Nnedi Okorafor - Lagoon

“I don’t believe you,” Father Oke said.

“Where the hell would I get a monkey at this time of night?” Adaora snapped, but she knew his response before he spoke it.

“You’re a witch. I’m sure you have your ways.”

Several of his followers muttered agreement.

“Father Oke, or whatever your name is,” Anthony said. He stepped forward, placing himself between Ayodele and the two men. “Remove yourself and your people from Adaora’s property. There is nothing for you here.”

Father Oke flashed a menacing look at Anthony, then turned to his followers. He lifted his injured left arm, wincing theatrically. “Please say it with me, ‘This is my bible…’” He pulled a bible from his pocket and held it up with his right hand.

“This is my bible,” his followers repeated, their faces earnest.

“It is the Word of God,” he shouted.

“It is the Word of God!”

“Yes! Good, my sheep, good! I believe I am who I am. I believe I can do what it says I can do. Do you believe in me?”

“We do!”

“Yes, o!”

“Speak the truth!”

Father Oke, buoyed by the trust of his flock, did an excited hop, grinned and shouted, “Amen!” But when he turned back to Anthony, his grin was gone and his face was angry. He snapped his fingers and flung his right arm toward Adaora and Ayodele. ‘‘Grab am , grab am !” he yelled. The two burly men stepped forward.

“Adaora, get inside!” Anthony growled.

The moment the two men lunged at Adaora and Ayodele, Anthony let it loose. For the first time since he was ten years old, he unleashed the raw power of what he called the rhythm. It was a vibration that swelled up inside him and allowed him to touch all things. It rolled warmly over Father Oke, the two men, his followers and everyone on the streets. It put out the Molotov cocktail-ignited fire that had been eating Adaora and Chris’s home, and the one across the street that had ravaged most of the house. Weaver birds that had taken refuge in a nearby tree fell to the ground. Car alarms went off. The few unbroken windows around the block shattered.

And as the sonic wave rolled, Anthony stood still, eyes closed, and received information about all the things that the wave touched. His ability had grown stronger since he was a kid. Back then, when he’d handled his bitter relatives, he’d blown himself backwards into the house, hit the wall and been unconscious for ten minutes. Now he stumbled back only a single step. It was the rhythm. Ayodele’s people knew it well, too. They’d used it twice to read the city of Lagos.

Anthony took a deep breath and opened his eyes. There was smashed glass all around him. More glass fell from a broken window, tinkling as it broke against the sidewalk. Then everything was silent. And there were bodies on the lawn. Bodies . But he knew they were not dead, just unconscious. And yet he felt the same rush of power and stunned terror that he had felt when he was ten. He’d done this. He had controlled the vibration, the energy. He controlled it during his concerts to the point where the women felt ecstasy and the men felt exhilarated. Now he controlled it here, to read everything, to stop everything. To make order from chaos.

He knew so much. “Ayodele,” he said. “We’re not all bad, chale .”

Ayodele stood in the doorway, staring at him. She’d returned to her human form, except now she’d made herself taller, taller than him. She was at least seven feet. She was wearing a long, thick white dress.

“We will see,” she said.

“There’s more to this city than you imagined,” he said. He’d seen all that was happening in a three-mile radius.

He stepped inside and shut the door behind them, leaving Oke and his followers unconscious around the foot of the plantain tree. “We should get the car ready,” he said. “Agu is almost here.”

“Who I be?” Jacobs whispered as they slowly drove down the near-empty street. He could barely hear himself think. Moziz and Tolu were arguing in the front seat about which way to go. They’d dropped Troy on the side of the road minutes before, where his machete-wielding cousins waited for him. Jacobs wondered how they planned to find the soldier who’d assaulted their cousin.

“Dis night na him be de night wey I go bombard am,” was the last thing Troy had said, before joining his relatives. As they drove away, Jacobs saw Troy snatch a machete and thrust it into the air. Those around him shouted and did the same. Two women walking toward them immediately turned and hurried the other way.

Jacobs leaned his forehead against the cool car window, trying to tune out Moziz and Tolu. He didn’t care which way they went. They passed a group of market women carrying obviously looted goods on their heads. Chairs, bundles of textiles, baskets of tomatoes, desktop computer towers, all of the women were laughing and singing as they passed a burning office building. A slack-jawed Philomena sat beside Jacobs, watching the women. At least she’d stopped crying.

As they navigated the side road, Jacobs focused on the trees. If he shut his eyes, he’d only see Rome, Seven and the other members of the Black Nexus getting beaten to the ground. He’d left them so that he could go capture some sort of being from space for the sake of making money. Was this what he’d come to? He was no better than Moziz or Father Oke.

“Mek we comot for Lag!” Tolu was bellowing. He had tears in his eyes. They’d been shouting back and forth for the last five minutes. “Na de last place wey anybody go wan dey if true true alien wan take over, sha. Remember, dem no human person!”

“Tolu close ya mouth. Mek I concentrate, drive,” Moziz said, as he swerved dangerously close to the side of the road. “When we reach my place, we go decide.”

“I don tell you now, mek we act fast,” Tolu said. “If we no do am now, we fit no do am again, o.”

“Look ya front!” Philomena screamed.

Moziz’ eyes grew wide as he tried to stop the car from hitting the girl in the road. Jacobs pushed at the seat in front of him as they screeched to a stop, his seat belt biting into his chest and neck. There was a sickening thump and he looked up just in time to see the woman’s body thrown onto the hood. Then she slid to the ground.

For a moment they were silent. Moziz just sat there, staring blankly at the woman lying in the street like a discarded doll. The headlights glinted off her skin. She didn’t move. Philo numbly got out of the car. Tolu reached under Moziz’ wrist and turned off the engine.

“Oh, men!” Jacobs screamed, throwing himself out. He shoved Philo aside and ran to the woman. The road was empty and it was pitch dark, except for the headlights. In the silence, Jacobs could hear crickets singing. The woman was tall and maybe in her thirties. She wore dark blue pants and a matching top with silver and red embroidery . Stylish, expensive and unique , he thought to himself. One of her black high-heeled shoes had flown off. Her nose was caved in, as was her forehead. She wasn’t bleeding, but Jacobs could see the white of bone and something squishy coming out of her forehead.

“Oh God! She don peme ,” Philo said, standing beside Jacobs, as if he didn’t have eyes.

From far off, something grumbled like an enormous empty stomach and he looked around. “Wetin be dat?” he whispered.

“I no know,” she whispered back, moving closer to him.

When they heard it again, this time louder, Moziz started the car.

Philo looked up at Moziz through the windshield. “Wetin you dey do? We no fit just leave am! De woman—”