Chapter 5   Allies and defense

Birds sang happily and the warm rays of the sun announced the beginning of a new day in Ponyville, waking up the hard workers and the eager (or not so eager in fact) fillies and colts that had to do their morning jobs and attend to school, this of course also applied to Jack, after his arrival, almost a month ago, he had finally got himself his own place to live, a simple 2 floor house next to the Sugar Cube Corner, he got up and yawned.

“Its” another yawn “too early” muffle groans escaped his mouth as he got up from his bed, heading to the bathroom to take a nice warm shower, at first it was awkward to use the pony size bathrooms since they were smaller than human ones, but in the end he managed to use them properly in way.

After his shower, cleaning his teeth and changing to a red T-shirt and white pants he went to the kitchen for some breakfast, “now the moment of truth, corn based cereal with apple cider or a nice fruit salad with orange juice?” at first he had tried to eat hay thinking magic or the summon might had alter his diet habits, he found out it didn’t, at least not with the hay and grass, surprisingly he could eat the flowers finding daisies and daffodils delicious, he decided for the latter after all he had been eating to much cereal the past days, had to keep the nutrition balanced and all.

“AJ said that today was a free labor day and Fluttershy said she didn’t need help today too, could go with Twilight to keep practicing my magic, Rainbow wont wake up until after noon if nothing happens before hahaha” he sat on his living room sofa and started thinking of what could he do so early in the morning, until he heard a cry rather loud and awfully close “I think I’ll help Pinkie today too, those two little devils can be a greater challenge than the monster” he said leaving his house laughing along the way.

¨********************

“Okay! OW! Y-you can let go now Pumpkin cake, it’s not cotton candy even if it looks like it, OW! P-pound cake get back here, no ceiling-walk after each meal! OWIE! Pumpkin please I—“

“Having trouble with the twins Pinkie?”

“Hello Jackie! OW!, Just a little hehe, OW! Nothing auntie Pinkie pie can’t handle”

“Oh well” he turned away from her snickering “since you don’t need any help ill go over to-“

“Wait I ah, I think I might need a little itsy bitsy tiny help OW! OW! OW! Not so hard Pumpkin please!” she exclaimed smiling but in pain as little Pumpkin cake pulled at her curly cotton hair harder giggling in the process, as for Pound cake he had descended from the ceiling and was now sitting on Pinkie’s back smiling at Jack.

“Well then” he turned again smiling at the trio “let’s see what I can do, come here little guy” he picked Pound cake in his arms as he giggled happily “oh man, ugggghhh Pinkie I think Pound cake needs a diaper change” he made distance between him and Pound with his arms as the baby just smiled.

“And for what I smell, OW! so does Pumpkin, OW!”

*a quick diaper change later*

“I don’t understand how you can do that with your mouth” Jack said a little disgusted at the fact that Pinkie had to change the diapers of the babies with her mouth and not her hooves.

“It’s not that bad Jackie” Pinkie watched the babies play in their room along side with Jack, after some minutes she gave a chuckle. “Silly Jackie if you want to ask me something just ask your friend Pinkie” he looked at her confused “my knee is hurting a little, that means somepony wants to ask me something”

‘That Pinkie sense can be scary at times’ “Why are you taking care of the babies and not the orphanage?” he asked a little sad but firm.

“…its silly actually, Pumpkin and Pound are my little brother and sister, I could never give them away, Im their only family now and families must stay together!” a little tear fell from her eyes, she had really loved the Cake´s.

Jack kneeled down and hugged Pinkie, knowing how hard it was to lose someone important to you, Pinkie hugged back and soon they realized that the babies had fallen asleep. After helping Pinkie with some orders and baking some cupcakes he leaved in hopes to find anything he could help with.

“Pinkie is so different from the show, sure she is a party animal and she seems to know everything and it really is something to behold when she appears out of nowhere, but she is not the near crazy mare I always thought she was, I guess she is responsible now” he walked down the path to town center where everypony waved at him or saluted him, he reached Carousel Boutique and was about to knock when he heard voices in the inside.

“O-of course I would be delighted to make a new outfit for your new concert Sapphire!”

“Marvelous Miss Rarity~ I will be back in three days to pick it up”

As the door opened reveling the pony of pop herself along side with Rarity who was smiling so wide one could swear her face was going to split in two, Sapphire wasn’t paying attention where she was going and bumped against him sending her to the ground in a quiet *Thud*.

“Oh so sorry, I didn’t saw yo—“Sapphire began to apologize but stopped as soon as she beheld what she had bumped against.

“Don’t worry about it Miss, let me help you up” he offered a hand and she took it hesitantly, helping her stand on her hooves again. “Are you alright?”

“Y-yes thank you ummm?”

“Jack, at your service Miss Shores” he bowed a little before her.

“Of course, thank you Jack I wasn’t looking where I was going, even though I enjoy meeting new ponies or whatever you are dear I must go, until 3 days from now Miss Rarity, chao~”

For 2 full minutes both Rarity and Jack stood by the entrance of the Boutique watching Sapphire leave and heading towards the train station,  then with no warning Rarity fainted with the same big smile on her face. Jack carried her to her bedroom and leaved, in search to something to do and laughing all the way in his search.

*********

“Remember, since you are relatively  new in magic you must focus on four things at the same time, 1.- yourself, 2.- your magic power, 3.- the amount of power you need to use and how much you actually have and 4.- your destination must be clear, ready? GO!”

Twilight and Spike were watching Jack eyes shut as he concentrated his magic around himself, little by little a blood-red glow began to appear around his hands and his body, it was glowing differently than the magic Twilight, Rarity or any other unicorn seemed to had, glossy semi-transparent with sparkles around the magic aura, his aura had the glossy sparkles but in black colo and much more less in quantity, the kind of glow reminded Twilight of the magic glow of Celestia, Luna and Discord had. Suddenly a loud *ZZAPP* followed by a flash of red light and seconds later another one behind them.

“I DID IT!” Jack bounced much as Pinkie would “Finally I teleported!!”

“C-congratulations Jack!” for her part Twilight was as much as happy for his progress as she was stunned by it, in less than two weeks he had learned what she had learned and master in 3 years with no effort at all, of course he was no master but his advance was simply ridiculous. “Well, that covers “Teleportation for beginners””

“ “Teleportation for beginners” checked”

“What’s next on the list Spike?”

“Nothing Twi, that’s all for today” he said showing her the list.

“So fast?” she grabbed the list with her magic and checked her list “Levitation-checked, Telekinesis-checked, Morphosis-checked, Music magic-checked, Finding magic-checked, Sensor magic-checked, Teleportation-checked, huh? I was sure there was more, well Im sorry Jack but it seems you’ll have to come back until I prepare more lessons”

“It’s ok Twilight, you know Twilight, there’s something that’s been bothering me for a while”

“What is it?”

“You may think this is crazy but, don’t you think the whole thing about Discord is a little strange?” he asked as he sat in mid air levitating himself, she said nothing but looked thoughtful “I mean, sure he is evil and he is a maniac but there’s something that just doesn’t add up, Why?”

“Why?” asked spike joining the conversation.

“Exactly, why?, as far as I can tell and for what I’ve read in your books Twilight and watched in the show he was more powerful than Celestia and Luna together, sure story says he overestimated his own power and that was his downfall, but to me he seemed to be……holding back”

Realization kicked in the mind of Twilight, He was right!, ” Discord could have easily defeated me and my friends, even when we were using the elements of harmony against him, he could’ve easily teleported away or done something to stop us, but he didn’t, Discord didn’t even tried to actually assure his victory, he only played with us for a long time, at first I thought he had indeed overestimated his powers and was so sure of his victory that he believed he didn’t had to do anything more, why didn’t I noticed before! And now I just realized he wasn’t even trying, he was actually holding back on us, but why?, why?!, WHY?!.”

“Why?” a loud whisper came out of her lips and nothing more.

“Maybe we could talk with the princesses about this?” spike suggested

“Maybe, but not today we must make sure they are free to receive us” he watched the clock on the wall “Oh MAN! ouFf!!” exclaimed as he landed on his ass “ I must go, have to check the guard posts, see ya” a moment later he was gone with a *ZZAPP*.

“Twi? You ok?, Twi?” the baby dragon waved an arm in front of her but she didn’t even blinked.

“Why?”

********

--Main entrance—

*ZZAPP*

“huh? Who there?”  A strange creature above the wall, armed with a simple spear and a helmet asked.

“It’s ok Fido, it’s me”

“Oh it’s you boss”

“And Im not your boss Fido, Im your friend”

“Sometimes I forget, has been hard since-“

“Since Rover lost” another creature, smaller than the first said as a little whimper followed his sentence.

“How are things looking out for today Spot?”

“Looking good, no monsters near wall”

“Keep the good work guys, if you see any monsters, bark”

“You can count on the Diamond Dogs Bo—aaah, Friend!” Spot said as many diamond dogs around the walls and the main gate barked happily in unison.

“Good, keep on the watch boys” he then went to the other guard posts, checking if everything was ok, he had become the defense leader of the town, not officially of course, but he made almost all the decisions regarding the guard posts and who and when should keep guard.

*HHAAAUUUUUUUUU*

“Those timber wolves are at it again” he began to run towards the school to see what was going on this time with the blasted wolfs, “What the heck?” was his simple question upon arriving at the scene, the timber wolves were playing around with the foals and fillies, one in particular, the one howling, was receiving a hoof massage from the CMC on its wooden belly, it wasn’t a hungry or irritated howl, it a was a pleased one.

“See anything?”

“*sigh* no Ah see nothin”

“First thing we don’t fail at and no cutie mark!”

“I guess we are not ‘Timber Wolf Massagers’ after all”

“Hey! I know! Why don’t we try ‘Timber Wolf Riding’?”

“‘CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS TIMBER WOLF RIDERS’ YAY!!!!!” the timber wolf’s eyes grew as big as plates as the three little fillies jumped over him.

*HHHHAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!* (ehem, HELP MEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!)

Jack could barely hold back the urge to laugh at the poor wolf’s misfortune, he turned around to see Carrot Top and besides her a timber wolf carrying her groceries on its mouth, he also saw three timber wolfs playing along with some bunnies and little Twist, Dinky and Pipsqueak, he smiled at the scene, just as granny Smith said, magic is as magic does, who would have thought that the timber wolves weren’t carnivores and that they mostly ate apples?.

Their ferocious aspect, their sharp wooden claws and fangs and their size made them very intimidating, but in truth they were as dangerous as Fluttershy and as loyal as Rainbow Dash, he remembered how both the timber wolves and then later on the diamond dogs came seeking protection in the walls of Ponyville.

*Flash Black*

“And so my duty begins” Jack said putting on his helmet, then he jumped out of the wall right in front of the entrance ready to take on the timber wolfs with all his force.

The timber wolves were charging with all their might, full speed, on the walls unicorns and earth ponies were ready to receive them with stones and whatever they could throw at them, in the skies a line of pegasi were ready to launch merciless thunder strikes at the wolves, only 200 meters until they arrived at the gate.

Something moved from the edges of the everfree forest a little behind the timber wolves, “was something else was coming?”, 150 meters left.

Then, with both surprise and horror, Jack and many ponies saw the upper-half of a timber wolf fly out of the forest, shreds of wood and blood splattering all over as it fell, then it hit him, the wolves weren’t attacking. 100 meters left

“OPEN THE GATES NOW!” at this nopony understood why he wanted to open the doors to the wolves “ OPEN THEM DAMMIT!!!” whispers began, questioning  to follow or not his orders “THE WOLVES ARE NOT ATTACKING! THEY´RE RUNNING AWAY FROM THE FOREST!!!” wasting no more time he charged at the wolves, just at the same time the last of the timber wolves came out of the forest, and right behind them an horde of lupus, red lupus. 50 meters left.

Jack passed at the left side of the biggest timber wolf, the leader of the pack, and motioned it to keep running, it seemed to understand for it only gave a small nod and howled, seeing this the ponies in charge of the gates opened them. 25 meters left.

Horrible howls of pain began to sing in this night, as the red lupus charged at the timber wolves, jumping on them, biting them hard, breaking and snapping necks, legs and spines giving themselves a bloody feast out of the terrified timber wolfs, a little timber wolf no bigger than a pup was running for his life as a lupus was behind it jaws already open for more blood, just as the lupus was going to bite down on the poor pup Jack landed a powerful shield strike at its snout breaking it and making the lupus growl in pain, thus giving the little wolf time to escape. The timber wolves began to charge inside Ponyville, hiding behind the wall in fear as some injured ones howled in pain. The ponies by their part were stunned to actually see the timber wolves hide behind them and coil in fear.

All the lupus stopped their charge at the presence of Jack, he was as big as them and the glow of his eyes reflected hate and the will to not let them pass him, around 50 lupus in front of him began to circle him slowly, searching for a weak spot.

He didn’t moved, Jack was looking around seeing many parts of the unfortunate timber wolves that had served as the meal for this lupus, and some even had parts of the timber wolves on their snouts and fangs, chewing them. Their yellow glowing eyes showed just how blood-thirsty driven they were, the red lupus growled and barked and howled in anger and rage.

“Want dessert?” at the same time all the timber wolves howled to the skies, a howl that everypony heard and described as the call for a meal, he put his shield in front of him and his spear above his right shoulder, holding it firmly. “Then come at me you filthy bag of fleas”.

All the lupus leaped on Jack, barely giving him time to crouch and put his shield over himself, blocking all their attacks, one thing he noticed was that the lupus were heavy ‘good’, in a swift movement he threw away all the lupus above him in a single upward shield thrust scattering them long enough to retreat to the wall. All the timber wolves that survived had crossed the gates and now the gates were closed, ensuring a safe guard.

Jack was running as fast as he could while 3 lupus were right behind him almost biting him, the rest of the lupus close behind, suddenly Jack stopped and turned around to the surprise of the lupus behind him, one got his head pulverized by a shield crush and another one got decapitated by his reaper-spear, the third one landed a bite on his left forearm and to Jack’s surprise the lupus didn’t lost any of its fangs and the bite had actually left its scars on his armor.

“If one of them bites me without my armor they will split me apart!”

Another lupus tried to attack him as the third lupus was still clanged at his arm, sadly this lupus was greeted by the end of his spear through its mouth, Jack retrieved his spear out of the lupus mouth and stuck it at the back of the lupus holding his left arm, a growl of pain followed and then a strong kick on its chest.

Three more lupus charged at the same time at Jack knocking him down by their combined force and his lack of attention, one was about to bite his helmet as a rock, as big as a filly, landed on its head, many more rocks followed and hit random lupus, it didn’t stopped them but it gave time to Jack to free himself from the lupus above him.

The three lupus retreated back to their pack and started to growl angrily at it and the walls, the pegasi squad shot their thunder strikes at the lupus at the same time, hitting many and gaining more howls of pain and anger, they beheld the strange biped creature before them regaining the same posture it had after stopping one of them from getting a delicious timber meal, behind him, about 20 meters, the walls that separated them from a delicious and most promising feast of ponies, on them horned and normal ponies throwing big rocks and in the skies above the creature those horrid flying ponies shooting thunders at them.

Some lupus started to retreat back to the forest, this gave the ponies and Jack a little relief but it was quickly replace with surprise as the retreating lupus turned back running faster than before and jumped on the backs of their comrades, giving them more impulse to jump again higher, in the same level as the pegasi, the later to surprised to notice the threat on time were tackled by the lupus in mid air.

At the sound of screams of terror, surprise and pain Jack reacted on time to kill one of the falling lupus with his spear and catch an injured red pegasi screaming in pain for the lack of his right wing before hitting ground, he watched in horror as three pegasi landed hard on the ground while the lupus above them ripped them apart limb from limb feasting on their victims, the rest of the lupus that weren’t able to catch a prey or were separated from them by the magic of some quick thinking unicorns rapidly joined the other three, drenching themselves on blood.

The rest of the pack charged at the same time towards the gates and walls, the biggest one of them gave a mighty jump on the nearest wall and climbed it just enough to grab with its mouth a distracted earth pony stallion by his head before jumping off the wall while its prey struggled to free himself from its mouth, a sudden *CRACK* and a second the blue stallion stopped struggling and his hooves and tail went limp as a river of blood flooded from the lupus mouth, which in return gave a loud groan of satisfaction.

Ditzy was brave enough to descend and take the injured pegasi away, back to the other side of the wall, as the rest of the pegasi squad retreated back shocked and fearful of this intelligent lupus, the ponies in the wall also retreated a little, still shocked and horrified by the actions of the big lupus and happy that only the big lupus was big enough to climb to do that action.

Jack was staring coldly at the lupus before, aside and behind him, the lupus were too many to handle alone and too intelligent for wild animals, they were around 45 now and they didn’t seemed scared that their comrades had been killed before them, they didn’t even bothered to look threaten , they were just angrier. It didn’t mattered to him right now though, four ponies had died in a matter of seconds before him and he couldn’t do anything, he had promised to Celestia and Luna and Twilight and Spike and himself that he would protect Ponyville and its inhabitants and yet four ponies had been devoured right before his eyes, he had failed to protect them, he was angry, he was pissed, he wanted to kill the lupus responsible for this, he wanted revenge, he desired revenge………he had to avenge the innocent fallen ponies.

As fast as lightning every single creature near him felt the air becoming heavier and found it was hard to breath, a chill ran from the lowest part of their columns and fear stroked them, the ponies had never felt anything like this and for the looks of it neither had the lupus, this feeling of being afraid to even move an inch was strange and they didn’t liked, not at all, the ponies had for the first time ever felt what Twilight could describe only as “Killing Aura”.

“Im gonna kill you all” his voice was dark and low,  colder than ice and held so much rage it baffled the low tone it was muster with, the lupus had frozen up at the sound of it and the killing intent directed at them froze them up completely. The biggest lupus, still having the body of its prey on its mouth, looked directly at Jack’s eyes, his left eye was shinning blue as cold as the Windigoes while the right one was shinning red as the fire of Celestia’s sun itself seemed to burn inside of it, but both eyes reflected and promised one thing and one thing only for them, Death.

The lupus opened its mouth slightly letting his dead prey fall to the ground, it was shivering in fear, and some lupus looked to Jack’s eyes as well only to imitate their pack leader action, the rest only had to felt the already sharp killing aura increase as the dead pony hit the ground in a sick *Thud* followed by the crack of its already broken neck to do the same as their comrades, none of them dared to move an inch, purely shocked in fear.

What seemed to be an eternity of waiting and silence was ended the moment a lone cloud covered the light of the moon making his eyes shine more, thus making the leader lupus do a simple mistake, it moved one of his back legs away from Jack as the instinct to simply run for its life kicked in.

“No, there is no escape” a red aura appeared around his body before letting out a horrid and powerful war cry.

What happened next was burned into the memories of the ponies that had witness what Jack did; he let out a mighty war cry before charging into the lupus pack leader, Fluttershy, who was already crying for the deaths of her follow villagers, could not stop herself from crying even more as the head of the lupus flung through the air and the rest of the lupus tried to run away from the monster before them, Rarity had vomited the  moment Jack grabbed a lupus by its neck and pierced him with his bare hand in its stomach and then splattering its insides all over the air for everypony to see, Spike didn’t even dared to blink as Jack took his spear and impaled it on four lupus and hover them in the air while a beautiful shower of blood bathe him, Rainbow had fainted when Jack leaped about 10 meters in the air and landed on two lupus crushing their heads and showing their contents to the world to admire, Applejack couldn’t bear it anymore and hid herself on his brothers forelegs while the magnificent cries and howls of the terrified lupus and the vicious screams of Jack filled the night, Pinkie didn’t moved or blinked the only reaction she showed was the deflating of her puffy mane and tail as she observed a fountain of blood rise from what used to be ten lupus curled against each other in pure terror.

The rest of the inhabitants had similar reactions and nopony seemed to care how much time had passed, finally the last lupus was curling before the now bloodstained armored creature, same eyes and same aura around him, Jack was breathing harshly and was carrying his spear with his right hand while his left hand was missing the shield, discarded at the entrance of Ponyville to allow free movement, he bent down and grabbed the lupus by its neck with his left hand and draw it closer to him until his helmet and the lupus face were practically touching, he draw the end of his reaper-sword spear next to the unmoving lupus head.

“Go back to the forest and tell your friends” he pointed at the bloodbath he had created with the help of its pack. “That if they try to come again, to harm, kill or eat MY friends again, the same will happen to them” the lupus understood as it only gave the smallest nod. “Now Get.Out.Of.My.Sight!” he threw the lupus a good 3 meters and had landed on its back “I SAID FUCK OFF” Jack gave the lupus a mighty kick on its right side that made it howl in pain but began to run as fast as it could back into the forest.

Everypony was shocked (the ones that did not faint) at the sight of their guardian returning, the timber wolves were terrified by his mere presence, the gates began to open as Big Mac was the only one to react, Jack entered Ponyville drenched in blood of the lupus he had annihilated, he was carrying his shield again and the stench of fresh blood and death filled the air. The red aura around him faded bit by bit as he began to speak.

“Tonight we lost four ponies, four friends; Lets honor their memory tomorrow with a proper burial” as Jack said this many came out of their trance but said nothing “Im tired” Jack dropped his shield and his spear to the ground “I need to r…e……” and then he felled to the ground like a lump of clay.

The next day Spike had informed everything that had happen to Twilight and she was the one who organized the funerals for Mint Breath the earth pony stallion and the three pegasi mares Dawn Bringer, Cloud Jumper and Shinny Skies.

A week later after the incident and having suffered no attacks the diamond dogs came running to Ponyville seeking help and refuge, although many denied to open the doors it was Rarity who told the dogs they could enter if they behaved like civilized dogs and not brute savages, accepting the terms they entered the town safety and told everyone their story, how lupus and scorponoks invaded their tunnels, how they defended against the monsters, how many dogs died, how many monster they had killed and how Rover, their original leader, sacrificed himself to give them time to escape. Jack told them that to repay them they had to help in the defense of their now new home, to which they accepted instantly, for some reason beyond knowledge the dogs started to call Jack “Boss”.

As for the timber wolfs, after the discovery of their true nature and diet they were more than welcomed to stay in Ponyville more as helpers and pets than actual protectors, seeing they were such cowards.

*End of Flash back*

“I was so lucky everypony understood that what I did was for them and their protection”

*BARK BARK BARK*

“Monsters, don’t they ever rest?” Jack questioned himself as he started to run towards the main gate.

*********

“B-braeburn watcha doin’ here cousin?” Big Macintosh asked who was currently delivering apples.

“Hello Mac” Braeburn was dusty and clearly exhausted, the diamond dogs and many ponies were around him, trying to see what was outside.

“Who is he Big Mac?” Jack asked as he arrived

“He is mah cousin Braeburn”

“What brings you here to Ponyville Braeburn?”

“…….ah yes” his shock was fast and fast lived, he didn’t had the energy to open his mouth at all “We seek refuge ya see mister”

“We?” the dogs opened the gates to reveal not only ponies or injured ponies but buffalos too, some of them carrying very injured ponies or aiding other injured buffalos.

“Braeburn is that ya?” asked Applejack as she and the rest of the mane 6 followed by The Doctor, Derpy and many more, “Wha’ happen to ya? Why are ya ‘ere?” she asked really worried fearing to hear what her hearth already knew.

“……….Appleloosa is no more”

Chapter End