Ah, Phoenix, mentioning these musicians and writers seems to have gotten your attention. Of course you read them. What haven’t you read? You glow more strongly now, and you have added a hint of blue to your orange, red and yellow light. Yes, you would have liked my father and he would have liked you, my mother, too.
You know what he told my mother when he first met her? “I never had to DE-colonize. I’ve never been colonized.” You were the opposite of him when you were in Tower 7. How you have changed.
My father instantly liked my mother, and my mother liked him. And soon they were both angry militant young people intent on taking back the “motherland.” My father went on to become an engineer and a local politician. But though he put faith in science, he put his greatest faith in what he called the Old Ways. These included things he’d learned from his own father, the masquerade secret society he belonged to and the Old Ways of other ethnic groups like the Yorubas, Efiks, Ogonis. He took what he could use. And he knew it all very well.
I had two older brothers and one older sister. Whenever we travelled anywhere during election season, my father would take us behind the house to the shrine he kept there. He’d cover us with a special shea butter he mixed himself.
Phoenix, what is this lightning that you just tried to kill me with? You zapped me with a thread of electricity when I mentioned shea butter. My hands are shaking and the air smells a bit acrid, but I am still here. I will make sure that your Saeed brings you some when you return. Would you like me to keep telling you my story? Ok.
My father said his special shea butter would stop bullets. He’d learned how to make it from a close friend of his who was Yoruba. This friend had covered himself with the shea butter and then made my father shoot him. My father said that after he shot him there was nothing but powder on his friend’s chest and that the bullet had fallen to the ground, hot and spent. We all believed my father.
And we were right to, because one night during the time when my father was running for Imo State Governor, we were driving to one of his speaking events. My mother was already at the place where my father would speak, waiting for us. We were in my father’s black Jaguar and my siblings and I were in the back. My father was in the front seat. I remember this well. The driver, whose name was Endurance, was driving.
I was laughing at my sister, who sang along to the song Endurance played in the car radio when she suddenly stopped singing and gasped, looking past me out the window. After that, I only remember screaming, noise, and the sound of the tires screeching as Endurance mashed the brakes and swerved off the road. Some people had opened fire on our car. Several of the windows were open when they began to shoot. There were holes in the car doors, the windows that were closed were shattered, but not one of us was hit.
We’d all been covered with the shea butter, even our driver Endurance. Earlier, my sister had complained about how shiny it made her skin and how she could never apply the proper make-up. But she knew to put it on anyway.
My father won that election, easy.
By the time I made it to university, I had learned everything my father knew. I was his favorite because I was the one who took a vested interest in the two things my father loved— juju and politics. I learned how to make the shea butter that stopped bullets; my father initiated me into his masquerade secret society; I knew how to make a man hurt, forget his name, and stop chasing women; and I could speak to the goddess Ani, that’s the goddess of the land.
You are an American, Phoenix. So though you know Africa well, you will believe in the power of science over all that we know. But you are an African, too, so you know it in your flesh, your strange flesh, that the spirit world rules the physical world. Where is it that you are returning from as I tell you my story? Is it from a test tube? Or from somewhere else? They made you, yes. But something made them make you, Phoenix.
Anyway, by the time I went to university there was something else that I had learned to do. My father taught me about the mystical, but I came by this knowledge on my own. I was not at the top of my class, but I was one of the smarter students. I loved and understood the spiritual, yes, but I also loved the sciences. I loved nature’s structure, rules, logic, its playfulness and the sheer scope of its creativity. Science has always been aligned with Ani. It was clear that my path of study would be engineering.
One night, I was pondering the laws of physics and the will of Ani as I stared at my bedroom door. I’d been lying on my bed for an hour, thinking and thinking. Maybe at some point I’d fallen into a trance or meditative state. Something came together in my mind as I stared at the door and considered the flesh of it, the tree it had once been a part of, its power, its weakness, its dead cells, molecules, and atoms. The space between them. The spirit of the tree that clung to this piece of tree flesh.
I got up, walked up to the door, and I walked right through it. I emerged outside of my bedroom, and there stood my father staring at me, shocked. He’d been on his way to the kitchen. He smiled and I smiled too. After that, I did it over and over again, walking through wooden doors. Now you see how it started for me.
In university, I became like a miniature version of my father. I didn’t do it on purpose; it was just a natural progression of things. I was my father’s son. Like him, I was drawn to mysticism. As he did, I believed that Nigeria could be better if it just changed. I loved Fela, as he did. I wanted to walk around half-naked like a real African and spit in the face of the West. I joined the student government, and by the end of my second year was its president. By the end of my third year, I was one of the top engineering students but I was most known for being a part of WaZoBia.
“WaZoBia” means “come, come, come” in the three most widely spoken Nigerian languages. Yoruba, Hausa, and Ibo. Wa in Yoruba means “come,” Zo in Hausa means “come,” and Bia in Igbo means “come.” The word “come” is an invitation of togetherness, and represents unity and diversity in community. Phoenix, WaZoBia was a radical student group bent on challenging the ever-present and meddling oil companies and corrupt military Nigerian government. No campus cults for me. I wanted to join a group that was about more than wahala, petty trouble. I really did want to change Nigeria.
At some point, WaZoBia decided to overthrow the government. Maybe it was after the fuel riots. How can you be one of the world’s last leading producers of crude oil, and yet still have a shortage of kerosene and vehicle fuel? In Nigeria, we use solar generators but solar powered cars are rare, and it’s next to impossible to find a place to recharge an electric car, especially outside of Lagos and Abuja. Hybrid vehicles are still quite popular, some even still use fuel-powered cars. So fuel is still in demand there.
But no, no, I remember now, it wasn’t the riots that convinced us that it was time to overthrow the government. It was the introduction of the Anansi Droids 419. The Anansi Droids were, how do I explain them? They were digital android killer soldiers! They were the size of dogs and looked like shiny silver spiders. They were robot spiders. The Nigerian government’s engineers created the prototype. Can you imagine? We came up with these things ourselves FOR ourselves. We’re so colonized that we build our own shackles. Some young engineer by the name of Obinna Ukamaka came up with the idea after reading a science fiction story about robot spiders guarding the pipelines of the Niger Delta. Life imitated art, except this particular story was actually critiquing the government not giving them a blueprint. The author must be rolling in her grave.
Chevron, Shell and a few other oil companies helped fund the project. The purpose of these machines was to prevent pipeline bunkering by guarding them . . . by any means necessary. Though the machines were supposedly artificially intelligent, they killed senselessly. If you so much as touched a pipeline, they came running and tore you apart. These pipelines ran right through the backyards of villages. They ran alongside roads, past schools. Within the first month, hundreds of people were killed.
None of us in WaZoBia could live under a government that would sell out its people so thoroughly, so brutally. We were strongly united in this understanding. We’d grown up with technology. And everyone knows that after the prototype is put to use successfully, they upgrade and then they upgrade that next generation and so on. The Anansi Droids were a slippery slope, especially with Nigeria possessing a still sought after resource.
The daughter of Nigeria’s Vice President was a member of WaZoBia. Three of us could build bombs. Four of us had fathers high up in the military, five of us had been area boys before entering the university and had only recently shrugged off bad habits, one of us was a mistress of the Nigerian president himself, and one of us could walk through wooden doors.
Our plan was perfect. We had guns. We could get in. And none of us was afraid to kill or die. We were idealists. We’d all seen our parents, families, ourselves, suffer. And we knew we were capable. But there must have been an informer. That is the only way to explain what happened the night before we were to put our plan into action.
We’d gathered at Rose de Red’s house. She was the leader. She could shoot a gun like her soldier father, and she could shout like her Minister of Communications mother. She had a small apartment in the capital of Abuja close to Aso Villa, the office and residence of the president. We’d all travelled there, some by air, others by car or bus. None of our parents knew where we were. They all thought we were at the University of Lagos preparing for exams.
We sat in that room on the 4th floor with white walls and expensive leather furniture. Rose de Red came from an oil rich family. She knew so much. We were all accounted for. Everyone in WaZoBia. We were smiling, young, excited. Right outside the window you could see the Aso Villa. It was a warm night. Our weapons were ready. WaZoBia’s most charismatic member, Success T, was getting everyone excited before Rose de Red spoke by shouting, “Victoria, Victoria, Victoria acerta to the great of the great Nigerian students, both home and abroad . . .”
And that’s when the door banged open and masked men in black suits burst in with AK-47s. Without hesitation, they opened fire. I was sitting in a chair near the balcony window right in front of Success T. The lights stayed on so I saw it all.
Success T’s chest exploded. Rose de Red’s left eye popped as a bullet smashed through it. WaZoBia members tried to run, but there were too many men in black with guns. The room that moments ago had been immaculate and full of optimism now smelled tangy with gunpowder, blood, urine, and was full of death. The window behind me shattered. And through it all I just stood there. Right before the meeting, in my hotel room, I’d taken a shower and the soap dried my skin. It was itchy, and I realized that I’d forgotten to bring lotion. So I’d used some of my special shea butter. I’d brought it for the next day, when we planned to storm the capital.
But I don’t think I’d have been shot even if I hadn’t put the shea butter on. They didn’t want to kill me. How else can I explain the people who grabbed me, put a sack over my head, and dragged me out of there? How can I explain being cuffed, blindfolded and shoved onto a plane by men and women with badges on their chests of a hand grasping lightning? How else can I explain why they took me across the Atlantic Ocean to the United States without a passport and drove me straight to Tower 7? Was that an accident?
The Big Eye agreed to serve as the strong arm of the United States and Nigerian governments and the invested oil companies who wanted to prevent a coup d’état for their own various greedy reasons. And the Big Eye got to grab the engineering student they’d heard could walk through wood. They killed two birds with one stone.
Who are the Big Eye? Are they a secret part of the American government or a powerful private corporation? Is there a difference? To me, it doesn’t matter. It’s the same ends. So while they did what they did to me over the years in Tower 7, fusing and altering my body and forcing me to show them how to use my father’s juju, Nigeria remains under the latest crippling military rule as oil companies suck the last of its black blood.
I knew I could escape them once they succeeded in enhancing my ability to the point where I could walk through all matter. I only learned that they’d coated all the outer walls with their “just in case Mmuo escapes” substance when I ran face first into the wall and lost consciousness. The only way I escaped was because I came to in time to sink to the room below. I was trapped in Tower 7 until you got me out, Phoenix. I’ve never been able to properly thank you for this, dear.
Come back to us. We need you.
CHAPTER 11
Return
I came back.
Mind.
Wings.
And other flesh.
Under the blue sky. In the city.
This time it is different. I will be different. I am different. I was different. You must know that by now. You’ve watched me, heard me. I speak my life into existence with each expressed breath I take. I tell you a story within which are more stories. Universes within universes. We are all spinning like small suns. I am like my own sun.
I could feel my lips. “Praise Ani,” I breathed, for Mmuo’s story was on the tip of my mind when I finally found I could speak. Mmuo laughed loudly. I blinked as I looked at him. It was the first time I’d ever seen him wearing clothes. He wore white pants, leather sandals, and a beaded necklace. This was a lot for a man who never wore clothes at all. He looked different.
“What is Ani?” Saeed asked, frowning, as he grasped my hand. He must have wondered if I’d lost my mind.
“She’s the goddess of the land,” Mmuo said. “I spoke of her to Phoenix while she was recovering. I guess Phoenix heard me.” He looked at me knowingly. “Good.”
“She’s the sister of the Author of All Things,” I said to Saeed. Then I smiled. I was weak but I felt so good. The air was fresh and I inhaled it deeply.
Saeed helped me up. My muscles worked and my skin prickled, absorbing the sunshine. Mmuo averted his eyes from my nakedness. Saeed didn’t. His eyes swept from my body to my wings. “When they made you,” he whispered. “Something good was touching their minds.”
I smiled, basking in his gaze.
“When they made you, planets must have aligned,” he said. “When they made you, they made one of a kind.”
Saeed, always the artist. Maybe he’d draw me next. I looked up, through the trees, at the sun. I shut my eyes and was happy. Absolutely, completely happy.
Saeed gave me a small jar of yellow raw shea butter. “Thank you,” I whispered. I coated my skin with it, the nutty smell reminding me simultaneously of my happier days in Tower 7 and my happiest days in Wulugu, Ghana. The dress Saeed gave me was yellow and the back was open for my wings. It wasn’t heat resistant. It fit perfectly. Then he handed me the black burka. I looked at it, perturbed, as I stood tall in my dress. Then I looked back at the sun, and then back at it. Thick, black, rough. I put it on. I was the veiled hunchback, again. This time on a different continent. But I had plans. We had plans. The first was to get out of there before the Big Eye spotted us.
Mmuo reluctantly shrugged a t-shirt over his lean muscular chest. “We leave these walls and enter barbarism,” he said.
• • •
It was broad daylight and I could see the tall tall buildings clearly. We had to walk several blocks to get to Mmuo’s car and as we walked, I held Saeed’s hand and gazed up. The palm, iroko, and ebony trees that grew between the buildings reminded me of Ghana. In Ghana, men would climb the palm trees to tap palm wine. Here, they pruned the palm trees until only the top had the bushy leaves. I could never see this from the top of Tower 7, and when I was running I didn’t care. Now, I had to smile. The trees looked naked.
Beyond the trees loomed the tallest human-made structures I’d ever seen, aside from The Backbone. At first, I clung to Saeed and listened hard for the sound of walls crumbling and buckling. I’d seen Tower 7 and the Axis fall. It was more than ea
sy for me to imagine these ones doing the same. When I realized the appearance of the buildings falling was just an illusion created by the sheer height of them, I began to relax and enjoy their enormity.
The buildings flashed and chattered even in the daylight with commercials, TV shows, the latest news. One building was covered with a giant screen that only showed a little girl smiling and smiling. As we passed it, the girl puckered her lips. People around us exclaimed and started moving quicker. Some laughed, two women yelped and started running, covering their heads with their briefcases. I found out why moments later when a spray of mist burst from the mouth, dampening everyone. We were right in the middle of it all.
Mmuo loudly sucked his teeth. “These people dey craze,” he muttered. “Waste of solar power.”
The mist felt wonderful in the heat. It blew beneath my burka and dress, cooling my entire body. I giggled, delighted. It was all so silly. It was nice to see a lighter side of the city for once.
The sidewalks were packed with people coming and going, Asians, Africans, blended, Hispanics, Muslims, Hassidic Jews, Hindus, suited businessmen, a blind woman carrying a very loud navigation companion. Americans and visitors. All kinds of people who unknowingly accepted the existence of the towers. Who reaped the fruits of the tower’s callous labor. Few of them looked twice at me.
They talked on their portables. They drove in solar and hybrid vehicles. They sat in office buildings draped with eco-clean vines. I wondered how many of these people were “mild speciMen,” speciMen who turned out too normal to work with; these people were released and begrudgingly accepted and integrated into American society. And who in amongst these people was a “quiet clone”, always hiding his or her belly-button-less waist? Who had a cybernetic limb that had replaced one damaged by an accident or by a birth defect?
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