Work Horses

Warning: Please mind the "sex" tag on this story. If you thought the last chapter was too graphic, you best prepare yourself for this one.

A black abyss is an interesting concept. Some imagine it as a canvas upon which a world can be created by means of pure imagination and will. Others imagine the black as pure terror, concealing monsters and demons that have no need to kill and exist for solely to inflict physical and psychological torture. Still others depict the abyss as death, the end of days, a realm where we wander aimlessly for all of eternity without thought or feeling. I contemplated all of these possibilities and came to the conclusion that all of them would be a better scenario than not being able to sleep. I hate not being able to sleep. I know I need my rest and have a lot to do the next day, but my mind races with the countless possibilities of what the future holds for me. This leaves me in a state of boredom where I feel chained to my bed yet desire to be doing something else. I lay there comparing the level of darkness in the windowless room to that of when my eyes are shut. They are the same.

My mind drifts to the events that transpired earlier; more specifically, to Rarity’s story. I started replaying in my mind how she lost ownership of her company, and I saw a magnificently clean to the point of sparkling pony with a white coat and purple mane sitting before a very solemn board of directors. I saw her face break down in a matter of minutes as she listened to how people were growing tired of her clothing line and she was being forced to sell her business.
Rarity curled her lips and desperately fought back tears, but as the bad news piled up her resolve grew weaker until, finally, she excused herself from the meeting room and sobbed outside its closed doors.

Next was how the poor unicorn dreamt of going back home to Equestria, but needed money for a ticket across the inter-dimensional border. Her resolution to the issue was a reluctant career as a miner. What came to mind was this pony wearing a hard hat in a damp, dark tunnel, accumulating stains of dust, dirt and sweat on her coat which was once white as snow. A baby blue glow of magic surrounded her horn as she searched desperately for precious stones such as sapphires, emeralds, rubies and so on. Try as hard as she might, the gems were too deep for her to detect. The panic on Rarity’s face was as plain as the horn on her head and not too far behind her was an impatient human miner, sitting atop a drill with his arms crossed. After that, poor Rarity was fired and was left to reminisce about the casual mining trips of a long, almost forgotten past with a certain Spikey-wikey.

Now I imagined Rarity walking carefully through the city’s alleys, keeping a careful eye out for pony catchers. Little did she know that they weren’t the worst threat out there. I saw her digging about in the trash for scraps of food or something that might be used to keep her warm, but as she crawled out of the filth she encountered a man and a woman, both with vicious, lustful eyes, pawing at her and slavering their jowls with the venom of their sinful thoughts. They grabbed Rarity, pinned her against a building and hurriedly undid their pants, but the pony struggled to freedom and ran out of the alley. She slowed to a halt in front of a bakery, which reminded of the wonderful moments spent with her friends. The bakery displayed all sorts of breads and pastries. The mere sight of these delectable foodstuffs would have been enough to make anyone’s mouth water, even if they weren’t hungry; Rarity’s empty stomach growled at the sight of them. After careful thinking and a sigh of acceptance, she dragged herself back to the alley where the fiendish “people” had their way with her for money.

I envisioned Rarity shamefully beckoning strangers into her little alley near the bakery. They would hold her in every position imaginable: missionary, doggy-style, orally; some would even use cheap toys and use her pain-fueled gasps and moans to fulfill their sadistic fantasies. Then one day, after Rarity was worn out, and appeared half dead behind the dumpster, a suave young man clad in a white suit and fedora strolled over, swinging a polished, black cane which concealed a blade gripped in one hand and a predator’s smile on his face that made him both approachable and intimidating. This power of intimidation is what demanded and held Rarity’s attention; what made her come out from behind the odorous rubbish was a tap of his cane on the dumpster and his soft voice, which promised her safety and any comforts she might desire. The man’s name was Sir Young Blood.

Now I saw a Rarity confident, but with a glazed look in her eyes, like that of a broken mustang. She wore the same layers of makeup as when I met her and her coat was new. It was a gift from Young Blood after her pet, Opal, died. Her clients looked cleaner and were more considerate, and they were willing to flash out more cash, but slowly they became worse and worse. The worst of them all was a man in his late thirties, developing a beer belly, with a drastically receding hairline and a heart as hard as diamond which pumped cold blood.
He took Rarity to his dingy apartment and didn’t even bother with foreplay. First he grabbed her flanks, rubbed them slowly, and lifted her tail. To Rarity this was just another classless evening, but then it all started to go terribly wrong. He was so rough, so careless and dry …The pain was sharp. She needed to slow him down, but this beast was totally in control. Finally, he threw her onto the creaky bed and quickly stripped himself of every article of clothing he wore. Rarity tried to scurry into a more advantageous position, but her legs were too shaky and she was caught up by the man’s sweaty hands. However, as much as he liked Rarity’s body, what he was most interested in was her horn. He licked it, sucked it and even scraped his teeth against it.
Finally, his lust peaked and all decency was lost. He yanked Rarity roughly by her horn and turned himself around. All Rarity could do was shut her eyes and imagine that she was somewhere else. Never before had she been forced to do something as degrading as this. She felt a building tension in her horn: something felt tighter. Then, crack! Pain as sharp as a knife and as hot as the sun struck down her horn and coursed through her body like lightning. Rarity tried to pull away but was met with resistance. In her panic, she discharged some magic that made the man yelp and release her. She ran out of the apartment and back to Sir Young Blood.
I cringed at this thought and wished that the story was over, but there was still the most disheartening part to come. For how compassionate Young Blood might have seemed to Rarity, it was only skin deep. She came to him with tears and shrieks of pain, her horn cracked and splintering, and was taken aside. Young Blood had with him a cream. Rarity did not know what this cream was, but as a vet to be I did. I couldn’t remember the chemical name, but I commonly referred to it as “bone in a can”. In surgery, it is applied directly on the fracture and artificial osteoblasts and osteoclasts have the bone healed up in a day’s time. Young Blood applied an overly generous amount and carelessly wrapped it up in gauze. He demanded to see the money, but Rarity had forgotten her coat in the apartment, obviously a different one from what she presently had on. Young Blood grew furious and yelled at Rarity, grabbing and shaking her to the point of tears. “I want out,” I imagined her muttering.
“Out? You want out?!” replied Young Blood. “The only way you’re getting out is in a catcher’s van or dying in your alley. You’re mine! Without me you are nothing!”

Returning to the present I rubbed my eyes and groaned. “Screw it.”

I threw off the sheets and get dressed in the dark with just a plain white T-shirt and a pair of jeans. Skipping putting on socks, I slip my shoes on and walk out of my small room. Only a few lights illuminated the dim, deserted hallway, sending a small chill up my spine. I never really found that chill to be a bad thing. Often times, it helped cool my head.

I aimlessly walked through the building on the first floor staying away from more lighted areas, but fearing the darker corners. If only there were windows. I’d really like to see the moon. Eventually walking bored me, so I trudged into the lounge. A few long tables from the wall on the far side lined with stackable chairs. To the right was a refrigerator sitting snuggly between the far wall and a counter holding some cabinets, a coffee maker, and a microwave. The room wasn’t spacious, but it was comfortable enough. I flicked on a fluorescent light over one of the tables, sat down, and rested my head in my hands with my elbows on the tabletop.

The images of these poor creatures kept flashing into my vision. Snapshots of those caged ponies back at the pound, all looking at me with eyes that had long since run out of tears, flooded my mind. They looked at me like I was their salvation, like I could save them all. The pain, the strife, the tears, it all disturbed me. I shook my head and tried to think of happier times. Mom and Dad. My childhood was good right? Free meals, a warm bed, plenty of love…though they tried to force all that pony crap on me. DAMMIT! My mind was flooded with these terrors yet again. Luke? He was my best friend…‘was.’ That night. That night was too real. I was there for that event. That was not my friend; that was a fiend of the shadows wearing his skin. What he did to Fluttershy…oh Fluttershy. She was so cute lying in my bed. And scaring her with that zombie stuff. I couldn’t help but laugh at the preposterous notion. The only way to “save” her was to spray Febreze under the couch. Man, that pony is something. Something special.

The faint smile on my face melted away and I rubbed my eyes. “What’s happening to me?” I groaned.

There was a knock on the open door that made me jump a little. “Sorry,” said the human at the door. “I can’t sleep.”

The young man walked toward me. He had brown, medium-length hair that was combed out of the way of his eyes and a bit of brown stubble about his chin. He was slightly taller than me and had somewhat of a scrawnier build. “You mind if I sit?” he asked.

“Uh, no, not at all,” I replied.

He sat down and looked at me, then squinted his eyes. “You’re that guy that Fluttershy likes, aren’t you? Eric was it?”

“Yeah. What’s your name?”
“Justin.”
A moment of silence passed awkwardly, then I spoke again.
“So, why can’t you sleep?”

He ran a hand through his hair and rubbed the back of his head before replying. “I had to question Applejack today and her story just really…got to me.”

My curiosity piqued. “What happened to her?”

Justin turned his eyes up to me and started, “Well, let me start off by saying that it took a while to get this information out of her. It all started about six months after ponies first came to our world.”

Justin was a great story teller. What I first imagined was Applejack smiling up to Ned Vincent, who smiled back at her. They were in his office talking business, and Applejack hopeful that she and some other ponies might be able to find work in this new world. Good arable land was becoming increasingly rare in Equestria due to a growing clan of Apples all across the map and civilization and feral wilderness such as the Everfree forest alike were using up the rest of the land. The Apples could manage for the time being, but it was going to get harder over the years. Ned outstretched his hand and presented an orchard of apple saplings in the large window behind his chair.

Next was a tearful goodbye. Applejack was next to a line of ponies, all of which looked like they were getting ready for some kind of trip. She was embracing an elderly pony with a gray mane and a light green coat and holding a hoof over the head of a young yellow filly with a red mane and large, pink bow. After Applejack, a large, red stallion came and embraced the same two ponies in the line. All four were crying, but they knew that this was the best thing to do. That was the last Applejack ever saw of her granny and sister.

At first, work was easy. All they had to do was water and fertilize the saplings until they were mature, which didn’t take long thanks to the apple farming expertise of the Apple family. The saplings were full grown in a year and began producing apples that summer. This is when things took a sharp turn for the worse. Applejack could tell things weren’t right the moment she put a hoof to the bark. The first tree felt rough and stiff, not at all like the trees back home. She bucked the strange tree for the first time and a sting shot up her hind legs. Where her hooves had struck the trunk there were hoofprints, but not a single apple had fallen. She kicked again, harder, but the fruit still did not yield. Another buck, and another, and another, and finally a single apple fell, but it did not fall into the basket as she had intended it too. Something was amiss.

Time went on and the harsh work took its toll on the normally resilient Apples. Several fell to exhaustion and injury and some even chose to return home, but their window of liberty did not stay open for long. Tickets to Equestria had increased in price and were well out of range of the lowly farmers. They had no choice but to continue working. Living conditions worsened for ponies at this time. No longer were they living lives of lavish privileges and higher status. They had onyly the same benefits as any human would have, perhaps less. Working conditions were worsened as employers no longer had to let their ponies go home after a certain number hours of daily work. Sure, earth ponies are more durable than humans, but the lengths that they were driven to were too much for the poor creatures.

One by one, they dropped like flies. I imagined them stumbling over to a tree, which had a depressed ring from countless kicks, give it a half-hearted buck, and weakly land back on all fours. I saw knees buckled, bodies fallen over and final breaths exhaled. The number of Apples slowly dwindled even as Vincent alleviated the work load so as to make sure they lasted longer. Each death struck Applejack with a painful blow to her heart, but one in particular pushed her over the edge.

It was the day after a somewhat large storm. Several apples were shaken loose from their branches, so the work day started out with gathering what was salvageable. Applejack’s older brother, Big Macintosh, was pulling a cart carrying full apple baskets. What Justin described next was rather brief and didn’t really have a lot of detail, but Applejack wasn’t watching when it happened.
She heard somepony lose their footing in the mud, a grunt, the creaking of wheels, a deep-voiced yelp, a crack, and then silence followed by a crash. Applejack turned around to find her brother lying on a muddy hill with several apples around its base next to the cart, which was damaged after colliding into a tree. She ran over to him but couldn’t bear to look for long.
His eyes were wide open, his tongue lolled out with blood slowly gurgling from his mouth and a broad bruise striped his neck. She buried her face into his shoulder to cry and felt its remaining warmth, but this was no longer the living pony she had called brother. This was a worn out carcass. Or at least that’s what Vincent saw.
The large stallion was buried in a far off hill. Applejack didn’t understand why the human workers felt the need to put two planks of wood in the shape of a “T” over his mound, but she didn’t mind too much at the time. At least they engraved his name and a few kind words onto it.

Since then, Applejack became less social to anyone or anypony she came in contact with. Even Fluttershy, who was allowed an occasional visit whilst under Vincent’s supervision, was given the cold shoulder. The lonely earth pony hardly said a word to anyone, until she stopped receiving her pay. When she confronted Vincent with the issue, he gave a half-hearted attempt at looking sincerely sorry. It had become too hard for him to pay all of his workers and donate to pony charities, so he cut out the middleman and decided he was doing the ponies on his orchard a charity. “Doin’ us a charity?” replied Applejack, aghast. “We’re the ones doin’ the charity work! We’re buckin’ hard-as-nails trees for peanuts! How the hay are we supposed to live without money?”

She made no attempt to hide her anger. She had left her home and family, was forced to work unreasonable hours for minimum wage, and just lost her brother. She wanted it to be known that she was ready to pack up and walk out the door. Unfortunately, Vincent had planned for this. “Y’all can stay in the new stables I had built, and I’ll have some workers feed ya every day.”

This was an insult Applejack could not ignore. She slammed her hooves down on Vincent’s desk and stood up as calm as a tiger. “We ain’t some dumb animals you can just pen up and put to work. Either ya loosen our workload and raise our salaries, or y’all can kiss our flanks goodbye!”

I envisioned Vincent smile his sly, cocky smile as he reached into a desk drawer to retrieve a document. He laid it before the orange mare and explained, “Accordin’ to this slip of paper, y’all ain’t got that right. Effective today, y’all are my own personal army of work horses. Like it or not Applejack, you ain’t goin’ anywhere without my say so.”

Applejack’s eyes scanned the document several times. A few of the words flew clear over her head, but she understood the gist: it meant Vincent wasn’t lying. She felt a lump in her throat, but wouldn’t allow herself to show defeat in front of this monster. She looked around his desk for anything that might distract her. The only thing she could find to focus on was an envelope with the address 1587 Luz de Verdad Rd., NM written on the front.

“We researched the address,” continued Justin. “I guess it’s some kind of research facility. We’ll know what it is for sure sometime soon…at least, I hope so. Well, I should probably go. I think I can get some sleep now. See ya around Eric.”

I said goodbye to Justin, watched him walk out of the lounge and listened as his footsteps became quieter and quieter. I was alone again, but the story didn’t help to put my mind at ease. No wonder Applejack thought we were monsters. I find it curious that she came to trust us, or at least me, so quickly. I stared off into space for several minutes before I heard more foot-steps, or rather hoof-steps.

I glanced at the doorway again and saw the faint black, masculine shape of a pony. Curious, and with nothing better to do, I followed it. I only had to stick my head into the hallway to see where the gray, winged stallion was headed: a sort of nursery for ponies to recuperate and socialize in private. At this time of night it was fairly empty, but there were a few ponies now and again who needed to do the same thing Justin and I were doing: that was shake off our insomnia. I waited for the gray pegasus to disappear behind the door before I dared to approach the large window, and even then I kept to the shadows.

This dark stallion had a sleek, straight mane and a neat, plain tail, both a slightly lighter shade of gray than his coat. He kept a stern look on his face, as if he was perpetually unhappy with his surrounding environment. The mark on his flank was that of a dagger, which was pretty surprising to me. Why would a pony have a talent with a blade? Perhaps he was supposed to be a guard of some sort? But why, in this day and age, would he be a guardian to anyone? I soon disregarded the curious marking and told myself that speculating on unknowns such as this were fruitless and even counterproductive to trying to ease my mind.

The stallion, despite his grim face, had some compassion in his heart. He had brought a bottle of medicine to a pair of other ponies, both of which were pegasi. One was an orange stallion with a blonde and red mane and tail and blue hooves. The other was a gray mare with a red and white mane and tail. The latter was looking rather ill and was curled up snuggly against the former’s torso. I could hear a muffled “Thank you” from the orange stallion, but the good Samaritan simply replied with a grunt and a swift turnaround to the door. While the healthy pegasus nursed the sickly one, I could hear a southern drawl emanating from the other side of the nursery.

“It’s great to finally see you again sugar cube.”

“I thought you didn’t like me anymore,” replied a hushed voice that I could just barely hear. These are some thin windows. Then again, it’s pretty quiet at this time of night.

“Oh Fluttershy, I didn’t mean to shrug you off like that. It’s jus’ you were with that crook Vincent all the time an’ I couldn’t bring myself to be happy in front of him. I really do feel sorry for treating you like that.”
“I understand. He…wasn’t a nice man. He…he…” Fluttershy trailed off and started to sob in a hushed way. I need to be clear about how she cried here. It was a kind of crying where one could tell that she had cried about this before, but never let another soul see. At first, one might just chalk it down to being a part of her quiet nature, but if one had half a care to stick around a little longer and watch, one would see that there was more.

It was a sort of glimpse into her psyche that opened before the viewer a novel of torture, deceit and darkness. This was the crying of an angel who had not fallen, but was dragged down and forced to burn in Hell: where tears burn like acid and sobs fall not on kind ears, but on pointed ears that would stir the curiosity of the demon of malice. Her cry churned a fire in my belly that filled me with rage for this demon and filled my heart with sorrow and pity for this forsaken creature.

Applejack embraced her friend and gently shushed her while stroking her mane. “There now sugar. You’re safe now. Ya wanna talk about it?”

“No,” replied Fluttershy weakly. “I don’t want to think about it anymore. I just want to go home and never think about this place ever again.”

Fluttershy lifted her head from Applejack’s shoulder and looked downward, her lip still quivering with tears still dripping from her chin. “Well hold on. What about that Eric feller? What about all he’s done for ya? Ya don’t wanna forget him do ya?”

“No, I don’t want to forget Eric.” Fluttershy sniffled and looked Applejack in the eye. “He was sort of a meanie to me at first, but he’s the only one who treated me like any other pony…or person. He never gawked at me or treated me like a pet…except when he had me eat cereal on the floor, but he didn’t know better. I don’t think he really likes ponies that much Applejack, but I don’t think he hates us, or is incapable of liking us. I think he’s just confused.”

Applejack raised a single eyebrow at this. “How do ya reckon?”

“Well, he wants to be a veterinarian, so he knows how to take care of animals, and in this world, ponies are just another animal. But ponies like us can talk and feel emotions. I think to Eric, we’re a mix of animal and people and he just doesn’t know which side he should take. But I know deep down he just wants to do the right thing, and I think that that’s opened up his heart for compassion to ponies like us, and I’m grateful. He’s become such a good friend to me. I know one day we’ll have to go back to Equestria and I’ll probably never see him again, but even if we’re just faint memories to each other we’ll always be friends right?”

Applejack smiled. “Even if y’all forget each other, y’all are still friends in some mysterious way. Ya may not know it at the time, but you’ll always be together.”

Suddenly, my face felt sore. I had been smiling wider than my face would allow. As I turned around I thought to myself, why so serious, and quietly laughed. A yawn signaled that I was finally ready to go to sleep. It must’ve been my body’s way of saying, “Quit being such a stalker.”