And then they came, all 40000 of them except one, the people born from the ashes of the phoenix. Or so they call, the fire bird.
“We need a temporary home,” A man whom I believe is their leader said the very moment they met our barangay captain.
Our captain said nothing in return. Every one was in awe at the time.
“Don’t worry we’ll bring goodness to your land, we’ll make this land flourish with fruits again.” Again said the leader of the fire people – as I have called them because they call their creator a fire bird.
And so they were given a lot at the end of the town, almost the other side of the mountain. For all of them it seems fit. It was the previous trashland, which was not used for quite almost three decades now, but still the stink of the earth is still present just by passing by the place.
And yes, a year later they were able to make their side of town greener. They didn’t had an easy start as the people from our town did not accept them easily.
“ We are people born from the ashes of a fire bird. One man represents one feather, and someday we will return as a fire bird. But for that to happen we need to be together again.” Said Rex, one of the people whom I was able to speak to during their first days.
“How sure you are?” I asked.
“We dream every night since we woke up like this, some time ago.” To know how long was that time nobody knew.
“So one man is missing, and your looking for him. Is that why the firebird divided himself as many as you are now?”
“Nobody questions that intention of the firebird, it has its own life, and avery life is different from the one before it, but one thing is for sure, our goal in this life is to look for the missing feather of the previous fire bird.”
I silent
“Isn’t that how life should be, no matter what happened yesterday, it shouldn’t be a nuisance in having your goals at the present moment?. I think that’s how it should be. “ He affirmed himself.
And we parted ways, since then I never had a chance to speak with him again.
These people are dark in color, not black but dark. They had a very shiny black hair though, as black as the gas that when I look at them intently they seem to shine with all the colors. Their eyes were as dark as their hair is and their eyelashes which seems common to everyone of them is long like that of a beautiful girls eyelashes. Another common thing about these people, is that they are all people of nature, they can tend a broken bird’s wing. They can befriend any beast they encounter, once a deer got lost on our side of the town, and they were able to seem to tell her which way to find the others.They can make sure that a plant would grow from a seed. They were not aware of what plastic is, but then eventually they were able to know how to recycle them.
Some people from my town are actually envious of them. As years past, and as it turned into a decade, still their temporary stay is questioned. Eventually they were left on their own, but with all the money they are making for flourishing the land they borrowed the town would not let them have their own state.
I wouldn’t deny that even I got envy of these people. I have seen their side of town grow and ours eventually fell into sudden state of being poor. Some blame their coming as a curse. Some would say that the only difference between their side and ours is that they know how to help each other. But most agreed that our fall started when they came.
Which is another truth I would share, could be a coincident, but the people from our town just can’t ignore the fact that the some of the eldest in our town died all at the same time, 7 of them, just didn’t woke up the next day, And soon a lot of things followed. The first murder happened in our town, with our own people killing one of our neighbor.
Until a night came, when one man from our town got drunk and questioned them again.
“I remember how they died,” He shouted over the edge of the town. To the people who seems not to understand that they were being shouted of an anger of almost a decade now.
“I remember how they died, they died out of breath. The were choking. I saw both of my parents die and breathed their last breath. It’s as if there was an ash coming from out of their mouth, and like an ash it flew over the air.”
I can remember each word he said, I remember because they keep on repeating the same one for over a week, until he died. Just didn’t wake up.
“He was killed obviously,” Somebody said. Although most said that he died out of drunkenness.
Of course this talk did not just die as fast as when the man was buried, after a month one man, so drunk from reality, went straight to the edge of the town and burned their houses.
Nobody survived, but no bodies were found. Everything turned to ashes, and the story of the fire people seems to get lost as the days passed.
This was how it was told unto me by my father, and this is how I tell this to you, so that when you meet the last fire people, I want you to know what you should do with him, just bring him over to the trashland and a new fire bird will arise.