Teens Write Fanfic: A Youth-Organized Protest March Goes Global

For Teen Week, we reached out to three teenage fan fiction writers and asked them to write a short, politically focused piece of fan fiction. In this story, Mollie, a 17-year-old student journalist from Maryland, envisages a student protest gone viral.

Mollie's note: As a teenager myself, I really wanted to write a story where teenagers are the focus. I'm growing up in a very politically active home so I've been interested in politics and government ever since I was a young kid. Not being able to vote doesn't mean we shouldn't have a voice when it comes to the future of the country where we're growing into adults.

"What happened to you?" Connor said, chuckling a little at Eliska's lovestruck expression.

"I'm a changed woman." she said.

Allison raised an eyebrow. "Care to elaborate?"

"I went to the Women's March over the weekend." Eliska sighed happily and dropped her head into her hands, beaming. "And it changed my life."

The whole group laughed, Allison leaning forward and waving her hand in front of Eliska's face.

"Well, snap out of trance mode and tell us about it!"

"It was… indescribable. I never thought that I could be a part of something like that."

Eliska's mind went back to the events of the past Saturday, remembering what it felt like to be surrounded by so many people fighting for the same cause that she was. She had never felt such a strong feeling of pride like that before.

"I think it's really cool that a lot of teenagers went. I would have gone, but I had soccer," Lacey said.

The group then fell silent for a moment, Connor speaking up next.

"What if there was something like the Women's March, but called 'Teenagers' March,' or something like that. Now that, that would be cool."

"Like in that movie where all those kids went on strike to fight for their rights… Newsies! I mean we aren't paperboys in the 1800s, but the concept is the same. Us being young, and not able to vote, doesn't invalidate our opinions. This is our country too and we have the right to fight for its improvement just as much as my grandma does," Allison piped up, rambling on a little.

Eliska and the whole group nodded along as she spoke, with Eliska reaching down into her backpack and pulling out a notebook and pen when she was done.

"Let's do this."

The group all went to Eliska's house straight after school, sitting in a circle with laptops, notebooks, and pens amongst them bouncing ideas off of each other.

"How do this sound?" Connor said, everyone looking up from what they were doing to pay attention to him.

"Youth March 2017 is a march organized by students of Broadlet High School, Washington DC, to promote the visibility of young voices in politics and social issues. The march will take place on Wednesday April 5th at 11:11 AM. Students who want to participate are encouraged to walk out of class and meet in the parking lot, and from there we will march forth into the city."

When he was done reading he turned his laptop around to show the group the poster he had made, all of them reacting positively with smiles.

"That sounds great. Go ahead and tweet it out. The rest of us will make our own posters to hand out at school."

Connor tweeted out the poster and closed his laptop, joining the rest of the group in making posters. They were so caught up in their artwork that they weren't checking their phones, and had no idea what was awaiting them when they did.

It was Lacey who broke the no phone streak first, picking it up to look up something for a drawing reference.

"Uhhh, guys?" She said, not able to pry her eyes off her screen.

"Hm?"

"#YouthMarch is trending worldwide on Twitter."

Eliska snatched the phone out her hands, the rest of the group crowding around her to look at the screen. She scrolled through all the tweets under the hashtag, full of students from all over the country saying that they would be walking out of their classrooms to march. With every page refresh there were more tweets.

The day before the march went by in a happy blur. There was one disturbance; a disturbance by the name of Principal Vickers, who came over the intercom saying that anyone who walked out for the march would face expulsion. The group spent lunch looking over the school handbook, and come to the conclusion that the rules were vague enough for them to fight expulsion, if it came to that. Outside of their school, #YouthMarch continued to trend on Twitter, people seeming to grow more excited about it by the minute.

No one in the organizational group slept a wink that night.

The next day, at 11:11 AM, it began. Standing up, grabbing their things, and walking out of class was nerve-racking, but that didn't seem to put people off of it. Eliska did a quick headcount in the parking lot. Nearly two-thirds of the school had turned out! When she checked her phone, she could see the same thing happening around the country, which fueled her excitement.

The left the parking lot and marched onward to the city, signs in hand and game-faces on. A few cars slowed down and honked as they passed by. Suddenly, Eliska felt her arm being pulled.

"Eliska Matthews? I'm with the Washington DC Police Department, you need to come with me."

Eliska did a double take, a panic beginning to set in. She wanted to run, but she knew better than that, so she went with him. She could hear people yelling for her as she was put in the back of the cruiser, tears stinging behind her eyes.

"Can you tell me why I'm being detained?"

"You were the organizer of this, correct?"

It didn't take long for word to travel that Eliska had been taken away, both among the Broadlet protestors and protestors across the country. Lacey and the rest of the organizational group ran off to a quiet area to brainstorm, all of them on edge."Connor, you have the most Twittter followers out of all of us, start a hashtag!" Lacey spat out. Connor yanked his phone out his pocket, typing rapidly. Within seconds #FreeEliska was released onto the internet with a short explanation. It blew up within minutes, quickly trending worldwide. Everyone from students to teachers and journalists was tweeting it out to the official police department Twitter account.

After taking a minute to calm down, the group made their way back to the student group. They led them off their planned route, leading them on a different route, one that led to the police station. They weren't allowed inside the building, but that didn't put them off standing outside and chanting "Free Eliska!" till it felt like their voices might give out.

The same power that fueled the fire for a nationwide march fueled her release, Eliska soon found. After what felt like days of sitting in a room answering questions, an officer poked his head in the room and said that he was going to "shoot the phone off the desk" if "those dang kids" didn't stop calling demanding her release. The officer questioning her sighed, and motioned out of the room. Eliska gave him a bewildered look, which was met with a "Go!" She walked out with the other officer, who gave her a fist bump before letting her out the door.

"You be careful now, kid."

She nodded and pushed open the door, shocked to be met by the friends and marchers all waiting outside. Lacey squealed when she saw her, hugging her tightly. The rest of the group joined in, tears pricking begin Eliska's eyes. She pulled back after a minute, looking out at the crowd of students who was cheering, laughing, and waving at them, yelling "Thank you!" as loud as she could. As much as she wanted to stand on the steps and admire the crowd all day, she knew she couldn't do that. She ran down the steps with her group, running along the crowd to get back to the front. After all, they had a march to do, and they wouldn't get much done by just standing around.

It was around 11 PM by the time Eliska got home, and she almost collapsed out of pure exhaustion as soon as she walked through the door. But, as tired as both her feet and mind were, she was happy. Kids, no matter how physically and figuratively small they may be, were heard.

Illustration by Dan Evans.