Zell lay on his bed, fingers clasped behind his head, he looked at the roofing sheet high above t were three of these structures on the coumpond .
The buildings had originally been built as warehouses, two of them had been converted into dormitories for the boys, while one was still used for its intended purpose.
The rectangular brick building was long and narrow with a large solid metal gate at one end, there were no windows as fresh air came in through the gap were metal supports were fixed to the wall which held the roof in place.
Luckily the climate was generally cool for most of the year otherwise they would have been roasted alive, their bunk beds had been arranged at the farthest end of the facility leaving a lot of room between the beds and the metal gate.
This space served as a play area for the boys when they got bored, they would either kicked around an old football, run fifty meters dashes or play some of the childhood games they had grown up with .
“Pssst, Dorm B, what do you think is happening out there?” The lad in the bunk bed next to zell hissed.
” Well, your guess is as good as mine,” zell replied not wanting to be drawn into any useless conversation .
“Do you think those are the authorities sent here to set us free ?” The lad asked .
“Don’t you think that’s wishful thinking?” Zell answered with a question. ” wouldn’t they have stormed this place already if they were here to set us free?”.
“Well yeah, I guess you you ‘re right . I thought those were sensible questions to ask, Seriously I’m tired of this prison life” the lad lamented bitterly
Zell totally agreed with his colleague’s last statement but said nothing, this place felt more like a prison than a dormitory, the ‘water- boys ‘ who were usually on duty throughout the night slept in warehouse ‘A’ .
The rest of the boys, Zell and his friends lived in warehouse ‘B’, this was where they were bought to after their daytime shift in the factory and then locked in from the outside.
Zell always wondered what they would do if there was a medical emergency in the middle of the night or if there was a fire outbreak .
There were three points in the brick work were the masons had either forgotten to Insert the last set of bricks , or had intentionally left them out, these points had become the ‘slot ‘; their windows to the outside world when they were locked up in this prison being passed off a dormitory.
“Hey , why are you deep in thought ?” a voice quietly asked .
“Just trying to figure out what’s going on out there ,” Zell replied in an undertone .
“You think something’s gone wrong?”
“Whatever’s going on out there is not going to help any of us, and there are only two things I can think of at the moment ,” Zell responded.
“What are those ?”
“They are either testing out a new security system..” Zel paused for effect , “…. or some one tried to escape”
“Are you serious ? Some one tried to escape again ?” The lad jerked off the bed.
“Dude, were you listening to me when I spoke? I gave you an either – or scenario,” Zell responded irritably .
Though Brian was his best friend, he really wasn’t the smartest boy around, at fifteen and fourteen years old respectively, both boys were among the oldest the lads working at the complex, they had both been around since the launch of the project six years ago.
Zell was dying to tell his friend what he was really thinking, but he just couldn’t bring himself to, deep within him , he knew what had most likely happened during the night .
He had studied the layout of the complex for years and had found only one probable loophole, Zell knew someone bad tried to escape and had definitely not been successful. He knew this because he was making escape plans on his own.
Earthmix lobster farm was a huge complex with some very unique features, it was a very beautiful place despite the dark secret it held.
It was the only lobster Farm of its kind in West African and probably only the second, or third on the continent, the farm which lay in a valley had two distinct sections; an artificial salt-water Lake and a network of buildings. From the top of the hill , the farm looked like an elongated horseshoe.
The ‘U’ in the horseshoe was the artificial salt-water lake, this had been created by pumping millions of gallons of seawater from miles away into the valley, Sheer cliff walls on all sides held the salty water in place and a system of pipes regularly kept the water fresh and clean .
The open end of the ‘U’ was blocked off by the network of buildings, these included a factory, warehouse , office buildings and sleeping quarters.
The farm looked perfect, the calm surface of the water and the beautiful lawns giving it an almost heavenly look, Deep beneath the surface of the artificial lake lay the merchandise that brought in hundreds of thousands of dollars to the owners of the farm, the same merchandise that was paying poor families that lived along water bodies to break the law.