R. A. M.

1; I'm doing this for them

She knew.

She have always known the truth. It was just a matter of finding reliable evidence to support her claim.

But she also knew that every time you reach for the stars with open arms, when you finally make it, there's always that one misbehaving asteroid that inevitably gets in the way.

She found her asteroid.

Carmen knows she has precisely one chance to cautiously but swiftly conceal her lifetime research before R.A.A. comes barging into her secluded house. She quickly placed the tablet and laptop inside her satchel and places the satchel in the discreet wall of her backyard storage shed. She gently pushes back the wall so the secret door wouldn't be discovered and anxiously looks at her watch.

Three minutes.

"Shït." She swears and hurriedly dashes in the direction of her house. She can already hear the blasting, vexing sounds of the persistent police sirens and the subtle slam of her inquisitive neighbor's front doors.

When she finally enters the back door of her house, she hurriedly runs to her home office and starts to destructively throw bins full of paper everywhere in the room. As the papers scatters everywhere, she hears the familiar protocol shout.

"This is R.A.A, open the door or we will forcefully enter." Carmen of course ignores the warning and continues to completely demolish her office. When she finally hears her front door slam open, she hurriedly opens the 'secret' compartment by her Athena head sculptor and shoves a clutch of random documents inside the small compartment. She makes sure to leave the compartment open long enough for R.A.A to sneak a peak and then 'hurriedly' closes it.

"Hands where we can see them." One man says, carelessly waving his gun at her. Carmen already knows the protocol, though.

You have to when you're a person of color.

Carmen quickly raises her hands in the air in surrender and an officer swiftly storms over to her. The white woman harshly pushes her body to the ground and applies what feels like her entire body weight on Carmen.

"I'm doing this for them." Carmen eagerly repeats in her head to build courage, while she's cruelly man-handled by this woman, ironically enough.

But she knows not to protest.

After the woman beats Carmen to her satisfaction, she finally grabs her off the office floor and throws her to the other officers. They grab her and lead her out the house.

Carmen raises her head and looks into the eyes of her neighbors. All of them hold such pain, humiliation, and sorrow in their eyes that Carmen has to try and hold back her tears. Albeit, she continues to carefully watch the neighbors with such brave strength while getting dragged to the big R.A.A van that's hastily parked in the middle of the street. She makes sure to remember all the faces of the victimized black people that she encountered, just as they make sure to remember her face. They all knew that even though they don't have their melanin physically, they'll always have it in their hearts.

No matter what R.A.M does, they will not succeed in taking P.O.C's strong and enchanting pride that they rightfully carry though rough and petrifying times.

Even though Carmen's neighbors held such familiar pity for her in their eyes, she knew that she will make it out of here alive, and most importantly

With her melanin skin.

As the van drives off with Carmen in the back, shackled up with her arms behind her back and her legs bent in front of her, she makes sure to take note on every little thing they pass on the way to R.A.M headquarters. Carmen bitterly chuckles at their stupidity to not cover the medium sized windows that covered the back of the van, or to even blindfold her. They really must be very confident that she won't make it out of there alive.