After the roaring fires

The fires raged long into the night. The crowd stood transfixed, eyes wide, some with tears — not of sorrow, but elation. They thought they were watching their enemies fall. Billionaires, bankers, bureaucrats. They believed justice had finally arrived in flame and ash.

But justice never came.

And neither did tomorrow.

In the days that followed, the celebratory screams faded into a gnawing silence. The kind of silence that sinks into bone, that makes people whisper even when there’s no one around. Power stations, destroyed. Substations looted. Electricity vanished. With it, so did refrigeration, the internet, the news. Cold food became rare. Hot water, a memory.

The stores were emptied in two days. Then the pharmacies. Then the homes.

And then came the first kill — over a bottle of insulin.

In the darkened corners of the once-proud city, former neighbors began to eye each other with suspicion. A man who cheered beside his friend one night stole his last can of beans the next. Mothers clutched children in stairwells, praying for morning. Morning brought no safety.

People forgot what day of the week it was. Time was measured by desperation:
"Day of the first blackout"
"Day we ran out of fuel"
"Day the river turned black"

No one sang anymore.

The same crowd that once danced before the burning courthouses now huddled together, hungry, unwashed, cold. Some blamed the rich again. Others blamed the activists. Some blamed the government — and some started calling for one.

They had torn down the machine, not realizing it was the only thing holding the fabric of their lives together. No trucks brought food. No one came to repair the pipes. Doctors had fled or starved. Those with skills hid them.

It took just ten days before a faction rose up offering food in exchange for obedience.

And people obeyed.

Barter turned into bribery. Then into beatings. Then chains.

The revolution had become its opposite.

And still… as the fires cooled and smoldered like dying gods in the distance, the crowd remained, staring at the skeleton of the city they thought they freed.
No one said it aloud, but some of them finally began to wonder:

“What have we done?”