by Dave Eggers
—Don’t worry, she said.—The SPLA will be here soon. Circle, circle, triangle within.
—With guns?
—Yes. They have guns just like the horsemen. Circle, circle, triangle within.
—Are there as many of us as there are Baggara?
—There are just as many of our soldiers. Or more. I laughed and sat up.
—We’ll kill them! We’ll kill all of them! If the Dinka have guns we’ll kill all the Baggara like they’re animals!
I wanted to see it happen. I wanted it more than anything.
—It won’t be a battle! I laughed.—It’ll end in seconds.
—Yes, Achak. Now sleep. Close your eyes.
I wanted to see the rebels shoot the men who had killed Joseph Kol, William K’s brother who had done nothing. I closed my eyes and pictured the Arabs falling from their horses in explosions of blood. If I was near, I would stand over them, beating them with rocks. In my vision there were so many of them, at least one hundred, the Arabs on horseback, and they were all dead. They were shot by the rebels and now William K and I were crushing their faces with our feet. It was glorious.
In the morning I found Moses. He was living with his mother and an uncle in his uncle’s half-burned hut. Moses was unsure where his father had gone. He expected them to return any minute, though his uncle did not seem to know his whereabouts. Moses thought that his father was a soldier now.
—For which army? The government or the rebels? I asked.
Moses wasn’t sure.
Moses and I wandered through the cool darkness of the schoolhouse. It was empty, the walls punctured by bullet holes. We put our fingers in one, two, three—so many that we gave up counting. Moses fit his fingers, bigger than mine, into five holes at once. The schoolhouse was abandoned. Nothing was happening anywhere in Marial Bai. The market now was a few shops only; for substantial goods, one had to travel to Aweil. That trip could be undertaken by older women only. Any man traveling north to Aweil would be detained, jailed, eliminated.
Most of the men of Marial Bai were gone. The men who remained were very old or very young. Everyone between fourteen and forty was gone.
We watched two ostriches run after each other, pecking and clawing. Moses threw a rock toward them and they stopped, shifting their attention to us. The ostriches were known to the village and were considered tame, but we had been told that they could kill any boy quickly, could disembowel someone our size in seconds. We ducked behind a half-burned tree, its trunk scorched black.
—Ugly birds, Moses said, and then was reminded of something.—Did you hear Joseph was shot?
I told him that I had heard.
—It went through him here, Moses said, and then, as William K had done, he pushed his finger deep into the hollow of my throat.
CHAPTER 9
Do you want to know when I left that place forever, Michael?
The day was bright, the ceiling of the sky raised high. My father was gone, in Wau for business. This was only one week after we had returned to Marial Bai. Again I was feeding the fire when my mother looked up. She was boiling water and again I had brought kindling. I saw her eyes looking over my shoulder.
Tell me, where is your mother, Michael? Have you ever seen her terrified? No child should see this. It is the end of childhood, when you see your mother’s face slacken, her eyes dead. When she is defeated by simply seeing the threat approaching. When she does not believe she can save you.
—Oh my lord, she said. Her shoulders collapsed. She splashed hot water on my hand. I squealed for a moment but then I heard the rumbling.
—What is it? I asked.
—Come! she whispered. Her eyes darted around the compound.—Where are your sisters?
I had not seen what my mother had seen. But there was the sound. A vibration from under our feet. I looked for my sisters, but I knew they were by the river. My brothers were grazing the cattle. Wherever they were, they were either safe from the rumbling or had already been overtaken by it.
—Come! she said again, and pulled me with her. We ran. I held her hand, but I was falling behind. She slowed her running and pulled me up by my arm. She ran, jostling me, finally arranging me over her shoulder. I held my breath and hoped she would stop. It was then, over her shoulder, that I saw what she had seen.
It was like a shadow made by a low cloud. The shadow moved quickly over the land. The rumbling was horses. I saw them now, men on horses, bringing the land into darkness. We slowed and my mother spoke.
—Where are you hiding? she breathed.
—Come to the woods, said a woman’s voice. I was placed on the ground.
—Hide in the grass, the woman told us.—From there we can run to Palang.
We crouched in the grass with the woman, ancient and smelling of meat. I realized we were near my aunt’s home, on the way to the river. We were well hidden, in the shade and amid a dense thicket. From our hiding place, we watched the storm overtake the town. All was dust. Some horses carried two men. They rode camels, dragged wheeled carts behind them. I heard the crack of gunfire behind us. Horses burst through the grass to the right and left. They were coming from all sides, converging in the center of the town. This is how the murahaleen took a town, Michael. They encircled it and then squeezed all within.
—There were only twenty last time, the woman said. There were easily two hundred, three hundred, or more now.
—This is the end, my mother said.—They mean to kill us all. Achak I am so sorry. But we will not make it through this day.
—No, no, the woman scolded.—They want the cattle. The cattle and the food. Then they’re gone. We’ll stay here.
At that moment, the shooting began. The guns were like those the government army carried, huge and black. The sky broke open with gunfire. The pop-pop-pop came from every corner of the village.
—Oh lord. Oh lord.
Now the woman was crying.
—Shh! my mother said, grabbing for the woman’s hand and finally finding it. Now quieter, she soothed the woman.—Shhhhh.
A horse carrying two men galloped past. The second man was riding backward, his gun aiming left and right.—Allah Akhbar! he roared.
A dozen voices answered him.—Allah Akhbar!
A man lit a torch and tossed it onto the roof of the hospital. Another man, riding on the back of a great black horse, prepared some kind of small round weapon and threw it into the Episcopalian church. An explosion splintered the walls and eliminated the roof.
When I thought to look for her, I saw the horsemen circling Amath’s hut. Four horses carrying six men. They guarded the hut from every side and then threw a torch. The roof smoldered first and then blackened. Fire finally overtook it and leapt upwards first, then crept down. Brown smoke billowed. A figure emerged, a young man, his hands surrendering. Guns popped from the perimeter and the man’s chest burst red. He fell, and no one else left the hut. The screams began soon after.
—Achak.
My mother was behind me. Her mouth was very close to my ear.
—Achak. Turn to me.
I looked into her eyes. It was so hard, Michael. She had no hope. She believed we would die that day. Her eyes had no light.
—I won’t be able to carry you fast enough. Do you understand? I nodded.
—So you’ll have to run. Yes? I know you’re fast.
I nodded. I believed that we could survive. That I could.
—But if you run with your mother, you’ll be seen. Do you agree? Your mother is very tall and the horsemen will see her, yes?
—Yes.
—We’re going to run to your aunt’s house but I might ask you to run alone, okay? You might be better running alone.
I agreed and we ran from the grass further, toward the river, toward my aunt’s compound, far from the town center and far from the cattle camp and anything else the horsemen could want. I ran behind my mother, watching her bare feet slap the ground. I had never seen my mother run this way and I worried. She
was a slow runner, and she was too tall when she ran. She would be seen with her yellow dress and her tall slow running and I wanted to hide her quickly.
A burst of hooves and we were met by a single man, gun held high, who looked down at us and held his horse.
—Stand still, Dinka! he barked in Arabic.
My mother stood rigid. I hid behind her legs. The man’s gun was still held high, pointing upward. I decided to run if he lowered his gun. The horseman yelled in the direction he had come, pointing to me and my mother. Another horseman galloped toward us, slowing and beginning to dismount. But then something saved us. His foot was entangled, and in his struggle to free it his gun blasted into the front leg of his horse. A howl from the animal as it twisted and pitched forward. The man was thrown over like a doll, still caught in the tangle of reins and the strap of his rifle. The first horseman slid down from his mount to help him and in the moment his back was turned my mother and I were gone.
Soon we reached my aunt Marayin’s house. It was quiet. The sounds of the attack were distant, muffled. Marayin was not there.
We ran up the ladder to her grain hut and sat in the kernels, burying each other, pushing the mass onto ourselves, sinking lower. My mother’s eyes darted back and forth.—I don’t know if this is best for us, Achak.
A scream punched through the silence. It was unmistakably Marayin’s.
—Oh lord. Oh lord, my mother whispered.
She buried her head in her hands. Soon she gathered herself.
—Okay. Stay here. I have to see what’s happening to her. I won’t go far. Okay? If I can’t see anything I’ll come right back. You stay. Be completely silent, okay? I nodded.
—Will you promise to barely breathe? I nodded, holding my breath already.
—Good boy, she said. She held my face in her hand and then slipped backward through the door. I heard her feet on the ladder and felt the hut shake with her descent. Then quiet. A shot burst, close now. Another scream from Marayin. Then silence. As I waited, I dug myself into the grain until I was buried up to my shoulders. I listened and kept ready.
Footsteps scratched through the compound. Someone was very close. But so quiet, so careful. A hope grew within me: it was my mother. I quietly pushed myself from the grain and shifted toward the entrance, to be ready when she reached for me. I peered through the entrance and could see a few inches outside. I saw no movement but still heard the footsteps. Then a smell. It was something like the smell of the barracks, complicated and sweet. I eased my way back into the grain, and Michael, I do not understand why I was so quiet. Why I made no discernible sound. Why that man did not hear me. It was God who decided that the movements of Achak Deng would not produce a sound at that moment.
When the man was gone, Michael, I ran to the church. I had been taught that the church would always be safe. The church’s walls were sturdy and so I ran to them. Once inside, I found it to be a safe place, at least for the time being. I hid beneath a hole in the thatched wall, in the cool shadows, and under a broken table, and waited there for hours. I could see the village through a mouse-sized hole and I watched when I could bear it.
In the village, the besieged were learning. Those who ran were shot. Those women and children who stood still were herded onto the soccer field. A grown man made the mistake of joining this herd, and was shot. The besieged learned again: grown men should run, or fight and be killed. The horsemen had no use for the grown men. They wanted the women, the boys, the girls, and these they gathered on the soccer field, penned between two dozen horsemen. Elsewhere, there was a certain order to what the horsemen were doing. There were those who seemed to be charged with burning every dwelling, while others seemed to be riding with abandon, shooting and barking their Arabic and satisfying any urge or inspiration.
The grown man who had tried to join the group of women and children in the soccer field was now dead. He was tied by the feet and then was dragged behind a pair of horses. Many of the Baggara were amused by this and I now could imagine what had been done to Joseph.
A man with a different kind of rifle, leaner, narrow with a longer barrel, jumped from his horse and dropped to one knee. He aimed his rifle at a faraway target and fired. He was satisfied with the result and repositioned himself and fired again. This time it required four shots before he smiled.
A horseman, taller than the others and wearing a white tunic, was carrying a sword as long as I was tall. I watched him run down a woman running for the forest and raise his sword high. I looked away. I buried my head in the earth and counted to ten and when I looked again I saw only her dress, a pale blue, splayed in the dirt.
On the soccer field, a group of horsemen had gathered. Ten men had dismounted and were tying up a group of girls. The moment I thought to look for Amath I saw her. She was standing, her face placid, her hands tied behind her back, her legs tied loosely together. Twenty feet away from her, a young woman was screaming at the militiamen, a curse in Arabic that I knew. She was wearing a bright dress, red-and-white patterned. I had never heard a woman tell a man that he had had sexual relations with a goat, but this is what this woman said loudly to the raiders. And so without any particular relish, one of these men drew his sword and ran it through her. She fell, and the white parts of her dress became red.
One by one the rest of the girls were lifted by pairs of men and fastened onto their horses. They threw each girl onto a saddle and then used rope to secure them, as they would a rug or a bundle of kindling. I watched as they took the twins I knew, Ahok and Awach Ugieth, and tied them to different horses. The girls wailed and reached for each other and when the horses moved, for a moment Ahok and Awach found themselves close enough to hold hands and they did so.
After an hour, the action dissipated. Those Dinka who would fight had fought and were now dead. The rest were being tied together to be taken north. The raid was near its conclusion and was, for the murahaleen, a success. Not one among their ranks had been injured. I looked for Moses and William K but did not see either. I could see Moses’s hut, and what looked like a person lying in the entrance.
But then there was a shot from a tree and a horseman, with darker skin than most of the murahaleen, fell forward on his mount, and slid slowly off, his head landing hard on the dirt, his foot still caught in the stirrup. Quickly ten horsemen surrounded the tree. A flurry of words in Arabic, spitting with fury. They aimed their guns and fired, two dozen shots in seconds and a figure fell from the tree, landing heavily on his shoulder, dead. He wore the orange uniform of Manyok Bol’s militia. I looked closer. It was Manyok Bol. He was the only rebel this day, Michael. Later I would learn than he was cut into six parts and thrown down my father’s well.
—Get up!
I heard a voice I knew. I turned to see a boy standing over the body near his uncle’s hut—it was a woman lying on the ground, her hands in fists at her sides.
—Get up!
It was Moses. He was standing over the woman, who was his mother. His mother had been burned in her hut. She had escaped but she was not moving and Moses was angry. He nudged her with his foot. He was not in his right mind. I could see from a distance that she was dead.
—Up! he yelled.
I wanted to run to Moses, to hide him in the church with me, but I was too afraid to leave my hiding spot. There were too many horsemen now and if I ventured out we both would surely be caught. But he was simply standing there, asking to be found, and I knew he had lost track of the dangers around him. I needed to run to him and decided that I would, and would suffer the consequences; we would run together. But at that moment, I saw him turn, and saw what he saw: a horseman coming toward him. A man sat high on the back of a wild black animal, and he was riding toward Moses, who looked no bigger than a toddler in the shadow of the horse. Moses ran, and made a quick turn around the ashes of his home, and the horseman turned, now with a sword raised high over his head. Moses ran and found himself along a fence, without outlet. The horseman bore down and I turned away. I
sat down and tried to dig myself into the earth under the church. Moses was gone.
As the darkness approached, many of the raiders left town, some carrying their abductees, others whatever they had scavenged from the homes and from the market. But still hundreds were in the village, eating and resting as the last of the homes smoldered. There were none of my people visible; all had run or were dead.
When night approached I planned my escape. It had to be dark enough to pass under cover of night, and loud enough to hide any sounds I might make. As the animals overtook the forest I knew I would not be heard. I saw the Marial Bai Community Center fifty yards away and needed only to make it that far. When I did, I threw myself onto the ground, in the shadow of the roof, now unhinged. I waited, holding my breath, until I was satisfied no one had seen or heard me. Then I was gone, into the forest.
That was the last time I saw that town, Michael. I leapt into the woods and I ran for an hour and finally found a hollow log and slid into it, backward, legs first. There I lay for some hours, listening, hearing the night overtaken by animals, the distant fires, the occasional pops of automatic gunfire. I had no plan. I could continue running, but I had no ideas about where I was or where I would go. I had never gone farther than the river without my father, and now I was alone and far from any path. I might have continued but I could not decide on even a direction. It seemed possible that I would choose a path and find it taking me directly to the murahaleen. But it was not only them I feared now. The forest was not man’s now; it was the lion’s, the hyena’s.
A loud crackle in the grass sprung me from my log and I ran. But I was too loud. When I ran through the grass I seemed to be begging the world to notice me, to devour me. I tried to make my feet lighter but I could not see where I was placing them. It was black everywhere, there was no moon that night, and I had to run with my hands rigid in front of me.