It began like a celebration.
The night air was alive with chants and crackling fire, glowing red against the towers of glass and steel. Crowds packed the streets, shoulder to shoulder, waving flags, makeshift banners, and cell phones raised high like digital torches. The old world, they claimed, was dying — and they were the midwives to its death. Skyscrapers once symbols of power became beacons of flame. Statues melted, public squares erupted, and smoke billowed like ghosts rising from the earth.
They had no idea what they were ushering in.
The chants turned to roars as the financial district went up — the banks, the courts, the halls of bureaucracy. “Burn it down!” they screamed, dancing in front of infernos that lit the sky like a second sun. Fireworks popped over collapsing malls. Gas stations exploded in the distance. Police had vanished. The mayors were hiding. The power grid began to flicker.
No one stopped to ask who would rebuild.
They were told they were tearing down oppression. That a new world would rise from the ashes. No rent. No rules. No rulers. But the fire spread faster than the dream. Data centers fried. Water lines burst. The hospitals fell next, then the food chains. Communications died in hours.
The crowd, still cheering, didn’t notice when the drones stopped flying — or when the cameras stopped recording. They didn’t ask who was keeping track of their medicine, their deliveries, their clean water. They thought freedom was fire. They didn’t know it was maintenance.
And the worst part? They thought they had won.
They thought they were free.
No comments:
Post a Comment