3RD OCTOBER 1997
EP 4
“Stoooop!!, don’t jump into the water” a stranger screamed loudly from afar. Fidelis was coming back from the club, he was actually very drunk but could still see front. He was racing speedily unto the falomo bridge when he saw a little boy climbing the bridge. Immediately he saw Samuel, his humanity kicked in, he stopped his car on the main road and ran towards Samuel screaming at the too of his lungs asking Samuel to stop. The sound of his voice startled Samuel and he looked back, his hand was poorly on the rail so, as he tried to look at who was calling. His legs shook and he tumbled, a shriveled scream erupted from both Samuel and Fidelis. Like a plane flying in the Sky, like a bull charging towards its deathh spot, Fidelis ran with all his strength and grabbed at Samuel who was just a second away from his deathh. They both almost tumbled into the water but luckily, Fidelis held unto Samuel and pulled him unto the road. Fidelis totally in his drunken state laid down flatly on the bridge panting heavily like a prey who just escaped a predator while the exhausted Samuel laid besides him speechlessly.
Sometimes, the light only comes when it is the darkest. When the going become too tough, the road too rough and people too cruel, it’s the time to keep moving forward without giving up. Samuel was at the bleakest stage of his existence, everything were going in total disarray towards him. It was like they was a huge deep black hole s*****g his life away. He lost hope, he lost strength and enthusiasm to live but just when he was just a step away from eternal destruction, they was a flint of light beaming towards him.
“I don’t care what you do or how you do it but you must look every place of the city and fish out that boy. Take him out, do anything;” Mr Jege screamed at the gang of three men as he sipped his strong wine with a squeezed face. The guys rushed out and checked their phones, Samuel’s pictures were sent to their phones for easy recognition. “Get into work” the leader ordered.
“Doctor, i honestly, i don’t know his name but that’s not a problem. Treat him as best as you can, get him to best state of mind. He seems to have experienced an inexplicable situation for him to considered jumping into the ocean ” Fidelis told the doctor who was asking him some questions. The doctor was Fidelis personal doctor so, he was concerned about the consequences of bringing home a traumatised boy with unknown backgrounds. “Fidelis, i strongly advised you get the police involved to avoid future problems ” the doctor suggested again for the fifth times but Fidelis insisted against his suggestion. Somehow, he felt sympathy toward the strange little boy who stared at them bluntly without talking. The doctor asked over a thousand questions but like a deaf and dumb person, Samuel sat there on the bed without talking or saying anything. He looked lonely and exhausted but they was a strong message coming down from his eyes. As he stared, tearss of agony, regrets and anguish streamed down his eyes. “He’s highly traumatised” the doctor said as he signalled Fidelis to give them some personal time.
It has been exactly a week since Samuel’s parents were killedd and his whereabouts were unknown. Mr Jege and his men were looking for him in every nook and crannies of the society but something unimaginable was also brewing in Mr Idoko’s house. The family were in total chaos, they raised razors and blades at themselves over Mr Idoko’s properties. Everyone were busy looking for the official documents of one property or the other while their brother and son with his wife laid coldly in the government mortuary decaying away. Immediately the news of his passing away reached the village, his younger sister, the one that followed him directly. She was married too with two children, she traveled immediately to the village after turning Mr Idoko’s apartment into a treasure hunting ground for the land documents. A year before his deathh, Mr Idoko had bought a large expanse of land in the heart of village to erect a new home. After purchasing the land, he had kept the document with his mother who hide it in a place no one could find it. Idoko had an uncle whom he was training his son in the university, few days after Idoko’s deathh, the only thing constantly in the mind of the uncle was taking ownership of his new SUV Jeep. It was a pathetic sights to behold, a total definition of a lost family and brotherhood. We seems to have lost African where love and brotherhood leads already.
After the three first days, every members of the family except the parents forgot about Samuel and focused on dividing Mr Idoko’s properties. Insults, quarrels, fighting were everywhere and it seemed like a certain carnivorous ant had eaten all their consciences. The mother couldn’t stopped crying, she watched helplessly as her children and extended family fought and gnawed at each other for what doesn’t belong to them. “Your brother just diedd tragically, his cold body still laying cold in the mortuary, his only son missing yet you’re only here to ask me about his land documents!. I’m disappointed at you” the mother said crying bitterly with regrets when her daughter came to ask her after searching fruitlessly for the document.
Fidelis was becoming scared now, he worried about what will happen if people found out he brought a child of six years whom he knew nothing about his background home. Won’t he be accused of harbouring some sinister thoughts?. It was giving him sleepless nights, to make the situation worse, Samuel had refused to utter a word no matter what Fidelis asked, he cried almost half of the day and only ate a pinch size of food. After careful considerations, Fidelis decided to report the situation to the police as constantly advised by his doctor who usually checked on Samuel.
Fidelis was a young 32 years old tech champ, he was into cryptocurrencyy. He had no corporate work but he made millions of money on weekly basis from legitimate trading of cryptoo currency coins. His source of income was clean and legitimate but in the part of the world he was born, people castigated his type and labelled them either a ritualistt or fraudster. They were many occasions in the past where the police took him into custody because his neighbours in his formal residence reported him as suspicious. Knowing the risk involved if people found out he kept a child secretly in his apartment, he finally made up his mind to take Samuel to the police station the next day if he refused to talk.
TBC
