Project New Genesis

Engineer Jacob was in the company of 7 ponies: 1 unicorn, 2 earth ponies, 2 pegasi ponies and 2 alicorns. They all were in train, on way to Canterlot, Equestria's capital city.

Princess Celestia, one of Equestria's rulers, was still afraid of their alien guest from planet called Mars. She was observing Jacob, who was sitting alone and fixing something. On opposite seat was sitting Twilight Sparkle, her former student and Princess of Friendship. She was reading on device, what Jacob gave to her.

"Twilight, if you had to describe this... 'human' in one word, witch one would you chose?" Princess Celestia asked, still looking at Jacob.

"I would say, he's... 'unpredictable'. We barely know him, so he can do anything. Actually, I know about him pretty much." Twilight showed Celestia informations about Jacob, what she found on tablet.

"Okay, let's see... 'Pvt. Jacob Dracons. Talented engineer, bionics specialist and Project New Genesis' member. Achievements: None. Family: Dr. David Dracons- father, bionics specialist; Martha Dracons- mother, philosopher. Col. Raymond Dracons- brother'. Nothing, what could tell us anything more about him." Celestia said with resignation.

"Lower are movies, what are telling more about him. They are recorded by other Athena's crew members." Twilight said. Celestia played the first movie.

"So, what do you think of Pvt. Dracons, Dr. Sky?" Someone in the background said.

"Well, he's... trying to make everyone around laugh with his 'humor'. It's kinda cute and interesting, because he was through a lot in childhood. He was born without left arm, he lost his father, he had a lungs cancer... He's lucky, that he's alive and it's a miracle, that he doesn't have depression. I'm happy to have someone like him in crew."

Celestia turned on another movie.

"What do you think of Pvt. Dracons, Prof. Nate?"

"He's just another kid. He never cuts his hair, he lives in junkyard, what he calls his room and leaves his 'creations' everywhere. But, at least he eats healthy and don't believe in any superstitions or fairy tales."

"For now, some interesting facts and habits..." Celestia commented and played next video.

"Off. Stone, what do you think about Pvt. Dracons?"

"About Jacob? Best guy, I've ever met. He can fix, literally, everything. Once, he fixed a hundred years old motorcycle. He called it Raptor. Jacob promised me that when we land on the potential colony, he will let me drive on this beauty. I can't wait."

"What's a 'motorcycle', Twilight?" Princess asked, curious.

"It's some kind of vehicle on two wheels on Jacob's planet." Twilight explained shortly. Celestia raised an eyebrow and turned another video on.

"Sgt. McCain, what do you think about Pvt. Dracons?"

"For now, I don't have my opinion."

"Well, that was short..." Celestia said surprised and played the last video.

"Col. Dracons, what do you think about Pvt. Dracons?"

"As his brother, I love him and I would die for him. His jokes are cheesy but it's nice, that he tries to make someone laugh. I don't like them very much, honestly. As soldier, I see a milk drinker, who disobeys orders and does everything, what he wants. He only listens, when he has to fix something. That makes him great engineer, but awful soldier. But, we need engineer, like him, on Athena. I'm done."

"And?" Twilight asked.

"He's... interesting. I hardly believe, that Sombra could make him his student." Celestia sighed and looked at Jacob.

When Princess Celestia was watching video's about him, Jacob was trying to fix his plasma pistol. Energy core was untouched, so it just needed working barrel. After repairs, it looked like XVII century flintlock pistol. When Jacob finished looking at it, he noticed, that on opposite sit was Pinkie Pie. She was staring at him with weird look.

"There's something on my face?" Jacob asked.

"Where's your scar?" Jacob felt confused about Pinkie's question. "And coat made of dragon scales?"

"What scar? What coat?"

"Woopsee, wrong universe." She said and giggled. Jacob had no comment.

Pinkie, what did I tell you about breaking the 4th wall?

To do this anytime, I want to?

First, my failed fanfic, now this?

Don't forget, do it better. No Gary Stu.

Weird conversation was broken by Rainbow Dash. "I see, that you fixed your... what was that?"

"Plasma pistol. It's a stopgap, but it should be fine. Wanna see it in action?"

"Sure!" Rainbow responded excited.

Jacob looked at Celestia and smiled. "How much money, that I will shoot off Celestia's crown and she won't notice?"

"100 bits and mug of cider."

"We have a deal."

Jacob pointed Celestia's crown and shoot it with blue streak of plasma. The crown rolled in the air and landed quietly on the sit, next to Celestia. Princess didn't even notice, that she don't have crown on her head.

"Awesome..." Rainbow was very impressed by Jacob.

"What was that noise?" Celestia asked. Jacob quickly hid his gun in Pinkie's mane.

"No idea." Jacob said with shrug. Celestia raised an eyebrow and returned to tablet. Jacob giggled and started to look for his gun. He found there cake, chocolate, dynamite and cannon. He finally could feel his gun. "Jackpot." When he grabbed it, gun fired and plasma went far through the train, puncturing Applejack's hat, Rarity's mane and wagon's wall.

"What in tarnasion?" Applejack asked scared and confused. "Ra-Rarity..."

Rarity looked up and screamed, like someone was torturing her. "WHO! DID! THIS!" All ponies looked at Jacob.

"Eee... Pinkie! I told you! My gun is not a toy!" Jacob tried to get out from this situation.

"No, silly. You tried to find it in my mane, when you hid it, after shooting Princess' crown." Pinkie said that, like it was no big deal. Celestia checked her head. There was no crown. Luckily, it was on seat. Celestia took it with her magic and placed back on her head.

"Mr. Dracons. I'm warning you. If you will hurt anypony, you'll suffer the consequences. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, Your Highness." Jacob responded with remorse. He knew, that pissing off the princess isn't the best idea.

"For now, I will confiscate your weapon. I will return it, when we will trust you enough. Now, could you give this to me?" Jacob had weakness for asking for permission, so he took it from Pinkie's mane and gave it to princess.

"Be careful with trigger. It's very..." When Celestia grabbed the gun with her magic, it fired again, but in second direction. "...fragile." Jacob finished the sentence. "My fault. I forgot to lock it." Jacob grabbed it, locked it and gave back to Celestia. Her eyes looked like broken bulbs, when she accidentally fired.

"I've changed my mind. You can keep it but make sure it's secured." Celestia said, still with scared and surprised face.

"As you wish, Your Highness." Jacob said with smirk and put his gun in holster. Everypony left Jacob alone, except Twilight.

"May I look closer at your weapon?" Twilight asked, pointing the gun. Jacob gave it to her. She sit next to him and started to study alien weapon. "How exactly does it work?"

"It absorbs air around it, warms it to very high temperature, to ionize it and fires it with great speed. Everything in one second." Jacob described. "In brief, it shoots with plasma."

"Like beam from unicorn's horn?" Twilight asked.

"I... think so." Jacob doubted.

Jacob was looking at Twilight with curiosity. For someone from less advanced civilization, Twilight was very intelligent and talented. She quickly learned many things from tablet, what he gave her. Jacob was thinking about teaching her bionics' arcana.

Jacob quickly started to treat ponies more like humans, not animals. Since he heard them speaking English, saw, that they have civilization, even monarchy and technology (pretty primal, but still), he knew, that this place has something special.

"So, you say, that you're an engineer..." Twilight started a new topic. "Maybe you can teach me a thing or one about this?

"Actually, I wanted to ask you about the same thing." Jacob said, little embarrassed. "Sure, with pleasure."

"Great!" Twilight screamed with happiness and impatience. "When do we start?"

"Tomorrow morning." Jacob said with smile of excitation.

"I can't wait to start..."

Without any warning, train started to slow down and hit something. Jacob realized, that train is falling on the left side. Twilight brought everyone close to her and created giant bubble around them. When everything ended and train was 'stable', Twilight took off the bubble.

"Everypony okay?" Twilight asked.

"We're okay, Twilight." Princess Celestia assured.

"What the fuck just happened?" Jacob was angry and scared. "Nevermind, I'm gonna check by myself." Jacob broke window above him and climbed on it. When he saw the obstacle, what stopped the train, he was little surprised.

All ponies left the train and jumped down, except Main 6 and Princess Celestia, who stayed next to Jacob. Ponies below were staring at Jacob and whispered about him.

"What is this?" Applejack asked.

"Looks like a piece of Athena. I guess, that gravitation of this planet does it's work." Piece of the ship was pounded right in the mountain.

"Can we remove it?" Pinkie asked. "It shouldn't be a problem."

"We're gonna need all Cloudsdale to take this piece of metal from this mountain." Rainbow was really destroyed by Pinkie's logic.

Jacob jumped of the train and walked to the wreck. "Meet me on the other side." Jacob took from his backpack laser burner and welding goggles. "I wanna check something there." Engineer put goggles on and started to make himself an entrance. After a few minutes, wreck was open. In the meantime, Celestia and Main 6 were on the other side, except Twilight, what was standing behind Jacob.

"I'm coming with you." Twilight said. Jacob was scared by her sudden speaking.

"Fine, but don't touch anything without my permission. Well, except air and floor."

Twilight and Jacob started Athena's wreck exploration. Twilight used her horn as flashlight. Jacob used to this... flashlight from his backpack.

"Dark, cold, scary... Like in my ex's house."

"Even now you say jokes?" Twilight said with little dose of anger.

"I just want to make our tour little more... like not being in haunted house?"

"You... have a point." Twilight tried to look around, but she barely saw something. "Do you know, where are we?"

"Crew's cabins." Jacob read a note on the wall. "Second door, left." Engineer pointed his room and opened it.

"I see, that your cabin is not okay after the crash..." Twilight commented mess in Jacob's room.

"Nah, It looked like this always." Jacob said and walked in. Twilight was after him. Jacob opened the cupboard and took from it a sport bag. Inside were his clothes.

"Ew..." Twilight said, feeling a slice of rotten pizza on her hoof. "How can you live, like that?"

"It's my Feng Shui." Jacob explained. Twilight wanted to clean her hoof with a nearby wipe, but it was sticky.

"Why is it so sticky?"

"Well, you don't want to know..." Twilight screamed and quickly took the wipe of her hoof. Jacob grabbed his tools and left the room. Twilight was after him, trying not to stick to anything else.

"Can we go somewhere else?" Twilight definitively had enough of Jacob's room.

"If we're lucky, below are docks. We can find there pretty nice stuff." Jacob said, rubbing his hands.

"What exactly?"

"Jeeps, motorcycles, fighters... standard equipment."

Jacob found elevator's door and tried to open them. "Of course, no power. I'll have to use an universal key." Engineer started to look for a crowbar in his backpack. Jacob quickly found it and tried to open the elevator with it. "Twilight, could you give me a hoof?" Twilight joined with her magic. After a few hard seconds, elevator was open. Actually, it was shaft. Luckily, elevator was below, so they could just jump on it. "Ladies first." Jacob said, pointing the door. Twilight jumped down and Jacob was after her. "Piece of cake."

"Now what, genius?" Twilight asked, looking at the 'floor'. Jacob took laser burned and made an entrance.

"MacGyver can bite me." He said, jumping down.

"Who's MacGyver?"

"Guy, who can destroy the whole town with match and bag of jelly beans." Jacob explained in most illogical way.

"This is impossible." Twilight said with confusion.

"Nothing is impossible." Jacob said, opening elevator's door.

Twilight's eyes whitened, when she saw the docks. They were full of equipment and vehicles. Jacob went to the one under blanket.

"What's this?"

Jacob took off the blanket, showing a black motorcycle with chromed parts. "Original Harley Davidson from 1978. It belonged to my great-grandfather. It was old, but I gave this beauty a new life. I replaced some things, I changed old, gasoline engine for new, electronic one and... everything's working."

"Is this a motorcycle, what you promised Oscar Stone to drive on?" Twilight asked. Jacob already knew, what's going on here.

"You saw videos, don't you?" Jacob asked with little sad face. "So, you know something about my past, already?"

"Y-yes. I'm sorry." Twilight was sad, saying those words. She thought, that she hurt Jacob, but he just smiled and gave Twilight scratch behind her ear.

"Twilight, those things happened years ago. There's no reason to mention them. We shouldn't live past but we also can't forget about it. It's true, I miss my dad, I've never had left arm and I have fake lungs. Past makes us people, who we are in present. Sometimes weaker, sometimes stronger. And this is beautiful in life."

"You mean, life is beautiful, because it's unpredictable?" Twilight deduced. Jacob answered with nod.

"Life is one big Butterfly Effect. One detail can change whole universe."

"Actually, you reminded me about very important think."

"What exactly?"

"Me and my friends got our cutie marks because of one thing. Sonic Rainboom."

"That atomic blast, what Rainbow Dash can make?" Jacob asked surprised and Twilight nodded. "My mind... hurts as fuck..."

"Boom. Butterfly Effect."

They both started to giggle. Jacob stopped and prepared his gun.

"Jacob, what's wrong?"

"I've heard something." Jacob started to study docks. "Is that you, Sombra? SHOW YOURSELF, COWARD!" Jacob's mood quickly turned into deep anger.

"Something's moving behind this jeep." Twilight noticed. Jacob loaded his pistol and walked to the mentioned jeep.

He saw there familiar, blond shag. "Sarah? Is that you?" When Jacob touched her hair, she shouted like haunted and threw herself on Jacob, trying to bite and tear him. "Not on first date!" Twilight hit Sarah with magic beam, throwing her on the wall. She had familiar, green glimmer in her eyes. Sarah charged, but Jacob shoot her knees and arms, to immobilize her. "What happened to her? She acts, like fucking zombie. I think, I shit down my pants."

"It's King Sombra. He cursed her." Twilight said. Jacob felt, like he was in some cheap horror. Engineer decided to end Sarah's suffering and shoot her head.

"Rest in piece, old friend..." Jacob started to study her. Sarah had black veins all over her body, pale skin, sharp teeth and nails, plus greenly glimmering eyes. "If he did the same thing to my brother...." Jacob noticed something in her pocket. Jacob grabbed it. It was silver amulet in the shape of celtic dragon, curled around amber.

"Jacob, you can't rob someone, who just died." Jacob quieted her.

"It's... Draco Insignia. My mom's amulet." Jacob was surprised, because he thought, that she never was taking it off. "How did it appeared in her pocket?" Jacob put it on the neck, to don't get lost it. "This planet's getting weirder and weirder... Let's get the fuck out from here..." Jacob said, with impassivity. Twilight casted a spell, what teleported them outside. Jacob took with him a motorcycle.

"Jacob, what is this?" Rainbow asked.

"I want to be alone." Jacob sat on the ground. "I'll catch you later." Ponies knew, that something's wrong, but decided to leave human alone.

"Um... Twilight... What happened there?" Fluttershy asked. Twilight sighed deeply.

"Inside was Athena's crew's member, corrupted by King Sombra. Also, I moved very delicate topic. Jacob seemed optimistic, but I saw sadness and longing in his eyes. He was through a lot and he hides his true feelings behind joker's mask. I know that but he don't want to show it. Please, don't tell him I worked him out." In Twilight's voice was easy to catch sadness and worrying.

"Don't worry, Twilight. I won't tell anypony." Fluttershy promised with smile.

Twilight felt sorry about Jacob. She read some books about psychology and knows, that someone, like Jacob, should spend much time with friends and family. That's why Jacob tries to draw everyone's attention with his humor. To turn his sadness into happiness. Well, that was Twilight's opinion.

In the meantime, Jacob was thinking, what Sarah was doing on the ship? He saw, that escape pods are leaving the ship. This was a giant mystery for him. After a few minutes, Jacob stopped felling sorry about himself and decided to return to his new friends.