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Lyra's Human 2: Derpy's Human

by pjabrony

Chapter 82: 79: Cloak and Derper

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The room had no windows. That Karyn expected. She did not expect it to be so utterly clean and clinical.

When the SUV had stopped and the door opened from outside, Karyn found herself in an underground enclosed garage with no indication of where she was. The other SUV, the one with Derpy in it, was nowhere to be seen. For all she knew, Derpy was off somewhere being tortured.

The man in the tan suit had hustled her to an elevator. The car was the only thing that showed any kind of personality, having its own style of buttons and walls. The buttons went up to five, so it was at least a five-story building.

Unless that was done to deceive. Karyn had no way of knowing whose custody she was in. It could be a special division of the police, the FBI, the NSA, or some x-file division, not even made public. When the elevator came to a stop on the second floor, she was walked down a hall and into the windowless room. The door was open when they arrived, but her escort swiped a card through a reader, and a light switched from green to red. She was locked in, alone.

The walls were the off-white shade of the cheapest and simplest paint. The desk was gray laminate over gray metal. The chairs were perfectly straight-backed and darker gray. It was funny, Karyn thought, how the same color could give two different feelings. The gray of Derpy’s skin was a hidden laugh, a cloud that passed over the sun on a too-hot day. This room had the gray of cold metal, the kind used for jail bars and guns.

Karyn figured that she was being left to stew so as to loosen her up before they began questioning her. She didn’t even know what she was planning to say. Her highest priority was to preserve the secret of magic so as not to have it fall into the wrong hands, but just getting herself and Derpy out of their custody was something that she wanted to do. If they could have privacy, even just for a split second, they could get away to Equestria and figure out what to do next.

It was the grey-suited man who came back in, swiping the card again and taking a seat. Karyn’s memory finally tripped as to what the room reminded her of. It was like the agents from the movie “The Matrix.”

“Now,” he said, “Why don’t you tell us what’s going on, to see if it confirms what we know.”

Did that mean that Derpy was talking to them? Or was it a bluff? She couldn’t risk that. “What do you know about My Little Pony?”

At least, for a moment, she had broken through by mentioning something he was not expecting. He beckoned her to tell more.

Karyn spilled out everything, talking about how the land of Equestria was real, how unicorns had developed the magic to transfer across universes, how Derpy had helped develop spellcrafting, who she was. She was just into explaining about pegasi when he interrupted.

“All right, let’s take it from the top.”

Great. He didn’t believe her. This was a problem for Karyn. Getting away was important, but even telling all and dealing with the consequences would be a means to that end. She thought of a scenario where some other human tried to get into Equestria, the ponies would find him, Princess Celestia would be informed, and she would fix everything. For all Karyn knew, the princess could cast a spell to make it so the entire capture never happened.

The realization that she had no way out, not even the truth, meant that she had to think harder and quicker. No way out of the room. Ventilation was through the ceiling, twelve feet up, but even if she could get past the grate, she could see that it made a sharp turn and became too narrow to crawl through. Every movie cliché she knew was failing her. One other thing she saw on the ceiling was the signature black hemisphere that indicated a security camera. Again, this struck Karyn as cheating on the part of whatever shadowy government agency had her in custody. But this wasn’t a work of fiction where they had to be fair to someone trying to escape.

That gave her another thought. She might be overestimating her situation. Maybe they weren’t unapproachable.

“Look, am I under arrest here? If not, I would like to leave.”

Gray Suit smirked, as if knowing this would be her next tack. “You’re not under arrest, but you can not leave. Arrests involve all sorts of nasty paperwork, publicity…rights.”

Karyn felt the first touch of panic claw at her neck. Half of her was ready to break down, cry, and beg to talk to her parents. The other half was still looking for a way out, but it was losing ground, and crying seemed the last avenue to get out. She stared at the door. Locked with the electronic security system.

Her voice breaking, and as much as she could hold on, she said, “Please, can I have some water. Or coffee, or something. I just, I really…”

“Yeah, all right. I’ll get you a drink and then we’ll begin again.”

Karyn kept her eyes focused on him as he pulled out his swipe card and passed it through the scanner. Once he was gone, she closed her eyes and folded her hands below the table. Her breathing slowed and she concentrated. When her interrogator returned, she was calmer as she answered his questions.

“Now,” he said. “Tell me again how this supposed pegasus came here.”

In monotone, she told more stories about her and Derpy, leaving out as many details as she could. She endured as long as she could, taking sips of the water with her left hand. She could tell that he wasn’t believing her any more than before, so she had to reveal a real detail.

“If you go into the bag, you will find her assortment of spells. If you give her the second one, she can turn visible. Then you’ll see for yourself.”

Clearly he could detect no dishonesty, since Karyn hadn’t lied to her. Still, he was able to pick up that this was a different kind of candor, something that she didn’t want to tell. He got up and walked out of the room.

Now was her moment. She got up and stood with her back to her camera, covering her right hand with her left. Bracing herself for the pain, she picked up her hands and swiped the magnetized card that her hand had become through the reader. Her finger muscles screamed at her, but the door clicked open.

Thankfully, there were no guards immediately outside the interrogation room, but she was sure that her escape would be noted on camera and that the alert would be sounded. Her changeling powers did not extend to pure invisibility, but she had to be stealthy. She considered becoming something ridiculously small, like a fly, but worried that it would make her too vulnerable. One misplaced swat and she would be done for.

The air ducts beckoned her again, but even if she could fit by becoming a bird or a ferret or something, the idea of being cramped in a narrow tunnel didn’t appeal to her. What she needed was to hide. Then it hit her. Karyn focused and turned herself into a chameleon.

She knew that chameleons didn’t change the color of their skin for camouflage but based on mood. She didn’t care. She would be her own type of chameleon. Blending perfectly with the wall, she was finally off camera.

Her next move was to get out of the hall. Racing as fast as her lizard legs would take her, she turned a corner. After passing other interrogation rooms, some with the more traditional one-way glass, she found an open and empty conference room. It even lacked a camera. She reverted back to human form. She breathed.

How did it get so out of hand? She thought to herself. This was the worst-case scenario. This must be what Derpy felt when I was being held by the changelings. But things always work out for the best in Equestria. They might really hurt Derpy here!

Karyn needed to figure out a plan. Just as Derpy had come to her rescue then, Karyn would have to come to hers. The first step would be to figure out the layout of the building. If she could make her way outside, she could figure out where the most likely place that they were keeping Derpy was. At least, she could try. The major disadvantage she had was that no one else could help her, unless she was willing to give away the secret of Derpy’s existence.

No, that could not be allowed. And so Karyn had to face a difficult choice. The saddlebag, not Derpy, had to be her first target. Once she had that, she could really have some fun. She didn’t know all of Derpy’s spells, but she knew enough that could be used for defense or even to mess with the captors. Combined with her changeling powers, she’d be unstoppable. But finding it was the first step.

The problem was that, knowing she had escaped, she had to assume that the building would be on lockdown, and that everyone would be suspicious of anything. Her advantage was that no one knew she was a changeling. She went back to lizard form and moved out.

Whether the building had no windows or whether she just couldn’t find them, Karyn spent fifteen minutes trying every hallway. It occurred to her that she might still be in a basement, and wondered if she couldn’t tell from the air pressure. She had no way to figure out how, and nowhere was there any floor plan or directory for the building.

“Damn!” she swore, hoping that no one else heard her. There was only one alternative. She would have to try to find someone, convince them that she was part of whatever organization was holding Derpy, and get them to divulge the location of the bag.

The only people she knew worked for the organization were Gray Suit and Tan Suit, and she didn’t know if either of them were actually important or if they were just there to intimidate people. Plus Gray was probably scouring the building for her right at that moment, if he wasn’t getting reamed out by a supervisor. She could picture the scene. “How did she manage to get one of our cards, then get past the cameras in the hall?!”

No, assuming his form was only setting herself up for failure. She would have to act slowly. First that meant finding someone, exactly what she had wanted to avoid. She found a main hallway, wider than all the others, and proceeded down. It wasn’t until she reached the end and saw a sign that said, “Commander” that she saw another person.

The man at the desk, presumably the commander, stared into a flatscreen monitor while taking calls. Karyn refused to believe that anything could be more important at the moment than figuring out Derpy’s secrets, so he had to be working on that. She inched toward the door, but hesitated as she heard footsteps.

Three men in lab coats were coming up the hall the same way that she had. They were all engrossed in reports, and Karyn saw her chance. As soon as they passed, she transformed into one of her professors who also wore a lab coat—she never knew why—and followed the men into the commander’s office.

“Well,” the commander spat. “Have you got anything?”

“There’s definitely an energy source coming from the bag and the items within,” said the first Lab Coat.

“Is it dangerous?”

“It’s powerful. Power always has the potential for danger. What it does, how the danger could manifest, that we don’t know.”

The commander stared daggers at him. “So you know nothing. What about the creature?”

Karyn bristled as she heard her friend referred to that way. Lab Coat said, “That’s really the other team’s department—“

“Then what are you doing here?!”

“Well, frankly, Commander, we don’t know what to try next. We want to send it to the lab out in Al—“

“No.” The commander interrupted. “As few people as possible are to know about this until we get a handle on it and—who the hell are you?!”

He had stood up and, in doing so, spotted Karyn in the back. Her disguise wasn’t working as she’d hoped. She stepped back and saw the commander’s jacket hanging on the wall. She hadn’t had a picture in her mind of the change she needed, but this would do. Reaching into her coat, she flashed the green light and pulled out a gun.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to have to do this. No one move, please.”

“Is that my gun?” the commander said. His eyes shot to his holster, seeing that it was still in place.

“I guess we just use the same model. Hands up, please. Everyone against the wall.”

Karyn had no experience holding a gun on people, and tried her best to make it look real and not just an extension of her arm. The commander and the lab coats stood against the wall, but she thought they could tell that she was an amateur.

“All right. Two questions. Where is the bag and where’s Derpy?”

The other three stood mute. “You mean the invisible creature?”

“Yes.”

“The creature is in the secure lab. The bag is in firearms and toolmarks.”

Karyn advanced on him. “No, I need their locations in the building. Give me exact and simple directions. If I take one wrong turn, I’ll come back here and take care of you.”

She moved to the side and took the commander’s pistol from its holster. Karyn had never held a gun before that, but it was more about getting it out of his hands than into hers. He laid out the position of the room with the bag, which was on the roof.

“And the secure lab?”

“In the subbasement. Dead center. But you won’t get there. Let’s just talk about this.”

“No. I’m sorry, but this isn’t for you to know about. Now, phones, keys, key cards please.” She emptied the pockets of everyone and took their means of communication. Then she disconnected the office phone and removed the Ethernet cable from the commander’s computer. Finally she locked the door, trapping them inside.

The commander hadn’t lied to her, as she made her way according to his directions, approaching the roof. As she took an access stairway, she took out the magazine from the gun she had confiscated and tossed it to the bottom of the stairs. The gun itself went onto a random floor. She was content with her bluff weapon.

Karyn realized that she could have interrogated them more and found out where exactly they were and what organization they worked for. But she didn’t care. All she wanted was to get away and forget it ever happened.

At the top of the stairs she changed form again. No longer did she plan on blending in. Intimidation was her weapon now. She recalled an image from one of the crime drama shows of a tactical officer dressed in riot gear, with a thick plastic helmet and face guard. Her garb was black and so was the high-powered rifle that she conjured as an attachment to her right arm. Sneaking through the hall, she found the door marked “Firearms and Toolmarks.” It had another magnetic card reader, but she did not want to hurt her hand again.

She probably could, in this form, kick the door open, but she didn’t know the technique and feared that, in a failed attempt, she would alert the people inside. Instead, she knocked on the door as if she belonged there. Twenty heart-pounding seconds passed. She knocked again. At last, someone disregarded protocol and opened the door a crack. She stuck the rifle muzzle in and shoved the door against the man who had opened it.

The room was full of more lab coats, clones of the ones she had left locked in the room below. Their resistance was limited to one of them yelling, “Call security!” As Karyn turned her attention to that one, he raised his hands and dove for the floor. The rest followed suit.

“Where’s the bag?” she shouted in a gruff voice.

“Security room.” One of the lab coats pointed a shaky finger toward a closet. There was a keypad next to it.

“The code!”

“O…one-one-two-three-five!”

She picked him up by his collar. “You put it in, Fibonacci.”

It took him two tries, since his eyes kept looking toward Karyn’s gun, but at last with the sound of a hydraulic release and air escaping from a hermetic seal, she saw Derpy’s saddlebag.

Just to see a familiar object, something homey and made out of cloth, with color designed for aesthetics, was a boost to Karyn’s heart after seeing nothing but clinical government cleanliness. She tossed up the flap, confirming that all the spells were still in their slots, and shouldered the bag.

She kept her gun trained on the Lab Coats as she backed out of the room. Now that she had the bag, she was less concerned about keeping secret. All she wanted to do was to get Derpy and get out of there.

As soon as she reached the stairwell, an alarm sounded and the lights went out. Karyn swore once more and tried to think of some animal she could transform into that had night vision. She remembered that ponies couldn’t, because Pinkie Pie needed goggles for the purpose. Instead, she just reached into her pocket, took out her phone, and turned on the flashlight function.

Karyn realized that there was a major flaw in her plan, as the directions she got to the lab where Derpy was being held were starting from the commander’s office, and to translate from her current position was impossible. She could retrace her steps and go back to the office, but they had to be waiting for her there.

She went for broke and just took the stairs all the way to the subbasement. Once there, she saw a cadre of guards, and she didn’t think their guns were magical extensions of themselves. She flashed green once more and turned herself into a cheetah. This had the dual effect of giving her extra speed and scaring off some of the guards. Not all of them were frightened, but they did hesitate. Once she got past them, she heard gunfire, but felt nothing and concluded that she had gotten away.

There ahead was the lab. Flashing claws, she burst through. On a monitor to her right was a display of a heat signature. The image of Derpy in expanding red, orange, and yellow showed her to be between four poles in the center of the room. She converted back to herself.

“Derpy!”

“Karyn! Don’t—“

She reached into the bag and pulled out the second spell from the front. “Take this and let’s get out of here!”

Outside, she heard the footsteps of the guards trying to catch up. Why was Derpy taking so long.

“Karyn, stay back,” said Derpy.

“What for?”

Karyn advanced toward the center where she knew Derpy was. Halfway there, Derpy finally turned visible. “Don’t come any closer! It’s a trap!”

Derpy flew toward her, but right at the border of the poles, she was pushed back in pain as an arc of electricity flew across the poles.

“Derpy!” Karyn cried out, but in doing so she noticed that the two poles nearest her were mirrored by two more. She heard the hum of a motor starting up, and could tell that she too was trapped.

From the back in walked the commander who she had thought was safely locked in his office, along with the original Gray Suit who interrogated her. He spoke with no detectable emotion to Gray. “You see, in situations like this it’s best to let the subjects have some play. It often reveals a good starting point of information.”

Derpy backed into the center of the poles, as far away as she could from the electric fence. “Why are you doing this? I’m sure that we can all be friends. If you were in my home, I wouldn’t treat you like this. You’re being mean.”

“We’re just seeking information,” said Gray Suit. “We have to make sure you’re not dangerous.”

Derpy closed her eyes, tears still making it past her lids. Karyn could tell what she was thinking, because she cast her mind to the same event. Three society ponies proposing to conduct experiments on her, and Derpy being an unwitting coconspirator with Princess Celestia to foil them. Here, though, there was no princess. Only a bureaucracy where almost no one had a name, and no one could check them.

All at once it became clear what Karyn had to do. She faced her friend.

“Derpy, I’m sorry. I’ll come back for you, I promise.” She reached into the bag.

Right as she turned to face down the officials who were advancing on her, Karyn caught Derpy’s glance. Pain, but confidence as well.

Karyn glared at the commander. She pulled out the first spell, put it on her hand, and, for the first time, entered Equestria without Derpy.


To be concluded...

Next Chapter: 80: All a Derp Estimated time remaining: 21 Hours, 41 Minutes
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