Hey everyone!
So with the whole nationwide movement going on, I totally forgot that I was supposed to…. *DodgesBroom* oya make una no vex na! I’m sorry!
Okay. So on the 2nd of June 2011, we started a journey on my blog with Book One of Fourth Day by my best friend Remi Olutimayin. This book is actually meant to be a graphic novel, but Remi, being the lazy bum that most ridiculously intelligent people usually are (it’s not his fault. He just can’t bring himself to be bothered with some of these nuances), had kept it in the closet of his mind for too long. So I decided to let y’all read it. And now, we come to the end, not only of book one, but also of the intermittent story on The Emptiness.
No, Fourth Day isn’t over. This was just a beginning. We’re working together, and I know that somehow or the other, Fourth Day is gonna become the graphic novel that we want it to be. I don’t know if there’s gonna be more on my blog, I’ll have to let y’all know about that. I just hope y’all have enjoyed reading as much as Remi enjoyed writing and I enjoyed editing and posting. If this is the first time you’re seeing Fourth Day, you can go right to the beginning and catch up by clicking here.
So yeah… enjoy. We hope there’ll be more.
VIII
The generals of the enemy noticed the Emptiness in the midst of the skirmish. They asked each other who he was.
One of them spoke with a gravelly voice,”I believe he is the one who killed our scout. I don’t know who he is or why he’s joined with them. I just know that he’s a dangerous man. Even the Behemoths give him deference and a wide berth. It is something to note and be wary of.”
When the day grew long, also did the heat of the battle began to cool. The Emptiness then had the Behemoths retreat, leaving him alone in the valley craters made by their exertions. He then walked up to the Leviathan leading the enemy troop in the skirmish.
“When a snake is beheaded, the point of its life has been made.” He said as he approached him.
“Who is the snake? The Behemoths or you?” was their reply.
The Emptiness then caused a mound of earth to rise as a seat so he could rest on it. This took the Leviathan general by surprise. The Emptiness then did the same for him. The courtesy of the action gave the general no option but to accept the seat offered.
“I know the discontent growing among your numbers. Especially when we consider the truth about whose war you’re fighting. Discontent is the sign to a slave that he is not a slave. Do you agree?”
The general nodded briefly.
“I’m going to make an offer. It does not extend to your employers. You must listen and weigh my words without pride or haste.
“Lead your men out of this valley and out of their land. The Behemoths will return home. I will face those godless men and do what is needed of me. This world isn’t meant to be slaves to civilisations that are already living on borrowed time. The Atlanteans are too proud and narrow-minded to realise what the offer truly entails. They are committed to this course of action. It is because, sadly, they’ve been enslaved already. Their life-forms read differently. Their minds have been taken from suckling to the old. I have to destroy that civilization to save the rest of this world. That also includes you.”
“How would you do this and why?”
“’How’ is not your problem. Why? Let us just say…it is not in the power of the slave-masters to reverse the insults of their actions to me.”
The Leviathan general then did something that no one expected. He ordered a retreat. And they left their allies. The Behemoths did the same. The Emptiness then appeared before the Atlanteans.
As he looked at them, they knew that he could see their grip on the minds of the Atlanteans.
The Emptiness seemed to rise in the air as he said, “Not one of you will escape me. But it will be satisfying to watch you try…your women and children will perish. And your place in this world will not remember you. Your name will go unspoken and you will know that you cannot cheat death.”
It took him a day to hunt down and kill every last one of their leadership.
He then went into their armory and set off their water-driving bombs at different parts of the world. By the time he was done, the land of Atlantis sank under the weight of the water that was driven their way.
That Emptiness watched an entire civilization scream and drown in fear. Not a single nerve of his was stirred. He had left their weapons running indefinitely. His actions led to the displacement of a continent and one of the results was the great flood.
Epilogue
I asked him why he did not prevent the flood from happening. His reply will make it obvious to you why you’ve been protected from him.
“Why? Men were born to die from every cause under heaven and even above it. It means nothing to me. It came in its time. They died in their time. If God had not wanted it to happen, so many things would have been different.”
Anne trembled violently.
“Anne, drop your intellectual pride and ego in this matter. Let it go and move on. You will never see Richard again. You will never be able to speak of these things with anyone. You must never mention the Emptiness, not even to yourself.”
They were back in her home, but she did not understand how or notice the transition. She calmed down and took a seat.
Nedeseh looked at her door.
“It has been a long time since I’ve used a door. Keep that to your grave. As well as every other thing you’ve heard. The Emptiness wouldn’t mind about the book. It’s not him they are talking about.”
“This Emptiness? How will he know he has been spoken of?”
Nedeseh ran to her and ran her to the opposite side of the room. She watched in horror as her chair folded violenlty into itself as if an invisible beast was fitting it into its jaws.
“She asked a question.”, Nedeseh snapped to no one she could see.
There was a silent lightning storm the size of a man building in her small living room. The clouds billowed as if alive and a man who seemed more apathetic than cruel materialised before her eyes.
“This is why you were never an Emptiness, Nedeseh. She doesn’t think it is a matter worth the caution you gave her.”
She gave way to animal fear and shock as her chair folded back into reality.
“I knew you would save her.”
He looked at her at growled.
“Do you think I came because I was waiting for you to mention me? Foolish mortal! I heard you. I hear everything and I don’t care what you think you are. Nedeseh will not protect you next time. We agreed on that long ago. Caution your tongue, cut it out, adopt selective amnesia…I do not care, but I guard my name and identity as a thunder-head guards its center.”
Anne was suddenly alone in her home, and the only trace of what had just happened was the smell of ozone. Electrical discharges are a source of the fishy smell.
She developed a white streak in her hair and became less brittle. She settled down with her boss Joseph and he never understood how she could tolerate his brashness. How could she mention why and not risk his return?
What she could not have known was that the Council of the Half-Moon feared him to the point of preparing going to war against him.
But that is another story.