p@rt 18
“GHOST RUN!”
©️Opeyemi Akintunde
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Before you re-ad, I know this upd@t£ is super late. Sorry.
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I sat on the ba-re floor un-der the tent I was kept. My left hand had been cuffed to one of the iron rod that held the tent in place.
I couldn’t wra-p my head around the thought that my father brou-ght me to that terrible place.
“ God What is happening?” I meditated for hours.
Much later, very late into the night, I was lying on the wra-pper that had been provided for me on the floor, when I suddenly started hearing approaching footsteps…
“ The Captain!” The Spirit of God told me…
I jumped up and sat up crossing my legs…
“ I have been busy… I am here for what I said earlier!” He said
“ plea-se don’t defile me… !”
Captain didn’t listen as he f0rç£d himself in to me….
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“Hey!, Hey! Wake up!” I heard someone whispering… I woke up from my nap…
I looked around and I realized the r@p£ incident was a dream.
“ Thank God! It was a dream!” I said breathing out…
“ What dream?” The man who had woken me up asked
“ Never mind! “ I said
“ I sneaked to bring you this food, you should eat fast!”
“ Thank you! “ I looked at him unsure of why he was helping me.
“Will Captain carry out his threat of ra-ping me!” I asked Him
“ If you stay longer, I cannot as-sure you that Captain won’t carry out his threat! My advice is you get out of here fast!”
“ But That is impossible, I have been handcuffed!”
“ Then tell him what he wants to hear!”
“ Which is!”
“That you have reconsidered your intentions of going to Mororo!”
“ I can’t do that because I am un-der a vow! I have promised God and I can’t just go back and say I am no longer interested. God takes our vows seriously!”
“Hmm.. Well I hope you are alive to go back there..”
We both heard another approaching footstep…
“ Captain!” The soldier said in fear, he quic-kly packed the food I was about to eat and disappeared.
Fear gr!pp£dmy heart as I was afraid my dream was about to become real. The moment captain got into the tent, I la-id down on the floor, worsh!ping God and praising Him at the t©p of my voice….
“What is the meaning of this?” Captain said and without Mercy he turned me facing up with the intention of r@p£. At that same instance, the young soldier who had brou-ght me food earlier c@m£ in and pushed him off me…
“ Captain, st©p this!” The young man said
Captain fell to the floor and you should have seen the unbelief in his eyes…
” Reme, what did you just do?” Captain asked
” I am sorry Captain, forgive me, I don’t know what c@m£ over me…”
” Really? Well I will help you!” He said and called out for silver…
Silver rushed in…
” Yes Captain!”
” Silver, Reme pushed me because he wanted to defend this thing, and he said he didn’t know what c@m£ over him, help him check his br@in if it is still functioning well, if not relieve him of the pressure of carrying such a heavy load on his shoulders….” Captain said
” Captain plea-se I am sorry, plea-se captain…” Reme pleaded as he was dragged out. I also tried pleading but Captain shut me up with a sl@p…
” Silver, plea-se don’t cut off my head!” I heard Reme pleading. I couldn’t see him anymore but I s-en-sed fear in his voice. All of a sudden, I couldn’t hear his voice anymore after a slashing sound…
” I think you are jinxed, your husband died because of you, I also heard your recent b©yfri£nddied because of you, now Reme has killed himself because of you, well I am smarter, I won’t sleep with you and die! But I give you the next 3 hours to tell me you are not going to Mororo anymore so I know i can get let your jinxed self out of here. Be re-ady to sign the papers.”
With that Captain left, and I was in between shock, gratitude and pain that Reme had to died…
I wept so-re and started reconsidering my stand…
p@rt 19
The next two days were worse than the first day in terms of the sl@ps I got from Captain. Whenever I told him I was still interested in going to Mororo, he would give me a h0t sl@p. I wasn’t given food to eat. By the third day, I started screaming for God’s Help… I was at the brink of saying the wrong words to God, but whenever I was at that point, different scriptures will rise up within me, which made the scripture Psm 119:11 very real to me…
“Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee”
God’s Word I had eaten in the past three months was a defense in my Spirit.
On the third day, The lady who takes me to the makeshift rest room c@m£ to the tent where I was lying on the floor…
“ Hello…” She said but I did not have the strength to give a reply…
“ Your father will be here soon, Captain has not received your father’s money so he went to the bank in the city to confirm if your father has made the transfer.” She said
I still maintained my silence…
“ He told me I should take you to where you will take your bath in case you have decided to go back on your stand.”
I refused to say anything..,
“ Adenike or whatever your name is, you are only punishing yourself, be smart about this, Keep this Mororo vision for a later time, maybe Five years from now. Tell your father you are no more interested and Captain will re-lease you. Return home, stay with them for a year or so and then relocate to another state, pretend like you want to start a new life. Let your parents visit you in the new place and after another two years or so, you go to this Mororo you are pas-sionate about… This is the wisdom you nee-d!”
“Ok…” I managed to say!
Her idea was a good one. It was a good compromise and I felt I could deceive my parents for a while and later when I gain my independence, return to Mororo.
“ You will do what I just said?” She asked very excited and I nodded…
“ Oh thank Goodness, at least you can have something to eat soon! My Goodness ! You are one tough girl though! She re-moved the handcuff from the iron rod but did not re-move it from my hand as usual. She helped me get up and together we walked toward the makeshift toilet/bathroom.
“ Let me get you water and soap” she said compas-sionately..
“ Thanks, But can you take this hand cuff off, so I can wash my b©dy well…” I said to her…
“ I am sorry, Captain did not give me the instruction to that, you just have to bear the discomfort till your father comes around. Since you have agreed to go back home, the discomfort you are feeling will soon be over.”
“ Ok thank you! “ I said as I stood waiting for her to get me water…
On bringing the water, she realized the soap was in her tent!
She rushed off to her tent and I heard …
“ Run!” I turned around to see who spoke, but there was no one…
I heard the voice again saying with all urgency. I looked and saw a pathway to my right. I didn’t know where the Strength c@m£ from, I raced off…
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I know I was running throu-gh bushes but I didn’t know where I was headed….It was getting late and I had not yet seen a main road.
“ God lead me out of here plea-se!” I screamed out loud with tears pouring out of eyes. I was hungry and tired. The hand cuff on my hand was hurting me terribly..
I decided to take a short rest by sitting on the floor. The moment I sat, something heavy dropped on me. On impulse I had closed my eyes, so on opening them I realized I was tra-pped in a big net.
“ What?” I literally screamed… “Where was I and whose net was this?”
p@rt 20
“ GHOST RUN!”
By Opeyemi Ojerinde
I tried getting out of the net but all to no avail…
“ Who is there?” I heard a voice say from the distance…
“ plea-se help! My name is Adenike and I missed my way!” I said
The person shone the torch on me…
“ The Peleta’s net!” The man said
“ What?”
“ You have been tra-pped by the Peleta’s net…”
“ Yes sir! I don’t know the name of the net, but I am in it!”’I said to the strange man…
” If you stay in that net for the next 2 hours, you will be dead. The Peleta net is a strangulating net, it will be keep shrinking till it strangulates you!” He said
“ Ok!” I said hoping he would come closer and help me out…”Are you not going to help me?”
“ I have to be sure of my safety first before trying to save you, that’s how it should work!” He said as I saw him shining his torch around himself.
“ The Peleta people do not come out to fight their invaders, they made these nets as a way of defending themselves…It is a shrinking net soa-ked in poison.” He said as he carefully walked towards me…
“ There could be 1000 nets scattered around here, but to escape them, you nee-d to walk in circles” He said and that made me un-derstand why he walking in circles towards me. On getting close to me, I thought he would help cut the net, but instead he stretched a short knife towards me.
“ Once you cut throu-gh, walk in circles towards where I am …” He said as he walked back in circles forming the infinity sign till he got to a far distance…
I cut the net successfully and the moment the net fell off…I noticed another one was about to drop on me, I jumped from the net and landed on a new surface, and as swift as a deer, I walked in circles till I got to where the stranger was…
“ A very good one I must say….!” The stranger said
“ Thank you! But I don’t how I did that! That must have been God!” I said
“ Hmmm… !” He said
“ So what are you doing here? And are a Peleta person! Besides, who are the Peleta people… Never heard of them!” I said
“ Come this way!” He said
I followed him towards the right and as we kept walking , I started hearing drum sounds… A certain amount of illumination was coming from un-der ground…By the time we moved further, I realized we were on t©p of a hill and a large expanse of land la-id on the ground below. A strange looking people in hundreds filled up the land!
“ That would have been you tomorrow morning if I had not rescued you tonight!” He said to me as he pointed to a roasted looking animal.
Like the stranger heard my thought, He said….
“It’s not an animal, but a very unwise human like you!”
“ What?”
“ His name was Robert Schwartz!”
“ Robert Schwartz!” The name rang a bell, but I couldn’t tell from where I heard the name…
“ Yes, an unwise missionary!” With that he looked straight into my eyes with a terrifying hurting look…
“ The painful thing is that, he didn’t die alone, he wasted the lives of his wife and children.” I saw another set of people roasting two children and a woman and they ate their bodies like barbecue.
“ Oh My God! I thought God was meant to protect His missionaries, why this?” I said in pain. A pain I felt so dearly, because of what I had just faced recently in the hands of Captain…
“ God will never st©p a stupid man from going to a mission field, but God will empower and Encourage a wise man on the mission field!”
“ What differentiates a wise man or a foolish one on the mission field”
“ Get back to Captain and he will tell you more!”
“Captain?” I asked and on looking intently at the stranger, he fizzled away like a feather….
I stood shocked on the same sp©t! I just saw An angel? I looked down and the Peleta people were no longer there… The night had turned to day like a pas-sage of time happened right in front of me…
“Captain?” The Stranger was asking me to go back to Captain.
Everything was looking all complicated and I went blank!
To be continued…..