THE TWELVE-season 3,episode 13

RWANDA

                 Ken and zodiac decided to visit Lydia and they were accompanied by Shorsha. They left their assistants with the other children at the camp to get familiar with the kids there and get to equally know their stories and experiences. Lydia on the other hand felt greatly honored to have the two members of the group she loved and admired so much sitting in her little mud house. They were surrounded by Lydia’s little ones who were staring at them like some aliens, Lydia was not embarrassed by the state of her house but she felt really happy and privileged to have them visit her.

“We came because we heard of what happened,” Zodiac said. “This is Ken,”

“Saw him once on TV,” she giggled at him and Ken smiled.

“It’s nice meeting you Lydia,” Ken said. “Heard you can sing,”

“I was blessed by the gift,” she smiled.

“You were blessed with the gift,” Ken gently corrected her. “God gave you the gift so you were blessed with it not by it. You have lovely siblings,”

She smiled and nodded shyly.

“So what happened, why did Wangshari send you and your little once away?”

Suddenly she felt uncomfortable and stammered looking at Shorsha for help but she was willing to help.

“Did you do anything wrong?” Ken asked.

“He hates me, he has no empathy….” She tearfully said. “He doesn’t like I and my little ones,”

“Why does he hate you?” Zodiac asked.

“Because I someday stole from him when we were still staying in the camp,”

“Why did you steal from him?”

“My juniors were bitterly in hunger and the time for eating had not arrived, time was taking so long and they needed food badly. I begged him at the first but he pushed me away, see I had no choice because I couldn’t stand watch my juniors die hunger so I went to kitchen and took the rice they had boiled and kept so I could feed them but then they caught me and this man sent me away without pity,”

He story was sad and though Zodiac and Ken knew stealing was bad they could understand why she did it. Her siblings were still very young to sustain that kind of hunger.

“You know we eat in the camp just once a day right? Twice when we are lucky,” Shorsha said. “Things only changed when you came, now we eat twice because they want to buy your favor.”

“We understand what you kids are going through,” Ken said.

“Make us to be like you,” Lydia pleaded. “Please, I beg you take us out of this misery, we want to be like you……. I want to be like you.”

“We are going to take you all out of here someday,” Zodiac said. ‘But you have to help us; we need to make our fellow mates understand that the power to build our dreams and make our lives beautiful lies in our hands, not in the hands of anybody.”

“No….. They won’t even believe you.” Shorsha said. “Where is the dream, people like us don’t dream because this is the end of the road for us. We will grow up in that camp and sold off to any man who pretends to take interest in us. Those on the streets face endless cruelty, our rights have been taking away from us, and they are violated by many adults, many times who were supposed to protect us. In many cases we are subjected to sexual harassment in return for food or clothes or even a night shelter. Often police will detain us and beat us without cause. We don’t have any hope and even our dreams will always just be dreams.”

“There is a world of possibility waiting for you all out there Shorsha, just open your heart and believe it.” Ken told her.

“Is this world of possibility able to stop the children’s crisis all over the world?”

“Yes it is,” Zodiac said. “Only if children like you and I stand up for those who are not strong enough, only if we stand up and bring them to believe in the beauty of their dreams and the chances for its possibility. Both of you are heroes to your generation and the children’s world awaits people like you to stand up for them and fight so join us to fight this crisis and we shall win it with the almighty God on our side,”

“You know God too?” Lydia asked. “I and Shorsha always study the bible. It made us learn English with my little ones.”

“Wow that’s very cool,” Ken smiled. “How did you get the bible?”

“From missionaries,” Shorsha replied.

“Amazing, then we can study the bible together, build our faith from there and learn strategies on how to win this crisis from our great forefathers of faith.”

Shorsha and Lydia became excited about learning more from the bible, even the little ones were happy about studying the bible with Ken and Zodiac and they started their studies that same day.

                      When it was getting dark in New York Jan decided to take a quick tour to Rubel’s house since he had already left the office. She knocked persistently at the front door and Rubel could not ignore it and whoever it was, he was ready to receive. He walked to the door.

“Who is it?” he asked aloud.

“Rubel it’s me Jan,” she said outside. “I need to talk to you,”

He then opened the door and she quickly walked in.

“What’s up Jan,” He asked copiously. “What is wrong?”

“Too many things are wrong,” she sat down without being offered a seat.

“What can it be?” He sat too.

“The twelve, have you heard from them?”

“No I haven’t and yes that borders me too,”

“I really don’t know why we can’t contact them….. I left them several mails but no response.”

“Did you forget so soon, they didn’t travel with gadgets, just cell phones and I’m sure the network that way is hindering our communication with them.”

“But is it that way?”

“It’s Africa Jan, what do you expect?”

“The more reason why I’m so worried.”

“The good news is, Moscow and Lennon went over to Botswana to check on the progress of the camp.”

“It’s already in construction?” her anxiety was replaced by a fresh delight.

“Yes,” Rubel proudly said. “A hundred and fifty expert builders flew into Botswana and laid the foundation in two days, one hundred other expert builders flew to Botswana yesterday to start the full construction and as I’m talking to you right now, every building material has been supplied, the workers are extremely enthusiastic to see the camp put in place and they are working on a fair discount as their own way of support. In five months time, the biggest house in the world must have been complete.”

Jan smiled, she could imagine the expression on the twelve’s face when they finally see their world and all the children living in it as they dreamt.

“Wow, I can’t wait to see how this whole thing ends up.”

“Gloriously I bet you because we are all praying hard for that to happen and God will answer us for sure.”

“Moscow should try calling them from there since he is in Africa,” Jan said.

“He said he will and if things work out well he will get back to me and I will let you know,”

Jan took a deep breath and relaxed.

“Please don’t forget,”

“I won’t,”

“What are you up to now since you left Randy?”

“I and Chris are planning to start a label of our own with Duncan being our first signed artist.”

“Wow that will be great any way I can help just let me know.”

“But we have decided to wait till the twelve’s return.”

“You sure about this,”

“Of course, we still need to stand on guard for them till they arrive safely our lives will never go back to normal,”

Rubel was amazed at their commitment to the twelve and he was no doubt a part of it.

RWANDA

                 Later that night, Zodiac and her team where laying on their beds, some were reading and others were desperately trying to call home but the lines were still not going through. After so many tries others gave up but Zodiac kept on trying with Ken just admiring her efforts, she tried few more times and she didn’t even realize when the phone started ringing because she was already use to the beep that comes before the voice telling her the lines are busy.

“Zodiac it’s ringing,” Ken told her then she realized it was ringing…… she screamed and then hut her mouth with her hands. Maul was almost closing her eyes when she heard her phone ring beside her, she jacked up from the bed and quickly pressed the answer button and when she said hello all the others woke up.

“Zodiac,” She screamed.

“Maul…… oh my God I’m so happy to hear your voice,” she was on loud and so was Maul.

“Me too, me too Zodiac…. How have you guys been?”

“Hey Zodiac,” Zed said through the phone.

“Hey Zodiac,” All the others said.

“Hey guys, I missed you all so much. How are you all?”

“We are doing ok,” Zed said. “How is Ken?”

“Pastor Ken,” Maul added.

“I missed you Maul,’ Ken said. “Hey brother, hey guys we are all greeting.”

“We’ve tried calling to no avail,” Zodiac said.

“I guess it’s a general network problem,” Maul said. “We tried calling you all several times but the lines keep failing.”

“That means you’ve not heard from the others?”

“No but I’m sure they are alright, since you guys are right?”

“Yeah I too, how Is Sierra Leone?”

“It is ok; full of street children and we are surrounded by Muslims here. Got into a mosque earlier today,”

“What?” they all exclaimed.

“Zed’s idea but it turned out great though, we were given a chance to talk to the children and that will be on Monday.”

“Wow it’s a great thing you are making progress,” Ken said.

“How is Rwanda?” Zed asked.

“It’s full of street children too; the cases here are so complicated. We live in a camp with some orphans, nice place.”

“Really, we live in a nice house too. We just have a room with a bathroom and a small parlor but it’s conducive. We don’t even know how to begin sharing the dream; they hardly understand anything we say,”

“Here too,” Ken said. “But we just have to start with the opportunity God gives us, stay focus and keep leaning on his direction.’

“Thank you pastor Ken,” Maul said. “So glad we could talk, I feel boosted right now,”

They all laughed.

“I’m serious,” She said.

“We all do Maul. My phone credit is expiring, I will have to refill and try calling the others.”

“Yeah we will do same,” Maul said. “We all will try calling from here and our assistants can also try calling home, let their parents know they are doing ok….”

“Sure, talk to you later. We love you all,”

“We love you all too,” The group from Sierra Leone responded and the lines were cut.