We've Got to Get Out of Here

​ By dawn we had taken control of the southern sector of the mine. Our rebellion spread like wildfire, and soon slaves from the northern sector rose to join the fight. In what felt like a single, breathless night, we shed our shackles. We are no longer slaves; We were the ones in command. The captured soldiers were put to work as a new workforce, condemned to complete the backbreaking work they had once forced upon us. I stood on a high ridge and looked down at the captives toiling below. Among them was Maggie, now clad in the drab gray rags of a slave, straining to shovel rubble into a mine cart. If her pace slackened even for a moment, the overseer, a woman whose back still bore the scars of Maggie's whip, would snap the leather across her shoulders. “Now she knows what it feels like,” Lynda said, coming to stand beside me. Her voice was cold, and her eyes fixed on Maggie with pure, unalloyed hatred. “She earned every bit of it,” I replied, my tone flat and final. “We have a meeting