Readers, I have exceeded my number of readers for this week, as a gift, I have posted this chapter early. Have a good weekend 

Below are pronunciations of some names and terms mentioned frequently:

Limbani: Lee-mber-nee

Kaulimi-Ker-oo-lee-mee

Chapter 4

Ipyana

I thought…hoped that I would get a week rest before my next fight. But I only got a day. The crowd loved me; the referee of the fights kept calling me a K’warrior; Kaulimi warrior. I lost this fight too. Amidst the booing from the crowd I was dragged out of the cage and backstage by the guards. They were going to kill me. They were going to kill me. The guards dragged me into a dark room which was filled with four other pygmies stacked in a line. The guards handcuffed me and made me stand on the line. After the fights were done, we were led into the cage. The seats were filled with an unwilling audience. The paying crowd that had been there during the fights had left now replaced by captives.

Limbani was dressed in a red suit. He walked to the other end of the line and pulled a pistol. “You know what this is. It’s a hand gun .22milllimeter to be precise. Very similar to a blaster but more effective. Makes your opponent bleed more, more lethal and oh my favourite part.” He shot the first pygmy woman on the line through her skull. “It’s more dramatic.” He laughed as he watched her body drop to the floor.

This was how I was going to die. At the hands of a maniac in a hole where no one knew me. Oh God. I don’t want to die here. I want to find where my biological  parents are buried, find out who they were. He shot at the second pygmy in the line. Why was I adopted? Why? Why did they even tell me I was adopted? If I did not know I would not have left Kaulimi. I would not be dying in some hole. I would be safe with my adoptive mother. He shot the third pygmy. I watched his body drop to the ground. I just pray they find my body and burry it properly. That’s all I want. He shot the fourth pygmy. It was my turn to die. He pressed the pistol to the base of my skull.

“Bang!” he said with a laugh. “I have great hopes for you little K’limian pygmy. I see potential in you. If I let you live will you disappoint me?” My eyes were glued to the bodies that lay on the floor of the cage. I had seen all of them today: one in the café, the other at our shower time and the others as they lost to their opponents in the cage. He nudged my head with his pistol. “I asked you a question?”

“I won’t.” I cried. “I won’t.”

“Good K’limian.” He withdrew the pistol from my head. “Take her to the clinic.” Thank you God. A torrent of tears flowed down my face. Thank you so much God. Before I could contemplate thanking Limbani for letting me go, two guards led me away.

I could hear a loud voice saying. “Her injuries were extensive but luckily no internal bleeding.”

I slowly opened my eyes, all I could see was a white coat. I heard footsteps leave the room.

I looked down at my hands, my wrists were bound and so were my feet. I was lying on a hospital bed. I must have been in the clinic.

“You shouldn’t be awake yet.” The man in the white coat said. He moved to a table with syringes, took one and walked towards me. He bent down and slowly inserted the syringe into my wrist. I tried to struggle but it was to no avail. “Sleep little one.”

“She awake?” I heard a voice ask.

“Yes, she is stronger than I thought. The sedative I gave her earlier should have kept her unconscious for one more hour.” The guy in the white coat responded.

“How are you?” Vinjero asked. She was sitting on her bed with her arms resting on her knees and her hands clasped together.

“I’m okay considering.” I mumbled. I pulled myself up into a sitting position. My back was aching and the action of sitting made the pain worse.

“I thought you were gone.”

“So did I.”

“He never does that you know.” Vinjero said. I looked at the window , outside it was a thick forest.“You know what this means right. You need to win the next fight. No more holding back.”

“I know.” I said bitterly. “I have to hurt innocent people so I don’t die. I know.”

Everyone expected me to be this great Kaulimian warrior. The two pygmies I had been matched with came at me with all they had even though I was just kid. It scared me. Vinjero told me she was scared too, but watching her fight it was hard to believe she was scared at all. Every hit she got made her strike her opponent harder. She told me that she would tap into her rage. The indignation she felt about being held captive and forced to fight. “My opponent becomes the personification of my oppressors.”

“But, they are a victim too.” I argued.

“Yes but if I look at them as that. I won’t win the fight.”

Her technique clearly worked for her but it could not work for me. The other Akafula in this camp were victims. I could not let them be a target of my rage.

“This is not the place for a conscious Ipyana.”

This was untrue. This was exactly the place for a conscious.

“I was a street kid. I have been since my parents died from a pod accident. They put me in an orphanage but I got beaten up everyday by my caregivers. So I ran away and that’s how I ended up on the streets. That’s where they got me.” She paused to chuckle. “One day these guys show up. And say they want to give pygmies food. Tell us their organisation takes care of Pygmies in particular as vulnerable minority. Promised us food, accommodation and education. I had no one.” Her voice was shaky. “So I came with them, elated. “ She exhaled to steady her voice. “Once we got here they put us in these cages and forced us to fight like animals.”

“I am sorry.”

“How did they get you?” she asked. Her voice was steadier now.

I lay down on my bed and exhaled. “My sister and I are adopted. I was five when my parents died.” I paused. I noticed my lips were trembling. “I don’t know much about them. Salifya, my sister, never talks about them. A year ago I mustered the courage and asked her about them. I asked her if we had any relatives. I also asked where our parents were buried. She didn’t know where they were buried. I asked her if she would be willing to help me find out. At the time she said she was busy with work.” I drew my breath in. I felt agony surge through me. “So a fortnight ago she told me work had cleared up and she had gotten a holiday so we could find out where our parents were buried and any relatives we had. We came to Mzuzu to find the central registry at the District Commissioner’s office. The first day we were in Mzuzu we got attacked by these other guys. It happened three times that week. After that Salifya abandoned me.” I paused again. I kept repeating ‘abandoned’ over and over in my mind. I slowly wiped the tears off my cheeks. And took several breaths. “Then I got captured by these guys.”

I don’t remember what Vinjero said. It all got lost through my sobs.

I could hear the other prisoners snoring. I glanced at Vinjero she was still sleeping. The moon light danced off the closed window. I wonder where Salifya was. Did she worry about me? Ama must think I am ignoring her because I’m having such fun outside Kaulimi. They had taken all my devices. I pulled my knees closer to my chest. I wonder what Vilelani and Talilo were upto. They were most certainly wondering what I am doing and why I have been offline. I missed real food. I missed the taste and even the smell of food. Oh God what did I do to deserve this? I just wanted to go home. I closed my eyes and tried to remember what the sun felt like on my skin.

“Are you crying?” Vinjero asked.

I wiped my tears.

“What’s bothering you?” She got up from her bed and walked to mine.

“I hate it here. I hate everything about it.” I sobbed. “I just want to go home.”

“We all do.” She said quietly. She put her hand on my back and was moving it in vertical motions. “You need to win that fight tomorrow. It’s there only way to get out of here.”

I sniffed. “I told you I’m not a fighter.”

“You probably have more training in martial arts that any of us here. Use it.”

I bit my lip, and held my forehead as more tears flooded my eyes. “It does not seem right to hit another just because our captors have told us to.”

“For this week alone drown your conscious and win these fights.” She said gently.

I turned and faced her. “Don’t you see what they are doing to us? They are turning us against each other for their entertainment and profit. They are taking away our humanity.”

“I know.” She said wiping the tears off my face: a fruitless exercise for more tears were coming down. “But we are under their control.”

“Maybe we can escape.”

She pulled her top up from the left side exposing her belly. There was a red jelly-fish-tentacles shaped scar the size of a hand held out. I had seen it before when she was dressing. “I tried that. They electrocuted me as punishment. Let’s just do things their way and get out of here.”

A guard led me and my opponent to what the other captives called the cage. It was a box with steel bars enclosing it completely like a boxing ring. Once, during a fight I saw Vinjero push her opponent against the steel bars so hard they bled. She looked like a wild animal when she fought. I think the rage she tapped into was bestial. It scared me. The arena was packed. Some people were cheering and some were booing. I walked into the cage slowly. Rumbani had her game face on. She flexed her huge biceps and the crowd cheered even more. My heart was pounding. I inhaled and exhaled to calm myself. The referee, who was seated outside the cage, was doing a countdown. I knew at three Rumbani was going to charge at me with all she had. I stood with my legs apart, arms behind my back the first stands of bembe.

“Start!” the ref shouted.

Rumbani charged at me. I managed to dodge her. She hit the cage. I quickly kicked her from behind making her hit the cage again. I climbed on her back and started to choke her from behind. She tried to grab me but to no avail. She stopped struggling and was almost losing consciousness. I felt sick. I was doing this to her. I was hurting her. I released her. She inhaled then turned around. She pinned me to the ground with one arm and hurled a punch at me with the other arm. I ducked when she tried to get a second punch on my face,she hit the ground. I hit the back of her head with my elbow. Then freed myself from her grip. I hit the back of her head. Just the right spot this time. She passed out. The crowd cheered. I felt sick. I had made her pass out. I wiped the blood off my forehead. Amidst the cheering, the guard led me to the clinic.

A siren went off. It was time for education and execution. I wanted to run but Vinjero had told me that anyone who failed to attend would electrocuted.

Inside the cage was my most recent opponent Rumbani and four other pygmies.

Limbani came out with a gun that looked like a breed of the rifle and the pistol.

“It’s semi-automatic.” He said cheerfully. He explained to us what that meant. “Blasters they make people lazy and they don’t inflict enough suffering.” He shot Rumbani in shoulder. “That’s called a through and through because it missed your major arteries.” He knelt down beside where she lay. “Do you know how much these bullets and guns cost. You should be happy dying in such an expensive way.” He shot her again this time in her head. She died. After that he made jokes that only he laughed at and monologues as he took the lives of the other four pygmies. As I starred at Rumbani’s body I knew I would always remember the price my conscious paid for my freedom. I could not afford to lose the next fight. But I knew winning would come at a high cost too. God where are you? Why have you forsaken your beloved? Limbani took a deep bow. My hands came together to give an involuntary applause.

“Thank you, Thank you. You are too kind.” Limbani said bowing over and over again. Did he really think this was a show? Did he??

Vinjero told me that he always brought different historical weapons. “He says, a worthy audience deserves a worthy show that is full of surprises.” She said bitterly.

Tiwonge had a look of toughness that masked fear. I inhaled deeply. I wanted this fight to be swift. Most of the crowd was cheering. My mind was focused on my opponent. I needed this to be swift and painless. Tiwonge had her fists up to her shoulder. Her biceps scared me. She kept moving forward and backward. She was wasting her energy. She threw a left hook at me, I dodged it in time. I kicked her in the calves. She fell to the floor. I quickly knelt beside her and hit her on behind the head. She passed out. The crowd cheered louder. I exhaled to calm my racing heart. I was free. This was my last time in this accursed cage.

Vinjero had also won her fights. They were five of us out of the fifty. We were taken by the guards to the bottom floor. The bottom floor was a common area connecting to other rooms. Limbani swaggered out of the elevator, that had taken us down here,to the middle of the room.

“We told you that you will be given freedom if you won the fights. But it was a lie. We wanted the strongest amongst you. Don’t look so alarmed.” Limbani said with a smile.

As he spoke a multitude of guards entered the room from all the adjacent rooms and grabbed us. I tried to struggle but it was pointless so I stopped.

“After we are done with you, you will be very strong and fierce.” He said. The room the guard led me to had a bright light and a bed. There was a tall a man wearing a lab coat and carrying a syringe. My hands were sweaty. The guard strapped me to the bed. I felt the pinch of the syringe. I tried to struggle out of the straps. My arms felt heavy with each movement. My eyes closed involuntarily.

Sneak Peak at Next Week's Chapter

Chapter 5

Ipyana

The bright lights dazzled me as I opened my eyes. I shut them then opened them slowly. The man in the lab coat was standing in front of a large monitor. On the monitor was an image of a female pygmy and several numbers attached to it.

“Her biometrics show that she is ready for the operation.” The man in the lab coat said.

“Yes. She is not as strong as I hoped she would be,” replied a woman I could not see.

“True but she will have to do.” The man touched the screen another image came up. It was a human cyborg. “I want to remove her left arm and leg. I will give her solar powered limbs.”

They wanted to turn me into a human cyborg.

Creator’s Note:

As you read the first part of this chapter, did you think Limbani would kill Ipyana?

Why did Limbani spare Ipyana?

Thanks for reading.

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