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TOCHI ONYEBUCHI

War Girls

Beasts Made of Night

Crown of Thunder

Dedication

To Chinoye and Uchechi

Part I

CHAPTER

1

Centrafrique, Outer Alabast Colony:

2181

Wesh? Je suis enjaillé de toi. Ça avance ndank-ndank. Je wanda . . . deuxieme bureau . . . Il est sorti nayo nayo. Je vais te see tomorrow.

The words mingle and the voices echo inside the receiving station, shuttles docking with a whoosh and clank, passengers alighting with their checkered nylon-canvas bags. Ify squints and touches her temple, activating the Whistle, the communication device linked to the Augment embedded into the base of her neck, and flips through the languages in her translation software—Arabic, Wolof, Finnish, French. Yet it all comes to her as gibberish. A riot of words to mirror the mess of colors before her in Porte Nouveau, the capital city at the center of Centrafrique and, according to Céline, the brightest jewel in the crown of Outer Africa’s future. Ify looks to her friend, who grins at the bustle of the city on the other side of the receiving station’s entrance, at the Adjogan drums and singsong blaring from street speakers, the teenage boys—all arms and legs—lounging on hoverboards with dishes of chicken yassa balanced on their chests, chuckling and speaking around mouthfuls. The scotch bonnet peppers are so hot Ify’s eyes start to sting from several hundred paces away. Someone shouts a string of words, and Ify hears “shoga,” and two older men—cyberized—walk over to an old woman crouched over a misfiring broadcast transmitter. The men walk with the ease of people in love. The taller one gazes admiringly at his partner, who stoops to help the woman fix her BoTa and hear the rest of the football match. Farther down the broad thoroughfare, Ify sees the spires of chapels and the domes of mosques and, past that, the tops of what look like broad-based swirling cones with antlers sticking from their tops to absorb solar energy. Centrafrique Polytechnic Institute.

“What are they speaking?” The whole time, Ify has been scrolling through languages. Xhosa, Mande, Sandawe, Vandalic. “Is it French?”

Céline turns her smirk on Ify and slaps her shoulder with the back of her hand. “Ah-ah! You think these people would sully their tongues with such a bankrupt language?” Then she laughs and loosens up, her eyes softening into an apology. “It is everything. You know how we Africans are. We don’t choose, we collect.” She mimes opening a cupboard and picking out ingredients. “Some onions, some olives, okra, sofrito, and whatever else is in the cupboard.” Then she mimes pounding on a surface. “Grind up some maggi cubes.” She spreads her arms. “Then throw it all in the pot.” A glint of seriousness flashes like a comet in her green eyes. She lowers her voice to a kind murmur. “When was the last time you saw this many Africans in one place, eh?”

Shame warms Ify’s cheeks.