The smell of dust and diesel mingled with the weight of dread in the air as Lagos awoke to another day steeped in uncertainty. In the heart of Obalende, where bodies moved like currents through narrow lanes and whispers passed faster than the danfo drivers could shout for change, something was shifting. Beneath the buzz of daily life, an operation was underway, calculated, clandestine, and devastating.
Dapo crouched behind the shell of a gutted minivan, eyes fixed on the skyline beyond the viaduct. A high-rise two blocks away, once a derelict government office, had become the headquarters of Operation Convergence, an elite unit formed in the aftermath of The Alausa Breach. The mission tonight wasn't recon. It was extraction. And for the first time, Dapo wasn't sure who the enemy was.
"Phase One begins in sixty seconds," Bibi's voice crackled in his comm. Calm. Cold. Efficient.
Dapo tapped his earpiece. "Copy. I'm in position."
Phase One was a coordinated breach of the building's western wing, where they believed Councilor Onome was being held. She had vanished a week ago, last seen leaving a closed-door committee meeting about the proposed restructuring of the state security apparatus. Many believed she had defected to the federal bloc. Dapo knew better. She was being silenced.
Bibi emerged from an alleyway, clad in black, her movements feline. She joined Dapo behind the wreckage and handed him a modified drone. "Surveillance uplink. No thermal interference from this quadrant."
He took it without a word and launched it skyward. The feed came through instantly, infrared overlays, biometric scans, perimeter mapping.
They had less than twelve minutes to extract Onome before the building's power rerouted to backup generators and locked them inside.
"She's on the seventh floor," Bibi said, eyes glued to the tablet. "Corner room. Two guards."
"Sound alarms, create chaos?"
Bibi smirked. "Too crude. We play it quiet."
A soft chime in their ears signaled Phase Two. Sadiq's voice came through, heavy with tension. "Diversion in place. Sending decoys now."
Far across the street, a set of explosions erupted, a planned detonation of petrol drums near a construction site. People screamed. Cars reversed into each other. The chaos gave Dapo and Bibi their opening.
They ran.
The entrance was unlocked, an inside man's doing, and they slipped through the security checkpoint like shadows. Inside, the halls were dim and lined with peeling posters of outdated civic slogans. "One Lagos. One Future."
As they reached the stairwell, Bibi halted. "Hold. Something's wrong."
Dapo turned, and that's when he heard it too, a click. A mechanical sound too deliberate to be ignored.
He grabbed Bibi and shoved her down the stairwell just as the tripwire triggered a blast.
Concrete rained from the ceiling, and the lights cut out.
"Ambush," Bibi coughed, dragging herself up. "They knew."
"No," Dapo muttered, rage creeping into his voice. "Someone told them."
They pushed forward, blood ringing in their ears. Gunfire burst from above as guards descended the stairs. Dapo opened fire, covering Bibi as she sprinted up the adjacent stairwell.
By the time they reached the seventh floor, smoke filled the air, and the alarm screamed like a wounded animal. Dapo kicked open the door to Onome's room.
She sat in the center, tied to a chair, bruised but alive. Her eyes widened in shock. "Dapo?"
"No time," he said, slicing through the ropes. "We're getting you out."
But she hesitated. "They'll follow me. They've seen your faces. You're burned."
"We know."
As they reached the hallway, a squad blocked their exit. And then, a voice echoed from behind them.
"Drop your weapons."
It was Farouk.
Once Dapo's friend. Once the man who vouched for him at the first joint-security summit.
Now a traitor.
"You're interfering with national security," Farouk said, his gun leveled. "Onome's not what she seems."
"She's a whistleblower," Dapo snarled.
"No. She's the architect."
A pause. Even Bibi blinked.
"She drafted the blackout protocols. She's the one who planned the shutdown of the anti-corruption watchdog. This isn't a rescue. It's damage control."
Dapo turned to Onome. "Is it true?"
Her eyes were unreadable. "I did what I had to. But not everything you've been told is a lie."
Before more words could be exchanged, Bibi fired. Farouk dropped. Chaos exploded again. Smoke grenades, bullets, screams.
They escaped through the emergency stairwell, emerging into the street with Onome barely conscious. An armored truck awaited them, courtesy of Sadiq.
As the doors slammed shut, Dapo sat in silence. Across from him, Onome stared, her voice barely audible.
"They think I betrayed them. But what I really did, was show them their reflection."
Back at the sanctuary, now relocated to a subterranean safehouse beneath an abandoned factory in Mushin, tempers flared.
"We risked everything," Sadiq said, pacing. "And she may be the reason this entire network is unraveling."
"She's also the only one who knows what Phase Three entails," Bibi interjected.
Dapo stood apart, watching the footage replay on a screen. Farouk's face. His words.
"You're interfering with national security."
He played it again.
And again.
"Pause," he said.
The screen froze. Dapo walked closer, pointing to Farouk's lapel.
A pin. Not a military insignia. Not even an agency badge.
It was the crest of the Chamber of the Sovereigns, the clandestine advisory body no one publicly admitted existed.
"They've gone above the presidency," Dapo whispered. "We're not fighting a corrupt system. We're fighting its architects."
Onome coughed from her cot. "They call it the Umbrella Committee. Every major decision in Lagos over the past decade, power grids, economic zoning, social media blackouts, has been run through them."
"And you were part of it?" Bibi asked.
"I was… until I realized they weren't building a better Lagos. They were constructing a cage."
Sadiq shook his head. "We need evidence. Proof."
"I kept files," Onome said. "Encrypted. Hidden in the digital ether, scattered across old state servers. I never trusted the cloud."
A new mission formed.
Retrieve the files. Decode them. Expose the Sovereigns.
But time was no longer on their side.
That night, Dapo climbed the rooftop, unable to sleep. The city glowed beneath him, flickering, flawed, familiar.
Bibi joined him minutes later, silent.
"You think we'll survive this?" he asked.
"I think that's the wrong question."
He looked at her.
She continued, "The real question is: what happens if we don't?"
Below them, in the darkness, a convoy of unmarked vehicles rolled past.
The hunt had already begun.
SIX DAYS LATER
The files were retrieved, but not without consequence.
Sadiq and a junior operative, Tolu, were ambushed at the Ministry of Tech, barely making it out with the drives. Bibi lost contact for twelve hours, and when she returned, her left arm was bandaged, and she spoke less than usual.
But the files were real.
Every sanction. Every media blackout. Every secret arrest.
The Umbrella Committee had its fingerprints on all of it.
One entry stood out.
Project: GONG
A plan to permanently disrupt all encrypted communication networks under the guise of "National Data Sovereignty."
If enacted, it would render all resistance blind.
And the launch date?
Ten days.
TWO DAYS TO LAUNCH
An emergency summit convened. Not in Aso Rock. Not even in Alausa.
But in Makoko.
In the waterbound stilt community, where no drones flew and no signal penetrated without permission, the last true neutral zone existed.
Community leaders, rogue journalists, dismissed judges, student union heads, even reformed area boys, each had a seat at the table.
Dapo presented the files.
Onome testified.
And the consensus was reached.
Expose the Sovereigns on a livestream, during the state's Independence Gala.
But someone had been watching.
THE NIGHT OF THE GALA
Lights bathed Tafawa Balewa Square in gold and blue. Banners flew. Speeches echoed. Cameras rolled.
And in a nearby high-rise, Bibi set up the uplink.
Onome, disguised, waited for her cue. Her voice would be the final nail.
Dapo monitored the perimeter. Sadiq jammed nearby signals.
The livestream began.
Across Lagos, people tuned in.
And then the screen went black.
An override.
Suddenly, a new feed began.
A man in shadow.
"The traitors among us have been found. This city will no longer tolerate sedition disguised as patriotism. A reckoning is upon us."
It was a counter-broadcast.
Dapo screamed into his mic, "They hijacked the stream! Abort!"
But it was too late.
Explosions rocked the compound.
Smoke.
Gunfire.
Screams.
And above it all, a low whine as drones descended from the clouds, silent, winged, merciless.
The Sovereigns had declared war.