SADE HARAM (IV)

To do a great good, you must do a little evil
—William Shakespeare

Previously on Sade Haram

As soon as Abu reached Sade and grabbed her on the shoulder, he heard a shout. He looked up as Husseini who hurried into the field.

‘Get up everyone,’ he ordered. ‘Get the girls into the vehicles. We leave now, now! We have information that the military are set to attack….’

Sade disengaged her shoulder from Abu’s grip as he watched Husseini’s mouth. She quickly slipped into the girls, trigger-ready.

‘Tashi, tashi, chanchan,’ rent the air.

The girls were herded like cows into a lorry and a bus. Sade made into the bus and squat by a window in the middle row. The girls were jammed full into the seats, aisle; seated, kneeling, standing; all, terrified, weeping, sniffing withself-pity, terror. Two terrorists stood guard at the door as the driver engaged gear. As the bus began to move, Sade nodded. Now she had them where she wanted them.

# #
The bus was speeding the road, the direction opposite Takwa town. Behind the bus was a lorry-load of girls, then a convoy of terrorists’ cars and buses. In addition to the two gun guards in this bus was the driver. Three of them.Too easy. But the mob behind her, and the other girls on the lorry… would get hurt.

Sade brought out her two-way radio. She heard the sound of approaching aircraft. The arrival of assistance, time to act. Sade stamped to her feet. The first guard saw her gun, made for his, Sade shot him on the neck. The girls screamed as Sade squat and bullets ripped overhead, fired by the second guard. Sade showed her hand and fired in the direction of the second gunman. He cried out. She showed herself. She had hit him on the shoulder. He made to lift his gun. She shot him on the face, and watched as the bullet made a uniformed mess of his tongue, nose, chin, eyes, all.

The cries in the bus intensified. Some of the girls were squatted with hands on their heads but a few were running, or attempting to run, on their feet and scrambling, distracting Sade!

‘Lie down, everybody!’ It was useless. Sade used her fists and elbows to made way, making for the driver. Before she reached him, he had loosened his pistol holster. Her bullet reached him. Blood smeared the windscreen. At this stage, the frantic atmosphere was hell pitch. But because she had an ear on the ready, Sade heard the screeches of two cars as they stopped by the bus. Sade took control of the bus which she head into a bush; the two cars pursued. Helicopters engines drones were now overpowering. Gunshots rattled the air. The girls were mad with fright.

Sade suddenly turned the bus into a masquerade dark thickset of bush and stepped on the brake. The girls knocked into themselves in a unified stream of ghostly voices. The two cars also braked and three gunmen came out, stood before the bus and opened fire on the driver area. They didn’t stop till there magazines were emptied.Then one of them made for the bullets-ridden door and opened it. He didn’t see Sade lying dead in her blood-pool…

‘Hey!’

They all turned around, facing Sade who was lying on her side and shooting. She lifted to her feet as the men fell to their deaths. Two helicopters emerged from the sky and stood hovering over the bus and Sade. SS agents, gun on the ready began to jump down the crafts.

‘Agent Sade?’

‘Yes. Secure the girls.’

One of the agents began to talk rapidly into his radio as others made for the bus.
Mark showed his face on the helicopter window. ‘What is your position?’

‘We have to get after the other girls,’ she shouted.

‘Hop in.’

Sade climbed in and the helicopter made for the sun.
Five minutes on the air, Sade spotted the roofless lorry full of the girls on its solitary journey on a road more grass than soil. Two terrorists were with the girls on the back. One sat astride the tailboard while the other leaned on it. They began to fire at the helicopter as soon as they saw it. The helicopter continued to descend towards the lorry. Gunshots continued to be fired on it. ‘Turn the chopper so that I face them,’ Sade shouted so as to be heard above the engine drone.

‘That is a suicide mission,’ Mark shouted. ‘Turn it my way!’

‘That is the only way!’

The pilot positioned the craft so that Mark sat on a higher level opposite the lorry. He aimed his pistol. Two gunshots shot pass so close his face. Too dangerous, but he didn’t panic. He couldn’t afford to, a shift could see him miss the target and hit one of the girls behind the gunmen. Sade held her breath…

Crack!
The terrorist on the tailboard fell into the girls. His comrade stole a look at him…

Crack! The bullet met him on the chest… ‘Whoah!’ he fell.
‘Mark, you sure enjoy killing this people,’ Sade noted.
‘As long as they stand between me and the girls, I do!’
The lorry had stopped; the lorry began to go into reverse. ‘What the hell is he doing?’ Sade asked.
‘He wants to kill the girls!’
Indeed, he was positioning the back of the lorry in a hill under which was a drop of over fifty feet of rocks… from this position the driver would get the vehicle somersaulting down a bitter end, death…
‘Hover over his head so I can jump unto the driver’s roof!’ Mark shouted to the pilot as he got to the tip of the window. Sade was horrified as the two hind tyres of the lorry were being positioned on the edge of the hill…
Mark landed on the roof. He threw himself forward and with the expertise of a gymnast got into the driver’s window legs-first. A deadly struggle ensued.

‘Let me drop too,’ Sade screamed but the helicopter was making to the land by the side of the lorry. ‘Oh no!’ A gunshot was fired on the driver’s section. ‘No!’ Sade jumped down the helicopter twenty feet before ground, misbalanced and fell on her back. She rose to her feet the next moment, her pistol on the ready and began running, wild-eyed toward the lorry. She stumbled and fell. As she made to her feet, someone fell from the lorry.

‘No!’ Sade flew to the body. It was lifeless. Sade saw that his neck was broken. It wasn’t Mark. She couldn’t conceal her relief as she looked up at Mark wiping away at his bleeding nose.

‘He broke my nose,’ Mark said.

‘You broke his neck.’ Sade winked.

Sounds of helicopters carrying nurses and aids workers could be heard on the distance.

One of the helicopters that landed at the end of the rescue battle carried Special Agent Pilah from the office of the National Security Adviser. Although this operation was in the command of Mark, it wasn’t unusual for the NSA to send in special agents to monitor high profile operations like this. So Special Agent Pilah landed on the forest.

The gun battle over, the military personnel and agents were returning to the field were Pilah stood, lean and angry, his long well-masculine hands lying by his sides, one of which a pistol holster hung.

‘Where is Agent Mark?’ Pilah asked one of the newly arrived agents.

‘He is supervising the transport of the girls from here,’ replied a staunch agent.

Pilah pouted his dissatisfied mouth as his brooding eyes burnt holes into the agent’s body. ‘What is the state of the terrorists?’

‘We have killed or captured all of them.’

‘How many are they?’

‘Can’t say…’

‘You ‘‘have killed or captured all of them’’ remember?’

‘Yes sir, but I think…’

‘Don’t think! I want all the dead and captured brought here immediately.’

‘Yes sir.’ The agent turned to go.

‘Agent!’

The agent stopped. ‘Yes sir.’

‘I want all recovered ammunition also brought here… get another agent on this while you make for the bodies.

‘Yes sir.’

Pilah waved him away. He reached for his hip and brought out his hand-held phone. He dialled the NSA’s number. ‘The operation is over sir. The girls are secured and the terrorists either killed or captured.’

‘Good. What is the position of Sade?’
‘She is alive. She was instrumental in the rescue of the girls.’
The NSA grunted. ‘I know what Sade is capable of. Now listen Pilah, we need Sade out, kill her, hand over to Mark and return to Abuja immediately.’
‘Yes sir.’ Pilah returned the phone to his pocket. No argument, just an affirmation of an order by a true agent; an agent who had sold his heart to the government.‘Get me Sade,’ he said to an agent standing by.

‘Yes sir.’ The agent left.

Pilah brought out his pistol and checked the bullets. He nodded with grim satisfaction and began to walk small circles about. He hadn’t waited two quarters of an hour when Sade joined him. Her hair, in disarray, a patch of blood on her shirt and her face worried… Her worry only aided to lift her calm beauty.

‘Hi Pilah, didn’t know you were with us,’ Sade said.

Pilah grunted.

‘We need more security operatives to escort the girls into town,’ Sade began, ‘and we also need you to get the NSA make special reservations in at least four hospitals for the girls. Again…’

‘Sade,’ Pilah hissed her stop.

‘Yes?’

‘I need to talk to you…’ he didn’t open his mouth… ‘in private.’

‘Okay.’

And together the two stepped into the bush.

To be Continued…

I earnestly apologise for my inconsistencies in posting Sade. Of recent, I am faced with a major headache that forced me to raise my priorities. But my love for Sade and my happiness in sharing her with you have continued to haunt me, hence my return of Sade. Forgive my Mr Hyde attitude, pele. I promise to make the postings of Sade more balanced, henceforward. I love you for waiting so long. Cheer, continue to read Hard… Voices

 

SADE HARAM (I)

There has not been a terrorist attack on American soil since Jack Bauer first appeared on TV. We must not neglect the power of make-belief. This is Nigeria and we shall fight terrorism, one word at a time.

8.02am, 30^th May, 2014

She stood before the mirror and frowned at her cheekbones and the bags under her eyes. She ran her hand on her unmade hair and decided that she would shave it off. Her hair magnified the want of flesh in her face; additionally, she had no money to take care of it.

She sighed, walked to her bed and collapsed on it. She was thirty minutes late for work, but her legs weren’t looking forward to the two hundred or so paces to where she worked. The month was not half-gone and she was already broke, she had around six hundred naira in her purse. Too unsubstantial. She had to buy things; the light and house cleaning bills could wait, but her kerosene, water, sugar, vegetable oil, soap, detergents, seasoning, pepper, salt…

She sighed again. No, six hundred naira was a mere stone to the mountain of her problems. Perhaps it was time to ask the headmaster for a raise. How could she teach CRS and Social studies in six classes and write six lesson notes, six lesson plans, mark registers, give tests, mark them, record them and swallow the insults of the ‘senior staff’ for just eight thousand naira per month. No, she would demand a raise.

With this resolve she rose to her height, clad in neat, humble shirt over pant trousers, a textbook school teacher. She gathered her books with weary hands and began a giddy walk to the door. She opened the door and beheld a sadness-infested face of man, made up with a scar under one eye. Her alarm snapped.

‘Yes?’

‘Can I come in?’ he asked.

‘No, I am late for work.’

‘You won’t be going to work if you hear what I have to say.’

‘I don’t care what you have to say. Give way.’

He remained on her way. Her anger rose from her bosom but fell as soon as it came to her face. What could she do? She turned and walked back to the room. The bed was unmade, the dish unwashed and dresses scattered around, the home of the distressed. She didn’t care that this very strange stranger saw these.

‘What do you want?’ she demanded, ‘and I didn’t ask you to sit.’

He smiled a smile that he didn’t feel. ‘Nigeria needs you Sade.’

‘I am not Sade,’ she said.

‘Who are you?’

She threw her staff ID card on his lap.

He read it. ‘Juliana Bako?’ He laughed bitterly and broke the plastic ID into two. ‘You don’t need this Sade,’ he said as he saw her eyes flash with annoyance. ‘If money is your problem, the government can give you one thousand times what you are paid in this miserable school. Sade, class teacher? No, not when your country boils.’ He rose to his feet. ‘Nigeria is in a serious problem.’

‘Talk to the President then.’

‘The President knows about it and he needs you to help solve the problem, Sade. Anything you want, just name it, the government will wire it immediately.’

‘I want rest of mind.’

He looked at her hard and she returned his gaze without flinching. He fished out his phone from his hip and began to dial a number.

‘Forget it. No one on earth will make me put my life on line for Nigeria again,’ she said.

A moment passed, he spoke rapidly in the phone then stretched out the device. Sade didn’t collect the phone. ‘The National Security Adviser on the line, Sade.’ She didn’t budge. He returned the phone to his ear.

‘Sir, she wouldn’t talk to you.’

‘Put the phone on speaker,’ came the other voice.

The phone was put on loud speaker.

‘Hello Sade, how are you?’

Sade bit her lip but said nothing.

‘Sade we need your help… I understand how you feel about Nigeria but you should know that it is still Nigerians who saved your life and gave you your new identity. The Chinese think you are dead.’

Sade didn’t open her mouth.

‘Sade, help us and get whatever you want.’

‘Sade!… Hello, Sade!’ Then carelessly, the Security Adviser said, ‘There is something you need to know about Dozie.’

‘Dozie is dead,’ Sade said huskily.

‘That is what you think.’

‘He died in my arms.’

The adviser chuckled. ‘That is what your eyes wished to see.’

She snatched the phone and shouted into the mouth-piece, ‘Dozie is dead!’

‘Everyone on earth thinks you are dead, Sade; now why do you think Dozie too isn’t living quietly somewhere with false name and—?’

‘No, it can’t be! Dozie is dead; I can feel his loss in my heart. If he is still alive I will know; I will feel his breath. No, he is dead!’

The NSA emitted a grunt. ‘Don’t argue with me, Sade, not now. We need you to tackle the insurgents. It is essential you help us… after that, we will talk about Dozie. Adamu will brief you.’

‘Wait…’ the call was ended.

Sade looked at Adamu. ‘Dozie is dead!’

Adamu’s face was blank. ‘I don’t know about that. The NSA should know better. Now, listen, the insurgents are in Kaduna and we have reasons to believe that they are led by their leader Shaka. They are quartered in a nomad settlement inside Takwa forest.’

‘Dozie is dead,’ Sade said.

‘The security of our nation, Sade, should be our problem for now. There are insurgents—’

‘The military should be made aware,’ she said with irritation. ‘I have head ache.’

Adamu smiled with dismay as she took her seat on the mattress, her head on her palms. ‘We can’t involve the military for now. There are one hundred and fifty girls kidnapped from a boarding school last night and we can’t attack the terrorist base and endanger the lives of these girls.’

Sade looked up. ‘Girls kidnapped? Again?’ She was alarmed.

‘Again.’ Adamu was ashamed. ‘We have intel that the terrorists are quartered in Kaduna in preparation for a major attack on Abuja. So we have to act fast. We also need to rescue the girls before it inspires another international storm.’

Sade sighed. ‘Why kidnap girls?’

‘To use them as human shields. With the girls in their midst, we will not use airstrike. And also to embarrass the government. This is war, Sade.’

‘But why girls?’

‘Because they are damned terrorists!’

‘What do you want me to do?’

‘We want you to enter their camp and ascertain for sure that the girls are there, get their position and inform us on how best to strike.’

Sade rose to her feet. ‘Me alone?’

He said yes.

‘That’s a suicide mission.’

Adamu nodded, pained. ‘But you are the only one we can trust. The terrorists don’t know for sure that we are on them and if you are captured we know you won’t talk.’

‘If I am captured, they will torture and molest me.’

Again, Adamu nodded, pained. ‘The chances of capturing you are low,’ he said. ‘But you mustn’t expect the worst; just be prepared.’

Sade made to her desk, opened a tattered massive textbook and brought out a postcard-sized photograph of Dozie. He had his jaw in his palm, smiling brightly at her, his eyes locked in hers. Sade caressed his face.

Ninety-nine per cent of Sade said Dozie was dead, one per cent suspected he was alive… A teasing dilemma. Could she afford to risk her life in order to find out about Dozie, to satisfy one per cent of her?

‘There are over one hundred and fifty girls being abused by terrorists as I speak to you, Sade.’

‘There are fifteen thousand secret agents in the country,’ Sade said.

‘We know no one who can handle this better than you.’

Sade’s eyes were locked on the photo. ‘I am out of touch. And Dozie is dead.’

‘You may never find your man,’ Adamu agreed, ‘you may never rescue the girls, you may die in the terrorist camp, but I know you Sade. You can’t live with the blood of these girls on your thought. You have sacrificed a lot for this country, the girls need you.’

‘I am a school teacher. I teach the next generation. My pupils need me.’

‘And there are a hundred and fifty girls who will never go to school again, who will never have a shot at leading the next generation. Not just because they are kidnapped, but because people like Sade are still bearing old grudges. You can’t let this happen just to show us how angry you are.’

Sade said nothing.

‘Come on, Sade, your boyfriend being a worthy Nigerian will approve of this.’

Sade turned. ‘And where is he?’

‘I don’t know. But I know you want to help us; I can see it written boldly on your face.’

Sade still wasn’t so sure. She had done undercover agent thrice. Among drug dealers in Benin Republic, among traffickers in Libya and among the militants in the Niger Delta. She was found out in the last two assignments and tortured. Interpol rescued her in Tripoli while the militants released her when Amnesty was declared. She was a captive for at least a month in each camp. She was tortured at first then dumped with other captives. She knew that she couldn’t expect such from the terrorists, if they captured her….

‘Sade, we are wasting time.’

Sade put Dozie’s photograph away. ‘How do you want to do this? If I say yes, you will take me on a jet and drop me in the forest?’

‘We will go first to the Secret Service Division and get you equipped for the journey,’ Adamu said, half-successful in concealing his impatience.

If she didn’t do this, the crooked NSA was sure to turn her to the Chinese. And this time, there would be no hope for her. Better Terrorists than dying in the hands of the Chinese, she reasoned. But… was she so sure?… The Chinese won’t rape her nor cut off her head; what they would do was plant a bullet in her head. And they were even. But the terrorists! They would want to eat her cake and have her!

‘Sade, let’s go,’ Adamu’s voice cut through her consciousness. She brought out Dozie’s photo for one last glance…

Crack! Crack! Crack!

Adamu seized his breath, mouth agape; he fell on his knees and spread limp on her feet, blood gushing out of his back. Sade looked up as a tall thin youth wearing a white-turned-brown sleeveless over big jeans trousers, his pistol smoking entered the room. Another youth wearing a dirty white-check turban and wielding a gun across his shoulders like a nomad’s stick came to a stand before his comrade. The first pointed his pistol on Sade’s chest.

Sade shut her eyes. At least she would die with Dozie’s picture in her hand.

She heard whisperings in a language she didn’t care to follow. She opened her eyes when she thought she heard one of them mention her name. A third man had joined them. He was dressed in khaki with his eyes hidden behind dark goggles, between stubborn forehead and fanatical beard. He had a pistol held in his belt. He took off his dark glasses to reveal blood-shot eyes and spoke. ‘I know you,’ he declared, beads of saliva pouring from his yellowed teeth. ‘You are Sade!’

Sade’s heart broke with grief. Now she remembered him; he was Sami, her partner in the Niger Delta. A Secret Agent turned terrorist! ‘She is a government agent,’ he told the others.

‘Why did you become a terrorist?’ Sade asked. ‘Why betray your country after all—?’

Sami hit his fist on her abdomen cutting her speech short. ‘You bagger! So it is you that the SS want to use!’

Sade bent double, clutching her belly as pains tore into her intestines. Sami grabbed her on the hair, lifted her face up and gave her a rock head-butt on her face. She returned to her knees, her bloody nose on her palms. The men surrounded her. ‘Yensu fa?’ one of them asked.

They would kill her; there was no time for theatrics. She suddenly stretched up, snatched the pistol in Sami’s belt and shot away from the men, covering them with the pistol, her back on the door. ‘Take it easy,’ she said to them, jeeringly. ‘Drop your weapons and put your hands up!’

Sami lifted stiff hands above stubborn shoulders. ‘What do you think you are doing? You are already in our hand.’

She didn’t like the smug smile on his face. She—

A heavy object exploded in the back of her head. She didn’t see it coming; she didn’t hear it either. It just exploded, driving her senses out of her as she fell on her kneels then her side.

‘Shegia!’ Sami cursed. ‘Take her to the vehicle.’

‘But Shaka ordered us to kill whoever this SS man came to see.’

‘Yes, but Sade is different; she is too valuable to die immediately. Take her to the vehicle.’

Strong hands lifted Sade off the ground and carried her away.

To be Continued…

Forty-eight hours ago, my eldest sister and godmother was delivered of a fairy baby boy, her fourth, my number ten niece/nephew, worldwide, incorporated. Hard Voices wish both mother and child everlasting Godspeed. Now the more kids come to call me Uncle, the more I… I don’t know.

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