CHAPTER THREE
As unconsciousness released me from its sweet embrace, some words and phrases reached my ears. Some of the inflection sounded friendly, and the other ones…eh, not so much. I’d assumed I was being held accountable for some crime I didn’t know I committed, unless they thought I was a spy or something…which wasn’t overly reassuring. To make me feel welcome in their “great and glorious city”, both of my front hooves were chained to a two-foot thick steel girder, while my rear hooves were attached to a similar steel pole.
A door somewhere in the near vicinity whispered open and I heard three…no four sets of hoofsteps on the cold, hard ground that I was lying on.
“Do you have any idea the amount of trouble you’re in right now?” A gruff voice asked. I shook my head: I didn’t know what laws I’d broken!
“To start with the big ones: you, Venture, assumed the identity of Commander Dawn of the Imperial Navy, used his private boarding craft, evaded the police, and trespassed on Imperial airspace without permission. To finish off, you will also be charged with fifteen counts of reckless flying, eighteen instances of breaking the speed limit by a factor of two or three, and lastly, evading your rent and housing payments.”
I could understand all of those, except for that last one. My landlord and I had a deal, as long as I got it paid it was all good. And I was the only one in my family with a job, and I had to go to flight school, and I had a second, higher paying job which was racing. If you hadn’t already guessed by the numerous counts of speeding and reckless flying.
” So, by order of the Imperial Court here in Ciedan, you are subject to twenty years in prison, with an extra five years for the various speeding infractions.” With the sword dangling over my head, there was nothing I could do except wait.
I never realized it until now, but at night, Ciedan was completely silent. No noise of aircon units, no whirring of personal spacecraft, no late-night chatter…nothing. I relaxed my head back onto the concrete wall and tried to find even one noise I could concentrate on, but there wasn’t a single peep.
I don’t know how long I was in that silent hell-hole, it could’ve been days, weeks or perhaps even a month or two. The only way I found some sort of cycle was that I was fed once every twelve hours or so. I tried to keep track but I eventually gave up.
One cold winter morning, while I was shivering in the corner, one of the guards was laughing and said, “Hey, cheer up! One year down, only twenty-four more to go!” They continued laughing until I screamed at them until my throat was raw with the effort. After my tirade, I slumped back down into my corner and wondered if this was all worth it. Was leaving my family really worth it? No, it wasn’t.
I sighed. I wonder if they thought about me, if they missed me. I’m not too sure they would, I really only payed part of the rent. They’d be ok.
I didn’t sleep too well that night, but in the morning, I woke up to find someone had placed a mirror in my cell. I dragged myself over to it and glanced at my reflection.
Prison hadn’t done me any favors, to say the least. I was a skinny changeling to start with, and I think I may have grown a little since last year, but that combined with drastic weight loss probably didn’t look too good. Well, in fact, it didn’t, but y’know, I can’t do anything about it.
The monotony that was my life now, was broken by the sound of hoofsteps. I didn’t lift my head to see who was there.
“Come on. You’re getting out of there right now.” The voice said.
Now, I was interested. I lifted my head and almost had a heart attack: the pony breaking me out was the pony I had accidently impersonated.
“There’s no time for questions right now, I promise you’ll be able to ask them later, but right now, just trust me.”
I figured my situation really couldn’t get that much worse so I said what the hell, and followed the Commander out of the prison block, and past the guards. We didn’t move very quickly, mostly because I hadn’t moved any significant distance in more than twelve months. I wracked my head for a reason that someone so, for lack of a better word, important, was helping me. I couldn’t figure it out. He led me to his personal craft, an Imperial PL Eagle, and we headed east, presumably to the spaceport.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “I never meant for that to happen. You see, I was visiting below the clouds, and some dimwit stole my Eagle from me, I figured they’d scrap it for parts, but apparently not. I searched high and low for that ship, and believe me, when I saw that somepony was flying it, I had all of Ciedan’s eyes watching for me.” He laughed a little, “To be completely honest, when I heard your voice I knew that something was up, because, if you really knew that you were flying a stolen ship, I don’t think you would’ve come within a hundred kilometers of this place. And also, I’m going to apologize for knocking you out. I wasn’t thinking straight.” With that, he landed his PL and started making his way to a hangar on the extreme west side of the spaceport.
“Now, I fought for your freedom for months, and since we don’t have a lot of prisoners here in Ciedan, they wanted to keep you locked up in there and gloat about how they captured a criminal and all that nonsense.”
I took a moment to compose myself before summing my entire night up in one word.
What.
“I know what you’re thinking, and that’s why I brought you here.” He gestured at the hangar, “This is the Imperial Navy’s surplus hangar.”
What.
To be fair, I don’t think I was thinking straight when I believed everything he said, but hey, I’m not complaining. But as they say, desperate times call for desperate measures.