America the Great

The world I live in today is much different than the one I remember. The water that once flowed through the rivers has now dried up. The trees are close to none. Millions and millions of species have gone extinct. Entire countries have been wiped off the earth. And this place I knew, this place I used to call home is no more. I stand here before you with nothing. Everything I have ever known has been taken away from me.

My name is Bianca Marie Dominguez. I am now 18 years old and I'm a refugee from a land that was once filled with greatness, The Great America. I came from a family of great wealth; I thought I had it all; success is the only thing I ever knew or understood failure was never an option. But in the blink of an eye that all has changed now and nothing seems to make sense anymore. I now walk through the ruins of my great America perplexed wondering why and how this happened, what went wrong? Amongst all the rubble and decomposed bodies I see fragments of what was once the American dream; the dream that once burned so brightly in the hearts of many, the dream that many other countries envied. Here I leave all of my hopes and dreams, I'll bury them here, and lock them tightly away in the ashes of my family that has now passed away, here too lays the remains of the life I once knew. The life I live now is one of solitude and fear. If my true identity is ever revealed it will be the end of me. I will be killed on the spot without questioning, without remorse and I will be forgotten like all of my brother and sisters that have fallen before me. My people are not welcome here anymore. My country has been destroyed and the American people have been completely banished from the other nations. I now live in exile, I seek refuge in no one and I now have no place to call my home. I am a wanderer, a drifter constantly running from my fears. Every day I wake up wondering, where do I go from here? Every day I wake up wondering if this breathe will be my last? Nothing in my life is certain, but I'm here and I have a story to share.

I remember when it all began. It all started some time ago, in the midst of war and a very chaotic world. America, which at the time was the most powerful country in the world, began to conquer. And by conquer I mean completely destroying other countries and spreading democracy throughout the land. I didn't believe it when I heard it, but news of America after one government was soon on the front page of every newspaper, the top story in the nightly news. America was seeking one government, one world government with America as the powerhouse. Our need to consume just kept growing and growing and our resources only got smaller. We began using up all of our resources at a very rapid rate; not only were we using up our resources but we also felt it was ok to use up the resources of the poorer nations as well. The poor were getting poorer, more people were going hungry and yet we didn't seem to care. We were acquiring all the things we needed to become the most powerful country in the world. We wanted to make it so the other countries had to turn to us as their saving grace. We were destroying the earth all the while destroying ourselves. The sad reality was we made up a mere 5% of the overall world population and yet still we were consuming over 30% of the worlds resources and the more powerful we got, the more this number increased. And the more we consumed the less resources there were available to us. It turned out our great plan to conquer wasn't so great after all, things began to fall apart. One can only progress so far and when you go as high as you can go, the only other way to go is down and down is where we went and we fell hard. Eventually we were faced with a great problem of scarcity. It became harder and harder for us to meet even just our basic needs. Poverty was on the rise, the majority of the people were going hungry, and it got harder and harder to control the violence. People were being killed for food. Drought became a huge issue, all of our main water sources began to dry up, and crops were no longer able to be grown. Natural disasters became more and more of a problem, various storms and tornados ripped through the mid west, hurricanes and earth quakes ripped through the coastal states and constant dust storms in the desert states made it unbearable to be outdoors. As the conditions worsened, we fell deeper and deeper into the mess that we ourselves had made and in the midst of all this the other nations started to crave the power that we once held. The countries we once walked over now sought vengeance on America. We had nothing but enemies and they wanted to make sure the great America would never regain its power again. This is when the air raids began. Day and night bombs rained over us ripping our country to shreds. We had nothing anymore, no means to defend; most of us didn't even have any shelter to seek safety in. I remember seeing a man being blown away by a missile as he rummaged through a garbage can in search of food. No one knew what to do it was all coming back to us. All the pain and suffering we inflicted on those around us was coming back to haunt us. Our military wasn't around to defend. They were scattered throughout the world, being slaughtered by the masses. We were being picked off one by one and no one had the slightest clue as to what to do. Helpless in every sense of the word; the only thing we could do was wait to die and that is what the majority of us did. I some how managed to get away, I managed to stay alive. My family however was not so lucky they were burnt to death as they slept during an air raid that happened in our neighborhood on a scorching hot night in June. I watched my entire neighborhood burn to the ground; All I remember doing is running. I ran and I kept on running until I reached the remains of what was once my grandfather's house. And I hid; I hid in the war cellar my grandfather had built many years ago with his own bare hands. He said it would survive anything, he knew one day we would be faced with days like these and he told us that when those days came, for us to go into hiding. The cellar was equipped with all I needed to survive for two years and I stayed in that cellar the entire time; all the while the world on the outside was being torn apart. I should have died in that cellar, but instead I survived, there a prisoner anxiously waiting the days life would greet me again. Finally the day came when the cellar no longer had any use to me. I remember when I opened its doors for the first time in 2 years. My bones were brittle and body malnourished. It took all the strength in me just to pry the doors open. I remember the sting of the cold winter air hitting my face. I was not able to make out my surroundings all I could see is dust and the smell of death lingered in the air. The silence of the world that awaited me was the most terrifying part. The fires still burned but there was not a living sole in site. And as I stood there in the ashes, I soon faced the harsh reality that I was alone, alone and there was nothing to turn back to. The only thing left to do was embark on the dreadful terrifying journey that was ahead of me. Leaving my home and seeking life abroad.

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