Chapter Two: Apex predator

CHAPTER TWO – APEX PREDATOR

   At the end of that day at about 6pm, a loud speaker called on all the students to assemble together at the south east part of the hall, chairs had been arranged in large quantity, the chairs were separated into five columns and each column had 60 chairs. 

  Getting there, a man with a mic directed them on where to sit

“If you look at the ID cards given to you, you will find the names of groups written below, if you have Overcomers written on your tag then occupy this column, Triumphant occupy the next, Victory the next, Dominant the next and finally Champions occupy the last column over there” they all did as he had instructed them. Roxanne had always hated sitting in front so she sat three rolls away from the front roll

“Excuse me… please you have to occupy the front seats” a female voice said to her, Roxanne looked at the lady

“I’m fine here” Roxanne replied 

“It’s not about being fine, if we fail to occupy the first roll we will be punished” she said 

“Punished? Because I refused to sit in front? That’s not even realistic, you can start by occupying the front roll and go disturb others cause I am not moving from here” Roxanne said and looked away, the lady looked at Roxanne then walked away quietly 

“Praise God! Triumphants will be leading us in praise and worship today” the man with the mic said; Roxanne looked confused, were they here for church service or here to learning a skill, she thought to herself. 

   Well, the day went on with various activities that looked exciting and fun, a motivational speaker was called to address the students for about an hour then they did some counting and reporting both of which were carried out by the leaders of each group or faction. They didn’t leave until after 10 at night, there were large school buses waiting to take the students to the hostel, Roxanne was completely exhausted as she headed to the buses with the other students and as she walked towards the bus some young men were gathered discussing but when she got close they stopped talking and stared at her, she looked at them then looked away as she walked on, they murmured words amongst themselves which of cause she didn’t care to know, she got on the bus, took a seat then turned her attention to her phone, a young man sat beside her

“Hey” he smiled, she looked at him 

“Hi”

“I’m Jacob” he said

“Roxanne” she replied 

“Sorry I didn’t get that” he said

“I’m Roxanne”

“Roxanne… Waw, never heard that one before, it’s beautiful” he said

“Thanks” she replied then returned to her phone 

“Can I call you Rox or Roxy” he said

“No you can’t” she said without looking at him

“Okay Roxanne…” he remained quiet a while

“Hey you are getting famous already” he said

“What do you mean?”

“Those guys outside were talking about you”

“I don’t care actually” she said

“Are you new?” he asked

“Yes”

“The program started two days ago, I noticed you are kind of a lone wolf” he said

“I’m not a lone wolf… a lot of people come around me but I prefer very few” she replied

“It’s a good thing though and a bad thing” he said and she looked at him 

“And why is it a bad thing?” 

“I mean, it’s okay to avoid some people but you know friends are important”

“I got trust issues” she said

“Oh, now I get it” he said “Yeah, you are right there, trust is a real thing” he added

  The bus was full and they moved, headed for the hostel…

  There were many hostel buildings in the area, the ladies had a building and the guys had theirs; as they all alighted from the bus Jacob quickly followed Roxanne 

“Hey Roxanne” he said and she turned

“Can we chat on W******p?” he said

“No problem” she replied then he handed her his phone, she punched in her number and walked away with the other ladies

“Cool… thanks” Jacob said then walked into the guys hostel 

   The next day, there was a loud whistle from a facilitator waking everyone, he walked through the passage of the ladies blowing the whistle and speaking 

“Jump up! Jump up!”

“If you are still sleeping you’re on your own!” 

“Rise I shine for the light has come and the glory of the lord is risen upon thee!” he said aloud

“If you are still sleeping you are wrong!”

“You are the Apex of your kind, lead by example” his voice was deep and loud enough to wake any sleeping person, Roxanne was forced out of bed, it was a rush hour, everyone had to hurry up with their bathing and get on the bus else the bus will leave without the late comers who will have to trek down themselves to the hall, the hostel to the hall was about 2000 meters. 

   His name was King Boma, he repeated the words loudly over and over till they were all awake then he left and headed to the boys hostel and did same thing.

   They got back to the hall and were asked to gather the same way they did at night, separated into groups then the day began with praise and worship then other activities before they were all dismissed to go for their classes on every corner of the hall. Roxanne was still seated as other students moved chairs to their various corners then suddenly the large screen at the end of the hall came on, a white man was seated in an office like a library with books behind him, at first they thought it was a movie then he spoke 

“Good morning students and facilitators of the RIYA program” his voiced blasted through the speaker and every one paid attention, Roxanne looked in the direction of the large screen which was far away but she could see and hear him

“You are about to experience the first stage of the RIYA experiment and your first test of survival, this test is called The Apex Predator” he said, everyone kept looking around them and wondering what was going on, Roxanne looked around to see all attention on the screen

“In 15 seconds 24 tigers will invade this hall, their soul aim is to kill as many as they can and your objective is to escape… if you look just outside the hall towards the north east of this environment there is an uncompleted storey building, you have to reach that building before the tigers get to you… good luck, your time starts now” he said and the screen went off, there was confusion everywhere as voices lamented, everyone then continued with what they were doing believing it must be a prank. Roxanne looked around then felt something was wrong, she got up from her seat and looked out the window and immediately saw six tigers running out of the bushes, suddenly someone screamed as tigers divided into the large hall and started crushing people, everywhere was in chaos, tigers tore necks open, tore faces, a tiger dived at a young lady and bites her jaguar vein out of her neck, killing her immediately. 

   Roxanne looked confused as her heart raced, suddenly a tiger dived at her and out of fear and reflex she dodged and the beats attacked somebody else, she immediately ran out the building and started heading for the uncompleted building on the north east, she saw some other persons run out the hall and started heading for the building, the beasts came after them, pounced on people and tore them open, as she ran she looked back and saw a tiger 100 meters away heading towards her, it was catching up faster than she imagined while she was getting closer to the building but suddenly ahead of her was a large wall coming out from the earth creating a barricade between her and the building

“No!” she yelled as she ran faster, the tiger was close, she got to the growing wall then jumped and grabbed the top ledge as the tiger dived at her and forcefully hits her off the ledge with its powerful paw, she falls and rolls on the ground covered in dust, the tiger immediately pounced on her with its teeth but she already placed a large rock in front of her and the beast bites onto the rock hard, she then hits it in the eye with another rock, it roared and clawed her with its sharp claw causing her to scream out in pain but it was her escape she quickly moved away from the beast, she spotted a rope hanging from the still growing wall, she quickly grabbed the rope and climbed up till she reached the top, the wall then stopped growing.

   She saw other people running towards the wall but she watching on horror as the tigers killed everyone of them, she looked at the building she was heading to, it had glass covering it and preventing one from seeing the inside, she looked down the wall but it was too high to jump down from because she’d obviously break her legs. She thought for a while then she pulled up the long rope she earlier climbed up with and threw it into the compound–the rope was pinned into the top part of the wall so it was strong enough to hold her, she immediately decided to climb down when she saw a tiger already on the wall walking towards her, she quickly started climbing down the wall which was almost 50 meters tall, the rope didn’t reach the ground so she had to jump although it hurt her feet when she hit the ground but she was fine, she immediately ran towards the building, she looked back to see the beast watching her as she ran away, the beast then jumped back down the way it came as Roxanne kept running towards the building.