Default

by Cackling Moron

The will is strong

The walk to Sweet Apple Acres was scenic, uneventful and quiet, the upshot of which was to give Jack plenty of time to dwell on what Applejack might possibly have waiting for him once they got there.

“Seems a little late in the day for farmwork to me,” he said aloud once the place itself finally hove into view.

Not that Jack was an expert by any means, but his whole impression of farms and those that worked on them was that you either had to get up and get going before the sun or else you’d wasted a day. He was probably a little bit off in this.

“It might not be farmwork,” Twilight pointed out and Jack just gave her an odd look.

“I find that very difficult to believe. At the least I suppose it’d be good to, ah, ‘touch base’, as they say.”

“Who says that?”

“I...don’t know.”

It was just one of those things that Jack had always heard second-hand. Presumably someone out there actually said it, but he’d certainly never met them. And likely never would.

No great loss.

Actually entering the property through the actual gate was refreshing, as the last few times Jack had been here he had come in over the fence. Doing it while the sun was up was pretty different, too.

“This place looks a lot nicer during the day,” Jack observed. Twilight made no comment.

Fortunately for them they managed to catch Applejack while she was having a quick drink in the shade of the barn between chores and, waving, headed on over to her.

“Hello Applejack,” Twilight said, moving in for a hug. Jack stood awkwardly off to the side, fidgeting.

“Hello Twilight,” Applejack said, pleasantly enough, inclining her head. Her face then took on a particularly grim cast as her attention fell on Jack. “Jack.”

As adorable as she was - and, being a pony, she was pretty damn adorable - she was also plainly not exactly filled with happiness on seeing him. Given the circumstances of his previous visits this was understandable.

Twilight gave Jack another bump to get him going.

“Ah, hello Applejack. You’re looking to be in fine form. Trees look good. Apples are, uh, bountiful?” He said. He probably should have thought about this a little harder first.

She made no response. Jack swallowed.

“I’m, uh, yeah. Sorry for breaking in those times and stealing that apple juice of yours. It was good, by the way. Not that you, ah, probably want to hear that but, uh, yeah. It was.”

He swallowed again and Applejack continued to bore a hole through him with her eyes. Her ability to hold off from blinking was alarming. Jack shuffled his feet and cleared his throat and scratched his neck and plunged on:

“I really am very sorry. I’ll say that, and apologies are always kind of flat, but I do mean it. And I’ll do whatever you feel appropriate to try and make it up to you guys, really.”

Jack’s personal stance on apologies was that the best way of saying sorry was never actively doing anything that warranted apologising for in the first place, but he was well aware that life wasn’t ever as clean as that. That, and he also understood the value of contrition to some people.

Applejack continued giving him the hard stare a moment or so, but it then softened.

“Well we’ll see how you feel about that once you’re started. For now though, apology accepted, Jack,” she said and Jack practically melted on the spot out of relief. The tension had been unbearable!

“Honestly? I can apologise more, really. I didn’t damage the place too much when I came in those times, did I?” He asked, hands wringing.

The more Jack dwelt on it the worse he was feeling, and the relief of being so easily forgiven immediately jackknifed into a sense he’d got off lightly. Jack’s mood could often turn like this, he’d found. Likely something everyone had to deal with.

“Nothing we couldn’t fix,” Applejack said. Jack was appalled.

“That makes it sound like I did!”

Jack likely would have continued had Applejack not seized control of the conversation.

“Listen - what’s done is done. You’re back now is the point, so let’s go from there, okay?”

This she said with such firmness that it was obvious to all that the matter was closed. Jack sighed. Defeated again by tiny, pleasant, stubborn horses. He tugged the bottom of the poncho-thing.

“If you’re sure,” he said.

“I am. Now, time’s a-wastin’, come on.”

“She said it too!” Jack mouthed to Twilight, pointing down at Applejack as he followed behind. Twilight just rolled her eyes.

They followed her away from the barn and across towards a fence, thence followed beside the fence to wherever it was that Applejack had in mind.

“Alright, so what we doing today? That weird tree-kicking apple-picking thing? I can do that. Just point me at a tree and I’ll fuck it up,” Jack said, feeling infinitely better about things than he had some seconds previously.

“Please don’t fuck up the trees, Jack,” Twilight hissed out of the corner of her mouth, a rictus smile of forced politeness on her face. As was known to Jack - and to Twilight on account of him having boasted of it - when Jack disagreed with trees, trees had been known to explode.

Surprisingly, Applejack smirked.

“He may not be far wrong, actually.”

“What?” Twilight asked, unable to mask her shock. Jack just pumped a fist.

“Fucking yes,” he said.

Applejack came to a halt besides a gate and turned back to the other two.

“There’s some hard work needs doing and it ain’t anything to do with apple bucking. What we got is new land that needs clearing for trees,” she said.

“New land?”

This was news to Twilight, who was being steadily reduced to someone who could only ask confused questions in response to fresh information.

“Yup. Know Old Mr Shergar? Owns that parcel of land that abuts the southernmost field? Old Mr Shergar is - well, surprise surprise - gettin’ on a little and says that land is a bit too much for him to look after these days. He’s agreed to let us take the land off his hooves an’ - you alright there, Jack?”

She asked this because Jack had doubled over laughing.

“Old Mr Shergar! That’s amazing. Holy shit that’s a deep reference. Did I die? Am I dead? Is this my heaven? Oh man!”

He trailed off into chuckles and had to take a knee he was sniggering so much. Applejack and Twilight had a moment of shared mystification before Applejack continued:

“...right. Anyway, Old Mr Shergar weren’t the best at keepin’ his land in good condition if you catch my drift, and if we want to put that land to use - and we do - we ‘gon have to clear it out first. That’s where Jack comes in.”

Jack heard his name and glanced up.

“Ooh, land clearance! I can do that. I’ll opening-days-of-Harvest-Moon the shit out of anything you need me to,” he said, standing again.

“I don’t rightly know what that means but we got rocks that need breaking and trees that need felling - reckon you’re up to do that?”

“You bet your sweet-ass hat I’m up for that. I’m up, down and every which way, just turn me loose.”

Jack’s barenaked enthusiasm for productive destruction was enough to actually get a small laugh out of Applejack

“Ah’m glad to hear it!” She said.

“It okay if I leave this here?” Jack asked, shucking off the poncho-thing and moving to drape it over the fence and then going through with draping it when Applejack nodded to him. He figured it would be a shame to ruin it so soon, and had a feeling smashing rocks to bits was the sort of thing that would ruin most clothes. The trousers would just have to live with it.

“Right, Now what?” He asked clapping and rubbing his hands together briskly.

“We got a pickaxe here for ya,” Applejack said, nodding to the pickaxe in question, which was resting against the post of the gate they’d halted beside. It was like a pickaxe, only hilariously small compared to Jack, who frowned at it.

“I was just going to use my hands if it’s all the same to you. They work pretty well for me,” he said, cracking his knuckles with a sound like branches being ripped off a tree.

“Jack, I’d prefer if you used the pickaxe,” Twilight said, piping up. He gawped at her a second and made to try and protest but she was staring him down before he’d even opened his mouth and so whatever he might have liked to have said just came out as mumbles.

Keeping his eyes down he took the pickaxe. In his hand it looked almost dainty.

“Feel like I’m going to break this damn thing…” he grumbled. “Where to?”

With a light kick - Applejack had a repertoire of kicks all tuned to achieve specific purposes, she just never told anyone - opened the gate and it swung smoothly out of the way.

“Through this gate and thataway. You’ll know when you get there - it’s the place that’s a mess an’ Big Mac’ll be there already,” she said, pointing off and away. Jack squinted in the sun, shielding his eyes, seeing nothing but getting the idea.

“Cracking. Right, well, best get on. Let’s be farmers, eh? Ooh arr.”

Hefting his miniature pick Jack gave a salute and then went marching off, leaving Twilight and Applejack to do whatever it was they were planning on doing in his absence. Hijinks, possibly. Or a pillow fight. Who knew?

Bic Mac was indeed already there along with a wagon he’d apparently brought with him. But that wasn’t what really got Jack’s attention. What got Jack’s attention was the lacklustre condition the new land was in.

“Ye Gods. Look at this! Was this guy an aspiring rock farmer or something?” He asked after wandering over to Big Mac. He tried counting the rocks present, but quickly gave up.

“Yup,” said Big Mac.

“What? He was? That’s a thing? I was joking!”

Big mac just shrugged and kicked a nearby boulder, splitting it neatly down the middle before somehow managing to kick a half of it into the wagon. The physics of this defied Jack’s human understanding so he just ignored it and set to work himself.

As Jack had predicted the pickaxe did not last long, or at least the handle didn’t. A few very enthusiastic swings from Jack saw the wood split and the handle snap in half. From then on he - rather red-facedly - took to just holding the thing by the head and smashing rocks like that.

Surprisingly, it worked pretty well.

Quickly Jack and Big Mac worked out between the two of them an efficient division of labour. Jack broke the rocks up and loaded the pieces into the wagon which Big Mac then hauled off, taking them away to parts unknown and returning with the wagon emptied just when Jack had more pieces ready to load. In this fashion they got a lot of shit done in not a whole lot of time.

Jack also got to punch at least one tree that was in the way, with spectacular, splinter-rific results.

“Okay, maybe I won’t do that again,” he said to himself as he picked bits of tree out of his slightly ruined new trousers and also his flesh, which appeared far less damaged than it ought to have been.

For the next few trees - for there were only a few, having grown unmolested thanks to Old Mr Shergar’s neglect - he used the axe that Big Mac had brought along in his wagon, at least until it looked as though he was going to break that, too. After that he just took to uprooting the trees by hand with Big Mac’s help. Not especially subtle, but it worked.

The place got cleared up pretty damn quick and they were basically all but done before the sun had even started dipping. Being freakishly, terrifying strong had some positives sometimes.

Deciding they’d earned a break Big Mac returned with his empty wagon and also some actual, bonafide cider in two hefty wooden mugs, one of which he passed to Jack.

“Earned it, this time,” he said.

“Okay, I deserved that,” Jack conceded, tapping the mug against Big Mac’s before downing the contents in one, smacking his lips in satisfaction and gazing out at the results of their work, wiping sweat from his brow and scratching his temple with the head of the pickaxe.

“Shit man, we’re making record time, this is great,” he said, grinning fit to burst. Big Mac said nothing but did nod and - Jack noticed - he was grinning too.

Then out of nowhere an idea popped into Jack’s head. It was so out of the blue it caught him completely off-guard and he was entirely unable to resist it. It just appeared, and he was compelled to act upon it. He had no choice!

“Hey! Big Mac! Kick me in the head!” Jack said.

Big Mac’s grin did not survive this statement.

“...what?” He asked.

“Come on, man, we’re way ahead of schedule and I’m curious. Kick me in the head. Just once! It’ll be fine.”

Jack knew this wasn’t a great idea but was worked up enough not to really care. That, and he didn’t care in the first place, so what with being so worked up he now really didn’t really care.

In all likelihood getting kicked in the head would sting a little and he’d walk it off. He had, after all, been eaten by a dragon more than once before and walked that off, so what was a little kick in the head?

And if it worked out more serious than that? Well, no great loss, right?

“I ain’t so sure that’s a good idea, Jack,” Big Mac said, glancing around for Applejack - or, even better, Twilight - because they’d probably have a better idea of how to handle Jack at a time like this. Alas, neither of them was anywhere to be seen.

Jack stepped closer, tossing what remained of the pickaxe to one side.

“Course it’s not a good idea, son, it’s a dumb idea! But It’ll be fine. I’m a tough boy! Come on!”

“I really don’t know-”

“Do it! Do it! Just once! Come on, man! It’ll be fun! Come-”

Big Mac panicked. Having Jack bearing down on him was one thing. Having Jack bearing down on him while spouting crazy and increasingly aggressive-sounding nonsense was quite another, and certainly nothing he had been prepared for.

So he panicked, and this panic took the form of turning and bucking Jack in the face.

There was a crack, and where before Jack had been walking forward he was now sailing backwards, neither feet touching the ground. He hit the dirt arse-first, arms and legs trailing. His forceful journey carved a furrow out of the mud for some considerable distance and left him in a tangled, awkward heap at the end of it which took a second or two to get out of.

Jack, laughing, got back to his feet, only swaying in place briefly a moment before shaking off the aftereffects. There was a distinct, horseshoe-shaped mark on his face, but nowhere near what he deserved from what he’d just got.

“I can’t believe you actually did it! Oh that’s got to be some animal instinct in there, whoo. Oh you’re a pal, Mac. Whoo! That was a good one! Some real cartoon shit. Look at this furrow! Amazing. Ah, anyway. Back to work I guess,” he said, knocking some mud off his trousers and heading to retrieve the pickaxe head while Big Mac stared at him in alarm, mildly horrified at what he had just done without even really meaning to.

“Are you okay?” He asked. Jack frowned. What an odd question to be asked.

“Me? Fine, fucking fine. I’m indestructible, haven’t you heard?”

To better demonstrate this he whacked the side of the pickaxe head against his skull. The metal went clang, his skull went thunk. Big Mac winced.

“You sure?”

For some reason that probably warranted greater introspection than it got, this question really got under Jack’s skin. Had he not just hit himself over the head with a pickaxe? Was this not proof enough?

“Kick me again!”

“I really don’t-”

“Again! I bet we can go even further this time!”

There was a rational part of Jack’s brain that was calmly trying to explain that this was all a terrible idea and trying to lay out the reasons why he needed to reel it in, but that part wasn’t in the majority. The majority, for some reason, really wanted to get kicked again. Jack wasn’t one to question why this might be the case.

Big Mac licked his lips and swallowed, continuing to look around in the increasingly forlorn hope that someone else might come and defuse the situation. Again, no-one did.

“W-well, if you’re sure…” he said, himself sounding anything but sure.

“Never been surer. Right here, man, right here,” Jack said, tapping a finger to his belly.

The second kick - not being delivered in panic - was nowhere near as forceful and Jack didn’t even fall over, though he did stagger back.

“Hmm,” Jack said, looking down at his gut, dissatisfied. “That wasn’t as good. You were holding back.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Big Mac said, reasonably enough. Jack blew a raspberry.

“Man, I’ve been set on fire, I think you’d have trouble hurting me.”

“Still, I reckon we should probably finish first, huh?” Big Mac said, giving a nod to what few rocks still remained in the field. Jack considered arguing the point, but whatever manic energy had driven him to such poor decisions mere moments ago deserted him, leaving him bereft. He sighed.

“Yeah, yeah I guess you’re right.”

And so it was.

Roundabout the time they were loading up the remains of the very last rock, Applejack came strolling up, presumably to check on progress only to find all progress had been made. This was a very good thing, and quite unexpected, so she was approaching smiling.

“Lookin’ good, boys, you two are really - “

She stopped, because Jack had given her a wave and she’d noticed the two very obvious horseshoe prints on his person. The smile went away.

“What in the blue blazes happened?!”

“‘Blue blazes’?” Jack repeated before giggling quietly to himself. It seemed an overreaction to him.

Following closely behind Applejack though was Twilight, who appeared to be no-more pleased than her friend.

“Jack! What did you do?” She asked.

Now Jack actually looked worried, his face falling. Why’d she have to put it like that?

She was right, clearly, but still. Why’d she have to be so right so quickly?

“Uh, what are you talking about?” He asked, taking refuge in audacity. As one, both Twilight’s and Applejack’s eyes fell to the somehow more prominent bruise on his belly, and both of them pointed. No getting away from this.

“It was an accident. I mean, it was my fault. I did it. Whatever it is you’re seeing here and are mad about, I did it. My fault,” he said, tapping a finger to his chest. This convinced no-one, and so Twilight and Applejack’s attention shifted to Big Mac.

“It was an accident,” Big Mac said, also convincing no-one. Applejack’s eyes narrowed. Jack interposed himself between the two siblings, attempting to redirect the ire back onto himself where it belonged.

“I’m not kidding, it was me, alright? I wanted to get kicked in the head and so that’s what happened. Gut too, I guess.”

As far Jack was concerned the second hadn’t really counted, but he imagined it was the sort of thing they’d feel he was leaving out on purpose if he didn’t mentioned it. Applejack muttered something while Twilight just goggled.

“You what?” She asked, continuing her streak of questions.

“I don’t know. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. Well, it didn’t, but I just kind of wanted it to happen, and Mac just kind of...reacted. It wasn’t his fault.”

They were looking at Jack as though he’d lost his mind, and not without good reason.

And only then did Jack properly, fully notice just how powerfully uncomfortable Big Mac looked, and the bottom fell out of his stomach.

“Shit. Shit shit shit, what was I thinking? Ah, fuck, I’m sorry. Shit, man, here I am trying to make things up and I just made it worse. I’m sorry. I should - maybe I should have just stayed away.”

So obvious now! So easy to avoid! What had he been thinking indeed?

The urge to just run away again was very strong, but that hadn’t worked out so great last time. Best to just keep on forward. Better to stick around and talk things through. If Jack had learnt anything from his time in the wilderness it was this.

That, and he could jump really high. He’d also learnt that.

The ponies were no longer looking at him as though he’d lost his mind, which was good. They were instead looking at him with something approaching pity, which was bad.

“Maybe we rushed the plan. This could probably have waited until tomorrow. It’s okay, Jack,” Twilight said, stepping over and giving his knee a reassuring rub. It was just the first bit of him she had within reach.

“It’s really not okay. There’s something wrong with me, I think. Well, more than the obvious. Think I’m a little mixed up,” Jack said, shrugging helplessly and going quiet. A second or so later adding: “Oh, and I broke your pickaxe too, Applejack. Sorry. It just snapped in my hand.”

Jack held up the remains of the pickaxe to demonstrate this. Where the handle had ended up was anyone’s guess.

“It’s alright,” Applejack said. Jack had the powerful impression she was saying this solely for his benefit. He decided this with no real evidence, but it felt compelling to him right at that moment, and lowered his mood further.

What had been going rather well had taken a sudden and sharp turn towards the decidedly sour.

“Are you finished clearing up?” Twilight asked Jack who nodded, his eyes on his feet. “Alright, good. You did a good job. Let’s go back to the castle.”

“If it’s all the same to you I’m just going to sit down for a second. Get some quiet, calm down. I think I - I’m really sorry, you guys. I don’t know what came over me. I just - I don’t know…”

Jack continued to stare at his feet while the ponies had a hurried, silent discussion mostly conducted through half-understood facial expressions. The generally accepted gist was that none of them knew how to handle the situation but that Twilight was the one who felt she had to take charge.

“That sounds fine, Jack. Just don’t disappear, okay? I’ll meet you back at the castle.”

“Don’t worry, I’m not going off again. I just - yeah. Little quiet, I think. I’ll see you back at the castle. Sorry, Mac.”

He then picked a random direction and jumped in it. This was rather more violent than it sounded on the face of things, as Jack really putting some effort into a jump resulted in him leaving a small crater behind.

The crater he made on landing was somewhat bigger. Picking himself up and dusting himself down he wandered a little to pick out a spot to sit and stare into space.

Author's Note:

How unnecessarily melodramatic.

Comments

[Venerable Ro]

Yeah, by this point I'm fully convinced that he's turning into some kind of amicable ork. That's why he keeps pulling stunts like this, his newfound orkology craves adrenaline as a vital nutrient, and he's not getting it from a sedate ponish lifestyle.

[Morphy]

9528137

Either an orc or he's turning into Wreck-It Ralph. I really expected him to attend a meeting of the other MLP villains/nuances.

[SIGAWESOME]

Mr Shergar

Wow. First H(uman) In Equestria and now H(orse) In Equestria. He was not kidnapped, he just moved to Ponyville!

And if it worked out more serious than that? Well, no great loss, right?

Jack is really starting to lose it isn't he?

[pedro0071]

IM BAD THATS GOOD
I WILL NEVER BE GOOD AND THATS NOT BAD
THERE IS NOONE ELSE I WANT TO BE
BESIDES MYSELF

IM GONNA WRECK IT!!!!!

[SilverDiamond]

So, what people think he's turning into? Some think ork, some think Ralf. I think either Hulk, or Saitama. And also, we are APES, fighting is in our BLOOD. Too long without any excitement, and we start climbing walls. I noticed it with myself. Several times I had reasons to get angry at someone. Someone was being really dumb, and kinda took the hate of me and another guy. Then, I had been in groups that were OK. Nobody was stupid or challenging. I still found myself growing impatient to the end of the studying years. Only it was worse, since I had no "valid target".

[Verdauga]

This is nice, and I am kinda worried for the guy.