There was a mighty and magnificent carousel. Round and round and round it went, all the painted plastic horses galloping in tandem on their poles, sure and swift, keeping the magic of the carousel alive with the sparkling gold and glitter and bright music of the carousel in the middle of a city park. Every day, every day, every day, round and round and round. Children screaming, laughing, and crying, as the lights and music of the carousel blared on and on. This is all that was and all that had ever been and all that would ever be.
One day the earth quaked, and the carousel lurched and jerked as it went round and round and round. A smaller, bonny little carousel horse was in her tandem with the others when suddenly, on her upswing, the carousel, now lurching and jerking on the downswing, crashed downward and snapped off her pole at the top. This caused the bonny little carousel horse to burst forward over the edge of the carousel platform with her pole bending forward underneath her, lowering her over the carousel platform and leaving her precariously hovering over the ground as the carousel resumed its mighty and magnificent spin around and round after the lurching and jerking stopped, never once faltering. Then a strange thing happened. As the bonny little carousel horse hovered precariously over the ground that raced beneath her, her legs began to kick and thrust in panic and fear. Some of the other carousel horses began to thrash and neigh at the sight of this, whining, snorting, and stomping in their respective places on their poles, but none could break free, and none could restore her. Soon the bottom of her pole snapped off from the carousel and the bonny little carousel horse was set off running through the city park, with the carousel screeching and screaming at full tilt behind her, into the city streets.
There the bonny little carousel horse regained her footing and caught her breath. Her surroundings were unknown to her, and she proceeded with caution. Slowly the bonny little carousel horse made her way to a small grocery store. There she saw her reflection for the first time in the store window and to her surprise she found that she was no longer a painted plastic carousel horse, but a real dapple-grey horse of muscle and meat and flesh and bone. This delighted her. She snorted and tossed her head, pranced around and turned from side to side to see herself entirely. She felt like a new horse and yet still the same, too. A real bonny dapple grey carousel horse.
Then she heard small voices whispering and giggling from around the storefront. Three children stood huddled and peering over each other at her. She froze. She remembered children from her time on the carousel and she remembered that not all children are nice. The eldest extended an arm and held out a bright red apple, calling to her in a soft but insistent voice, Dapple! Dapple! Have an apple! Then the smallest child giggled and the second eldest quickly shushed. Believing that the children meant no harm, Dapple proceeded forward, slowly, cautiously, and, after sniffing the apple and the hand that held it with hard huffing nostrils, Dapple ate the apple. This delighted the children who then took turns feeding apples to Dapple, which of course delighted Dapple who had never before eaten an apple, and now knew what a delicious treat apples make.
Suddenly a loud, booming voice demanded attention. Dapple and the three children quickly turned to look and saw a small, bald, angry man standing at the grocery storefront fruit and vegetable stand shaking his fist at them, shouting and shooing them off. A woman rushed out of the store, apologizing, and dragged her children away, scolding them and Dapple over her shoulder. The children cried and looked over their shoulders and waved goodbye. Dapple neighed to them and tossed her head urging them to break free. The children smiled through teary eyes and broke free from their mother, galloping away from her like little horses, laughing and neighing, smiling as they waved goodbye to Dapple and ran home. No sooner had sadness filled Dapple's heart when the grocery store owner stomped his foot and bellowed at Dapple, startling her to flee down the road in haste.
Soon Dapple found herself being shouted at and honked at by locals on the street and in nearby cars as she stood stunned at the middle of an intersection. Suddenly the whole city was in an uproar. Dapple, standing frozen, looked around at all the din and up and down the crossroads trying to decide which way to run. Then a policeman on a horse approached. At last, rescue, thought Dapple, but as the policeman on horse approached, the police horse neighed and tossed his head, urging her to flee! flee! in the direction of the mountains! Suddenly startled by this urging, and fearful, Dapple set off through the snarl of cars and traffic, up the road in the direction of the mountains.
Dapple ran and ran and ran and ran, never looking back, in a full throttle gallop, feeling the full strength and flex of the muscles in her legs, back, and neck as songs played on the wind in her ears and danced through her mane. The sun was setting when Dapple finally reached the mountain top and looked out over the land. Thousands of little lights began to light up as the sky grew darker and Dapple found herself thinking about the carousel and other horses, wondering if she would ever see any of them ever again, as she drifted off into a fitful sleep and dreamed of running under a full moon.
Dapple woke at daybreak to a great commotion from the land down below. Car horns, train whistles, fumes and exhaust, crying babies, loud and angry people shouting, rushing, and charging at each other in a steel and cement world with enormous jalopy contraptions boring holes into the ground and pillaging the earth while a factory on a hill overlooking the city billows poisonous black smoke into the sky that hovers over the city like a black cloud full of acid rain. Dapple gasped and shook her mane. This could not be true. The only world Dapple had ever known before was the trees and grass that surrounded the carousel in the city park and she had believed that the whole world must also be a park full of trees and grass, but this...this could not be true. Dapple became depressed and hung her head low as she turned away from the city down below and made her way into the earthly sanctuary of the mountains. There Dapple nestled herself under a tree and quietly wept. Her life had taken a very abrupt, very unexpected, and very hard turn, and she definitely would never go back to the ugly world below, but she also did not know what lay ahead, and so Dapple just laid her head down and wept. Dapple was always very melancholy after that, but the days passed nonetheless, and Dapple became familiar with her surroundings and friendly with the local mountain critters and animals that she encountered while out grazing and soon Dapple had nestled into a little forest community with them, in this new world.
One morning Dapple awoke suddenly to earth rumbling and explosions on the horizon, and all the other critters and animals scrambling to run and hide in trees and shrubs. Dapple, unsure what was happening or what to do, ran a few disoriented circles around the tree community to make sure all the other critters and animals were ok before heading to the mountaintop. The rumbling and explosions had ceased by the time Dapple was overlooking the city. All that was left of the city was smoke and rubble and carnage. Dapple's breath caught in her throat and for a moment there was a deafening silence. Then at last a wind swept up the side of the mountain and gave Dapple a chill as she caught her breath and the wind ruffled her mane. Dapple watched in silence. There was very little movement, but there was still some movement, though what little movement there was mostly ended in a shotgun standoff that ended almost as soon as it began. Then there followed another kind of silence, a petrified silence. Dapple stood frozen there, watching, until all that was left was an abandoned city kind of silence, the kind of silence with an ever-lurking presence of danger. Dapple shuddered at that and returned to the earthly sanctuary of the mountain, to her friends, the other critters and animals, and nestled in with them.
The next morning Dapple awoke to a gentle kind of sound that she had never heard before, a kind of swishing of leaves in the wind, but different somehow. Roused from her dreams with a sleepy curiosity, Dapple followed the swishing ebb and flow that echoed on the horizon. When she reached the mountaintop to overlook the city, she startled. The city was no more. The ocean had reclaimed the land and was rushing against the bottommost elevations of the mountain, crashing against the dirt and rock in a big, frothy, breathtaking firework-like spectacle. Now Dapple spent the day watching the ocean coming in and going out until darkness fell and all the stars came out as an epic supernova like none Dapple had ever seen before over city lights. The stars twinkled and winked at Dapple as her eyes blinked and grew heavy and sleep took over.
When Dapple woke, the ocean was gone. It had returned to the seabed, leaving the former city washed up and wiped out, buried like old pirate bones of a rubbled empire. Dapple thought she might go down and look around, see what's left, but then she heard a neigh in the distance that sounded like her name. She turned to look and waited. A moment later she heard the neigh again and this time she was sure that it was her name. Her heart leapt as she neighed back and set off in that direction. Soon she encountered the other horse. It was the police horse she had met in the city. She stopped a few feet back from him and neighed acknowledgement. The police horse neighed her name again. After all this long and lonely time, here, finally, was a friend. Dapple was overcome with emotion, but tried not to let it get the better of her. Dapple neighed surprise that the police horse knew her name. The police horse snorted and tossed his head back in the direction of the valley on the other side of the mountain, and then trotted off in that direction. Dapple briskly looked around to make sure all the critters and animals were ok and then quickly followed after the police horse to the valley on the other side of the mountain, where, to her surprise, dozens and dozens of wild horses ran through the mountains and the valley below, fiercely liberated and kicking up dirt in celebration. Dapple watched in awe and neighed her happiness to her friend, the police horse, who neighed back that everyone knows her name. Dapple nuzzled into the police horse and he nuzzled her right back, and the two of them watched the wild horses riding the wind while contemplating the new world and future together, as the sun set, living happily ever after. The end.