FLASH5: RESOLUTION. DAY 4.

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*Lights come on to Soobaba's entrance music. The lights flicker as we hear the sound of an engine whirring. An army jeep pulls up the ramp. The driver's door opens and Soogun steps out and slams the door. The crowd pops. He's Wearing combat fatigues and a bullet-proof, he does the Black Power fist and strides towards the arena. Today, the arena is ringed with burning torches.*
Announcer's Voice: Day 4, ring of FIRE!
*The light goes out. There is silence then we hear an eerie laughter. The light flashes for two seconds and there is a bowed figure at the entrance wearing a robe and with a staff. Then it is dark and silent again.

A bell starts tolling then we hear Black Sabbath's 'Shock Wave' playing:
"There's no reason for you to run
You can't escape the fate of the chosen one
Black moon rising, in a blood red sky
This time you realise that you're gonna die."
The lights come on and Hymar is already in the ring, black paint under his eyes, Takedown Shirt and intense look.
The crowd yells, 'TAKE HIM DOWN!' *
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ANNOUNCER'S VOICE: Here we go again. Let us get down to business immediately. Yesterday, Soogun wrote CLAIVORYANCE and scored 56 popular votes and no judge vote. He has 15 points. Hymar did THE BOY WHO DIED WHILE IN COMA and notched a massive 185 audience votes and 3 judge votes to score 84 points in total. This is on record the biggest win in any Flash contest. Hymar wins day 3 and reclaims the lead at 2-1.
Today's prompts are 450 word pieces. The theme of the day will be given after the stories are posted.
I predict a Soogun comeback today BUT it will be interesting to see if Hymar widens the gap.
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THE RULES REMAIN:
1. Read both stories and say what you think of them. Criticisms? Critiques? Famzings? Badbelleisms?.
2. Vote your favourite of the two(eg I VOTE story 1)
3. Edited comments to change votes are considered void.
4. Do NOT mention who you think wrote which. Such comments will be deleted. Mentioning names will foster biased voting.
5. Do NOT copy and paste the stories and absolutely DO NOT BLOG them without permission. Beware the Block button
6.Soogun and Hymar are only allowed to comment to tag their friends.
7. Tag your buddies, do not whine about tags. Tag yourself.
VOTING ENDS ON THURSDAY BY 8:30AM.
Let The Madness Begin. Amen.
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HELL ON EARTH
My eyes flipped open!
With an impossible speed, I surged from the chair in my study and peeled to the sitting room. My senses were right, a fire had started, and it was spreading fast through my duplex.
Confused, thoughts raced through me, what could have started the fire? How bad had it expanded? But I wasn't ready to burn my mental strength on such questions. Only one thought remained. My wife and kids!
Within the space of a heartbeat, my legs darted upstairs, towards my wife's room. I didn't feel them as I leaped over the steel stairs, penetrating the thick dark smoke. Soon, I found myself inside the smoke-filled room. She sprawled on her mattress.
"Get up! Get up... We're on fire!" I tapped. No response.
I tapped her again, yelling,
"Will you get up and let's go save the kids!" .
She still didn't flinch. It then dawned on me; she was gone. I screamed as I sprinted out again towards Bayo's room, a few meters opposite her's. Luckily, the door to his room was already blown off its hinges. The fire had escalated on his side of the building.
A breath later, I gasped in horror as I swished to a stop near the burnt structure that used to be his bed. It was no longer my light-skinned boy on it. I was now seeing a black rigid figure with clenched teeth. Oh God! He just got admitted into the university.
My little girl!
I spun and faced the corner where her crib should be. It was missing. Instead, I saw ruin.
"Where is my baby!" I howled from the smoke. I went mad.
Then it came to me; she had been with me this night at the study! Joy gripped me. If I could survive, then she was safe.
In a flash, I appeared downstairs. The crackles of burning sofas and curtains still made the room alive. I began seeing better through the dark smoke than I could in light as I raced to rescue my girl.
I entered, and there she was in one corner, balled up into a lifeless piece of horror. She must have died trying to crawl out. She must have felt pain.
"Is this the very famous hell? ...God!" I roared, hands on head.
"Where are the demons! ...let me roast with my daughter!" I prayed.
I wobbled deeper into the room, wailing. I then saw it, another burnt body glued to a disfigured study chair. A pleasant terror gripped me as I moved closer to see who it was. A charred version of me. I had died too.
**
SALVATION.
'Let my people go!
That's his favourite scripture. Salvation spelled out in four words. He wasn't religious, but the last time he drove Oga, Madam and Bomboy to church, the pastor preached about God sending Moses to Egypt with a message of redemption.
' The set time for your salvation is now!' he said.
Later, the words replayed over and over in his head in a furious, unrelenting crescendo, Thesettimeforyoursalvationisnow!thesettimeforyoursalvationisnow!thesettimeforyoursalvationisnow!
Except Oga was no Pharaoh and the house in Lekki wasn't Egypt.
He didn't need saving from a live-in driver and gateman job, or from three decent meals a day. He didn't need salvation from the clothes Oga gave him to send to his two boys in Ilorin with his wife. Or the dresses and wrappers Madam sent his wife.
He didn't need salvation. He just wanted more.
But he had to convince himself his life there was a prison. That the smile Madam gave him every morning when she greeted him was a sneer. That behind their charity was contempt.
He looked for signs.
Like Bomboy not greeting him when he picked him up at school.
Like Oga shouting at him when a danfo scratched the side of the jeep and sped away.
Like Madam giving him a hard look when he didn't come to open the gate on time, at the sound of her horn.
Signs that said, the set time for his salvation was close by.
These thoughts flashed across his mind as he watched the house start to burn, the cheque safe in his pocket.
The cheque had clinched it. It was the sure sign, sole sign, leaving sign, last sign. His cue.
" The client don pay o," he heard Oga announce ecstatically to Madam as they drove home earlier, fiddling with the cheque in the backseat. " Éight million naira!"
He'd locked them in their rooms before dousing the house in petrol. He heard screaming as he made for the door, he shut out the sounds.
The roar as the flames ravaged the house seemed like laughter to him. Joyful noise. Opening the gate and stepping into the midnight, he ran.
*
" I am sorry, sir, but this cheque is a dud."
" No!" he screamed at the cashier, drawing stares from the Friday morning crowd in the bank. "No!"
" I am sorry..."
"No!"
They watched him go berserk, he snatched the cheque, held it in the light like it was money he wanted to be sure wasn't fake and shoved it at the cashier. " Cash it!" he barked, "Cash it!"
The frightened woman looked around for her boss who was already reaching into his pocket for his phone, to call the police.
**
THEME: A story set in a burning house.