EP 2 - CHRYSANTUS MEETS HIS FATE.

Chrysantus returns home drunk with Angela, his ex who broke up with him due to financial instability. Nonso follows behind, only just tipsy. Chrysantus drops his fifth bottle for the night on the bedside table and collapses on the bed, spreading his arms wide, in a way that will have no space for anyone else. Angela goes to lie on him.

“Chris baby, hope you are not trying to sleep o. You know we have action tonight?” Angela says, caressing his back.

Chrysantus in a low, drunk tone “Now I’m your baby abi. Because I have gone to make money, you like me again. Ah, fear women. You people are wicked.”

“It’s not like that. Chris, you know you’ve always had my heart. I just wanted you to up your game, you know. I knew breaking up with you would wake you up. And because of that, you were motivated to go all out and see the result now. I know you want to thank me but don’t mention.”

Nonso is in stitches, Chrysantus manages a chuckle under sleepy eyes. “Awn. Please Nonso, clap for her on my behalf. Isn’t she wonderful?”

Nonso indulges and claps aloud. Goes down before a plastic chair and beats like they were drum sets. “Now the award goes to... the best in break up because the break up wasn’t really a break up, just that the lady chose to take a break because she wanted her partner to find a breakthrough. And now he eventually has, she’s back from the long break and wants to break her way back into his life. Ladies and gentlemen... please give it up, for the lost but found... ANGELA!

Chrysantus laughs and joins in matching Nonso’s vigorous clapping.

“Guys stop, it’s not funny.” Angela shakes her head, feigning being downcast.

“Swear you don’t want to laugh.” Nonso says, in between laughter. Angela covers her hand in her palms. Angela continues caressing, planting kisses on his back, unknowing to her, her efforts were rather drifting Chrysantus to sleep quicker. “Chrysantus, Chrysantus. Don’t tell me you have fallen asleep.”

Chrysantus falls asleep.

Angela hisses. “Wait, Nonso, tell me. What’s going on? How is Chris balling all of a sudden?”

Nonso makes out a wry grin, shaking his head, not wanting to disclose.

While asleep in the physical, he comes awake in an eerie ealm. Now unlike a typical dream, he might not be able to come out of this one because his soul is trapped. 

On a bare floor, he swayed his head side to side, feeling uneasy. His eyes open fully now and he stands up in a jolt, curious head turns.

He sees utter darkness, fused in graveyard silence, staggering, the weight consuming him.

He scans again but sees nothing, no object in sight, just hard earth his legs felt beneath. He felt swallowed up. His shaky breathing was all he could hear now, deafening to his own ears. 

Then slowly, a shadowy figure forges into view. Then a sound escorted right along – an ominous reverberating hum. It echoed in the abyss, slowly growing into a crescendo.

The figure, covered in red lights, like a light sweep, shaped in the form of a human body, thin in the distance, now heading stealthily towards him.

He wanted to talk but he felt the thick void, stuffed down his lungs.

He remembered he was just in the room with Chrysantus and Angela, but he was all alone, no one in sight. As he saw the figure approaching, his pulse began to throb, his palms now sweaty and his body quivering entirely. He knew he needed to move but he felt his muscles stiffened. When he saw the figure opening up the more, he forces his joint to move and just as he is about to run, he hears...

“Guy, why you no send back the money?” Nonso voice echoes in the eerie atmosphere.

“Nonso. Nonso, na you be that?” His voice quivers as he turns around, looking all over him to see where the sound could be coming from.

“The man call you say make you return the money but you no hear.” Angela said in the opposite direction.

He turns abruptly to the left direction. “Ah ah, Angela! But you were not there.”

“Return the money!” Both voices chorus now, in booming resonation.

“Wait, Nonso you de mad? No be me and you de chop the money? And where una de talk from? Where be this place?” The voices laugh, in a resounding echo.

The figure has been coming ever so closely towards him while he was distracted. He realized now when he was almost halfway. “Shit, it’s been a distraction.”

He began to run, as fast as his legs could carry. He kept hearing the voices.

“Why you no wan send back the money?” Nonso goes again.

“Guy leave me, you no de here. No de distract me.” He responds, in between gasping.

After he covered some grounds, he comes to a stop, not seeing the red figure trailing him any longer. Then he realises, he had just returned to the spot he was when he arrived. “No, no, no, what’s going on?” Looking around him, apprehensive. The figures appears again, walking towards him stealthily as before.

Apparently he never stopped walking to his direction because he knew he was going to return to the same spot. He is closing down on him now while hiding behind the thick void all the while. He fully revealed himself and by the time Chrysantus sees him, he lunges a dagger forward. Chrysantus staggers, falling backwards, stretching out his hand like to hold on to something.

“Abeg, abeg, no kill me. Wetin I do you? I am innocent.” Chrysantus pleads.

“Of 15 million? No, you are not.”

“Okay, na that money? I go return am, abeg!”

“It is too late.” The figure about to strike him when he loses footing, slips and touches a stake...

TBC... (Will Chrysantus die or make it out alive?)