“Eh?” Bonny asked.
“Mommy’s purse!” Nnamdi insisted. “It was right there! It’s gone! I saw it disappear!”
His mother started, looking around her seat. “Oh my God,” she said. “Oh my God!” Bonny started looking around his seat, too.
He felt the softest touch in his hand. He looked down. Now the crushed mobile phone was gone! He was about to say something when Bonny jumped up, bashing his head on the car ceiling. “Ah!” he exclaimed, rubbing his head. He started looking around like crazy. “My watch, o! What is going on?”
Nnamdi heard similar exclamations from other vehicles all around him. People’s things were disappearing left and right. Some people jumped out of their cars and ran off.
“It’s Mama Go-Slow!” his mother said, taking off her seat belt. “We need to get out of here immediately. Sometimes she has people beaten. She won’t take the car; that’s not how she operates.”
Nnamdi looked around, his body tingly with adrenaline. He knew what he was going to do. All he had to do was do it. I can do it, he thought. He remembered what Mama Go-Slow looked like at the funeral—wearing her stylish red abada clothing and blocky black shoes as she walked like a buffalo. She was a scary lady.
“You sure they won’t take my car?!” Bonny said, looking distressed.
“Yes, yes,” his mother said, jumping out of the car. “My . . . my husband said she never steals cars. Just people’s things.” She opened Nnamdi’s door. “Come on! Move, move, move!”
Nnamdi got out and ran down the road behind his mother and Bonny and everyone else. When they weren’t watching, he stopped beside a truck. His legs felt rubbery. He looked at his mother and Bonny as they ran farther and farther, thinking he was right behind them. He bit his lip, his heart slamming in his chest. “Go,” he said. But he couldn’t move. “Go! Go, Nnamdi!” he shouted, and ran to the other side of the truck. He got down and rolled beneath it. He waited. Only for a moment. He gasped as he felt himself change into the Man. Everything stretched and he was sure he could crush bricks with his bare hands. This time it felt nearly voluntary and with the change came something else. His uneasiness disappeared. “Where is she?” he whispered to himself in his low, rumbly voice. He waited some more.
From under the truck, he saw feet run by. Gym shoes. Sandals. Slippers. Pumps. Flip-flops. Oxfords. Big and small. All running. Then he saw a pair of wide, chunky black shoes standing a few cars away. He leaned out a bit and could see the shoes belonged to a pair of short, fat legs. He rolled out and jumped up.
She had her back to Nnamdi and he stared at her. She was a short, stocky woman with patchy fair brown skin and thick, bushy black eyebrows. His father had speculated that she colored them with coal to make herself look more intimidating. Today she wore a bright yellow dress that barely reached her knees. Her method of attack was to wait until traffic was heavy and people got comfortable and turned off their vehicles. Then she and her trained thugs would descend on the cars, SUVs, and trucks, robbing people of everything they had with them . . . including useless things like crushed cell phones. Mama Go-Slow was a trained dibia gifted in the arts of all kinds of juju and charms, a ninja and an expert in the South African martial art of Musangwe. His father had said she taught her thugs the art of blending in and fighting, so that, like ninjas, they were not seen or heard when they struck, and like Musangwe fighters, you did not want to cross them.
Nnamdi hid behind a car, mere yards from Mama Go-Slow. He watched her as she proudly observed her thugs do her work. She laughed crazily as people ran for their lives. A few of her thugs, who were dressed in camouflage bodysuits and were probably older teenage boys, purposely knocked people over and shouted and slapped at them until they fled.
“Yes, yes, panic,” Mama Go-Slow loudly said. “Run. This road has a toll you must pay. I am like the troll under the bridge: pay me or you can’t pass.” She laughed heartily, her round belly vibrating.
Nnamdi took a deep breath; watching her like this gave him such a bad, bad feeling. It was now or never. He ran at her like a great lumbering black beast. If he grabbed her quickly enough, he could get a hand over her mouth and drag her away from the road before her thugs spotted them. But she’s just a tiny old woman, he briefly thought. He pushed the thought away. None of her thugs were around her. He would grab the collar of her dress and . . . She turned to him just before he reached her. WHAM! As if he’d run into a wall! He stumbled back and sat down hard, dazed. Right there on the road.
Mama Go-Slow belly-laughed heartily as Nnamdi shook his head and pushed himself up, reaching out again to grab her, harnessing all his super-strength. The invisible force slammed into him again and he fell back to the street. This time the force ground his face onto the warm concrete. He painfully twisted his neck, fighting to keep his eye on her.
“And stay down,” she said, still laughing.
“Mama, are you all right?” one of her helpers asked her as he ran up. He was carrying several purses.
“Oh, I’m fine,” she said, gazing down her nose at Nnamdi. “Gather the others. Have them take everything to the car. This is the Man and I’m going to show him who really has the power.”
The boy looked down at Nnamdi with wide eyes. He shuddered and took a step away. “That’s . . . ?”
“Yes,” she snapped. “Don’t get distracted. Finish the job. I will finish him.” She laughed loudly. “Today is a good day.”
Nnamdi wanted to get up, but the pain, oh the pain. So evil, he angrily thought. Thief! For the first time, Nnamdi really, truly, deeply understood why his father risked his life to get rid of people like this woman. Laughing like a wild animal as she takes people’s hard-earned things. A surge of righteous fury flooded into Nnamdi and he felt as if he were dunked in hot water. More pain. But this pain energized him and his world turned red.
He started to get up.
“Stay DOWN,” Mama Go-Slow said again. This time, she strained as she used her strange juju on him. When he fell back down, she smiled triumphantly, slightly out of breath. “Temper, temper, young man. Resistance is futile.”
She leaned closer to him. She smelled heavily of perfume and he could see that she had several flower-shaped rings on her stubby fingers. She brought her face so close that he could smell her sour minty breath. He frowned as she looked into his eyes. Her eyebrows went up with surprise. She grinned. “Oh, this is rich,” she said. She brought her face closer. “Who gave you the juju, boy? This is quite a costume.”
Nnamdi was so shocked, he nearly forgot how to breathe.
She cackled and said, “I seeee you. Son of the dead Chief Icheteka. Did you know I had my kids sneak into your house and steal from it during your father’s funeral? Nothing big or important. Just . . . things. Did you notice? Or just feel something wasn’t right?” She smiled, showing all of her teeth. “Your father was a real thorn in my side. I’m glad the Chief of Chiefs did away with him.”