The red metal box was heavier than Adekunle could have imagined. It was not just the weight of the hardened steel sockets and wrenches inside, but the crushing, terrifying weight of hope. He clutched it to his chest as he and Ben scrambled back through the jagged hole in the corrugated iron fence, the sharp metal tearing a fresh rip in his trousers. The alley was silent. Their ghost had done its work, and the mad king was left to his crumbling fortress of whispers. There was no time for pity, no room for guilt. Every second they spent here was a second stolen from Funke.
They didn't retrace their steps through the desolate construction site. That route was too open, and the memory of the feral dog pack was a fresh, chilling deterrent. Ben, his internal map of the city as sharp as ever, chose a different path, one that led them deeper into the warren of residential streets, a place of high walls and narrow lanes where they could, he hoped, remain unseen.
Carrying the toolbox was a two-man job. It was awkward and heavy, banging against their legs, its contents clanking softly with every hurried step. That sound, the gentle music of their potential salvation, was also a dinner bell in the dead quiet of the night. Anyone who heard it would know it was the sound of quality tools, a prize beyond measure in this broken world. They were no longer just two desperate men. They were a target.
The city had changed again in the few hours they had been inside the shop. A new smell had joined the familiar scents of dust and decay: the smell of rain. The air had grown heavy and humid, the sky above now a thick, oppressive blanket of cloud that swallowed the faint light of the moon and stars. The darkness was absolute, a profound, ink-black void that their eyes struggled to penetrate. They were moving almost blind, relying on memory and the feel of the road beneath their feet.
"It is the rainy season," Ben muttered, his voice a low rumble beside Adekunle. "It has been holding off. It will not hold off for much longer."
The thought of a torrential Lagos downpour, which in the old world was a cleansing, life-giving event, was now a new and terrifying threat. A storm would turn the streets into rivers, wash away landmarks, and bring a bone-chilling cold. But it would also mask their sound. It was a double-edged sword, and they were walking on the blade.
They moved through a street lined with expensive, high-walled houses, the kind with private security and ornate gates. Here, the silence was different. It felt curated, as if the wealth of the former occupants had left behind a ghost of its own composure. But the gates were all broken, hanging open like slack jaws. The houses were dark voids. Whatever money and influence the owners had possessed, it had offered them no protection from the Fall.
It was on this street that they found the new sigil of the apocalypse. Scrawled on the wall of a large, white mansion, in what looked like charcoal from a fire, was a single, stark symbol: a circle with three jagged lines cutting through it, like a shattered eye. They saw another one fifty feet later on a different gate, then a third on the pavement itself.
"What is it?" Adekunle whispered, stopping to stare at the crude drawing.
"A warning," Ben said, his voice grim. "Or a claim. A gang mark. Someone is organizing. They are marking their territory."
Blade's militia had not been an isolated phenomenon. It was happening all over. The city was being carved up, new borders being drawn street by street. They were trespassers, moving through a land whose new, brutal laws they did not understand. The knowledge spurred them on, adding a fresh layer of urgency to their flight.
They were a block away from the Al-Hassan Superstore when the first drop of rain fell. It was a single, heavy drop that splattered on Adekunle's forehead, as warm as blood. Another followed, then a third. Within seconds, the heavens opened.
The rain that fell was not a gentle shower. It was a vertical flood, a solid wall of water that hit the ground with the force of a thousand tiny hammers. The sound was deafening, a roaring, hissing deluge that instantly swallowed all other noise. The streets turned to slick, black mirrors, and the air grew thick with the smell of wet earth and hot tarmac.
They were soaked to the bone in an instant. The rain plastered their clothes to their skin, and a deep, penetrating chill began to set in. But the storm was a gift. A cloak. Under the cover of the roaring downpour, they could move faster, with less fear of being heard.
They ran the last block, their feet splashing through the instant rivers that formed in the gutters. They reached the corner and looked toward the supermarket. The fortress was still there, a dark, silent monolith in the driving rain. It was untouched, unclaimed. They had made it.
They took shelter under the narrow concrete awning of a closed bank across the street, the roar of the rain on the metal roof above them almost as loud as the storm itself. They were shivering, their teeth chattering with a combination of cold and nervous energy. Ben set the red toolbox down with a heavy, final-sounding thud. They had brought the key to the lock.
Now they had to plan the break-in.
"The noise…" Adekunle shouted over the roar of the rain. "Even this storm won't cover the sound of breaking those bolts."
"I know!" Ben shouted back, his face a mask of dripping water and intense concentration. He was staring at the maintenance panel above the shutter, a dark square against a dark wall. "We have to be fast. One bolt. The one at the bottom corner. That is all we need. We don't have to take the whole panel off. We just need to break one corner loose, bend the steel plate back, just enough for me to get my hand inside."
It was still a huge risk. The sound of a heavy wrench on a steel bolt, the high-pitched shriek of metal giving way—those were sounds that cut through anything. Sounds that signaled a prize being claimed.
"We do it during the worst of the storm," Ben decided, his voice resolute. "When the thunder comes, if it comes. That will be our cover."
So they waited. Two shivering figures huddled under an awning, their prize at their feet, while the world drowned around them. Adekunle's mind drifted back to the flat. Was the roof leaking? Was Funke cold? Was she still breathing? The urgency was a physical pain, a fire in his chest that fought against the encroaching chill of the rain.
After what felt like an eternity, the sky lit up with a brilliant, silent flash of sheet lightning, illuminating the entire street in a stark, blue-white glare for a fraction of a second. The world looked like a photograph of a dead city. Five seconds later, the thunder arrived. It wasn't a rumble; it was a physical concussion, a deafening crack that shook the very ground beneath their feet, rolling on and on, a sound powerful enough to wake the dead.
"NOW!" Ben roared, grabbing the toolbox.
They sprinted across the street, the rain so thick it was like running through a waterfall. They reached the base of the supermarket wall, directly beneath the maintenance panel. Ben fumbled with the clasps on the toolbox, his cold, wet fingers clumsy. He threw the lid open. Inside, the tools lay gleaming and dry, a beautiful, perfect arsenal.
He selected the heavy breaker bar and found the star-shaped socket bit that matched the security bolts. He fitted them together. The tool was heavy, solid. A weapon of creation, not destruction.
"Give me a lift!" he shouted to Adekunle.
Adekunle braced himself against the wall, cupping his hands. Ben, with a grunt of effort, placed a muddy boot into his hands and climbed, using Adekunle's shoulders as a platform. He was just tall enough to reach the bottom-right bolt on the panel. He fitted the socket over the bolt head. It was a perfect match.
Another flash of lightning bleached the world white. Adekunle looked up and saw his uncle, poised against the wall, breaker bar in hand, a figure of grim, desperate purpose. He looked like a man trying to break into heaven, or out of hell.
The thunder crashed again, a rolling, apocalyptic roar.
At that exact moment, Ben threw all of his weight onto the breaker bar.
There was a sound that no storm could cover. A high-pitched, protesting shriek of tortured metal, followed by a loud, sharp CRACK as the hardened bolt sheared under the immense torque.
It was done. One corner was free.
Ben slid down, his feet hitting the ground with a splash. He handed the breaker bar to Adekunle. "Your turn," he said, his chest heaving. "You are thinner. Your arm will fit. Pry it open."
Adekunle took the heavy bar, his heart pounding in his throat. He used the chisel end, forcing it into the tiny gap they had created. He pulled, using the wall as a fulcrum. The steel plate groaned, then began to bend, peeling back from the wall. He pulled harder, straining every muscle in his arms and back. The gap widened. Six inches. Eight inches. It was enough.
He dropped the bar and, without hesitation, plunged his hand and forearm into the dark, jagged opening he had created. He felt a sharp pain as the edge of the metal sliced into his skin, but he ignored it. His fingers scrabbled in the darkness inside, feeling for wires, for a circuit board, and then… he found it. A thick metal lever, cool to the touch. The manual override clutch.
He gripped it, took a deep breath, and pulled.