La Liberte De L'Interieur

A man huddles in the gray of a window-less, door-less cube. Out of nowhere, he hears, "Freedom!" and a sign is shoved through a slit in the wall. He cautiously picks it up. It’s pointed on one end and reads: Freedom.

He stares at it for a moment, confused. A hand shoots through the slot, grabs the sign from him, turns the arrow downward, and hands it back to the man. Freedom is in the floor. The man tears up the carpet and finds a hatch. He reaches down, turning from gray to color. He gets rid of the carpet in his cell and lays down fresh grass instead. He lowers the dim light and finds pure light to shine in his cell. And last, he tears some tarnished wallpaper from the wall, reaches into the hole in the floor, and stretches the image of a beautiful outdoor scene over the wall.

It creates a door. He steps through, free from his cell, into the outdoors. The cell disintegrates. And the hole disappears. But the sign lies on the ground. He picks it up and starts to walk. Somewhere far away, someone yells, "Freedom!" The man runs toward it.

He finds a whole field of gray cells, still enclosed, each with an occupant. He smiles a little to himself, takes his sign, and runs toward the nearest one.