"Aaaaahhhhh..."
The sound of wailing rose—not like a child's cry, but like the howl of a shattering soul.
In the stillness of his dark room, Ahmed's fists gripped his knees so violently that his knuckles turned white. His tears fell in silence, leaving dark stains on the cold wooden floor.
Every insult he had ever heard or witnessed in the past now echoed in his mind, like a whip lashing his spirit. At that moment, his entire life was embodied in a single question, one for which he never found an answer: "Why is the weak beaten? Why does the strong hold an open license for brutality? And can this madness truly be called justice?!"
"Damn this world! I hate it," he whispered. Then, his voice rose: "I hate the streets that have memorized every detail of my weakness. I hate the faces of people who carry a look of malice in their eyes—those eyes that delight in seeing me broken. I hate the voices that laugh at my pain and treat it as entertainment."
Suddenly, the torrent of congested words cut off. He began to laugh.
It wasn't a normal laugh; it was hysterical, manic, mingled with salty tears that flowed profusely. His voice echoed through the room, as if all the pain he had lived had suddenly transformed into a frantic energy. He was laughing at himself, at his weakness, and at his blind fate that had placed him in a world he did not understand.
Those questions and broken laughs were the daily anthem of his life ever since he began to realize the true weight of his school bag. It wasn't heavy with the weight of the books it held, but with the weight of the stares that followed him every day—looks of contempt and mockery.
His name was "Ahmed," but in the school hallways and yards, his name had completely vanished. "The Rat," "The Coward," "The Silent One"... these were the titles his classmates branded him with, becoming like indelible tattoos on his skin.
He hated school, he hated the walk home that always hid grim surprises, and he hated every face he saw in the street—even his own reflection in the mirror. To him, the world was nothing more than a large cage of iron bars, where he carried his wounds in silence, waiting only for "salvation" to arrive.
And "salvation" was embodied in the faces of his family—the only hope that had not yet been tainted by the cruelty of the outside world.
One day, amidst the darkness of their despair, the sun of hope rose. The family had the chance to travel to Russia to start a new life, far away from humiliation.
Joy filled their hearts as they climbed the airplane stairs. Inside, everyone was jostling, laughing, and racing toward the comfortable front seats, believing they were flying toward safety.
But Ahmed retreated slowly. It wasn't out of generosity, but rather the product of a lifetime of isolation and the fear of friction with others. He dragged his feet slowly until he found himself alone in the very last back seat, behind everyone, isolated as he had always been.
At the front of the plane, his family seemed to have fallen into a peaceful, reassured sleep.
As for him, from his solitary seat, he watched the world—which he thought he had said goodbye to—collapse once more, but this time, physically.
Suddenly, the plane shook violently, as if a giant were rattling it. Silence reigned for a single second, and then hell broke loose.
From the nearby window, he saw an extraordinary, brilliant blue flash illuminating the dark sky. It was followed by a deafening, thunderous roar—unlike anything he had ever heard—a roar that tore through the stillness of the night and numbed the ears. A sharp alarm blared from the cockpit, briefly announcing a failure in the rear lightning arrestor.
He didn't have time to think. A violent bolt of lightning, like a spear of fire, struck the tail of the plane directly.
In an instant, sound vanished. There were no more screams, no engine noise, nothing... only a mute vacuum, intense cold, and a suffocating ringing in his ears.
Ahmed felt as though time had stopped completely, as if the scene were moving in slow motion.
In that eternal second, he saw his mother in the front, far away from him... She turned toward him in pure terror, her eyes fixed on him, her mouth open in a scream he could not hear.
As he looked at her, he saw the metal wall rise between them. The lightning had ripped the plane in two.
The front half, carrying his family and his hopes, began to drift away slowly... agonizingly slow in his eyes, as if it were bidding him a final farewell.
He saw his entire old world, with everything that bound him to it in love and fear, vanish into the dark clouds.
Suddenly, time accelerated terrifyingly. The rear half he was riding began to plummet... falling into the abyss at a maddening speed, and the screams of the passengers around him began to rise again, mingling with the sound of the wind howling through the torn fuselage.
The first signs of returning to life were sounds he wasn't used to in his "rear kingdom": the chirping of birds and the nearby murmur of water.
He opened his eyes slowly. His vision was blurred, and pain flooded every inch of his body.
He was shocked by the sight of a small, colorful bird perched confidently on his shoulder. He tried to turn, only to find himself lying beside a calm river, its waters shimmering under the morning sun.
Where was he? Everything seemed strange... the trees, the damp air, the strong earthy scent.
He tried to stand, but his movement was immediately halted by a painful sound... the sound of "blood droplets" falling rhythmically onto a dry leaf beneath him.
He reached for his back, and his hand was stained with warm blood. He felt the source of the pain to find a sharp piece of metal from the plane wreckage had pierced his body.
He looked around again, this time with a scrutinizing eye. He wasn't in snowy Russia. He was in a dense, tropical jungle, full of mysterious sounds and high heat.
He realized, with a horror mixed with his grief, that he had not left the continent of Africa. Instead, he had fallen into its very heart—alone, injured, and facing a world that knows no mercy.
Here, his true journey began... not just to return to his family, but to search for the answer to his old question: Will the weak still be beaten here, too?