Accidental Heroism

by Zaffy

Chapter 6: Everypony Hates the Escort Missions

“Pinkie Pie… Really?” Jacob asked, still trying to catch his breath.
“Yep, that’s me! So you’ve heard about me?” the pink pony giggled giddily, bouncing around him.
“N-No, it’s just… never mind, you wouldn’t get it…” he muttered, shaking his head.
“Aw. Come on, tell me! Tell me, tell me, tell me!” she asked, pouting cutely.
’Screw it, I'm not going there…’ he thought to himself. “S-So, what do you want?” he asked, regaining his composure.
Pinkie Pie looked at him oddly for a moment, before shaking off whatever thoughts she had on the subject at the moment “I came to see Fluttershy! Is she home?” she asked.
Jacob shook his head “No, she’s out doing her rounds. I don’t know what for, but I figure she’s in the forest.” He answered plainly, motioning towards the Everfree Forest.
A quiet moan escaped the pink pony’s lips when he answered “Great… Oh well, you can come with me in the forest! I want to know more about you and why you’re a blank flank!” she told him, getting in his face.
Jacob backed up quickly and said “No way, you shouldn’t need someone to hold your… hoof for a walk in some forest…” harshly.
“But it’s dangerous in there-”
“Fluttershy seems more timid than you, and she went in just fine.” He muttered, sitting back down and taking out his tools. He then took out his arm cannon and began to work on it.
Pinkie Pie stood there, taken aback by Jacob’s attitude. “Look, mister, you might be new around here, but you can’t just be rude-“
“Can you please quiet down? I’m trying to work…” Jacob interrupted, holding his hoof up, and getting back to work. He lowered his goggles over his eyes and said “I advise against looking too closely to this…” as warning, as he turned on a small machine near the base of the arm cannon. Small sparks began to shoot up from the machine’s work.
Pinkie Pie stepped back in surprise, but kept looking at Jacob and his work. She closed her eyes, the bright sparks making it hard to see “You’re a weird pony… But then again, I’m a weird pony too! Hey, maybe we could be bestest buddies if you got a better attitude! Then we could do a bunch of stuff like eat cupcakes, and pull pranks, and go on adventures and stuff!“ she giggled. Once Jacob had turned off the small machine and raised his goggles, Pinkie Pie sat down next to him “So… What’s your name?” she asked.
“Jacob. Go away.”
“Ok, Jakey, where are you from?”
“Not from here. Go away.”
“Well duh, silly, but where are you from?”
“I’m not telling you. Go away.”
“…Fine then, Jakey, why are you a blank flank-“
Jacob quickly stomped his fore hoof on the grass, startling Pinkie Pie. “You’re not going to leave me alone until I agree to take you, are you?” he asked, looking at her from the corner of his eye.
She gave him a broad grin and nodded quickly “Yep!”
“…Fine, I’ll bring you on two conditions.” Jacob answered with a sigh.
Pinkie Pie cocked her head to the side, listening carefully
“First, you let me finish my work. Second, you stay quiet while I work. Understood?” he instructed, only receiving a quiet nod from the pink pony “Good.”

A small while later, Jacob proudly held up his arm cannon “All done! I’ll be able to use this with my horn now, instead of my…hoof.” He announced, chuckling to himself. The cannon hadn’t changed much, except for its base being adjustable in size. He placed it on his horn, and tightened it into place “Perfect!” he chuckled.
Pinkie Pie leapt up “Hooray! I don’t know what it is, but it’s finished!” she cheered, happily jumping around
Jacob made a small smile and said “Alright, we’ll head off into the forest… I don’t know how long Fluttershy is supposed to be in there, but we’ll see if we can find her.” He told her, slinging his satchel around him once the tools had been put away.
Pinkie Pie started hopping off towards the forest’s entrance “Come on, silly, let’s get going!” she giggled.
Jacob trotted after her, rolling his eyes “Really… Where do you get this energy from…” he muttered to himself.

“So Jakey, you’re still a blank flank at your age?” Pinkie Pie asked him, hopping along the forest path.
Jacob sighed “Before today I didn’t even know what a damn cutie mark was, let alone that not having one was the biggest faux-pas a pony could make, or something.” He grumbled, starting to regret having brought her along.
Pinkie Pie gasped “How could you not have known what a cutie mark is?!” she asked, totally shocked.
’I shouldn’t just be spouting information about myself to some random pony…’ he thought, carefully planning his answer “…Where I’m from, there aren’t any?” he answered, not too sure how that would fare.
“Wow, there’s somewhere in Equestria where they don’t have cutie marks?!” Pinkie Pie gasped “Unless you’re not FROM Equestria! Are you from Equestria? Because if you’re not from Equestria, where are you from?” she asked, starting to get even more excited.
Jacob just watched her hop around him for a moment, before saying “Nowhere important…” quietly.
“Oh come on, it’s your hometown! That’s always important, especially to the pony who came from there!” Pinkie Pie whined, pouting “Give me a better answer!”
“No, I refuse.” Jacob sighed, walking a little faster, and passing Pinkie Pie.
She frowned, and bounced after him “Fine then, meanie head…” she grumbled. She then looked at him and asked “So what’s that thing on your horn? Can’t you use magic?” she asked.
Jacob stopped and looked around at the trees. Cocking a brow, he quietly sniffed the air.
“What’s wrong?” Pinkie Pie asked.
“…You don’t smell it?” he replied.
Pinkie Pie shook her head quietly.
He looked around them once more and sighed “Anyway, this is a modified Arm Cannon – Buster Class. It’s a ranged weapon, letting me shoot at things from a distance…” he explained, facing forward again to keep walking.
Pinkie Pie just gave him a confused look in response.
“It’s complicated…” he added, focusing on the path ahead.

Pinkie Pie was about to ask something else, when they reached a clearing. At the end of said clearing were Fluttershy and a few small animals. Pinkie Pie giggled, zipping forward and startling the pegasus with a quick “There you are!”
“Oh goodness, Pinkie Pie, you scared me…” Fluttershy sighed, her hoof to her chest as she regained her composure. She looked past Fluttershy to see Jacob walking towards them “Oh, Jacob! You’ve come too?” she asked.
“I didn’t have much choice. This crazy train wouldn’t leave me alone until I agreed to bring her.” Jacob muttered, motioning towards a hopping Pinkie Pie with his head.
Fluttershy sighed “I’m sorry… She means well.” She apologized.
“What’s done is done.” Jacob grumbled, shifting his gaze to the animals that were eyeing him carefully from behind Fluttershy. He cocked a brow “So what’s with them?”
“O-Oh, the animals? They don’t see many ponies other than me because they stay away from the forest.”
“Pinkie Pie said something about that before we came here. I mean, I can understand being scared of one of those bladed mammals that attacked me, but I was just unprepared.” He muttered, looking at Pinkie Pie chasing playfully some animals.
Fluttershy shook her head “There are more dangerous creatures like the razorboar… B-But they usually live deeper in the forest and don’t come here often.” She explained “A-Also, the Everfree Forest is fairly large… It’s easy to get lost. That is, if you don’t know your way around….”
“I… hadn’t thought of that, actually…” he mumbled softly, looking at the surrounding trees; the dense woods did seem hard to navigate, off the small path. He then looked back at Pinkie Pie “Hey, didn’t you have a reason to come here in the first place?” he asked.
The pink pony stopped chasing the animals and looked back at them “Oh yeah! Fluttershy!” she giggled, zipping over in the blink of an eye. She hopped in place excitedly “Fluttershy, remember those HUGE twitchy twitches that I’ve been having these past few days? Well, when I was on the way to your cottage, I had them again!” she began.
“O-Oh my...”
“And before I met with Jakey, I got ANOTHER big one!” Pinkie Pie continued with an exaggerated gasp.
Fluttershy looked at her worriedly “I wonder what it could mean…” she said quietly, lowering her head.

Before Jacob had the chance to say something else, the animals surrounding them suddenly froze, sniffed around, all tense.
“Wh-What is it?” Fluttershy asked, looking at the animals.
“Something’s coming…” Jacob mumbled, pressing a button on the buster attached to his horn “Whatever it is, it smells rank… Whew!”
The surrounding critters quickly made their escape, running away in all the same direction.
“Whatever it is, it’ll show up there…” Jacob warned, taking aim with his buster towards a set of trees opposite the fleeing creatures.
The group waited quietly for what seemed like hours before something in the bushes moved.
Jacob tensed up, awaiting his foe, but groaned when he saw a cute baby rabbit hop slowly out from the bushes.
Fluttershy smiled softly “Aw, how adorable… “ she cooed, taking a step forward.
Suddenly, a large foot came from the bushes, squishing the rabbit beneath its weight and making Fluttershy gasp and tear up. The creature slowly stepped out; large, fuzzy looking, large snout, blades everywhere, and black fur with red marks. It was a razorboar.
“Shit… Pinkie Pie! Get Fluttershy out of here!” Jacob instructed while watching the beast, which quietly stood there. He heard Pinkie Pie respond with an “Okie dokie lokie!” and say some words to Fluttershy, but he wasn’t really paying attention to them right now. When he could no longer see them, he looked at the razorboar more closely; it had a large hole in its head “That… That’s not good.” He gulped, pressing another button on the buster.
Suddenly, from calm to rage in a second, the beast let out a sickening roar that sounded off like buzz saws grinding against each other. It brushed its foot against the grass, wiping off the remains of the victim and preparing to charge at him.
The beast began to move, but Jacob was ready “Here goes nothing!” he gulped, taking aim and hitting the trigger in the buster with the tip of his horn.
The charging beast soon came face to face with a flurry of flames, steering away from his path and squealing loudly as the fires burned away at him.
Jacob tapped another button on the buster and fired small, burning balls of energy at the moving beast. He hit the surrounding trees more than he hit the razorboar, but it eventually fell to the ground all the same. Jacob scowled, watching the flames eat away at the razorboar, but didn’t stop him from getting up. “You don’t know when to quit!” Jacob snapped, taking aim as a light began to shine from the inside of the buster.
The razorboar shakily got up, the flames still roaring, and began to run towards him again.
Jacob released the trigger, launching a much larger ball of burning energy sped towards the ambling creature, knocking it off the ground.
When it slammed onto a dirt pile, the fire had burned out, leaving nothing but a metallic skeleton.

Jacob chuckled softly to himself, looking at his vanquished foe from afar “And THAT’S how you-“ he started, stopping himself when he turned to see both Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie staring at him in shock “…What?”
“You… You just killed it…!” Pinkie Pie whispered, not looking away from Jacob for a second.
“…So?”
“So?! You… You just killed a razorboar!” Pinkie Pie yelled.
Jacob couldn’t tell if she was excited that he killed something they generally feared, or that she was scared of him now “Well, it’s not like I hadn’t killed it before.” He answered, thinking back to the day before.
Pinkie Pie took a step back “H-How did you kill it twice? How COULD you kill it twice?!” she asked, still appalled by what had just happened
That’s when Fluttershy joined in, somewhat teary-eyed “W-Well, I saw it had a hole in it’s h-head…” she told her friend quietly, nervously looking back at Jacob now and then “And I-I’m sure that Applejack and I found it d-dead yesterday…”
Jacob sighed “And that’s what worries me; I just killed off the undead…” he said with a shudder “That’s some creepy shit, right there…”
Pinkie Pie looked back and forth between Fluttershy and Jacob, before saying “Can we go home now…?”
Jacob made a small nod and said “We should head back to the cottage and relax a bit. I think we all need a breather after all that.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author’s Note: Geez, this took a while to make, huh? I’d like to apologize for how long this took to put together. Not only has real life been kinda busy, but for a big part of this chapter I just had trouble figuring out what to write. I’d like to warn you readers that the next chapter or few might also take a while to post, due to me still being unclear about how exactly I want to go about executing them.

Apologies in advance,

Zaffy.

Comments

You know that at least theory magic and technology are not on opposite sides? Nice story BTW, will he ever accept that he is a "mage" now? Or he always was but never knew?

[Meta Knight]

♫♥I look forward to reading what happens next in your story♥♪

[Beyonder]

Not so accidental, it would seem

[BitCoin]

So, no updating?

[Bass Tech]

I saw this and thought you have potential with this story I only wish you would continue it