Buried a Lie
The lights. They hurt your eyes. They sear your eyes as you slowly crack them open. It wasn’t enough that you couldn’t get to sleep the night before, but now being awoken right when you had the chance to fall asleep for a power nap… was just cruel.
“Hey, you,” a rough, gnarled voice calls out. “Get up. It’s time.”
You rub the sleep out of your eyes and sit up in your cot. A few extra minutes of sleep would’ve been nice, but the guards wait for no man, or pony for that matter. Looking over to the bars of your cell, you see two of them standing by the door, dressed up in the hoof-to-head armor, glaring at you.
“I’m coming, I’m coming.” Twisting your body around, you make sure to slip the cigarettes and matches you got from another inmate under the pillow. You’d definitely need those later.
You jump out of bed and slip on your white shirt and slacks. They were nothing fancy or particularly comfortable, but at least the Princesses had custom fit clothes made for you. After all, it wasn’t as if the prototypical prison garb for ponies would fit a human.
After slipping on your socks, you walk to the waiting hooves of the guards, who open the cell for you.
“Alright, no sudden movements.” One of the guards quickly shackles your hands together behind your back. “When we get there we’ll take the cuffs off, but we’ll be standing right behind you, so don’t think of trying anything.”
You roll your eyes. “Yes, sir. Of course.”
“Good,” the other guard stated. “Now, follow us. He’ll be meeting you in the main visitation area.”
“Lead the way.”
You follow the two guard ponies down the winding corridors of the prison. The air never gets warmer down here. Every day, you wake up with the same goosebumps over your arms from the chilly environment.
You hear your muffled footsteps echo between the stone walls, mixed in with the loud clops of the ponies on either side of you. That noise was just one thing you still hadn’t gotten used to. Hoofclops, hay bales, carriages… After almost a year in pony society you’d think some things would start to click and become natural. But nope. It was still as foreign as they day you arrived.
You let out a sigh and focus back on the task at hand. After a few more twists and turns you see a large, wooden door. It has somewhere between five and two hundred locks on it, obviously to prevent any kind of dangerous criminal from getting out. The guards quickly undo all of them and slide the door open.
Once it's finally open, you’re welcomed by the site of the visitation room. It’s a brightly lit room, nice wooden flooring, various pieces of art and fake plants as decorum. It’s obviously meant to portray the prison as something better than it actually is for the sake of keeping family members and children’s minds at ease. It was devious, certainly, but understandable.
“Alright, have a seat,” one of the guards states as he leads you to a nearby table. “Your visitor is on his way in right now.”
The guards unlock your cuffs, allowing you to comfortably take a seat. It was a two person table, a seat on either side.
“Thank you, sirs,” you say, turning around to face them, only to have your head forcefully turned back the other way.
“You’ll focus on Mr. Poptart, answer his questions politely, and then you’ll be returned to your cell. There will be no extra comments or requests.” The guards voice got closer to his ear. “Are we clear?”
Not wanting to push your luck, you simply nod. “Crystal.”
You test your freedom for just a moment by resting your hands on the table. No spears jabbing you in the back yet, so at least that was allowed. After a few minutes of drumming your fingers and darting your eyes around, trying to take in as many new sights as possible, you hear a door slam on the other side of the room.
“Good evening, gentlecolts!”
A pink unicorn with a black and pink mane trots across the room towards them. He was carrying a satchel with him which was hanging around his neck. Given the smile on his face, it was obvious to see he was happy to be here. After all, what reporter wouldn’t be happy to land possibly the biggest interview in Equestrian history?
“I’m sorry I’m late,” he states. “The check in process took a bit longer than I expected. I take it I can sit here?”
“Yes,” one of the guards spoke up. “You’ll sit there to conduct the interview. Ask only the questions that were prescreened and only make comments related to those questions. You will have fifteen minutes in total. Understood?”
The unicorn vigorously nods. “Absolutely.”
He quickly levitates a notepad and pencil out of his satchel and places them on the table before sitting down.
“I guess the best way to go is to get started now, huh?” He reaches a hoof out over the table. “Hi, the name’s Poptart of the Manehattan Inquirer.”
You look down to his hoof and then back up at him. “Sorry, but there’s a good chance that if I shake your hoof I’ll get stabbed on the spot.”
Poptart chuckles and brings his hoof back to his side. “I see. We wouldn't that now.”
You smile politely. “Of course, not. That’d ruin all the fun of the executioner.”
Poptart chuckled a bit louder. “Okay, enough nonsense. Let’s get down to business. First off, what’s your name?”
“My name?” You scratch your chin for a moment. “As far as I’m concerned, it’s Prisoner 12483. Next question.”
“Alrighty then,” Poptart replies to you, scribbling down a few notes. “How do you feel the Equestrian Prison System has treated you, considering you’re a human and everything. Do you feel it’s been fair?”
“I’d say so,” you say, shrugging your shoulders. “I’ve got clothes to wear, a bed to sleep in and food to eat that’s not just hay. Assuming I’m a criminal… that’s all pretty fine treatment if you ask me.”
“You don’t think there’s been any instances of favoritism between how the guards treat you vs how they treat the ponies down here?” Poptart asks his pencil at the ready.
“Heh,” you say with a slight chuckle. “It’s kind of hard to feel like a favorite when you’re locked in a cage, no matter who you are.”
“Fair point,” Poptart states, jotting more notes. “Onto the next question. Real quick, take us back to the scene of the crime. The day it happened. Tell us, for the record at least, what you saw that day. Briefly, of course. We’re on a time limit.”
You let out a breathy sight and sit up in your chair. “It’ll be the same thing the courtroom and Celestia herself heard but here goes…”
You’re walking down the streets of Manehattan. The sun was setting at this point, but of course, that didn’t stop the streets from being flooded with ponies. The city truly never slept.
All you were looking for was a dinky motel to sleep in for the night. You swore you saw it just earlier today, now if only you could remember.
“Gah!” You say aloud. “Why does this city have to be so big!”
It was your first week in the city and it would probably take months before you even began to learn your way around. But, the offer to do some trash pickup work in the area was good and you got extra bits to pay for a hotel.
...Now if you could only find the one you were looking for.
“Aaah!”
A loud, shrill scream rips through the nearby alleyway, almost rupturing your ear drums. You weren’t sure exactly what it was, but it definitely sounded like someone needed your help. You weren’t quite accustomed to the culture and norms of this society yet, but at least offering assistance seemed like the right thing to do no matter where you are.
You race around the corner into the nearby alleyway and what you saw before you made your stomach churn.
On the ground in front of you was a younger mare, stomach ripped open and blood running out onto the street. Thankfully the rising night sky hid a few more of the finer details but nothing could be done about the smell. The stench of iron fills your nostrils to the point where you could taste it on your tongue. Other smells emanate from the now lifeless corpse as well, wafting through the area, practically singeing the skin on your face with their virulent heat.
Your stomach begins to toss and turn as your run off to get help. But, of course, the police were already headed that way.
“Sir!” you scream out a police officer who was nearing the alley. “There’s a pony. She’s dead!”
“What?!” The officer screams at you.
“I’ll show you where!”
“...And that was it.” You clutch your stomach, the memory of that night making your mouth fill with the taste of vomit. “Just like I said. I led them there and the next day I was taken into custody and questioned.”
“I see,” Poptart says. “Well, whether it’s true or not, you’re holding fast to your story, so I gotta respect the perseverance. Now, onto the last two questions.”
You simply nod. “Yes, please.”
Poptart flips a page in his notebook and looks up at you. “So, let’s talk a bit about the trial. A lot of citizens felt justice was served, a few didn’t. It’s no secret that the primary argument against you in court was your species. Being a human. After all, you’re the only one in all of Equestria and then the first murder in over a decade happens after you get here. Frankly, I hardly find it evidence, but it was enough to sway the jury, along with circumstantial witnesses, of course. But, how do you feel about it?”
“You’re asking how I feel about being convicted as a murderer?” You ask him.
“Not necessarily that per say, but more or less… how can I put this?” He drums his hoof for a moment before finding the words. “Do you think the court was skewed against you to start with?”
You fold your arms and drop your gaze to the floor. “Well, here’s the deal. They used the evidence they had and imprisoned the most likely subject they found. It just so happened that the biggest piece of evidence they had was that I’m human. That I’m the only human in Equestria.”
“Yeah,” Poptart replies. “And do you think that’s fair?”
“Whether it’s fair or not isn’t anything I have control of,” you say. “Honestly, in my three months waiting around here in prison, I’ve tried to think about things from everyone else’s point of view. A new creature comes out of nowhere by magical happenstance and he just so happens to be in the vicinity of a murder, which is already a rare occurrence. Fair has nothing to do with it.” You can feel your arms tense up as you continue, your breathing getting labored with each sentence. You take a few breaths to calm down before finishing. “They needed a cuprit and I fit the bill.”
After jotting a few more notes down Poptart set his notepad and pencil away and leaned forward, his steel gray eyes looking at you. “So, one last question. Off the record. You’re already sentenced to life and possibly even the death penalty, so it can’t hurt.”
“Shoot.”
“Did you do it?” He asks. “Are you guilty?”
You stare into his eyes for a moment, never once breaking contact as you process the question.
“Am I guilty?” You sit back in your chair. “Yes. I am. I’m guilty… because I’m a human.”