//------------------------------// // 21: Derpan Hines Baked Goods // Story: Lyra's Human 2: Derpy's Human // by pjabrony //------------------------------// Although she had no idea how to accomplish such a thing, Derpy tried to emerge into existence quietly and unnoticeably. She was still nervous about being discovered by Karyn’s parents when she teleported into her house. She silently said to herself that she would be glad when Karyn returned to school. “Good morning, Karyn,” she whispered. “Don’t worry, Derpy. The folks aren’t here. The whole house is empty.” Derpy let loose, spread her wings, flopped on the bed, and spoke with greater projection. “Whew! That’s good to know! Now I can relax. For a moment at least.” “What do you mean, for a moment?” Derpy held up a hoof. “Two, one, there. Moment’s over. I know we’re normally all fun and games, but today I need your help.” “Oh? What do you need?” “Well, what happened is, back in Ponyville there’s this big charity event going on.” Karyn smirked. “Why? Does town hall need renovation again?” Derpy missed or ignored the slight. “No, nothing like that. But there’s always a few ponies down on their luck, or maybe they’ve had a new addition to the family and need a few bits to tide them over. So once a year we have a week where everypony helps out.” “Sounds great. Where do I come in?” “Part of it is a bake sale. I help out with it. I always have. But up until now, I’ve always had Dinky around to assist me. It’s a lot of work for one pony to do, and work is always lessened with more hooves. Or hands.” “Say no more,” said Karyn. “When do we leave?” Derpy spread her wings invitingly, and Karyn hopped on. Minutes later, they were entering Derpy’s house. As she opened the door, Derpy stomped hard on the welcome mat. “Are our feet dirty?” asked Karyn. “I’d better wipe mine as well.” “No, it’s not that, come inside quick!” Karyn finished wiping just in time for Derpy to grab her and pull her inside, slamming the door closed just ahead of an orange streak moving at about nine-tenths the speed of light. “Muffinhead has been trying to get out of the house without me,” Derpy explained. Karyn reached down to try to pet him, but Muffinhead skittered behind Derpy’s hooves. “Hey, last week you were scared of her and all over me. Now you’re the opposite?” Derpy flew up, leaving the little cat exposed. “Come on, it’s Karyn. She’s a friend.” She picked Muffinhead up and put him down near Karyn’s feet. He sniffed cautiously, then rubbed his head against her shoes. “There, she’s coming around,” said Karyn. “All right, from one muffin to the next. Let’s get baking.” “Huh?” “Baking the muffins.” “I’m not making muffins,” said Derpy. “We’re making éclairs.” Karyn was taken aback. “Oh. Sorry, I just assumed. I don’t know how to make them, though.” Derpy’s expression changed quickly from irritation to elation. “Well, that’s fine! I’ll walk you through everything, and before the day is out, you’ll be as good as me.” Karyn followed her to the kitchen. It still had that imperceptible newness, and Derpy had kept it spotless. However it was organized, Karyn could see no pattern, but Derpy cheerfully went from pantry to cabinet to drawer, pulling out equipment and ingredients and setting them on the table. “All right,” she said. “Let’s get measuring! We need a cup of flour first.” She dumped flour into a measuring cup and tamped it down with her hoof. She closed one eye and added a bit more. “Shouldn’t we turn on the oven first?” asked Karyn. “Oh, yeah. Can you take care of that?” “What should it be on? Four-fifty?” “Four-fifty?!” said Derpy, looking frightened. “I can’t imagine how hot that would be. No, just seven or eight is fine.” Karyn looked back at the dial. Instead of temperature markings, there were only ten lines to indicate how hot the oven was going. She shrugged and turned it halfway between the seventh and eighth line. “All right, good. Now the sugar. Want to do this one? Just a quarter cup.” Karyn dumped a little bit of the clumpy confectioner’s sugar into another measuring cup. “I think that’s about right.” “No, you’ve got to be sure! Baking is all about getting the measurements exactly right. That’s why I like baking as opposed to cooking meals. If you know the right proportions, you’re guaranteed a good meal.” “Hmm. . . maybe that’s why, when I do cook, I don’t like baking. I’d rather do things by eye instead of by math,” said Karyn, but she carefully pushed the sugar down into the cup and added a little more until it formed a perfect flat top. “Hey, Karyn, do you smell something?” “Yeah, it smells like gas.” Derpy flew over and turned off the oven. “You didn’t light it! This is my fault. I forgot to tell you about that. A lot of ovens light themselves, but not this one.” “So how do you do it?” “You just use a match. But don’t do it now. We’d blow up the kitchen. Let’s let it vent first.” She opened the window and flapped her wings to fan out the gas. Despite Derpy’s acceptance of blame, Karyn felt as though she had failed her. She tried to make up for it by being as careful as possible in measuring out the milk, butter, and vanilla. “OK, let’s try this again. Go ahead,” said Derpy. “Matches are in the drawer next to the oven.” Karyn found the box right where Derpy indicated, and she took out a match. She was stymied, however, when she found nowhere to strike it. “Um, I’ve got a little problem here. How do I light this?” “Oh! You can’t do it. Allow me.” Thankful that she was finally off the hook, Karyn watched Derpy deftly turn on the gas, take the match in her mouth, and then run her hoof across it like wiping her lips with a napkin. The match came alight and she stuck her head into the oven. In a moment, there was a puff of flame in the chamber below. Derpy pulled her head out and shook it, dousing the match. “There! Now, let’s get back to the mixing. This is the fun part.” She brought out a huge crockery bowl and a wooden spoon. “Do you remember when we went to the beach and made sandcastles?” “Of course,” said Karyn. “Now we can have the same fun at home!” Derpy took the measuring cup of flour and turned it over. It slowly slid out into a shape vaguely resembling a castle, and she attacked it with the spoon. “It’s not exactly the same. If the recipe called for brown sugar, then you’d get some real action.” “I do suppose.” They mixed the dry ingredients before adding in the eggs and liquids. Derpy stirred constantly, and had Karyn pour slowly. “Everything in baking is about getting things to meld perfectly,” said Derpy. “I thought it was all about proportional measurement.” Derpy looked up and stopped stirring for a moment. “It’s about both. That’s the one key.” Karyn shook her head and kept pouring. When they finally had the batter, Derpy piped it through a pastry bag onto cookie sheets. They each picked up one, but as they reached the oven, Derpy paused. “The oven really hasn’t had a chance to fully heat up yet. Let’s go in the living room for a few minutes.” They sat on Derpy’s sofa and made idle conversation. Karyn was excited to be going back to school soon, and Derpy was happy about that as well. “It’s odd how the schedules work. Dinky will be coming home for a visit soon,” said Derpy. “Hey, that’s great! I’ll get to meet her.” “I’m sure she’ll like that.” Just then, Muffinhead came tearing into the room. He skidded to a halt in front of Derpy and meowed loudly. “What is it?” said Derpy. “You can’t go out now. We’re busy.” He kept screaming and pointing toward the kitchen. “You have food already. I’m not going to give you a treat until tonight.” Muffinhead ran toward the entrance, drawing the girls’ attention. Smoke was billowing around the edges of the door. “Oh, no! What’s going on?” Derpy trotted toward the kitchen. “No!” Karyn grabbed her. “It could be on fire! We should get out.” Derpy scooped up Muffinhead in her hooves and followed Karyn to the door. From outside they could see the smoke in the window, but as yet no flames were visible. “Does Ponyville have a fire department?” asked Karyn. “I don’t know. I’ve never had to find out. Here, hold him.” There was a garden hose attached to a tap on the outside of the house. Derpy handed Muffinhead to Karyn and sprayed it in the window, but the smoke kept coming. “If only there were some way to shut it off!” Karyn was struggling to keep Muffinhead from getting away. “Oh, my Luna! I completely forgot,” said Derpy, “There’s an emergency gas cutoff switch in the basement.” She ran behind the house, and a moment later there was an audible click. In a few minutes the smoke stopped. They went back into the house, and Karyn was relieved to be able to let Derpy’s cat go. “Well, everyone’s safe, at least,” she said. “Yeah, and the batter’s even still good.” “What happened?” “I don’t know,” said Derpy. “But this oven’s awfully old. I was planning to get a new one eventually, but I kept trying to stretch it out a bit longer. If I had to take a guess, I’d say that the gas line got loose and some sort of muck got in there and it started smoldering.” “Can you fix it?” “No. I mean, I could try, but I wouldn’t be sure if the repair was right, or if it would hold. I’m just going to have to bite the bridle and get a new one.” Karyn sat down at the kitchen table. “But that doesn’t help us right now.” “No, and the charity bake sale is tomorrow. We can try to find another oven, though. Let’s see if Pinkie Pie will let us use one of the ones at Sugar Cube Corner.” “It’ll be nice to see her again. I mean, a little bit of Pinkie goes a long way, but at the same time, I do miss her.” ****************************************** The aroma upon entering the bakery hit them at the same time as Pinkie’s voice. “Well, hey! If it isn’t my favorite pegasus-human team. What can I do for you? Simple baked goods, or you want me to throw a party together quick?” “Actually, Pinkie, we’re hoping that you can help us out of a jam,” said Derpy. “Out of a jam? But you’re not in a jam. I can put you into one. Maybe a nice apricot jam, although that’s really more of a preserve than a jam—“ “Ugh, Pinkie, you know that I’m talking about a problematic situation. It’s really annoying when somepony takes a perfectly ordinary expression and fails to understand it.” Karyn coughed. “An expression like, ‘That’s the pot calling the kettle light-sapphire-bluish-gray’?” “Exactly.” Everyone, human and pony, just stared for a while, then Pinkie said, “So what’s your problem?” “We were getting set to bake the éclairs, when the oven exploded,” said Derpy. “Maybe exploded is too strong a word,” said Karyn. “But it’s definitely out of commission.” Pinkie frowned. “Gee, girls, I wish I could help. But the fact is that all the ovens here are in use for the bake sale too. I’ve got everything scheduled down to the minute.” From behind the counter came a ding. “That means I have to take out the cookies and put in the cake! Or was it take out the cake and put in the cookies? Well, whichever comes out, I’ll put in the other. Excuse me, please!” Derpy and Karyn headed outside. “Well, what do we do?” said Karyn. “I don’t know. I’ll just have to explain everything to the ponies running the sale. They’ll probably tell me that they have plenty. But I’ll be disappointed all the same.” Karyn looked at Derpy’s puss-face. “I guess there is one oven that we can use.” “Huh? Where?” “At my folks’ house.” Derpy’s look changed from depression to confusion and then to elation. “You really mean it? You’d let me take all my stuff there?” “Yeah, but remember, we’ve got to leave it exactly as it was before. They can’t know about it.” They hurried back to the house where Derpy loaded up her saddlebag with cooking equipment. Karyn held the batter steady as she mounted. As they prepared to go, Muffinhead came in and mewed softly. “No, you can’t come,” said Derpy. “You’ve got to stay here for a few hours on your own. You can handle that, right?” He turned his head slightly, and Derpy took that as a yes. They vanished and reappeared on Earth. “All right, let’s try to work quickly,” said Karyn. “How long to these things take to bake anyway?” “Well, with éclairs, ‘low and slow’ is the rule. About eight hours.” “What?!” Derpy stuck out her tongue. “Just kidding! An hour, maybe, with cooling included.” “You are so mean.” They repositioned the pastries on the baking sheet as Karyn started the oven, silently thinking that she preferred to just turn a dial to a temperature rather than starting it the way Derpy’s oven did. That triggered another thought. “Hey, Derpy? Did I mess up the oven when I didn’t turn it on right? I’m so afraid that I’m the one who broke it and almost burned you out.” “No, it wasn’t you. Almost certainly wasn’t you. It was just old. Things break.” She sat down at the kitchen table and fiddled with a bowl of wax fruit. “I remember when I got that oven.” “Huh? It didn’t come with the house?” said Karyn. “No, I brought it with me specifically. I had a lot of attachment to that oven. If anything, that’s what did it in. Moving from one house to another. Something probably went screwy in the move. Trust me, I know about things breaking in a move.” Karyn smiled and put a hand on Derpy’s foreleg. “Anyway,” she continued, “I had it since Dinky was little. Whenever I had a baking day then, we would sit around and she would help, or try to. I tried to instill a love of baking and cooking in her.” “What is it about the baking? And the muffins?” “Huh? I don’t know. I guess I just like doing it. The smell and the tasty treat you get afterward. Don’t you have anything that you like but you can’t explain it?” “Probably, yeah.” Derpy stood up. “Anyway, let’s get to work on the filling. Oh, and the chocolate too, we can’t forget that!” They put together more ingredients, whipping and mixing. Karyn let herself go and forgot about the cleanup to come. When the oven dinged, Derpy went back to her saddlebag. “Now, for the secret advantage that makes my baking what it is. The cooling rack! Baking is all about having a good cooling rack.” “I thought it was all about blending. And before that, all about measurement.” “It’s all about a lot of things, OK?” Derpy set up the cooling racks on the counter and deftly transferred the éclairs onto them. Then she mixed the cream filling and sliced the pastries open. “I still don’t know how you do that so well without hands or fingers,” said Karyn. “You sound like Lyra. She and that other human are always playing finger games. But manipulation isn’t difficult. You just grab and push. Anyway, you want to do the filling?” Karyn took a small spatula and spread the cream in between the éclairs. While she was doing that, Derpy was preparing yet another bowl. Karyn noticed her putting her hoof to her mouth every so often. “Hey! I see you sneaking that chocolate,” she said. “Do you want to run out before we get these done?” “You caught me. But I was deep in thought.” “About what?” Derpy stared at the oven and the stove. “Melting chocolate is tricky. You can burn it if you’re not careful. Ideally I’d want a double boiler for it. But I’m going to cheat. Promise not to tell anypony?” “Sure, but that’s an easy promise to make. I’m not even going to be there.” Derpy reached into her saddlebag. “This spell was supposed to be for an emergency, like if I got caught in an arctic wasteland or if the windigoes came and I had no one to be friends with. Twilight probably wouldn’t like hearing that I used it to heat up chocolate.” “Oh, I get it. Yeah, I’ll keep it under the rose.” “That’s fine, just don’t lift up the rose later.” Soon the chunks of chocolate in the bowl were sweating and turning into a sticky mess as Derpy moved her heat-spell all around like a magical blowtorch. With another spatula, she spread it on top of the éclairs. “Good, there’s plenty left in the bowl,” she said. “You want the first lick?” As they washed dishes and put the kitchen back together, Derpy was still looking distracted. Karyn thought of something clever. “A bit for your thoughts,” she said. “Well, now that we’ve gotten these baked, everything about the oven breaking is finally starting to hit me.” “It’s going to be a lot of money to fix, huh?” “Nothing I can’t handle. But it goes beyond that. I have a lot of fond memories of that oven,” said Derpy. Then she chuckled to herself. “Sometimes actual fond memories, like the time I burned a casserole.” “Am I missing something?” “The word ‘fond’ can also mean the charred parts of a meal that you use to make gravy with.” “Derpy, you’re really smart. I don’t know where you got the reputation for being less intelligent than the average pony. Heck, you’re more intelligent than the average human.” “I’m not intelligent. Just experienced. Anyway, even if you didn’t bake, didn’t you ever have something of yours that you couldn’t bear to give up?” Karyn closed her eyes. “When I was young—really young, I mean, like before I even went to kindergarten—I had a quilt. I probably had it since I was born, or at least since I was sleeping in a bed instead of a crib. I’m sure at one point it was new, but as I remember it, it was always old, pilled, and with half the stuffing missing. My mother wanted to buy me a new one, did buy one at one point, but I refused to let it go.” “Then you understand. It’s the comfort of the familiar. But a quilt can’t break down entirely like an oven can.” “No, but eventually I had to get rid of it. Or, at least, stop using it. I think it’s still in a plastic bag up in the attic.” They scrubbed the kitchen clean, finding different surface cleansers that Karyn hadn’t even known existed. Finally, everything was done and the éclairs were finished cooling. “Well, I guess I’d better be getting back,” said Derpy. “Can I come with for a bit? We should probably clean up your kitchen as well.” “Sure, no problem. I’ll need you to carry the tray anyway.” Back at Derpy’s house, the smoke had coated the walls and ceiling of the kitchen with greasy blackness, and the two friends had a hard time scrubbing it off. Karyn was spelling Derpy by sitting on her back while she hovered just below the ceiling when she heard the doorbell ring. “Now, who could that be?” asked Derpy. “You’re not expecting anypony?” “No, not that I remember. I’d better check my calendar. No, I always clear Sundays to spend with you.” She trotted to the door, keeping an eye out to make sure her cat didn’t escape, and opened it. Pinkie Pie was waiting for her. “Hey, Derpy. I stopped by earlier, but you weren’t here, so I peeked in your window to see if you were here, but again, you weren’t here, so peeking in the window didn’t show you, but I did see your kitchen when I peeked in the window because that’s the window you left open and you told me how your oven broke and I saw all the damage it did and—“ “Pinkie?” “Yes, Derpy?” “Breathe.” “Right, I always forget about that.” Karyn walked in from the kitchen. Always wary of Pinkie, she kept her distance, but smiled and waved. “What’s up?” “Well, since, as I was telling Derpy, I saw that the oven had baked its last cake, I realized that you needed a replacement. Take a look outside!” Derpy and Karyn went to the window. There on the lawn was a shiny new stainless steel oven. It was festooned with special features like digital timers and convection settings, and it had a much more modern, curved design compared to the defunct one still in the kitchen. But both of them looked at Pinkie. Surely she couldn’t intend this as a gift? “Of course, you don’t have to buy it, but since we have a lot of ovens at the bakery, we can get it for you at wholesale price.” Derpy ran over and hugged Pinkie. “Thank you. I’ll definitely find a way to buy it.” “But Derpy,” said Karyn. “What about everything we were saying about the comfort of the familiar?” “How do things get familiar? They all have to start off new sometime. It’ll take some time for the new oven and I to get to know each other, but some time in the future I’ll find enough room to love both my old oven and my new one. I know it, because it came from a friend, so there’s a tiny seed of friendship inside already.” All three of them helped move the oven inside.