The town was perpetually exhausted.
Ashen's streets he traversed daily, and they never changed—walls that fell apart into dust, gaunt-faced children chasing after scraps, old men staring into nothing as if hope itself had abandoned them years ago. The wind stank of smoke from low-grade fires and sour sweat. It was not a world one would desire to be born into, and yet here he was, living in its shadow.
He was left with only his father. His mother had long since passed away, years ago, cancer consuming her body till all there was left was emptiness. He remembered the nights when she sang softly to him, her voice frail but sweet, and hunger and chill became easier to suffer. When she passed away, his father grew quieter, but not weaker. He labored until his fingers blistered and bled, with a dignity poverty could not remove.
Ashen had always admired that in him. Even when the world spat on them, his father never bent his back. "A man must stand," he would say. "Even if everything else falls, you stand."
That evening, when the sun had dipped low and painted the town in dull orange tones, the rhythm of the day was broken. It began with a sound—boots. Large, together, pounding against the pavement. A murmur swept across the streets, and Ashen stood before it.
Twenty-seven police officers walked into the town. They walked like a wall of black uniforms and neat arms, their faces hard, their eyes keen with power.
The villagers grew tight-lipped. Mothers pulled their children close. Men hung their heads, not wishing to draw attention. No one knew they had come for what, but everyone knew it could only be suffering.
Ashen was standing at the edge of the crowd, his heart racing. He was only a boy, but even he understood: the law did not come to protect. It came to remind them who they were.
The officers broke and ran, barking orders, dragging individuals from their homes, striking anyone who hesitated to move. A man shouted in defiance and was shoved to the ground, his face scraping against the dirt under the shined boot.
"What are they looking for?" someone whispered. No one answered.
Ashen's father came out of their hut, his face lined from the years of work but resolute. He did not tremble like the others. His palms were calloused, open, his body loose, but his eyes retained the same gentle strength Ashen had grown accustomed to her whole life.
He approached one of the officers—a tall, sharp-jawed officer with eyes that carried a sheen of contempt. The officer looked over the villagers as if they annoyed him. His lip curled, and he spat onto the ground.
"Thieves," he said. "Parasites, the whole lot of you. Living off refuse you did not work for."
Ashen's father moved forward, his voice booming but polite.
"Enough. We are not criminals. We are fathers, mothers, sons. If you are searching for someone, then do say so. Do not punish the whole town."
For a moment, there was quiet in the square. Ashen hoped against hope that reason would find its way into them. But then, the officer with the height laughed.
The voice was low, sneering, like a teasing predator observing taken prey. He stepped nearer, scanning Ashen's father from top to bottom as if considering the worth of his uprising.
"You dare speak to me like that? A gutter rat instructing the law?"
Ashen's heart tightened. He attempted to grasp his father, to get him to be quiet, but his legs would not move.
The officer's hand came for his gun. Time was slower. Ashen's father stood upright, shoulders squared, still believing maybe that dignity mattered, that truth could penetrate pride.
The sound of the shot echoed in the air.
Ashen snapped back, ears ringing. His father's head jerked back, a fountain of red, and he collapsed onto the ground. The world was quiet for one fleeting moment.
The officer stepped forward, kicked the body with his boot, and sneered.
"This is what happens when filth forgets its place."
The other officers guffawed. Some punched additional villagers, knocking them to the ground, calling them dogs, thieves, rats. Ashen stood rigid as stone, his whole body trembling. His father—his only remaining kin—lay outstretched on the ground, blood seeping into the dust.
Ashen couldn't breathe. His nails dug into his palms until blood oozed from his fists, but he felt nothing. His mother had been removed from him slowly by disease. But this—this was cruelty in its purest form. This was power warped into something cruel, exerted with pride.
Everything around him became indistinct. The wails of the officers were a distant rumble inside his head. All he saw was his father's pale, dead face.
Something inside him broke. No tears fell. No cry uttered his lips. Only fire burned, fierce and unceasing.
He gasped into silence, words addressed to no one but himself:
"I will never forgive this. I will never kneel. If there is no freedom, I will make it myself with my own hands."
The boy who had lost everything he had stood frozen, but in his heart, something had already been formed. Ashen was no longer merely a boy of the slums. He was a promise wrapped in flesh, a flame born from fire and ash.
And that flame would never be put out.