Burning Palm 1

Bello sits on a chair in a church, a different church from the one earlier. He's slightly younger here, and isn't wearing any uniform. A sermon is going on. The minister's words, for some reason, aren't audible, yet everyone nods their heads in agreement, including Bello. In fact, no sound is heard in the area, as though all the audio had been stripped away. But then, one sound travels, a gunshot. This gunshot drags volume into the world, and panicked screams resound all over. Bello also gets alert. He turns around and immediately, he finds himself being forcefully dragged away from a church on fire.

“No! No!! My mother's still inside! No!!!”

His cries are not attended to, and he's dragged into a truck by rescue operatives. The vehicle begins to move away and all around him are date palms on fire. He keeps yelling.

“No! Mummy! No!!”

Then, a rescue operative drags and pins him down forcefully. Then yells at him;

“Come over to Gashari and help us!”

With that yell, he snaps awake.

Looking around, he sees he's in a room, a bed is by his side, and he's currently on the floor. Looking beside him, he sees his Bible open, and the page it's open to is quite crumpled. Yes, this is his room, he had slept off in prayer, and he had accidentally slept on his Bible. Picking it up, he straightens out the page carefully, before closing it.

On the bed is a woman sleeping peacefully. Bello looks in another direction. There's an open door that leads to another room, and on the bed there is a sleeping child, a boy. He's about to get up from where he's seated when his phone vibrates. Taking a look at who's calling, he sees a name, ‘Yeji’.

He picks it up, tries to be as quiet as possible, and says.

“Yeji.”

Yeji, the lady that talked to him in the compound earlier, can currently be found outside a house, in a compound. Even if it's nearly midnight, her eyes are clear and bright.

“Sir. Someone just got some information that Gashari might be subject to an attack tonight.”

Bello gets struck, as if by lightning. Gashari?

“Gashari?”

“Yes sir.”

Bello sinks into his thoughts for a short while.

“Is this intel source any reliable?”

“I don't know sir. This might be a trap. Remember what happened to Sahura squad two weeks ago. They were essentially wiped out.”

Bello thinks, ponders. The dream in his mind is still very vivid and clear. He decides.

“Ready the men. We're going. I'll meet up with you guys at the roundabout.”

Yeji takes a deep breath.

“Yes sir.”

The call cuts. Bello hears a voice come from behind him.

“You're going? You can't be serious now.”

He turns around, and right there is his wife, now seated on the bed. Seeing her eyes, he immediately sits on the bed too.

“I think the Lord wants us there.”

“You think?!”

Mrs Bello isn't having it.

“Have you forgotten what happened to the Sahura squad? This is a trap! You're walking into a trap because you think?!”

Bello isn't sure how to explain himself, because, isn't she right? Isn't he giving his life away because of a dream?

“I had a dream. Someone said I should go to Gashari.”

“And what if you had a dream? What if you had a dream? You want to leave me and Yero? You want to leave me and Yero? What will I do? What will Yero do?! You want to leave me…”

At the end, she begins to cry, and Bello hugs her tightly. He says.

“I'll be careful. I promise I'll be back in an hour; Gashari's not that far away.”

After holding her for about a minute, he releases her. She's still sobbing, but she nods her head to indicate she's agreeing to his decision. Bello hugs her again before fetching some simple clothes from his wardrobe, which is just a sack of clothes. He's about to step out of the house when he hears a question.

“Daddy, where are you going?”

Bello turns around. It's Yero. He must have woken up from the commotion earlier.

“I want to just go out and verify something. You can go back to sleep. You have a test in the morning, remember?”

Yero nods and sleepishly returns to his bed. Bello looks at his wife standing in their room, her eyes still watery, her left hand holding her right arm. He sighs and leaves.