Freetown, Sierra Leone
CniDaria 25
"We're assassins our impact will always go nameless."
It's been 12 years since I've stood here on this road, in front of the ruin that used to be our apartment building. I look around and the deserted neighborhood is no longer a scar on the earth. It was now a ruin made up of collapsed buildings and overgrown vegetation. I guess that's an improvement in a sense. If this place can show growth and that it's possible to heal, maybe I can too. We were back in our hometown which we had limped away from all those years ago. I didn't know how I would feel coming back. We narrowly escaped death multiple times that night and never felt more hopeless than I did here. As I look at the abandoned streets I keep getting flashes of memories in this place; good and bad. Where I learned how to ride a bike for the first time; in the same place where I dragged Ty away from our burning apartment. Well, it was no mistake saying that we have been a lot better off since then. Instead of dragging around half burnt valuables to sell for a quarter of its worth, we were freshly made billionaires. The weapon, ammunition, military, and technology stock we bought from a huge portion of Lucius savings that we took right before we left the states, has been growing for years now while the war has been raging across the world. Now that World War III was coming to a close and transitioning to perhaps another cold war it was the proper time to finally sell the portfolio that my brother had been sitting on for so long. The acquisition of a precious mineral manufacturing company here pushed us well over the Billionaire status. My new sister-in-law was ecstatic that we had the foresight to plan. I had expected her to want to settle down back in Australia, buy a mansion and live in luxury for the rest of her days without a care in the world. She defied my expectations and suggested we come back here to Sierra Leone and rebuild our old neighborhood. Ty agreed with no hesitation. I'm sure Nala's big heart made him feel warm inside that she suggested on her own. She probably felt invigorated that she was dictating things. Unfortunately, this was always the plan to move back to West Africa. Just maybe not Sierra Leone. I however, didn't so readily agree to come back home. Nala was a lot smarter than we ever gave her credit for and I couldn't help but think she had an ulterior motive for all this. I didn't like it when people played shrink with me, and I couldn't help but feel like she was doing this to deal with the feelings of our past which she only recently found out about. Ty told her everything about our past. Every action and sin we've committed since leaving this place. The way she's been acting however, I have a feeling that he told her half-truths. I fully expected her look towards me to change after their conversation, and I was right. Not in the way I thought though. She used to look at me with the same eyes as Ty did when he was younger. The eyes of the younger sibling looking for approval and acceptance from the older sibling. I expected her look towards me to change to fear and hesitation. Our ideals are selfish and evil, both me and Ty understand that any morally sound person would rebuke our actions. Her look however was filled with curiosity and pity. I didn't speak with Ty about his conversation with her. Seeing how happy he was I just assumed it went well. It seemed like the only plausible way to do it though. The least amount of risk and blow back, tell her just actions and not motives. Tell her what we did but never why. I don't blame him either. Living the life we have, seeing the things we have, experiencing the fear and chaos we have. A regular human being wouldn't get it. In her head she probably thinks we were forced into contract killing for a living and try our hardest to get away for years. Some sap bullshit. Maybe I'm just overthinking things, my big sister instincts making me overprotective. To be honest, to me if he did tell her the whole truth and this is the way she acts, so accepting and forgiving. That would be the most frightening thing in the world. Hades would have found his Persephone.
After walking around for a bit, I got tired of the endless memories and decided to go back the house. We bought a house on the beach with a nice view of the ocean something we always wanted as kids. The only view we ever got then was of slums now our back yard is the Atlantic. It was probably worth it to come back here just to accomplish this. When I got in, I saw Nala lying in the same spot I left her at, on the couch eating Hot Cheetos. It's only been two months since they got back from their honeymoon and Nala had gained a considerable amount of weight. I wanted to say something, but I couldn't bring myself to be so inconsiderate to my sister-in-law. Ty doesn't seem to care though. He still looks at her with the same love he always has. Seeing her in the same spot kind of annoyed me so I decided to relax on our veranda and watch the ocean. To my surprise I wasn't the only one enjoying the ocean breeze. My little brother was already here with a laptop on his lap and a beer in the other. I decided to look at him for a bit in the doorway. Marriage suited him. He was more tanned than he was before, the look of stress had faded away from him. Like a huge weight has been lifted from him. He took a deep breath and smile off into the distance. He looked as if he was at peace, like he was the Ty I knew before fire danced in his eyes. I sat next to him and mimicked him. Took a deep breath and exhaled. I guess being back here wasn't so bad. There's comfort in being home. Ty looked at me and smiled.
"Nice to see you finally sit down and relax Ni you've been on edge since we got here." I gave him a whimsical look and then sat back and closed my eyes.
"Well, being back here hasn't been the easiest brother. Memories continue to flood out making me doubt if it was the right idea to come back here." When I opened my eyes, he was looking at me full in the face. I noticed the coldness of his eyes yet again. At this point I'm pretty much the only living soul that remembers that there was warmth in them. To everyone else those were just his eyes. I knew better. The fiery drug called love still wasn't enough to melt that grey ice. It seemed like I wasn't the only one struggling with the past when he spoke there was sadness in his voice. Something I haven't heard in a while.
"I know what you mean, at night I lay awake seeing that fire with those screams of help echoing in my head. It hasn't been like this since we lived in Libya but it's necessary. For the things we've done there should be consequences, if I'm to be haunted for the rest of my life then so be it." I found it weird that the consequences for his actions were to be haunted by the actions done to him rather than the actions he's done to others. It took a while for me to understand this, but I finally understood that Ty and I were two different people. Feeling remorse for others that he didn't know wasn't in him but that let him cope better, make better decisions, survive, and flourish. My dreams and nightmares will always be filled with the faces of the deceased, but I won't run and cower from them. I viewed that as strength; I turned it into comfort. The visions were just a reminder that I'm alive.
"Why did you agree that we come back Ty? If you wanted to settle down here and rebuild this shit city, you didn't need me here. You and Nala could've handled it yourself. You have architecture and civil engineering contacts from college. You're an Electrical Engineer yourself you have what you need to rebuild that neighborhood. Why drag me here? The plan was for me to settle in Ghana." His smile returned and gave me a thoughtful look. He pulled his laptop towards and started to show me what he was working on.
"Well let's look at the world as a whole. Economically speaking African countries are the wealthiest countries in the world due to the rearrangement of borders on the other continents. As well as Africa having the most natural resources to sell to warring countries. So, while other countries depleted their wealth multiple African countries were gaining wealth exponentially. The time of an African renaissance is upon us. We manipulate this wealth to make this continent into one single Empire. We start here in our birth country. The first step is our old neighborhood, and we branch out from there. I admit I asked you here for selfish reasons. The more I thought about it, the more it felt right. If we were going to come back, why not make our home country the epicenter of the change that is coming. You're a huge part of this plan. The health system on this continent has always been seriously lacking. You're already the smartest and the most qualified doctor in the region. Rebuilding that system will go a long way. You're the co-owner of the most profitable company in all West Africa. Getting you to become the Surgeon General of this country will be child's play." His plan was amazing and in depth but not the plan we spoke of all those years ago in Lucius' house.