Never let anyone change you.

Once in a small town lived these wonderful and cheerful people. They had a great life with their leader, Dan. Dan had become their leader because everyone in the town agreed that he had fit the requirements to lead. He would always make smart choices that would benefit everyone. There was not a lot of violence in the town. Everyone got along with everyone else. If there were problems in the town, Dan would always sort it out and make everything better. Dan loved to play with the kids and he had a brother named Luke who looked up to Dan.

For three days a ruler and his army were walking around in the desert in search for settlement. While looking they came across a small town.

“This will be a great place to settle down and take over,” said Matthew, the dictator, to his men.

They walked up to the small peaceful town, and Matthew asked a stranger, “Where is your leader? I need to have a word with him.”

“I will go get him,” said the blacksmith. The blacksmith had gone to summon Dan, and he said to him, “Dan, someone wants to talk to you.”

“Who is it?”

“I do not know. Some strangers came into our town and asked to see the leader.”

“Alright, take me to them.”

“Okay, let’s go,” said the blacksmith. The blacksmith led Dan to the strangers. As they walked to the strangers, Dan was suspicious of the request to see him.  

“Who are you and why have you come here?”

“I am Matthew, and these are my men. We are on a journey to a large town up north to trade. We are in need of shelter, food, and water. Would it be okay if we stayed the night? We will leave the first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Alright, you and your men may stay here but under one condition.You have to set up your own tents and buy your own food, but we will provide you with water, that’s all.”

“Thank you,” said Matthew.

Matthew lied to Dan so that it would not seem suspicious. Dan did not know that Matthew and his men were planning to take over the town and kill him. So Matthew and his men planned a way to take out Dan early in the morning; they wanted to do it in front of everyone so that the whole town would be scared. Later that night, Dan rang the bell, which meant the whole town would meet in a secret location that no one knew except for them. When Dan felt like something was wrong, he held these meetings to protect his people and town from outsiders.

“Everyone, I have called you here tonight to tell you to be aware of the strangers who have come into our town. They have a lot of equipment with them and their leader said it was for ‘trading purposes.’ Do not let your guard down. We do not know if they are dangerous, but we will not take any chances. They are suppose to be leaving tomorrow morning, but something might come up. I am not sure. That’s all I have to say. Thank you for your time.”

They all agreed with Dan because they knew that he was usually right. They all left and went back to their homes after that speech.

“They fell for our trick. Now it’s time to plan out our movement! We have to take out their leader first; he is our main objective. Tomorrow morning, I’ll find him and start a conversation. After a few minutes, I want Mark, William, and Lewis to come up and grab him, then bring him to the bell. Everyone else surround the bell. Once we are there, I will ring the bell. Then we will kill him in front of everybody.”

Everyone witnessed the assassination and it was horrible what happen to Dan. Luke was furious and devastated about how Dan died.

“Everyone, I am your new leader. You will obey me from now on and if you choose not to, you will suffer the consequences,” commanded Matthew.

“We will not listen to you!” yelled a food sales woman.

“Lewis, grab that lady! She will suffer for disrespecting me!” Lewis brought her over to Matthew. They stoned her then cut off her head, arms, and legs. Then they tied her remaining body to the pole and left her there.

“Here is a sign to everyone not to disobey or disrespect us. Since I am now your leader, you will learn to speak my language. You may not speak English anymore; if we hear you speaking it then you will be tortured. Your new language that you will be learning is French. There will be signs to assist you in speaking the language but everyone will be taught it.”

After he was done talking, everyone went back to what they were doing before and talked about the situation. He commanded his army to put the posters and signs around the entire town. After one week, everyone was broken and torn apart. They were so scared of speaking English for the fear of getting caught. They did not know what to do now that they did not have a leader or someone to strengthen them. In that week, someone was caught speaking English and was tortured. It was not like how Matthew killed the lady. This time he burned the man to death.

“Si vous ne voulez pas suivre mes règles, vous serez punis,” said Matthew. Everyone was terrified now. Luke spread the word around to everyone to meet in the secret place that night to discuss the problem because he was afraid to ring the bell.

“We have a crisis on our hands. Matthew has changed our language and lifestyle. We need to do something about this. We will not survive if this keeps going on,” said Luke.

“What do you suggest we do?” said the blacksmith.

“We fight back for Dan, our town, and our language! Everyone will have to fight because we are doing this for ourselves and for everyone in the town! We have a better chance of defeating Matthew and his army if everyone helps.”

“YEAHH!” everyone screamed.   

“Blacksmith, go and prepare weapons for us to use.”

“When will we strike, Luke?” asked the Blacksmith.

“Tomorrow night, we will go in and kill the guards first, then make our way to their leader. Now go back to your homes before he knows something is up.”

The blacksmith worked long and hard to prepare the weapons for battle. Luke was there to help him to help speed up the process.

“Looks like we have enough weapons for everyone,” said the blacksmith.

“Yeah, this should be enough,” said Luke. Matthew’s men were walking by for their morning stroll and they walked past the blacksmith’s shop.

“Comment allez-vous?” said one of the soldiers.

“Je suis bon vous remercie.” responded Luke. The soldier carried on.  

“That was a close one,” said Luke

“Yeah, it was,” said the blacksmith.

Later that night, everybody gathered around the blacksmith’s place and received their weapons.

“Tonight is the night we take back power in our language, our town, and our lives!” said Luke.

Everyone then ran to Matthew and his men’s huts. They started killing all of his men. Cutting their heads off, arms, and stabbing them until they died. They fought for a while. When Luke and the blacksmith went to look for Matthew, they found him trying to escape so they grabbed him.

“You killed my brother. You came into our town and changed everything for us. Now you must suffer.” They started to fight. Luke was wounded, cut in his arm and leg; Matthew was wounded, cut in his arm and chest. During the fight, Luke had been knocked down to the ground.

“Say hi to your brother for me.” As Matthew was about to kill Luke, Luke took his sword and quickly pierced Matthew right through his chest. Then Luke also cut off his tongue because Matthew had done that to his brother, and it is a symbol of their ability to have power of what language they want to speak.

After the battle was finished, ten people died in the town and fifteen were injured. They tossed all of the bodies of Matthew and his men outside the town walls. They buried all of the bodies of their people next to Dan’s body. The townspeople later told Luke to be their leader because he was brave and stepped up when they were in need of help.

“I am honored to be your leader. I will follow in my brother’s footsteps. I know he is proud of what we did and he is looking over each and every one of us.”