-I can’t believe we are doing this again,

-This is the third time Ndoto and we might get caught.

-Just keep quiet Maya, I am running out of patience listening to you rant.

-Honestly, you two are like two parts of an engine in a land mover rubbing together- always creating friction.

-Keep it down Cudjoe, so we don’t get caught and be careful of the notifiers on the ground,  you step on it and we are done- duck!

(all three raiders crouched below a fence to avoid the lights of the drones above them).

20 minutes later.

-I am sorry.

-I told you to watch your step. (Ndoto glared at Maya who stepped on a notifier).

-Sit down the three of you, you already broke into the storage twice and we let you go, but a third time? Who does that? Water has been rationed for each camp, yet you have broken in twice for more, we are running out of ores and coal to keep camps warm at night and hell we are even running out of oxygen tanks. There are not many green plants to produce oxygen. We are trying everything we can to breakthrough, just be normal teenagers and stay in your camps with your parents. (Sigh)

Flashback

Year 2030- sudden change in weather – dark clouds – plants wilting in different parts of the globe, most especially in Africa, ozone layer depletion, and the gradual loss of oxygen in the atmosphere, larger concentration of nitrate, CFCs and carbon emissions released in the atmosphere. Day of Doom.

20 minutes ago.

-Captain Bolekia we have been breached. The intruders are on the south-eastern side of the facility – facing the storage room; and for the third time that week Maya Adams, Ndoto Boleka and Cudjoe Osei were caught trying to steal from the B.R.I.A.M.L. facility in the heart of Niger, headed by Captain Justo Bolekia. These three have been on the radar of many facilities on the African continent and the globe at large. They raid facilities of ‘purified water’, oxygen tanks, ores, coal, capacitors, praseodymium, neodymium and promethium and cell batteries. They began as rookies and are now a nuisance to most camps and facilities round the globe. They were indeed born in harsh times, water scarcity, unsafe levels of air pollution, unpredictable weather conditions, mass carbon emissions, and mining of rare earth minerals, which some tend to have unstable energy and volatile reactions to the environment.

-Ndoto, please keep your crew away from my facility, Maya, you are a good kid, stay away from trouble (Captain Boleka pointing towards Ndoto), and Cudjoe, I hope this is the last time I see you.

(Cudjoe with a grin on his face)

-I hope so too, Captain.

-Escort them to the outskirts of the facility and dou-…….

(Alarms going off, sirens blaring, spots appearing all over the globe on the screen in the administrative unit of the facility).

  • Captain, we just detected mass eruption of energy all over the globe, and it seems we have more of them on Africa, the closest to our location is 920,052km. Everything within a radius of 30m is sort of morphing…..we are still finding more about the energy source and its impact.

-I want every drone, pilot and aircraft, and every land mover on the move now, we move in 5. Send the coordinates to every connection we have around the world, we have to move qui-..

  • Captain, your land mover is not in its pod, it was driven out 40 seconds ago by-

-So help me God, I don’t put lasers in their boots, these teeny teenagers are getting on my nerves, we roll out now.

All focus was on the new sites of energy scattered across the globe, every research organization was on the move to various energy sources, and in about 920,000km, a pure form of energy glowed, the same across the Pacific Ocean and the shores of the Australian continent. Major stakeholders and scientists in Africa and across the globe sit with thoughtful countenances of what various heads of operations going out to look for the energy source will meet, most of them hoped for better outcomes of this sudden mayhem on the African continent. Ndoto, Maya and Cudjoe are also embarking on this mission.

-Maya, please tell me there is an extra oxygen tank back there, I am running out of oxygen, there seems to be a crack on my mask, the crevice keeps cracking.

-I have said times without number Cudjoe, be careful with your oxygen mask, what is wrong with you, even clumsy Maya still has her mask on.

-Nope- (Maya popping the ‘p’). No extra tank, there is barely anything here, just laser guns, bio stuff and more papers about carbon emissions, and what is that by the way?

(Maya pointed out to the purple gases shooting out of the earth crust like hot vapor).

They were already long gone from Niger and halfway to their destination, using the coordinates sent to every vehicle, including the land mover they were in.

Ndoto shrugged, never seen ‘em before, come to think of it, my dad always talks about how beautiful and peaceful the world used to be, not purple gases, rapid changes and patterns of the weather, and water scarcity.

Due to the weather conditions, acidic rain and air pollution, farming and hunting is close to impossible, vegetation and animals have morphed into mutants, the cure for these are still in the making.

En route when all that could be heard was aircrafts, drones and land movers, the thoughts that resonated in every mind was that, the new source of energy would change their lives….or not.