The terror of WYD

Ch. 1 of Maria

Maria

When we went on the trip for world youth day, we all expected it to be a good trip one that we could all enjoy together, but that all changed the day our god abandoned us. We never saw it coming, how could we have, there was no warning, no motivation, it just happened. The faces of the people still haunt me from their final moments and it makes me cry every time, but this needs to be recorded and our story must be told, so that our mistakes can never happen again. It all began with a suggestion from our friend Jess to go on a life changing trip and I guess in a way she was right. We are all different now. I still talk to some of them, but we all find it difficult to do so now that we have other responsibilities. It all began on the day of the final mass and we were fortunate enough to get front row seats in Pope Francis’ final mass on Copacabana beach. It was such a beautiful ceremony, the air came rolling in from the water and was cooling as the hot sun shined high in the sky. Everyone was so happy and cheering for him with a roar unrivalled by any other that I heard and then it was gone replaced by an eerie silence.

 I was petrified as I watched his lifeless body fall to the ground, the once roaring crowd was battered back by their shock to be finally reduced to silence. As I struggled to believe what I had just witnessed, the war had begun. The beach was filled with the screams of the people as we were placed, under fire from the warships that were supposed to be protecting us. Why…Why did they have to attack? I still remember the panic in that single moment. The crowds of people pushing and shoving past each other all trying to get to the safety of the city, I tried to keep my friends together so that we could all escape together, but it was incredibly hard. The crowd was in a frenzy, most people didn’t care who they hurt as long as they got away. In the first couple of minutes we had already lost some good people, they died in that first wave of cannon fire from the destroyers and others were simply crushed by the terrified crowd. Jess, Georgia, L, and James to name a few and then still hundreds of others that I didn’t even know fell to the madness. All of them were such good people. It was Jess’ idea to come on this trip and I really don’t blame her for what happened. I wish she was still here with what remains of us. She was the first to go, taken out by the first wave of firing that came from the war ships. She tried to save L, but it was to no avail. They both died in one of the blasts. The next to go was Georgia, and she died just trying to get through the crowd, she was too weak to push her way through and was quickly separated from the others. She was knocked over and died at the feet of the thrashing crowd, unable to stand back up once she fell. James… Poor James, he saved Keisha and her brother Kyle by pushing them out of the line of fire. That all happened a week ago and now I don’t know what happened to the majority of our group, but now I lead all the people that I have found trying to keep them all safe. I walk ahead of the group as I usually do, trying my best to scout out the potential dangers. I couldn’t explain it, but I somehow found a peace in the solitude, like most of the pressures that I have been feeling have been released. So I lead on my only company were the damaged buildings, but yet remains of those very buildings seem to be taunting me, staring down at me with their hundreds of cold heartless eyes. They were cruelly watching without remorse for the damage that the people that once lived in them caused. The buildings were abandoned before the attacks began, as if the whole city just got up and left and I suppose that is exactly what they did.

The once proud and friendly people that just stood by and watched as thousands of us were gunned down for merely existing. Things didn’t get any better because they were replaced with roaming firing squads and vicious militia that search for any survivors. They always kill the men and raping the women. I’ve seen this happen to so many people and I always want to help, but I have to try to keep the people in my group safe. However, it’s getting more difficult to move around without getting noticed and since no one knows where we are…. We are lost. Right now all we are doing is trying to look for a nice sheltered place that would be easy to escape from if we were attacked, but it is so difficult. Everywhere we go the buildings are damaged and look far too fragile to support anyone while others still had just been completely destroyed.