A Slave's Freedom

It's not about the dry grey grains that slide between my toes, but that I and Rainbow Dash have been walking for hours, and all we've walked is further and further into the tunnel. Not one other route has been found. We've been stuck walking this way. The only thing that has changed is the water, which is starting to fill up more and more with every drip coming from the darkness. Those drips sound like distant cannon fire we slaves heard once before. The explosive bang could be heard from anywhere on Sweet Acres: the barn, where we'd sleep at night, the Master's home, or even in the fields, where our own struggle remained. I knew who owned the cannon fire, and so did the rest of my brothers and sisters. It was the Northerners, they were coming. Unfortunately the cannon fire wouldn't stay for long. It was sent away; they were retreating. Once it all faded, we went back to living the life we've been destined to live, waiting on the slim hope that they would come again.

Now that I think about it, maybe the cannon fire wasn't them. Maybe the slave masters were just plotting to confuse us, make us slaves think we're being fought for and someday be free to escape and leave them without a trace. I don't want to someday be freed, though. I want to be free. No sir, I'm not going down without a fight. I want freedom, and whether I'm with my brothers and sisters, or with a clown horse, I'm going to fight for it.

So I trudge on in those grey grains. They don't slide between my feet like they used to, the water carries them now. My feet are cold, my body is aching, and my God I'm flowing through the river. Flowing down stream quick, just like before.

I look over at my partner, that clown horse--or was it a pony?--whose problems equaled mine. She is a feisty loyal mare who likes her way.

How do I know that?

"Dyson, get over here!"

That's why.

Letting my thoughts veer into the river, I turn to my little pony and come to her aid. "Hiya," I say, rubbing her ear. "What be the problem, Dash?

"Stop that!" she begs while batting my hand with her hoof. "It's hard to act serious when you're trying to feel up my ear."

"Sorry, can't help it. You just so irresistible." I earn a well-made groan for that one. "'Sides, in all my days of workin' on Sweet Acres, I know that a good rub down be needed whenever you are in a stressin' situation. Good idea, ain't it?"

She groans. "Dyson, focus."

"Sorry," I say, looking into the dark depths again. "Say, what're ya focusin' on?"

"Could a white man speak without some nigger talking in his ear?"

"Yes, sir!" I sa--oh no, I said that out loud! "I mean--y-you can say what ya wanna say, Dash."

"I didn't say anything, Dyson," she says while raising a brow at me. "Are you all right?"

What should I say, what should I *say!?*** "Um... ya, all fine and dandy, ma'am." If I get nailed to the cross by 'er, I'll be sayin' my prayers, Momma.

She  laughs at me, which is something I wasn't expecting. "Ha-HA! Dyson! You crack me up! We're not in some academy! You don't have to call me ma'am!" She giggles after every little word before looking at me with tears--those are happy ones--racing down her cheeks. "Dyson, I'm not some master you need to be formal to. I'm your friend! Did you ever do this to your friends?"

"No, just to Master when he wants my attention," I reply.

She wipes her face of her tears before staring at me with the intent of a murderer. "Are you saying I'm like him?"

I shake my head rapidly, hoping that it won't suddenly pop off my neck and go into the air. "I'm not! Honest!"

She brings her face close to my ear. With the warmth like the water from before, she whispers, "Then don't act like I'm him."

Don't act like she's him... Don't act like she's him... Don't act like she's him...

The phrase repeats in my brain for more than just a few seconds. It sits there, echoing, waiting for me to understand that she's serious, that this is no fluke, that there's no end in sight for this type of reasoning. I have never been told to reason before, I had to develop that skill on my own. Master never liked it when I reasoned, he said I was given too much freedom when I sat there, holding that book in my hand, learning about those stories: fantasy books that talk about them Princesses that need their knight and shining armor. Despite them being fake and just being stories, I learned a lot from them. They taught me to not only reason, but to survive. No other words were needed; we need to move on to survive.

"So," Rainbow Dash says, bringing my attention to her. "Does your arm hurt?"

I look away from her. Those murky waters look dark... "Yeah, it doe--YA-OW! What in the Lord's name are ya doin'?"

She chuckles. "That's for rubbing my ear."

Note to self: don't rub her ear. She don't like it none. "Ya don't need to be so rough."

Those brows fall to a dreaded slant. "Rough is my middle name."

"I thought your middle name wa--"

Snap.

"YA-OW!"

"Don't you say a word about my middle name! It's... personal."

I smirk. "Whatever ya say there, Dash." She rolls her eyes at me before pointing her hoof at the--is that more than just a river?

"We're going to be swimming from here on out, Dyson." She turns to me. "You know how to swim?"

I smile. "Of course!" She raises a brow. "Don't ask me the know how! We gotta swim!"

"I'm not raising it because I'm wondering how you know, I'm just wondering how you swim." She looks at my arms. "Those things don't really look water-ready..."

I eye her wings. "Them things are water-ready?"

She growls. "Water-ready as your wittle arms would ever be!" To show me, she tries to bust them out. Unfortunately, she grimaces as her eerie reminder of our accident braces her body. "They are, I swear!"

Seeing her pain--that face--burning--it causes my ribs to cry too. Maybe we're both pained to see the other hurt. Maybe they want freedom too. "Right... I will be rememberin' your wittle wings too."

She groans and moves in front of me, plunging straight into the water with a splash, covering the walls with water. She comes out from the depths and smiles. "Are you going to jump in or complain about me calling you a wittle human?"

Somewhere, deep inside my body, a force is engaged. Without warning, I jump into the pool of water and dive in. Skipping to check if she was behind me or not, I swim further into the depths of darkness. I can barely see a thing. A few clumps of dirt drift on by, the waters we swim in sound lifeless, and the only one who is full of life (other than me) is Rainbow Dash, who--I check behind me--is staring at me, menacingly.

She points ahead and glares at me. Guess I better swim some more.

After a brief few seconds, I stop again. I feel Rainbow Dash's head bump into my back, sending shots of pain through my spine, but I bear it for a moment. I spotted something moving. Something large. Something... with blue glowing eyes.

We've gotta get out of the water.

With a frantic expression, I point above and make a sign of a bubble drifting up. She nods and zooms up to the surface with me. Breaking it, we catch our breaths, and realize we're already near the ceiling. One wrong move, and I could be impaled by an attached pointed rock jutting from the ceiling. I don't know what they're called, but they do look interesting.

"What's the matter?" Rainbow Dash asks. "I could've gone for another few minutes!"

I shake my head. "Not with what I saw."

"What did you see?"

I sigh. "It was large, wavy, and had a tail zippin' with lightnin' all 'round 'er."

She gasps. "You saw an eel?"

"An eel?" I ask, not knowing what she meant. She sighs.

"Dyson, it's an electric eel. Ever heard of electricity?"

I shake my head. "Never used no electricity on the farm. At least, not that I recall..."

She brings her hoof to her face. "Look, electricity is something that can kill you if you aren't too careful. How big were those eels?"

I look back at what I saw, the brief glimpse I had. He was large, huge, like a giant snake rattling in the fields, except ten times larger. He was swimming. Swimming fast. "Huge."

"That's great, but how huge?" Rainbow Dash spreads her forehooves wide. "This long?"

I shake my head. "Put about a hundred of me in a line and you'd have just the length of 'im. He's a big one. Bigger than three houses combined!"

She gasps and puts her hooves to her head. "Oh no..."

"What?" I ask. I see her body shake, while her hooves slowly moving from her face.

"That isn't an ordinary eel." She lets her hooves rest under the water. "It's her.

"Her?" My eyebrow is probably raised a bit too high.

She swims away from the open waters. "We need to find some dry land to talk about this..."

"How d'ya think we'll find that? There's not even enough light in this here cav--"

She slaps her wet hoof to my mouth, and shushes me softly. "Just follow me, Dyson. It'll be easier if I am point." Eyebrow is raising higher... "Please?"

I give into her demands and nod.

"Good," she says, giving me a brief smile before letting her dirty hoof pop off my mouth. I choke a bit, feeling a bit of her dirty water slide down my throat. Feels wrong to be choking on what I drank mostly; must be the surroundings. "You coming?"

I swim towards her while making sure my head doesn't become part of the scenery. Coming to her side, I see the land she's talking about. The cave raises up there, and so does the land, letting just a bit of room for us to sit and rest. A breathing room. Somewhere to be safe from her...

I watch as she clip clops onto the breathing hole's dirt (still grey grains but dry). Her wings are soaked. Her mane is soaked. Everything is soaked.  She's probably mighty cold too, that water wasn't exactly warm as it was before. Something else down here changed, though, and I can't put my finger on it. Was it the temperature? The atmosphere? Something did. All I see is grey. Grey behind her.

"Gosh, you're dense, get up here before she gets ya!" she hollers, grabbing my attention. I quickly paddle my way over and climb the grained haven. She smiles and pats beside her. "It's cold down here. Phew."

"Just the water," I say, taking a seat beside her. "It ain't as warm as it was before."

She nods and scoots over. "Sorry about before. I just don't like being touched without warning." She looks at her hooves. "Especially my hooves. Hooves are off-limits even for the awesome ponies that aren't me!"

"So what about before--"

"That was because I was scared okay?" She puts a hoof to my chest. "You better not tell anyone I was scared. I have a reputation to keep." She removes the hoof from my chest and turns her head towards the water.

The air around us is thin. It's getting hard to breathe. "Look, we only have a little bit of time to talk about this, so let's stay on topic." She takes a deep, shaky breath. "She is a giant electric eel with large sharp teeth. Most eels would attack if provoked or as self-defense, but this eel will hunt after anything. Her strike has the ability to kill!"

"A killer electric underwater thing..."

She nods, rather frantically, holding her hooves to her head. "We're just going to have to try and swim past without getting killed." She takes a loud gulp. "That's what Daring Do would do."

I raise an eyebrow at her. "Daring Do?"

"She's the coolest pony ever!" Rainbow Dash exclaims while hopping up and down giddily. "I'll have to show you her when we get back to Ponyville! She's got the best books ever an--"

"Books? You mean she a character from a book?" I ask.

She shakes her head. "She is in a book, but she's also alive. She's gone on the adventures herself so she retells them an--"

"Publishin' them to the rest of the world?"

She nods and lays her head on my shoulder. "And you said you were just a slave."

I frown. "But I am, Dash. Slave then, and a slave now."

She pulls her head away from my arm--it felt nice for that moment too. "What do you mean? Aren't you free now?"

I shake my head. "I hear 'im. Y'know, Master? He be talkin' to me lots, whenever and wherever! He be there tellin' me that I am still his slave. Can't resist 'im if I even tried!"

She frowns. She can't deny that we're stuck here. This isn't freedom, this is slavery without the chains, without family, and  without all the bells and whistles the white man got. Big cigars, hats, boots; all new and fresh from the mill, while my clothes are tattered, worn, and as I know them, gone. The last fabric left behind still grips to my general zone, but no where else can I say I'm covered, I'm shielded from the elements. I'm just Dyson, all black and nothing to show for--

"YA-Hey!" I glare at Rainbow Dash. Apparently my clothes don't shield me from hooves. "What're ya--"

"You have me, don't you?" She is smiling at me. "Don't you?"

You have me, don't you?

Her voice is what I've been hearing lately. She's overshadowed his voice, and I barely hear him calling my name. He's not there, is he?

You bet your slave ass I am, boy.

I gasp. "Dash, he's here."

She grips me tight.

She won't be able to save you. She just a horse, and you are some ragtag slave of mine that decided to try an' escape the farm!

I grip her tightly, my eyes beginning to close, and my ribs are crying out to me, begging me to shove her away.

All she will do is hurt you, Dyson. Hurt you like you hurt me.