Shattered Past

by thunderclap

Scattered Thoughts

Jake looked up through the broken roof of the castle and saw the moon shining brightly. This only furthered his sense of urgency and caused his thoughts to become erratic.

“What the hell?!” he cried. “I slept for an entire day! I’ve never done something like that!”

“At least… I think I’ve never done something like that.” Jake sighed and scratched the back of his head for a moment. “Man, amnesia is a bitch.” He said before running out of the castle.

Jake madly dashed out into the night. Parts of his body were being gnawed by cold air that found its way through the rips in his clothes. Jake didn’t slow down for a second. Not even when he reached the rope bridge that spanned the large ravine separating the abandoned castle from the rest of the forest.

*Snap*

Jake turned his head to see the ropes attached to the stone supports were starting to unravel.

“Oh. Fuuuuuuuuuu!” Jake screamed making a dive toward the wooden planks that made up the bridge as the ropes gave way.

Jake could feel his stomach churn as the collapsed bridge swung across the rest of the gorge. In a matter of seconds Jake could feel the end he was holding onto slam into the cliff face. Jake felt his arms nearly get ripped out of their sockets but still managed to keep his grip. Jake opened his eyes and looked up to see the other end of the bridge still safely attached to the stone supports.

“There is no possible way my life could get any worse than it is right now.” Jake grumbled, slowly ascended the cliff via the remnants of the bridge. “I mean, I have amnesia, I can’t seem to take two steps without pissing off some big, hungry creature, I’m on the brink of dehydration, and my arm feels like I’m being stabbed repeatedly with a hot poker. Did I forget anything?” Jake wondered in an exasperated tone.

“Oh yeah, I’m extremely late for my meeting with the Crusaders, and I’m climbing a freaking cliff! Seriously, it’s like some sick thing is making it so that my life is nothing but hell! Well, can you hear me? I know you’re listening. So, bring it on! I don’t care anymore! Throw your worst at me! Whatever it is, I can take it!”

At that moment the clouds opened up and rain poured down on Jake. Jake was about to scream in frustration but only sighed and calmed down. “I suppose I did ask for that.” He said. “On the bright side I might be able to drink some of this rain.”

Jake continued climbing until he reached the top. He turned over on his back and started to pant a little from the climb. “There, I made it. And now all I have to do is navigate that winding path again, cross the river, go through the woods and make it back to the clubhouse. All without being seen or detected by any of those ponies. Oh well, at least my lifestyle keeps me in shape.”

Jake walked up to the edge of the river with an exhausted look on his face. His trip down the path from the night before had taken a lot more out of him the second time. The rain coupled with the fog had brought Jake’s visibility down to next to zero. Jake couldn’t even tell how many times he had almost fallen from the cliffs because of this; he had lost count after about twelve.

“Note to self, never taunt the mysterious forces of the universe. They tend to get even.” Jake mumbled, before collapsing at the riverbank. “If I slept for an entire day, why do I feel so tired?” Jake asked himself. “Then again, nothing has made a lot of sense since I found myself at the Crusader’s clubhouse. Oh well, there’s no sense travelling anymore tonight. I should make a quick shelter and rest up until the morning.”

Jake followed his advice and made a lean-to structure by the river. He also caught a few more fish and cooked them with a small fire he had made from broken branches. Jake stared at the dying embers of his campfire and felt a small amount of stress leave his body. Somehow, staring into it reminded him of what he had said back when he had fought the two manticores. After another minute or so he scraped the remaining embers with his foot out of existence and felt himself drift off into sleep.

Jake was walking down a white hallway with a grin on his face. Jake didn’t recognize the place but it felt… familiar. Jake continued walking, and despite the look on his face, his thoughts were anything but cheerful.

‘Why are they all getting so upset with me? I’m only doing what I’ve been told to do. If they don’t like that, then they shouldn’t even be here.’

Jake was torn from his thoughts by a voice calling out to him, “Hey, Jake. Could you wait up for me?” Jake turned to see a young woman dressed in black fatigues jogging up to him. He didn’t know her name but he did recognize her, so he stayed where he was. “Thanks,”

“No problem, was there something you needed?”

“Yeah, I wanted to introduce myself.” The young woman replied with a warm smile. “My name’s Diane Thompson, but you can just call me Diane.”

“Nice to meet you, Diane. Today’s your first day here, right?”

“That’s right, so I thought I’d introduce myself to you because you seem to be a pretty big deal around here.”

Jake struggled to keep the grin on his face as she said that, remembering his thoughts from earlier. “Well, it was nice meeting you, Diane.” He said, turning to leave.

“Wait, I wanted to talk to you some more.” Diane pleaded.

“I guess I can talk a little more, what do you want to talk about?” Jake said, rubbing the back of his head.

“Let’s go somewhere else to talk.” After that, Diane led Jake through a number of identical white hallways, until they reached a large room filled with tables.

“Why’d you bring me here?”

“Because no one’s here at this time, so we’re all alone.” Diane said with a grin, taking a seat.

“Uh, okay.” Jake said, taking the seat across from her. “Is there anything in particular you wanted to talk about?”

“Not really, I just wanted to talk.” She answered, tossing Jake a red, plastic, package.

“You know you’re not supposed to bring outside food here.” Jake said flatly.

“Relax, they’re just Skittles. Have some. They’re my brother’s favorite. You seem a little like him so I think you might like them too.”

Jake looked at the package with a look of doubt. He opened the pack and popped a green one into his mouth. Jake’s face lit up and his grin became real. “That’s really good!”

“Put all the colors in your mouth,” Diane instructed. Jake listened and his grin got even wider. “There you go. Now you’re tasting the rainbow.”

“Aside from spouting slogans, do you have anything else to say?”

“Hmm, do you like it here?”

“Uhh, this place is really the only thing I’ve ever known so I don’t really know if I like it or not.” Jake said with a sigh.

“Oh, I guess that’s right, sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it. You asked a question and I answered it. What about you, do you like it here?”

“It seems alright, but there’s kind of an ominous air around here.”

“Comes from having armed guards all over the place,” Jake said with a chuckle.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“Being right is something of a talent of mine.”

“Look at you with the big head.”

“I only say it because it’s true.”

“Uh huh, whatever you say. Well, it was nice getting to know ya Jake. I’ll be seeing ya.”

“See ya later, Diane.”

The dream dissolved and Jake groggily brought himself into consciousness. “Yay, another cryptic dream that tells me nothing other than I lived in a place with armed guards. Better suppress that for now to avoid pulling my hair out over it. I had enough stress to deal with yesterday. Alright, let’s get going. I hope I can make it to the Crusader’s today. I wonder if they’re okay. Did I just rhyme? I’ll have to save that thought for another time. Crap. Maybe the first thing I should do is, think of a way to carry my own water.”

A few hours later Jake had carved two functioning water bottles. The first thing he did was hollow out thick tree branches and made them the appropriate size. Then he made lids that fit over them snugly so water wouldn’t escape while he ran, which he did quite a bit. The last step in his process was tying vines around them so he could carry them while keeping his hands free.

Jake dipped his new water bottle into the river and took a tentative sip. “Well, it tastes like wood pulp, but it beats the hell out of dehydration and the water that was in those casks, so these’ll have to do.” He said with a slight smile. His smile disappeared in an instant when he heard a large growl behind him. “Please let this be a small, fluffy bunny and not a large carnivore that wants to eat me."

Jake turned to see a large reptilian behemoth with four heads attached to one body. “Oh, dear sweet mother of God this thing does not look friendly.” As if in response the thing’s four heads roared in unison. “And that’s my cue to get the hell out of here.” Jake said, scrambling to his feet just in time to avoid an attack from one of the thing’s heads.

Jake jumped into the river hoping he could avoid the thing there, but it waded into the water and chased after him. Jake cursed up a storm and reached out his mind to the thing only to be pushed out almost immediately. “Wait, that thing has four distinct minds.” Jake said to himself, struggling to avoid the four sets of jaws that were trying to devour him. “I don’t have to work on all of them. I just have to work on one of them.”

Jake reached out with his mind again and found that together the four minds of the creature were fairly strong, but alone they were weak. Jake got one of the thing’s heads under control and had it bite the head next to it. In a few moments the thing was going crazy and started attacking itself left and right, giving Jake ample time to escape.
It was close to four in the afternoon by the time Jake made it to the edge of the orchard. It had taken him a few hours for him to retrace his steps back to the clearing with the dead manticore where he could get the Timber Wolf head to show to the Crusaders.

“Finally, maybe now there’ll be some sort of normality to my life.”

“Poopsy Doodle!” screamed a male voice from the direction of the town. Jake strained his eyes for a moment but was eventually able to see the faint shape of a pony pulling a house.

“Why do I open my mouth?” Jake’s shoulders slumped and he let out a sigh. “My life is going to get a lot crazier, I just know it, may as well just go along for the ride.”

“I still can’t believe we had to do your brother’s chores.” Scootaloo huffed.

“Well, we did give them a love poison.” Apple Bloom reasoned.

“We said we were sorry so…”

“Raar!” growled a timber wolf in the corner of the Crusaders clubhouse. The three fillies screamed which caused what they thought was a timber wolf to laugh. Then in a familiar voice it told them, “Gotcha.”

“Jake!” They cried together. The figure in the corner moved the timber wolf head to reveal a grinning Jake.
“You called.” Then the three fillies tackled him and started hugging him. Scootaloo was the first to recover and stared daggers at the human.

“Where have you been? We’ve been waiting three days for you to show up.”

“I know. I didn’t exactly have a picnic in the forest ya know. I had a run in with a pony called Fluttershy that ended badly; I fought a timber wolf and became the leader of a pack…”

“Wait, Fluttershy saw you?” Sweetie Belle asked.

“Yeah, but she fainted and I was able to convince her that it was a dream so I don’t think anyo… anypony knows about me.”

“How did you convince her that it was a dream?” Apple Bloom asked.

“Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you this the last time we saw each other. I’m a telepath.”

“What does that mean?” Scootaloo asked.

“It means he can read somepony’s mind.” Sweetie Belle explained.

“Exactly, but I can do more than that. I can put ideas or suggestions in somepony’s head, and I can look through their memories.”

“That’s so cool!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “You gotta try it out on me.”

“I don’t think so. I still don’t have full control of my abilities. And if I look through your memories I’ll know all of your secrets, and I mean all of them.”

All three fillies gulped as they thought of all the secrets that they had. “I heard that.” They all made a startled yelp which caused Jake to laugh again, “Just kidding. But you see what I mean. If I’m not careful I could really hurt somepony with this ability.” Jake explained. “Hey, if it’s not too much trouble could you girls grab me a few apples or something. I’m starved.”

A few minutes later Jake got his food and they all filled each other in over the events of the last few days. “Girls, I have to say that I’m disappointed in you.” Jake said with a stern look. “Making two ponies fall in love with some sort of love poison. That is highly immoral and, and, one of the funniest things I’ve ever heard!” Jake cried, busting out in fits of laughter. The Crusaders perked up at Jake’s reaction.

“Yer not mad at us?”

“Nah, it seems like you learned your lesson.”

“So what happened to you?” Scootaloo asked. “Your clothes look terrible.”

“Oh, that could’ve been the timber wolves, the two manticores I fought at the same time, or the cliff dive I nearly took.”

“You fought two manticores at once?" Asked a frightened Sweetie Belle.

“Yeah, it wasn’t even that big of a deal. I just got a few scrapes.”

“Jake, you’re amazing! Nopony has ever fought more than one manticore at a time before! You’re totally awesome!”

“Is he more awesome than Rainbow Dash?” Apple Bloom asked with a sly look.

“No way,” Scootaloo said frantically. “Jake may be awesome at fighting manticores and stuff but he can’t do the Sonic Rainboom and she can. So she’s still the most awesome.”

“Well girls, it was great seeing you again but it’s getting late and I need some sleep.”

“Yer leavin’, can’t ya stay over in the clubhouse just this one time?”

“I guess I could.” Jake sighed caving into the three sets of puppy dog eyes that were staring at him.

The night was rather uneventful as the three fillies snuggled up to Jake and slept. Then the morning came and ruined everything.

“Hey Apple Bloom, you an’ yer friends need to get up!”

Comments

[Knighthawker]

...... Well the voice at the end had an accent so that narrows it down to about 4 ponies.... and unless Applebloom is talking to herself its not her.

[MidnightThunder]

And BOOM goes the peacefulness