The Unbroken Chain

04:40 - 12/02/1011 - Ursagrad, Chiropterra

The alarm clock rang, splitting Abdaz’s head open like an axe against firewood. Abdaz flinched, ears ringing as he fumbled for the snooze. His hoof smacked the edge of the bedside table before hitting the clock, on the second try, silencing the racket.

For a moment, he didn’t move, didn’t open his eyes. He burrowed deeper under the covers, wrapping them tight around himself as if they could shield him from the day ahead. But they were hollow, empty. The bed felt massive without Azanit’s warmth or the faint, murmured breaths of the fillies.

Wife and children, gone. Evacuated far away, to some rural countryside farm. Letters were the only things tethering him to them, and they came only sparingly. Delays, crossed wires, and many that simply got lost along the way, nevermind how low of a priority civilian mail was. Every message that did get through was a fragment of the other person, enough to sustain hope but never enough to soothe the ache.

He lay there longer than he should have, knowing that every minute stretched the limits of his morning. Still, he couldn’t summon the strength to leave. The apartment was as cold and lifeless as his weary body.

Minutes passed before Abdaz forced himself up, wincing as his body protested. His joints felt like rusted hinges, stiff and reluctant, as he shuffled to his hooves into the kitchen. The dishes had long overflowed the sink, a precarious mountain now colonised by mould and rot. The floor, neglected for weeks, had grown sticky underhoof. Somewhere, water leaked in slow, irritating drips. The faint reek of urine lingered, rising up from who knew where, and Abdaz had stopped calling the landlord. Nobody answered when he called. Nobody was ever going to answer.

Four nights out of the last week, he’d spent the night huddled in an air raid bunker packed shoulder to shoulder with strangers, the stank of sweat and fear thick enough to taste. Each time, the sirens cut through the city like the wail of a mourning spirit and Abdaz braced himself for the possibility that the apartment wouldn’t still be standing when he returned.

You know what the strangest part was? He honestly had less free time per day now than he did ten years ago. As a labourer, he’d be awoken an hour before work began, work for twelve hours a day, and that was that. Now his commute, usually forty minutes each way, was added on. Now his meagre unpaid lunch break, where he was kept within the confines of the factory, was added on. Now whatever mandatory meetings outside working hours were added on. It was waking up, going to work, working, returning home, straight to bed, and repeat. Every night. Four months straight. No end in sight.

Before stepping in the shower, Abdaz stared at his reflection in the grimy bathroom mirror as the flickering bulb above cast a pale, sickly light over his face. Just weeks earlier the image before him would’ve been unfamiliar, almost unrecognisable. There were more wrinkles beneath his eyes than there were stripes on his coat.

With a sigh he turned away, stepping into the shower. The water, lukewarm at best, drummed against his back. It washed away the grime from his coat but couldn’t touch the weariness lodged in his bones.

Afterwards, he ate a sparse breakfast in silence. Stale oat bread and lukewarm tea, just enough to keep him moving. He threw on his work jacket and stepped out.

Light ash drifted through the outside air like snow, the city streets bearing fresh war wounds. Numerous buildings were slumped inwards, only a skeleton facade standing. Fewer civilians wandered the streets, even at this hour. Yet the police were everywhere, their new militarised uniforms stark against the muted grey of the cityscape. Abdaz wondered what good they were doing here, pacing his neighbourhood, when soldiers were allegedly needed on the frontlines.

Work offered no reprieve. The factory felt even more oppressive than the streets, the air inside thick with the acrid smell of machinery running on overdrive, tools being worn down beyond use yet no replacements in sight. Zalid now had his own overseers. State-imposed managers wearing sharp uniforms and carrying blunt batons patrolled like vultures, their eyes scanning for inefficiency. Armed ponies guarded the gates, ensuring no workers entered or left without authorization. There was an Iceberg around every corner, even over Iceberg’s shoulder.

The demands were climbing ever higher, impossibly so. Each night brought new quotas, new metrics, new penalties for falling short. Demands that Spring Break, that jittery kid, didn’t meet. They decided he’d be more useful in the infantry.

Even when the air-raid sirens screamed, there would be no rest. At Perigee, orders outweighed sirens and the machines ground on, louder and more ceaseless than any warning. He’d learned to ignore the trembling in his chest when the sound came, to keep his hooves steady and his mind on the task. Stopping was not an option.

The bus shelter stood empty, its shelter offering scant relief from the morning smog. Abdaz sat on the creaking bench, water seeping into the coat on his flank. The buses were fewer now, many requisitioned for the war effort with their routes merged and schedules stretched thin, yet each more and more packed as fuel and rubber rationing forced more and more to use the buses, another system stretched to its breaking point and then pushed even more

A bus hissed to a stop in front of him. Not his. The doors creaked open, spilling passengers onto the cracked pavement. Most hurried past, faces drawn and hollow, ghosts on their way to whatever routines still tethered them to the city. Abdaz barely glanced at them, pulling deeply from his cigarette and letting the sharp bite of smoke fill his lungs.

“Daz?”

The voice sliced through the stillness, sharp and startling. Abdaz coughed. His ears flicked up. His eyes snapped to the source. A figure stepped out of the thinning crowd.

Merzaal.

He looked both familiar and alien, morphed by time and violence. Scars webbed across his cheek like a fractured pane of glass, along with faded bruises here and there. Yet, he was dressed sharply in a fashionable jacket and had his head buried beneath a wide-brimmed rancher hat.

“Merz. You’re alive.” He looked away and took a pull from his cigarette, hoping the relief it offered would take his mind off of things.

“Za’al above, how’ve you been, Daz?” Merzaal asked, his tone too bright, too eager.

Abdaz exhaled a thin stream of smoke. “Busy.”

Merzaal stepped closer, his voice carrying an awkward lilt. “On your way to work?”

A grunt. “Need to be in by six,” Abdaz replied flatly, tapping ash onto the concrete.

“Still at Perigee?”

“Eeyep.” Another pull from the cigarette, the orange glow flaring in the dim light.

“How’ve things been since…” Merzaal trailed off, his hoof brushing the scars on his face. “Well….” He let the silence hang for a moment.

Abdaz held the smoke in his lungs, letting it sting, letting it burn. He exhaled, slowly. “Busy,” he repeated.

Merzaal hesitated, his weight shifting from one hoof to the other. “You, uhm… You doing alright, Daz?”

“Why are you here, Merz?” Abdaz snapped. His voice came low and sharp, cutting through the air.

Merzaal flinched back. “I’m taking a day off work. Got some stuff to do around town.”

“You-” Abdaz blinked. Flinched. Stumbled. His cigarette faltered in his hoof. “You’re off work? Now? It’s Frinight.”

“Yeah, I needed to use up some vacation nights,” Merzaal’s tone shifted, carrying a trace of smugness now. “Meeting up with friends later.”

“And you’re…” Abdaz blinked, like he’d do to clear a mirage from his sight. “Just allowed to do that?”

Merzaal smirked, a glint of defiance in his bruised face. “Well a little more complicated than just asking nicely, Daz.”

Abdaz exhaled through his nose, the tension in his shoulders softening by a fraction, though his body still held itself taut. “How?”

Merzaal cleared his throat and sat down beside him on the narrow shelter bench, his back straight but his air casual. “After the strike, I was tossed into a cramped jail cell. Didn’t get charged with any crimes., Most of us didn’t,” Merzaal said. “In fact, the only one of us who stayed more than a night there was Spichka.”

Abdaz raised a brow. “I mean what do you expect? Course they’d go hard on the ringleader.” His voice held a certainty that didn’t need affirmation.

Merzaal snorted out a laugh, shattering the spectre of tension. “What? Spich leading? No!” he exclaimed, words still drenched in laughter. “Spich had barely anything to do with organising the strike. Spent more time sewing that damn flag together than he did doing any organising. But with the lot of us herded into jail, he steps forward and says it’s all him. ‘The whole affair is my doing,’ or something like that,” Merzaal said, dropping his voice to imitate Spichka’s accent. “‘Inciting revolutionary activity,’ in his words.”

Abdaz frowned, his cigarette hovering near his lips. “Why’d he do that?”

“Took the blame for us,” Merzaal said. “Went down hard so the rest of us could walk free.”

“And why’d that work?” Abdaz asked, as though the answer wasn’t already crystallising in his mind.

Merzaal sighed, his laugh giving way to something heavier. “Racism. Ignorance. Cops wanting less paperwork. Take your pick. The cops were all too ready to believe that an ‘overly educated and idealistic Equestrian’ whipped us ‘servile natives’ into a rabble, rather than consider that we were capable enough to organise ourselves. They didn’t want to imagine we could manage this on our own.” His voice dipped, carrying a note of something between bitterness and admiration. “The last I saw of him, they were marching him off in shackles. He even smirked at us and gave a little salute.” Merzaal paused, his words lingering. “Wherever he is now… I just hope he’s alright.”

Abdaz drew on his cigarette, the ember glowing brighter as he tried to piece together a version of Spichka that fit into this story. But the picture didn’t quite form. The Spichka he’d known was an antisocial troublemaker, an annoying brat that never knew when to shut up, who could never take a joke. Yet the longer he turned it over, the more it settled into place. Some part of him could believe it, that the fool was desperate to be a martyr. How well we know people sometimes, Abdaz mused to himself as he let out a long trail of smoke.

“Still,” Merzaal continued, his tone lightening, “after that, I was out in the cold for a while before I landed a new job. Driving lorries.”

Abdaz flicked his cigarette to the ground, grinding the stub beneath his hoof before exhaling the last of the smoke. “Weren’t you a lorry driver already? Before…” He let the word hang there.

Merzaal nodded. “That’s right. And I’ll be honest with you, the work was crap. The pay was crap. Hours were absolutely crap. But we got by, you know? Then the war started.” He let out a sharp breath. “And everything went to hell. Longer hours, harsher conditions, higher expectations. Nothing but driving, driving, and more driving on harsher and harsher schedules.”

Abdaz blinked, his gaze drifting forward, unfocused. An eerie familiarity crept into him where he didn’t want it.

Merzaal noticed, a knowing smirk tugging at his scarred lips. “Same thing’s happening at Perigee, isn’t it?”

Abdaz turned back to Merzaal, only nodding in response.

“Figures.” Merzaal leaned back slightly, his expression shifting to something more wry. “So what happened was, we drivers could only take so much. Then, the evil bastards running the company decided to stop paying us for two weeks straight, claiming ‘we’ve all got to make sacrifices’ or some crap like that.” He snorted, his tone acidic. “Funny though, I didn't see those assholes sacrificing their fancy Aquileian cars or their cushy eight-hour desk jobs.”

Abdaz’s ears twitched. “So what happened?” he asked, tone faintly challenging. “I’m assuming you didn’t sit down for a chat with your manager.”

Merzaal’s grin widened. “We took our lorries and parked them in interlocked rows at the gates to each of the company’s main depots. Blocked the whole lot. Nothing in, nothing out. They didn’t have a choice but to listen.”

“And they caved?”

“Damn right they did,” Merzaal chuckled. “We got our wages, and an increase in line with inflation. And, as you can see, we got paid time off too.”

Abdaz raised a brow. “And they didn’t fire you?”

Merzaal chuckled, shaking his head. “Couldn’t. Not enough ponies or zebras who can drive heavy goods vehicles, especially with the war choking the labour pool. Besides, we weren’t flying solo. We organised with other workers across the city. Even the military authorities pressured the company to get a deal done, they wanted us back at work and didn’t care what the bosses thought. Pressure on all sides and they didn’t have a way out.”

“And you still went through with it, even after what happened at Perigee?” Abdaz’s voice carried a weight now, a low simmer of incredulity.

“Are you kidding?” Merzaal laughed again, this time with a sharpness that cut through the chill air. “After that? I wanted to hit these bastards back twice as hard. Perigee taught me the lesson. If you’re going to fight, you need to fight prepared.”

“Huh.” Abdaz drew in a breath. “That’s it? Just be prepared?”

Merzaal shook his head. “It wasn’t just that. Took time, took effort. We had good chaps working behind the scenes to make it happen.” He paused, then pulled a small notebook and pen from his jacket pocket. With a few quick scribbles, he tore out a page and held it out to Abdaz. “Here.”

Abdaz took the paper, his eyes scanning it. A phone number, scribbled hastily. “What’s this?”

“Phone number for some labour organisers I know in production,” Merzaal said. “They’ve got a proven track record of winning real victories for workers. If you’re curious, they’ll talk to you. Just make sure you call from a phone box. Nothing they can trace back to you.”

Abdaz stared at the note, his hoof playing around with the piece of paper. Silence drifted between them. “I thought you’d be mad at me,” he said finally, his voice quieter now.

“Why?” Merzaal shook.

“I crossed the picket line,” Abdaz said, his tone hollow. He looked up at Merzaal, his jaw tightening. “I helped the company when you were trying to fight them. I’m a ‘scab’, aren’t I? Nevermind the beating you got.”

Merzaal’s expression softened, the sharpness in his eyes giving way to something warmer. “You’re a worker, I’m a worker,” he said simply. “We’ve got more in common than we’ve got separating us.”

In the distance, the familiar rumble of an approaching bus, Abdaz’s bus. With its grinding brakes approaching, the moment was broken.

Abdaz held up the note. “You think it’s really a good idea for me to get involved with these guys?”

“Definitely. But then again what else would I say?” Merzaal said, nodding with conviction. His smile was earnest now, free of smugness or bravado. “Think it over. After all, it’s only an hour or two out of your night, right?”

The bus pulled to a halt, the doors hissing open like a sharp release of breath. Abdaz tucked the paper into his jacket, placing it in a pocket where he couldn’t lose it. He gave Merzaal one last look.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said.

With that, he stepped onto the bus as the doors closed behind him. The engine roared back to life, carrying him into the grind of another working night. As it had the night before. As it would the night after. Again and again. At the mercy of his masters.

The road he was going down was no road, really. It was a roundabout. It brought him back to the same backbreaking slavery it promised to release him from. From then he could keep his head down and carry on. He could stay on this roundabout. Keep on working miserably for masters who didn't care for him and hoping they’d throw him a bone. He'd been their doormat. He'd be that doormat every night of his life until he dropped dead, or until he stood up.