1 One & Only

BLAISE SMILED, THE operation had gone without a hitch, neither he nor the other four members of his vile crew expected the success. Behind him, Emeka pushed scared schoolgirls; armed with an AK47, Emeka coerced the younglings. Their movements shuffling the greenery aside, critters leapt out of their way, startled animals sprang away from the humans trespassing their habitats.

The day was hot, the tree canopies prevented the sun's rays from directly caressing the group's dark skins. But the moist jungle about them didn't dispel the ferocity of the heat. To add salt to injury, bugs were relentless in their feeding. The dozen female children ill protected from the biting insects, clad in their white T-shirts and blue knee-high skirts. Their long white socks and canvas stained from their plight in the lush wilderness.

Blaise fared better, clad in black T-shirt and jean-trousers, and deep-blue sneakers. His gang dressed in a similar fashion.

Emeka wore black turtleneck and shoes; Pascal, wielding a shotgun, wore brown Tims and a deep purple shirt—a fat gold chain around his neck; the others were clad from head to toe in black clothes. 

Blaise turned to appraise the merchandise. Fear stifled their cries, sorrow lumps of glum emotions in their throats, tears streaking silently from sad eyes. The imaginative prowess of their young minds exacerbated their fears; Nollywood movies, gossip, words of elders and the likes seemed to have hinted at what their fates would be should they reach their destination.

They would die.

They were healthy specimens by Blaise's reckoning, fair maidens aged eight to twelve. They would fetch a fair price; customers will be pleased.

Emeka felt smug, thinking himself a twisted rendition of Saint Peter. A self-styled fisher of men; more like a wicked fisher of innocent young girls.

Unbeknownst to the group of captive girls and their armed captors making their way to an undisclosed location in the woods, baleful eyes the colour of fiery gold watched them.

The face that owned the watchful burning eyes was contorted with abject hate and disgust, it was strange that no one in the group felt the unrestrained bloodlust radiating from the lithe form that watched from the shadows of the tree-tops. The snarling fanged mouth uttered a low growl, the hunger evident in its disposition.

It thirsted for the blood of the unclean; the face licked its pink lips in anticipation… its thirst would be sated in due time.

BLAISE PULLED OUT his phone, his belt-tucked pistol shifting slightly. He worked the screen-touch device, his fingers scrolled to the name Carter and dialed.

"Hello," Blaise said after the dial tone clicked, his voice gruff. "Yeah…" replied the voice from the other end. "How far? Anything? Everywhere clear?" Blaise asked. "Everywhere tight! Those Okada people no follow us." "Alright… make you and Sous reach site. Make we know as matters go be." Blaise said. "Ok… no waha…"

Carter's voice was cut short by Sous's exclamation.

"Cartie! Come first…" Sous said, apprehension in his voice. "Wetin be that?" Carter and Blaise said in unison. "I no know… make I go check." Carter replied. Blaise gave the affirmative before dropping. He turned back to the others waiting with him outside the unpainted bungalow.

LEAVING HIS VIGIL of the black bus parked on their escape route, Carter joined Sous. Sous told him that he saw a ghostly white silhouette. Carter laughed at his friend's hysteria, Sous kept his machine-gun trained at the jungle's shadows.

Sous protested, vehemently trying to convince Carter. Carter turned away sighing, motioning his return to their vehicle.

In that same instant, yellow burning eyes shone like pinpricks of sparks in the shadows. Sous screamed, opening fire with his gun reflexively. 

Drowning the lonely road with loud bangs and a blinding glare, Sous shredded the greenery with a hail of bullets.

Did you see it? Sous said, but only the sounds of ugly gurgling replied him. Stunned, Sous turned to see Carter's prone body bleeding on the ground from a nasty gash across the throat. Blood began to pool, blood splatter on Sous's blue jeans. Before Sous could orient himself, clawed hairy hands the size of a child snapped his neck from behind… 

Sous slumped to the ground dead.

Unlike Sous's quick death, Carter saw what ended them. In his dying moments, Carter beheld a monster masked as a child. The monster met Carter's dying gaze; a blood-stained fanged mouth smiled at him.

The last thing Carter saw in the land of the living was a bestial child wearing a blood-stained white-and-blue P.E uniform, the boy's fat serpentine tongue lapping at the pooling blood like a dog laps at water. 

Same uniform as the girls his gang abducted. The last thing he heard was even the worst…

"Can't save my schoolmates with an empty belly. Bon appetite." 

The boy's voice a wicked rasp of animalistic hunger, the whispery promise of death. With the blood of the unclean wetting parched throat, the beast-child ripped open the clothed chests of the dead men.

The monster-boy smacked his lips at the quietened delicacy nestled within stilled breasts; hearts of the unclean were sweetest during the ember months.  

THE BUNGALOW WAS a cheap sturdy structure, more utility than aesthetic. It boasted a bland parlour, five rooms, and a naked kitchen. The biggest room served as the holding-cell for the twelve girls. Only two rooms were habitable, made palpable by the presence of windows. The rest –the girls' cell included- had square small-sized holes which no child could reach, let alone squeeze through to freedom.

With the girls secured, Blaise's gang sat around on stools and stones, waiting for their eager employers, bottles of beer and snacks in their hands to celebrate incoming profits.

"Wetin Carter talk sef?" Pascal asked Blaise, his voice betraying the alcohol in his bloodstream. Blaise swirled beer in his mouth, swallowing the amber liquid to free his tongue for speech.

Just as he spoke there came from the forest a terrible roar.

avataravatar