PROLOGUE:
I watched, as he was maimed and murdered. I didn't flinch. I couldn't cry. I couldn't struggle anymore. Been tightly held by two scrawny men. I was faint like air. I was dry like dust. I watched him rolled away. He's nice khaki scrubbed the floor. His body was heaved on top other dead bodies. It formed a pyramid. On the middle road. The pyramid was burnt down at the dusk of time.

Like the other boys I became an orphan. A slave. Driven like stray cows. To camps. Into thick forests. To borders. To nowhere. We watched as we became skeletal bones. We watched as we became smokes. Gone with the wind. Some of us were served meals. We watched as one of the captors ate a raw penis and the bulged eyes of a friend.

There were times we cried and prayed loud at night. No one heard us but the captors. They bruised our skin with Koboko. Nights I couldn't sleep I thought of Mama, of Papa, of Nimi, of home. Where I belong. I was but a boy when I became slave...

(1)
I took time off grief, watching the sun from end. As it moves closer and closer to the surface. It became bigger and bigger. Bulged and wider. Stretched and bright. Fiery white. Like yellow butterfly. The sun rays swirls like dragonflies. It formed a spectrum. Became patterned like a rainbow. Even when my eyes were shut, I saw it bold and beautiful. The light from the sun raved my face. It boiled it like yam in a metallic pot on hot coal. I let my tongue to absorb its heat. Like I did once with hot yam and missed Ma's peppersoup for a week because my tongue was nearly burned out.

"Get up lazy hens," one of our captors bawled in Hausa. He was the tiniest and most fierce amongst them. He hauled the first boy who was seated at the end of the line on my right hand side. Whom I presumed was also carried away by the cryptic powers of nature. He hauled the other boys too, who could hardly stand straight. I stood swiftly before he could get to me and had to start moving before he said move. Move was all we did for the last weeks. From safe heaven to hell hole to devil's playground. It has been one ceaseless itinerary to God's no where. Some of us were left behind. Rotting meats for wild animals. Some were even fresh meats for our captors soups. We had an impoverished white skinned rats and its tasteless juice two days ago and carried empty stock of drums days later. Forced to chant prayers in a language we could not understand. While they fed on our meat. I couldn't understand why they hadn't hanged us all to end our tribulations. The Chief Commandant once stated, they were preparing us for a greater cause. A greater cause we were yet to discover.

(2)

I lived in a small farming village in North Adamawa. Close to the ends of north. It sits on rocks and hills. It appears most times like its elevated in the sky. It has a swinging climatic condition. There are times its so cold that it shrivelled the rocks and times its so hot that it literally boils our skins. Our village is mainly inhabited by old men and women and children. Most able-bodied young men and women from our village lived in Yola or other cities in search of a greener lane. The most predominant occupation is farming and cattle herding. Ma taught in a secondary school at the neighbouring village, of which I attended its primary school. Pa worked at Yola in a construction company as a security officer.

The night the insurgents raided our village, Pa was at Yola. They rode their war tanks and trucks into the heart of our village. They fired shots incessantly from their riffles to the sky, into our huts and raved it to the ground. They took women and children captive. Hauled into their trucks. While they slit the throats of our old men at the entrance of the village. Their bloods spewed on our soil and dead bodies littered on it. None of our wails and cries perturbed the insurgents from speeding off with us compressed in their trucks. I cried till my eyes protrude and almost jotted out. I couldn't find Ma and Nimi. Did they escape? Or where they in the other trucks? The trucks glide on the road and in no time our village had disappeared.

(3)
The truck we rode in was luminously dark. I couldn't see the sad faces of others. I could only hear them cry loud. I could only hear them sneeze loud. The tears in my eyes must have dried up because they were no longer rolling down my cheeks. I only snivelled and whimpered. The truck was so stuffy that i perceived others reek more than mine. A strong smell of fresh dead bodies. The truck had rode frantically non-stop for hours. On to a deserted path, the truck swerved to a halt. Leaving the tyres rolling for a minute or two. Away from the growling of the truck's engine. I could hear screeching tyres from other trucks.

We were hauled out from the trucks by three masked insurgents into the open. It was dark. Half the moon stretched from the sky. We separated to two. Males to the right. Females to the left. A bigger truck arrived the scene. The females were forced into the bigger truck. I couldn't have mistaken, I saw Ma been held in the crowd. As the others were heaved into the back of the truck. "Ma," I yelled. I moved hurriedly to meet up with her. Almost in her arms, I was sidetracked by one of the masked insurgent. He pushed me to the ground and repeatedly whacked me with his boot. While I writhed and struggled on the ground. I could hear Ma cry out, "leave him alone, he's only a boy." The Masked insurgent didn't stop until I blanked out. Ma's voice slowly dissipated. And that was the last time I saw or hear her.

(4)

It was morning though it appeared as night. Dark clouds walked the earth. The voices of the roosters in our yard ran straight into our house. The groggy bleats of the goats in our stead filled the air. The morning wind sends whimpers to my spines. I was still curled up on the bed with a thick blanket over me.

I presumed, Ma was still asleep. Having attended to nocturnal Nimi all through the night. It was school day however hailing to the morning cold I was intending of boycotting school. Pa had night duties so he remained at Yola. I must have been half way to heaven. When I felt my head vibrate. An almost deafening strike right at my forehead. I stood swiftly from the bed. Before Ma howled out, "Bidan, won't you go to school?" Ma was dressed in her favourite flowery patterned gown. She held Nimi with her right arm, whom seemed like she'd slept through the night. I drooled with no apparent word to say. And was heading reluctantly to the bathroom when Ma said, "Oh! Bidan, you wet the bed again. You are such a little boy." I was ten. I was Nimi's big brother. Should have been a big boy and not wet the bed every night. But it seemed uncontrollable. Like the situation I was in. I couldn't control been conveyed against my will from one dumpsite to another at the eves of day and death of the night.

The Chief Commandant voice filled the surroundings. High pitched. Like he spoke with his lungs, "Better days are ahead my friends. When all your lives shall matter. Better serving God. Our friends has supplied our needs. Hence, there would be no need feeding on your wretched meats. Prepare my friends. Cause the holy war is about to be fought again."

(5)

I was three weeks old in our captor's den. We never heard a word from the outside world. We were all at that moment looking frailed and malnourished. Our hands and legs were jointly tied with sturdy ropes. We were strapped in a dim filthy room with less ventilation. For weeks I didn't shower. The stench from my skin nauseated me even more than the room did.

The day we were rallied out of the stinky room was the day the withe got separated from the shaft. They had the non-conformists stoned and beheaded in the open. I heard they filmed them. To send to the authorities in the outside world per se. I was among the withe. I accepted the religion of our captors. They spared my life so I could partake in the holy war and die gloriously.

The last time I was in church was during baptism. Ma and Pa got baptised. I refused to sink low in a dirty murky pond while the priest hallowed, "he that is born in christ is born anew." It was kind of ironical, same pond Pa would flog the hell out of me if i swam in was same pond he got dipped in and all his sins were to dissipate. Because he was not just born anew in christ but was born out of a pond water. I imagined a new man arose when Pa was lifted off the pond. But I was mistakened, it was Pa who didn't need a second to whack sense into me if I ever bath in the pond after school.

I was only a boy, I understood few things about life. I couldn't understand why we go extra miles in pleasing a god that we do not see at peril to the humans we could see. Just as my captors had killed thousands of innocent people in glory of an invisible god. One thing I knew was that I wasn't going to be of service to their god. To a god who is delighted by the killing of so-called profanes. What kind of god derive pleasure from the mishaps of people?

Another one...

Nice story..I hope you will feeds us a lot

Nice one op...have parked here patiently following...am from adamawa too.

Thankz GuyZ. I'M so Glad to Know U all are Followin Mai story. Stay tuned. More Updates are on the way. Thanks Guyz Once Again.

(6)

I dreamt, I saw Pa, he stretched his arms out. Towards mine. I was almost off a cliff. I stretched my hands forward against his. But the more I pushed the more he drifted away. He loathed he was incapable of saving me. It was killing him deep. I let myself off the cliff. Along with the twirling wind I raced into an ocean. Into a shark's mouth. I heard Pa's voice from the distance. It was loud and piercing. His voice never dissipated until I woke.

The insurgents hurled us out from a van. We were ten boys. We looked tattered and rickety. Five of the boys were of same heights with me. And the other fives were ridiculously tall. They arranged us in a single line and pulled us into a single room in same uniformity. The insurgents forced us UnCloth from our rags and hauled us to the open to bath with steaming water and black soaps.

Later in the day, we were dressed with long garments and improvised explosive devices were tucked around our chests and waists. They filled us out at the brink of nightfall as three long military buses were parked at the entrance of the toppling camp. We were going to be taken to market places. To bus stations. To blow ourselves and other innocent people the insurgents referred as apostate. They threatened they will kill our family if we didn't adhere to their instructions.

We were lined like plagued animals waiting to be quarantined. We waited to be conveyed to town so we could do god's will . A voice rose from the crowd . One of the insurgent. He tied a thick scarf over his head. He wore a military jacket. He walked briskly towards us. "Who's Bidan? He asked, I was so petrified that I couldn't answer, I couldn't move even. I was literally trembling. He lifted his scarf off and lowered his face towards me. His face was terribly scared and excessively black. He looked familiar; like someone from my village.

(7)
I had a dog, I named it Tiger because he had a fiery pale skin, inverted canines and could run like a tiger. We used to hunt wild rodents
together. On a particular day on one of our expeditions. He outran a squirrel and fiercely gorged out the eye sockets of the squirrel. He snagged his neck and blemished his furred skin. We watched it writhe and die slowly. I felt bad for the squirrel and had it buried instead of bringing it home. The next time I tried cajoling Tiger for another expedition. He refused to come with me instead it chased after cats and chickens. One night Tiger was poisoned; he died slowly like the squirrel.

One of the insurgents called Rabiu, have a teeth like Tiger. He's face was very black that I imagined he rubbed charcoal every morning when he wakes. Rabiu for weeks have been trying to free Nurudeen. Nurudeen is a Rabiu's cousin from the maternal side I heard. Nurudeen's family had contacted Rabiu. They were willingly to offer money for Nurudeen's freedom.

On a particular night, we were all asleep. Rabiu sneaked to our side of the camp. He absconded with Nurudeen. Out from the camp's light. Managed to escape to a hinterland. And was on the verge of getting to the mainland when the other insurgents cornered them at the brink of dawn. They ordered Rabiu to slit the throat of Nurudeen. He stabbed his neck instead with a dagger. Nurudeen was also butchered at the spot.

The Chief Commandant had us rallied out of our rooms. He ordered the other insurgents to flog us under a scorching sun. As we laid flat on the ground naked. He warned that grave consequence awaits anyone who attempts to escape.

"If a dog bites his owner, the owner must kill it and eat it. Whenever a servant has become disloyal, he's no longer servant. He likes to be a master too. But there are no two masters. Only one on earth and one in paradise. Feed carcass to dogs, not dogs to carcass..."

I watched almost nauseated as the Chief Commandant devoured the leg of a sizzling hot squirrel. Seating across from where I sat. I wondered if it was true what I have been told that I was getting freed.

( 8 )
The insurgents took us to a border village. Taj, Moidu, Rua'za and I. The village occupied a small mass of land. With scanty huts built with red muds and raffia palms. It felt like home. Stray goats prancing against the wind. Frays between cattle and herders. Pigeons flying to their stead. Boisterous children playing in heaped sands. Women with exposed tits drying cow's skin under the heated sun. Old scrawny men breaking rocks with hammers. I could perceive the smell of days old cow milk and spicy porridge on burning woods. I'd began having nostalgic feelings. Home was all in my mind. My beautiful grazing village in Adamawa.

The insurgents hurled us into a trench. For days we fed on bird's food and stale cow milk. We were isolated from the rest of the village dwellers. At night, we were visited by rustling termites and mosquitoes with terribly long proboscis. Despite we had become so thin that our bones were very conspicuous and we could feel the edge of our ribs. We'd become fat with sores. We were only heaved out of the trench whenever we wanted to defecate or were offered audience with the Chief of the border village.

Pa was coming to free me. He was going to pay a ransom to the insurgents so they could free me. Same was applicable to the other three boys. "We cannot be sure, they would release us to our parents, Taj said. "I mean, we have seen them do terrible things. These people lack even an ounce of compassion, He continued. "I doubt too oh," Moidu retorted. "We just have to pray, they keep to their words," I said. "The only reason, they will release us, is if our parents pays them money; like they care about our lives even," Taj said.

At the fortnight of our stay in the border village. The insurgents lifted us off the trench with sturdy ropes. Like one would heaved a bucket of water from a deep well. Our parents must have arrived and must have paid the ransom. They tied our both hands strongly with the same ropes they used in lifting us up from the trench. And put a sack cloth over our heads. They forced us into a van and sped frantically for hours before the van tumbled into a tree trunk. They hauled us out from the van into the open. I could hear others also been hauled out. They removed the sack cloth off us. It was night. A blue night. The full moon lighted our faces.

Standing adjacent to me was Pa. I swear it could have been an apparition. Not until he ran and embraced me. He crushed me into his arms and couldn't stop crying. I couldn't stop crying too. I was elated with plethora of tears. Pa was with me in flesh and he had soaked my ringworm infested hair with his drooling tears. There were so many questions I wanted to ask him. "Pa did you see Ma too?" "What of Nimi?" "How did you contact these people?" "What's on your mind?" He moved his head from mine and faced me. His eyes were bloodily red. He smirk at me and wiped the tears off my face. His palms after he wiped my tears were wet and black like charcoal...

( 9 )

Moments later, the insurgents separated us from our parents. They hurled Pa and the others to the end of the road."It is time," the Chief Commandant proclaimed. The insurgents held our hands together in a tight grip with their scrawny hands. Pa didn't say anything to me, he just smirk at me. The looks on Pa face confused me. He didn't appear scared. He appeared composed. More disturbing thoughts I was having was about the ulterior motives of the insurgents. What are their reasons for bringing us to a deserted suburbs? For planning a reunion with our folks in an eccentric manner. It was uncertain what they were to do to our parents. The Chief Commandant kept whispering to his men. He appeared unstable and disconnected. He kept thwacking their skulls like hitting it would bring his senses back.

One of the insurgents. Black eyed, brawny shoulders and gangly physique. He wore a faded satin and white washed kaftan. He took out a dagger and slit the throat of Rua'za's father who was standing at the end of the line. Rua'za screeched loud and tried forcing himself out of the strong hold. I'd began weeping but Pa was still smirking at me. I wanted to scream wild when it was Pa's turn.

I watched as Pa was maimed and murdered. I didn't flinch. I couldn't cry. Been held tightly by two scrawny men. I was faint like air. I was dry like dust. I watched as he was rolled away. He's nice khaki scrubbed the ground. His dead body was heaved amongst other dead bodies. Even the ones they pulled out of their vehicle trunk. They built a pyramid with the dead bodies at the middle of the road. They spewed fuel at it and raved it. I watched as it was burnt to ash.

Taj angrily seized a sling from the coat of one of the insurgents. He whacked the sling over the head of the Chief Commandant. The Chief Commandant had began to bleed profusely when the other insurgents overpowered Taj and smashed his bones till there was no bones to thwack. The insurgents pulled the rest of us into their vans without resistance. We'd become drained and exhausted. I was more drained. While the others boys bawled I thought of Pa. I thought of how true what I witnessed was. Whether it wasn't all a terrible nightmare. One moment I enjoyed been joyous and the next moment I'd become burdened with sadness. I wondered whether this grief would ever die away. I felt a void deep in my heart. A void filled with darkness. I'd lost all hope in humanity and any possibility of man ever doing good. The more I thought I thought of dying. They should have taken my life instead. I wished our van run into a dam and become submerged and all of us drowns in it. I couldn't bear the loss anymore. I was but a boy. No boy should undergo the pains I was going through. As the van rode into darkness all I thought about was revenge. I was going to avenge Pa's death...

(10)
It was two years later I'd began growing brownish thick hairs on my armpits and very bright gold coloured hairs on my head. I reeked like rabbits. I'd become anomaly emaciated. I felt the hems of my bones like knife edge plunging my innards. I was darker. Taller. Fiercer. The Insurgents trained us to race fast like cheetahs. They taught us the art of murder. They taught us endurance, fervour, angst and vengeance. I felt like them. I felt like I hated who I was. Innocuous little boy from the Northern ends of Adamawa. I felt I hated the world. I felt i hated all they hated.

Two years back, I squirmed, screamed and cried for Pa, Ma and Nimi. All the days light and dark nights. I became tired of sorrows. I became bitter. I became tired of bitterness. I became wicked. I wanted to be wicked. I hungered for it. Yes, I smile to myself when we raid communities. I killed a young boy at the border village. I gorged his eye sockets out. I stabbed a soldier till I heard him say his last words in a fading motion.

For weeks we moved down down. Deep into the forest. We'd lost our camp to the Nigerian soldiers. We were at the stead of reinforcing. Bouncing back to the horizon. Turning the wheel for our course. Taking that which we had been deprived of...

Sharabutu moved swiftly to the burning woods, where about six of the insurgents and i sat cyclically around the burning woods. He quickly spewed water at the brooding flames and watched as the flames died slowly. The night went from been fiery red to dark purple . He tied a scarf over his head almost covering his face. He's Bazooka was heaved and seemed glued to his fore limbs. He appeared a bit exhausted. Like he ran miles to get to where we were. His deep choking voice entrapped the air at our direction as he said: "The Chief-commandant dead..." It must had been a mistake, he didn't actually say that, did he? What I had always wished and dreamt of. The man who caused terror on me was dead!! I was going to be free!! The atmosphere was still and unsaturated. The night mourned. Sharabutu tall and burly figure rose in the haze. He lowered his armors and Bazooka as he stood in the dark shades of the night. He was going to say something, however he just wiped like a baby.