• Published 7th Feb 2012
  • 1,317 Views, 15 Comments

Shattered Past - thunderclap



Jake wakes up in Equestria only to be chased by three certain fillies

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What Am I Doing?

It took Jake a few minutes but he was finally able to find the ponies that had been chasing him with such gusto. Now they were holding onto each other, on the verge of tears. Jake could hear their pleas for help even before they formed the words.

‘What could possibly scare them that much?’ Jake wondered.

Then he turned his head slightly to see a weird lion thing with a huge scorpion tail. The creature made a deep rumbling sound with its throat and paced several feet in front of the trembling trio. Jake thought it was toying with the poor things. He tried to stifle his rage, but before Jake knew it he was standing between the snarling beast and the frightened ponies.
‘I must be crazy.’ Jake considered for a moment. ‘I mean, what can I do against this thing?’

“Stay behind me and avoid that thing at all costs!” He cried. His face turned toward the ponies.

The fear on the little ponies’ faces was replaced with curiosity.
“You can talk?!” they asked in unison.

“Talk later, just listen!” Jake bellowed, and the ponies nodded in agreement.

The lion creature let out a roar and Jake turned back just in time to dodge a deadly strike from its tail. The creature retracted its stinger from the ground, a patch of grass withering into death as it did. Jake grimaced at the thought of what the appendage’s venom would do to him. He took a moment to notice the ponies hiding in some bushes in the corner of his peripheral vision. Aggravation was evident on the creature’s face; obviously the initial strike with its tail usually did the trick. It let loose a torrent of attacks with its two front claws. Jake managed to avoid them all, but a breeze from one of them made him hold his breath for an instant.

Then something incredible happened. Images and colors flooded Jake’s consciousness, all of them coming from the creature before him. He could see moments previous hunts, time spent among its own kind, and the colors seemed to represent its emotions. At the moment the color he could see was red. Jake didn’t need to guess what emotion that represented.

Jake didn’t have time to question what all of this meant. Right now he was in a very simple situation; either he killed this thing and both he and the ponies could walk away, or he could get killed and the ponies might be able to escape. Luckily Jake had learned a few key weaknesses from the images he had seen from the creature. First, there were cracks in between the sections of its tail that could be easily taken care of with a blade or any other sharp edge, then there was the slight blind spot it had to the right, and the last one was that it had a major artery near its spine that could only be reached by its tail.

Now, all that was well and good, but if he couldn’t think of a way to cut off its tail then it wouldn’t mean jack.

‘I could try to bite the tail off, but that would be as productive as just throwing myself down its throat.’ Jake thought, discarding his idea as quickly as he had thought of it.

He frantically patted himself down hoping to find anything that could help him. His prayers were answered when he felt a bulge on the side of his thigh. Jake pulled out an eight inch long hunting knife with jagged edges running down what should have been the flat of the blade. A wicked grin spread across Jake’s face as he exchanged glances between the knife and the creature.

“Here kitty, kitty.” Jake taunted as he hovered the knife in a reverse hold.
The creature had had it with Jake and charged him. Jake barreled towards the monster’s right side and narrowly missed its left claw, but he wasn’t so lucky with the right one. Jake cringed in pain as a gash opened up on his left shoulder and spurted blood onto his shirt and down the thing’s foreleg. Adrenaline helped him block out the pain as he slid down its back to its tail.

Jake grabbed onto the scorpion tail and held on for dear life as he was flung wildly in a mad attempt to knock him off the creature’s back. He sheepishly hooked his injured arm around the base of the tail and set to work on cutting it off. Jake let his eyes dart in every direction trying to notice any irregularities in the sections of the tail he could work his knife into.

After what felt like an hour (but what were really only a few moments) Jake saw a small opening on the third section from the base, and not a moment too soon. Jake was beginning to feel ill from the creature’s thrashing and had to shift his weight every so often to avoid being thrown off. He thrusted the knife into the opening and in a few seconds could feel the tail give way.

Snap.

A mixture of blood and acidic venom mixing to form a blackish green color erupted from the stump that used to be a tail. Jake grabbed onto the fur of the creature’s rear end with both hands. He kept his knife in his mouth hands, opening up small wounds around the corners of his mouth, as he climbed towards the spine. His arm screamed in protest from his endeavor, but he pushed the feeling to the back of his mind for later. Jake finally made it to the thing’s back.

The thing seemed to understand what Jake was trying to do and proceed to buck like a rodeo bull. Desperation fueled the beast’s charge and Jake found himself on the ride of his life. The world around him became a blur as he held on for dear life with all of his limbs. He knew he wouldn’t have time for finesse this time, so he tightened his grip with his legs and stabbed the thing’s back repeatedly with the knife. Eventually he hit the artery he was looking for and the beast’s tense muscles abruptly went slack.

Jake rolled off the thing and finally took a moment to asses his injuries. He dismissed the cuts around his mouth altogether and looked at his shoulder. The gash was still bleeding, but nowhere near as much as when he had received it. It had missed all vital areas and now infection was a more serious problem than anything else.
He kept the torn and blood-soaked sleeve on and tore off pieces of cloth from his shorts and shirt and tied it around the wound to form a crude bandage. The bleeding staunched at some point and with the adrenaline leaving his bloodstream, Jake could truly appreciate his exhaustion.
His rest was short lived when he could feel the presence of three ponies that had just come out of hiding. Their minds were teaming with questions, and each one hit Jake like a sledgehammer. He took a deep breath and was able to calm the storm of information that had entered his head. They could see he was in pain and were a little hesitant about speaking to him, but relaxed when they saw the strain on his face had lessened.

“Thanks, Mister! That was really cool! I’ve never seen anypony take down a manticore by themselves before.” Congratulated the orange one.

“Yeah, you totally saved us!” chimed the white one.

“An’ we’re real sorry you got hurt because of us.”

“Don’t worry about it kids.” Jake assured, “I probably would have some other way to hurt myself at some point.” ‘Wait did one of them say anypony?’

“Thanks again, I guess we should introduce ourselves. I’m Scootaloo,” said the orange one.

“I’m Sweetie Bell,” the white one continued.

“An’ I’m Apple Bloom.”

“AND TOGETHER WE’RE THE CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS!” The three chanted together at a deafening volume.

“I got that last part; remember you shouted it right before you all chased me into these woods.”

“I guess we kind of did,” Sweetie Bell said with a nervous laugh. “What’s your name by the way?”

“My name’s Jake Valentine, it’s a pleasure to meet you three.”
“Jake Valentine?” Apple Bloom repeated, raising an eyebrow and cocking her head.
“That’s a really weird name,” Scootaloo stated bluntly.
“Well I’m a really weird monster so it fits.” Jake grinned menacingly.
“There’s no way you’re a monster.” Sweetie Bell ignored the statement with a giggle.
“Yes I am, and I’ll eat you if you aren’t careful.” He retorted, raising his arms up and forming his hands into claws.
“If you were going to eat us you would’ve done it back at the clubhouse.”
The other two nodded in confirmation. Jake’s shoulders slumped and he let out a deep sigh.
‘I really hate an observant kid.’ He thought
“Alright you caught me I’m not a monster.”
“You may not be a monster, but what are you exactly?” Apple Bloom asked.
“I’m a human.”
“What does that mean exactly?
“I don’t know.”
“Do you live in the Everfree Forest?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are there other things like you close by?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well what do you know?” the three ponies cried.
“That my name is Jake Valentine and I’m a human.”
“That doesn’t give us a lot to work with,” Scootaloo huffed.
“I know.”
“Now you’re just trying to annoy us aren’t you?” Sweetie Bell asked.
“Maybe a little, consider it payment for saving your lives. C’mon I’ll walk you three home. In case we run into any more trouble.”
Jake got up and brushed himself of as the trio of ponies hopped down the path in excitement at the idea of having made a new friend, even if his origin was a little questionable.