to get Michael and Jiggs’ attention. “This is Jake canceling radio silence, can anyone hear me?” He waited for a moment and received nothing but static. “ I need evac, and a location…IS THERE ANYONE THERE!?” He was calling out for help yet no one would hear him. He received no response, his final hope was crushed instantly. “I guess I really am trapped down here…No! I won’t give up hope! Someone else is down here. Maybe it’s Cadence or maybe it’s another human . If I ended up here unintentionally what if someone else did to? But it could be another trap... No, I won’t give up. I must get out of here.” He powered down the headset to conserve energy for later use. “I can’t go anywhere. I need a source of light. I wish I kept that small cigarette lighter...” He threw his hands back against the wall in frustration. He instantly saw what was in front of him as he looked down at the ground and looked up to see his hands were on fire. 

“My hands…..are on fire?!HOLY CRAP! MY HANDS ARE ON FIRE!!” He flailed about to extinguish the flames but nothing happened. In his confusion he tripped over a small rock behind him and fell over backwards releasing a flare into the air. It raced toward the ceiling of the cave and hit the roof with a small explosion. Jacob was stunned by the sight he just sat there staring at what he had done.  Rocks at least three times his size fell and when he finally snapped back to reality he raised his hands in a vain attempt to protect his face. His entire field of vision went red and he saw that fire surrounded him and he saw something in his hand. He heard the rocks smash against the flames but the object didn't appear to be damaged by the rocks. When it was all over, he stood up with little effort and no pain. He saw that his entire body was immolated in flames. He noticed that the object that had saved his life was attached to his right arm – the one furthest out when the rocks fell.  He found that the shield was in the shape of the old ones that the Roman centurions used in battle. When he tapped the shield, it felt solid yet sparks flew off.

He looked down and saw that the fire had formed into various pieces of armor. He was literally covered from head to toe with a set of fire armor and  the light it glowed was more than he could have ever had hoped for. For the first time he was able to see his surroundings in full detail. Rocks lay scattered all over the cavern floor. He saw that he was in a sealed area and began to miss the darkness's illusion of escape. He looked at his shield and wondered if he could use it to escape when it disappeared. To his surprise, he found that something else began to form on his arm. It took the shape of a cone then several sharp edges formed along it and it began to turn rapidly. “A…drill? But how?” He didn’t question it too much as he was almost afraid that it would disappear in a puff of logic. He walked over to the wall and shoved the fire drill into the rock. He saw cracks form and then they widened and formed massive cracks and snaps as the rocks crumbled under the power of the drill. He still wasn’t sure how it was being powered or how it had formed on his arm in that case, but all he knew was he now had a means of escape. Soon he had drilled a small whole through to the other side. He enlarged the hole by using more fire to blast the rocks away. He looked down the long tunnel in front of him and his hope had been rekindled as he felt the aura. It was stronger, but he could still not figure out its identity. He walked further into the cavern and as he moved through the caves, he felt as if an invisible entity were guiding him whenever he came to a fork. For some reason, he was compelled to go one way without even thinking about it. As he walked he still could not explain how he was even in flames right now, much less how he was on fire yet did not burn. That shield and drill were something else “Could I make more objects? They were solid--can I have more than one tool out at a time? That shield withstood the impact of a 600 pound boulder and that drill tore through the wall like tissue paper.” He tried to form another object by thinking of one, as he did that before when the ceiling collapsed. 

He saw the flames come together and take shape, and the object had a double-edged blade and a handle. He created a sword out of fire! “This is amazing! The boys back home are never going to believe this. I wonder how powerful it is...” He brought it above his head and slashed at the wall. It left a fine mark on the rocks and the crack it left behind glowed bright red and the rocks were smoking. The sword cut through the solid rock and burned it in the process. “Whoa, this is just too cool! I wonder…” He pointed the sword towards the tunnel behind him and channeled all his energy into it . “Can I blow stuff up with this?” The entire tunnel turned bright white as a massive fire ball was released. When the light died down, Jake saw it traveling rapidly through the tunnel lighting up the dark areas it past for just a moment. It reached the end and he saw a massive wave of fire speeding towards him. “Maybe that wasn’t such a good idea...” He reformed his flame into the shield again and braced for the worst. The flames surrounded him, wrapping him in a cocoon of fire and the wind nearly blew him away with its force. It was over within a moment and even though the shield didn’t prevent the fires from hitting him, he wasn’t burned and the shield didn’t even have a scratch. I am guessing he is immune to fire somehow, but he did manage to collapse the passage behind him. Not that he planned on going back there anyway, as the aura was still giving off its location as if it were begging to be found.

Jake found himself running through the cavern. He felt like he had enough strength to use his super speed once more, even though just a while ago his legs were probably the sorest parts of his body. Paradoxically, his head sustained the most injuries yet he felt no pain. He didn't know if he healed quickly or if it was because of something else. He was still exploring the abilities of this new power had recieved. So far he felt strong and was running faster than before; his recovery was by far the most astonishing part, as he went from falling apart to physically fit and ready for action in less than a second. He eventually entered a wider cavern, which was decorated with crystals and gems all exposed and waiting to be plucked from their place. He noticed sets of rails and mine carts throughout the cavern. “Miners? Guess I’m really not the only one down here. I wonder where they all are…”  He tried to remember if he had missed any details in the episode of the show. As far as he could remember, Chrysalis did reveal that these mines were indeed abandoned by their owners long ago, yet they showed traces of recent activity. “And why is there an aura still present here…?” He continued to move through the cavern until his instincts told him he had reached his destination. The world around him was silent; the only sound that could be heard was his breath as he breathed through the faceplate the helmet of fire provided. 

“Hello?” Jake called out, “Is anyone here?” There was no response. he began to panic. “What if I am the only one down here and this was just a trick to toy with my mind? NO! Someone is here. SOMEONE HAS TO BE HERE!” He took a deep breathed a yelled as loud as he could “PLEASE, SOMEONE ANSWER ME!” 

He heard his own words echo off the chamber walls and he fell to his knees waiting and praying for an answer. The flame of hope which was burning brightly was about to go out. He tried to focus more on aura, but he couldn’t get any closer to it. He tried to pin it down, but his attempts proved to be in vain. He just couldn’t reach it. He began to breathe hard and felt the fire growing dimmer; now that which he held most dear to him was being taken away, the light was going out. 

“Hello?”

Jake lifted his head up and saw an alicorn. Its mane was three separate shades of magenta, purple, and a creamy white on the edge and its cutie mark was a blue heart with an arrow through it. The ravaged condition of its mane as well as the terrified look on her face gave her away.  Jake knew it was possible but still could not believe that before him stood Princess Cadence. Jake’s fire went out and immediately all the aches and pain returned, but he was too exhausted to deal with his pain and he fainted. But he blacked out this time knowing he was – for the time being – safe.

Jake was sick and tired of blacking out so much in the span of however long he had been there. Sadly, he had lost his sense of time since being shut out from the world, but he was pretty sure it hadn’t been all that long. Usually he is pretty good in combat and doesn’t get put out this much. He was going against mythical beings as well as powers he had never had any experience with prior to his visit to Equestria . So don’t take him for a total wimp. Chances are he’d kick your sorry butt easily, seeing as he is combat trained and blows up stuff for a living. 

He woke up and found himself in a strangely well-lit cavern, despite being who knows how many feet underground. He looked around  and saw that the gems were lined up along the walls and a small orb of light floated in the center of the room. The light bounced off the gems and lit them like lanterns. His fire armor was gone and he reasoned it was but another gift to master. A moment later, Cadence was standing over him and he still couldn’t believe he actually found her. More importantly, she had made herself a small safe zone. Besides both extremely kind and gentle, she was incredibly smart as well. 

“Ah I see you’re awake.” Jake turned after hearing that voice to see Cadence really wasn’t a figment of his imagination. “I was hoping you’d be asleep for a little longer. You have a really nasty cut across your head and it’s going to need serious attention. I know a few spells to treat it, but the spells I know only work on foals."

Cadence was still as friendly as ever despite her situation. Jake moaned as he became aware of his pain.“Ooooooh…Where am I?”

“You are underneath the city of Canterlot.”

“Specifically?”

She sighed “I’m sorry, I don’t know all that much about this place.”   

“Well, it was a question worth asking I guess.”

“Yes, I think that is a fair question to ask. I hate to tell you that I don’t know the answer. I don’t think we have been properly introduced; my name is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, but I realize that’s a mouthful, so please just call me Cadence.” 

“Well, it’s a shame princess we had to meet this way. My name is Jacob  Samuel Fischer, but all my friends call me Jake.”
“Well, which would you prefer?”

"I would consider you a friend..."

"But you  just met me."

"Yeah, but right now I need a friend and you seem like a good one, so please call me Jake."

"Well, then it is a pleasure to meet you Jake. I don't know how bad it is up there." Cadence out her hoof over Jake's head and lightly touched it. Jake winced at the pain in his forehead. "Well Jake, this is going to take a moment, so I want you to just lay back and relax." Blue magic began to surround her horn, as she prepared to heal Jake. "We'll have to pass some time, so why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself? I know it help this go by much faster."

It took him a moment, but he realized that the bandages strapped around his head had been removed and his injury was now exposed. He saw light blue magic come forth from Cadence’s horn. The magic instantly went to work on the injuries but if the way it worked was it would disinfect the wound and then seal it, he imagined that this would hurt a lot.

“Well, you see as you can probably tell- ow!” He winced back as he felt a light burning sensation as the first stage of the healing began “….I’m not from around here..”

Cadence smiled and even laughed a bit. “I can see that. So are you considered an infant or adult from where you come from?”

“I am twenty-five years old, which is considered adulthood. I was supposed to have a career by now but instead I got pulled into the army.” 

Cadence continued then as the spell continued to reach further into the Jake’s injury a puzzled look came over her face. “You have a terrible infection in that cut. Why didn’t you go to Canterlot medical hospital? They have some of the best doctors in that building.”

“Let’s just say I’m not strictly speaking welcome in this city. I'm kind of a persona non-grata right now.”

The burning sensation increased as the spell continued; it went deep into his skull, practically annihilating any possible infection.
“How long have you had this injury? The spell is taking much longer than it should be.”

“Since the day I got here, which I think was the day before I was thrown down here.”

“Oh?” She raised an eyebrow. “And why were you brought down here?”

Jake was unsure of what to do. He wanted to tell her the truth but he was worried that she would stop healing him if she found out he was considered a criminal topside. The fact that her fiancé chased him around the city would decidedly not help his case. At the same time, he thought it likely that she would find out anyway and didn't want to lie to her. So, he told her a half-truth. 

“I ran into the fake you.”

“I see.” She frowned. “She got me while I was in the mare’s room.”

“Wow, really?”

“Afraid so.”

I personally thought Cadence's capture would be a little more dramatic, but guess everything is never as you think it would be anymore. “I almost had her too. If only…” He stopped for a moment and remembered his firearm. He pulled it out and examined the chamber to find two bullets missing. 

“If only what? And what is that?” She asked trying Jake to get Jake to complete his sentence.

“I come from a planet or world known as Earth. This is my weapon. Back at my home, I am an air force pilot, which means I fly in the air a lot. Sadly, we aren’t blessed with wings like you are, so we built machines to allow us to fly.”
“No magic? Wow, you must live an interesting life. How do you make the weather happen? Or have the plants grow? Or raise the sun and moon? Do your people also have machines to do that? Or do they do that themselves?”

“Well, originally they did that themselves. But we made machines that can do that, too. It has its ups and downs, anyway. This was given to me to defend myself in case I crashed or ran into a sticky situation where my bird wouldn’t be useful. I had two bullets left in it which are these gold casings” He held up an empty round for Cadence to see. She stared at the seemingly alien object, but allowed Jake to continue. “The idea is you shoot a small piece of metal so hard and so fast that it goes through the other guy, killing him before he can kill you…”

“But that would mean you were…!” Cadence's eyes grew wide with alarm.

“Yeah, I tried to kill her. I knew she wasn’t you," Jake said, trying to calm her down, "as you wouldn’t try to pry your way into my mind and force me to do your bidding.”

“How do you know that? We’ve only known each other for a few minutes!”

“I know probably too many things. It got me into this mess. Anyway, for some reason when I had her at point blank, which is where you take this end of the gun and hold it so it is practically touching the skin of the one you are trying to kill, I pulled the trigger and heard a metal click similar to that of a door locking. When using one of these you never want to hear that noise. It means you are out of shots and need to reload, but the weird thing is that even though I only used four of my bullets, two went missing for no reason at all. My torch and battery stash were also taken from me. I had the light but nothing to power it with, I have been trapped in the dark for who knows how long, that’s why I went searching for anyone who may be down here with me, which lead me to you.”

Cadence calmed down, but she then inquired almost forcefully, “So then, tell me what are  you doing here in Canterlot that would cause you to injure yourself like this.”

“Do you want the detailed version or the skimpy one?” 

“Well I am not sure how long this is going to take, so please be as detailed as possible.” She knelt down and got in a comfortable position near Jake, still performing the spell but now listening intently to everything he had to say. So naturally he told her everything, how he had broken into the city for the sole purpose of going to her wedding, stalked the ponies to their assorted rooms, broke into the castle, was chased throughout the city, and then thrown down into the caverns under Canterlot.

“So let me get this straight: you illegally broke into the city, you forced your way into a heavy guarded fortress, you snuck into several rooms and silently stalked several ponies, you are willing to risk life in prison, your personal well being, and your life for a chance to see me get married?"

“Yeah, that sounds about right.”

The smile returned to her face and she even laughed a bit. Guess she found his insanity humorous. “ You crazy colt, or whatever you are. If you had wanted to get in that badly I would sent you an invitation and saved you all this trouble.”

“Wouldn’t have been much good. I didn’t even know I was going to be in your world to see it. This was the spur of the moment kinda thing and usually I don't care much for weddings.”

“You're weird. I am not sure I wish to understand you. But I will admit that was an interesting story. Just one question: you said my Shinning Armor was chasing you?”

“Yeah, apparently my breaking into the castle forced even him to chase after me! Amazingly enough, I am never this popular back home.”

“I’ll try to talk him out of being too mad at you.” 

“Thanks. You don't seem surprised to see me; have you seen my kind before?”

“No, I cannot say that I have, but I am not surprised to see you. Equestria is so diverse that a new creature is not surprising. Although you do seem like you would be an interesting species. I am sure our scientists and historians would love to talk with you to study you and see how long you’ve been here.”

“But I’ve only been here for a couple of days.”

“How do you know there isn’t more of your kind in Equestria? Even if you came from another world, it doesn’t mean your species doesn’t exist in ours.”

There was a moment of silence between the two before Jake spoke up once more. “Well, there was a second reason for my coming: I honestly came to this city also looking for answers as well, knowing that some of the brightest minds in Equestria reside here.” 

“Answers to what?” She asked as she increased the power to the spell hoping to get it done slightly quicker. Jake was currently resisting the pain and found it difficult to speak.

"Here in this world, I have abilities or powers that I can’t use when in my world. I don’t know where they came from or why I have them and I keep discovering more and more of them the longer I stay here and I have no idea how to get home…”

“Every pony is special in his or her own way. The reason is we are all unique and different.”

“Yeah, but can unique and different do this?” He tried to trigger his fire abilities and it worked. He was able to light his left hand, startling Cadence almost causing her to lose enough focus to continue the spell.

“Well…that is… certainly very unique.” Jake stopped the fire from spreading to his entire body, and promptly put the flame out. He was surprised that in his state he could even create the fire, but what puzzled him was that he thought for certain she had seen him do it earlier. Most likely she reacted the same way he would have if he had seen a man on fire then suddenly go out. She probably thought it was just her, and he sadly reinforced a memory that she didn’t want to believe. 

“I know a pony who could help you answer your questions. Her name is Celestia and she is ruler of Equestria and by far one of the wisest ponies in existence. There has never been a problem that she could not solve. I bet she could help you return home, and if she can’t she could probably point you to the pony who does.” While Jake knew this to be true he was afraid to meet her because he had broken into her castle, broken her window and successfully aggravated her royal guard captain. Jake felt the burning sensation stop as Cadence stood up to start the second stage.

“That should do it. I must admit you had one nasty infection. Now to get the easy part done, after this you should be all patched up.” 

“Awesome, let’s do it.”

The seal was quick as she ran her magic across his forehead sealing the wound. Jake felt much better, but she prevented him from standing.

“You are still in no condition to go anywhere. Your external wounds are all healed but your body clearly needs time to rest.”

“But you need to get back to the surface!”

“That is true, but that can wait a little longer. I will not do it at the expense of some pony else suffering. We will begin after you get some sleep.”

“I’m a soldier, princess . I have been trained to be without sleep for several days. Your kingdom needs you and I don’t have the time to rest.”

“You’re going to make time.”

“Or what?” Given that Jake liked Cadence and was a brony, his defiance was unexpected.

“Here, let me give something to help you relax.” Jake felt himself growing tired, and he realized that she had used her magic on him once more. As he felt his body growing limp, she knelt down next to him and brought her wing over him and pulled him closer. “Don’t worry. I’ll watch over you and keep you warm. For now, sleep Jake.” She wrapped the wing around him allowing him to use it as a blanket and gave him room for his back and head to rest against her body. She was much larger than him, so he found her to be very comfortable without making her uncomfortable. She was almost motherly to him, which made it all the more harder to resist her enchantment. "Sweet dreams," she said as she dimmed the light in the cave and Jake quickly fell asleep. He will admit that to this day that was probably one of the best nights of sleep he had ever gotten.        

> Chapter 7: The Swarm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 7: The swarm


When he fell asleep, the machine played back a battle Jake and I fought in...   

“That’s right, commander, we got this place surrounded. The men are now inside the mountain and engaging terrorist forces.”

Jake pulled the joy stick in the ship up, raising the altitude. From there, he saw the battle transpire below. The Snake led a coalition of galactic terrorists in his quest for his own empire, and we were fighting one of the larger factions at one of his military bases.

A young pilots voice came over the com channels it was one of Jake's pilots from what I could tell.“You’ve got clear skies! Squad leader, all enemy aircraft and AA guns have been taken down! We now have air superiority!”

"Those artillary batteries won't last long with out that air defense. Our troops are advancing from all sides on the enemy." 

A smile of job satisfaction came over Jake's face as another plan fell into place. 

“Without those guns, they have no way of defending their escape routes. Good work gentlemen! Tonight, dinner’s on me.” To him his pilots were the best and their performance was more than enough to prove it soon they would be able to fly home and rest. Even though things almost never go like that anymore.

Another voice came over Jake's com line this one was different, not one of his pilots and the transmission was centered around the flagship in orbit.

“Sir, the commander has just asked me to tell you to switch your com line to channel six. Says it’s really important and requests to speak to you alone.” 

This struck Jake as odd, because he doubted that the Commander would have anything to say to him that needed that much privacy. But he immediately flipped the switch in his cock pit. He was now broadcasting on channel six and spoke clearly into his microphone, with a slightly curious tone.

“Hawk leader here.”

A deep voice in much more solemn tone answered back. “Am I speaking to Jacob Fischer?”

“Yes you are sir. What can I do for you?”

“I am aware you currently have loaded a long range atomized shock missile for fire.”

“Yeah, that’s one nasty missile. I never used it during my mission to sector forty-three. When I return from this mission it will be removed, sir.” 

“I need you to use it.”

Jake was surprised. “On what? We’ve won, sir. This place is going down.”

“Intelligence from a very reliable source indicates that the Snake himself is in that facility. I am authorizing use of that missile. I want you to fire it straight down the entry way. The demolitions experts tell me that the resulting explosion should spread through the entire facility and kill everything in it.”

“A leave-no-survivors policy, I see…” Jake slipped his finger under the small switch cover and flipped it up and pressed a small red button, arming the missile. “When do you want me to fire, sir?”

“Now!”

Jake felt his stomach fall into his seat. “Excuse me sir?”

“You heard me, squad leader, I said fire it now!”

“But sir, some of our men are still in the base!”

“Look, we just received new Intel. It shows that there is another way out that was not in our initial analysis or the schematics of the base: an underground tunnel exists, but we can only locate the entrance from the inside of the base. Our sensor data allows us to see where he is in the building, but if we wait too much longer he could escape. ”

“My ejected pilots as well as infantrymen are still on the attack in the base. I can’t fire this missile. Please, at least give them time to get clear.”

“Pilot, I am ordering you to fire!”

“No.”

“FISCHER, DON’T YOU GET IT?! WE CAN END THIS HERE WITH THAT SKAGLICK'S DEATH! HE IS THE ONLY THING KEEPING THE TERRORISTS FROM TURNING ON EACH OTHER!”

“At what cost? It makes you no better him.”

“SQUAD LEADER, FIRE THE MISSILE!”

“IS KILLING HIM REALLY WORTH ALL THOSE LIVES!?....HUH?”

“We can save countless more lives if that man is stopped here!”

“At the expense of others?” 

“They knew what they were signing up for!”

“These are the lives of men like you and me! You’re telling me they are dirt under your foot. You were once an admiral for the U.S. Navy, sir. This goes against all the principles our country stood for.”

“This is no longer the United States Navy. It’s the EDI Armada. The stakes are higher and we're playing for keeps!”

-“You sicken me.” 

“I am going to give you one more chance pilot: fire the missile or you will be court-martialed and stripped of your rank and command for insubordination! I'LL MAKE SURE YOU WALK TO EVERY PERSON WHO HAS EVER LOST SOMEONE THEY KNEW TO THAT MONSTER AND APOLOGIZE TO THEM FOR LACKING THE BALLS TO TAKE HIM DOWN HERE AND NOW!” He paused for a moment giving Jake time to take in everything he had just said. “Now fire the missile.”

Jake saw the red button in the center of his joystick glowing red. His hand was shaking and his head was dripping with sweat. His thumb slowly approached the button. “…I’m sorry…” He pleaded.

As a side note, I was in that mountain with my division at that time. I don’t know specifically what happened, but considering I am still alive and he is still leader of the night hawks, something happened that day. I tried asking Jake about it and even though he willingly submitted to the memory analysis, he refused to tell us and we were not permitted to go anywhere past the Irentos Incident due to terms of the analysis.

Jake’s eyes snapped open. He found himself breathing heavily and his heart was racing. He slowed his breathing eventually and tried to calm himself, assuring himself that he wasn't in the cockpit near the base. He found himself completely wrapped in a cocoon made from feathers. He was just the perfect temperature, and Cadence had even wrapped her wing around him in such a way she even covered his feet, despite the fact that he was wearing hiking boots. Her coat was softer than most beds he slept on within the past few months, and he did not want to move. However he was afraid of falling asleep, and he felt very well rested.  

He began to move out of the wonderfully warm feather blanket. He slowly moved the wing to avoid waking Cadence, who seemed to be sleeping peacefully. After he had enough room to move without hitting her, he stood up and carefully moved the wing close to her coat. The light in the middle of the cavern hadn’t gone out but it was very dim. Trying to go anywhere out of the small area of light was too dangerous because Jake liked seeing where he was going and didn't know what lay beneath the castle. He wasn’t considering leaving Cadence. Even though he knew he wasn’t supposed to be here, he also knew that he wouldn’t last long on his own without a way out or a light source of some kind. He still had not mastered his fire ability and even though he was able to master the other ones quickly, he was worried about the repercussions of his fire powers going wild and he didn't know if this was the last power he had. But when active all of his powers were in a way amplified as well. He could run faster, his senses grew sharper, and he didn’t feel a single bit pain or fatigue. He even regretted not using his phase ability to get to Cadence faster. He tried to bring out the fire armor, but he couldn't this time. He could still use his other abilities and the headaches he received whenever he tried to use night sight and his aura sensing abilities had gone away, at least for now. 

He knew he was safe where he was, but he felt that something else in the caves. He couldn’t sense another aura, but it was more like an extremely dark presence. Jake was unable to make it out. It felt like a soulless being; cold, dark and unnatural. He tried to ignore it, but its presence began to draw closer. He felt like something horrible was following them.  For now, his powers were underdeveloped and unstable. His peacemaker was a good weapon to keep him out of trouble, but he didn’t feel completely secure, even if he did have Cadence with him. He took the pack and put it down to take a look at the various weapons I had packed, when he accidentally dropped it. The metal pack fell to the ground and a small rock hit the small blue button I had placed near the upper part on the back side of it. Immediately a small holographic screen appeared. He looked at the screen closely, trying to make out the words written on the screen. 

“Welcome to the travel display! Please select which category you would like to browse.”

Jake picked up the backpack by the straps and swung it onto his back again. “What the heck, Richy … ? Where's the manual for this thing?”

He tried to reach his hand up select the screen and the screen immediately angled itself to fit his hands  while allowing him to still read of the choices; a feature that I personally loved. He tapped his finger on the weapons tab, and began rummaging through my weapons stash. I learned at that moment he had taken my antique pack this unfortunately meant that all the weapons inside were around a century behind.

He was looking specifically for a shotgun and rifle so that he could have a weapon for close-quarters combat and any long range firefights respectively. He had to be prepared for anything.. He didn’t want anything too big which routed out most of the heavy and special weapons. These other weapons would serve him well later, but down here they would collapse the roof in on him. He took the time to wonder if I wasn't secretly making money on the side by running guns for a crime lord. He managed to narrow down his selection a few shotguns and rifles and soon was ready to go. I honestly don’t know if guns he picked were good ones; I was bored and had gun parts to spare and thought they looked cool. Coincidentally, although they were popular in my childhood years, these guns were now horribly outdated, along with a good portion of the fire arms in the pack. Luckily Jake knew a little more about guns and considered my selection to be decent and chose what he determined to be the best guns for this scenario.

He ended up going with an assault rifle. He wanted a magazine and a decent rate of fire. His fingers moved across the virtual keyboard and the rifle was printed right out of the backpack. It even came with a bandolier strap to carry it on his back and extra mags. However, I wanted to savagely beat him later because this rifle was no longer manufactured and it was vintage.  He checked it to make sure it was loaded, and was ready to move on as soon as Cadence opened her eyes and was willing to move. He waited patiently while trying to summon forth his armor of fire. He grew anxious. He could feel the presence he sensed before and it drew closer. He used his night sight and saw the outlines of the rocks and Cadence, who had a soothing cyan aura flowing around her body. It was odd because the aurora did not match the color of the vast majority of the body, such as with Spike.  He could feel her mind, which was tranquil despite the fact that she was sleeping in a cave.

He watched over her silently. He kept his vision active to detect the aura of any living thing that tried to enter the cavern. He could see for a good distance, but it did have its limits. He couldn’t see far beyond the end of the entrance tunnel. That distance was the entire length of a football field, however, and his awareness stopped at a fork at the entrance and encompassed a large circle around him. A couple hours passed and Cadence remained asleep. Jake could tell she was in a deep sleep and probably dreaming, but at the same time it was if her dreams allowed her to escape from the situation she was in. He felt a feeling of fear and sadness. He couldn’t sense her thoughts and mental images; only the emotions that she was feeling. She needed to return to the surface where the love of her life was waiting, and Jake was regretting ever coming to Canterlot. In only a few days' time, he caused more chaos than Queen Chrysalis had. He thought they could simply wait for Twilight here, but considering that the cavern wasn’t out in an open area, this wasn’t the location where Twilight was shoved down into these caves.

He heard Cadence begin to stir. He turned to see what she was doing, and her eyes had just begun to open. She lifted her wing a bit and noticed that Jacob was no longer under her wing. 

“Jacob?” She asked.

“Right here.” Jake walked over from the rock he was perched on. He was still in his alternate vision mode, and did not see the expression on Cadence’s face. “Jake…! Your….your!"

“My what?"

“Your eyes…they’re…!” She stepped closer as if she was trying to examine Jake's eyes. He decided to remove his vision for the time being to make sure he didn’t miss anything around him that his night vision may not allow him to see. His vision went normal, and he saw her shocked look for a brief moment then it went to confused.

“They’re what?” He asked.

“They were pitch black, like some pony filled your eyes with black water! But it's gone now.”

Jake was never able to see what he looked like while night sight was active because any attempt to see his reflection was met with the fact that he could see straight through objects instead. He took it into mind that his eyes looked weird.  It was just a side effect of his power.

“Well, I'm sure it is nothing to worry about.” Jake replied, trying to calm the already anxious pony down. But it still reminded him that he didn't really know anything about his powers, other than the fact that he was tired from exertion of his powers.

“If you say so...So, how are you feeling?”

“I feel much better. My abilities, from what I can tell, are back to full strength, and I feel really, really good.”

She smiled, and got up onto her hooves.  

“Another job well done, Cadence.” 

Jake heard this, but didn’t see her lips move. “What did you say?”

“Hmmm?”

“A moment ago I heard you say something.”

“Uhhhh…I didn’t say anything.” She didn’t say anything but Jake continued to pick up her thoughts. “What is he saying?”

“I am saying that you said something just a second ago, and you just did again.”

“Is he hearing things? What in Equestria is he-?”

"I'm not hearing things. I know you said something. At least, I think you did..."

"Is he reading my mind?"

“I….don’t know.”

She slowly began to back away from him, not sure what to think. “Okay, what does this mean? I shouldn't let this harm our partnership. He hasn't harmed me and he is just as lost as I am. He needs a strong hoof to guide him through this, and I can do that.” She stopped walking away and came back towards him “You have some truly unique gifts, Jake. This isn't something we see in unicorns or even alicorns they require a spell to be cast and channel their powers through their horns rather than just simply using it as you do. We'll figure out what your gifts bode when we escape to the surface.” She began to move towards the exit tunnel and motioned for Jake to follow.

“Don’t make me a priority. Please…I’m not even supposed to be here.”

“Excuse me...” She immediately stopped and turned her head and made eye contact with Jake. “You are talking to the princess of love. I care for others, and help them when they have nothing else. That means I will care for you, whether you allow it or not. ”

Jake didn't argue with Cadence any further on this point. He just didn’t want her throwing herself in danger for his sake, especially since equestria’s future was on the line . He feared that his presence would alter the future for the worse since he was certain he wasn't originally supposed to be there. But it was in her nature to be kind and loving, so I don’t think she knew what he was trying to do. 

She brought the orb of light with them for illumination as Jake was unable to activate his fire power. Jake still sensed that dark presence, and as they wandered he sensed it moving closer and closer. The tunnels seemed endless and the echoes of their steps momentarily deceived them that someone else was in the tunnels, but Jake was certain that the presence was still there. He tried to ignore the gnawing feeling of fear, dismissing it as a side-effect of his powers. 

Eventually, the two reached a set of rails probably left behind by the miners that once worked the caves and took the gems as proof of their labor. They decided to follow the rail, hoping it might lead to an exit long forgotten by the miners and Chrysalis. After a long trek, they found themselves in a large cavern. In front of them was a massive canyon with only an old wooden scaffolding that supported cart rails for crossing. The entity was now closer than ever, with the hair on Jake’s body began to stand up straight and he felt extremely uneasy of his surroundings. 

“Afraid of heights?” Cadence asked. 

Jake went into night sight mode and looked over the edge of the cliff. He couldn’t see the bottom. He kicked a rock off, but he didn’t hear it hit the bottom. 

“A little bit…” Jake responded. How ironic, considering he faces these kinds of heights on a daily basis back on Earth.

“I can fly you across,” Cadence offered. 

Jake, of course, was more than happy to take her up on that offer. He could feel the presence though, as if it were right on top of them. Before he could get on her back, Cadence yelled, “JAKE, BEHIND YOU!”

Jacob turned but saw nothing. Suddenly, he felt something jump on him from the front, forcing him to fall on his back almost taking him off the cliff. He then felt something begin to claw at his face, ripping pieces of his skin off. He put his right arm up in an attempt to block the invisible force. He felt multiple sharp objects pierce the skin of his right arm. He didn’t understand. He looked and saw the blue aurora was on him. “GET UP, JAKE!” Cadence yelled. Jake turned his vision to normal, and saw his right arm was now gushing with blood. 

“Aw, and that just happened! Gah, that is a lot of blood!"

He looked at attacked him. It was stunned by Cadence. Its teeth and claws were red with Jake's blood. It opened its eyes again, revealing two light blue, soulless eyes. It hissed at Jake, and then charged at him. Jake ripped out his peacemaker and fired. The shot echoed throughout the entire cavern and the bullet went straight through the head of the creature. Lime green blood and grey matter splattered on the ground and flew past Jake, unable to aim its momentum and crashed audibly against the cavern wall. The presence of the entity he was feeling suddenly intensified. He heard a loud shriek come from down the tunnel, and heard something that sounded like a bunch of tiny bungs crawling towards him.

“Wha-? Changelings?!” Jake almost stuttered.

“Jacob, get on my back now.” Cadence commanded. She spread her wings, preparing to take off, and Jake turned to hop on. 

He held his right hand close to his chest, applying pressure to stop the bleeding. He could see his shirt turning a new shade of grey as it soaked up the blood. His face wasn’t too badly torn up; he only had a few shallow wounds . Cadence took off quickly, her hooves left the ground just as the changelings rushed from the tunnel. She flew at full speed across the canyon and into the tunnel on the other side. The swarm of changelings didn’t peter out and the fiends even began to catch up with them. Jake quickly searched through the medical supplies to find a bandage for his wound. He wrapped the bandages and med tape around the gash and almost immediately the bandages turned red. He turned around and was reminded of his experiences back in Canterlot; the only difference now was that he wouldn't feel guilty about killing these things . He pulled out his rifle and made sure it was loaded and the safety was off. He put his index finger on the trigger and pulled back on it. He could barely see the orb of light that Cadence  had summoned. It was keeping up with them, but it slowly grew dimmer as Cadence flew farther. Either she was growing tired or the orb had a time limit. Either way Jake could feel the fatigue and fear within her mind and could feel each breath she used to fill her lungs with precious oxygen. Magic required strength and focus both of which Cadence was running out of. 

He continued to fire and watched some of the changelings fall to the ground. Some bullets went through multiple changelings  but it became increasingly apparent that the his current weapon wasn't enough. There were more changelings than bullets.

He then felt Cadence panic, but not because of the changelings behind them. He turned to see a dead end ahead of them. Jake activated his night sight quickly and saw the outline of the tunnels. He saw the tunnel reach a fork, with one tunnel going right and the other going left. 

“Go right when you reach the end of the tunnel,” Jake said.

“What?” Cadence shouted back.

“You heard me, go right.”

She looked at him to try and signal her disbelief, but her eyes grew wide. "Your eyes! They're-"

“I know," Jake answered, "you have to trust me! Go right!”

Her wings pushed hard against the air behind her, giving her a small boost of speed as she approached the intersection. “Hang on!”

Jake wrapped his hands around her neck and braced for the turn. He felt the g-forces almost rip him off of her and he felt Cadence struggle as his arms clutched her neck desperately. He turned around and found that even with his augmented vision he couldn't see the changelings because they didn't emit any auras. The only thing that signaled him that they were there was the constant sound of their wings flapping in the air and their shrieks and hisses as they chased after them. 

Jacob returned to normal and reloaded a fresh magazine and took aim at the changelings closest to Cadence. The changelings began to tail Cadence closely and Jake fired at any changeling that drew too close for comfort. She continued to push herself, even though Jake could feel the stress on her wings. She would soon plummet like a rock if he didn't do something and fast. The orb of light Cadence made was fizzling out from fatigue and Jake desperately needed to see. Jake was burning through the mags faster than my marines down a six pack of Beers  on a Friday night. While he was reloading a small portion of the swarm broke formation and bull rushed him. He was able to pull out his revolver before they were on him. He took aim and unloaded on the changelings with great accuracy and results. Unfortunately, six more caught him. Three managed to catch them both. They tackled Jake and nearly hurled him off Cadence. He managed to beat the first one off by beating it with the stock of the rifle. Even out of ammo, he still found it useful and slung it across his shoulder. The other two ran into him full speed , tipping him over. He was now using only his legs to hold onto Cadence and was upside down and very close to grinding his head against the ground. At that speed, if his head touched the ground it was highly possible he would break his neck or lose his head.

The two changelings grabbed both of his arms and began to pull him away from Cadence. He dug his heels deep into Cadence’s coat, and felt her mind wince in pain at the sudden clawing at her coat. He knew that if he lost his grip it would prove to be fatal to him. He mustered whatever strength he had left in his left hand and moved his arm directly into the cave wall, at the speed they were going he lost some skin on that hand from friction burns but the changeling  didn’t stay on for very long. In fact, it even left a lime green trail of blood as it tried to hold on. With his other hand now free, he sucker punched the other changeling square in the face. The first punch didn't faze the changeling, but the next few punches hit him like a truck. When it lost its grip, Jake grabbed the changeling by the neck. But when he swung again to catch it square in the face, he suddenly found himself in Shining Armor's suite in the castle and spotted Cadence. He wanted to talk to her, but was afraid it may be Chrysalis.

“I don’t care what you have to do! Something just tried to kill me! I want her dead! I don’t know why I didn’t finish her off in the mare’s room when I had the chance. Once she's gone, my plan is a guaranteed success.”

“What of the other...being?”

“The being that I banished to the caverns? I want him alive. I have never seen or heard of such a being, and that alien technology he -or could it be she?- had...I think he could prove to be useful capital for my ascension. I only need a more powerful spell to work his mind to gain more. I already have these.” She pulled out the two missing rounds from Jake’s revolver. “It appears I can change his perceptions and senses, yet I do not understand how he was able to resist me while I did it. But I have proven he can bleed by changing his senses; it's only a matter time before I strike him again.”    

He then found himself back in the cave, clutching the neck of a hapless changeling. He squeezed until he heard some bone breaking. It went limp and he let the changeling fall to the cave floor. Jake stared in disbelief at his hands, unable to comprehend his previous action. He crushed a creature’s neck; back on earth, he couldn’t do that to a normal human. The other changeling was crushed on the wall. Where did this newfound strength come from?  

Jake felt Cadence’s magic wrap around him and begin to tilt him right side up. He felt relieved to finally not have to worry about breaking his neck on the rock hard floor of the cave. “Thanks." He said.

“Hey, it’s what…I do,” Cadence huffed as she gasped for breath. Cadence’s reply made Jake realize that he couldn’t beat this horde directly, and she wasn’t going to put up with this much longer. He had already used up all the magazines for the assault rifle, he placed it back in the pack and pulled out a shotgun. 

“These guy just don’t quit!” He said. He pulled the trigger and watched as a group of the changelings fell to the ground. He knew Cadence didn’t have much time left as the light from the orb was growing dimmer. With that last shot he had a small moment to go back into night sight and look around the cave. They were flying in a long tunnel that didn’t seem to have to an end, but a few yards away he spotted a shaft that looked like it might be large enough for Cadence to fly through without injuring herself. He had to be wary as he still couldn't see the swarm and it would take time for Cadence to change her direction. He took careful note of the distance between them and the shaft and then switched his vision back to normal. The changelings were almost on him again. He pulled back the pump of the scattergun, loading another round into the chamber, and fired with extreme prejudice. 

"Alright Richy, let's see what you got in the line of explosives." With one hand he shifted the shotgun to rest against his shoulder so he could still fire. His aim wouldn't be good and the recoil would be murder to his shoulder, but he needed to get something out before they reached that shaft. Since Cadence would be completely vertical for several moments, he would have to hang onto her neck with at least one hand with the other he could throw the explosives. Thankfully, the shotty also came with a shoulder strap he would need it when they reached the shaft .

"Hmm, let's take a look. Frag grenades...I didn't flunk out of physics enough times to think that's a good idea. C4? No. Splitters aren't powerful enough. PLANET BUSTERS? How the freak does he have those?! The EDI science division doesn't even have those! Well, they're too powerful for use, anyway. Napalm...not trying to burn a forest or a city...Come on, where are they...Ah, here we go, high yield nitroglycerin ! Perfect for this kind of excavation." He pressed the enter button on the holographic keyboard. The pack's computer then immediately pulled six of the explosives. They even came on a bandolier that Jake swung around his shoulder.  

"What are you," she paused to breathe for a moment "...doing back there?"

"Get ready to fly straight up."

"What!?"

"I need you to trust me, Cadence. You will be fine if you do it when I tell you to."

"But there's nothing but rock up there!"

"In a few seconds, there won't be any rocks there. I have an idea on how to get rid of these guys, and I need you to trust me, okay?"

He waited, making sure to keep his cool. If he made a mistake now, there'd be untold amounts of brain damage, Cadence would be killed and he would be mind raped into Chrysalis's willing slave. No pressure, though. The sound of the changelings grew louder and louder in Jake's ears. He took into account the time it would take Cadence to turn he body vertical to the ground and guessed the angle she would enter the tunnel in . 

"FLY UP, NOW!" 

Jake's body began to feel a change in apparent weight as she changed direction. He was holding onto her by her neck and his legs stabilized him below by not allowing his body to be flying freely through the air but rather hanging on slightly to her coat allowing him to hold on without chocking her . His hand fell on the timer button for the charges, setting them for five seconds and praying that the changelings couldn't close the gap between them in that time. Using his one free finger, he activated the spike feature on all of the to cause several long spikes to appear on the explosives, allowing excavators to simply jam it into the rocks without using any means of drilling.  He had to throw it at the walls of the shaft and hope it would stick. He crossed his fingers and threw the payload over his shoulder and watched it crash against the wall. The timer was live and it stuck.

"Heh, heh, you're all gonna die !"  He leaned in against Cadence, despite the apparent weight pulling him down. "YOU MIGHT WANT TO COVER YOUR EARS!"

Jake's heart was racing he knew it was now up to Cadence to escape the shaft before the explosives detonated. He looked behind and the black mob continued their persute closing the distance that Cadence had made earlier. Cadence shot out of the shaft just as the explosives went off. Massive amounts of fire and rock were thrown out of the shaft as it was sealed away under the rock Jake began to relax a little until he saw changelings still flying at him. It soon became very clear he didn't defeat all of the changelings. Luckily, those were only a fraction of the original horde. "Now this, I can take care of," he quipped as he loaded several more shotgun shells into his weapon. 

The orb of light was now almost entirely out. Jake needed to take down the stragglers for Cadence to rest. He took aim at the closest one and fired. The flash of the shotgun muzzle illuminated the changeling's gore spill out onto the cavern walls. The others went down just as easily when they tried to rush him. He nailed the majority of the remaining small mob with one lucky shot. From there, it was a simple matter of picking off the survivors, but even then they tried put up a real fight and began using what little magic they possessed. Jake had a hunch from the image he saw in the changeling's head they wouldn't go directly for him or kill  him. He had some importance to the queen and was well armed. But instead they elected to attack the easier and less important of the two targets and lunged for Cadence's wings and hooves. She dodged the changelings as well as she could while Jake set upon them. Only one survived.

"That's it. Fly right in front of me..." Jake said. He lined up his sights, aimed carefully and squeezed the trigger. To his surprise, the changeling dodged all of the pellets of the shot. "What the-? Oh, okay, little man, let's go again." He pulled the pump back and fired again and again and watched the changeling dodge his shots with extreme speed. 

He wasn't about to let one changeling get the best of him, especially after all that he had just been through, but somehow it was dodging his shots as if it had mad reflexes . He tried to fire again, but he realized he was all out of ammo. The changeling charged towards the alicorn. Jake tried to reload, but the changeling grabbed Cadence's leg and caused her to jerk, throwing off the unloaded shells.. She tried to shake it, off but its grip was tight. Jake used the stock of the gun to smash its face. Even though he could see it bleeding, it was determined to bring them both down. 

Jake continued to beat the ling mercilessly when he heard a small whisper from behind him. "I....can't!" 

The tunnel suddenly went pitch black and he could feel himself falling in the air. He lost his grip on Cadence and was thrown into the darkness. He felt his bones crash against the ground and his skin began to burn when he finished sliding against the rocks. He tried to stand, and found himself limping.  He heard Cadence sliding against the ground in the distance, and a few seconds later he heard a crash. He feared the worst may have just happened. He heard some rocks move from a way down the tunnel, but he could also hear something hissing and growling. His vision immediately went into night sight he could see Cadence's aura in the distance it was dimmer than it was when he first saw it, but still there meaning for now she was still alive. It wasn't moving so those sounds weren't from her, making Jake all the more anxious. His senses knew something was around him. He couldn't see it, though, even with his night sight. His head was constantly turning, looking in all directions as he heard the footsteps of something getting closer. Suddenly he felt something sharp dig into his back and then throw him hard against the wall, causing him to drop the shotgun. He got to his feet, and drew his peacemaker. He pointed his pistol in what he believed to be the direction of what he believed to be the changeling and fired several shots. He heard it squeal and could see rocks shifting. He couldn't see it but he could most certainly see the objects it was moving. He then heard a voice behind him.

"Jake?"

Jake's heart nearly stopped. He turned quickly, hoping to see what was talking to him. He recognized the voice but couldn't believe it. "Ray?"

"It's me man. I'll explain everything later, but seeing those wounds tells me you don't need a lot of explaining. That thing attacked me, too. It's not safe here. I need a gun to protect myself, give me yours!" Jake saw the aura surrounding him and knew what he saw not to be true. Inside he wanted to believe it was Ray but he knew it couldn't be.

"Jake, it's coming! Give me the gun!" He brought his gun up and pointed it at the changeling. 

"Jake, what the hell are you doing?"

"You chose the wrong person to disguise yourself as. That man's been dead for two years. I know this because I had to bury him." He aimed for the head and pulled the trigger and watched the aura fade into blackness. “Don't you dare try using one of my men's faces to trick me again.”  

When that was over, he felt the pain spike in his back when he bent down to collect the Winchester.

"How the heck did it know Ray?"

He tried to limp back to Cadence. He never thought he would be this badly injured so quickly. Most of these injuries he could tend to himself, but he wasn't going to be able to do squat without light. Cadence seemed, from the perspective of his night sight, to be simply knocked out. But he was glad she crashed where she did; a little more to the left and she would have flown straight off a ledge that marked a bottomless pit. He didn't see any wounds or other injuries, but he wasn't a medic. Even though she had a pulse and was still breathing if she had an internal wound and was dying from it he would be clueless. 

He waited and waited and wondered if she would really be okay. Currently, he was staring at perhaps Canterlot's or even Equestria's last hope.

"I could be responsible for the enslavement of the equestrians ..." He pondered how to get out of the cavern. The tunnels stretched farther than his senses could perceive. Even with his new found strength he wasn't going anywhere until Cadence was awake, for one with his wounds he wouldn't be able to carry her, not that he could carry her to begin with or so he believed. 

His injuries also kept him with her, not that he was planning on leaving her anyway. His back was wrecked and he tried something that goes against all medical textbooks that describe treating backs. He twisted his back to left and heard all of the joints and bones crack and the pain was gone. His cloths were torn up from the fall but he could feel where the changeling had dug its claw into his back. He could feel a cut but it didn't seem to bleeding for now he could leave it be. Which left the bite on his arm. He needed light for this one to properly examine it. He put some rubbing alclohol on his arm and it burned with the heat of a thousand suns after the pain he was able to properly bandage it . As for his leg wounds, he didn't break any bones but may have sprained an ankle or over extended a few joints. They needed time to recover properly, which was time they didn't have.

He waited patiently for her to awaken. He tried extending his power out of the cave to see what was happening on the surface. He didn't have much luck. His mind couldn't reach out that far. The only mind he could feel was Cadence's. A few hours passed and her thoughts were constantly changing but it wasn't anything serious. From what Jake could tell she was having a wonderful dream . But his loneliness would soon be over as he sensed another aura not too far away. He got to his feet and saw a purple aura on the other side of the cave wall. "IT'S TWILIGHT!" 

A sigh of relief left his mouth as he realized he had just gotten her to the right spot at the right time. But then he noticed Cadence was close to a wall that was about to be blown to bits. "Crud, it's Twilight!"

He mustered whatever strength he had left and wrapped his hands around Cadence's torso and began to drag her across the stone floor. "Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap!" Cadence began to open her eyes, and looked straight at Jake.

"Jake, what are you doing?"

"Trying to keep you in one piece!"

The moment he finished saying that was the moment that the wall was blown open. He was barely able to move her far enough away from the explosion to prevent the debris from hitting her. Cadence eyes instantly went from early morning start to wide awake. The dust settled quickly and he was relieved to see Twilight, but sadly the unicorn did not share the same feeling. 

“NO WAIT!” Cadence yelled out trying to keep Twilight back. 

Twilight completely ignored the fact that Jake was still holding onto Cadence. Jake knew this was going to get ugly within the next few seconds; he released Cadence and jumped out of the way. Twilight pounced on Cadence; and pointed her already lit horn directly at Cadence’s face.

“Twilight, it’s me!” Cadence cried.

“A likely story!” Twilight spat.

“Sunshine, sunshine, lady bugs awake. Clap your hooves and….”

“…do a little shake…” Twilight finished.

Twilight instantly knew she was talking with the real Cadence, and Jake was standing off to the side observing it all. He remembered this part of the episode and smiled. He was glad Twilight had finally been reunited with the real Cadence and that for now the timeline remained normal despite his presence.  

“Wait a minute…” Twilight turned to face Jake and the look on her face was just priceless, the look of complete and utter confusion.

“What?” Jake replied pretending to be clueless.

“Jake?”

But I think Jake's face was the best of them all after that. 

> Chapter 8: Getting Out
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 8: Getting out


The look on Jacob's face was simply priceless. For the integrity of the story, shall we call it, I had to spend the next few minutes rolling on the floor in fits of laughter at my friend's predicament. 

Jake didn't know how to react to Twilight's familiarity with him. If his discovery at the library was to believed, he would come here sometime in the future, but it still left him stunned. He wondered how she recognized him, as he felt he would change much in the interim between now and that point in the future. 

"How...how do you know my name?"

Twilight smiled warmly and gently at him. "How could I not? I've missed you so much. It's been so long since I've seen you guys-"

"-You guys? There's more?"

"Yes, don't you remember? The last time I saw you and your friends, Richy didn't even say good-bye when he left. We miss him too, and the library isn't as lively without you all." She chuckled a little. "Spike certainly misses your help with the chores."

"When was this?"

Twilight looked confused. "Several years ago."

"What?" Jake simply couldn't take it in; at least not in one moment. Twilight greeted him like he was a long-lost friend, and that was an indicator that he'd have a big role to play in her life. He couldn't determine whether he would impact her life for better or for worse.

Intrigued by the apparent (if at least one-sided) rapport between the two, Cadence joined in. "I had no idea you two knew each other."

As much as Jake would like to say he knew Twilight, he had to tell the truth. "We don't. Or at least I don't." 

Twilight raised her eyebrow, her face expressing a similar level of confusion. "What are you talking about? Of course we do!"

"I'm sorry, Twilight, but I've never spoken to you in my life."

Twilight grew wide-eyed with some realization. "Wow...He wasn't kidding in his letter. You really haven't met me yet. You must be his past..."

"I'm sorry about disappointing you..."

"No, you haven't disappointed me. It's just that I was-"

She didn't finish her sentence, but Jake felt she was going to say she was hoping for someone else.

"Well, someday you'll be that person and that's good enough for me." 

"Someday?"

"Yeeeeaaaaah...I probably shouldn't have said that or, well, a lot of what I said a few seconds ago. I figured it wouldn't change much as you wouldn't have the context for it to make any sense. I suspect your life will unfold exactly the way it should."

With that statement, Twilight might as well have shoved him back down into the darkness of the caves. Jake's mind was now home to angry breeding thoughts, lost in the mire of his cluelessness. What happens in the future? Why does he have these powers? Why was the computer locked down? Why was there a lab buried beneath her library? She wouldn’t tell him anything. No matter how hard he begged her to answer his questions she refused, simply saying, “I have already said too much. If I tell you more, you could endanger yourself and your friends.” After several attempts to reason with her, Jake decided to lay off for a bit. Perhaps the answers would reveal themselves with time.

“I assume the wedding is still going on?”

Twilight looked down at the ground. “Unfortunately yes, and as you have probably guessed the creature that trapped both of you down here sent me here too.”

“Well then, that means we gotta get to the surface ASAP.” Jake was already ready to go but Cadence stepped forward.

“Not until I look at your wrist!” Jake rolled his eyes. Cadence focused on him, speaking like a stern mother to him. “Don’t give me that look! I saw how badly you were bleeding.”  

There was just no getting past this mare, but he realized that before this entire ordeal this would be a dream come true, so he didn't squirm too much when she took his wrist. He removed the bandage from his wrist. His arm was stained red from the blood, yet there didn't seem to be a cut. It was as if someone simply dumped the blood on him to make it look like he had a terrible injury. Cadence stared at his arm, baffled as much as Jake was by what she saw. She was astounded; the injury was over a major artery point. By all accounts Jake should have bled to death by now. He didn’t even bother to share his back injuries or the burns that were on his arms from the fall. Right now he needed to get them moving towards the surface; they didn’t have any more distractions and needed to focus on escaping.

As they walked through the endless maze of caves, Jake suddenly found himself slightly taller than Cadence and Twilight, even though they were both supposed to be taller than him. He looked at his feet and saw they were no longer touching the ground. Twilight and Cadence looked over their shoulders and saw that Jake was floating. To Jake's confusion, they weren't shocked or surprised. Suddenly, Jake found himself encased in his fire armor and he soared upwards. He flew haphazardly through the cavern and it was clear that he lost control of his powers. Twilight yelled after him.

"JAKE, LISTEN! YOUR POWERS ARE CONTROLLED BY YOUR OWN WILL AND FOCUS! DON'T FOCUS ON THE ENVIRONMENT! JUST CONCENTRATE ON WHERE YOU WANT TO GO!"

Jake heard her and tried to focus, but he wasn't fast enough and hit the top of the cavern. When he hit the ceiling, he accidentally released a fire ball directly at the tunnel in front of them, causing the entrance to shudder and collapse in large chunks of rock. Jake closed his eyes and kept on thinking the word "ground" to try and make some semblance of a landing.

Twilight and Cadence both continued to shout after him and try to placate him and get him to land.

“"THAT'S IT," Twilight shouted, "NOW JUST SLOWLY DESCEND..."

Jake finally focused and slowly spun in the air to land on the ground. His armor was still on, and so he became wary of harming them.

Cadence was shocked by the appearance of his armor and stood far away from Jake. Twilight, however, approached him calmly as if she had nothing to fear.

"What are you doing?!" Yelled Jake. "GET AWAY  FROM ME!"

He moved away from Twilight until he found himself against a wall. He needed to run away from the two ponies to keep them safe, but he remembered he barely escaped with help. He didn't want to use his powers as he couldn't control them. He created a sword of fire and drew it toward Twilight as threateningly as he could.

"I don't want to hurt you. Please...back away from me." He implored.

She continued her calm pace towards him. She raised her hoof and tenderly placed it on the blade. Jake was astonished to find that she didn't wince in pain; her hoof showed no scorch marks and she even smiled a little at him to calm Jake. She pushed it down to the floor.

"It doesn't hurt me because you don't want to hurt me," Twilight said.

"How do you know...?" Jake began to ask.

"First, I haven't been incinerated yet. Second, I have encountered this before. I met two humans that look exactly like you and someone like you. I know that sounds crazy, but I did and they told me that I wasn't burned because they didn't want to hurt me. They somehow control the fire through their will and they can shape it into anything." Twilight looked off to her right side and sighed. "Even with such immense power at their side, they fought to protect us and refused to bring us harm. They were heroes. But that was a long time ago, and I miss them so much..." She looked at Jake with sadness bubbling up in her eyes. "At least you're here..."

It was obvious something was bothering Twilight. Jake didn't know why at first, but then he thought back to what she had said earlier, about the letter, and him being his past self. I felt sorry for the both of them; Twilight had a good friend with her, but he didn't know her. She had to wait a long time before she could see him again. I would not understand its significance until much later.

Cadence fell on her flank, staring at the rock that obstructed their path. Jake and Twilight looked at her and felt guilty for their distraction. They needed to focus on finding another way out.

Twilight sighed. "The wedding starts in less than an hour and this, to my knowledge, was the only route out of the mines. I only ever read one book on these mines. I don't know what we are going to do now."

Jake quickly raced in his mind for an answer, but they all required him knowing another way out.

"If only there was a way to keep the wedding from happening, or at least delay it."

"You mean stall for time?"

"Yeah...if only we were that lucky."

Then it hit him. He had the power to break through rocks. He could buy them the time they needed and immediately his mind began to work on a plan.

"Twilight, does this tunnel lead directly to the surface?" Jake asked.

"It should. The book I was reading was rather old, but no one's been down here for quite some time, so I don't think any major changes happened here besides that rock fall."

"I can break through the solid rock. You two go find a way out. I am going to go buy you some time."

Even though he was encased in an armor made completely of fire, Jake was still able to access the various devices he had on him such as his com device as well as the pack. Thankfully, the pack could assemble objects outside the armor so it wouldn't be trapped in the armor, because it was almost airtight save for two holes; one for his mouth and one for his eyes.  He took the one of my many headsets and adjusted it for Twilight's size. He taught her how to use it, but he forgot that he gave her one I was tampering with and didn't test yet. I had switched all of the functions associated with each of the buttons on the headset.

After giving Twilight a very brief but useless tutorial, he immediately headed straight at the rocks.

"JAKE WAIT!" Twilight said.

Jake heard Twilight yell but didn't turn back but he read her mind, "Be safe." 

"Thanks, Twilight." With that he left them behind and sped off towards the surface. He ran faster and faster through the tunnel, and as he continued he found the cave floor began to slant upward. He hoped that the surface wasn’t that far away from his current position.

After running for several minutes he found himself in much larger cavern. His fire armor illuminated most of the cavern around him, but once again to his dismay he found he wasn't alone. Three mares stood in of him: a unicorn and two earth ponies. They moved toward him slowly and deliberately. He sensed all three of them, and they didn't feel like the regular ponies. Their minds were twisted and further inspection showed that their eyes had a green tint. One he recognized to be Lyra, and the way they were dressed allowed him to make the assumption that he had just run into Chrysalis' "bride's maids." He would soon have to figure out how to get past them, but once he did it was a clear shot to the surface. The way he went about it though was...well, let's just say Historians will debate how his incomprehensible response ever left him alive. He backed away for a moment, afraid to get to close to the mares. Upon their continued approach, he formed his fire into a sword and shield and pointed the blade at the mare in the center of the three.

"I am going to give you all three seconds to quit creeping me out."

"Jooooooiiiiin usssssssssss..." The ponies hissed.

What happened next was most peculiar. His fire suddenly went out he lost his source of light and his defenses. 

"Ah, crud." 

He could hear their footsteps in the dark. They echoed all around him and he couldn't tell which direction they were coming from. He instantly went into night sight. It revealed the three mares, but their auras were…tainted, not normal. Another outside force was controlling the ponies. Something was able to overwhelm their wills and was now in charge of their bodies. It didn't matter much - there wasn't much he could do for them. He searched through the pack's vast inventory and selected a gorgeous X-33 pump action shotgun it had two ten shot loading chambers as well as a grenade launcher. While the normal chamber as well as the grenade launcher served as nice modification, the one feature he was after was the tranquilizer function that allowed him to stun his enemies without actually killing them. That is the glory of the second chamber. You can pelt your opponent with several tranquilizers at once, knocking them out for sure and blowing them back in the process. However, this made the gun unwieldy and cumbersome to carry, let alone aim. 

There was no way he was going to shoot any of the mind wiped ponies, so he flipped the switch and changed to tranque ammo. "Last chance quit freaking me out." 

As before they paid no attention to him and continued their advance. He let off a warning shot into the air. It did nothing to deter the ponies. I'm not entirely sure why Jake thought that would work. These ponies don't seem to have grasped the concept of a firearm, so I doubt that they'd be scared by what looks like an unattractive pole that makes a loud sound. So he aimed and he shot, but the tranquilizers ricochet off so kind of shield protecting the mares and they simply planted themselves in the stone walls and floors.

He realized his efforts were useless and decided it was time once more to use his phase ability. He ran straight at them, and phased through them easily bolting through them with little effort. Since his last few attempts though had resulted in his demise he hesitated heavily before using it, in the end there was no other option though he took a deep breath bolted through and hoped for the best.

Before proceeding further into the tunnel, he stopped and looked over his shoulder to see the mares just standing there starring at him, as if they reached a fence that they couldn't cross. Jake couldn't believe his luck they weren't pursuing him he turned his body to face them and yelled out into the tunnel. "My apologies ladies; there just simply isn't time for this. I hope you all will forgive me for trying to shoot you." Jake reached the exit with five seconds of a fast sprint. He saw a staircase with a rotted wooden door at the top with light pouring in through the broken window. He was about ready to jump for joy. Ever wary, he pointed his shotgun at the door before kicking it open and proceeding to the surface.   

> Chapter 9: Stalling a Wedding
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 9: Stalling a Wedding


=====================================================

I was amazed that Jacob made it out easily. This analysis was about to get interesting.

Jake quietly shut the door behind him and then quickly surveyed his surroundings. He saw stalls to his left and sinks to the left and it became clear exactly where he was.

"Of all the places I could have ended up, why did I end up in the mare's room? " He sighed.

As any man with any form of common sense would have done, Jake quickly but quietly made his way towards the door. He put his hand on the handle and was ready to twist the knob, when suddenly the door opened away from him. He stood in front of a mare, which knew Jake all too well. 

"YOU!?" She yelled.

That cutie mark of sushi burned a literal hole in his memory, according to the scanner. He wanted to run but there was nowhere to run to, except back into the caves. At this point, that was a viable option.

"You're the creep who broke into my kitchen!" The mare accused, jumping onto her hind legs to attack him.

"Wait I swear this isn't what it...!" Smack! The mare nailed him in the stomach, and Jake fell without breath. She caught him in her mouth and threw him against the wall in the hall. He made a dull thud against the wall and rolled onto his side, coughing from the solid punch in his stomach. He focused on the mare, dazed and with ringing in his ears.

"This is what it looks like, you other-worldly PERVERT!" She yelled.

Jake pointed the gun at her as she charged him. He squeezed the trigger and heard a shot fired over the din of hooves. She winced in pain and diverged from her path and galloped into a wall, landing close to Jake. She tried to stand up, but collapsed underneath her own weight. She managed to turn her head towards Jake with an angry expression before she slid into unconsciousness and her eyelids dropped, her tongue hanging out of her mouth. Tranquilizer darts, for all your attacked-by-pony needs.

Luckily, firing a tranquilizer made less noise than firing a bullet. This was probably one of the few ponies he would willingly shoot with any weapon of any kind purposely in his journeys to Equestria  other than possessed mares down in the caves. 

As the mare lay unconscious on the floor, Jake took careful note of her attire. She was actually wearing clothes; ones that would befit a wedding. Her mane was carefully placed and styled to go with her outfit. She was going somewhere, obviously, and just stopped to empty her garbage tank in the local receptacle. Jake looked up and around him. He was in a very large hallway; rays of light shown in from the massive windows in front of him. He hadn't seen day light for quite some time and took a moment just take in the sunlight. 

He had to keep moving, or else he'd be making more "friends" in the mare's room. He hid the body in one of the bathroom stalls; he didn't know how long she'd be out, but he certainly didn't want to be around when she comes to. 

He took a look at the windows in the hallway. Even though it was empty, he had to be careful because he didn't know where he was. The sky was clear, and if it weren't for a changeling planning to enslave Canterlot it would be a beautiful day. The wedding was still on schedule and looking out he could tell he was definitely within the castle perimeter. He could even see the window he broke out of a while ago; it was now covered with caution tape and all the remaining glass had been removed. 

He then remembered he was above ground, which meant a radio signal would reach Michael and Jiggs. Twilight was more of a long shot he wasn't sure if Twilight was close enough to surface to hear what he was saying. 

"This is Jake canceling radio silence," Jake called over his radio."How are you guys?"

There was a moment of silence before a familiar voice came through the com set. "Squad leader...? You have no idea how good it is to hear your voice!"

"I was gone that long?"

"Yeah. Over 36 hours of silence nearly gave Jiggs here a heart attack."

"Oi, don’t ever do that to me again!" Jiggs yelled in the background.

"Oh so you didn't miss me?" Jake responded into the quickly becoming populated com channel. It was good to hear from both Mike and Jiggs after all this time.

"Nah, just had a certain feelin' of neglect, that's all."

"Awwww, not enough attention for daddy's little baby?"

"You call me that again and I’ll show you just how much pain I am actually able to cause a human."

"Good to hear from you too. Alright, sounds like both of you are okay, but I'm going to ask this anyway, status?"

"Well, we managed to set up a perimeter defense outside the shield. We are hiding in a cave about 60 feet above the entrance to the city . There are no signs that the local authorities have discovered us yet. We managed to set up a network of auto turret defenses, a blast door keep anything large out, and a small sensor relay giving us about a mile radius. If anything moves, we shall see it. We also installed a security camera system in the Cliffside just outside our hideout allowing us to monitor the city's entrances and outer defenses . We are locked down pretty tight up here. I did some analysis on the city's force field. That is a class five force field. None of the equipment we have will be able to penetrate it."

"Yeah, not even my nuclear ordinance can get through that thing. It is truly a work of art...the perfect shield. Mankind isn’t even close to developing a class five shield! Score one for 'primitive society,' eh?"

"Yeah, yeah. Fantasize about that later. Check the relay, I'm picking up a lot of movement in from the east. Probably just an equipment malfunction. Anyway, that's all we got for you. How's things on your end? You've been out for quite some time now."

"Oh, you know, just escaped from the pit of despair." Jake looked up in confusion for a moment before speaking. "Hold on, you said signatures incoming?"

"Yes I did. It shouldn't be anything to worry about; my bet's that something's wrong with the sensor."

Jake knew what was going to happen. This very day in Equestria, the day of Shinning Amor's wedding, the changeling army was readying itself for the siege on Canterlot. At this point Jake knew he was now on a time limit he wasn’t certain if those signatures were the changelings. His feelings were optimistic, he assumed that they weren’t changelings since it could not be verified for now but kept that thought in his head. "Keep me posted on those signatures. Be combat ready do not engage unless you have to." 

"Yes sir.  Whatever it is, there's a lot of it, because according to these numbers there's more personnel than the entire EDI ground division."

EDI ground division consists of all military personal equipped for fighting on the ground and make up the vast majority of the EDI's military forces. I would be very scared of an army bigger than that ground division. "Wait a minute, that's more than 1.2 billion people. There must be some mistake."

"I know. That is why we are checking the equipment."

He was hoping that it would be an equipment malfunction, but every sense he had told him that wasn't true. He would worry about the changeling army later, as he had a wedding to crash. 

He listened carefully and opened his mind to find the one room with the most ponies, because that was probably the wedding. He knew exactly how he was going to do it. He pulled out a hand held PA and synced his com set to it. He pulled out a remote detonator and slipped fresh rounds into his peacekeeper and the X-33. When I saw what he did, I wanted to punch him and applaud him at the same time. I will allow you to judge what he did. I'd be surprised though if anyone even looked at this archive given the current state of the human race. He took a deep breath as he approached the hall doors. He could sense the auras on the other side. The doors were shut and were so massive that he seriously doubted if he could pry them open . He strapped the shotgun to his back, and began his attempts to open the doors. At first he tried to quietly enter, he pushed lightly on the doors. They wouldn't budge. He slowly increased the force he exerted on the doors hoping to make them open slowly. It was no good. He would have to break the doors down, but he didn't dare use explosives because the radius of the explosion would harm some of the ponies standing near the door and lose the element of surprise. 

"Sir, we have a problem," Michael radioed over.

Jake stopped for a moment to catch his breath. "Go ahead," he said.

"Those signatures are getting closer to the city, and the power in that field protecting it has dropped by almost twenty percent and is in free fall. It is now class four force field."

"Any additional activity outside?"

"For now none, but this is way too coincidental if you ask me."

"What makes you say that?" 

"There are no equipment errors. Everything is functioning at one-hundred and ten percent. We do not have visual confirmation of this yet, but we can conclude that the signatures are real beings. We do not know their intent, but if they have come in an army and mean to wage war their timing is perfect, and we most certainly do not have enough ammo to deal with them."

Chrysalis's plan was coming to fruition. The shield was beginning to collapse and all those signatures were probably those of the changelings. It was really happening and he was really there. From here out it would be a matter of time before the battle for Canterlot began.

"What you talkin' ‘bout, mate? We got more than enough gear to deal with a force that size," Jiggs chimed.

"I am trying to think practically my friend. There are two of us and over 1.2 billion of them. Even you cannot take on an army the size of the EDI ground division." The sad part is, I think I have disagree with Michael on this one; Jiggs doesn't like to lose, and he'd do whatever it took to win. 

"Depends on the situation, my equipment, and my environment. I have a lot of tricks up my sleeve. I bet I can take these freaks."

"You do not even know what you are facing!"

"Think berserkers guys. You are going to take on horde of beings that are going to want to literally rip you limb from limb."

"Oh that's just gorgeous!" Jiggs guffawed. "This is goin' to be all the more interestin' now..." He went silent for a moment. "Hold it...Mike, pull up the feeds. I am gettin' a proximity warnin' on the edge of our perimeter."

"They are up...what the...?Sir you may to look outside."

"'Ere move over, I'm takin' a look." There a short silence before Jake heard anymore. He looked outside to see a clear sky, as peaceful as it could be before the coming storm. He didn't even know what he was supposed to be looking for. Sadly I cannot display the following phrase in its entirety because it would violate EDI's conditions for the archived reports, and it would be considered "unprofessional" and removed from the EDI archive network. "HOLY **** JAKE, this ain't lookin' good!! They've surrounded the city already they're on the ground! Dang, the guards are all down! THEIR ENTRANCES ARE EXPOSED! Bloody cowards tryin' to hide in the cliffs."

"Jiggs, kill the guns. They are about to get in firing range of the auto turrets."

"Let 'em come. I'm ready."

"Think for a moment Jiggs. We are no good to Jake in pieces! We do not have the ammo to take on all of them. For once, could you just do things my way and be quiet?! Turn the turrets to manual-only fire if they get too close. We do not need to give away our position yet."

"Both of you keep it together!" Jake interrupted. "I don't want either of you going back to earth in pieces."

"Trust me, sir, the feeling's mutual." 

Jake made up his mind. There was no way to play it safe. He slipped on his mask to hide his identity and began his entry. He mustered up all the strength that he had and pushed against the door. It moved slowly but it was opening. When he got it open enough to slide through, the entire back few rows were staring at him. The ceremony was still proceeding but Jake couldn't let that happen.  

He flipped on the PA, and took a deep breath. "STTTTTOOOOOPPPPPPPPP!" He yelled. Every eye was now on him, and room had grown dead silent. "YOU'RE MAKING A BIG MISTAKE! YOU HAVE TO LISTEN TO ME!" He continued.

There were several guards in the room, all at once they began to converge on Jake he could see Shining Armor silently directing them from the other side of the room. "CALL OFF YOUR GUARDS, ARMOR!" He pulled out the detonator he brought out earlier and held it high in the air with his one free hand. "I'VE GOT ENOUGH BOOM IN THIS PLACE TO BLOW YOU ALL INTO LUNAR ORBIT!" Bear in mind there is the off chance Twilight could be listening to all of this. 

"Don't call my bluff, don't call my bluff, don't call my bluff..." He thought. The guards stopped and started to move away slowly. Jake walked calmly toward the front of the chamber, pretending he was dead serious and crazed. Armor was giving him a really dirty look, but Celestia seemed more curious then she was angry and stared at him with intent eyes. "Look, I don't want to hurt anyone but there is something I must tell you."

Shining Armor grew heavily impatient. "If that is true," Shining Armor began in a harsh tone, "put down your weapon and surrender yourself. You’ll get a hearing where you can explain your story." 

"Sorry. Can't do that. I'm afraid it would interfere with my plans. Look, you love your wife right?"

"Of course I do! I love her with all my heart. What does that have to do with any-"

"Good. I'm going to save you some grief and tell you that's not her,” Jake said, pointing at Chrysalis in the disguise of Cadence.

“What are you talking about? Of course she-" Shining Armor's eyes grew wide for a second, then he slapped his hoof against his face. "Wait a minute. Let me guess. Twilight told you this and asked you to come here, right?"

“Heck no dude, I came here of my own free will! Don’t believe me? You can ask both her and your wife when they get here in a few minutes.”

“And why should I trust you?" Shining Armor's eyes narrowed. "You’re not even willing to show your face.”

Jake looked down at his feet. “Well, the truth is, I don’t have a reason. You’re just going to have to decide for yourself. But think about it: your sister loves you dearly. She would have come here whether or not you wanted her here. You know that."

Shining Armor glared silently at him. He seemed almost insulted that Jake would bring his relationship with his sister into this.

"Yeah, well, even if that's true I don't want her to come. Not after the way she treated my wife-to-be. And I don't think I like you talking about us."

"Look," Jake continued, "good siblings work their problems out. They don't let one thing get in the way of their entire relationship. You know what kind of pony she is. She wouldn't do what she did if she didn't feel there was something seriously wrong going on. Now, she probably did it in a bad way, you know what I mean." Shining Armor simply stared at Jake, with the only change in his expression from frustration to slight bewilderment. “Still don't believe me, huh? Fine, I'll use more logic. You haven't seen your sister since her little...incident, have you?" There was nothing but silence between the two as Jake allowed his words to sink in. "I have a wonderful theory that would explain all of this and I am sure when Twilight shows up she will support it. There is an imposter in this room, who shall remain nameless, who attacked and imprisoned the real Cadence to the caverns underneath the city. She has the power to look exactly like Cadence, but not act like her. The only pony who knew Cadence well enough to spot a fake was your little sister. The imposter notices this and decides to send her down into the caverns as well. But not before debunking her in a way that ruins her rep, so that no one will care if she's gone or believe her if she escapes. All the while, the imposter has been sapping your strength so she can keep Canterlot vulnerable to an invasion by wood spirits who want to devour your souls, one and all."

Shining Armor just stared at him. "Do you get these 'explanations' from cheap one bit comic books?"

"Do I look like I'm making a joke?"

"I don't know. You're the one in a mask with some sort of explosives rigged at my wedding for no reason. I'm waiting for a psychotic ex-psychiatrist in a clown suit to pop in behind you and call you 'Mistah J.'"

"Touche. But I'm dead serious."

"Fine. Let's say your berserk little imposter theory is true. How do you know this and why hasn't this 'imposter' done away with you?"

"'Cause I spent that last few days trying to break out of that cavern- yes, she tried to 'do away with me', too- and in my haste, I accidentally collapsed a section a rock blocking the quickest way to the surface...That's why I volunteered. I won't let my clumsiness result in the death of a nation."  

"What could one imposter do against an entire nation?"

"She's got a massive army camped outside of the city. We're talking about more than 2 billion tree demons craving Canterlot-ian brain-flesh and squishy hormones."."

"That's not possible." Shining Armor grew angry at Jake's snide insinuations of incompetence. "I have guards patrolling the perimeter, as well as many city lookouts on the highest towers. There's no way anything can get in without being noticed by us."

"Well, they found a way. Don't believe me? Listen to this." Jake hooked his receiver up to the PA and called to Michael and Jiggs, hoping for good news but not expecting it. "Michael, Jiggs do you read?"

There was nothing but static coming through until a few seconds later a voice finally came across.

"Sorry Commander, it's hard to lay low here...Those things are freaking everywhere! We are fine for now. Jiggs has powered down the turrets so our position is still a mystery...For now anyway."

"It's good to hear that man. How's the big guy holding up?"

"I'm holdin' up rather well, thank you."

"What does it look like outside the city?"

"We don't know. Our cameras went down a few minutes ago. Somethin' is jammin' us or some type of system crash is in effect right after you began to crash the weddin'. We've been blind for quite some time now; we can only see within the cave now. I doubt things have changed outside. They are just waitin'....for somethin'. Here, take the turrets Mike, I'll take a look outside...."

	“Jiggs I am better at stealth than you. Take the turrets let me go instead...”

“I've got every mechanical spec you have. I'm pretty sure I can handle it...”

“You have got to be ****ING ME!”

“Oi, what just happened?”

“The camera inside the mouth of the cave watching our entrance is now down! I don't like the sound of that!" Jake heard a small click in background and heard the sound metal shifting around. 

"Don't try anything stupid, either of you!"

“The relay is still functional and confirms that there are still a massive amounts of targets just outside this cave. Going now for visual confirmation that these readings are accurate.”

"Jiggs ,I want you to stay back.”

“Look, I am just as qualified to deal with stuff like this as you are.”

“That gun is too loud and you know it.”

“As it should be.”

“You are going to give us away, and all this stealth will be for nothing get back…!"

Mike stopped mid-sentence. He rarely ever does that. I would consider it harbinger of things to come, and Jake didn’t like the silence one bit.

"Hey, anybody still alive there?...Guys?" 

Mike’s tone suddenly went quiet.

"Sir, they are...In the cave..."

"Just keep it cool! Don't let them..."

"****!THEY SAW ME!" 

"WAIT, HOLD YOUR FIRE!” Jake heard several gun shots go off in the background. “You…idiot.”

“Wha’?”

“You hear that?”

“Yeah it sounds like…****! Let me at the console, NOW! COVER THE ENTRANCE!”

Jake was once again thrown into a panic as the situation worsened and began to destabilize. “Talk to me guys, what’s happening over there?”

“Well, the dumb*** trigger happy moron of the century just alerted probably every single thing on this mountain to our position. You probably can’t hear it, but I can hear their wings flapping and their claws digging into the rock. They are coming.” And come they did. Jake heard horrible sounds of gun shots ringing out and echoing, rocks collapsing, the horribly mind melding screeches the changelings gave off as pressed their attack hammering mercilessly through the bots defenses.

“Givin' turrets full power!” Those turrets didn’t last long. Further examination of the hardware afterward showed that within 85 seconds the outside turrets had been over run and within 145 seconds they were breaching their last lines of defense.

“SHUT THE DANG DOOR MIKE…WHO CARES WHO HEARS?! US WE’RE ALREADY BLOWN!” 

Jake heard the blast door slam shut and heard a few more gunshots as they finished off the few changelings that managed to get in their safe room.

“Dang it, Mike, why’d you have to go and get their guts all over me? Look at me! I’m plastered with green goop.”

“Well you are the one who decided to stand in front of the beast as I cut it in half.”

“Why can’t you just be like me and shoot the dang thing? You’ve got more ammo than the entire third fleet!”

“Well, if I shot it, you would've been splattered with goop anyway. At least I could try to be clean with a sword.”

“…Well, anyway, back to the topic at hand. I think after that it’s safe to say the situation is still the same.”

“No changes?”

	“No sir. There’s lots of them. They keep freaking coming. There is no visible end to these things! The cameras may be out but the relay is still fully functional.”

“Look, Commander, I advise you to leave that city at once. I’d bet my armory that somethin' really bad is about to happen. I don’t think the city is in good hands either; I managed to examine their armor compounds. I know the exact chemical signature of the alloys they use. This allows me to see all personal with the armor on, and right now he has his forces scattered! If he doesn’t rally his troops right now, the city won’t last but a few minutes. THE COMMANDER IS BLOODY MORON! HOW CAN YOU NOT SEE THIS INVASION?!”

“Is he referring to me?” Shining Armor was already frustrated enough but now he was being openly insulted by a being he didn't even know. Jake was making a very bad first impression. 

“Uhhhhh…..” Jake stuttered.

“You realize my forces are scattered because they are currently searching for you because you are currently on top of Equestria’s most wanted list for breaking into a city under military protection during a time of crisis?” Shining Armor said accusingly.

“Wow, never knew I would be this popular. But you need to recall your forces, NOW, for the sake of your city.” Jake, Jake, Jake. The fall of Canterlot may have been inevitable, but he most certainly helped speed it along.

“Oh I will, to ensure that you go directly to the dungeon.” Shining Armor stated simply.

“What the-? But-!"

“How can I even trust you? You run in here and threaten to kill us all! I'm going to blow you out of Canterlot and then give Twili a good piece of my mind. Sending a terrorist to break up my wedding, and not even a good one at that! She's gone too far.”

“But you don’t understand! She didn’t do anything!”

“Oh, trust me, she’s done enough. You don’t have any evidence to back your claim except a square…cone..thingy that spews out weird sounds.”

Jake felt something hit the back of his head hard. He collapsed to the ground and the detonator rolled from his hand into the crowd. It was quickly seized by the guards. The guards made a scramble for the strange device. He couldn't believe he let the guards sneak up on him like that. Jake tried to stand again but he felt a hoof hit the center of his back, pushing him right back down to the ground. They pinned his hands against his back, forming handcuffs made from raw magic. They seized his peacemaker and shotgun. And he felt several spear tips mere millimeters away from his skin. One wrong move and he was done.

Thankfully, Celestia intervened before Shining Armor could really do anything to Jake. "Captain Shining Armor, what are you doing?" She inquired with a serious tone.

"I am arresting him for making threats against the crown, as well as trying to insight panic amongst the public."

"I think we should wait for a few minutes."

Shining Armor sighed. "You aren't actually considering believing him?" He looked at Celestia. "You are?! Princess, with respect this...whatever it is just threatened to kill everyone in this room! Including yourself!"

"But he could still be correct. Send your orders to recall your troops the thing you were looking for is right here anyway.” Shining Armor was stunned at the princess’ order“You should consider this a compliment. You don't even know this creature, yet he is willing to risk life in prison and even public execution for the sole purpose of ensuring you marry the correct mare. Besides he's not going anywhere if he's wrong then you may do as you wish with him.” 

Shinning armor gave a look of shock. He backed down, since he was being ordered to by a higher authority.

“I am going to give him a chance to prove his point." She turned to Jake. "You have one hour."  "Please don't make a fool out of me...Jacob Fischer." He heard this but her lips did not move. He had just read her mind but did it involuntary, almost as if she made him read it. He didn't have time to think about his abilities, though. Right now he remained still, flat on his stomach with spear tips practically brushing the skin of his back, praying that Twilight wouldn't be long. 

The time ticked by slowly before he heard again from Jiggs. He had just reached the 35 minutes marker.

"Sir, the shield just dropped to a class three force field. I could throw a piece of granite at that thing and create a hole big enough for a small armor column to enter. Sensors show that only a small percent are outside the blast door clawin' at it. The rest have surrounded the city. They are formin' a ball around it! They really do plan on attackin' from all directions."

"What about you guys? Are you alright?"

One of the guards slammed his hoof further into his back

“Quiet terrorist scum.”

Celestia was not amused by this and immediately order the guard off him

“He is not to be hurt or miss treated I will allow him to continue to be in communication with his friends.”

Jake then bowed his head in respect. 

“Thank you princess. Continue Jiggs.”

"For now, we are debatin' bout the best plan of action. We are probably going to blast our way out of here and harass the attacking forces."

"I am giving you orders then."

"Well, let's hear 'em."

"If shield goes down, you are to put protecting the civilian population as your top priority. You both are ordered by me to survive unless harming any of the civilians interferes with that objective. Lastly, I am giving you permission to attack the enemy in whatever way you see fit." 

Now there is one major problem with what Jake just told them. He is basically letting my bots off the leash I put them on. I don't believe he knows what that means. They are perhaps some of my most dangerous creations. They're designed to be unbeatable in a firefight and had the strength humans could only dream of having. They're also packing some of mankind's deadliest weapons. What you are saying is they have license to kill whatever using whatever they like. Jiggs is especially dangerous in this position.

"Sir, to confirm, we have permission to engage enemy in whatever way we see fit?" Jiggs almost gleefully asked.

"I don't want to see any mushroom clouds, if that's what you're asking."

"AWWW COME ON! I can't use my nuclear ICBMS while in EDI territory, it's illegal!"

"And so is, from what Richy tells me, half your arsenal."

"But this is my chance! Please sir, just let me get off one nuke."

"Out of the question. We are here to keep Canterlot in one piece, not reduce it to rubble."

"Fine. I'll do it the old fashioned way." Once again the sound of metal shifting in the background met Jake's ears. "You know, you'd think by now we would be usin' lazar tech...but no we still walk around with our ballistics. Guess mankind just doesn't have incentive to make a portable lazars cheaply. I mean, we have third generation lasers for mining and buildin'. It would make sense if second generation weapons were more readily available by now." Laser tech is a wonderful thing. Sadly mankind hadn’t made the conversion over to completely energy weapon arsenals yet. It would in the months to come but for now they were still using mostly ballistics. 

"Speak for yourself. I got this."

"OI.....DEAR SWEET MOTHER OF PERPETIUAL MADNESS, that is...!"

"Our ticket out of here."

"How did you do it?"

"Surprised you didn't figure it out first."

"Is your wrist cannon supposed to be glowin' like that?"

" Boss, you might want to hold onto something. The city is attached directly to the mountain and our blasting through the roof might cause a few tremors."

Considering he was pinned to the ground, he couldn't do much but he never un-synched his com from the PA so everyone in the room heard it. A few seconds later the entire room began to shake and a massive explosion was heard off in the distance. Everyone in the room began to panic a bit, with voices moving up from whispers to concerns and scared reassurances that they were safe. Surprisingly enough, the members of the mane 6 didn't attempt anything, despite the familiarity with Jake even with his mask on they expressed earlier.

This is another reason why I never let my creations off the leash because the following happens. 

"YYYEEEEEAAAAHHHHHH!"

"See now, aren't you glad I salvaged those jetpacks?!"

"RIDE ON, JIGGS! LET US SHOW THESE GUYS WHAT WE ARE MADE OF! OPEN THE BLAST DOOR!"

"Mate, you're gettin' off on this way too quickly. Did you rig the explosives like I asked you to?"

"Yeah."

"Alright, then, since we are in the air now it's safe to blow our hide out. Open the door."

"WHOA! LOOK AT THEM RUSH IN!"

"Just wait a moment. I want to give it time to fill up...Alright, you might want to cover your ears boss."

"What?"

There a second explosion. This one lit up the sky and caused another tremor that shook the very foundations of Canterlot.

Jake looked at the window in awe at the massive explosion taking place just above the palace he didn't have a clear view but it was large enough to light up the sky in broad daylight.

"Captain. You might want to take a look at this..." 

Shining Armor walked over to the guard who gazing out of the oversized Castle windows. He then turned back to Jake. "Sir," the guard continued, "Their army will overwhelm our forces if something is not done quickly. What are your orders?" Armor knew there wasn't nearly enough time to set up an effective defense against the changeling army Jake could tell inside he was panicking rapidly trying to think of something.

"Armor, let me go," Jake squirmed, “please." Just keep the time line updated, Jake was now at the 45 minutes marker. “A lot of ponies are going to suffer if you don’t let me go. Please, let me fight.”

The guard became more impatient. Jake could feel the soldier becoming more and more anxious by the second. "Sir, orders?"

"YOU WANT SOME OF THIS?! COME ON!" While Jiggs' insanity proves to very useful on the battlefield, at times it can quickly get out of hand and stopping him can be extremely difficult. That is why I keep him on a very tight leash. 

Jake continued to hear continuous gunfire erupt from the PA as the chaos above Canterlot continued. "Commander, you're gonna want to take a look out the window! I want you to see this." Jake saw another bright light flash from the windows like several lightning bolts striking the ground one after another. Another explosion was heard as the room grew dark from what I guess to be the smoke from the explosion blocking out the sunlight as it cleared. Jiggs made several experimental weapons that I did not let him use in our universe simply because they would be far too destructive for actual use. He built weapons capable of destroying entire worlds! He is the reason I have planet busters in that pack. Now, of course, at this stage of the game they were prototypes so they probably wouldn't be able to blow up a planet, but it could fracture it to the point of breaking it apart. I vowed never to use them, or any of his other experimental explosives, but he wasn't bound by the same vow. The one he just set up was designed to be a miniature atomic bomb minus all the radiation. He called it "The Pillar of Fire."  As the name would suggest, the last thing you would see as this bomb went off is a pillar of fire that would incinerate you, and being both the size of and weight of a small tupperware made it all the more easy to carry. It couldn't destroy an entire city, but it could vaporize a small area with its massive fireball. Its explosive yield was similar to that of the atomic bomb with its blast radius however he modified it so it wouldn't produce high amounts of radiation. So most likely, he went up into the air a detonated it at a high altitude but low enough so the changelings would get caught in the blast. 

“Jiggs! You cannot use another one of those devices! The shield surrounding the city cannot take another hit like that!”

“But…I HAVE SOOOO MANY!”

“Control yourself! If you launch another one, you are in violation of our orders.” 

"Hold up, I think I just became really popular. I have a horde of fans chasing me. COME ON KIDDIES! JUST GET A LITTLE CLOSER! I GOT ENOUGH SHOTTY SHELLS FOR ALL OF YA!....COME ON MIKE YOU'RE FALLIN BEHIND, I HAVE 5,789 KILLS RACKED UP, WHAT ARE YOU AT?!"

"5,790. Suck on that!"

“Those kills from the bomb don’t count for you! It was my bomb.”

“I armed the explosives. I earn some credit by association.”

“I pulled the trigger. Stop kill stealin’, noob!”

“Well I could have left the explosives in your pack, and they would have detonated while you were carrying them. I aimed the gun.”

“Fine. We’ll split the kills the 50/50.”

“You realize that because the number of deaths caused by the bomb was an even number, I'm still ahead."

"Eh, I'll beat you still. We got one point somethin' billion to go."

"Captain?"

Shining Amor was in shock as he stood in indecision. As much as he hated to admit it, Jake seemed to be telling the truth. Still, he'd never admit that, as it'd mean he'd have scorned Twilight for trying to protect him and that he'd need to team up with a bunch of psychos to protect Canterlot. Slowly, the minutes continued to tick by. Then the moment Jake had been waiting for arrived; the doors on the opposite end of the room flew open. Jake raised his head and saw a purple unicorn rush into the room.

She shouted at the top of her lungs: "STOP!"

"Twilight, there are no words to describe how amazing your timing is!" Jake exclaimed. She made it at 57 minutes 42 seconds, leaving Jake a whopping 2 minutes 18 seconds to spare.

Shining Armor turned to the door. "Twilight!?"

"That mare is in an imposter!" Twilight accused.

Chrysalis, in spite of everything that transpired over the PA, naturally put on her fake innocence act. "Why is she so protective over her brother? This is supposed to be my special day."

"Wrong," a voice interjected from behind Twilight, "it's my day." The real Cadence stepped forward, allowing the entire room to see her. Jake let out a sigh of relief. He didn't think he had it in him to stall for so long at a royal wedding. For a moment, he felt his body relax as he was no longer in any immediate danger of dying. But he then realized that it was only the beginning of the battle for Canterlot.

> Chapter 10: Clash of the TItans
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


Chapter 10: Clash of the Titans

I continued to watch the memories. Jake had worked himself into quite the situation at this point.

“What!? How did you escape?!” Chrysalis cried. Chrysalis’s plan just had a massive hole blown through it. The room was silent as the real Cadence walked toward the imposter.

“Get away from my husband,” Cadence commanded.

Shinning Armor was dumbstruck. “Cadence?” He asked.

“No matter! You’re too late.” Chrysalis gently touched Shining Armor's forehead with her horn and his eyes glowed green with her horn. He slumped over with a listless glean in his eyes. Jake could feel Shining Armor's aura suddenly turn weak. He was now just like Lyra and the other bride’s maids back in the caves. Shinning Armor, the captain of the royal guard, no longer had his own free will.

Twilight and Cadence rushed toward Chrysalis. Strangely, Chrysalis remained confident and simply said:

“You don’t want to go back to the caves, do you?”

The look on Cadence’s face was one of extreme anger and frustration as she sat and watched the queen of the changelings do as she pleased with her stallion. Jake tried to get up despite the new revelation, or perhaps because of it, the guards still stopped him, unsure of what to do. So they maintained their current orders and would not let him get up.

“Sir, I got a news flash for ya…”

Jake was lucky Chrysalis was too busy boasting about her inevitable victory was to notice the PA blasting out sound. Jake slowly reached out  while the guards stood dumbfounded by the chaos. 

"Sir, are you there?”

He finally grasped the small handle on top of the megaphone and pulled it toward him. He quickly hit the power button and enjoyed the silence. No one could listen in on what he was hearing. 

To keep a low profile, he had to resort to a whisper. Making too much noise would make ponies stare at him and he didn’t need that; especially not now. He was just happy no one except him seemed to notice the PA.

“I’m a little busy at the moment,” He quipped.

“You remember that class three force field that is currently surrounding the city?”

“Yeah, what about it?”

Several explosions were heard in the background as well as the pain-wracked screams of several changelings.

“I am going to need that knife back! Thank you.”

The screams suddenly ceased and the com was quiet for a moment.

“Dang, he soaked my knife and now it is tainted green. Neon green.”

"Michael…?”

“Yeah?”

“Focus. What about the force field?”

“Oh right, that. It just took a dramatic drop in power. It dropped from a class three field to class one in under a minute. These things are already beginning to crack the field. Jiggs and I will keep doing what we can, but I can break through this field just by running at it. They are already ramming the field using…their bodies? Well, I have never seen that before but the shield is already beginning to crack. Whatever power they had holding this field together, it is fading fast.” 

“Understood.”

Just then, Chrysalis vanished into a pillar of fire. Dark magic surrounded her as she morphed into her true form. She spread her torn wings as if they were bound for too long and let out an evil and twisted laugh as the transformation finished. The final result was a creature that looked half-plant, half monster. A twisted version of a unicorn with a bent horn and holes in her wings.

“Nothing can stop me now!" She cackled, "Equestria is mine!”

“Not so fast, ” Celestia said as she stepped forward, confident and serious in intent and ready to fight for her subjects.  

“Hmmmmm?” Chrysalis gave a wry smile that seemed to quiver a little at the ends of her mouth.

“Now that you have so foolishly revealed yourself, I can stand up and protect my citizens.”

The magic of the two queens clashed, neither of them willing to back down. However, Jake had seen the season two finale too many times to not know how this fight was going to end. In mere moments Celestia was overwhelmed and thrown to the floor, unable to stand on her own four hooves. This was the mare that had built Equestria from the ground up, and this really dug its way into Jake. A small fire lit within him. He now had a another reason to get up and fight. 

“Princess!” Jake yelled.

“I’m alright…You must…activate the elements of harmony,” Celestia strained.

Twilight knew what to do and made a run for the exit with all her friends with the exception of Rarity, who stopped to save the wedding gowns then followed after them.

“PROTECT THE PRINCESS!” A guard yelled. The guards in the room regained their focus and surrounded Chrysalis, and a few quickly formed a defensive ring around Celestia. One guard was left to keep Jake down. 

“Is this really the best Equestria has to offer?” Chrysalis chuckled.

“Can it! You are under arrest. As of now, you are considered a prisoner of war.”

“Is that so?” Chrysalis raised an eyebrow.

“You can bet your bits! We will not stand for this!”

“Pity. Such a waste.”

The guards pointed their spears at Chrysalis. If she were to try to fly or take a step in any direction she would find one wedged into her body. But she just smiled. She seemed to have everything worked out and the guards’ resistance was just part of her plan.

“SIR! THE FIELD IS GOING TO COLLAPSE ANY SECOND!”

“I know Mike. I know.”

Jake’s eyes were overwhelmed by a bright flash of light. When he could see again, the guards' spears were nothing but ash. The guards were pinned up against the walls with a green, glue-like substance sticking them in place. The same substance sealed their mouths as well; Jake could only hear their various mumbles and grunts through the thick liquid. Jake turned his head towards Celestia. She was now chained to the floor, unable to stand or move. She too had the muzzle over her mouth she just shut her eyes and looked down in shame. 

“Please…Jacob, help my ponies…” She beseeched. Jake grew wide-eyed. Was she speaking to him telepathically?

“Well, that was much easier than I expected." Chrysalis snorted. "Now, if you’ll all excuse me, I have to go and take care of a few mares.” She put her hoof under Shining Armor’s chin and tilted it to her eye level. “Be a dear and make sure no pony misbehaves while I am out.” 

“…Anything for you, my love…” Shining Armor droned.

“Good. After all, we are madly in love. Aren’t we?”

“…Yes…we…are…”

The black creature let off a small giggle, satisfied with the reply. She headed for the door. For the time being, she had forgotten about Jake or at least that was what I thought. Jake had no intention of letting her leave through those doors. For now, the shield was still up which means there was nothing to stop Twilight and her friends from reaching the tower. From what I could guess they were probably the only threat to Chrysalis at this point. His weapons were still on the floor where the guards had left them, fully loaded and ready to fire at a moment’s notice. He quietly stood up and looked around. No one was paying any mind to him. He then used his speed to get in between Chrysalis and the door. He had the shotgun barrel raised to her face, and magnum at his side.

“I can’t let you leave,” he said.

“You are horribly arrogant and naïve," Chrysalis sighed. "Move out of the way before someone gets hurt.”

“I’m gonna make you hurt for what you’ve done.”

“Is that so? So tell me... Jacob, that is your name right?”

“How do you…?”

“Oh, I know a lot about you. I know that you pilot a Javelin fighter, you crashed here during your retreat on your battle in the nameless mountains, and you sleep in boxers with tiny hearts on them.”

“What? But how!?”

“I froze your mind. You see, I altered your perception of time. What you believed to be a second was really several minutes. In that time,  I was able to learn everything, well almost everything about you and your home world. I just love learning all about my enemy. Makes it all the more enjoyable to rip their feelings from them and make them my servants.  And the best part about it: no one can resist it." She squinted her eyes at Jake. "But you are a unique case. You have been the only person to ever stopped me from reading their entire mind. You're a mystery, and I don't like mysteries. But don’t worry, I have more powerful spells that I can use to get what I want.”

Jake’s grip tightened on the trigger; his hand began to shake, almost unable to comprehend what he was being told. Thought of her clawing through his mind again enraged him. “I am going to give you one chance to leave, and take your armies with you. This doesn’t have to get any messier than it already is.”

Chrysalis laughed. “How about this: you leave. I just want to enjoy the spoils of my victory, for now. I don't really know what I want to do with you, so it's better just to remove you from the whole situation. I don't want to kill you, so I figure that I'll let you walk away. We won't attack you or your friends while you leave.”

“You are preying upon innocent blood, on a peaceful world. That makes it my problem.”

“Innocent blood, oh please. They forced us out from our homes, and banished us to the desert wastes just because we looked a little different. We had no food or water there, and the only shelter we could find were caves. We were forced to live off of what little we could find. When the last of the apple trees became barren, we were forced to resort to a spell that would change us. We would no longer eat food from the land but instead we would harvest energy from the heart. It gave us unbelievable power, but at a cost we would drain the love a colt has for a mare but after it is drained they have nothing left, and our magic takes over, they become our slaves. But if we refrain from feeding then we collapse and die like any other being of starvation.” 

“So this is all about vengeance I take it.”

“No, not vengeance. Survival. We need to feed.”

“Just feed? I doubt that.”

“I care for my subjects. Like any other leader, I want what’s best for them.”

“And you think by breaking down someone’s door and stealing what they hold most dear is best for your kingdom?”

"We must feed, Jacob. Our brood starve and our food cannot be grown like crops. Are we truly evil for wishing to sate our hunger? It is as the tale of the scorpion and the frog: it is in our nature to hunger for memories and gorge on feelings.

“I'm not saying let your kids starve. I'm saying work something out peacefully between your kingdoms."

“We tried that before with other kingdoms. We are an abomination to them. Now get out of my way.”

“No, I will not. I cannot accept this. Not from EDI, not from you., These ponies breathe just like you or me.”

“So do the animals that you slay for food on your planet. I'm the one who is merciful, because I don't kill them. My patience with you is growing thin. Move or I will overtake you just as I have done to every other pony in this room.”

“So that’s it then. They are like cattle to you? Just a herd that you use for your own personal gain? They are a respectable race, with incredible intelligence! Their kingdom is built upon love and mercy-"

"WHERE WAS THAT 'LOVE' OR 'MERCY' WHEN WE WERE CAST ASIDE LIKE TRASH?! WHERE WAS IT IN THOSE LONG YEARS IN THE DESERT?!" Chrysalis yelled. She stared at Jake with rage and hate in her eyes. She stopped and something that looked like sorrow in her eyes. 

“I cannot forgive them. They are the reason I grew up as an orphan. Yes, this is also part vengeance, but you have already shown just how little you know about the ponies you protect. I cannot expect justice; not from you, not from these ponies. It may not get rid of those years we spent wandering the desert, but all that matters is that my people feed and I get to crush this wretched hive; may that Celestia and her ilk wander forever and rot in that desert. And how dare you present yourself as some moral arbiter and talk down to me! I saw you. In your memories. You fought because you thought it made you a hero. You're not. You wished to sate a hunger, a hunger for violence and glory." 

"I did not!"

"You did. You gorged yourself on battle. Especially here. I know what we are to you. We are fictional characters on some glowing box to capture your amusement. You watched this battle play over and over. You know how this ends. So why didn't you warn any pony? Because you wished to fight me. You wanted to spill some changeling blood, and sate your hunger, like we are. But can you blame us, or we you? Scorpion and the frog. It is in our nature. 

"In yours, perhaps. If you thought I fought to 'feed', then you learned all the wrong things from my memories. I fight for justice, for peace and to stop the big guys from walking all over the little guys. The guys that fight for pleasure are the ones that truly scare me."

"Remember Jacob I've seen inside you I know what your true motives are even better than you do, and what I saw was nothing more than what I just described to you as far as you're concerned you're just as bad as the men you fight."

Jake's fingers wrapped even tighter around the trigger "I AM NOT LIKE THEM! I WILL NEVER BE LIKE THEM! I fight and will continue to fight for the well being of those around me, I am standing before you because you mean them harm, and I will not tolerate it!"

Without a second thought Jacob pulled the trigger and the gun let out a loud bang as it released it’s metal payload out into the air. Chrysalis flew back as the metal pellets impacted against her. The barrel was smoking., Jake pulled back the pump and walked up to the seemingly motionless corpse. He could see the blood streaming down the side of it. The rest of the room just stared in awe at the gruesome scene before them. Then a beam of magic shot out from Chrysalis's horn, blowing Jake back. He back flew back and crashed into the door. He felt a nothing but searing and burning pain where the beam hit him. He stood up slowly with his gun as a cane.

“I gave you a chance, boy. I offered you a chance to turn and leave, yet you stayed and continue to fight. Why? WHY FIGHT FOR THEM!?”

“Because I choose to. You made a choice. Instead of trying to mend your wounds, you resorted to something you didn't’t understand.” A sharp spike of pain shot through Jake’s back, causing him to almost completely collapse back over. “…and…now…” He struggled to speak. The pain was immense, and he was on the verge of blacking out. “…You…are paying the price. I’ll make sure, you pay it in full…you will burn for what you have done.”  

Instantly, Jake’s body was surrounded by the armor made of fire and he suddenly felt no pain. He could think clearly, and felt as if he had all the strength he could ever need. The gun he was holding melted quickly, much to my chagrin. Everything else was encased within the armor so thankfully the pack didn’t melt and his peacemaker was in its holster, so it also remained solid. 

“Jake, are you alright?”

“Yeah, never felt better. Why?"

“I just detected a massive energy spike from your location. According to this device, you are at the dead center of it.”

Jake just smiled from within his armor, feeling completely full of raw power. “I have never felt better Mike. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

“I see," Chrysalis uttered. "Perhaps I have underestimated you."

"This is just a little something I picked up on the road." In a blink of an eye Jake ran behind crysalis hoping to catch her off guard, even I believed it should have worked but Changeling queen was able to act quickly and dodged the attack his fist drove straight into the stone floor crushing the bricks into bits and pieces beneath his fist.

When he turned around to face his opponent once again she was standing in awe. "With me you could do so much more.”

“Yeah, no.” 

Chrysalis scowled. "You say that like you have a choice in the matter. I get what I want. One way or the other.

"Thought I was a little too much for you to handle."

The queen simply smiled back "Perhaps I was wrong to deny you that chance, you are powerful enough that I could take this kingdom with ease."

“You’re fightin her again, aren’t you Jake? You may have ordered radio silence but we have ears and could still listen.”

“Technically the term is audio receptors in our case since we are machines after all.”

“Mike! Now's not the time. Look, my point is if you go in you may not come out this time.”

“ON YOUR LEFT!”

“I SEE IT!” Many shots were heard in the background of Jiggs transmitter, as well as the thuds of changelings dropping to the ground.“My apologies, it’s a mess out here.”

“Are you enjoying yourself?” Jake said deadpan.

“Yeah, 'course I am. You gave me only one restriction, no 'shroom clouds. That’s way better than what I usually get. I haven’t been able to fight like this in years! I love it!”

Of all their functions, my bots are perhaps the most effective at killing. This event tested their abilities in combat and strategy. I made them to be tough, but they are far from invincible. The fact that they made it out of this without having to be reconstructed along the way amazes me. 

“Jiggs, I can handle myself.”

“I bet that’s what you thought last time too, right before you got your *** handed to you by a flyin' turd.”

“Things are a little different now.”

“Look, just be careful mate. The hierarchy wouldn’t be too happy if anything happened to you while I was nearby.” 

At that moment Chrysalis unleashed another beam of magic tearing through the air and destroying anything in its path. 

“Jiggs I’m going to have to call you back.”

Flames formed around Jake’s hands. They formed the drill he had used earlier to escape from the caverns and charged at Chrysalis. The point of the drill head split the beam of magic into many different rays. Chrysalis increased the power of the beam to try and break through Jake’s construct, but Jake quickly pressed on and before she knew it, Jake was directly in front of her. Jake jammed the drill head into Chrysalis’ neck and tore it out and then smashed the blunt side of the drill into her torso with such force that she flew back to the other side of the room, crashing into the stair case right in front of the alter. 

Jake was deeply satisfied with the effectiveness of his initial strikes, but was incredibly shocked when Chrysalis got back up and stood unhurt. He also noticed the wounds from the shooting earlier were gone; there wasn't even a scratch on her skin. But the blood was still on the floor, she could still be hurt.

“You know, Jake of Earth, even though you would have been quite useful...” Her wings spread out in a threatening stance, "Part of me really wanted you to refuse!" She then disappeared from his sight. 

Jake’s eyes darted back and forth and he turned around to search for her. The crowd of ponies used the small moment of chaos to run out of the room; the only ponies that remained were Celestia, her guards, Cadence, Shining Armor, and even though he’s not a pony Spike also remained. An evil laugh rang out in the room. It echoed off the walls and had the same volume throughout the entire room. He quickly reformed his flame into a short sword in his right hand, then formed a shield in the left. He placed spikes on the front end of the shield, allowing for additional damage to be caused to his opponent whenever he decided to shield bash anyone. 

He needed to use his other senses to locate her. He taped into his alternate mind sense, hoping to use it to detect Chrysalis before she could attack him. The moment he activated it he felt a presence behind him. His reflexes kicked in and his body immediately turned to face the threat. He brought the blade of the short sword down on the figure behind him. it With a loud whiff, the sword only managed to slice the air. 

Before the image faded, he got a look at its face. It was a pilot he once knew back in flight school. Jake knew him as Benny and he was his first wingman. Sadly, this pilot was deceased, which meant that Chrysalis knew who he was attached to and was now using it to get to him . He felt something else behind him again, this time it was a much stronger presence. He pulled his arm back over his shoulder and leveled the blade so it would instantly decapitate anything he decided to strike. He turned quickly and stopped himself from swinging the sword. 

“Fuh-Fluttershy?” He stammered.

A yellow hoof flew out from under her and drove itself into his stomach. Jake was blown back and fell to the ground, his sword faded as he lost concentration. He rolled over and he saw her hoof strike the ground where his head once was. It cracked the stone floor. She struck the ground again, this time wedging her hoof in the stone floor temporarily trapping herself. Jake seized her moment of error and got to his feet. He drove his spike layered shield into her side and ran with such speed that Chrysalis was practically carried with the shield. Jake rammed her into one of the support pillars holding up the roof. The solid concrete split and cracks formed all over the base of the pillar. No mercy was given out on Jake’s part seeing her disguised as Fluttershy, and using her against him ticked him off to the highest degree . He yanked the shield from his prey and watched the steam rise from the spikes as the blood evaporated from them. But in the blink of an eye the body that lay before him was no longer wedged into the concrete crevice he had made.

“You know, what I find interesting is that you have never even talked to this Pegasus, yet you have an incredibly strong attachment to her…” 

Jake formed his flame into a hatchet and swung at the image of Fluttershy. She jumped back and the blow missed by a long shot.

“This is almost too good! But you care is greater for others isn’t it?” 

Jack charged her and swung with all the strength he had. She leapt to the side and he threw the axe at her. The blade spun rapidly in mid air, but the changeling queen’s reflexes were better than he expected and she moved out of the way, with the axe slicing only through air. With a strong flash from her horn, she changed forms again. She grabbed the spikes on the shield and forced Jake to stagger backwards with a shove into his shield. She wrestled with him for a moment, pitting her strength against his. She gathered enough strength to shove him back. He slid against the hard floor. Jake was amazed at her strength when he lowered the shield to see who she was disguised as this time. When he saw the image she had chosen, he felt like the anger he felt towards her was going to cause him to explode. 

“You cared for this man a lot didn’t you? What his name? Frank, was it?" She had taken on Frank's form, flight suit and all. "You really cared for him, didn’t you? I can feel the power I am receiving from you growing. The Pegasus enhanced my healing powers and speed, but this one, this image…Oh you have given me more power than I needed to defeat you…Ahhhhh, it feels like I'm...how do you say it? Pumped.”

“You know…”His shield exploded the blast forced a space between the two titans as they fought. “…I originally was fighting you because I thought it was the right thing to do, because I bring down people like you in my universe all the time, but now…You’ve made it personal.” A massive war hammer formed into his hands with massive spike for the hammer head where the it was connected to the pole of fire. “No one insults the memory of those fallen! ESPECIALLY NOT ONES THAT WERE UNDER MY COMMAND!” 

The spike let out a massive fire column. Jake controlled it like whip and lashed it out at Chrysalis. She dodged most of the strikes but then Jake began to run, and at his peak speed he jumped into the air. The hammer was raised above his head, and he brought it down on her with a yell. She jumped up into the air, dodging the blow. The hammer struck the ground so hard that it caused several large pieces of the floor to be thrown into the air, all of them red hot from the flames of the hammer. Jake ripped the hammer out of the floor and swung the spike up at an angle, nearly tearing off Crysalis’ legs. He then launched off at such a speed that she didn’t have time to notice him going up behind her. He struck her with the pommel of the hammer. Chrysalis fell to the ground. Jake aimed the point of the spike down at Chrysalis and flew straight towards her. She rolled over and was just in time to stare into Jake’s eyes as he plunged the spike into her upper body. 

The spike went completely through her and penetrated the floor on the other side. He pulled the spike out and Chrysalis gasped for breath and writhed on the floor. Jake brought the hammer over his shoulder, with all his strength brought down on Chrysalis. The explosion was massive. It blew out some of the nearby windows and let a small crater where the hammer impacted the ground. The entire area within the crater was red hot, and smoke rose and formed a small cloud above it. Jake looked down, there was nothing but a pile of ash in the shape of his former friend. He was disgusted by the sight and simply let the wind coming from the broken window carry the ashes away. He took a look around the room. It was wreck; half of it turned black because of scorch marks from the battle, the other half horribly mangled from the struggles that occurred earlier. 

“SIR, THE SHIELD JUST COMPLETELY COLLAPSED! THESE THINGS ARE RUSHING INTO THE CITY!”

“You know what to do. Stay safe Mike, make sure Jiggs doesn’t hurt himself.”     

Jake’s eyes turned to the window and he watched the black masses pour into the city. He could sense Twilight and her friends weren’t too far from the tower. Things were going better than he had hoped, when he heard a familiar laugh come from behind him. He spun around, quickly viewing the rest of the room. 

“Did you really think you could beat me that easily? Perhaps you would not be that useful after all.” 

“You’re not dead. Obviously you didn’t learn your lessons from your teacher in death class.” 

He pointed the spike in the hammer out into the room and waited. Then something struck him from behind and sent him flying forward. He recovered quickly and brought the hammer back. It its previous position. He sensed a presence behind him and swung the hammer behind him. It hit nothing but air but seconds later something hit his shoulder, almost knocking him over. It felt like someone sent a knife at the speed of light to hit him, and he just got clipped by it. 

“Psssst, over here.” 

He turned to the left and saw Chrysalis in her original form standing still as if waiting for him. He ran at her and brought the hammer over his head once more, this time he wanted to crush her into a thin, chitinous paste. She moved just slightly to he left dodging his attack, but he quickly compensated and swung to the left. Again and again she dodged his counters as if taunting him, flaunting her superiority in face.

“Honestly, Celestia, where do you get creatures this stupid? He knows he is outmatched, yet he continues to fight as if he knows he’s going to win. You truly are the most evil ruler of Equestria.”

She continued to taunt Jake as he practically painted the floor to look like the floors of hell. There were few spots that weren’t smoldering, or covered with scorch marks those areas Cadence had managed to put up a field protecting spike, Celestia, herself, and the guards it was the one thing preventing them from being injured throughout the battle. Jake wouldn’t let up for second and continued to do everything that he could to beat her to the ground. She continued to harass him to the point of becoming enraged.

“I’LL GET YOU YET!” He screamed in a fit of rage.

He ignited the air around him, forming a defensive ring of fire around him. He watched for openings or areas in the ring where the fire was broken apart, a place where she had possibly broken in. The ring remained solid for the longest period of time, but just as he felt secure enough to think for a moment, Jake felt another presence to his left and it felt incredibly strong. He swung the hammer down in that direction and was disappointed to hit nothing but air again. Then something smashed into him, cutting a section of his shoulder armor off and throwing him to the floor. 

“Quit flying around and face me like a real Changeling!”

The armor quickly repaired itself, but before it was sealed he noticed he was bleeding on his shoulder. This was the first time the armor had actually been broken, and the only time so far. His hammer faded to embers and reformed into a well kept throwing knife. He concentrated heavily on searching for some trace of the changeling queen. He tried using night sight but in the day light his night vision blinded him. He made a rookie mistake. He didn’t get what he wanted until she was practically on top of him. His senses were well trained and since he was concentrating on them enough this time was able to fly up just as she was about to strike him again. He saw the faint image of her rushing towards him and threw the knife at it as it passed through the fire trying to escape the wall. The construct exploded on impact and sent Chrysalis flying. She fell against a wall causing rubble and debris to fall on top of her from the already ravaged wedding hall. 

Jake took full advantage of this opportunity, dealing blow after blow. Driving forward with his attack, it looked good for him for a while the queen was unable to counter his moves for the time being.

“YOU’RE DONE!” He yelled.

He picked up Chrysalis by the coat and threw her across the room. The moment she hit the ground he had a sword composed completely of fire at her throat. 

“I think this means I win,” he said slyly.

The queen simply started to laugh at his victory. The sounds of breaking glass suddenly reached Jake’s ears. Changelings flooded into the room. The queen continued to laugh. It was the kind of laugh a crazy man gives off as he is about to blow himself and everyone else around him into oblivion. It’s the “You’re screwed and there’s nothing you can do about it” kind of laugh.

He stared at her in confusion. His dismay turned to anger and he yelled "I WON'T LOSE TO YOU!" He channeled every last ounce of power he could muster into himself, and released it all at once. Celestia knew Cadence's field wouldn't hold up to this kind of power. Quickly using her remaining magic Celestia brought up a force field around the remaining ponies and spike that were in the room. The explosion lit up the entire room, and the fires spread to some of the adjacent rooms destroying stone walls, and bursting through windows. The explosion went for about a minute straight without ceasing in power and size. When it was over Jake’s armor left him, and he was wearing his normal clothes again or what was left of them. He felt incredibly weak and almost fell over backwards. The smoke cleared enough for Jake to see something. Chrysalis was just sitting there smiling. She had conjured a shield that protected her from the fire as well. Jake gave into his weakness and fell to his knees. 

Crysalis leaned in closer, a massive grin on her face. “You're done,” she smirked and said in a mocking tone of voice. 

Jake had over exerted himself. He had used an attack he wasn’t ready for and now he was going to suffer the consequences. She then took on Frank's form again brought her foot up and kicked him in the chest. Jake couldn’t put up a fight and he flopped to the ground. His vision then went dark.