Escape

“I´m sorry.” The stallion jumps with a small squeak coming from him, like he has seen a ghost. Are these ponies so unused to threats that he took it for real? Or is there another reason he fears me?

“I´m sorry, that I exploded on you like that,” I repeat myself.

“Oh it´s all right. We all have our moments,” he says with a nervous chuckle while looking left to right. A short moment of silence presents itself.

“What even is your name?” I ask him. I haven´t

“I´m Fruity Loops.” He smiles awkwardly. Yeah, his name definitely fits him. He looks like a fruit bowl with his colours. “And what may yours be.” Ok. Don´t say escalate. He didn´t mean anything by that. I quickly take in a breath. Before I, well cry. Is it better to cry than to be unnecessarily angry? Definitely.

“I don´t know my name.”

“Well that ugh… sucks. I mean, yeah.” Wow how informative and helpful he is. I will definitely remember all my memories and get go home, with this kind of advice. If I even have a home, it isn’t like I remember.

“Hey, why are you acting like that to me. Why are you acting scared around me?” Damn it I am getting emotional again.

Ideal Idea is keeping an eye and ear out for the child. As you should with such a child. And she noticed that he is distressed. This is perfect, in a perverse way. She is purposely helping the colt when he is in emotional need. Even with her stone faced demeaner. She wants him to look up to her. Or at the least like her.

He will become dependent on her emotionally if he gets all the support, he needs from her. At least that’s the idea. She doesn´t put the child´s interest into the front. The revolution´s interest is of much greater importance. In fact, the revolutions interest lies in the child´s benefit.

Obviously again, she isn´t good with children. But she doesn´t need to, this child funnily enough behaves better than some adults she has met in her life. Excusing themselves after they did something wrong, it is unlike their age.

But it´s still foal.

With her plan being thought over again she walks over to the distressed fruity and the almost crying colt. “He is scared of you because you´re an alicorn.”

The child´s face turns to confusion “, a what?”

“An alicorn.”

“I heard that. I mean, what is an alicorn?”

“A pony that has wings of a pegasus, a horn of a unicorn that can use magic and the strength of an earth pony.”

He looks around himself, he sees his gray coat, horn, and wings as well as his turquoise mane “Oh really, I haven´t even noticed them.” He says in genuine surprise.

Now of course Ideal wondered what the past of this colt is. But she couldn´t find the time, energy, or resources to research that. And if it isn´t a guarantee to help her and her goals, she could put it in the back burner for the future.

But this really confused her. She tries to go over to another subject “You are going to get a lot of attention for being the only known alicorn. You certainly…”

“With attention you mean getting shot at,” he says spitefully.

“Yes.” Now that explains it. The griffons tried to shoot at the child. And she reacted with her magic subconsciously, like catching a falling object. But expanded manyfold because of her race and therefor power. “But I wanted to say you probably don’t want to be known as “The alicorn”. How about a name, even if it is a temporary one? It is better than nothing.”

He looks into her eyes without real focus. “I guess.”

“Do you have a suggestion?”

“No.”

Ideal thought for a while “We found you while we were fleeing the camp. How about Escape.”

We have been going again for a while. I am again on Ideals back. The name “Escape”, it is weird, but I kinda like it. And I´m also starting to enjoy the free ride from Ideal. It is comfy and I don´t have to move.

Maybe things are going to get better. If I don´t find my home if I even have one. I hopefully get a comfy bed … sometime. Yeah, about that I don´t know “Where are we even going?” I ask.

“To Dark wing a thestral township.” Ideal answers

“Ah, Ok,” I have no clue “What is a thestral.”

What follows is an explanation about what these bat ponies are. They are a nocturnal race, known for their love for fruit. They along all other species have been segregated, with the only exception of the griffon to enforce said segregation.

So, they were racist griffons that attacked me. Did their bias cause them to attack? I´m thinking too much about it. It doesn´t really matter now, it already happened. Maybe it was the corpse lying next to me, letting them think I killed him, me being an “alicorn”, entering the grounds unauthorized, they could have been ordered to shoot trespassers, or maybe they were prejudiced. Probably a mix of these reason.

Luckily, I didn´t dream last night. You can´t kill people without it leaving some psychological scars.

Let´s avert this topic. With that I ask what she meant by “can use magic”, and she meant it literally. I still have no idea how to do “a magic”, but that confirms it. I killed those griffons. Instinctively or magically and in self-defence, which doesn´t make it really any better.

And again, I brought up a different conversation topic. It isn´t like there are better things to do than walk and converse.

“Why do they do it?” I ask her, while we were on the topic of segregation.

“It depends on who you ask. Some say it is for our own good to stay with our own kind. Others say it is because their griffon race is naturally superior. At the end it doesn´t matter; the result is the same. They all deserve the bullet, for robbing us of our freedom.” She takes out a cigarette, it takes her multiple attempts to get the lighter to work “Don´t understand me wrong, Griffons aren´t inherently evil. We shouldn´t shoot all griffons that would make us worse than them. The supremacist I mean.

“The griffons have been lied or forced to, letting them think that it is in their best interest to oppress, rather than fight against those that order them to oppress.” She takes a short time to think. “Now they can´t even imagine a world without their superiority. The society is built upon it. For example, that little camp you freed us from is one of many sites that make up the backbone of the resource economy, practically a slave economy. We dug out the iron, going towards a corporation. that griffons with machinery and an actual education processed, to… build weapons that keep us in the mines.”

Is she a book? That is quite an essay. But still, this makes me quite … upset is a too weak word for it. I killed creatures that just hated me and it wasn´t even really their fault. Partially.

Ideal seemed to notice it as she continues “Now you, killing those griffons wasn´t a bad thing just because they were fed lies. It was their own decision to attack you, Escape, you acted in self-defence. In fact, it was good that you killed so many. Every dead soldier is one less enemy we must deal with.”

“Why didn´t you just flee to another country?” I ask “, if it´s so bad here?”

“What country? The whole damn known continent of the frontier is controlled by martial Theodoro and his thugs.” She answers. Wait, a whole continent controlled by one dictator, that is too extreme. No, it´s dreadful not even escaping is possibility. Well, escaping through the ocean will practically be suicide “, and we should rather take our chances overthrowing the government than going on the seas of chaos.”

Then I noticed something in her little preach. “Who is “we”.”

“Do you want to hear a funny theory of mine?” She says without a smile. Ok what has that to do with anything? But I nod anyway. “So, the economy needs very cheap labour in form of prisoners. So, what do you do if you don´t have enough prisoners, not enough criminals?” another pause. “You invent them, you incarcerate them under the slightest suspicions, for minor, or non-existent reasons. They put me into the camp for treason. Now the funny thing is, they were right. They had a lucky shot; I am indeed a revolutionary. But they just guessed, finding themselves right afterwards.”

“A revolutionary?”

“That would be the romantic word for it. A terrorist, a rebel or insurrectionist are also what they call the liberation front…” She pauses again, thinking “That´s what I would call our organisation. But we have been most likely been decimated, practically disbanded.”

Now I know that I, as an alicorn, am a little stronger than other magic users. The griffons underestimated me when they shot at me. With that little thought I had a question.

“Can I help?”

////

Her plan works. It works a little too quick. Yes, she wanted Escape on her side eventually, but she doesn´t want him to lose interest in the middle of a fight, like a child would do with a newfound hobby. She wants him fully onboard she must give him more perspective.

“You can. It isn´t like you will get a membership card or that I can stop you from that. But tell me something, Escape.” She picks the child from her back and puts him front of her to look into his eyes. “You, a child that is not even barely of the age to consent, want to fight a cause he barely knows? Can you even read?” He shakes his head a little dejected. “You want to fight for a future, in a present that you can´t even remember. You, want to become a child soldier?”

Escape slowly starts to become teary eyed. “Yes *sniff*. I don´t want to *Sniff* but I don’t have a choice I don´t want to hide forever I would rather want to *sniff* to DIE. You said it yourself, this isn´t a world where I would fit in. There is no alicorn township even if I *sniff* wanted.” he says in an angry tone while trying to avoid crying. He approaches Ideal, standing right in front of her, he looks up to her “Please Ideal, I don´t want to run away *sniff* and I don’t want to kill anyone.”

Ideal already regrets how she is handling the child. But some tears must be paid. And she would rather give herself to the authorities than sweet talk reality.

Without even a flinch Ideal says ",you will have to kill way more.”

“I know but it will stop won´t it?”

“Eventually.”

“Then let me help.”

“…Very well.”