Obelande Sector by Amplify

OBALENDE SECTOR 1 DR. MARTENS SUPPORTED BY

It’s funny how an idea can be sat right in front of you for years just waiting for the right moment to become visible. We’ve been playing music together in one way or another our whole lives. It’s what we make a living from, but also just something that was ambient in our house, something you got into as you were learning to walk and talk. Science fiction has also been ambient in our lives from Day One. We just didn’t call it that at first. It was Saturday Morning Cartoons. It was Star Wars. It was X Men and Superman comics. As children growing up in Nigeria, we accepted before we could articulate it that SF was something that happened elsewhere. Sure, there was the odd character with skin like ours. Occasionally these characters would even visit Africa, like when Storm from the X Men led a mission to her homeland of Kenya. ‘Visit’ is the operative word here, though. Fast forward to the start of 2020 and we both had enforced layoffs from touring. No festivals to play. No concerts. At the start, no studio sessions either. Making music for us has always been an in-person thing. The appetite was not there for a musical collaboration if we could not be in a room together like we had always been growing up. Writing, stories, though. That was a clean slate. Gbenga had tried making a concept album about a place called Yorubaland a few years before. Maybe it would work as prose instead of music. The customary Zoom meeting was convened and we brainstormed a story outline in little over an hour. Many rewrites later, ‘Obalende Sector’ is the result. We must thank Dr. Martens both for getting behind this project and for giving us complete freedom to realise our vision.

We are music people. To us, really well executed visual art is almost like magic. The chance to collaborate with some truly unique artists added an exciting new dimension to this story. Exhibit69 brought an amazing graphic sense and vivid drama to his pieces. Rome's phenomenal line work was a perfect fit for the human element to the world we were building. And Kieron Boothe managed to work the grit and dust of Yorubaland into his digital creation with true flair. We are in awe of these guys. This would be a very different (and less readable) story without our editor Lucy Kingett. Thanks, Lucy! Thanks also to our Auntie Yemi who gave the story a once over for Yoruba details. Oshe o! Any errors that remain belong to us, not her. Finally, the creative team at Amplify have been incredible at pulling this whole thing together and dealing with the sometimes circuitous logic of our creative process. Big thanks to them. Without further ado, come with us to the Obalende Sector. If you’ve ever wondered why aliens don’t land in Africa, this story is for you. If you believe other histories are possible, this story is for you. If you believe impossible things. This story is for you. Welcome to Yorubaland.

Seye and Olugbenga The Brothers Adelekan April 2021

OBALENDE SECTOR Written by The Brothers Adelekan

Every day I climb this tower like a child climbing a mahogany tree. I enter this room and dutifully tap my life away. I could have been a mountain. Perhaps I still am. But there is a hole in my heart large enough to see through. Hollowed out one drip at a time. Burrowed through while I was busy looking at these screens. Who will speak my truth if I cannot? I always said that this was not the person I would become. I alwa– ‘Wait, that’s weird.’ A movement on one of the screens snapped Adeola out of her thoughts. It was the feed from drone number 88FG. There was a strange bulge in the image. It happened quickly, but Adeola was sure of what she had seen. She was in a windowless room: Tower 18A, Observation Room 6B. It was a small space with pale grey walls, so small that Adeola’s chair knocked against the wall behind her when she stood up. Her desk was just a few steps from a door which required facial recognition and voice ID for entry and exit. Adeola’s task in this room was to monitor the Obalende Sector of The Field. Ten screens arranged in front of her displayed images from fixed cameras and drones. They showed endless rows of hexagonal solar panels and the spaces in between them.

The Field was a solar farm the size of a small country situated close to the border between Yorubaland and the Hausa Kingdom. It was a marvel of engineering that provided forty-three per cent of the world’s energy, still considered audacious three decades after it came online. A job at The Field – any job – was one to be coveted. A standard shift was nine hours, but Adeola was frequently required to work overtime. She had the physique of a woman who spent most of her days sitting at a desk – her uniform and close-cut military hairstyle were the only outward signs that she worked in the armed forces. Three perpendicular lines on each of her cheeks marked her out as one of the Egba. They were scars a little darker than her nut-brown skin and she had borne them since she was eight days old. While not like those who could trace their lineage to the Oyo Empire or the great city of Ile-Ife, Egbas did have reasonable status in Yorubaland. Adeola wore her tribal marks with great pride. It was true that her mind often wandered while watching the screens, but Adeola had never seen things that were not there. Strange as it was, she was certain the drone footage needed a closer look. She tapped the Review button on her main screen, dreading the call she would now receive. Within seconds she heard a chirp in her earpiece. ‘18A 6B. There is something you want reviewed?’ The voice on the other end did not identify itself but was male and bored.

‘That is why I called the Review line, yes. I have sent through the timestamp for the footage. You will notice that–’ ‘Anything of note will be noticed. If it is visible to you it will be visible to the AI that scrubs the footage. Your call has been logged.’ ‘Okay, thank y–’ He hung up before she could finish.

//// I only really liked playing in front of the house when I was watching out for Mummy. I would look through the small gap between the front gate and the compound wall, trying to catch sight of her the moment she arrived. It was my magic that brought her back from The Field every day. I truly believed it. This evening was like countless others, just another in what I believed to be an endless chain. I will never forget it. ‘Dapo! Come away from that gate!’ Dad shouted through the living room window. He was almost done with dinner. Every night we engaged in the same dance, me trying to stay outside, him calling me in to set the table. ‘Mummy will be here when she is here. Oya! Come inside.’ Dad’s cig-e smoke wafted through the blinds. He had switched from analogue cigarettes not long after Mummy’s promotion at The Field. Something about our military health insurance. Even as a seven-year-old it was clear to me that we had to do what the people at The Field wanted. We did not have a nice house. It was old and needed work. My best friend Kemi joked and joked about it the first time she visited. She didn’t mean anything by it – that’s just the kind of person she was. But after I visited her place, I actually began to feel ashamed. Our house actually still had charging bays for personal cars. Most people just built extensions or put down fake grass, but we couldn’t even afford to have the plug points removed. This was the main target of Kemi’s jokes. She kept asking if we

had a car with a steering wheel hidden somewhere. I would think about it every time I played outside. Like I said, she didn’t mean anything by it. Kemi could hurt you like that. I would console myself with the knowledge that our front gate was absolutely massive – way bigger than hers. Dad won that night. I was just getting the first dish onto the table when I heard an autocar pull up outside the gate. ‘Ugh! Dad! See what you did?’ I stormed out of the door and ran towards Mummy as she stepped through the side door of the gate. Her arms were open wide, ready for impact. I was not one of the biggest boys in my class, but I could still make her take a big step back when I came at her with a hug. ‘I missed you so much, Mummy, walai!’ Kemi teased me mercilessly for my close relationship with Mummy. In these private moments behind the gate, I did not care. ‘No Hausa language here, please, Dapo.’ This was my daily battle with Mummy. She said she had to think enough about the Hausas at work without hearing their language when she came home. I hated the Hausas for what they were trying to do to Yorubaland, but it was generally accepted by everyone below a certain age that their language just sounded cooler than Yoruba. ‘Oya, welcome me properly, abeg!’

Mummy handed me her jacket as she said this. I put it over my shoulders like a cape. Her uniform was so amazing to me. A black short sleeved shirt with black trousers tucked into her boots. Yellow fluorescent piping traced its way down the sleeves and trouser legs, electrifying the whole outfit. 11

Her jacket was black too and had ‘18A 6B’ stitched in the same yellow above the left chest pocket. I wish I could see that uniform again. ‘Welcome, ma,’ I said, standing at attention and saluting. The jacket fell off my shoulders and Mummy laughed. This little routine got her every time. ‘That’s better, Dapo. Thank you. Now, how was school today?’

//// The smell of pounded yam and egusi soup greeted Adeola at the door. After taking her jacket, Dapo took her satchel and ran it upstairs before returning to lead her to the dinner table by the hand. ‘You are welcome,’ said her husband, Femi, with a nod from the head of the table. She sat down on his right, with Dapo opposite her. Such a handsome man. Adeola often thought this when she got home from The Field. Still barrel-chested and vigorous after all these years. She had always said there was no way – no way – she would ever end up with a plainfaced man. Not only that, he spoke Yoruba with a funny burr from those years in his childhood spent in the Hausa Kingdom. Femi, however, was supremely relaxed about both his flawless skin and his accent. It put the people around him at immediate ease. Besides, he always made a point of mentioning as early as possible that he was from Ile-Ife. Sometimes Ife people didn’t give tribal marks. Everyone in Yorubaland knew that. When Dapo was born Adeola worried that Femi wouldn’t want the boy to take the Egba marks. In the end, her husband was the one who suggested it. Femi was in his element at dinner, proud of whatever dish he had just created. The table they sat around was part of this pride – a beautiful slab of iroko wood that had been in his family for generations. Femi blessed the food he had laid out in front of them. ‘Oya, make we chop,’ he said, with a

big, toothy smile. He and Dapo looked so alike when he smiled like that. Their dark brown skin was an identical hue and they both had perfect oval faces with almond shaped eyes. Femi wore his hair in a big afro, like so many these days. Even surgeons like him.

Before picking up even a mouthful of food in his small hand, Dapo began firing out questions. ‘So, what happened at The Field today, Mummy?’ Adeola was not sure how to answer. Well, my son, I saw something I could not explain and all I could do was phone someone who will not take the time to understand it. She ate hungrily, scooping up three big mouthfuls with her fingers, particularly savoring the crayfish. ‘Mmm. Femi! This is so good.’ Eventually Adeola turned her eyes to Dapo and said with a theatrical sigh, ‘Well, I shouldn’t really be telling you this, but...’ Dapo’s eyes lit up as she paused dramatically. ‘You wouldn’t believe it, but we had another attack from those Hausas!’ ‘Abeg, can we just eat?’ Femi’s tone was beseeching. Adeola kept her eyes fixed on Dapo. ‘Just imagine. I was patrolling the perimeter with my rifle. Everything was fine. Normal. Then pa-pam! Out of thin air, five Hausa operatives jumped the border wall and surrounded me! I pretty much vaporised two of them as they landed, then I jumped out of the way of the others and rolled behind some cover. The remaining three just kept shooting and shooting. It was like the New Year’s fireworks.’ Dapo listened in awe, his food growing cold, as Adeola recounted the story. He was in a daze trying to picture his brave mother in action – trying

to comprehend how much she risked every day as she worked as the first line of defence against the Hausa Revolutionary State. At intervals, he interjected with ‘Walai!’, receiving murmurs of disapproval from both parents. Eventually the tale came towards its conclusion. ‘I held on until drone support came and finished them. All praise to Almighty Olodumare. No survivors but me,’ Adeola announced. ‘Those Hausas should have stayed on their side of the border, with their cows and dried meat!’ Dapo exploded into laughter at this and Adelola allowed herself to laugh at her own joke. Femi rolled his eyes but remained silent. Adeola avoided his gaze. She could spin a yarn that rivalled any of the cartoons her son watched on his quantum pad. Today she did it almost without thinking – what really occupied her mind was the troubling drone footage.

//// ‘So, how was it with Dapo and Jimmy today?’ Adeola reclined on an oval chaise lounge, its blue and white pattern of circles and hexagons complementing the purple jumpsuit she now wore. She usually missed visits from Dapo’s friends. ‘Fine. They just stayed in his room playing screen games, really. I had some post-op reports to file, but I checked on them a couple of times and they seemed to be having a good time,’ Femi replied. He was in the kitchen on the other side of the open-plan living area. For a few moments he continued putting away dishes, his back to Adeola. He coughed lightly and continued. ‘You know... I heard Dapo telling Jimmy one of your work stories. He... um... he made quite a lot of it.’ ‘Hmph. He did, eh?’ There was an edge to Adeola’s voice. Femi hesitated.

‘Yes... he did. Twenty HRS agents instead of ten. Fighter jets coming in to bail you out rather than drones. That kind of thing. And of course, you are always working alone when he tells it. But I guess that part is true to your versions, right?’ Femi knew there would be no answer. ‘I mean... today’s story. Was that really the way it went? I know there have been more Hausa incursions recently, but are they not still quite rare?’ ‘Why would I lie to our son?’ Adeola retorted. ‘I don’t know. I... look. Forget it. I’m just saying maybe let’s be more careful about which stories you bring home from work.’ ‘I see. And would this be to protect Dapo, or spare your own sense of shame about where your wife works?’ ‘Hey-yeh! I’m not ashamed of you, Ade. Can we just calm things down a bit?’ ‘I am calm! When I am not calm, you will know about it!’ Femi put a plate down on the kitchen counter and turned around, arms out and palms raised. ‘Abeg, Ade. You know how I feel. The work you do is very important. Even without fighting off dozens of HRS agents.’ ‘It was not dozens. It was not ten. It was five. The Hausas are getting more and more desperate and incursions into our territory are becoming more frequent.’ Adeola was now sitting upright glaring at Femi. He knew none of this was true. When Adeola lied, the details became very specific. She stood up abruptly. ‘I tell you a few things when I come home, but I barely scratch the surface, to be honest. You think because you watch the news that you know what is going on. Trust me. You don’t.’ Adeola began to pace, patrolling the area between the chaise lounge and the dining table. She was getting more and more wound up and her voice when she continued was bitter. ‘You don’t know anything. The Hausas keep trying, trying, trying. Every legal challenge they can make. African Union. United Nations.

After that, the Hague. All of them have sided with Yorubaland. They cannot do it legally, so they want to spoil The Field and then take back that land by force.’ ‘We took it by force, did we not?’ Femi’s voice was barely a whisper. ‘Ehe! Ehe!’ Adeola clapped her hands. ‘Yes, Femi!’ She had finally arrived in the kitchen and stood in front of Femi, jabbing a finger towards his face as she spoke. ‘Finally you say something real. Some of what is really in that head of yours. The sky is wide enough for all to fly without colliding. Isn’t that what our people say? That land was barren. The Hausas had abandoned it. Yes, Yorubas took it. We transformed West Africa with it. Changed the world with it. People like you and those herdsmen over the wall want us to go back to using oil.’ ‘Okay, you are just being stupid now. Wa–’ Femi stopped himself, but not quickly enough. ‘Walai?’ Adeola grinned darkly. ‘Look. I’m not going to continue this.’ Once again Femi had both hands up in a defensive posture. ‘Just don’t be surprised when Dapo’s friends expect you to arrive home by helicopter and do a commando roll into the house as it explodes.’ He jerked into his silliest action hero pose, the kind of thing he would do for Dapo, flexing both biceps with legs wide apart. They laughed, and the conversation turned to other things.

//// Back then, before everything that happened, I dreamed of working at The Field. It made Mummy smile when I said that. Dad would always come back with something like ‘You know, Mummy could have done any job she wanted’

or ‘You have plenty of time to make your mind up, Dapo.’ I tried to imagine being a remote surgeon like him. Sometimes he would call me into the study and show me a live feed from a robot before they wheeled a patient in. Or he would tell me stories about surgery with all the gruesome bits left in, trying to appeal to my boyish delight in the secretions and squelches of the human body.

It is almost painful to remember how hard he tried when he must have known there was no way to compete with Mummy. Surgery was something done from home, in safety, remotely overseeing a robot in a dark room somewhere. Mummy was out in the sun and the dust, protecting Yorubaland with her sweat. Every morning as I walked through the gate of Kingdoms College, I saw the school crest – a huge Gelede mask framed by the proverb: Lack of wisdom in youth is imbecility in adulthood. To this day, I still don’t really know what that means. So much space in my brain is taken up by proverbs like that. The rabbit that eats yams and enjoys them will return for more. That’s a good one. Or... The journey is never so pleasant that the parrot does not return home. I could go on. We all had to learn them, each one a little longer and more complicated than the last. Year after year until we graduated high school. Yorubas were famous for their adamantine memories. It was part of what made us great. Kemi laughed at it, like she did about so much else. She understood that feats of human memory were pointless when everyone had a quantum pad.

Morning Break was only fifteen minutes – not long enough to get a decent game going. Some students would head onto the central playing field anyway but others like me would lounge in one of the three smaller outdoor areas. Kingdoms College had an enormous L-shaped main building. Many of the classrooms looked out onto the central field. Anyone wrestling, footracing or playing soccer knew they had an audience. That particular morning, Mummy’s story was all I could think about and I sat on a bench in a reverie, my mind turning over each florid detail. ‘Dapo Daps!’ Kemi’s voice came from behind with a shake of my shoulders. ‘Kemi Kems! How far? You scared me, o.’ ‘Daps. You really need to stop being so soft! Anyway, what’s up? You’re staring into space again.’ Her afro was in two puffs that day, accentuating the almost triangular shape of her face, which was often bisected by an enormous grin. She had three horizontal grooves on each cheek, matched by three vertical grooves along each temple. ‘Walai! Momsi was telling me the craziest story last night. I was just thinking about it. Do you remember that class trip we took to The Field? I wish I could go back. I ask Momsi almost every day. Security is crazy, right now. It has to be. ‘ ‘They’re just paranoid, I’ve told you. My dad says so all the time.’ Kemi’s tone was breezy. She loved any break from schoolwork, any reason to be outside. The sunshine on her light brown skin was such a natural sight. At home she would be wearing a European-style romper suit in some outrageous colour or a psychedelic-patterned ankara dress. No shoes, of course. She despised the pale grey shirt and trousers we all wore at school. I, on the other hand, loved putting on that uniform. With my hair cut like Mummy’s, I really looked the part when I saluted myself in the mirror each morning.

‘Your dad doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Does he work at The Field? Kai! Momsi says the Hausas are taking things to the next level now. Like, I shouldn’t be telling you this, but...’ ‘I know, I know. Your Momsi is fighting those HRS agents off left, right and centre. Walai ta lai, Dapo! How many times do I have to hear this?’ Kemi had a way of smiling as she said things like this. An off-balance smile, like you really were frying her brain. It was a very effective means of making a person feel quite silly.

‘Don’t blame me! Blame the Hausas! If not for Momsi, they would have taken over by now. I’m sure of it. And then we would have no electricity and no more school.’ ‘Dapo. My short-haired friend. What. Are. You. Talking. About?’ The smile remained, but now Kemi also had a hand on each of my cheeks. Then she gave me a playful rap on the top of my head with the knuckles of each fist. ‘We’re the ones who started the fight with the Hausas, remember? My Dad knows these things. Your Momsi should know too if she works at The Field. Did you ask her about it yet?’ ‘Kai! Why would I ask a dumb question like that, eh? Walai! Momsi would totally lose it. And what if she went to work and asked them about it and then they got really angry and fired her? And anyway, how would your dad know?’ I didn’t like Kemi saying things like this. I started getting a prickly, warm feeling and my voice went funny as I spoke. ‘He’s a history professor at Eko University, dummy. It’s his job. Yoruba soldiers killed loads of Hausa people and took their land. And then we built The Field.’ I couldn’t think of a comeback. ‘That stupid Field was built on

blood and lies.’ She lowered her tone as she said this, mimicking her father. ‘My dad says that all the time when people come over for dinner. Anyway, I’m going to get some water before class starts. See you in there. Don’t catch any flies in that open mouth!’ Kemi gave me one last shove and then was gone. I sat, inert, thinking of all the things I could have said. I barely noticed the talking drum on the announcement system signalling the end of Morning Break.

//// ‘Build women. Always we. It’s like. My say friend. In just the done work. Move hard once.’ Solomon spoke the seemingly meaningless words to the two pixelated faces in the chat window on the screen in front of him. He knew that they could not see his face either. Not yet, anyway. ‘It’s like we always say, my friend. Men build. Women just move in once the hard work is done,’ the person on the left answered, their voice heavily pitch-shifted. ‘And may I request a less imbecilic phrase next time?’ ‘Whatever. Numerical verification,’ Solomon said this evenly. ‘And I had better hear both of you reciting it. On my mark.’ A countdown from five appeared on their screens. The count reached zero and they spoke in unison the twenty-five digit number they had been given earlier – told to them verbally, and just once. Their unified recital of the number was the final proof needed that all parties were who they said they were and had not been compromised. ‘Two-way quantum encryption in place’, barked a computer-generated voice, and the faces of the three participants became visible. Everyone relaxed a little. The man and woman Solomon now saw had similar 21

features – slender faces with exceptionally straight noses and dark skin that made their eyes and teeth seem to twinkle from their faces. Both wore tan military uniforms with short sleeves. The man, Yusuf, was Solomon’s contact in the Hausa Revolutionary State. He did not know the woman. Her conical Fulani hat partially obscured her face and made it difficult to read her expressions. Yusuf and his colleague, in their turn, could now see Solomon’s almost impossibly symmetrical face, a diamond shape that mirrored the solidity of his torso. He had a thick beard to match his copious afro. No tribal marks. Had he smiled, they would have seen his eyes crease almost shut. There would be little smiling during this conversation, however. ‘Alhaji, how far now?’ Solomon said to Yusuf. ‘Who’s your friend? And how about she takes off her hat?’ ‘Solomon. Good to see you, brother–’ Yusuf began in stilted Yoruba. ‘His friend can speak for herself,’ the woman started. ‘We have cleared all the security checks. The hat stays.’ Whoever this woman was, she spoke crisp Yoruba with almost no accent. ‘Aisha is handling the – how you say? Yes! Technical side,’ Yusuf continued. ‘I thought better you should speak to her directly about what happened today.’ ‘Well, Aisha, if you are in charge of the technical side, maybe you can explain why the visual dispersion field around your drone failed yesterday. I said before that I didn’t favour this idea because the drone would still be visible on infrared. But there was also quite a noticeable bump in the visual field where the drone was moving.’ ‘Hello Solomon. What can I say? The tech isn’t perfect yet. If we had the proper level of investment from our government, maybe it would be. Things are tight here. Not something a Yoruba would understand.’

‘Don’t give me that. Ba a hada gudu da susar katara. Isn’t that what you people say? It is impossible to race beyond your speed.’ ‘Your pronunciation is poor, but that’s the general idea, yes,’ Aisha replied. Solomon found this arrogance typical of the Fulanis he had dealt with in the past. They were such a numerous people, found in pockets throughout West Africa. Excellent with languages and skilled traders. If they could ever unite, they would be a significant force. But they were too self-satisfied for that. Solomon still found it strange seeing a Hausa and Fulani sitting together working for a common cause. Yorubaland was the enemy of many. ‘Let me propose something more manageable for you.’ Solomon shifted in his seat, feeling like the pale grey walls had contracted around him. He was tired of these conversations. ‘With the right code fed into the system at the right time, I can alter the feeds from the cameras and sensors in Obalende Sector. It can only be done for a very limited window, not more than five or six minutes. But with today’s drone having successfully delivered the first part of the package, a few minutes should be enough to complete things.’ ‘How do we know we can trust your code?’ said Aisha. ‘You can trust it about as well as I could trust your visual dispersal tech. You need it to work. I tell you it can work. We go from there. If not, we stop this here and never speak again. I have taken enough chances. Now at least I am in control of the riskiest elements.’ ‘You have done well,’ Yusuf interjected. ‘Let us not talk of ‘stop’. We understand you. A dog does not boast in the leopard’s bush, abi?’ Yusuf allowed himself a grin here. ‘We continue with the plan but do your way. Three to four minutes is all we will need for the second drone.’ ‘Okay. Agreed, then. Doing this at the arranged time is very important, o! I cannot stress that enough. There will be no physical patrols, of course, but as you may have heard we do have one or two drones of our own keeping

watch.’ At this, finally, there were smiles all around. The government of Yorubaland was the world’s leading importer of drones. Solomon cleared his throat. ‘I believe we are still in agreement that we do not want to take life, yes?’ ‘You two are in agreement. Our superiors are, too. For the record, I am not,’ Aisha said quickly. ‘You Yorubas took enough life when you drove us from that land. You continue to take lives along the border. I have no qualms about taking Yoruba lives. What’s it to you, anyway? You run very little risk of ever getting caught.’ ‘But there is still a risk! If they catch me and all we did was damage some solar panels, I will go to jail. On Earth. If I become an accessory to murder, they will teleport me to the moon! I’m sure your spies have told you we have started doing that now. Those matter transporters are not meant for humans. No one is going to use me for their experiments!’ Solomon violently pointed at his temple as he said this. He was leaning forward in his chair now. ‘Anyway, why am I even discussing it with you? Alhaji, no lives taken. Agreed?’ ‘Agreed.’ Yusuf said, without looking at Aisha.

//// There was nothing sweeter than putting the ball into the net with Kemi in goal. The look of utter surprise and disgust was the same every single time, like I had never scored against her before. That day I had put two past her and was looking for a hat-trick. I can replay it in my mind like I’m watching it on a quantum pad. Kemi had just parried a shot over the bar. Jimmy walked to the right corner flag, ready about to put the ball in. As I jostled

with opponents in front of Kemi’s goal, I could see faces in many classroom windows. Jimmy raised both arms straight up, letting our team know he would kick the ball towards the near post. He fired it in and I jumped... just in time to hear frantic drumming coming over the announcement system. Not calling us back to class, but raising the alarm. I landed face-first in the grass and lay there for a few moments. The expected jibes from Kemi did not come straight away. She wanted to make sure I was okay before laughing in my face. ‘You would probably have missed anyway, Daps,’ she teased as she helped me off the ground. ‘Shut up. Were you even trying to stop any of my shots?’ I accompanied this with what I considered my most superior, sarcastic face. We knew what to do when an alarm sounded. Within minutes we were lined up in alphabetical order across the centre of the playing field. A drone hovered above us projecting a huge image of Mrs Bankole, our head teacher. Her severe face gazed down on us just as it would in person and there was complete silence as she spoke. ‘Good afternoon, students. I am interrupting your scheduled classes and activities to bring you some news about The Field. Roughly half an hour ago there was an explosion at one of the sectors nearest the Hausa border. For safety’s sake, we are sending you home early. It is only a precaution, but we at Kingdoms College feel that you should be with your families. Pack your bags quickly and proceed to the front gate in an orderly fashion. Please let me reiterate: you are in no immediate danger. We hope to welcome you back tomorrow for classes as normal. You are dismissed.’

Mrs Bankole disappeared and the drone moved out in front of the first child in the line. It hovered towards the main school building and we followed in silence, matching the drone’s pace until we reached our home room. No one was really talking much as we gathered our things. I could feel Kemi looking over at me, trying to catch my eye. I kept my head down as I filled my bag with my devices, water bottle and football boots. There was a smile on my face. I couldn’t help it. Soon everyone would know just how amazing Mummy was, fending off another attack from the HRS. Outside school it was controlled chaos. Bus after bus being loaded and sent off every few minutes. It was louder now. Three thousand students or so, all talking. The grin remained on my face. My cheeks were actually starting to hurt a little. Our class group was next in line for a bus. The drone we followed stopped suddenly and we all bumped into each other. ‘Stupid drone!’ I remember saying that to Kemi because of what happened next. The drone approached me at top speed and then hovered in front of me for a facial scan. ‘Dapo Ogunleye. Report to the staff pickup area immediately.’ The drone said nothing more. ‘Am I in trouble? Abeg, I’m sorry I called you stupid!’ I blurted the apology in a slight panic, even though I knew the drones at school were not smart enough to take offense. ‘Dapo Ogunleye. Report to the staff pickup area immediately.’ ‘So I’m not in trouble?’ This time the drone did not reply.

‘Must be something to do with The Field, Daps,’ Kemi said, giving me a good-natured shove. ‘Maybe they’re fast-tracking you to Momsi’s medal ceremony!’ ‘Yeah. That’s got to be it. I’ll see you later.’ Something felt odd. I was not smiling anymore. The staff pickup area was not close. I had to go back through the school gates and walk to the far side of the central playing field. I passed a couple of teachers, but otherwise the whole school was empty. I felt gooseflesh on my arms like it was Harmattan and I had forgotten a shawl. I started humming the tune Mummy often sang as she pottered around the house. Then I saw who was waiting for me. I stopped for a few seconds. No more humming. ‘Mr Dauda?’ I do not know who I thought would be coming to meet me. Dad, maybe. I figured Mummy would be at The Field. But why was Mr Dauda here? ‘Yes Dapo, how far? Your Dad is at work. At the hospital. This one he could not do from home. You know... because of the attack. Jump in the moto. I’ll take you to him.’ We got into his car and Mr. Dauda said, ‘Second Obaluaye Hospital. Full speed.’ ‘Here Dapo, have some chocolate,’ Mr Dauda always seemed to have a stash of sweets in the car. It didn’t seem to make him fat, either. He was a rake of a man, really. Many of the Hausas I had seen were like that. Mr Dauda had a wrinkly face with no tribal marks. When I was very small, Dad would tell me off for staring at him but he was the only plain-faced person I knew apart from Dad.

Mr Dauda grew up with Dad in the Hausa Kingdom. My grandmother had taken him under her wing at the Yorubaland consulate where she worked. I never really thought of Mr Dauda as a Hausa, but there in the car it was suddenly the only thing I wanted to ask him about. His face looked strange, though. Kind of set in a mask. None of his usual smiles and bad jokes. We listened to the news in silence. Mr Dauda sighed and kissed his teeth at various points, usually when they mentioned the Hausas. Another question came to me, and this one I had to ask. ‘Uncle, why haven’t they mentioned Mummy yet?’ ‘What... do you mean?’ Mr Dauda’s mask of a face hardened, like he was trying to lift something.

‘Well, Mummy would have been fighting the HRS today at The Field. I thought they would have interviewed her or something. Isn’t that why I was pulled out of school? Because she’s getting some kind of medal?’ ‘I don’t know about that Dapo. I really... Ah. Look. We are just about there now.’ The car pulled up to the main entrance of the hospital. ‘And there is your father to greet you.’

////

Femi stood at the top of the entrance steps and watched Dapo jump out of the sleek Peugeot Driverless. True to its name, Second Obaluaye Hospital had a sixteen-foot tall bronze sculpture at its entrance. All who came to the hospital had to pass by the Yoruba orisha of healing. Dapo seemed excited. What on earth had Abubakar been telling him in the car? The boy bounded up two steps at a time and grabbed his father, holding onto him like a float in deep water. It was then that Femi realised it was not excitement propelling Dapo. Femi started to sob. He could not help it. As his body began to shake, Dapo looked up. The look of confusion in his eyes brought Femi out of his grief.

‘Dapo, my beautiful boy, sit with me here.’ Femi led his son to a bench in the grassy forecourt of the hospital. After a major terrorist attack, one would expect the hospital to be buzzing. Not so. Drones and solar panels were repaired or recycled elsewhere. This was simply the place where the repairs failed for one or two humans from time to time. The scene around them was so peaceful. ‘Your mother...’ Femi began. ‘Mummy... Dapo. She... she was a hero.’ ‘I know she’s a hero, Dad! But where is she?’ ‘Dapo, Mummy... the doctors tried, you know. Everyone did their best. But she was at The Field when HRS... when the Hausas attacked. There was an explosion. She was killed. She died.’ A scream emerged from Dapo’s mouth that pierced the calm around them. Femi held him close as he sobbed into his chest. ‘No, no, no, no!’ he shouted. He thrashed at Femi with a flurry of punches, flailed his legs wildly. Femi did not know what to say. What was there to say? After his screams had died down, Dapo lifted his head. ‘What happened? Tell me what happened,’ he asked in a hoarse, strangulated voice. ‘The details are classified, Dapo. You know how it is. But they told me she saved a lot of lives.’ Femi wiped his tears, gave a big cough. ‘She was fighting off thirty HRS soldiers. Imagine that! Thirty! But their bomb went off before... before the fighter jets could come in and save her.’ Dapo sniffed and rubbed his eyes. ‘Really?’ Femi exhaled through a quivering lip and smiled. ‘Yes. Not just a hero. A superhero.’ ‘Wow,’ Dapo replied. A weak smile came to his face as he laid his head on his father’s lap, his face still wet with tears, thinking about his mother.

Adeola could tell from the moment the call ended. The little laugh that danced on the edge of everything the Reviewer had said to her. The drone footage she had flagged would be lost in a bureaucratic labyrinth. ‘Are you crazy? Are you crazy, Adeola?’ She said it to no one in particular. She was at her desk. How many millions got their electricity from the Obalende Sector alone? How many vehicles were powered by it? Perhaps some of this electricity went to the Space Teleportation programme at Ile Ife. Perhaps some went to Dapo’s school. The drones and AIs that carried out and assisted Femi’s medical work could well be sustained by the Obalende Sector, too. The blood that soaked this soil had not been spilt in vain.

I almost hit the prey I was aiming for, Adeola thought. She picked up the phone. ‘This is 18A 6B. Notifying you that I will be performing a physical patrol of Obalende.’ ‘Please wait a moment.’ The operative’s voice was unfamiliar but laced with recognizable disinterest. ‘I am transferring you.’ A woodblock chimed at two-second intervals to ensure Adeola she had not been cut off. ‘18A 6B. What possible reason could you have for requesting a physical patrol?’ It was her supervisor, Solomon. Adeola had hoped to avoid this. Solomon was not a man who appreciated interruptions to routine. ‘I flagged some footage for urgent review.’ Adeola swallowed. ‘It has not been seen yet. I feel I must follow up.’

‘Look. This is not the 1990s. We have drones for this now. The drones can see what we cannot.’ ‘Yes, but we cannot see what they can see. We only see what they show us.’ ‘You are not making sense. You are, in fact, embarrassing yourself.’ Solomon paused and Adeola heard him adjust his sitting position. ‘Listen, my dear. I am telling you this for your own good. Your review call has not been followed up because your peers and superiors are laughing at you. That makes me look bad, even if you weren’t someone I hired. You had good marks at every stage of assessment before you got this job, you even got a promotion last year. But I think you want your role here to be something different from what it is.’ ‘Oh? I don’t follow you, sir’ Adeola felt prickly heat. A single bead of perspiration ran from her right armpit. ‘We are not here to defend against the Hausas. We have not been for a long time. The drones and the algorithms do it better. You are in that observation tower because of one hundred per cent employment. It’s that simple. Also, the general populace feel better knowing there are still humans at The Field.’ ‘Thank you, Sir. But I would still like to go down there and take a look for myself. It will take fifteen minutes at most. And, as you say, the algorithms are doing all the work anyway. I will not be missed.’ ‘Hmm. No. You will not.’ Solomon paused to click and type. ‘Make sure you wear your high-vis ID helmet or the drones may mistake you for the trouble you seem to be looking for. I have just given you access to a folder on the server called “Emergency Protocols Scenario C.”’ This time he did hang up.

Adeola clicked through to the folder Solomon had mentioned and then opened the drawer in the bottom of her desk that contained her ID helmet, which emitted a beacon identifying the wearer to the drones. ‘I am doing this for you, Dapo. I am doing this for you, too, Femi. Damn you, Sir. Laugh at me all you like.’ And with that, Adeola opened the door and made her way down onto The Field. The explosion that killed her also obliterated her look of absolute surprise.

Fig. 1 – The Staff of Oranmiyan. Commemorative obelisk erected to honour Oranmiyan Omoluabi Odede, Great Prince of Ife, founder of the Oyo Empire. Sited at Ile-Ife for centuries before being moved to The Field to mark the rediscovered greatness of Yorubaland.

Front cover and pages 7 & 35: Exhibit69 @exhibit69 Pages 10 & 26: Kieron Boothe @kieron_boothe Pages 20 & 30: Rome @romeplusart Edited by Lucy Kingett Raising funds for Black Minds Matter