The night is thick and hot. The sounds made by owls, insects and other creatures of the night seem to have an ominous rhythm about it. All around, evil hangs heavily in the air and breaths down with sinister energy on Kocy Nku’s neck.
Kocy Nku’s eyes blazes with wicked intents as he moves through the darkness with deliberate stealth and calculated steps. He is dressed in tight fitting black jacket, black baggy jeans and black combat boots. A hood extends from his jacket and covers his whole head, completely overshadowing his face.
He is a huge man. His hands are huge and covered in thick black gloves and in his right hand is a huge glinting wicked knife.
As he makes his way through a lobby, Kocy Nku is aware of his accelerated breathing and the thumping sounds made by his chest as his heart pumps blood through his veins. His eyes darts swiftly in the darkness, analyzing his environment and looking out for any form of movement and possible threats.
Kocy Nku, is on a mission, howbeit, a dark one.
Following a mental direction based on the house plan he had studied the day before and committed into memory, Kocy Nku makes a left and moves to the end of the hall where he stops in front of a black wooden door. He reaches carefully for the door knob and turns it slowly but the door does not open and he grimaces in the darkness.
Kocy Nku puts the dagger away and takes out two needle-like metal instruments from his pocket which he uses on the keyhole of the door. He works for a while, applying pressure on the metal tools held firmly in the fingers of both hands and then, the door gives a subtle ‘’click’’ sound as it unlocks.
As the door opens, Kocy Nku takes out the dagger from its scabbard and approaches the bed in the centre of the room with lithe steps.
And in the same room, just above Kocy Nku’s head is a pair of demonic catlike rheumy eyes; huge and evil, glowing with a terrible sickening amber coloration as they watch the approach of Kocy Nku with evident hatred and wicked malice.
Dada Balogun gets up from his bed with a worried expression. He is a handsome man with a neatly cut thick black hair and well kept beards. He is in an expensive tunic and there is a bracelet made of cowries on the wrist of his right hand.
He takes a look at the wall fitted mirror to the right of his huge bedroom and makes a sudden but swift movement with his right hand and his mouths moves rapidly as he incantates inaudibly and then, quite suddenly, the mirror gives a series of ominous sounds and becomes cloudy as thick black smoke emanates from it.
And when the smoke clears, there is an image on it.
It is the image of Kocy Nku moving stealthily in the darkness with the sharp dagger raised above his head. There is a swift movement of kocy Nku’s hand and the dagger slices through the throat of the lady beneath the duvet of the expensive bed, spilling thick blood.
The mirror turns crimson and Dada Balogun has a single tear rolling down his right cheek. His eyes are closed and his body bristles as rage seeps through him and when he opens his eyes, he is no longer handsome. His eyes are red orbs that projects blue flames and fire burst out of his mouth as he incantates wildly. His voice is mechanical and ancient, painfully abrasive in the ears and there is nothing human about him now.
Dada Balogun points a stiff finger at the mirror and says in that horrible voice;
“I WILL SIFT YOU AS WHEAT!”
And then, without warning, he levitates into the air and when he takes his hand down, the mirror cracks into eight uniform zig-zag pieces and crashes to the thick marbled floor.
Kocy Nku opens his door and walks in dejectedly. He is obviously affected by the heartlessness of his action. It is his first kill. True, Kocy Nku is a hardened criminal but had only engaged in smart-stealing and burglary on establishments with high state-of-the-art security system, missions seemingly impossible to accomplish and which earned him the name “invisible man” in his circles but killing was what Chief Okonkwo Edoche had wanted and the price tag on the mission was very attractive.
Kocy shakes his head to rid it of the gruesome image of the lifeless lady with the bleeding throat playing in his head. She was beautiful even in the darkness of the room. Omolara was the name chief Okonkwo had given him but the chief had kept the reason for wanting her dead from him.
Kocy Nku sighs.
And then, he takes out his handset and dials a number.
“Yes, my boy?” The gruff voice from the other end of the line says.
“The job is done, send the balance”, Kocy says briefly with an icy voice and cuts the call.
He tosses the phone on the cupboard to the right of his, rather scattered, room and reaches for a bottle of whiskey on the side table of his bed. He takes a deep draw from the bottle, tosses two pills into his mouth and swallows.
The luminous clock above the head of Kocy’s bed strikes 1:00AM.
There are horrible evil sounds playing underneath the bed and Kocy Nku is having a terrible nightmare.
There is a man dressed in red tunic and holding a red tusk in Kocy Nku’s dream. He beckons to Kocy Nku and leads him to the dining table where there is a serving of pounded-yam and “egusi” soup in small calabashes.
“Eat”, he says to Kocy Nku with a smile but his eye holds a wicked glint.
Kocy Nku takes the first lump and it is the most delicious food he has ever tasted. He begins to wolf down the food quickly and with obvious relish.
The man laughs and then, he takes out his hand and snatches a piece of paper and a red pen from the air and begins to write down on it. He shows what he has written to Kocy Nku who is feeling uneasy and when Kocy Nku reads, he shivers and his fear is palpable.
There, on that piece of paper, boldly written is;
REVENGE LIST
- kocy Nku.
“I give you two days to turn yourself over to the police”, the red tunic man says in a deep wicked voice. “Don’t forget, you are on my revenge list!”
With that, the man gets up and moves towards the wall where a door appears and burst open in front of him, revealing thick hot flames within it.
And, Dada Balogun, the handsome medicine man steps through the door and into the roaring flames, the door shuts behind him and then, ”pooff”, he was gone.
Just like that!
Kocy Nku comes awake with a start. He is sweating badly and he glances furtively about and sees that it is morning and the sun is streaming in through the windows. He makes to get out of bed when he notices the palm oil stain smeared all over his hands and bed covers. Frantically, Kocy Nku jumps out of bed and his reflection on the mirror fitted into the wall shows that his mouth is smeared with the mixture and it, indeed is the “egusi” soup he has eaten in his dream.
Dazed with fear, Kocy Nku runs blindly out of the bedroom but comes to a sudden stop as he reaches the dining room and sees that on the table are the calabashes he had eaten from in his dream.
It dawns on Kocy Nku then, the magnitude of the problem facing him.
Kocy Nku is breathing hard as he tries to keep calm but just then, the huge flat-screen TV in the sitting room turns on without being connected to a power source and on the screen is Dada Balogun. He is looking at Kocy Nku with contempt and then he begins to speak in a wicked voice.
“Kocy Nku, I am Dada Balogun. We met in your dreams last night and I want to remind you that you have less than 48 hours to surrender yourself to the police for the murder of my daughter, Omolara Dada. She was my angel and you took her away from me. I am not a wicked man, Kocy Nku. I should have killed you immediately but I am giving you a chance for redemption, do not abuse your chance to make amends. The consequences would be grave. Two days, kocy Nku, two days!!”
The TV goes off and everywhere becomes normal.
Kocy Nku runs wildly out of the house as the words “Two Days” continues to echo in his head. He is not watching as he jumps over a cliff to his death.
Kocy Nku, the invisible man, meets his end.
Emmanuel is a student of civil engineering at CRUTECH, Calabar, Cross River State. He loves writing fiction and currently has some books he’s working on and wishes to publish this year. He’s hearing impaired but jovial. He wrote in via enakuemmanuel@gmail.com
