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.