The Origin, by Anne Friedman

No one really knows what occurred to us. They are told the stories. They hear the tales. They see the evidence. But that is not all. Not everything that happened. We were persecuted. We were forced to work. We were tortured. We were tested like animals. We were massacred. I lived through it. I witnessed the atrocities committed against my people. I was forced into their camps. The camps where they worked us like animals. Where we were anything but human to them. I was already used to the prejudice against my people and me, but I wasn’t prepared for this. It was horrifying. It was scarring. I was abused. I was put through so much. I don’t know how I can move on. But I have to move on. That’s the pain of it all. I can’t just give up. I have to do something. I have to fight for my people. I have to get justice for us and what has happened. All we ever wanted was to live out our lives peacefully. We didn’t want a war. We were ready for one, but we had hoped to avoid one. The last one almost killed all of us off. But a war was what was brought to us. They came and took over. They cared not for us but just for themselves. We were pawns in their grand game of conquest. We were just another thing in the way. Another thing to be defeated and taken control of. They wanted to rule the world. They were hungry for power and greatness. They wanted to believe that they were the gods. The gods who could judge everyone without consequence. So, they used us to help them get what they wanted. Forced us to do the manual work instead of them. They made us at fault for the horrors they caused. They took away our freedom, our individuality. Through all the maltreatment, they took us away from us. We weren’t human anymore. Or at least it seemed that way. At first, we had fought back but that wasn’t enough. It seems like it never is enough. When we realized we couldn’t win by ourselves, we asked our neighbors for help and got it. We were given refuge, a safe haven from the monstrosities occurring in our home. We were rescued from the camps and the abuse. We were saved and for that we are grateful. We can go on living our lives. It won’t be like it was beforehand or like we wanted it to be, but it will be good enough for us. Good enough for us to move on. Not to forget what happened, but to continue on. Continue making peace and ending violence. To make the world a safe place where everyone is accepted for who they are and are given the freedom they deserve. I would really have hoped to say that that was true. I had hoped that that was the worst of it, that everything bad would be over and it would now be peaceful, but that is not the truth. That was just the beginning, the beginning of the end.