Chapter Three - I'm Alive

It was total chaos. It was on every channel, news channels, movie channels, sports channels, music channels; every channel had the story of the epidemic showing on it. It was in the news, and it was all around her.

Nneka had gotten home from school. Lola was able to see the doctor, but even the doctor had fallen sick. Everybody had fallen sick, and nobody had any idea what to do about it. It was total chaos.

At home her mum was already sick. She had called their family doctor, but he seemed to be in bad condition himself. At the hospital, everyone was sick. The doctors were sick and they couldn’t do much to help the hundreds of people that were trying to get medical help. A lot of people had given up hope and had just went back home. The parking lot was crowded with people who were waiting to get in. There were already hundreds of people inside the hospital and the hospital management who looked like they needed help themselves stood behind the doors that were now locked. Mothers were crying for their kids, kids were crying from pain.

Nneka looked at her mum and her younger sister who both looked pale and sick. Her sister was already coughing blood. Tears welled in her eyes as she saw the pain around her, her heart ached from what she saw around her, and she had a headache that wouldn’t leave, probably caused by all the crying she had done, not getting enough sleep and worrying about what was going on around her. Apart from the headache, she felt perfectly healthy. Her eyes felt heavy from lack of sleep.

The scene was starting to get violent as some of the sick people outside were trying to get in. Some had picked up stones and had started breaking through the windows. The scene in front of her was hopeless. Sick people stormed in through the windows in their hundreds.

‘Let’s go’, Nneka’s mum started the car. The scene had become unbearable for her. ‘We’ll go to Doctor Oyebo’s private hospital.’

Her mum had stopped crying and instead had a hard stern look on her face.

It was hopeless, people were everywhere, and you could see the confusion in people’s eyes. Hundreds of people were out on the streets searching anywhere they could find a cure to the odd sickness that gripped the world. She even heard some people suggest spiritual healing from traditional healers and mystics, people had all sorts of ideas as they drove one.

A man who was himself sick and coughing blood was screaming at the top of his voice, ‘Judgement day is here! You will all go to hell!! This is punishment for your sins!!! You are all filth-’ the man paused to cough some more and then fell on his knees holding his chest. As soon as he stopped coughing, he stood up and continued shouting. Maybe he was right; it actually looked like God’s Judgement had befallen man.

Nneka’s mum looked at her. ‘You look okay Nneka. Thank God for that.’ Sadness consumed her as she turned to Ada, Nneka’s sister who wasn’t in a very good shape. ‘God, what’s happening? Aaaargh!’ Mrs Ofili suddenly screamed, bursting into tears. “God what is happening?’

‘Everything will be fine, mum,’ Nneka squeezed her mum’s hand.

‘I hope so,’ Mrs Ofili replied, using her hand to wipe the tears off her eyes.

The traffic was terrible as everybody on the road tried to get to where they could get help. It all looked so hopeless. The streets were filled with pale sick people, running to find any vestige of hope, none of them having any particular destination, screaming, weeping. Everywhere was in total anarchy.

Doctor Oyebo’s hospital was no better. The crowd that surrounded the hospital didn’t even let them get close to the gate. The gate had been locked and there was already commotion inside the gates. The hospital was in disarray. Her mum tried Doctor Oyebo’s number but it just kept ringing. They weren’t sure whether he was inside or not. Mrs Ofili burst into another round of sobbing. ‘What am I going to do now?’ She said, her voice stuttering in confusion. She had been trying her husband all night, but his phone kept ringing. He had gone to the country club with the ‘boys’ and she hadn’t heard from him since. With this madness going on all around she wasn’t sure what to think.

Nneka could imagine the chaotic mess her mum’s mind was. Her sister was too sick to think anything. She already had blood coming out of her nose. They all had tears in their eyes. Their dad was nowhere to be found. Her mum had told her he had travelled to Abuja, but she knew he hadn’t. She had over heard her talk about him going to the country club with his friends, her mum had only told her he travelled to Abuja so that she would not get worried. How could she not get worried? The man was in Lagos and had been out since the previous night and hadn’t even tried to contact his family in spite of the news about the outbreak everywhere. Something was obviously wrong, she knew it and her mum knew it but they kept quiet about it to each other, she had tried his number several times, and she knew her mum had also been trying his number. They both didn’t want to accept that something might have gone wrong. Ada was there, and getting worse with every passing moment and her mum didn’t want to let both of them out of her sight. The tears kept flowing down her eyes.

She looked out of the window and she could see the hopelessness on everyone’s face. Everybody seemed to have locked themselves in their own space not caring about the other person. Everyone had a common problem, but there was no solution in sight. It was a scary thought, but everyone seemed to be dying and nobody seemed to have any inkling what to do about it.

Mrs Ofili wiped her tears. ‘We are going home’, she had grown considerably weak. ‘Let’s just go home and wait’.

‘Wait for what mum? Look at Ada!’ Nneka said, yelling at the top of her voice. How could her mum just ask them to go home, Ada was dying and she needed help, but at the back of her mind she understood, the situation was ugly, hopeless. The tears burnt her face.

‘Can’t you see what’s going on’ Mrs Ofili looked straight into Nneka’s eyes. ‘Can’t you see it is hopeless? We can’t even reach the doctors. We can’t even get into the hospitals.’ Her mum’s face was also wet with tears, she could see the pain in her eyes- it was killing her. A dark patch surrounded her mum’s eyes, she was also sick, but she was fighting as hard as she could, for herself and for her daughters.

Nneka looked at the people around her. Her mum was right. There was hopelessness everywhere. The same hopelessness was all over the world as shown earlier on the news. Was the world coming to an end? Will they find a cure and save everybody from what was happening? Nobody was yet to give an explanation to what was happening. Everybody just knew everybody was dying, and there was nothing anyone could do about it.

They went back home and sat in the sitting room. Nneka had tried calling her dad to no avail.

‘Where’s dad?’ Nneka asked her mum, though she knew she had no idea where he was. They were all in the dark and it didn’t look as if there would be light shining through anytime soon.

‘I don’t know,’ Mrs Ofili, started crying. She had been calling her husband all night and all morning. She was already worried sick. Her youngest daughter was sick and her husband was no where to be found. She also felt terribly sick. Sometimes everything would just become a blur. The world seemed to be spinning. Sometimes she thought she saw things, sometimes she heard voices. Whatever was wrong with her was messing with her mind. ‘I don’t know,’ Tears streamed down her cheeks.

Nneka felt sorry for her mum. She looked really sick and she didn’t know what to do. Nobody knew what to do. Nneka held her mum close. They both held each other as they sobbed. Her sister looked worse every moment. Her mum had cleaned her body with warm water as she had started shivering. Every single minute her mum had tried the Doctor’s number to no avail.

Mrs Ofili suddenly got up. ‘I have to get a doctor,’ I can’t just stay here and watch my daughter die. If I have to drag him through the crowd I will’.

‘I’ll follow you mum,’ Nneka could not let her go out there on her own. She knew how the hospital looked. People had started getting violent. Everybody seemed desperate and desperate people are capable of anything. She was so confused, but she wasn’t sure if her mum going out was the best solution.

‘Stay with your sister. I’ll bring in any doctor I can get my hands on or I’ll get prescriptions for some drugs. Just stay and take care of your sister’, Nneka’s mum didn’t look too good herself. But she couldn’t just stay and do nothing. ‘Hopefully everything will be ok’.

Nneka wasn’t too sure. She had seen the chaos out there- the hopelessness, and it didn’t look as if everything was going to be okay. She couldn’t even think of the worst- an epidemic of this speed and magnitude could wipe out the whole of mankind. Everybody was going to die. She watched her mum rush out of the house; sick, with a sick daughter, a missing husband, and a hopeless world. Tears streamed down Nneka’s eyes. She didn’t know that would be the last time she would see her mother.

Her sister wasn’t getting better, her shivering had gotten worst. Nneka still felt healthy in spite of all the sickness around her, a part of her was anticipating some of the symptoms she had seen around her, but she was yet to exhibit any- it still amazed her how she had been able to stay healthy amidst all the sickness around her. Her sister’s shivering got more uncontrollable. She wondered where her mum was, she grew anxious as each minute passed, her mind racing in very terrible directions.

Ada got worse with each passing moment, the tears flowing down her eyes was now mixed with blood, and then she started to convulse, thick dark blood oozing from her mouth and Nostrils.

Nneka screamed for help to no avail. She placed her sister’s head in a resting position; her sister had stopped moving.

‘Help! ’

Nneka screamed at the top of her voice till it cracked, she didn’t know what to do anymore. She dialled her mum’s number but it just kept ringing.

‘Somebody! Help!!’

She ran out of the house and out the gate. She needed anybody to help her, Ada had stopped breathing and she had become terrified. Her head thumped with Migraine, as she searched frantically for anybody who could be of help. The street was virtually deserted, nobody was walking, no car was driving past, and she could only hear the wind. Everything seemed eerie, and there was a dark premonition to it all.

‘HELP!’

This time, the scream for help wasn’t from her. It was coming from her neighbour. There were cries for help everywhere. Then she saw some people running towards her from a distance, she seemed detached from what was happening, as if it was in a movie. Something or someone seemed to be chasing them, they quickly ran past her. Then she saw people about three men running towards her from the same direction in an awkward manner. 

The next few moments were like a scene from a horror movie. Down the road she could see someone slumped on the road, covered in blood- the person didn’t move. 

The three men had blood shot eyes, and had blood stains around their mouth. They seemed to have lost their senses- the eyes… Their eyes were filled with blood and were no more human, they were that of beasts, animalistic, intense, and unsparing. She suddenly snapped out of her dream state, the men looked like danger, they were the danger. Her nose caught the pungent smell of blood coming from the three men. The screams, yells, from all over seemed surreal, real, yet unreal, the men got closer, their face looked distorted, disturbing, pale, as if they were dead.

‘Egbamio!!’ someone screamed in Yoruba a few houses away.

She quickly dashed for the gate and locked it behind her, the men rushed into the gate, banging it from behind, making awkward sounds- like the wail of a grown man and a dog combined.

What was happening? Nneka’s head started spinning, the migraine pounded harder, everything just wasn’t making sense. Her heart was now in her mouth. She could hear people screaming everywhere. She ran back inside and locked the door.  The screams continued, the gate banging continued, the awkward sound reverberated through the air-disturbing, uncanny, animalistic. Her stomach churned with fear.

She stood behind the door for a while, trying to catch her breadth. She dialled her mums number again, and there was still no response. She tried calling her dad. It started ringing. She wasn’t expecting him to pick it since herself and her mum had been calling all morning. He picked it, her heart skipped two beats. Was he okay? Finally her dad had picked the phone; finally she was sure he was okay.

‘Hello dad’, there was no response from the other end of the phone. He had picked the phone, but why wasn’t he saying anything?

‘Dad!!’ still silence.

‘Dad!!!’ she was beginning to get worried. He still wasn’t saying anything. Was something wrong with him? Her head started spinning.

‘ARRRRRRGGGHHHHHHUUGGGRRRHHHH!!!!!’ the sound that came from the phone’s speaker was scary and eerie, the same uncharacteristic gory high pitched sound that the monsters outside were making. She threw the phone on the floor.

Her head started spinning again. What was that sound? Was her Dad okay? Had he left his phone somewhere, or was it his voice she heard? She burst into tears as she tried to gather her thoughts. She held her head in both hands and as she sat on the floor, too weak to move. She didn’t feel sick, or at least her body didn’t feel sick, but her mind had received so much battery in the last few hours that she wasn’t sure she was sane anymore. Was all of this real or was it just one realistic nightmare? She wished with every single tear from her eyes that she was in a dream and she was going to wake up and see her sister in her room trying to wake her up, and her dad getting ready to leave the house for work while her mum grumbled as she micro waved her dad’s food, and her mum vexed with her because she was supposed to do that but she had refused to get up from bed and was hoping to get another house maid since the last one had been sent packing after she was caught having sex with a carpenter, that stayed a few blocks away on the street, right on the sitting room sofa. That was the life she knew just a few days ago, a life that seemed very distant at the moment.

She picked up the phone and all she could hear where the disturbing growls from the other end, ‘dad,’ she spoke into the phone soberly, almost in a whisper. The call suddenly went off. She dialled her dad’s number again, and this time, it was switched off. She tried the number again, and again, until she couldn’t count the number of times she had tried anymore. She dialled her mum’s number again, and it just kept ringing.

‘Oh my God!’ She looked up ‘is this real?’ She felt exhausted psychologically, the migraine dug deeper into her head. She was finding it difficult to process everything that was going on; she pulled on her hair and tried to rip it out of her scalp.

‘God, why?!’ Her body ached all over. She remembered her sister, who was in the sitting room, whose life was slowly ebbing away.  ‘Oh my God!’ She got up and ran to the sitting room but her sister wasn’t there. The blanket they had used to cover her was still on the chair but her sister was nowhere to be found. Was she okay?

‘Ada!’ If she was okay, that meant everyone will be okay. A smile formed on her lips. That meant everyone will recover from the bizarre sickness, which meant her mum would be fine, and her dad too, and everyone in the world would be fine. She had to be sure; she had to find Ada, ‘Ada!!’

‘Ada!’ She checked everywhere in the house- the kitchen, the rooms, the bathrooms. She wondered where Ada had gone. She could still hear the noise from outside and it only got louder. People were screaming everywhere. She had searched the whole house and Ada was nowhere to be found. She was going to check outside when she saw Ada standing by the main door.

‘Ada, I’ve been looking for you,’ Ada just stood there.

‘Ada, are you ok?’ No response. The young girl just stood at the door, staring to the ground so Nneka couldn’t see her face clearly.

‘Ada,’ Nneka moved closer to her sister. ‘Ada,’ she stretched her hand to touch her sister.

As her hand moved closer to her sister, her sister slowly raised her head. Nneka placed her hand on Ada’s shoulder, and looked at her Sister’s face.

‘Ada, are you-.’ What stared at her wasn’t Ada. It was Ada, yes, but what stood before her was a monster. Ada’s eyes had become bloodshot with blood stains around her mouth. Her sister had seemed to lose every ounce of what she once was; she stared at Nneka with raving hatred and hunger. Nneka couldn’t move as she looked right into the bloodied eyes of her sister. She knew what had happened; she had seen how the screaming men outside looked and Ada looked exactly like them. There was no hint of recognition in those eyes; no hint that Ada recognised her, no hint of Ada herself. Her sister stared at her like a complete stranger.

‘AAAAAUUUURRRRGGHHHHH!!!’ The same sound the men outside had made came from her sister’s bloodied mouth- same intensity, same horror, same hysteria, same rage.

She grabbed Nneka by the hair and flung her to the ground. Nneka looked into her sister’s eyes and at that point she was certain that her sister was going to kill her.

Ada rushed towards Nneka, grabbing her by the neck. Nneka tried to push her off, but Ada held on to her neck with inhuman strength. The pain that came next was unbearable as Ada sunk her teeth into her hand letting blood flowing down the gapping wound her sister’s teeth had inflicted on her.

Nneka fought to keep Ada away as scratch after scratch left gaping wounds on her face. She didn’t want to hurt her own sister so she just tried to defend herself.

She had lost strength and was now covered in blood. She pushed Ada away from herself and quickly dashed for the bed room upstairs, at least she could lock herself in and prevent her sister from killing her or… she couldn’t believe the thought that came to her head at that point. The way things were going, it was either her sister ended up killing her, or she ended up killing her sister in self defence. 

God forbid! She’d rather die.

She darted up the stairs and was almost at the top of the stairs when she felt someone grab her legs from behind. It was Ada. Nneka fell with a loud thud on the floor hitting her head on the side wall.

Ada pounced on her still making the same ravenous sound. Tears poured down her eyes as she thought about all that was happening. The day before, she had been speaking with her sister over the phone from school. The day before, her mother, father and all her friends were okay. Now her sister was trying to kill her. 

She kept sobbing as she tried to fight off her sister’s relentless attacks. Her clothes were covered in blood and pain engulfed her all over. Her head felt like it had been hit with a sledge hammer- she could feel the swelling on the left side of her fore head where she had hit her head on the wall. 

Ada sunk her teeth into her shoulder tearing some flesh out. The pain stabbed her heart in ten places.

Nneka couldn’t help but cry aloud. The world as she knew it had shattered. Everybody was sick, her parents were missing, and her sister was trying to kill her.

With all the strength she could muster, she pushed her sister away from her, thrusting her with both her hands and legs. 

The shove sent Ada tumbling down the stairs, hitting her head twice on the concrete stairs before landing at the bottom. She stayed there motionless.

‘Ada!’ Nneka stood up and ran towards her sister. ‘O my God’, she was sure she had killed her sister. Her sister lay sprawled on the floor beneath the stairs and her head lay in an awkward position.

‘Ada!’ She turned her sister around and felt her pulse. Ada wasn’t breathing. ‘Somebody help!’ Confusion ran through her veins. Her head felt like it was going to explode. Her whole world had become a blur and she could make no sense of the events of the last few hours. ‘Ada!!’

Had she killed her sister? She hadn’t meant to. Tears flowed down her eyes as she held the lifeless body of her sister in her arms. ‘Somebody help!!’ She half expected to see people running in to help, but she knew that wasn’t going to happen. She could hear screams of help coming from outside the house. The atmosphere was filled with terror, pain and confusion, and nobody was sure what to do. She could hear the guttural screams of the death spawned humans outside the gate.

Ada moved. ‘Ada!’ Her sister had moved one of her fingers. She was glad her sister could move after she was certain she had killed her.

‘Ada!’ Nneka moved closer to her sister.

Ada suddenly grabbed her neck squeezing it as if her life depended on it. The nightmare had started all over again. It suddenly dawned on her that what was in there with her wasn’t the Ada she knew anymore.

‘AAAARRRGGGHHHHH,’ the same guttural sound that the changed men outside had made echoed from her sister’s mouth. She tried to fight herself free as Ada grabbed her hair almost ripping it off. 

Her head felt like it had hundreds of pins inserted in it. She was able to fight herself free and she immediately sprinted up the stairs. 

Everything was in a blur, as she felt her whole body weakening. The creature that was once her sister followed her now with more rage than ever as she scrambled up the stairs.

Her room to the right was opened and she sprinted for it.

If she could just get there on time…

Her sister got close to her and she could sense the intent, a mixture of rage, blood lust and total animal instinct. 

She felt a sharp pain as her sister tore flesh from her back.

She jumped into the room and quickly closed the door behind her, locking all the bolts she could find behind the door. She turned the key behind the door, locking it.

Her face had become immersed in tears, and the blood from the wounds her sister had inflicted on her covered her whole body. 

Ada kept banging the door as she tried to get in. The door was strong, but she wasn’t sure how long it would hold her enraged sister out. She had seen how strong her little sister had become, with one thrust she had yanked off a part of the railing on the stairway.

‘GOD!’ Nneka screamed. God had definitely forsaken them. She could feel her own hopelessness and it stung her to her heart. She tried to look into the future, and it was bleak. She could only see darkness. Things could only get worse. She walked up to her bed and lay on it, staring at the ceiling. She started to drift; her body and mind had taken too much at once and was beginning to shut down. The banging of the door and the guttural yelling of her sister became more distant as each moment passed. She lay there until everything became total darkness.