A SORDID PACT- PART 2

and use my skills and experience in areas needed. This is not just about
'Rambo' and 'Tiger', or against anybody. It is our country, Cameroon against
some motherfucken extremists, who are constituting a major threat to the
integrity, peace and stability of our nation. A few metres away are our
compatriots, Cameroonians like you and me, who have been held captive by
these brutes for close to a month and who are yearning for freedom. If you
are here to compare which is the better corps- BTAP or BIR, well this is
definitely not a place for you. So please, kindly go your way and allow me
move with those who are for progress."
This speech instead of arousing their sense of patriotism, attracted more
animosity from the grumpy fold who claimed Rambo was trying to show off
or was then looking for an excuse to present a negative report about their
behavior to their superiors in order to gain more favours. "Oh! Is that what
you think?" Rambo asked them apparently amused. "Well consider it the
way, you want, I'm off." He called the BTAP operatives and three BIR
operatives (Adamou included) who were willing to fight under him continue
along with him. This audacious act seemed to hurt the pride of Tiger and his
followers, who agreed, though begrudgingly to join the fold. They counted
themselves and they were in total fifteen. "Let's move," Rambo waved them
along.
The soldiers sneaked through the flora for quite some time until they could
see Kiri from a distance. It was the early hours of the day, a little while before
sunrise. The village appeared to be dead from afar given the fact that no iota
of life seemed to emanate from the thatched huts and few houses which
littered the scape. Once they got closer, Rambo dispatched the men such
that the entire western flank of the 'ghost' village was covered. He asked
them to wait strictly for his signal before launching any attacks. From his
section, Rambo using his binoculars could see the events occurring at the
centre of the village square. It seemed there was some sort of general
assembly there. They were lined up in huge numbers, apparently waiting to
receive their daily rations of water. Each one was equipped with a bowl, a
basin or a bucket and expecting his or her turn to receive the 'sacred' fluid.
There were two men dressed in military attire and wearing headscarves with
Arab designs who were charged with distributing water. They were dishing
out the substance, taking it out from a large drum, next to a well and giving
each villager a jug-full of the liquid for their daily use. Beside the distributors,
sitting on a throne (the chief's obviously) was a quite stout man, very dark in
complexion. He wore a Sheikh's hat on his head, was dressed in a twisted
agbada, on which he wore a camouflage jacket, and a pair of dirty boots on
feet. He had hung on a cartridge belt on his clothes which formed a slash