David Mogo Godhunter

by Suyi Davies Okungbowa

  In the distance, the snaky length of the Third Mainland bends away into Ìsàlẹ̀ Èkó, lit up on its sides like a festive Chinese dragon. I see where the lights stop functioning and Ìsàlẹ̀ Èkó begins. The lagoon itself is splayed out in the distance, ducking under the bridge to merge into the shallows of the ocean. Barge and boat lights twinkle like stars as they run around doing late night work, which could mean anything from industrial fishing to sand dredging to contraband smuggling.

  The water moves suddenly, yet it takes me a while to notice it. Mostly because it moves without noise. It’s dark, yet I can still see a shadow below the surface, waiting, almost pondering, the way a shark contemplates before snapping up its prey.

  “They say you’ll want to see me,” I say. “I’m here.”

  Then the god below the surface rises, slowly, and stands in the water.

  Their dreadlocked hair is held up in different places with seaweed, decorated with periwinkle, cowrie shells and water stones, which glow translucent in a myriad of blues, greens, turquoises, opals. Their skin reflects the water stones, smooth and silky, but not at all wet-looking, which messes with my eyes a bit. They are lean, with muscle-toned limbs that tell of a warrior life past; now withered, like a retired soldier. They stand at waist-level in the water, wrapped in green cloth at the torso and chest, swaying as if dancing with the waves. Their eyes are pure white, their àshẹ alive and kicking; yet there is a look of fatigue in them, of someone who has seen many things and fought many battles and loved hard and cared hard and eventually gotten tired of the world. I know that look, because I’ve seen it in Papa Udi many times.

  The god’s signature flashes across my consciousness: the beauty of sunset and waterfalls; the smell of raw incense; the sound of water from a fountain; a bell pinging underwater; a chalice—big and beautiful and royal—made for wealth alone; wine, drunk from this chalice, the back of my tongue tasting of grapes, but also of fish; a bleak day of mist and fog, but which is really a dream; the cry of a big fish, calling to its mates underwater. I reach out, heady with nausea, pushing my godessence, asking the signature questions of its origin.

  “Olokun,” I say, when the answer comes back.

  They cock their head in that jerky motion that only birds and fish have. A membrane slides over their eyes and disappears again, a fleeting fish-blink.

  “Orisha ’daji,” Olokun says. Their voice is clear, but with a wobble underneath, as if speaking underwater.

  “Yes,” I say. “I guess that’s me.”

  “You are not welcome here,” Olokun says, speaking sweetly but firmly, like my primary school teacher saying, Stretch out your hand, darling. Stretch out your hand.

  “That much has been made known,” I say.

  Olokun fish-blinks again, cocks their head, as if saying, Sooo, are you gonna leave or nah?

  “Are you going to attack me?” I ask. “Kick me out?”

  They seem to contemplate for a beat. “No.”

  “I assume you want to see me for a reason, then?”

  They rise completely out of the water, and I see that they have no legs at all, but large, suckered octopus tentacles, sculling themselves through the water with the tips, like snakes dangling their tails over the edge of a pool, swishing without sound. They sail forward and stop a few feet in front of me.

  “I hear you defeated the first vessel the Fiery Ones brought forth,” Olokun says, scrutinising me like a rare specimen, their head twitching here and there.

  “Well, yeah, I guess. Why do you care?”

  “You were attacked,” they say, sniffing the air. “I smelt Sango’s bolts all over you once you arrived in my settlement.”

  “Yes.”

  “Which means they will come here for you, soon. They will come here, and they will lay these people and everything here to waste, as they did on Orun. If you care about these people, you must leave.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  They fish-blink. “Death and destruction follow everywhere you go, orisha ’daji.”

  “But what the fuck does that mean though?” I say, my voice rising to puncture the night’s stillness. “Why do you all keep saying that, as if I am the one bringing all the death and destruction?” I wave at them. “Seriously, aren’t you guys the problem? Left your own home, came down here and messed up our very nice slice of the world, then you want to pin it on me? Me who has literally done everything I can to fix your mistakes, to make life better for everyone down here? Me who has lost everything I care about in this world because of you guys!” I slam my fist on the handrail. “You should be the one to get out of here. These people don’t need you; it’s you who need them for sustenance, who feeds on their worship and sacrifice to relive your wasted-away glory days of Orun or whatever. I’m coming for all of you, especially those Fiery Ones.”

  My breathing is agitated by the time I’m done, but Olokun hasn’t flinched, just blinking at me quizzically, with maybe a hint of sorrow in that stare.

  “I am sorry for what you have lost—”

  “Fuck your sorry,” I say. “Can’t you all just leave us alone?”

  “They will never leave you alone,” Olokun says, looking away from me for the first time. “The Fiery Ones do not take to threats kindly, and you have waged war against them. They have proven this in Orun, and they will prove it here. They will come for you, and everyone and everything around you, until all is ash and dust. Only then will they rest.”

  “Then I’m ready for them,” I say, my jaw tightening.

  “Good.” Olokun nods, looking back at me. “This is what I hoped you would say.”

  “Sorry, what?”

  “I hope for you to fight, to challenge the Fiery Ones. And I hope to offer you assistance.”

  The night is quiet, sans cricket and frog sounds. Everything of the river has gone to sleep, defaulted to the master of the waters. I remember I am dealing with a powerful high god, of the same echelons of Sango and Aganju. I could have a powerful ally right here, right now, for the first time.

  “So, you will fight with me?”

  The high god seems amused. “I cannot fight with you, orisha ’daji. Can you not see me?” Olokun attempts to show off their body, twirling in the water without making any sound. “I am no longer the warrior I used to be. Take this—all of Makoko and everything the lagoon has to offer—away, and I have nothing left.”

  “So you really only care about yourself, then? Not really about removing the threats to their existence.”

  “I am their Olùṣó,” Olokun says. “I protect them. I do not have to fight to do that.”

  “So you want to throw me to the dogs instead.”

  “You will not be thrown to the dogs. Not if you become Amúnáwá.”

  I translate that in my head: the one who brings fire.

  Olokun sidles up close to me, as if trying to tell me a secret. They’re less than a foot away from the footbridge on which I’m standing, so close I can feel their breath (is this really their breath, or their godessence?) which smells like wet clothes and seaweed and raw seafood. Their waterstones reflect calm, bluish tones on my skin.

  “You, orisha ’daji,” Olokun says, “are smithed of iron and fire. It is written all over you, I smell it in your spirit. All you need to do is unlock who you are, and you will become an equal for all powers in this world and others.”

  Unlock, unlock, unlock. Where is this door I should be unlocking?

  “So what do I do, then? How do I become this... bringer of fire?”

  “You will find the place where iron lives,” Olokun says. “There, you will find fire smothered by bone.”

  “Will it kill you people to speak proper English?” I can’t take it anymore; not from Payu, not from Ibeji, not from my mother in my dream-visions, and definitely not from some half-human, half-octopus god. “Can you, like, break it down for me? What do you mean where iron lives? What does fire smothered by bone even mean? Do you people think I was born with puzzle-cracking abiliti
es or something?”

  “This is what I know of how you will become Amunǫwa,” Olokun says, unperturbed. “Oshodi will guide you, though it won’t be easy.”

  “Oshodi? Like, the place Oshodi?”

  Olokun nods.

  Finally! One sane thing in all this madness. “Great, then. That shouldn’t be too difficult.” I pause. “Wait, don’t tell me: when I get to the place where iron lives, I’ll know it, right? And when I find fire smothered by bone, I’ll know too, right?”

  “You are not man, orisha ’daji,” Olokun says. “You will definitely know.”

  Of course I will, you incomprehensible ancient bastard.

  “Thank you,” I say. “However, you have not told me how I will defeat the two gods who brought down the whole of Orun and cast all of you down here. Last I checked, killing a god wasn’t possible. Not by me, at least.”

  “Well,” Olokun says. “The truth is, only with the weapon of a god can you overpower one.”

  “So this Amunǫwa is the power of a god?”

  “Well, yes and no. It’s not as much the power itself, as it is you. Only a god can scrape another god off this realm.”

  “So, to kill a god, I must become one?”

  “You can put it that way.”

  I stare off to the distance, at the lights of the barges and anchored vessels in the distance. These gods and their twisted ways will not be the death of me.

  “Fine,” I say. “I’ve heard you.”

  “But you must go now,” Olokun says. “Find what you need, for the safety of all. Keep us alive before it is too late.”

  I remember Justice’s Pasuma Wonder t-shirt and his precious books, Hafiz’s yellow ankara, and think, Yes, Olokun is right. But then I remember that night at Cardoso House, the bolt of lightning leaving Sango’s axe, Fati and Payu falling out of the first floor window in the hallway, crashing to the ground below, and I think, Nope, I’m too late any way. I’m always too late.

  I could go back. Try and pick up the pieces of my old life, try to make something out of it. I could find Papa Udi and Fati—they have to have survived somehow, have to—and we could start afresh, maybe move to Abuja or further north or something. We could leave all this behind.

  Or, I can fix what I started. Once and for all.

  Chapter Seventeen

  IT IS NEARLY dawn by the time Olokun leads me to where the footbridges lead out of Makoko and into the heart of Yaba, Lagos’s once-thriving commercial hub. By break of light, I’ve arrived at the tail end of Commercial Avenue, one of the main streets in Yaba, and home to the few surviving trees in the concrete jungle. Not a single soul in sight as I pass by the palms and evergreens, rising above building height, swaying in the gentle morning breeze.

  The buildings of Commercial Avenue haven’t fared as well. Most are in the same state as Ìsàlẹ̀ Èkó’s: abandoned, the wind rushing through broken windows and open doors, raising dust. Their walls are cracked, their paint faded to pastel shades and the whole avenue eerie with creepy abandoned things: empty danfos and kekes, vacant shops with banners hanging askew. I pass by an unnamed marquee tent that used to be an event centre. I work out that today is a Saturday, and the emptiness of the event centre says everything: on a regular Saturday, pre-Falling, vehicles parked off-street would’ve clogged up the traffic so I’d have to weave my way between cars, bikes, and humans in colourful aso-ebi uniforms and matching gele headpieces, flowing agbadas, spit-shined shoes, gold watches and Ray-Ban glasses. Lagos used to know how to party; Lagos used to know how to be wild and fun and colourful. Now, it only remains wild, in a way that brings darkness and grim and quiet.

  At the top of the avenue, right before I join Murtala Muhammed Way, I come upon the biggest building on the road: the E-Centre. I have to stop for a while just to look at it: at the tall Tecno banner still boasting Phantom 8: Capture Your Legend; at the big signs advertising Domino Mall and Ozone Cinemas; at the smaller signs for banks, telecom companies, electronic companies; all speaking to an audience that is no longer here.

  Few months ago, and this place, like Ìsàlẹ̀ Èkó, would’ve been crawling with godlings. Thanks to the work of the LASPAC, it is mostly a silent, windswept complex now, trash littered about by nature and scavenging animals. I wonder, yet again, why people have not come to reclaim what is theirs; but then it occurs to me that though the godlings might be gone, there are far bigger challenges to resettlement on the mainland, whether god-made or man-made. Anyone with a good head will not return to an abandoned building and resume business, serving an audience that is too afraid to come.

  I still haven’t come upon anyone, and that is expected. The most habitable zones post-Falling have remained Upper Island and Outer Mainland, the extreme ends of Lagos. Everything in-between is fair game, and no one wants to be the prey in open season (and I’m not just talking deities and their affiliates: some of the former policemen and military didn’t take too kindly to being replaced by the LASPAC, and anyone who still has guns at this time will use them to get whatever they want). This general absence of persons is a good thing for me. I’m in neither the shape nor the frame of mind to fight mindless creatures or silly humans. I just need to get to Oshodi and find what I’m looking for.

  I keep thinking I should’ve called Femi Onipede, who must be frowning so deeply about this whole situation by now that ridges have formed permanently on her forehead. I did think about it, while holding Justice’s phone by that handrail in Makoko, but then decided it too risky. Apart from the fact that I’m not really interested in bringing more victims into what’s no one’s fight but mine, I’ve also been wondering how Sango knew exactly where and when to find me that night (he’s a god, though, of course). I maintain a nagging feeling that there are a lot of ears to the ground on the side of the Fiery Ones, so maybe the more discreet I keep things, the easier it is for me to come out of the dark and sucker-punch them. It’s best if everyone believes I’m dead.

  Murtala Muhammed Way, much wider and more open, feels even more eerie and quiet. In front of me as I enter is the former Tejuosho Ultra-Modern Market, rows of shops and large, tattered umbrellas now quiet and dusty, just like I remember Balogun Market last year. Rows upon rows of yellow danfos are parked, abandoned. These ones are not empty, though: as I walk past the roundabout, there’s scrambling on either side; stray dogs, sewage rats, even a monkey; scampering, knocking stuff over—mostly the trash scattered all over. (Thought Lagos was dirty before The Falling? Try again: Tejuosho is a carpet of polythene bags, goods wrappers, degraded organic waste and, unsurprisingly, animal shit.) I half-expect to sense a signature somewhere, but there’s nothing.

  I breach Ikorodu Road, which an even wider road with service lanes. The emptiness of Lagos really hits home here, its windswept landscape bringing me to the full realisation that if I do not do something soon, every single place in Lagos is going to look like this. The first pangs of hunger hit me here, after a long walk down, and the midday sun tickles my throat with thirst. Under the bridge at Jibowu, I finally give in to my humanness: weak, tired, hungry. Aching joints, hurting sides, tight abdomen, tough breathing. But I must soldier on, mustn’t I? I’m Lagos’ only hope now, aren’t I?

  I stop and take a seat under a canopy previously used to house passengers waiting for interstate transport shuttles. Behind me, multiple road transport companies are scattered; all now abandoned, of course. A few of their old, rusted buses are left behind with company names still scribbled on the sides, advertising their destinations: Lagos to Benin, Warri, Lokoja, Abuja, Onitsha, Enugu, Owerri, Calabar. A few go up north—Minna, Kaduna—and westward—Ibadan, Abeokuta, Akure.

  The sound of an engine starts in the distance and grows steadily, before I recognise it for a motorcycle. The bike comes into view in the distance, on the opposite side of the road, going in the direction I have just come in. The rider is running at max speed, so I guess he won’t have time to see me; but I’m wrong. He slows once he approaches the bridge at Jibowu, an
d stops completely when he spots me, standing astride his bike, the engine idling. He looks terribly young, probably a teenager, and is dressed in aviator goggles and a windbreaker, both filthy with age like his hair, which is thick and woolly and likely hasn’t seen any grooming since The Falling. He regards me from head to toe, then waves a tentative hand as if checking, Are you human? I wave back weakly. Yes, I am. Also very tired. Then he does a salute, his hand flat at ninety to his forehead, as if to say Godspeed. I return the gesture and he zooms away.

  I think it’s this singular encounter with humanness that brings back my strength, my zeal, because I find myself standing up sooner than expected. Maybe in it I see hope, that there are those waiting for Lagos to heal, waiting for it to become whole again, so they can resume their business of being very human in one of the most inhuman cities in the world. And it is my job to try and bring this Lagos back to them.

  It’s what Papa Udi would have wanted—would want (stop speaking about them in past tense, you idiot; how do you know they’re dead?). It’s what Fati, Taiwo and Kehinde would have wanted—agh, would want (you’re doing it again, David). It’s what my mother would want.

  Besides, let me be honest with myself: I am not going to find any food or water. I am not going to find shelter or rest. Olokun was right: if I’m going to make it, to survive this, I’ll have to be more than human. I’ll have to become a god.

  IT TAKES ME the rest of the day to get to Oshodi. The route from Ikorodu Road takes me past Fadeyi, where I then decide that rather than going on and on along this major route, which is literally desertland now, I cut through Onipanu main. Thing is, I’ve decided to go as the crow flies. Yes, I risk clashing with one or two small groups, going through the small streets like Ayuba and Olateju, but that’s a risk I’m willing to take.

  It is in Onipanu I first start to see signs that people might’ve tried to return here. There’s some fresh trash, mostly human faeces in all the wrong places, and clothing scattered about or abandoned on clotheslines. A plastic doll, more creepy than endearing, cast mindlessly aside. A pair of bathroom slippers that do not look aged. This makes me more wary, so that right before I get to the Illupeju bypass—my legs finally getting my attention, reminding me that they can only work for so long—I find the verandah of a small house to lie down for a while. I fall into fitful sleep, dreaming of the charred, smoking faces of Fati and Payu, scattered amongst the rubble of Cardoso House; of Sango wearing the essences of Taiwo and Kehinde in a Yasal bottle on his neck; of Sango and Aganju laughing, clinking champagne glasses, their fingers delicately manicured, toasting to their new Lagos, their new Orun.