Beneath the Darkening Sky Read Online Free PDF Page A

too, I want her to run away, but Pina sees me and comes running out towards the truck.
    I want to yell out to her, but I’m afraid that will make the rebels mad.
    I scan my brain. Most of the rebels are out of the truck now. I ask one whether I can get down too, and he shrugs. There are too many of them for us to escape. A couple of other kids follow me
out of the truck, but most stay where they are, waiting.
    One of the rebels sees Pina coming near. ‘Hello,’ he says. ‘I think she wants to volunteer.’
    ‘She’s a bit young for my taste,’ replies another one.
    ‘Looks like someone’s already claiming her,’ says the first, as Pina comes up to me.
    They all laugh, but they don’t stop her. They are not shooting, maybe this isn’t a raid after all. The men are walking through the huts, looking around.
    ‘Obinna,’ Pina says. ‘Why are you in there?’
    ‘I have to join the army,’ I answer, trying not to sound scared.
    ‘But Mama says these are bad people! She says they killed a lot of people in the village. Did you know that?’
    ‘Shh!’ I try to make Pina be quiet. But I can tell some of the rebels have heard what she said. I take her round the back of the truck and whisper. ‘You mustn’t say
things like that, you must run away from here.’ I can’t tell her about Papa. ‘They came and killed people, and if I don’t go they’ll kill me too.’
    Pina drops to the ground, sitting with her hands folded up in front of her mouth. She’s looking off into space. I try to pull her up again.
    ‘They want me to be a soldier,’ I say.
    She grabs my arm, pulling me down. ‘No, you can’t. You don’t even fight with the other boys in the field. How can you fight the army?’
    ‘I’ll have a gun.’ I don’t want to fight, but I want Pina to think that I could.
    ‘And so will the other people!’ She’s shaking me. ‘And what if they’re good people you’re fighting? You can’t go.’
    Her eyes are wet and huge.
    ‘Pina, I have to go with them, but you must run away.’
    ‘Mama says they make kids our age kill people.’ Tears pour and pour from her eyes. ‘People are gone! Too many people are gone, and now you’re going too and no one is ever
coming back!’
    ‘I’m going to come back. One day, I’ll run away and I’ll come back.’
    ‘Yes, you run away.’ Pina is sobbing so much I almost can’t understand her. ‘You can hide in the bushes and no one will find you and I’ll bring you food.
You’re very good at hiding.’
    ‘If I run away now they’ll kill Akot. Or maybe Mama. I can’t run.’
    In the distance a scream. I scramble to my feet. It was so quiet before, everyone afraid to talk while the soldiers were around. Now someone is screaming. Looking around the side of the truck I
see two boys, maybe brothers, running towards the tree line and into the dark jungle. One soldier fires two bullets after them but he misses. The boys keep running without looking back. I
wouldn’t look back either if I was one of them in that field.
    The Captain follows them with his eyes, an outrun lion looking at the fast-running gazelles.
    ‘Those boys would have been my soldiers,’ he says in a soft voice, almost a whisper.
    He turns to look up the road, where the screaming comes from, and his eyes burn like charcoal.
    The soldiers are dragging Pina’s mother out of her house, one on each arm. Her knees scrape along the ground. Behind me, I can hear Pina getting up. If they decide to rip her mama’s
clothes and hurt her, I don’t want Pina to see. Pina lets out a little cry, but I hold her back and put a hand over her mouth. I remember from last night. The women they attacked first were
those who screamed the most. They like the screaming.
    The two soldiers throw Pina’s mama to the ground in front of the Captain. She’s sobbing.
    ‘This woman,’ the Captain yells – he’s making sure the people hiding in their houses can hear – ‘defames us! She spreads wicked