Chapter 3
754 Words
We'd just finished having dinner when the lights came on. There had been a power outage in our area and we didn't have any electricity for the past two days. Nobody knew what caused the blackout, but we sure were very happy that the lights were back on.
In the spirit of that happiness, my little brother rushed to turn on the television. I immediately searched for and found the remote control. For me and my brother, the remote control was an object of absolute power, for with it the holder could decide what would or would not be watched. As soon as he saw me seize the remote, he resigned to fate and sat back to watch. I started flipping channels to see if there were any good action movies being shown. I was still searching when my mom and dad walked into the living room.
"What are these kids doing? Turn on the news please, lets see what is happening in Nigeria"
That was my dad. Like I said, the remote granted absolute power, but all that power was nothing in the presence of my dad. I quickly switched over to NTA news, and relinquished control of the remote. From the corner of my eye I could see my little brother sulking and fuming as he stormed out. I didn't like watching the news either, but I could do nothing to distract myself as I'd lost my phone a few days back.
Soon, a news report came on that caught my attention. A series of terrorist attacks had been carried out earlier that day on a few small villages in a remote part of the country. The attacks had claimed hundreds of lives and the villages were almost completely wiped out as the armed bandits had killed and looted indiscriminately for hours, burning and laying waste to everything in sight. It was indeed horrible. We were still watching in shock when the news reporter mentioned that the terrorist group had a released a video that same day claiming responsibility for the killings and vowing to do even worse if their outrageous demands weren't met.
I couldn't bear it anymore. Something similar had happened a week ago; another act of wanton killing and destruction had been perpetrated by the same group. They had decimated the security forces deployed to the area to help stop them. Something had to be done, I thought to myself.
Filled with indignation, I stormed outside and took to the air, vowing to find and wipe out the heartless monsters. The sheer disregard for human life vexed me to no end and the imagined cries of the innocent villagers resounded in my head as I hit top speed. In a few minutes, I was 2000 kilometers away, flying over the location of the attacked villages. As a result of my enhanced vision, the evening darkness could shield nothing from me and I was filled with further indignation at the sight of the destruction.
I swooped down and landed near some of the remaining houses; smoke was still rising from most of them. A few of the surviving villagers sat mourning their dead and others were moving around trying to piece together the shattered remains of their lives.
One of the villagers, a young boy, noticed me and almost panicked but I also beckoned him to keep calm and point me to the direction to which the terrorists had left. He pointed east towards the forests surrounding the area. I thanked him and zoomed off. It would have taken hours for a search party to accomplish that, but after a few minutes of speed searching, I picked up some chatter with my super hearing and immediately sped toward the voices. I quickly activated my invisibility powers as I came nearer, hovering a few feet above the ground and moving silently so as not to be detected.
As I drew closer, the voices got louder. Soon I came to a clearing, a narrow pathway in the bushes. Following it led me to an even larger clearing lit up with lamps and torchlight. I'd hit the jackpot: it was the terrorist camp! They had probably stopped to settle for the night, and most of them were casually conversing and laughing, completely oblivious to my presence. Such impunity! Hours ago, these monsters had laid waste to entire villages, and here they were, laughing and talking like nothing happened. "Well I'm going to teach them a lesson", I thought to myself.
(To be continued)
- Writer
