//------------------------------//
// Chapter 2 
// Story: What We Are 
// by Twisted Brew 
//------------------------------//

I hate it here...

It's been a whole week now, and, judging from past experiences, you should only have one more and some change to go. It's passing by pretty quickly, thanks to the rather cute company in the cell next to yours. Jade has been nothing short of a treat after she dropped the whole Big Bad Wolf act she tried to play with you on the first day. You've spent the last week talking with her, the two of you swapping memories and stories about yourself and the species you came from. She was surprised to hear a lot of what you had to say, finding most of it unbelievable. More than that, she shared some of the tales about these ancient humans that her people apparently tell stories about. A lot of it revolved around humans being these great leaders and tamers that could command nearly any creature to serve them, so long as they could best them in a battle of dominance; Beastmasters, she called them. Her descriptions of them were definitely as human as they came, if also giving you the impression that they were brick-shit houses made of muscle that ran off of nothing but testosterone and protein. The only thing you can picture that might be close to what she is imagining is someone like Arnold Shwarzenegger with hair down to his tits, riding on the back of a manticore while David Bowie is sat atop a pegasus, made of lightning, tailing behind him.

In short: she's out of her fucking gourd.

As mad as she may seem, she's still pleasant to be around and easy on the eyes. Aside from all of that, diamond dogs themselves seem pretty put together from how she's explained it. There's a lot about her kind that is very similar to dogs or wolves in your world. They have a pack mentality and are undyingly loyal to the members of their pack. There's a pack leader, which makes sense enough on its own. The biggest and strongest dog runs the show. They look out for each other and, unlike dogs or wolves, they dig holes looking for gems. These gems are used as currency for them, which you assume must be hell on their economy, what with the constant digging and unearthing of more gems, lowering their value. However, a lot of species accept gems as a form of payment, so you assume that they only really use them to trade with other colonies and races. You'd ask for more detail on how their economy works if you cared enough to, but just the thought of trying to figure it out gives you a headache, so you let it lie.

Aside from that, she was more interested in you. After a few days of telling her about your race, she seemed less interested in your species as a whole and kept digging for answers about yourself in particular. The idea of how the other humans run things and function almost seems to disgust her, but hearing about you and how you deal with things always gets her excited for whatever reason. You can't imagine what's going on in that head of hers. With most, you would just shove her off and ignore her oddness. However, you find yourself curious about the things that are running through her mind. It could just be the proximity effect, developing a so-called connection with her since she's really the only one you can talk to during this time. That doesn't seem right though. You suppose, in some weird way, you actually kind of like her.

Unlike a lot of the ponies you know, along with their habits, Jade and her crowd just seem to make sense; which is more than what you can say about the society you've been struggling to adapt to for the last year. It's strange to think that it'll only be another few weeks before your one year anniversary of arriving here. So much time has passed by, and so fast, a fair amount of which you have spent in this very building, walking down these halls and being led to the cell that might as well have your name on a plaque bolted to one of the bars.

Once a day, you and your new friend are allowed to go the outside courtyard for some sunshine and fresh air. Of course, they take you out separately. Jade is always the first to go out and then you follow shortly after her return. The guard in front of you opens the door to where your cell is and allows you to walk in first. Staying close, the mare closes the door behind you and moves to unlock your cell. Meanwhile, your eyes scan the all-too-familiar living space, quickly resting on the excited looking dog pressed against the bars. Her little fluffy tails wags as she sees you come in, her face pressing against the bars as if trying to squeeze her head through them. There's a bright smile on her face as she watches you trail behind the guard and you notice the subtle drop in it as you walk back into your cell.

The guard pony closes you in and locks the cell door behind you. "Lunch will arrive in twenty," she says sternly, taking a step back to observe you in your entirety. "Behave and I won't feed it to you in a doggy dish."

There's a soft growling that reaches your ears as the mare says this and turns to walk away. Oddly enough, you notice that the growl didn't come from you. This has become more and more regular as of the past few days. It's not unnatural for a guard to give you lip, or for you to react with small forms of aggression. What's new is that Jade seems to be taking your place in that department. Every snark, every quip and remark that has been aimed at you has been met with a reaction from her before you could even think to.

Not feeling up to dealing with the nonsense today, you move to your bench, hearing the external door close as you turn around to rest your backside on the uncomfortable seat. As you finally sit, you hear the lock click from the door, sealing you and Jade in this room even if you somehow manage to get out of your cells. Your eyes soon wander to Jade, who is staring at the door with an almost muderous expression. After about half a minute of staring, the fur on her neck and back begin to settle. You've come to recognize this form of body language as her calming down. You watch as her tense muscles soon relax as well before she pulls away from the bars she's been standing at since you came in and moves to sit as close to you as she possibly can from her cell.

You get the feeling that she's judging you, based on the way her eyes are boring into your skull. It doesn't take long for her to begin voicing her frustrations. "I don't see why you put up with their crap." Here we go again. "How can you just let them treat you like that without fighting back?"

Time for a history lesson, I guess.

"Yeah, I tried that the first few times they put me in here. All it did was give them a reason to keep me longer and I'd rather not stick around in this place any longer than I have to." Thinking back, it was the first time they brought you here that led to you biting your first pony. The remarks the stallion made to you that day were plain and easy enough to ignore. It was when he shoved you against a wall...

That's when you finally lost it.

That pony thought he was tough, thought that no one could touch him. You proved him wrong that day, showing him just how weak he really was; how weak his flesh was and how strong your teeth were. He never came back after that day. You've never even seen him outside of the jailhouse. You like to think that he left town with a whole new outlook on life and a fear that you were coming for him. Obviously, you have no intention of actually going out and tracking him down, but it is fun to think about in your off time.

"There it is again!" Jade's voice pulls you from your thoughts, almost demanding your attention as you refocus your sights on the dog. Once again, you see her pressing against the bars, her small muzzle sticking out into your cell from between the metal rods seperating the two of you. Her expression is one of excitement and delight, which begins to fade the longer you look at her. You can see her wagging tail slow down as her face falls a bit as well. "Dammit..."

Curious, you can't help but to ask, "What are you on about now?"

Jade lets out a defeated sigh, pulling her face out from between the bars as she slowly sinks down to her knees. Her eyes never leave you, seeming to be searching for something. You can't imagine what had her so worked up just a few seconds ago, only for her to sink like a stone being dropped into a lake. "It's your eyes..."

Her tone is a lot less lively than you would think it should be, given how excited she seemed. On a side note, this is one of the few times she said something to you that just plain doesn't make sense. "You wanna elaborate on that? 'Cause right now you sound like you're about to start talking crazy."

Clearly realizing that you're not picking up what she's putting down, the dog is at least kind enough to expand on her previous statement. "I noticed it the first time we met, when you asserted yourself to me, making it clear that you were dominant," she explains, albeit a bit too cryptic for your tastes. Fortunately, she doesn't leave you hanging on the line long enough for a follow-up question. "I see it when you tell me stories about yourself and some of the experiences you've gone through, usually the ones where you've had to do the same to others that you did to me. When stories like that come up, your eyes show this sort of...primal being.

"Whenever you told me stuff about other humans that didn't involve you, your eyes were just like they are now. Blank, almost lifeless." You blink in confusion, still not quite following. Call it being simple-minded, but you've never been good at reading into people unless you were pinpointing a specific emotion or some form of hostility. "But when you talk about things like the fights you've gotten into, there's always this sudden flash in your eyes that almost reminds me of home. But it always-"

A look of realization dawns on Jade and her eyes narrow at you in an accusing manner. "You're suppressing it, aren't you?"

You feel your heart thump in your chest. "I don't know-"

"You are!" she interrupts, somehow knowing that you were going to lie. There's a lot of limits you've had to set for yourself; many of them physical because of your surprising strength in this world, but most of it has been mental. You get the feeling that she's reading this from you, but you have no idea how. "Why would you do that to yourself?" This question comes out of her in an odd mix. One one hand, she sounds angry with you. On the other, she seems genuinely upset, sad even. You're not particularly happy about the adjustments you've made to help yourself assimilate better into pony society, but what other choice do you have? You want to fit in; to not have everypony live in constant fear of you. It's a necessary evil.

Evil?

"Because I have to," you answer solemnly, feeling ashamed of yourself for having gone this far. On earth, you never cared what anyone thought of you. Hell, you even took pride in how weird you were to a degree. Those that didn't like it didn't stick around and, by your logic, weren't worth your time. You never changed for anyone, believing that if you truly cared for someone, you should accept that person for who they are and not who they can become. However, since coming here, the question has shifted from 'who' you are to 'what' you are. You didn't want to be just another monster. You feel your shoulders sag as you finally face the fact that you have done the very thing you hated others doing, changing who they are just to make others happy. "I just wanted to fit in."

Jade seems to detect how much admitting this bothers you, her body slacking and her ears drooping down as she looks at you with a mix of concern and worry. She seems to pity you, which only makes this feeling of self-loathing so much worse. "You don't belong here."

If that isn't the understatement of the century...

"Yeah, I'm well-aware of that fact." Six months of portal research and multiverse theories hadn't brought you or Twilight any closer to getting you home. What little you did discover only further proved that sending you back was next to impossible. There's too many worlds out there with too many differences. They might have been able to send you somewhere else, but there was no way to guarantee that it would be the same one you came from. There's no going back, as much as it sucks to say. You thought a fresh start in this world may have been just what you needed, but in the end you find yourself getting into even more trouble here than you did back home. "I made do at home, but there's-"

"You don't belong there either!" Jade's sudden change in tone grabs your attention in full, causing her to recoil a bit. "I-I mean...You said it yourself! Most humans didn't accept you either."

You stare at her blankly, feeling worse if anything. "If this is your attempt at cheering me up, you're doing a pretty shit job."

Jade lets out a frustrated growl, though it seems more directed at herself than you. "What I'm trying to say is that you just haven't found your place yet. The humans in your world are stupid; they don't recognize how great you really are. And the ponies here, they've never understood good leadership. They are natural-born prey, and because of that, they are afraid of you!"

They don't accept me and they never will.

As if reading your thoughts, Jade bounces in to add on to what she was saying. "But I'm not!" You raise a brow at her curiously as she continues. "You asserted yourself, which did startle me, yes. But, I'm not afraid of you. I respect you."

That...doesn't make sense...

"You gave me the smallest taste of how strong you are and I, as a diamond dog, know to respect and follow those who are stronger than me. That's just how predators like us work."

That...does...make sense.

"And you're not much different from us!" Jade holds up her paws, flashing you her strong nails in the most least threatening way she can before showing off all of the other similarities. "You have claws, strong legs, sharp teeth-" Once she's done with her short list, her paws reach up and grab onto the bars, pulling her face as close as she can without getting her head stuck. You practically feel her staring straight into your soul as her gaze locks onto its final target. "And your eyes...I can see so much of us in you every time you talk about your fights. I can tell when you're thinking about them too, because your eyes, like ours, speak to each other. They show trials, errors and the will to fight."

Why am I doing this to myself?

Jade pulls her head back, but her gaze never leaves you. Her face scrunches up into something a bit softer than anger as she shakes her head from side to side. "You don't belong here, stuck with these ponies who don't give you the respect you clearly deserve. And you don't deserve to be forced to walk around as some kind of sheep dog. You're not just some mutt meant to herd them! You're a lost wolf taking refuge in a town full of sheep and it's not right!" Her features soften, her eyes darting around the room as she clearly loses herself in some form of thought. The dog's breath hitches as her eyes find yours once more and she presses against the bars, yet again, as if to emphasize her words. "Come with me!"

Yes...

"What?" It takes you a few seconds to get your thoughts in order after all of that. Your mind feels like it's gone through the wringer twice already, and it seems to be gearing up for round three. "What do you mean? Where are you trying to get me to go?"

"With me!" she responds with haste, before finally taking the hint. "To the caves! To live with us and be wild and free, like you were always meant to!"

Take me there...

Jade seems certain that you are going to go along with her, judging by the look of glee plastered across her face and the rapidly wagging tail at her back. This is all just so overwhelming. You feel the desire to leave, to have a fresh start once more where you may finally be accepted, but it's too good to be true. It has to be. Diamond dogs are one of the very few races that will not intigrate with ponies and their idea of harmony. Even dragons are coming around and giving it a try. This is the only life you might get to have that even resembles something normal.

Jade seems to sense your inner turmoil and her demeanor falls once again. You can't help but to notice how cute she is when she gets excited and how much it bothers you that you're the reason her excitement dies as often and as quickly as it does. "I..." You struggle to speak, finding yourself at war with what you want and what seems right. You don't want to stay here anymore. This town, these ponies; you're miserable around them. There are very few exceptions to this, but if you could, part of you would torch this whole town. Burn it to the ground and salt the earth so nothing may grow. "I'll think about it..."

"What's there to think about?" Jade asks with melancholy in her voice. "I'm offering you freedom. Would you rather stay here, with every pony in this town trying to force their metaphorical collars around your neck?"

"You're one to talk," you quip at her without even thinking.

Jade takes exception to that, slipping a claw under her collar and tugging it. "Diamond dogs wear their own collars. It's a symbol to every creature out there that we are not property. We own ourselves and nothing will ever change that." She releases her hold on her collar before continuing. "Our pack leader guides us, but not a single soul out there will ever claim or control us like common house dogs; like how ponies keep trying to control you."

"Just...stop..." Your words feel lifeless even to you as they leave your mouth. Your head hangs low and you find yourself in an intense staring contest with the floor, one you are indifferent to losing over and over again. Normally the silence helps you zone out and pass the time quicker, but now it's disturbing. It feels like a cancer eating away at your brain. You have to break the silence, even if it does mean repeating old conversations. "Remind me again how you ended up in here," you say to Jade, already feeling her eyes on you. "Just humor me."

You can hear how frustrated she is with you as she decides to cooperate and tell her tale for the second time since you first met her. "Like I told you before, I was on a scouting mission with some of the other runts. It's a typical assignment for us since we're smaller and harder to spot by potential threats," she began, her words calming as she continues to recall the events with some amount of satisfaction. "We didn't realize we had stumbled into someone else's property, or that they were actually rich enough to have guards at the ready to charge after us. After a bit of scrambling around, one of my pack members, Roxy, took a tumble and messed up her leg. Tank, the final member of our squad, picked her up, but he couldn't move as fast with her on his back.

"I told them to go on ahead and let me deal with things," she concludes, leaving out much more detail than she had when she first told you this story. 

You never did ask, though you were and still are curious about it. Lifting yourself up a bit, you turn your head to face her proper. "Why do you sound so happy when you tell me about this? I'd think you'd be mad about being caught and brought here."

Jade shrugs. "Don't get me wrong; it sucks being caught. Moreso, being locked up like this," she explains plainly, her smile never wavering. "My pack is safe though and that's all that matters to me. I'll be able to return to them soon enough." The dog glances to the door, her ear flicking as the sound of hooves clopping against the floor reaches both of your ears. She leans a bit closer to the bars and whispers just loud enough for you to hear. "Between you and me, they're probably looking for a way to get me out as we speak."

You can hear the sound of keys rattling and a lock clicking before the door to the cell room opens. "Alright, mutts-" Your body instantly tenses at the mare's words, a growl leaving your throat and Jade's as you both turn to face the guard who is trotting in with two plates of food levitating in her magic. "Chow...time..." She slows to a stop, a look of fear barely etched across her face as she sees you and the dog staring her down with the rumbles of your throats stabbing at her ears. The mare shakes away her fears and takes on a more authoritative look. "So that's how it's gonna be, huh?"

With a hum, she drops the plates several feet away from your cells. "Enjoy!"

On that note, the unicorn turns tail and leaves, locking the door behind her. You and Jade both noticeably calm down once she departs and your eyes move to the dropped plates, far too out of reach for either of you to get to from your cells. You let out a sigh and raise to your feet as Jade curses the mare. "Bitch..." You make your way over to the bars, looking them over until you find the right ones. You place your hands on the bars, stopping when you hear Jade grunt. Looking back, you see the dog standing up on her two legs and walking closer to you with curiosity. "What are you doing?"

"Just watch and stay quiet."

Keeping your ears open, you make sure no pony is coming down the hall to this room. Peering at the door, you don't see any shadows on the other side. The coast is about as clear as it will get. With that in mind, you tighten your grip on the bars until your knuckles turn white and start popping. You suck in a fair amount of air through your nose before exhaling only a little bit through your mouth as you begin to pull. A faint squeaking sound reaches your ears as the metal in your hands start to warp from the pressure, slowly spreading apart like Moses splitting the Red Sea. A small breath escapes your nose as you let out a grunt, focusing to not pull against them too much. The bars continue to bend and make way until you let go and start breathing properly again.

After a quick examination of the new gap, you figure it'll be just enough for you to push yourself through. As fate would have it, you were right, meeting only a small amount of resistance as your chest is forced to pass in between the bars and you step out into the open room. With your newfound and very small sense of freedom, you walk over and crouch down to carefully pick up the plates before turning back to the cells and returning. You can see Jade is holding her breath for some reason, a ting of red showing in her face and her tail wagging like a dog with a bone. It's only now that you noticed the musky smell she typically gives off being suddenly more pungant in the air. As your gaze meets hers, she begins breathing again, panting for air like she had just come out from under water.

You decide to ignore her antics as you slip back into your cell with your plates in hand. Jade watches you with some intensity as you hold out the plate to her. She doesn't seem to even recognize that you're trying to give her the food for a few seconds before finally coming to and slowly reaching out to grab the plate from your hand. With her taken care of, you set your plate down on your bench and go about shoving the bars as back-into-place as you can. You give them a once over, figuring that unless they were actually looking for dents, no one would really notice what you had done. Security in check, you go back to you bench, sit down and grab your plate.

Picking around at whatever mush is on your plate, your eyes wander back to Jade, who is still staring at you with a dumbfounded expression and her plate her paws, but still on your side of the cell. "Th-That was..." You wait patiently for her to finish, scooping some of the slop onto your nail and holding it in front of your face. The dog lets out a heavy breath before finishing her statement. "Wow~"

While some of the ponies in town are aware that you are surprisingly strong, none know exactly how strong. Even you are lost on those details, never having a reason or a way to test yourself. You're aware of a portion of your strength, having had a few incidents which made you privy to them. Twilight had set something up to figure it out for herself way back when, but you wound up in jail that week and her schedule with the school became too hectict to try and set up another date.

"That was me trying to be careful," you say matter-of-factly, knowing you could have been much less graceful with this task.

Jade's tail begins to break the wind with how fast it's moving, an audible swishing sound breaking what little silence is between you two. "R-really?"

You nod in response, placing the slop on your finger into your mouth so you can get a taste for it. It's bitter, as always. But, it's fuel in the tank so you can't complain too much. After swallowing down the refuse they call a meal here, you expand on what you had just told Jade. "Last time I did that, I got too carried away. Took me ten minutes of fucking with it to make the bar look remotely decent."

Jade shakes her head and appears to have her wits about her again as she carefully pulls her plate into her side of the cell, being careful not to drop it as she angles the 'meal' into her area. She looks at her food for a moment while you continue to mindlessly pick at yours before she moves to the back of her cell to be closer to you. "If you can do that...why don't you just leave?"

Why am I still here?

"I'm not gonna be in here long," you say with a shrug, "Better to just wait it out rather than get myself into even more trouble. Pick your battles and all that jazz."

The rest of the day played out in its typical manner. The guard was curious when she came back to retrieve what should have been two untouched plates. Of course, you and Jade simply refused to say anything on the matter, and before long, it was time for the lights to go out.

There's a usual pattern for when night falls and the lights go out. For one, it's dark as a moonless night. Your eyes do strangely well in the dark, but even you struggle to see much in here when they shut everything down for the night. You have already reintegrated your habit of lying down to sleep on your bench while Jade has been dominating a small section of the floor in her own cell. This is the norm, how things should be. However, on this night, the dog that lays no more than seven feet from you is kicking around on the floor. It's hardly obnoxious, but it's enough to keep you awake. While you lay on your side on the cold cement, holding yourself to keep warm with your eyes closed, she lets out a huff and starts moving around. Her shuffling is short-lived, then she is on the move. Her paws lightly tap on the floor and you can easily make out that the sound is drawing nearer to your position. If not for the metal bars separating you, your guard would instantly be up. Eventually, her movement stops. Her breathing quickens and it becomes obvious that she's sniffing the air in your cell.

"Hey..." Jade whispers loudly to you. "Are you awake?"

You let out a heavy breath and respond, "Unfortunately."

"Can you come here?" she asks a bit apprehensively.

"...Why?" you ask in a similar manner, more out of caution than anything else.

"Just humor me."

Using my own words against me already..."

You let out a sigh and reluctantly push yourself into a sitting position. "What?"

"Come here," she presses, for whatever reason.

A groan escapes you as you submit and stand up, stretching your arms and legs before dragging your feet over to the bars. If you actually stopped to think about it, this is the first time you've gotten this close to her, not counting when you were giving her the plate of food earlier today. With your body feeling weak from the lack of sleep, you grab onto the bars and slowly lower yourself so that you're sitting down in front of her before replacing your arms around your torso. "I'm here..."

"Cold?"

"Yeah," you answer sleepily. "A lack of fur will do that to a man."

"Lay down."

"Why?"

"Stop being so defensive and just do it."

You let out a noise that's a mix between a growl and a groan before complying. You slump onto your side, keeping your arms tightly wound across your chest. You hear Jade shuffling around again before a strange sense of warmth hits you in the face. The next thing you know, something grabs your shoulders and pulls you closer to the bars. Your instincts kick into full gear as your eyes snap open and one of your hands grabs onto the metal rod between the two of you, locking you in place as you stare into the darkness, struggling to make out her form.

"Easy! Easy..." Jade says in a calming tone, releasing her hold on you as she explains herself. "I'm not gonna hurt you, I promise."

You can hear the sincerity in her voice, but are still unsure of whatever it is she has planned.

"Just trust me, okay." 

You hesitate for a moment, tensing a bit as her paw finds its way back to your shoulder. "You know how easily I could hurt you, right?"

Jade's paw rubs your shoulder in, what you assume is, a reassuring manner. "I know."

Without another word, Jade pulls you in close, wrapping her arms around you. The warmth of her body is pleasant, even with the distance still between you, but this whole thing is still rather off-putting. At this range, you can smell her much more deeply. Beneath the stench of mud and dirt, there's an odd musk that's oddly welcoming to your nose and serves to help calm your nerves some. The dog seems to meld with you more as your muscles relax and you soon find your own arms reaching out to wrap around her in return. Taking advantage of this opportunity, Jade's muzzle slides between the bars and presses into your neck. She takes a deep breath through her nose, humming in contentment.

"You smell nice," she says aloud as you subconsciously rest your chin atop of her muzzle. Her legs slide between the bars soon after, one sliding under your own while the other pushes to be between them. "Is that better?"

You're a little embarrassed to admit it, but it is nice. To save yourself the shame of saying it aloud, you hum in approval as your feel your eyelids growing heavy at an alarming rate. You feel you have to know before you doze off. "Why though?"

Jade presses her nose into your collar bone and breathes deeply again before replying, "Because I wanted to. Why else?"

Fair enough...

The world around you slowly begins to vanish as your body succumbs to the oncoming slumber. Before you fall completely into the realm of sleep, you feel yet another strange warmth as something hot and wet lightly presses into your neck and trails up to your chin. Too tired to acknowledge this, you ignore it as your mind finally shuts down and your body begins its attempts to recharge for the next day and what trials that may come with it.