SILENCE | ATEEZ

1 | Echoes Of Pandemonium

Sirens blasts through the whole district, deafening the ears of the citizens. Trickles of blood mixed with sweat and dried tears feels like it's sticking on his face. The outbreak of a virus that they only heard about through the screens had found its way to their district. Gunshots and screams could be seen and heard everywhere, mainly coming from those who had been infected. 'Crawlers' is what people call them these days here, at least in Zuhal District, a key word they had found as a verbal shorthand that was easy to use whenever they want to indicate there is a presence of the infected.

It was not even the citizens who started to use the nickname crawlers. It was them.

VESTRA.

In the early days, there used to be a small light of hope for the citizens. An enforcement team has been established on their land, an organisation that promised them a future. VESTRA, which stands for Vital Emergency Security and Triage Reservoir, has been working for almost a year towards an uncertain future.

It all began a year ago, when the leader of VESTRA, a group of scientists and doctors that had walked his way through from Ushtar District all in soiled and possibly bloodied clothes, had proposed the citizens of Zuhal District for their last remaining city to be made as a headquarters for them to work on an antidote. They had begged the common folk to accept them, to let them use whatever was left in their still standing city, to work on an unpromising future.

A lot of the people petitioned against the idea of letting strangers in their place, fearing the consequences they would have to endure. Moreover, them originally being from Ushtar District, does not convince the citizens they would have a chance on working for the antidote against this disease, just from seeing the district's own destruction. Ushtar District is now just a ruined city, full of the crawlers surrounding it.

But upon seeing no promising future other than what these groups of people had proposed, all of the citizens had no choice but to grant their entries to their remaining city, letting them navigate through. From there, that was how VESTRA was established in Zuhal district.  At first, everything had gone the way the common folks would want. Citizens cheered on them, preaching VESTRA as their saviour and even went as far as nominating them as their newly appointed representatives of Zuhal District's board of governors.

VESTRA gained more power each time, and within months, they were already at the top of the monarchy in Zuhal District.

It was when the people started to see their district flourish with glory, it all started to change.

VESTRA are starting to enforce a rule to kill those who get the infection, in hope that they could reduce the number of cases. At first, everyone had agreed to the new guidelines, right up until they saw their own family getting shot at. Swiftly, the new rule became something threatening, considered as cruel and dehumanising. People start to make petitions in front of the gates to the sacred safe zone, which is currently only occupied by the higher ups, an organisation that was created to 'protect' the district occupants.

People could not trust their government anymore. Moreover, it rather seems like they are leaving them to die by refusing their entry to the safe zone that the members of VESTRA currently occupy. 'Astral Ruins'; A safe haven that is heavily guarded, separating the district into two parts. It is almost certainly like they are building their own district and leaving most of the people here laying dead. Those who would dare to come near their steel barricades will be presumed as one of the crawlers and as soon as the security forces get alert on their presence, they are as good as gone.

Nevertheless, it won't stop the rage coming from the citizens. They are desperate for any help they could reach out to and Astral Ruins is the only place they could see a future with. And so, the petitioners didn't stop. They would come everyday in front of the barricades, putting their life at stake just to redeem their rights to be let in the safe haven.