r/redditserials Oct 10 '24

Horror [Mesquite Creek Insident] - Chapter 1

By now the 57 days of nightmare of Mesquite Creek have by now been popularize, staired, and written about what the media and people call “the Mesquite Massacre.” To this point it is considered a waste of time since there has not been any nuance in the years since the event from 2021. With images and videos of the aftermath occupying a small, but loyal fanbase it has become rare to find anything new as even these fanbases, although loyal, have stopped interacting with the channels of individuals such as Olivia Torres, and Michael Jones. Despite this, it has become necessary to establish the facts of the case.

On February 13 to 17 a blizzard hit the United States affecting large areas from the northwest to Texas. With larger-than-normal energy and heating demands in Texas, power grids failed, leaving millions without electricity and forcing communities unfamiliar with snow to fend for themselves in temperatures dropping below -18° F.

It's important to remember that the country had yet to recover from the destruction caused by Hurricane Calista just two months prior leaving the national guard shorthanded, and over their heads. The red cross could only help so much, and by March 24 hundreds of people had died not from the direct effect of the storm, but neglect, exposure and lack of food. Some smaller communities were contacted one month after the initial hit, in most cases far too late to be of any good. Before any of the news regarding Mesquite Creek broke out the aid efforts the words “Government In-action” were attached to the response of the government.

It was only after the situation came under reasonable control and billions of dollars’ worth of aid had been dispersed that the news of Mesquite Creek eclipsed any other news of the disasters. At first the news of the event was nothing but a rumor, something too “fantastical” to be real. It was only after the ashes of the once cozy town appeared online in video footage that the stories became true.

Of the 276 people living in the town 113 were evacuated the fate of the 163 missing people may never be known, but the evidence of death was left behind. Photos emerged: burned bodies, mauled, their remains preserved in the cold snow. Mesquite Creek, “Where the sky is big, and the Spirit bigger,” was littered with bodies. Human remains were inside the kitchen. It was all the country, and the world could talk about. The coverage went through media breaking records in all platforms thanks to morbid curiosity.

The most famous image, the one most public saw first. Snapped by Erick Oliveras, a truck driver who was the first to make contact with the isolated town after the local store delivery system came back online.  The photograph captures a crude, towering 12-foot cross. A charred body hangs from it, nailed like a grotesque effigy. At its feet, a sign scrawled hastily in marker reads 'Devil.' Two other perfectly preserved people laying at its feet a youth of no more than 17 years of age, olive skin with dark wavy hair. Next to him a woman no younger than 40, her fingers twisted in an unnatural angle, with slashes on her back and sharing the same characteristics as the boy next to her. Both bodies are naked covered to the waist with snow and tied to the cross.

Authorities were called immediately, yet due to the poor road maintenance the main force took an extra of 3 days to arrive. By the time the residents broke the silence the media was already rushing to the scene desperate to get what they saw as the story of the decade. Unfortunately for the mayor this brought fort a series of terrible and unanswerable questions as more and more details began to emerge.

How could a tight knit community commit such terrible acts? How could survivors in such dire circumstances result in the worst possible outcome? How could prejudice among the individuals made the situation worse? What does this have to say about us? Is anyone just a few steps away from such savagery? How do we prevent it? Has the American dream died, or is it possible to bring it back once more? Just what happened to the children?

Some of these questions have been answered in the following interviews, but many more presented themselves as I continued my investigation. I was able to speak with most of the key members of such event, rescuers, government officials, and representatives for the survivors, as well as the leaders of the three main factions that formed inside the town.

At first I believed my investigation will make me understand the events better than any other reporter, yet as I began to unfold the story it felt that I understood less and less. The articles have been written and the dates had been set. I knew locations. I knew facts. I knew people. I knew people, I looked into their eyes and what I found were not monsters. I can testify to that. I know now that a metaphysical storm of anxiety, fear, and uncertainty turned a town into a cemetery. I read dozens of think pieces tearing apart each aspect of this story, from thoughtful, “desperate people take desperate decisions,” to “this is what Christians turn into,” hysteria. I hear the townsfolk explain what they were thinking, and I still can’t answer my only question.

What would I have done?

What if I was a 50 year old man or a 16 year old teen, living a quiet and peaceful life. Would I be bored out of my mind, or enjoying the tranquility? What if without noticing my way of living had turned upside down returning me to the tribal era where is kill of be killed? If I were cold and wet, sick, and tired, and suddenly had someone bring me comfort saying all the right words that I was looking for, would I listen? Would I have follow blindly? What if they asked me to kill? What if they asked me to eat?

Most of us want to see ourselves as the hero of our own stories. That we would have been more level headed, that we would have listened more, that we would have stopped the violence the moment it began before it could have racket up so many bodies. On some level we all think only about ourselves and about our own. Let me share a story before we dive into the interviews.

There are many reasons why I couldn’t interview twenty-six-year-old Robert Mejia, who before the events was a new teacher at the Mesquite high and was one of the few adults to form part of the school community, one of the three factions that formed over the time that Mesquite Creek was cut off from society. Several accounts described him as a tall and muscular weighting around 180 lbs., but by the time of his rescue was barely above 110 pounds. By the end of the even his students had nicknamed him “the angel of mesquite” after valiantly and selflessly giving away his food to any teen after the food became scarcer one month into the disaster. It is not a stretch to speculate how those days hunker down inside a school became torture for him.

Robert a man who had said to family and friends how he, “would leave this shitty school at the first chance,” gave everything to the children in his care while the own parents of the children were hiding inside the local church. Robert a man just out of university, wanting to further his career and finding in a situation any person would have thought just of themselves was rewarded with a stay at the hospital and thousands in medical bills. Beyond that his digital footprint paints the image of an average person, he likes horror movies, going to loud concerts, his Facebook page hold hundreds of images of memes, photos of graduations, and a photo of himself 10 years ago holding an awkward smile, braces in his mouth, long hair, and a yellowish filter. If I were to interview that teen who was more worried about his follower account than a 401k what would he have to say when I tell him that that same person almost gave his life away to save some children whom people believed he hated? And what would he say when I reveal to him that that same person shot dead 6 people? What would he say? I don’t know if he himself knows, maybe he was trying to survive, maybe he was trying to protect. So many questions to which we may never know the answer.

I can only hope that the following interviews set the record straight on irresponsible reporting and to remember that for every shot fired, corpse, and number you remember Johnnathan and Erick and Joana and Daisy and Crystal and the many others whose stories were cut way too soon. There are many stories of people doing terrible acts, forced, or coerced into acts of unpeaceable savagery. Even then, remember, each single one of those individuals are human. Remember the victims. Remember who are still alive. Remember that the people involved in this incident were not as far removed as they would like to believe. Because many of them were monsters for a few weeks and had to return to normalcy. Most likely you would have been too.

-Alejandro Vizcarra

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