Katalaunia wrote:Present day Mariana walked into her small, sparsely-decorated flat with a sigh—her tiring day at work capped off by a tiring climb up to the third floor of this apartment building in downtown. She glanced around the area; the apartment was all a single room except for a small bathroom in a corner near the door, about the only redeeming quality of this cheap, ancient place she called home was the small balcony hanging over the street outside. As she looked around the room her eyes were caught by the red and yellow of the old, dingy Spanish flag hung on the wall, softly fluttering in the breeze coming in through the open window. The flag didn’t mean what it once did though; where once the sheet of cloth brought her pride now it only inspired thoughts of sadness and disappointment. Mariana had spent nearly countless nights lying in bed staring at the flag, asking herself why: Why had Madrid cracked down so hard on her homeland? It had been 5 years since the referendum and still Catalonia was governed by a military governor from a military base south of Barcelona. Catalonia had been stripped not only of its regional government but also of its representation in Madrid. She still didn’t quite regret her ‘No’ vote in the referendum in 2017 but she found herself questioning it more and more; What had her loyalty to Spain gotten her? As far as she could tell nothing but her squeaking by in a dead end, low wage job as a second-class citizen in her own country. As these thoughts rushed through her mind she glanced down at her left hand to see the exquisite engagement ring on her finger; Ramon was now her fiancée, and he was about the only thing keeping her going. From the ring her gaze snapped to the dated white fridge in its place along the wall, and she quickly walked over to it and swung the door open, snatching a bottle of wine from the inside of the door and quickly pouring herself a glass before returning the bottle to the fridge and briskly walking to the apartment’s small balcony. Mariana left the door slid open as she took a seat on a small plastic chair that occupied the balcony, and she looked down the street towards the sun just beginning to set in the west as she took a couple sips of the dry red wine in her glass, trying to take her mind off the present with the alcohol and the beautiful natural sight before her.
Mariana’s attempt to force even just a moment of bliss was quickly dashed however, by the sound of police sirens—a noise that had become sadly commonplace throughout the city, but this time Mariana’s heart skipped a beat as she noticed a convoy of intimidating black vans turn down the alleyway that her apartment was on; each vehicle had red and yellow markings, with “GUARDIA CIVL” stamped on each in bold yellow font. Mariana only stayed on the balcony for another second before hastily getting up and retreating back into her apartment, but her curiosity got the better of her and she stayed just inside the door, watching the scene unfold on the street below her. As she saw the convoy of national police stop right in front of her apartment she swallowed nervously in an attempt to suppress her growing fear as she watched a surprising number of militarized police officers, in black uniforms with black helmets and shaded visors quickly file out of each van but she was calmed slightly as she saw them stack up to breach into the building across the street. Each officer had an M-16 rifle in hand, and the one closest to the door looked back and held his right hand up with three fingers raised as he counted down ”Tres! Dos! UNO!” and on one he pointed forward before stepping in front of the door and harshly kicking it in as the police stormed the building. As Mariana watched she glanced back at the camera resting on the counter but she shook off the idea of taking a picture of the scene unfolding before her—she’d heard too many stories from coworkers of being assaulted by the police themselves simply for trying to document a newsworthy occurrence, and she knelt down as she heard the first shot of a rifle go off inside the building.
Only a couple more gunshots followed, and Mariana was only able to get a couple short glimpses of action through the windows of the unassuming building across the street, but after about 10 minutes a couple of the policemen marched out of the building with boxes that held computers, maps, some pistols, and various small unmarked containers, with a plethora of Estelada Blavas stuffed into the gaps of the items populating the boxes. These were fairly unceremoniously tossed into the leading van before the officers took their rifles off their shoulders and rushed back into the building. With the danger of getting caught by a missed shot seemingly past Mariana stood back up but she stayed at the edge of the window, only peaking out to the street in order to avoid drawing the attention of the policemen below. After a few more minutes of watching a now-boring scene a couple of policemen reemerged from the building, this time leading a line of men and women, young and old, all handcuffed and many with injuries from the firefight in the building. There were probably close to 30 in total, and they were escorted into the other vans as a new police officer emerged from the leading vehicle. This man was the commander of the unit—his status betrayed by his uniform—and he spoke quickly with one of the police who had assaulted the building for a few moments as their prisoners were shoved roughly into the police vans, until towards the back of the line of vehicles one of the officers shouted at someone out of Mariana’s view, catching not only her attention but that of the police commander as well. Her curiosity again got the better of her as Mariana leaned out the door to her apartment’s balcony, but as she did her heart dropped.
At the mouth of the alleyway Mariana saw Ramon stood frozen in the middle of the small path—she knew he was planning on coming over today but thought it wouldn’t be for nearly another hour—and she quickly noticed two of the officers rapidly approaching him with their rifles leveled—they must have thought he was going to what was apparently a separatist safehouse across the street. She tried to shout ”RUN!” at him but the breath was stolen from her and she couldn’t make a sound, and she stood terrified on the balcony for a second before the wine glass she was holding slipped from her hand and fell to the ground, shattering on the concrete floor of the balcony, but by the time it broke Mariana had already began to run. She sprinted through her apartment barefoot but as she reached the door she just kept going, knowing she had no time to slip her shoes on, and as she burst out into the dirty hallway outside her room she made a sharp turn and ran down the hall to the stairwell. As she ran she could feel a couple tiny, sharp pebbles dig into the soles of her feet, but she easily brushed the slight pain they caused aside from her mind as she made good time down the hall and reached the stairs, grabbing a hold of the banister and using it to spin herself tightly around the pole and rapidly descend the stairs. These tile steps were far dirtier than the carpeted hallway, and more and more pebbles dug at her feet with every step, but she knew that she didn’t have any time to stop and brush them away. After finally getting down to the first floor she darted the short distance down this hallway to the door and she burst through it onto the old brick street outside.
Upon breaking out into the street Mariana’s gaze first shot to the right, where she saw a couple of policemen including the police commander quickly spin around and begin to raise their weapons, obviously caught off guard by the unknown individual who had just loudly barged out of the building behind them, but she ignored them and turned to her left, where the two officers from before had just reached Ramon and were wrestling his hand behind his back to lock handcuffs on them. Without a second thought she quickly darted down the street, hearing a couple shouts of “HALT! ” from behind her but she ignored them, quickly feeling the rough bricks beneath her feet drive the sharp pebbles still stuck in her soles further in with each step, but she pushed herself through the pain as she ran down the street, where the police officers had finally gotten the handcuffs locked on Ramon and had begun to escort him to one of the vans. However with Ramon subdued the second officer quickly turned his focus to Mariana, quickly aiming his rifle at her center mass as he rapidly moved towards her, loudly shouting ”STAY BACK! RETURN TO YOUR HOME!” Mariana complied and stopped, but she stood her ground and in a panic pleaded, ”You can’t do this! He’s not a separatist I swear! He was coming to my apartment!” Only the officer’s mouth was visible under the dark reflective visor he wore, but she could see it twist into a sneer before he retorted ”Stay out of this and return to your home, NOW!” as he quickly closed the gap between himself and Mariana, but she continued to hold fast. She was terrified as she saw the officer approaching but her gaze snapped to Ramon for a moment, and it felt as if it was slow motion as she saw him mouth ”Run” but she remained frozen in place, her gaze growing saddened before she looked back to the policeman and with the last bit of confidence she had she began to retort; ”I’m not going to stay out of this! He did noth-“ but she was cut off as the officer reached her and quickly lashed out, smacking her in the side of the face with the stock of his rifle and knocking her down to her knees. She had spun as she fell and almost just as she crumpled down to her knees she felt the officer roughly kick her in the back with the bottom of his booted foot, sending her the rest of the way to the ground. As she hit the ground she heard the policemen forcefully order, ”DON’T MOVE! and her gaze was to the side and she saw Ramon shout, ”NO! as he lurched towards her, trying to rip away from the other officer’s grasp but failing, being harshly yanked back and shoved a short distance further to the van before being roughly cast in.
As Mariana lay on the brick road she didn’t move a muscle—sure there was a rifle aimed at the back of her head and petrified of what was going to come next, but she was knocked out of her nebulous terror by the officer’s knee driving itself into her lower spine as he pinned her down and grabbed her arms, yanking them behind her. ”AHHH!” she instinctively screamed at the pain that unexpectedly coursed through her lower torso, and she was too wracked by the pain to resist as the police officer locked another set of handcuffs around her wrists, but as she labored to push her focus to anything but the pain she saw another set of boots of another policeman walking up to where she lay in the street.
Captain Pedro Nevarez hailed from Leon, and he had been deployed to Catalonia since the Guardia Civil had initially been sent in full force in October of 2017. He had executed more raids like this than anyone else but from the moment this girl had ran out of the building something felt…off. He had stayed the weapons of his men at the vans as she had darted down the street, but it was only her agonized scream as Officer Hernandez had pinned her to the ground with a knee to the back that compelled him to take action, and he quickly walked over as Hernandez roughly grabbed her arms and pulled them behind her to lock handcuffs on them, however just as Hernandez was about to hoist her up Pedro quickly ordered, ”Stop! Hernandez’s gaze shot up to his superior with a confused look on his face but before he could debate Pedro continued—working to put a false coldness on his response to mask his true intentions—”There’s no reason to take her in. She wasn’t with the rebels and she’s too stupid to be any use to them if she runs out here during a police raid. Keep her there until the vans with the prisoners clear out.” He could tell Hernandez didn’t approve of the decision but he simply nodded affirmatively before cruelly driving his knee harder into the poor girl’s back. Pedro winced but said nothing as he quickly ran back to the lead van.
Mariana groaned in pain as the officer who had struck her down pushed even harder into her spine, but she was still too petrified to move. After what felt like an eternity she saw the last van begin to move, rolling right up to her and the officer gruffly ordered, ”Stay there.” and he quickly unlocked the handcuffs from her wrists before standing up, intentionally pushing himself off against her back and sending another wave of pain shooting through her body, before he quickly ran the short distance to the van and clambered in, and the van pulled away. Still Mariana was too terrified to move until the sound of the police vans finally evaporated into the ambient road noise before she pushed herself up into a sitting position. Immediately tears came to her eyes and her head fell into her hands as she broke down in the middle of the street, but after a few minutes she looked back up and noticed one of the Esteladas that must have fallen out of its box and blown underneath one of the vans, causing it to go unnoticed. With a rage she had never felt before welling up within her Mariana quickly brushed the pebbles away from her feet and gingerly pushed herself up, walking over to the independence flag crumpled on the ground, and she took a quick, suspicious glance both ways down the street before angrily snatching the flag off the street and storming back into her apartment building; tears still running down her face.
HNRoleplay
My hand has been forced.
