Lagos Island – Early Morning
The sun slipped slowly over the lagoon, painting the waves in fractured gold. Bayo stood on his balcony, the hum of the city below like a restless drumbeat. The air smelled faintly of exhaust and salt — the perfume of a city that never slept, only schemed.
Last night had left its usual ghosts — rumors, warnings, and that creeping sense of being watched. Somewhere below, vendors set up their stalls, traffic horns began their morning quarrel, and the streets awakened with anxious purpose.
From here, the skyline shimmered — banks, offices, towers of polished glass reflecting the illusion of progress. But Bayo knew better. Beneath those lights lived shadows that fed on fear and greed. Every floor of glass hid a secret. Every promise came with a cost.
A knock came at the door. Tope entered, her hair undone, eyes weary, phone clutched like a weapon she no longer trusted.
"They raided Mutiu's cousin's printing shop," she said. "Confiscated everything. And the commissioner's office froze two of our accounts."
Bayo exhaled slowly, the breath of someone who'd already predicted the move. "They're tightening the net."
Tope hesitated, gaze softening. "I think they're trying to scare us, Bayo. Maybe we should—"
He turned, voice low but steady. "If we run now, the story ends here. And they win."
Silence lingered — heavy but resolute. The city breathed beyond the window, its sirens blending with the sound of waves. A storm was building, visible in the sky, invisible in every soul that refused to kneel.
---
Surulere – Mid-Morning
The office buzzed with nervous urgency. The blinds were half-closed, muting the sun. Computers hummed; printers clicked. But no one was working — not really. They were waiting.
Mutiu paced by the window, phone pressed to his ear. Every call ended the same: another closed door, another excuse, another friend suddenly "unavailable."
"They've started tagging us as agitators," he said, tossing the phone onto the table. "Even the sympathetic journalists have gone quiet. One headline called you a 'dangerous populist.'"
Bayo didn't flinch. "Then we make noise loud enough to scare them."
Tope looked up from her laptop, exhaustion shadowing her face. "That noise could get you silenced, Bayo. Maybe us too."
He smiled faintly, though his eyes betrayed strain. "Then they'll know we were never afraid to breathe loud."
Mutiu stopped pacing. "We'll need funds. Real ones. If they keep freezing our accounts…"
"I'll handle that," Bayo said, gaze fixed on the skyline through the blinds. His voice was calm, but his fingers tapped restlessly against the desk. "There are people who still owe the truth a debt."
The words hung there — more promise than plan.
Outside, a generator sputtered to life, its droning echo filling the silence. The air felt thick with more than heat — it carried warning, as though Lagos itself was holding its breath before the storm.
---
Lagos Island – Afternoon
The apartment was quiet when he returned. The air smelled faintly of rain and dust. Sunlight fell through the curtains in long, tired stripes.
Bayo dropped his keys on the counter — and froze.
The frame of Amaka's photograph had been moved. Slightly, deliberately, tilted toward the door.
His breath hitched. He scanned the room — no forced entry, no sound. Then his gaze fell on the dining table.
Photographs. Dozens of them.
Him at the protest. Him outside his office. Him and Tope through this very window.
He stared, heartbeat thundering. Someone had been inside. Watching. Waiting.
A phone buzzed on the counter. Unknown number.
You still believe light survives the dark?
He deleted it instantly, but the chill stayed — crawling beneath his skin, nestling in his chest. He gripped the counter until his knuckles whitened, forcing breath into lungs that suddenly felt too small.
Outside, thunder rolled across the lagoon like distant drums. Somewhere, the storm finally broke.
---
Surulere – Evening
The crowd outside the community center swelled beneath flickering streetlights. Faces half-hidden by shadows, some with masks, others bare and defiant. The air trembled with chant and hope, anger and desperation.
Bayo took the stage, his shirt damp from the heat, his pulse matching the city's heartbeat.
"My brothers, my sisters—" His voice rang out over the noise. "They want us silent. But silence is death. We breathe because we fight."
Cheers rippled through the crowd. Tope stood near the side, scanning the perimeter. Mutiu hovered close, eyes restless.
Bayo raised his hand. "We don't beg for air. We claim it. And when they tell us it's too expensive, we remind them—"
The crowd finished the line for him: "We were born breathing!"
But even in the roar, Tope felt something wrong — the stillness of the street beyond the light, the hum of an engine that didn't belong.
A dark SUV, windows tinted, parked too long.
She nudged Mutiu. "That car hasn't moved."
Bayo's words thundered on: "Let no one tell you your life is worth less than their profit!"
The roar swelled — then snapped into panic. Shouts. A canister hissed through the air.
Tear gas.
Smoke exploded across the square. People screamed. Bottles fell. The chant turned to chaos.
Mutiu grabbed Tope's arm. "Move!"
Bayo jumped down from the platform, covering a woman and her child as the gas thickened. His throat burned. He could barely see. Through the haze, the SUV's lights blinked once — deliberate, like an eye watching him.
Then it vanished into the smoke.
---
Third Mainland Bridge – Night
Rain hammered the city in furious sheets. Bayo's wipers beat against the windshield, barely keeping pace with the downpour. The road shimmered, black and endless.
His phone rang — Mutiu's name flashed on the screen.
"Bayo—don't go home!" Mutiu's voice was frantic, breaking through static. "They followed us. I saw—"
The line went dead.
Headlights appeared behind him. Two, then four, cutting through the rain.
The SUV.
Bayo's pulse surged. He gripped the wheel tighter, eyes darting to the rearview mirror. The car closed in, steady, predatory.
He swerved left. The SUV followed.
The rain turned the bridge into a mirror of water and fear.
Lightning flashed — the railings gleamed like wet steel.
Another jolt — metal to metal. His car skidded. Tires screamed.
He fought the wheel, but momentum betrayed him. The barrier loomed. A second impact sent him spinning.
Glass shattered. The world tilted.
For one suspended moment, Lagos disappeared — replaced by light, noise, and the weightless horror of falling.
Then came the crash. A scream of metal. A splash that swallowed everything.
---
Lagos Lagoon – Late Night
The rain stopped as suddenly as it began. The lagoon was calm again, as if nothing had happened.
A fisherman swore he'd seen headlights vanish beneath the surface, but by the time rescue teams arrived, there was nothing — only shattered glass and the slow, haunting drift of bubbles.
Onshore, Tope stood beside Mutiu, both soaked, silent.
Police lights blinked in red and blue, washing the wet asphalt in color.
"He'll surface," Mutiu whispered. His voice cracked like glass.
Tope didn't respond. Her gaze was locked on the dark stretch of water where the city lights bled into the horizon. Somewhere beneath that surface, truth was waiting — heavy, quiet, unbroken.
A single shoe floated to the edge of the pier before the tide claimed it.
---
Antagonist POV – Same Night
In a penthouse high above the island, the sharp-eyed man watched the rain blur the city lights. Cigarette smoke coiled in the air like ghosts unwilling to leave.
"Clean up the bridge," he said into his phone. "No noise. No martyrs."
A pause. Then that thin smile again. "If he's gone, Lagos will breathe easier."
He turned away from the window, the glow of the city dimming behind him. But in the reflection on the glass, faint and trembling, the lagoon shimmered — as if something beneath refused to stay buried.
The storm had passed, but the city still breathed — ragged, wounded, alive.