The Great Rumbling #2
His jaw tightens as he continues to pat his chest now, as if visibly showing the crowd his heart lives within these words.
“Y luego nos dicen que tengamos paciencia.”
And then they tell us to be patient.
A few bitter laughs ripple through the group.
“Que esperemos nuestro turno.”
To wait our turn.
He shakes his head.
“?Qué turno?”
What turn?
That lands. For Julio. For each one of them. It breathes with feeling as the seconds tick past.
“Trabajamos sus campos.”
We work the fields.
“Levantamos sus ciudades.”
We build their cities.
“Construimos sus carreteras.”
We build their roads.
“Sus casas.”
Their homes.
“Y mucho más. Alimentamos, proveemos y compartimos nuestra cultura con ellos sin reservas. Y para algunos… la vida que disfrutan se ha construido sobre nuestras espaldas.”
And so much more. We feed and provide and share our culture openly with them. For some…the sweet life they live has been made off our backs.
“Y pagamos… cumplimos… bajamos la cabeza… obedecemos… y aun así…”
And we pay… we comply… we cower… we obey…and still…
He lets the sentence fall off.
Doesn’t finish it.
Doesn’t need to.
“Nos dan la espalda.”
They turn us away.
Silence holds for a beat.
“Nos niegan en cada paso.”
Deny us at every turn.
Another thump over his fiercely beating heart. But he’s not the only one now. Many others have raised their hands to their own chest, and it catches on like wildfire. Hands beating on hearts in tandem.
“No estoy diciendo que todos sean el enemigo… pero los que lo son deben rendir cuentas.”
I’m not saying they are all the enemy. But those who are must be held accountable.
“No puedo decirles nada que no sepan ya.”
And I cannot tell you anything else that you don’t already know.
“Esto está mal.”
This is wrong.
“Esto es injusto.”
This is unjust.
“No podemos seguir permitiéndolo.”
We can no longer let it stand.
“Así que solo me queda una pregunta.”
So I have only one question left to ask of you.
“?Están conmigo? ?No es hora de levantarnos y corregir este gran error?”
Are you with me? Is it not time we rise up and set this great wrong, right?
Mateo, standing beside Julio, squeezes his arm so hard it hurts.
“Tiene razón… por fin alguien dice la verdad.”
He’s right… Finally, someone is speaking the truth.
Julio swallows hard. His brother’s pain is real. This, the pain of his people, is real. But it’s more personal to see it echo outward from his brother. Because he has watched Alejandro drown in it for more years than he cares to name.
Alejandro’s wife and two daughters earned citizenship legally.
He tried. He tried for years, but no matter how hard he worked or how much he paid with his labor, blood, and sweat, he was denied.
Over and over again. In the end, he was deported.
That’s when he saw the last bit of hope leave the man he had always looked up to.
He’s not bitter. He’s enraged and terrified of losing the only thing that holds meaning in his life, and he’s fed the fuck up.
Years of paperwork, interviews, fees, all of it.
Then one day, men with badges and guns took him from the factory floor, dragging him away as if everything he had done to prove himself worthy meant nothing.
They held him captive for nearly two months before deporting him.
He tried to sneak back in to see his family. The first time, they shot him. If Julio hadn’t found him that night in the desert, he would have died.
Julio feels the anger too. That guard shot his brother and left him bleeding in the dirt. He wants change. He wants justice. He wants it all to end.
But he does not agree that this is the only way.
Alejandro lives inside his rage. He stands here preaching war to a crowd ready to burn the world for him. When he raises his fist again, others raise theirs to the sky.
“Ya no vamos a rogar. Ya no vamos a esperar. Manana derribamos ese muro. Manana vamos por nuestras familias. No pueden arrebatárnoslas y negarnos el derecho a estar con ellas.”
We will not beg anymore. We will not wait anymore. Tomorrow we tear down that wall. Tomorrow we go to take back our families. They cannot take them from us and deny us the right to be with them.
The crowd erupts. More fists pump into the air. Fire in the barrels around the courtyard flares as the aggression grows. Men raise their rifles and thrust them skyward, stomping their feet.
Julio stands still as the wrath and fury spiral out of control and slurs filter through the noise. He does not dispute that there is a great need to change. He understands his brother. He shares the pain, though not with the same intensity.
If he were torn from his wife and children, treated like a criminal and barred from seeing them again, he might feel as he does. Alejandro is nine years older and has worked his entire life for a pittance, paying every due only to be cast out.
But war. Is that truly the answer?
Alejandro says the American government drew the line in the sand, not them. They are only choosing to cross it now—to erase it entirely.
Enough is enough. Julio agrees with that much.
But his brother does not only want to tear down the border. He wants America, all of them, to pay for what their government has done.
That is where Julio cannot follow. Where their beliefs differ.
Innocents could be harmed. Worse, killed.
Fear coils tight in his gut. Not just fear of Americans. Fear of his own people and how this may end, with many of them dead or imprisoned for life. He fears what his brother is capable of. What he may be stirring, and what these men are becoming.
Mateo leans in, breath shaky with emotion.
“Manana somos libres, hermano.”
Tomorrow we are free, brother.
Julio nods, but his stomach twists. And he prays—quietly, desperately—that when the fighting begins, he will still remember who he is.
Underground Presidential Bunker — Washington, D.C.
Carson adjusts the wire of his earpiece and scans the small room.
Only twenty people have been allowed inside: a handful of top advisers, two senior generals, selected press, and ten Secret Service agents.
Double the usual detail. Triple the caution.
The world outside is burning—plagues, riots, nations are collapsing—and threats against President Ludlow’s life climb by the hour.
Carson stands at the president’s right shoulder. “Whenever you’re ready, sir.”
Samuel Ludlow straightens his notes and passes them off to the waiting assistant. His silver hair catches the bunker’s overhead lights as he nods. “I’m ready. Let’s get this over with.”
Carson has never worked under a man who carried chaos like this one.
Sixty-three years old and carrying the weight of a world gone mad.
Carson studies him for a moment. Not the politician.
Not the public figure. But the man who always tries to greet the men in his detail by name, and who asked after Carson’s father last week as if that personal detail of his father’s being placed in hospice wasn’t just something to be spoken about and forgotten.
Ludlow takes a deep breath before stepping forward and walking into the room we’ve cleared for this public address.
His hands rest on the side of the podium.
An easy confidence exudes from him as he takes in the packed room.
Cameras zoom in, ready to broadcast his speech across a terrified nation.
A low red light glows at the back of the room, and he looks straight ahead at the teleprompter as it begins scrolling with his prepared words.
“My fellow Americans, thank you for joining me tonight. I stand before you from this bunker not out of fear, but out of necessity. Our world has reached a point of crisis not seen in generations.”
Carson scans the crowd. Every muscle is ready. Every breath measured.
“War has erupted across borders, including our own,” Ludlow continues.
“A powerful foreign state has issued threats toward our allies and toward us. We will meet those threats with strength and strategy, not with panic. Bombs will only be used as a last resort, should diplomacy fail and our people face immediate danger.”
Carson’s gaze sweeps over members of the press. Everyone seems anxious, but nothing out of the ordinary for this kind of tense situation.
“I would also like to address that the epidemic has put every nation in a state of crisis. This is largely what’s causing so many leaders to act rashly.
It continues to devastate regions across the globe, including our own.
” His tone remains steady as he continues.
“Our scientists, doctors, and emergency teams are working tirelessly. The same can be said of our nation’s allies.
There is constant coordination happening behind the scenes, and progress is being made.
But progress takes time. And right now, we are in dire need of more time to seek a solution.
So we must all do our part. Mandatory quarantine remains necessary until we slow the spread.
I understand how difficult that is. It disrupts your work, your families, your routines.
” A small breath. “But please keep in mind, these measures are not in place to limit you. They are in place to protect you—and the people around you. If we take this seriously, we reduce the strain on our hospitals and give our medical teams the time they need to do their jobs. And that, I assure you, will save countless lives.”
He lets the silence rest for a few stretched seconds before speaking again.
“I ask for your cooperation and your patience as we navigate both of these important matters. We will provide additional updates as we have them and continue to support your communities, your families, and every corner of this nation through this. We will face it together—steadily, responsibly, and with care for one another.”
Carson feels a tug in his gut. He’s heard this speech rehearsed three times today. But in front of the cameras, Ludlow’s sincerity always cuts deeper.