Electing Evil by Ibrahim Baba Muhammed (Excerpt of my novel)

They were on a boat. It seemed as if the boat wasn’t floating on water, if that could actually have been possible. Going to the side of the boat, looking out, Faisal saw thick mist. Or could the boat be floating on mist? He asked him self.
When they were kids, he and Zed had gone on countless boat rides, and had even commandeered several speed launches on the numerous trips that they had taken to Tarkwa bay. Faisal knew boats. He was tempted to put his hands into the mist. Maybe he would touch water, he thought.
It was just the two of them. He couldn’t remember how they had gotten on to this boat, or where they were going to. One thing he did remember though, was that he had been sleeping, tired after a very sorrowful evening. He hadn’t slept long when he was woken up by someone. The person beckoned and he followed. Who ever that person was, it had to have been someone he immensely trusted for him to have agreed to come out here. Here?
He looked around. The place they were at was deathly quiet, the only noise being the lapping of water against the boat’s hull. But there wasn’t water, was there? This was a boat that floated on mist. To assure himself, Faisal kept quiet and listened. Maybe it was the boat’s engine. As he thought of this, he turned round toward the back, where a motor was supposed to be. There was nothing. Then how were they moving? He searched out oars, and then looked for a sail. All this boat had was two human passengers. This thought caused him to look toward the direction of the other passenger, having totally forgotten him.
He walked up to him. “Hey! How is this boat moving?”
Turning round very slowly, the person put a finger to his lips, forming the expression which usually signifies ‘keeping quiet.’ There was no need for it though, because the face Faisal saw was enough to cause him to freeze.
Faisal remained quietened by shock for what seemed like several minutes. The grave-yard silence of where they were, aided him as he thought. How come? It can’t be. Meanwhile the boat continued to move. Faisal found himself looking round, something he couldn’t remember doing since he got here. They seemed to be in some kind of underground cavern with water. Water? Looking to his left, he searched as far as his eyes could, but saw nothing. To his right, it was the same. All he saw was misty blackness. Weren’t they going to get lost? As he thought of this, he looked at the boat’s only other occupant: For the second time. He was concentrating on only God knew what. It was as if he too was searching the mist which had enveloped them from all directions. But this was only a dream. Or was it? Faisal asked himself. But what he was seeing seemed so real. He could even smell the dankness of wherever it was they were. Then, the odd sound, like water against a slow moving boat, was also so real. The mist too looked real enough; then, in front of him stood a person who made everything seem surreal. But he looked real enough. And Faisal could even smell him: he had on an after-shave that they had both grown up using. Also, he was wearing his favourite Beach-wear shirt; Faisal could clearly discern the coconut tree design printed on the light blue shirt. Even when he had turned round, the only time, the face Faisal had seen was as real as any.
Suddenly he was cut off from his deep contemplations. “Hey! Face?” the boat’s other passenger called out to him. It was barely above a whisper. Very few people called him Face. In fact, only one.
“Hey! Sissy-face?” this time around, Faisal recognized a familiar persistence.
“Are you coming or not? Don’t tell me I woke you up, had you follow me, only for you to chicken-out at the most important part!” he continued.
Faisal found himself smiling, and almost wanting to shout for joy. So his friend wasn’t dead after all. This wasn’t a dream. With renewed energy, he walked toward Zaharadeen, traversing the length of the shaky boat. Looking around, he saw that the mist had mysteriously thinned-out. He could even see the water. So much for a boat floating on mist, he thought, as he felt water rocking the boat from side to side; heard evident sloshing sounds.
By the time he got to where Zaharadeen was his friend was already fastening a thick rope to a wooden pole, thus securing their boat. “Zed,” Faisal whispered to his friend, as he followed him onto firm ground. The floor was rocky. A quick look showed that they were in a wide and high-ceilinged cavern. In strategic points, he noticed brazier-like torches emitting low flames. It gave out sufficient light to illuminate the ground, the walls, and the path which they were now following. On the walls Faisal noticed shapes and signs, carved or drawn on the rock-hard surface. He felt a curiosity to stop and look, but Zed was moving faster than he was; a purposeful stride evident in his gait.
After a couple of minutes, they reached what looked like foot-holds carved out of the rock-hard walls. Zed started to climb, and then beckoned to an extremely excited Faisal. They had gone on several adventures as kids. Many had gotten them whipped, as they tried to act out the numerous Famous five books they had read, or got influenced into believing that they were the Hardy brothers. Maybe this was one of those days, Faisal thought; one that was linked to Zaharadeen’s Weekly Truth newspaper. But what could it be all about? Was it a secret lab where a top government official printed naira notes? Or was it a clandestine meeting place for military coup plotters? These thoughts and several others were entertained by Faisal.
He followed Zaharadeen upward and out onto a level that had very hard sand. At this level, Faisal could smell sea breeze. Where were they? Looking toward Zed, he noticed that his friend was becoming more cautious. He seemed to be prowling, with his eyes darting from left to right. Up ahead, Faisal saw faint light. It was coming out of a building, one partially hidden by coconut and palm trees. Also, there were sounds coming from the building. As Faisal listened purposefully, he began to discern chant-like voices. Where the hell were they?
Slowly but eventually, they got to the building. For some weird reason, he looked back, and tried to locate the hole in the ground they had come out from. From where they presently were, he couldn’t see any thing, but he seemed to have a vague idea.
The building, which had previously been slightly visually accessible from where they had come out from up till now, suddenly appeared before their eyes; probably facilitated by the trees that seemed to protect it from prying eyes. It had the look of a ware-house; an abandoned one. There was also no sign of life, except for the chant-like noises that were now more audible. If it hadn’t been for the sounds emanating from the building, this place could have competed with a desert for ‘quiet and abandoned.’
He looked at Zed and saw that his friend was acting funny. It was as if he was in a trance, one that he had only come out of on the three occasions they had communicated. This was strange. Zaharadeen had always been talkative, especially around him. Thinking much more deeply, he realized that his friend had been in this trance-like state since he had called him out of the room tonight. Just then, an eerie thought hit him: But when exactly had Zaharadeen called him from the house? How had he? And how had they gotten onto that boat and into that eerie cavern? Faisal had no recollection. Those parts of a strangely unfolding episode with his friend, one that was supposed to be dead, were strangely inaccessible. Or could it all be a dream?
“Faisal, wait for me here. I’ll be right back,” Zaharadeen interrupted his thoughts, winked at him, and disappeared through a wide door. Just like that.
Faisal stood rooted to one spot, dumbfounded, confusion written all over. Did Zed bring him all the way here, just to wait outside a building, on what seemed to be an island, in the middle of the night? He glanced at his left wrist. He must have forgotten his watch. But he couldn’t remember taking it off.
After waiting for what seemed like ages, Faisal stood up and began to pace. The chants were at a crescendo now. What the hell was going on in there? Was this a cult? Suddenly, Faisal began to hear a sound different from what he had been hearing for the last couple of minutes. This was a whole new sound category. It reached out to him from the heart of the building and penetrated his soul with a precision that could only be found on a surgeon’s table. He found himself shaking.
Where the hell was Zed?
Then the sound stopped.
It had sounded like a wail. Or was it a scream? However, its nature was unmistakable: bone-chilling.
Then it rose again. This time around, Faisal could clearly discern agony: human agony.
What the heck was going on? He was already at the door even before he decided to investigate. What had Zed involved him in?
It was easy to know where to head to, as Faisal followed a frenzy of chants, multiple wails and screams. The building was big.
Upon entering, he had first been hit by darkness: opaque darkness, but he had adjusted immediately, his eyes resting on what looked like a helicopter, and the kind of plane that could be launched off of water. This part had to be a hangar, he thought. However, where the sounds were coming from seemed to be in front, about 100 meters away. The building was expansive. Who owned this place? Which island was this? He wasn’t going to get answers standing in fear. So he gathered courage and stepped forward into the uncertainties ahead: what ever lay ahead.
It took him almost forever to get to a door at the end of the hangar, which further revealed crates piled up high on each other to the left. He got to a sturdy, steel door, which he opened after mustering more courage and adding it to the one that he had thought was all he could muster. After all, Zed was in there. Somewhere.
When he opened the door, he was hit by a heat that seemed as if one had come out of an air-conditioned room, into a desert; or been thrown out into the streets of Lagos or Cairo during a severe heat wave. Next, he was accosted with a glare, one that was fiery-bright. The source was from a point almost thirty feet down below from where he stood. There were steps leading down. As Faisal stared hard, he noticed about twenty or more people gazing glassy-eyed at a bright red flame of enormous proportions. It was about five feet wide and Eighteen feet high. It looked like a living figure made out of fire. It seemed to dance, sway, and hop-around in conformity with the frenzied chant of the small crowd of people.
To one side, distinctively dressed; in a black and white robe with a hood, stood a tall man. He exuded a strange aura which seemed to reach-out to Faisal, beckoning him to join his own voice to the blood curdling frenzy. Then abruptly, the dancing, fire figure stopped, but the chants however continued.
As Faisal watched, four hefty men, who had been standing in the dark, to the left of the hooded man, and in front of the crowd of twenty or so, came out holding a squirming youth. The youth was naked; and was male.
He was moaning, Faisal noticed. He also noticed something odd about him: he looked drugged. But fear was evident all over him, rising up to the surface of his drugged facial features. He was handed over to the hooded man, and then the men returned into the dark. Meanwhile, the chants had increased as the naked man was brought.
The thirty or so members of the crowd —the chanters— contained several women. They were also robed like the man that seemed to be their leader, except that theirs had a lesser quality than his. His seemed to radiate; it had a glossy sheen to it.
A quick appraisal at this part of the strange place that his friend had brought him to showed that it looked like a caved-in cavern; similar to the one that they had just left behind. For a roof, instead of the rock-hard ceiling of the cavern they had tied their boat in; this one had a man-made roof, supported by massive, criss-crossing rafters. It dawned on Faisal immediately that the roof was the same as the one covering the hangar-like place he had just passed. The ware-house-type building probably served to cover the massive hole in the ground that now served a creepy purpose. His scrutiny further showed him that there were several cave openings around the weird underground hall, thus giving it a coliseum type of look. It was large by any standards; it could comfortably contain a thousand people. On the walls, he saw similar signs and carvings like the ones he had seen in the other cavern. All this he saw, unnoticed, from his high station of over 30 feet above the level of chanting people.
Back to the ritual that seemed to be taking place, Faisal saw that the tall hooded man was uttering some spooky incantations. Meanwhile, the bizarre looking fire, which seemed to be coming out of nowhere, was swaying wildly, going along with the chanting. Suddenly the naked man, who had been left standing all alone, a comatose, easily lifeless figure, began to sway, and move in the direction of the fire. When he was about two feet from the fiery figure, Faisal saw what he could swear were arms: arms of fire shoot out from the fire and grab the youth, pulling him into it. At the same moment, the chanting peoples’ chants increased; and the hooded man’s incantations became more vociferous and took on a fervent tempo. As for the fiery figure and its victim, their romance took the form of a tempest whose temper sought to consume all it had gotten into its vortex, which was nothing more than a solitary human soul who was now wailing and giving up varying sounds of extreme human agony, but with a tone that bespoke his obvious difficulty in mustering the energy to even open his mouth. After what seemed like an eternity in a dimension of bone-chilling suspense, Faisal heard a wail that penetrated his soul in a similar manner like the one he had heard when he stood outside the building. It lasted for five sickening seconds, then the Fiery-figure came to an abrupt stop; everywhere became quiet. There was no one contained in his fiery bosom.
He had to leave this place; now.
Faisal quickly concluded that this was the sickest and chilliest experience in his entire life. He turned to quietly leave, feeling numbness in his legs which had been in one position for the whole duration he had been tranfixedly watching the happenings below, in a squatting position. With the state of mind he found himself in, he could not be stopped even if he was paralyzed: He had to flee this place now!
As he made to flee, practically crab-like, so as not to be mistakenly seen, he remembered something. Zaharadeen! He hadn’t still seen him. Where was he? Using eyes that fear had made hyper-perceptive, he scanned the whole area of a still unfolding drama, seeing that another victim, a girl, had been brought out; the chanters still at it. Objectively, he refused to dwell on it: his friend was the only thing on his mind.
Where was he? He still hadn’t seen him. Could he have joined the chanting acolytes of what seemed to be a fire-worshiping cult?
As he intensified his search, focusing more acutely on the throng of thirty-something people, zeroing-in on the exposed faces that were illuminated by the glare of the fire-god, Faisal felt a deep, penetrating spotlight on him. Someone was looking at him. With an uncanny intuition, he lifted his eyes away from the chanting crowd, and looked toward the centre of the ritual grounds. His fear was confirmed.
As the visual and mental probe of the hooded man fully locked on Faisal, he felt the whole of his insides turn to mush; his courage of moments ago evaporating through his pores, and all other air-outlets. At the same time, he pictured himself being stripped and sacrificed to that fiery thing; and also quickly concluded that his missing friend was within the darkness, soon to be brought out by the same four hefty men.
Focusing fear-blurred eyes, he saw that the hooded man was smiling: a curl of the mouth that looked like a smile that Lucifer would deliver; light from the swaying fire-god partly exposing two mesmeric eyes.
As Faisal felt all the blood in his body seemingly turn to ice, his body consequently rooted to the spot, the hooded man suddenly turned, his eyes connecting to a figure huddled in a corner of a crevice naturally built into the side of the wall that flanked the stone stairs that led down onto the ritual grounds. Following his gaze, Faisal saw someone who had a look on his face that could easily have been duplicated from Faisal’s. It was an epitome of shock and horror mixed into one. It was the face of Zaharadeen Mubarak.
When the hooded man saw that Faisal had discovered that he and his friend had both been exposed, the smile on his face immediately turned to one of even greater dimensions. Then he started to laugh. He kept on laughing and laughing, till Faisal could take it no more. Then Faisal shouted.

Jus ad Bellum

When your nation is invaded or attacked,
and you see your lives achievements being slashed,
by unconventional means, it leaves you without the
will to live.

If your nation is invaded or attacked,
you then see those that love you, those that
will stick out their nose for you,
those that will die for you,
those that will stand by you,
then you will know the
will to live.

After your nation is invaded or attacked,
it is never safe to wander to the store,
the high street, catch a bus, say hello
to your neighbour,why? For, they have escaped
by means of immigration, finding the
will to live.

Year's after your nation is invaded or attacked,
you can still see the monuments,
the restructuring, the crime wave, the economic
deprivation, inflation and a host of other problem's.
In the faces of the people, their is hope,as they have found the
will to live.

Destiny by Sadiq Muhammed

It's a funny thing,
this called destiny.

It breeds a thing,
a thing which knows no outcomes
it see's itself as the bearer of ill will
or even good fortune.

It brings about two paths that set to cross,
be it for the better or for the worse.

It shows no liking or preferences,
it flails around, more like
not caring who it hits.

It brings about the unknown,
which in man is not a good sign.
Unless you are a man who doesn't
believe in his or her destiny,
then you would welcome
such an outcome.

It may provide a number of events,
from joy, sadness, love, heartache,
death, birth....

It provides an uncertainty,
thats one fact

You could be in your room,
and just decide to write a note,
a poem, a piece of literature.
A sign of creativity,
a bit imagination is all it takes,
creative imagination,
more like.

Was i destined to be sat here writing this out?
Maybe.But, who knows.

The Four letter word by Sadiq Muhammed

It can be used out of context,
or may be seen as a test.

It can be deemed an endearment,
or even taken as an armament.

It can be taken out of term,
or even used as an arm.

It can be held as a weapon,
or may be taken by the heart, as a harpoon.

It can be the means to an end,
or as an end to a mean.

It can leave you wanting more,
or even have you thinking its a bore.

It can come with so many explanations,
or can even show, with so much complications.

It can be sudden, seeking to throw on you,
the element of surprise.

It can be your dreams coming true,
or your freddies, coming to be.

It can be bliss, a hiss, a piss, a diss, a miss
It could be everyone of these things,
and more.

To me, it's LOVE.

1004 by Sadiq Muhammed

Growing up there was terrific,
amidst all the chaos caused by
a man called the
estate manager. And so called,
military personnel.

If you ask me, i would say
why dont they all live in the
barracks?

Apart from that and NEPA, and
the B52 bomber squad from 7pm.

All is calm and goes day by day,
you wake up, have a bath or not,
either way,depending on which gate you live closer too,
you go there, either for a fag, buy bread and eggs,
or the supermarket....hmm!!!

Now this place in itself could be called malo land,
little North. Why?
It was filled with traders, from the North.
Though there were other traders here and there,
like if you remember G4, you will remember Ibadan.

Now,thats another character,
he could cut hair as good as he could
cut everyone on a football field.
Next to Burro. He was the best. Kole. Kachi.
Phew!!!there were so many talents in that area.

Then, there is the bombazi squad.

Now, this was a squad, which as long as you
represent, you would be accepted
as long as you bring your supplies,
though.

P-School. side staircase. Tennis courts.
Now about them courts,
it was used as a satro court.

Satro?Its a football game the estate invented
due to the rainy seasons, and during the rainy
season, the fields are unplayable.

So, satro was used to pass away the
long evenings before 7pm.

Phew!!We had a whale of a time in 1G4.

Our Yesterdays

Our yesterdays, oh! Our yesterdays!
What we wouldn’t do, just to revisit our yesterdays?
Not much I say, not much we wouldn’t do.
Principles we’d bury, this much we’d surely do.
Desperate measures we’d take, if shown a way.
No time for thoughts, or waiting for another day.
Everyday gone: the birth of another yesterday.
Oh! Yesterday, if only I had known you today.
I know you surely must go, as sure as the falling snow.
If only I could see you, tell you I know……
……that I did you wrong, used you wrong.
If I could turn back time: before you were gone.
I would no longer have regrets, or say……
Oh! Yesterday, if only I had known you today!

NORTHERN BEAUTY by Zakiyya

Pure is your soul, oh northern beauty
It is made manifest in your modesty and humility
Pure as the silky fabric that conceals your secret skin
Chaste as the body you guard from the temptations of the sweetest sin
Sublime as the radient glow that emanates from an angel's halo

Supreme is your wisdom, oh northern queen
You speak only as and when necessary
Your shy demeanor is protective armour
Often mistaken for a lack of self-confidence
Nay, your shy demeanor is modesty in self-assurance
It hypnotizes wise men and repels men of ignorance

THE END