Time stopped as Benjay’s vision narrowed on the
number-plate tagged to the yellow bus approaching him with blurry speed. His
heartbeat resonated the clap of a thunderstorm recorded in slow mo waves and
amped with baser tones. His skin rippled with beads of sticky sweat trickling
under his shirt and his whole body felt like a tank of concrete. This was
dread; that dread which foreruns death.
The approaching
vehicle was Soji’s bus and that meant Soji had returned with his clutch of
touts. The two base instincts kicked in, but both options were ideas that only
worked in blockbusters and brilliant imaginations. Behind him stood a
seven-foot high fence that ran the next one hundred meters left and right, it
was dressed with spiral barbs. There were no open gates and by the sudden spike
in the number of dogs barking, Benjay could tell that they too had smelt death.
The thing with
Gbagada streets was that nights were extremely dark as no streetlights had
found permanent homes here yet and everyone just felt safer inside their high
walls.
Just two hours
ago, Benjay had creased Soji’s face with a wheel-spanner because Soji had
refused to do the needful – pay “loading-money” as demanded of all
Lagos-public-bus-drivers at all bus stops. Arguments escalated to abuse and
abuse evolved into punches and punches leaped unto borrowed weapons. Benjay was
only doing his job - what was required of every tout in Lagos. Soji had fled
the scene with a bleeding face and Benjay had stayed with a bloated ego. Well,
whatever merchandize the ego bargains for at the marketplace is worn by the
body.
So as not to
appear before the pearly gates and receive criticisms for not putting up a
fight against death, Benjay snapped out of the Slow-mo mode and set his feet on fast-forward
He heard the
first gunshot and obeyed instinctual advice not to assess the distance between
himself and the approaching train of death. However, on assessing the path
ahead of him, he was certain that he could not beat this track. Yet his
heartbeat replayed a line from Watersprout’s
lyric that stayed on his mother’s lips even on her death-bed, as long as you have a nose, keep breathing.
So he pulled apart the curtains of doubt and peeked at the river of
possibilities. Seven-foot high on the right and death train approaching on a
close left. Any attempt to cross the bus’s evil beam would buy him a one-way
ticket to the land never seen by humans.
Only three words came to mind Lord help me.
***
Huntoel strode
across the white-wood flooring of the glistening large Shamah hall with so much
glory that his chayil scent filled
the entire office floor. Huntoel was the most decorated executor in the Bureau.
For every successful 100-execution on earth-space another jar of elixir was
added to an angel’s essence and every elixir was a blend of refinement from Sakah
Labs – an elixir from this Shakah lab would literally suck up all scientific
and pharmaceutical labs on earth. The chayil
scent was the highest elixir to be worn by any angel in the bureau.
Huntoel was the
envy (or the equivalent of envy in Zion)
of all angels in the Bureau because in spite of all his laurels and declaration
he was the meekest in service. He remembered everyone’s name and he was easy to
talk to. This was the kind of entity that earthlings would crush on.
“Great seeing
everybody, in shape” Huntoel bellowed. His voice was what it was – an angel’s,
unimaginable. "Varralel, how’s your dog doing?”
Varralel, the
quirky secretary with huge globs of glasses on her nasal bone waved at him with
her purifying wand. “She’s waiting for you,” referring to Amaziel, the head of
Shamah Department.
Huntoel slipped
seamlessly through the thick cube of ice that served as the door into Amaziel’s
office. Only the highest ranks within the bureau could slip through ice
entrances and exits
“Thank you for
coming, Hunt,” Amaziel rose from her sit to embrace Huntoel.
“You may be my
friend but you are my team lead,” Huntoel taps her on the back.
“I summoned you
because, I believe your next mission is critical to a plan that Elion is
setting in motion. I couldn’t use the transmitter because of confidentiality.” Amaziel
sat down again. “It’s a Benjay Babatope—“
“--29, 76 strands
of dreadlocks and street tout in Gbagada--“ Huntoel completed Amaziel’s
statement.
“--You know him
already?” Amaziel asked.
“Bottle fight in
2011, snake bite in 2012, food poisoning in 2013, and stab wounds in 2014.”
Huntoel replied. He noticed Amaziel look away at the distant lushness of the valley of wellness through his ice
window.
“Elion is
preserving him for a plan.” Amaziel said.
***
The next bullet
grazed Benjay’s neck and the force-field that companied the lone murderer
propelled Benjay forward. He landed on his belly, but the fear of death whipped
him back to his feet. If only he could just beat this long fence. Then he saw
it - an open archway in the fence. Strange, he had never seen it before and
he’d passed this fence on his way back from ise
every day for the last three years.
He tossed his
torso through the open archway as another bullet ricocheted off the edge, just
above his head. He rolled to a stop, rolled his dreadlocks away and looked back
to see if any of Soji’s men had made it through the archway, but all there was,
was the white wall of the fence. No archway.
His heart stopped
as he looked around to ensure that he hadn’t died, sure enough behind him stood
an earthly duplex. The same he had seen
tower over the seven-foot high fence. Then his heart crashed as he saw two
pit-bulls sprint towards him. Lesser evil; he could beat these.
As he got up on
his feet again, he smelt a scent that weakened his bones, sent chills up his
brain, and wrapped his tongue with dehydrants.
It was not an earthly scent.
Image credit: Courtesy channelstv.com
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