Excerpts based on a true story (THEY WOULDN’T DIE)

They came in droves to Mazi Ibe’s abode. They were starved, ravished, looked worn, torn and tattered yet their chorus was deafening. Their voice was shrill and chilling, they had so many dead and died so much that death knew them and hell could take them no more and the only thing that was left of them was their irrepressible urge to survive, to live, to defy death and all the other horrors visited upon them by their antagonist, whom they had once cohabited with, shared moments with, had children with and called family.

Mazi Ibe was a man of few words and a strong demeanour but today, it seemed like it was a façade that broke because he shed tears that flowed like blood running from a fresh wound and cry he had to, for what the eyes saw, the heart and mind could not take in without breaking in a thousand shreds. This was a tale that was inexplicable, the war had not even come fully but they were hanging like pieces of a cloth that had been run through thorns. It hurt the eyes and tore through the core of the soul, he wept to fill and couldn’t weep anymore.

Also Read: My wife sleeps with my younger brother, man tells court

Then a song, their song rang through his being, it was a song of solemnity and solidarity. He began to sing and they all chorused until the land reverberated and echoed with grief and anger and vengeance and purpose, this would forever be sung as long as the remnants of these people walked the earth. The time had come, blood was screaming from the land, ghouls had been woken from of old and the departed ones turned in their graves, the shoal was stirred and it shook the walls and conspiracies that held them bound, freedom came at a price very dear and cumbersome but at least they could breathe again. They had vowed never to be caught out again and lessons albeit very grave ones were learnt. Darkness failed.

The world did not come to their aid as envisaged instead they waited in the wings like scavengers and vultures, ready to share the spoils, sniggering and dragging their feet when action should have been taken to forestall a bloodbath, spinning diplomatic webs with subterfuge and politics at the instance of humanity it didn’t matter though because these people had been bruised, battered, terrified such that it meant nothing to them, they emerged like new shoots from old stumps despite all they just wouldn’t die……..