Rosewater

by Tade Thompson

  ‘It already did.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It opened for some minutes last night while you were in Maiduguri.’

  ‘How is that information not on the cloud or in the news? Nobody’s talking about —’

  ‘We blanketed it. There were some odd effects.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Some general said he got cured of prostate cancer by breathing the “fumes” from the pore.’

  ‘That’s bullshit.’

  ‘Maybe, or maybe the prostate cancer was misdiagnosed in the first place, but either way, Rosewater has legs. More people arrive each day. We’ve got some professor from Lagos tapping into the electricity from the ganglia. Builders are coming in. I need you as eyes and ears there. You are going to stay.’

  I am not listening to her. It opened. Did it open for me? Did it close because I was not there?

  When I return from Maiduguri I head straight for the dome. No sign that it ever opened. I try to walk around it but after an hour and three litres of bottled water, I concede that it has grown since I last tried to circumnavigate it, and I’ll need a vehicle. I don’t know why I’m looking — the surface is one overwhelming sameness. It is definitely wider in circumference and the margins show where it shifted the soil and shrubs have been uprooted. There is dust and movement everywhere. Every motorbike has a passenger. Military personnel and men in black are ubiquitous. Cyborg hawks criss-cross the air, though many of them litter the ground, dead, decaying, burnt. Whatever controls the biodome does not wish to be observed.

  I have been either too self-absorbed with grief or too tired from the fucking training, but I see that Femi is right about the Donut.

  I hire a motorbike and ride around the dome, hugging the driver’s midsection. This is a cross-country ride and we bound over clumps of grass and mounds of earth that the motorcycle was not designed to tackle. There are schools and eating joints and prayer meetings. These people are here to stay. When we arrive at the north ganglion there is a smell of burnt flesh on the wind. This is not unusual_— some poor fool gets drunk and staggers through the warning stanchions, electrocutes himself — but it is different. First of all a soldier type, a Hausa boy, tries to order me back. I show him my S45 ID, and he reluctantly backs away, although he won’t let my driver through. I pay the man to wait.

  I walk past the screens put up just a few yards from the dome. There are perfunctory biohazard symbols but nobody is wearing protective gear more complicated than a handkerchief across the lower half of the face. I have of course seen burning bodies before. Immolation is the punishment of choice used by vigilante mobs and political rivals nationwide. I have almost been burnt myself. What I have never seen is mass burning of dozens of people.

  I see where they have been killed. The streaks of blood, the drag marks on the ground, the pools of blood. Strangely there are no flies. I am by now inured to most suffering but what I see that shakes me out of complacency. In that bonfire of human firewood, there is movement.

  It’s odd that I did not notice this before. Most of the limbs are twitching, writhing. Are they … alive? Are those motherfuckers burning them alive? But … no screams. There is an eye detached from a head, but it stares at me. I see the pupils change size. An unblinking, detached eye focusing on me. It sees. It sees me.

  Perhaps I’ve been wound up too tight, or I have a death wish, but I start shouting at the nearest soldier. I do not remember what I say, but I remember the glint in his eyes and the curve of his lips.

  Then he hits me and I black out.

  I spend two days in a hole before Femi retrieves me.

  ‘Are you insane? These are death squad people,’ she says.

  ‘They were burning people alive, Femi.’

  ‘Not people, and not alive.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Remember that general with prostate cancer? The healing was real. Everybody who was here at that time was healed. We think that when the dome opened it released some xenoforms that healed people in the vicinity.’

  ‘That means the alien hasn’t quite given up on humanity.’

  ‘Yes,’ says Femi.

  ‘What’s that got to do with the burning people?’

  ‘The xenoforms worked too well. Most of the graves around the camp are shallow.’

  ‘They raised the dead?’

  ‘No, not like Lazarus. They are more like reanimated flesh. Healed, heart beating, eyes open, bodies warm, but no … life. No memories, no soul, no recognition of what they used to be. We had to kill them all over again, and death didn’t come easy.’

  ‘Do they contain the xenoforms?’

  ‘No. Our analysis shows the xenoforms just heal and leave. The scientists theorize that they returned to the biodome before closure.’

  Femi steps into a jeep, leaving me filthy in the crowded shanty town. She gives me cash, a Certificate of Non-impedance coded into my implant, a Smith and Wesson automatic, a supply of ketoconazole cream, and a good luck.

  There is a shack offering hair cuts and shaves. That’s where I start.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Lagos, Rosewater: 2066

  I look at Layi, this beautiful boy, and I can’t think of anything to say. I usually lie to get myself out of situations like this. In Rosewater there are a few people from the early days who know me of old. A lot of people have a vague idea that I am significant, but I keep a low profile and there are any number of big-breasted starlets to occupy the imagination of the public. Occasionally I’ll be at a football match or concert and someone will stare for a while. A few times I’ve been accosted, but never with Layi’s certainty.

  Aminat comes in. ‘Is he telling you his conspiracy theories?’

  She kisses me and Layi mimes vomiting. ‘Stop. I don’t want to see that.’ He turns to me. ‘You were at Rosewater from the start.’

  Fuck it. ‘You’re right, I was. That is me in the video clip.’

  Layi smiles. ‘I knew it as soon as I saw you.’

  ‘Really? You were a supplicant?’ asks Aminat.

  Supplicant is the name the rest of Nigeria gave the settlers of Rosewater. Since most of them were ill with AIDS and terminal cancers the name is not one of good connotation.

  ‘Well, no. I was there on business.’

  ‘What was it like?’ asks Layi. ‘I’ve read everything, all the memoirs, blog posts, letters, and declassified documents. I’ve listened to every broadcast about it. You are the first person I’ve met who has been there.’

  ‘What about me?’ asks Aminat.

  ‘From the start. I mean, from the start. So, Kaaro, what was it like?’

  ‘Pretty faeculent.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ asks Layi.

  ‘He means it was shitty,’ says Aminat.

  ‘Yes, I know what the word means, but I think he means it literally.’

  ‘I do. The predominant smell was of shit. At first it was animal stuff because there was a farm close by, but it quickly became worse. There was no sewage system. People used to just dig shallow holes, do their business and cover it up. Sometimes they would not bother digging holes. Then it was impossible to step anywhere because, you know, shit happens. Then the banks of the Yemaja became the place. There was a hanging shelf over which you could do it and the water would carry it downstream. For a while. A series of dysentery and diarrhoea outbreaks took its toll on the children of the camp. We got together, had a few town meetings. It’s awkward when the place is circular. You have to send town criers all around Utopicity, and that takes ages. We bribed the Army to bring an Engineers Corps digger and built some soak-away systems and salanga. That helped a bit, but it was still a long time before the Federal Government asked wolewole to inspect us. The fragrance of Rosewater was terrible. For a long time, in front of my tent, there was a dead horse. It got swollen, then maggots burst out of it, then it dried up and stopped smelling. And, of course, there were the bodies of the reanimates.’

  Amina
t squinted. ‘So when we say Rosewater …’

  ‘Exactly,’ I say. ‘We mean the opposite. Actually, the real name is “omi ododo” which is “Flower water”. It stank.’

  ‘Do you like it there?’ asks Layi.

  I pause, then I say, ‘It grows on you.’

  I wander the grounds for a time. I feel odd inside the house because of the chain, and because I cannot sense the xenosphere. Layi seems to think I am off to smoke and I do not disabuse him. The boy has an intense benevolence to him that I need a break from. There is a gravel path and I take it away from the back of the house, crunching stones underfoot, walking towards the east wall. I feel the connections come back gradually. I feel the gardener first, signal strong like an act of parliament. He is called Bernard Okoye. I see his dreams. He is a young man in his dreams and his mind’s eye. He loves someone called Cecilia. In the past he was not able to woo her. He started studies, but his father —

  ‘Hello, Gryphon.’

  The words knock me out of the afternoon in Lagos and I am in a field. A light shower cools me. The elephant grass is waist high. There are red-brown hills all around, and the field is sunk in the valley. No trees anywhere. I turn around and there is Molara.

  ‘Hi,’ I say.

  She is different again. She still has butterfly wings, blue with black margins and speckles. The wings flutter, but she no longer has an insect body. She is a woman now. She is stocky in build, a stout, muscular woman with a tight round belly and small, jutting breasts. Her face is angular, sharp chin, crisp cheekbones, flat nose, large eyes. She has a dark copse of pubic hair.

  The rain is no longer cooling. I am hot and wet. Her body glistens with seriousness and sensual intent. I think she will never fly with those wings - they will never carry her body weight. She turns away, gets on all fours and pushes her posterior in my direction. I get behind her.

  As we rut, the field around us fills with butterflies of different colours and sizes. I read somewhere that they do not fly in the rain and I cannot ever remember seeing one. My claws extend and dig into Molara’s flesh where I am holding on to her shoulders. I gouge my curved beak into her neck for more traction. Blood wells up, but is washed away in the rain. The blue, butterfly gossamer wings rip to shreds with the force of our copulation. I cannot help myself, I stretch and flap my own wings. Conjoined, we take to the air together, surrounded by butterflies.

  A tremor runs through her. She is frightened. There is lightning, but the thunder is lost in my climax. I lose my grip between the orgasm, her sweat, and the slick of rainwater. She falls, turning head over heels, shredded wings beating like it could make a difference.

  I return to Lagos, to Aminat’s family house. I can feel the wetness in my boxer shorts. Bernard stands a few feet away from me, staring, a strange expression on his face. I look down, but there is no wet spot on my trousers. Yet. I go inside.

  I find my way to the living room after cleaning myself up. I am ready to go home, and spending Saturday together does not seem as exciting as it did when Aminat and I awoke in the morning. Again, the muting of the xenosphere inside the house. Not something I wish to endure for long.

  Aminat is seated on the floor at Layi’s feet. She smears cream on the skin of his leg, around the ankle where it makes contact with the metal of the manacle. The skin on both legs is darker and rugose in that area. Layi grins when he sees me. Aminat can tell that I wish to leave and she mouths ‘five minutes.’

  ‘Will you return to see me, Kaaro?’ asks Layi. ‘I like you.’

  He says this with such openness and a lack of irony. ‘I will,’ I say, and I mean it.

  On the way back the sun is low, almost extinguished. The radio is on, playing oldies, currently Otis Redding with “Hard to Handle,” but also Marvin Gaye, the Seekers, the Temptations, and a host of other Afro-sporting Motown-like crooners, some great, some flashes in the pan. The DJ keeps interrupting with his idea of commentary, but his English is horrendous and we wonder who he bribed to get the job. We are singing along where we know the lyrics and making up the parts we don’t. We laugh at our own inventiveness at filling in the gaps and we start to create deliberate mondegreens. When we tire of this, we listen silently for a time.

  ‘Your brother,’ I say.

  ‘Yes,’ says Aminat.

  ‘The chain.’

  ‘I know. You didn’t mention anything to him, did you?’

  ‘I didn’t. It seemed the polite thing.’

  ‘Thank you for that. He can be sensitive about it to people he’s just met.’

  ‘Aminat, it’s a fucking chain.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You could have warned me.’

  ‘I know. I’m sorry.’

  ‘That’s not an explanation. He’s chained in his own house.’

  ‘He’s not captive.’

  ‘Then why?’

  ‘So he won’t fly away.’

  ‘Okay.’ I think of Layi’s living space, the richness of what he has there, the gilded cage. I wonder why Aminat took me home at all. She must know it is bizarre to have a grown man chained up. Unless she wants me to know this part of her life, giving me an opportunity to flee.

  ‘Every year on Christmas Eve he goes out for the fireworks. The rest of the year he’s home. He’s exceptionally fragile, Kaaro. He cannot tolerate the world, and has not been able to do so since he was a child. We home educated him.’

  This is not as unusual as it may seem, although ‘fragile’ may mean Layi is mentally unwell. Not all psychiatric patients go to doctors or hospital in Nigeria. At times people are kept at home so as not to tarnish the family name. I know of at least one household where the oldest daughter was tied up with hemp rope and kept in the Boy’s Quarters behind the property because she had screaming fits. It is not polite to probe under these circumstances so I drop the matter.

  ‘He’s quite striking,’ I say.

  ‘Everybody loves Layi,’ she says.

  It is dark when Aminat drops me at home. We kiss through the car window for an eternity.

  ‘I like you,’ she says, in a husky voice. ‘I’m in like. Are you in like?’

  ‘I am in like,’ I say.

  She nods and drives off. I can feel the smile on my own face.

  The reanimate who was at my doorstep is no longer there. I am aglow from the encounter and this blunts my vigilance, but as soon as I enter my flat I know I am not alone. This is not going to be pleasant.

  ‘I know you are here,’ I say. ‘Tell Femi I’ll come quietly. I have no wish for violence.’

  Two intruders, one male, one female, dressed in dark body suits, masks, goggles, armed with pistols. No skin visible. They were prepared to subdue a sensitive.

  ‘Get your shoes off my rug,’ I say.

  ‘Kneel,’ says the female. ‘Cross your ankles and put your hands on your head.’

  I obey, although I know they will not shoot me.

  ‘I am about to search you. Are you carrying a weapon?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are there any sharp objects in your pockets?’

  ‘Well, there’s my prick. Sometimes I can reach it from my pocket.’

  ‘Alawada. Keep joking, see what happens,’ says the man.

  There is an edge to his voice that suggests to me that he might be emotionally involved with his compatriot. The xenosphere is devoid of their presence. The female searches me with rough hands.

  ‘I am about to inject you with something to relax you. If you move my associate will shoot you.’

  ‘You’re not going to kill me,’ I say. ‘Femi would —’

  ‘I said nothing about killing.’ She speaks this sentence in English.

  I feel the jab in my deltoid. I soon get slightly woozy. I tip over backwards, but the woman catches me efficiently and lowers me to the floor, straightening my legs. When she is sure I can breathe she rolls up my sleeve, ties a tourniquet, and takes a blood sample. The male holsters his weapon and produces a scanner device from a p
ouch. It looks like a magic wand. I’ve seen the like before. It scans implants, downloading telemetry and other stored data. There is a short beep which I assume means the scan is complete, then they both step away from me. I hear only the hum of my refrigerator and the blood speeding through my veins. I feel slightly euphoric, but that’s whatever drug they gave me. I’m on the floor for a while — I lose track of time.

  The man kicks me. ‘Sit up.’

  They position a small box close to me and activate a plasma field which floats up to eye level. Even before it resolves I know she can hear me.

  ‘This is home invasion,’ I say.

  ‘You’re still not carrying a gun,’ says Femi.

  ‘I forget.’

  She’s casually dressed and has one of those Bluetooth devices clipped to her ear. No earrings and minimal makeup. She is also at home, judging by the kitchen behind her. I can tell because I have been there.

  ‘Kaaro, you’ve been delinquent.’

  ‘I have, but I was young and foolish at the time.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘I was off duty.’

  ‘You’re always on duty.’

  ‘Then maybe that needs to change.’

  ‘Maybe it does,’ she says in a softer tone. ‘But we will come to an agreement about that instead of you running off willy-nilly.’

  ‘I’ve never taken time off.’

  ‘I know. But you’re in the middle of an interrogation, remember? We lost a whole day, and that can be critical. I also need to know where you are.’

  ‘That’s what the implant is for.’

  ‘It needs an upgrade.’

  ‘The implant is fine.’

  ‘You can’t see that woman. Aminat.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Her family is … problematic. Did you see the chained man?’

  ‘Yes. He’s sweet.’

  ‘He is dangerous. Just stay away, Kaaro. Can you do as you’re told for once?’

  ‘“For once”? I always do as I’m told.’