//------------------------------// // Jailbreak // Story: The Winds of Change: Fog of War // by AgentSnail //------------------------------// Jailbreak Dash hadn't needed to look much for Jason after he'd ran past her and Scoots had gone somewhere else. Or after him maybe. Ten minutes later of trying her best to be on the lookout but not too eager as she flew around the town, a small group of ponies exited the Everfree with a curiously familiar looking blob of camouflage and brown hair. Her heart sank, and she struggled to figure out what exactly she was feeling. Scared? Maybe, but as she swooped down and recoiled a bit at the blood, watching the body as it floated in Twilight's aura. He was breathing, although she wasn't sure how he'd managed to lose within such a short span. But then again, he wasn't that used to being human again anyway. "Dash! Where were ya?" Applejack asked, looking proudly upon Jason. "Just missed the capture of this..." "Human." Twilight filled in. "The first human in generations as well." "Yeah, that." "I have to give these things credit, they can take a lot more of a beating then I know I could." Twilight continued, "It took me a good six or seven spells, just to get him to realize that he wasn't running away. But it's not like he gave up, and he spoke perfect Equestrian too, I'm so excited to question him!" Twilight looked at Dash again, her eyes never really confirming the smile her mouth showed off. "Yeah, I really didn't expect that one..." Dash mumbled, slightly torn over what she should do. She could say that it was Jason, but then everypony would know, and that was one of the things he hadn't wanted. But this could get him out of everything, or maybe not, she didn't know why he'd been chased in the first place. "Dash?" Applejack asked. "Yeah?" "About earlier..." "Yeah." "Ah'm sorry, alright? Ah know you've heard me say this before, and before ya get all annoyed that ah'm apolagizin' to you and not Jason, Ah'm gonna do that too. He doesn't deserve the lot he has, and as much as Ah'd love to keep things simple and just dislike the guy, Ah know that he's done a lot more than Ah've given him credit fer. Sorry for not being able to get over it." She looked around. "Where is Jason, anyway?" "He's up in the house, he wasn't feeling well." "He didn't get hurt, right?" Twilight asked, studying Jason. "No, he's fine." Dash lied, gritting her teeth. "You don't look fine." The lavender mare replied, turning her gaze back. "I'd like to talk about what happened, before you left Sugarcube Corner?" "Yeah, go ahead." She sighed, trying to make up an excuse. "You preformed magic." Twilight said, rather simply. "Yeah, she did, didn't she?" Applejack asked. "That's pretty darn cool, iffn' Ah do say so mahself. Ah've never seen anything like that before, and it's kinda-" "Applejack, hold on." "Ah was just sayin'-" "I know what you were saying, but I have a lot of stuff to do, and this human over here just adds to the junk I have to do for Celestia, and then there's a friendship report that I should really send..." "Ah'm sure I can get the report done for you, Jason's worth about ten of those, minimum." Applejack grinned. "Course, it's been a few months, right?" Dash could hardly contain her laughter, bursting into guffaws after a few moments. The others were staring at her, but she supposed they didn't know that Celestia had made up the friendship reports as a joke. When Jason had told her that, she hadn't known whether to be angry that she'd been duped as well or to laugh for an hour. "Why are you laughing?" Twilight asked. Dash stopped immediately, her upper lip wavering. "That's classified." She said, watching Twilight's face screw into an expression of annoyance. "How can it be classified?" "By the princess's order, I'm sorry." Dash said, putting a hoof to her chest and swallowing a chuckle. "Along with a fair amount of war stuff. My job has it's perks." Twilight looked a little downtrodden, but only just. "I figured I'd be the first to know..." "Pfft, it's not a big deal, you'll know when they're declassified. If they are..." She trailed off, almost breaking out into more laughter as she watched Twilight's face. There was a period of silence where she could almost hear the gears turning in the purple mare's head, working out plots and deals, ways with which she could try to ease out information. "So then, the magic." "Oh yeah, it looks like I might be able to rival you in a fight. Oh wait..." She watched the other mare's face for a moment. "I'm just kidding. I'm not sure why I did it anyway, but maybe I'm just an outlier, right?" "You don't have a way to express the power, there's not supposed to be an outlier." "Alrighty then, I'm just going to go back home. You can figure that out if you want, but I don't care that much about why I get extra power. I just want to start picking things up without touching them." She rubbed her hooves together. "Tell me when that guy wakes up." She finished, as Scoots galloped over, looking completely depressed when she saw Jason. A finger of his twitched. So maybe he was already awake. Dash felt a smile spread slightly across her face as she picked Scoots up with her head, tossing the filly slightly and making her giggle. As much as it went against everything her being wanted, she took off and glided away, a tear blowing out of her eye. It felt terrible, knowing she was running away. And in probably half a day, given how fast changelings processed drugs, and assuming it was the same for potions, he'd be revealed. She'd either need to figure a way out of the cell he was surely going to be placed in, or hope that he could fine his own way out, without magic or flight. Shit. You know what? She banked, making a graceful U-turn. Best thing she could do, was at least be a presence, turn the other way if need be. And maybe, for once, have a little fun. She knew Jason would only be taking something like this with a shred of sincerity, so maybe she should just hop on the bandwagon. A little less stress would be nice. _____________________________________________________________________ Jason felt a jolt and a bump, cold metal replacing the weightlessness as his wrists were presumably tied with rather scratchy rope. He could tell that his knees were fairly bent; this chair was clearly not meant for humans. He opened his eyes, looking at his reflection in a one way mirror across a metal table. His head throbbed as he looked down at the bruises that had already showed up and swelled. From the little window he could tell that it had become dark, so hopefully only a few hours had passed. He knew the worst, in terms of bruising at least, would be with the ribs that Twilight had broken, but it didn't look like moving would be something he'd be doing a lot of. Meh, whatever. They'd have to let him out of their sight eventually. Jason stretched out his fingers, looking at the now blackened fingernails and corresponding fingertips, making light tapping noises against the metal arm of the chair. He flexed the rest of his muscles, and it didn't take much longer to notice that the rest of his toes were gone, probably starting to revert his feet into hooves. By the same logic, his fingers were feeling tighter, and it wasn't all that easy for him to stretch them all the way out. His back wasn't probably going to love being upright, considering the fact that he wasn't going to be bipedal after all this was over. Speaking of his back, it felt like his wings were at least partially through coming back, but he couldn't tell how far, and he couldn't seem to move them either. Jason considered asking about the service around here, before the door across the room opened and Twilight walked in, followed by the officer that he'd seen a few times before. They sat down across from him, staring for a few moments as Twilight spread out some papers and loosened the ropes around his wrists slightly. Jason looked down long enough to catch a glimpse under the rope, to the quickly spreading chitin on his forearms. That was kinda cool, at least. "So," Twilight began, looking up again. "Where should I start?" Jason paused, making himself look confused. "Yo no hablo ingles?" The purple mare stared, as Jason tried not to laugh. That was most of the spanish he knew, right there. "El pepe es bonita este semana?" The pope is pretty this week, maybe? Potato, possibly? "I know you speak Equestrian, let's just end this charade." "No me gusta." Jason replied, making himself look angry. The door opened again as Dash walked in, sitting down in a third chair without any prompting. "Dash, what are you doing here?" "I can do whatever I want." She replied, sniffling to herself. Definitely getting sick. "I don't think I'm breaking a law by doing this, I'm more highly ranked than anypony here." She sighed. "So how's this guy doing? I'm not sure if you've got enough rope there." "That's thirty feet per arm!" Twilight replied. "Yeah, but his upper arm is like, as thick as your thigh." Dash shot back, pointing at the arm, still partially concealed under the rolled up shirt. "No me gusta." Jason repeated again. "Oh, I know this!" The blue mare exclaimed, nodding her head as Jason repeated himself again. "He says... the door siding doesn't match the paneling." Jason nodded. "There's no way he said that! How would he even know you translated that correctly if he didn't speak equestrian?! Are you just goofing around?" "No, that's what he said." Twilight dragged her hooves down her face in annoyance. "I have things to do, do you think, human guy, that you could help me out a little?" "Why the fuck would I do that?" Jason asked, smiling widely. "You beat me around, and broke two of my ribs. I don't owe you shit." "Ugh..." Twilight moaned. "So, what exactly did he do?" Dash asked, rocking backwards in her chair and placing her back hooves on the table. "He was a ways out in the Everfree, and also armed. I'm not going to take the chance, especially if he's an unknown!" "Yeah, but what if he's got friends up there?" She queried, "Maybe you could beat him up, but twenty? Thirty? Hundreds?" "I know, but-" "What if he's a diplomat, with weapons to defend himself from Everfree stuff? Ooh, what if he's actually a mole, and this is just a way for him to figure out that most of us are worthless fighters?" "Dash, why are you-" "Oooooh, wouldn't it be cool if he has superpowers, and he's just hiding them because he wants the rustic experience of the common pon- man?" "I think that last one may be the answer." Jason spoke up. "Shut up! Listen, I'll figure out what to do later. In the mean time..." The chair floated upwards, bumping through a different door and down a hallway. "Hi!" He said to a passing pony, twisting his neck and face into strange expressions. It took all of three seconds for the pony to flee, and even before he could laugh Dash was already chuckling loudly, and even Twilight's expression seemed to lighten. "Hey, how come his fingers changed?" Twilight asked, stopping the chair and turning Jason around. She took a finger in her hoof, looking at the black that extended almost to the second knuckle. "What is this stuff?" "God dammit." Jason mumbled, spreading his fingers. "That's flaring up again?" "You know what this is?" The mare asked, losing the battle to not give his finger a slight sniff. "Oh yeah, it's like the opposite of hookworm in dogs." Jason said shortly, as he slid backwards into a cell. "In any case, we'll hold you here for questioning and then you're free to go, alright?" Jason put up a black thumb as the ropes untied and he stood up, bumping his head into the ceiling as his back gave a few cracks. "Can I get some gauze for this?" He asked, lifting his shirt and revealing some more chitin and a fucking nasty giant-ass bruise that covered his side, easily contrasting from the other skin that still covered most of his chest. Dash was busy biting her lip, as one of her hooves twitched as if she wanted to touch the wound. "I think you went overboard Sparkle." "I have trouble calming down!" She yelled back. "Sorry." She paused, turning back towards the other room with Dash. "So where's Jason again?" "At home, I think. I doubt he moved. There's only two times when he's like this, apparently when he's sick, or after we have se-" "Dash, come on!" Twilight yelled back, blushing at Jason's chuckle as it resonated off the walls behind them. "Is Scoots still in the room behind the one way mirror?" "She's your kid." "Well yeah, but sometimes she wanders around." "How did Luna see either of you as good parents?" Twilight asked. "Well in case you've forgotten, I'm awesome." The other mare sighed. "But whatever problems I have, Jason fills in pretty well. I mean, she's not a stupid filly, she know's what she's doing. It works well, kinda. I mean, sometimes I swear he loves that filly more than he loves me, and it's not like she's even his blood." "I'm sure she's glad to have you." Twilight replied, smiling as an orange foal galloped out of a door and down a hallway. Scoots grappled onto Dash, giggling as the mare tried to shake her off. "She's a real cutie too." Dash continued. "I swear, she's one of the few constant sources of joy I have, considering either Jason or I have some sort of crisis going on at some point." She sighed, watching Twilight disappear briefly into a room before she returned with a roll of gauze. "I feel sorry for you, Dash." The mare said as Dash shifted the filly onto her back. "I don't want your pity, just some peace of mind and for ponies to not move to the other side of the street when he goes by!" "Well jeez, I'm sorry." She replied, putting her hooves up defensively. Dash's ears flattened against her head. "Yeah, everypony's always sorry, huh?" She asked, grabbing the gauze and turning away before Twilight could respond. She quickly walked down the hall, handing the bandage through the bars as Jason simply started, biting his lip as if he wanted to say something, but he knew his cover would be blown. "Who's this Jason guy anyway?" Jason asked about himself, feeling slightly weird as he thought about the question. Twilight peered over, glancing at Dash with remorse. "From the beginning?" "Or just the short version." He replied, sitting down on the tiny bunk and cringing as the metal creaked. "Well here's the gist, I guess." Twilight started. "He used to be human, and I don't really know much about his past, but I think his parents got killed by somepony." "Somebody." Dash corrected. "They were other humans." "Yeah." She sighed. "So it started out great, I guess. Anyway, he caused a fair amount or trouble, and I guess Dash took him in. I'm not entirely sure why," Dash rolled her eyes, looking at the ground. "-but they both jumped town, saved a city from invaders and proved me wrong, adopted a filly and got recruited again for a few weeks before he got possessed and we had to save him, and then apparently Dash died, and Jason screwed with time to save her." "And what trouble did he cause? Murder? Rape?" "What? No?!" Twilight yelled back, backtracking a step. "He- I- Uh." Dash sighed. "He's a changeling, and maybe part of the war record isn't helpful." "It sounds so stupid when I can't even explain it." She murmured, shaking her head. "I'll see you later Dash." The other mare trotted off down the hall, closing the door to the interrogation room behind herself. Jason smiled, brushing a hand through his hair, knocking it rather painfully into the beginnings of a horn. The pain didn't matter right now though. He ignored Dash's slight whispers and got up, looking the bed over carefully, touching the cool metal with the tips of his fingers and looking at the bolts. Grabbing two of the legs, he quickly pivoted on a foot/hoof and slammed the bed into the wall, watching it blow apart. It was almost hilariously silent for a moment as Jason gathered up the new parts, listening to hoofsteps a moment later as Twilight and a guard skidded to a halt, staring at the carnage wide eyed. "Why did he break that bunk?!" She yelled. "Hey, do you have any food?" Jason asked, looking innocent. Dash choked back a laugh. "Whadda ya want?" She asked. "What? But he just-" Twilight trailed off, waving the guard away as she seemed to become more interested in Jason's diet. "Ugh, whatever." "Meat? I mean, most plant stuff works, but..." He paused. "You got any?" "No, why would we have-" "Yeah." Dash replied shortly, tossing him a package of beef jerky out of her saddlebag. "Dash, what was that?" "Beef." "Why do you have beef?" "Because it came through, and it's pretty good, actually." Twilight took a step back. "You ate it?!" "Yeah. The cow's dead either way, it's not like they talk over there." "I know, but-" "Jesus Twilight, I can eat what I want!" "Yeah, but it's-" A hoof found its way into her mouth. "It's good. The only reason I ate it in the first place is because of how much Jason talked about meat in the first place. I'm not eating red meat anyway, this is all cooked and stuff." "I'm pretty sure we cook meat." Jason said. "It's not really that safe if we don't." There was a brief silence. "So where are you from?" Twilight asked, cringing as he ate a piece of jerky. "Over...there?" He responded, throwing an arm to the side and pointing, before he noticed a hole through the side of his arm and pulled the the sleeve down before they could notice. "So why are you here then?" "That's...classified." "Oh, of corse it is." Twilight sighed. "Can I at least get your name?" "If it means I can sleep, yeah." He paused. "I'm Sir Ozlov. Son of Bob." "Are you serious?" "Oh yeah, because your names are so normal." Dash stifled a laugh, before she pulled Twilight away. "We gotta let him sleep, that's the deal, right?" "Yeah, I guess..." She said as she was dragged away. Jason made sure that they were gone, waiting a few moments to check for any noise. He only heard the breathing from another inmate and a sneeze from Dash, and quickly tore off his shirt, checking himself over. He turned his back to the smudged mirror, looking at the wings on his back. They were almost full size, but there was no way he could possibly get off the ground. He gave them a quick buzz, feeling a definite lightness on his feet. Next on the list fell to his arm, and he pulled back the sleeve. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting, but something had made him expect visible bone. Apparently the reformation of chitin was keeping his arm together while these pointless holes popped up. It looked so strange, especially considering the idea that his arm was still mostly flesh. Jason's eyes shifted to his chest, to the bruise that he'd showed off earlier. He poked it. It responded by flaring up in pain, unsurprisingly. The other side of his chest was covered in... well, it looked like an oddly colored bruise. Maybe a tattoo. Something clicked. It was the burn, from back in camp. It must be. Eww. Fuck, he needed to get out already. Jason sorted through the bars and rods, holding them up to the light. Just as he said that the lights went off, and he sighed into the darkness. His vision started to adjust, and the vague shapes of bars came back into view. A few more minutes passed as the night vision kicked in, and things were almost back to normal. Jason found a bar with bolts at either end and shoved it in between two of the bars. With his improvised bar spreader in place, it wasn't much of a jump to begin expanding the unit, screwing it one way so that the screws exited the bar and moved the bars apart. After maybe ten minutes he moved his escape plan upwards to a different part of the parallel poles. Another twenty minutes and two spots later, he slipped through, shirt and beef jerky in hand, and started walking down the hallway. He slid the shirt back on, yawning to himself as he grabbed a projector from the top of a barrel that he'd spotted earlier. Jason's fingers weren't really working as well as he would have liked; the way that they were curved and black almost made them look dead. No big deal, he'd be out of here in no time, and then he could just sleep the remainder of this stupid poison joke off. Jason faltered mid step, looking down at his shoes angrily. He didn't even need to take them off to know that his feet were hooves again. At least that wasn't all bad, he thought as he slipped off the foot protectors, looking at the black, holed chitin that lay beneath. Jason picked the shoes up and stuck a hoof/foot against the wall, testing whether or not he had his stickiness back. He did, luckily, and shakily walked his way to the ceiling. It was a lot easier when he had four points of contact, as well as wings that he could rely on. But as soon as he got to the ceiling, a door opened and a patrolling guard walked down the row of cells with a lantern, slowly checking the first few. He had some time at least, his cell was all the way at the end of the block. He averted his eyes from the guard and stepped through the same doorway upside down, glad that the ceilings were tall enough for him to still stay in the shadows that bunched near the roof. He heard giggling, and looked down to watch Scoots try to get away from the tickling hooves of Dash, making a quick turn as she tried to outmaneuver her mother. Twilight was reading a book in a nearby chair, yawning widely as she tried to keep her eyes open. Dash sneezed, blowing her nose on a tissue she grabbed as she ran by. "Don't get me sick, Dash." Twilight said. "Like it's my choice where the germs go." Dash replied. "I wish I wasn't sick though, even if it is a stupid cold." "What does Jason have?" "I dunno, the flu? It's hard to tell." The blood was starting to go to his head, bringing with it the familiar pressure as a tear went to his eye. He'd seen movies before; he wiped it away quickly, looking at the locked door that led into the rest of the jail, and the barrier to his escape. Jason heard yelling, as the door to the cellblock flew open, and the guard started yelling his head off again. "The guy's gone! He's escaped." "Bullshit!" Dash yelled, watching Twilight scramble in her drowsiness towards the door. Jason threw a piece of beef jerky at Dash as Twilight left and she got up to follow, making her look up at the looming half human stuck to the ceiling. "Uh." She said, taking a step towards the door. "Good luck." Jason dropped down as she left, pulling a penny from his pocket and starting to unscrew a bolt from the door. It popped free after a few seconds and he threw it across the room, moving down to the second of four. That went quickly as well, and he started on the third. As soon as it popped free, he heard the door swing open again, and turned to see Twilight again. Dammit, that mare was the bane of his existence sometimes. "How the hell did you break out in a half hour!?" She yelled, as he started on the last bolt. A blast of magic hit next to him, blowing off a few pieces of paint. Jason dug into his pocket, throwing the contents backwards. "Pocket sand!" He yelled, watching as the particles almost completely missed. Jason felt the bolt pop free soon enough, as he let the door fall outwards, swinging it into the path of Twilight's next spell. He threw the door towards her, sprinting through the lobby. Jason dove through the door, blowing the glass apart with his armored fists. Twilight had stopped, her mouth agape as she looked through the window. Jason rolled, turning to see that Dash had exited behind him, catching up as she flew. He dove into a bush, crashing through the foliage and down a slight hill, landing at the bottom in an exquisite sense of pain. He groaned out his dissatisfaction, feeling a muzzle push him into a bush. He turned over, grabbing Scoots from Dash's back and hugging her tightly. "You're going to have to tell me what you did." Dash said, rolling onto her side next to him and kissing his nose. "At least, so long as we don't get caught overnight, right?" "Yeah, I guess." He mumbled, putting an arm around her back. "But I guess I'll be back to normal by then anyway, and it'll be obvious what happened." "No, I think, what happened here, was that something has actually gone off without a hitch." "Heh, I guess we have a first on our hands." Jason murmured, drifting off to sleep.