Of Black Men And Time Travel

My beautiful wife lies besides me after a night of passionate lovemaking. Her name is Lasouda. And she is the Queen of the Bagayobo people of Mali, deep within the motherland of Africa. Anyone looking at her would see a six-foot-tall, dark-skinned young Black woman in her twenties. And that's fine because that's what they are meant to see. If only they knew what she truly is. A goddess among men and women. Today, she rules a Kingdom spanning hundreds of miles and well over two hundred thousand people make up the multitude of her subjects. Her Capital City of Bayoko Fanta alone houses eleven thousand people. I am here to tell you about a time of great trouble for her Kingdom, and the saviours who came to them from another time.

The motherland of Africa is the cradle of mankind. Long before man, other creatures lived here. Unfortunately, not all of them vanished from existence after the rise of man. Such creatures are the Others. I have battled them since I arrived here. My wife's mother, the beautiful and wise Queen Karidja lost her life in the war against the Others. Things that looked like men but aren't human. They feast on human flesh and blood. They are exceptionally strong and brutal. And they are very hard to kill. The Others hate us humans. According to the Elders of the Bagayobo people, the Others lived in the motherland of Africa at a time when the ancestors of man still feared the ancient beasts and had yet to discover fire or the means of making weapons.

The Others have often preyed on the peoples of various African kingdoms. When they came to the Bagayobo kingdom, the citizens vowed to fight eternally against their kind. Their endless wars against them cost many lives. The bravest women and men of the kingdom were no match for them. What good were swords, spears and bows and arrows against man-like creatures of superhuman strength and speed? The people of the kingdom cried out for a hero. And the Gods of Mali answered their prayers. They sent for a hero, and he came to them from the distant world of twenty-first century America. His name is Jackson Anderson, and he is by far the strangest African man that ancient Africa has ever seen. Even stranger than the creatures previously mentioned.

Hey, there. My name is Jackson Anderson. The hero of this story. Let me put in my two cents. Man, I'm having a strange time with this. It's definitely a weird story and I still find certain parts of it unbelievable even though I've lived it. I was born in the City of Cap-Haitien, Republic of Haiti, in 1984. My family moved to Washington D.C. five years later. My father Antoine Anderson worked as a bus driver. My mother Geraldine Pierre Anderson worked as a nurse's aide. I grew up in D.C. and eventually attended Howard University. I graduated with a bachelor's degree in Criminal Justice in 2007. Yeah, I'm the guy who's often been called a slacker. I get accused of being too rough around the edges and too into rap and hip hop. However, I'm still an educated man. Take that, haters! Since then, I've been working odd jobs while trying to come up with the funds to attend Law School. Howard University is the best school on the planet in this Haitian-American brother's humble opinion. I wanted to attend Howard University Law School so bad I could taste it. That's how I ended up working in this jewelry store owned by this old Black lady named Aminata. She's straight from Africa, in the region of Mali I think.

The jewelry store was really nice, housing a ton of expensive stuff. All of it authentic African jewels, as well as artwork, gadgets and priceless collectibles. The old lady was paying me sixteen bucks per hour to mind the store. Now, I'm a college graduate and should be making a lot more than that. However, I got fired from my job at Bank of America where I was a teller for nine months. I needed something to pay the bills, man. Otherwise I'm fucked. The old lady I worked for was really strict, and she forbade me from touching any of the stuff. Truth be told, I knew the old bat had cameras everywhere so I wasn't going to try anything. I just wish she trusted me more, you know?

One day, I was in the back, chilling. The old lady's equally weird nephew Hassan was minding the front of the store and I was on my break. After eating some delicious Chinese food from Manchu Wok, I relaxed in the backroom. I had this month's copy of BIG BLACK BUTT magazine. I've been a loyal subscriber for years. Needless to say I was a little busy when that idiot Hassan yelled that we were being robbed. I had to readjust my clothes real fast as I ran out of the back. If anything was taken, I'd be a dead man. The old bat would fire me on the spot. Somebody tried to rob us before, some neighbourhood punks who didn't even have guns. These fools actually showed up with bats if you could believe that. Who carries baseball bats as weapons in this day and age? Especially in a violent town like Washington D.C.? Anyhow, I ran to the front. And found Hassan struggling with two Black guys with durags on their heads. And they both had guns. Oh, shit.

One of them pointed his guns at me. I recognized the fool. Jamal Woods. I went to high school with that bastard if you can believe that. He banged Nerina Johnson, this fine-ass Jamaican chick I had a thing for. She was a religious chick who believed in waiting for marriage while dating me but she gave up the booty to Jamal. I've hated Jamal ever since. Especially since he got Nerina pregnant and then dumped her ass. He corrupted a good woman and made a decent brother like me look like a fool. When I saw Jamal, I forgot about his guns. I just went up to that punk and punched him right on his mouth. I don't know who was more surprised, him or me. Jamal staggered under the force of the blow. He fell but I guess his backpack broke his fall because he didn't seem to be hurting from hitting the floor. At the same time, I noticed he had a gold chain with a weird Medallion around his neck. It was The Medallion. A priceless jewel belonging to the old lady from Mali. I snatched it from his neck...and then all hell broke loose.

I'm not sure how or why, but the Medallion began to glow, and blue-white energy came out of it. Just like something out of the Sci-Fi Channel, fam. A vortex was formed by the energy, and it sucked both Jamal and I inside. And just like that, two Black guys from America found themselves transported from Washington D.C. in the summer of 2011 to the strange world of Mali in Africa, circa 800 B.C. The first thing I noticed when I landed was that I sure as hell wasn't in Washington D.C. anymore. D.C. has some rough spots but it's a concrete jungle, not an actual jungle. I landed in a puddle, right beside Jamal's dumb ass. We were still struggling. I was on top of the fool, trying to knock him out when we crashed through space and time. I think the water and our weird surroundings sobered us up, but I'm not sure. We definitely weren't in D.C. anymore.

Jamal and I stopped fighting, and gazed at our surroundings. Neither of us had ever seen a jungle before. And we had no idea how in hell we got there. Jamal was mad as shit. He pointed his gun at me and ordered me to send him back to the frigging store. He accused me of doing some voodoo magic crap. Just because I'm Haitian-American. I punched him and he punched me back. I hate it when people play up stereotypes about Haitians in my presence. I'm a Christian man and don't believe in the voodoo shit.

Anyhow, we stopped fighting because we heard a truly creepy sound. The unmistakable sound of a woman screaming. Without a word being spoken, we headed toward the sound. I think it's some deep chivalry thing because Jamal and I just went there in unison, in spite of our differences. We ran through the jungle, and came upon a clearing. There, we saw something amazing for the second time that day. Three young Black women clad in bright red tunics and wielding long spears struggled against a trio of bronze-skinned, burly guys. At first I thought they were guys. Once we got closer, I realized they weren't guys at all. They looked like cavemen. Ugly forehead, weird teeth and excessive body hair.

The young Black women kept hitting them with the spears. To no avail. They just wouldn't go down. One of the cavemen grabbed the nearest young Black woman. That's when I rushed him. Even with nothing in my hands, I'll be damned if I let some caveman or whatever hurt a Black woman in my presence. I slammed into the caveman, and he dropped his would-be victim. I crouched beside her, while locking eyes with the caveman. He stared at me, shocked. Moments later he hurled himself at me, but never made it. Shots rang out, sounding like thunder. I looked up. It was Jamal. With a single bullet he put down the caveman nearest me. The hairy beast fell, a hole in his forehead. The caveman's companions roared and rushed Jamal, but two more shots put them down.

Jamal stood there, posturing like Clint Eastwood in a cowboy movie. He totally didn't notice a fourth caveman who crept up behind him. I shouted a warning but Jamal heeded me too late. The caveman grabbed him, and I had to say the gangster dude looked like he was done for. Yet, the young Black woman I had rescued from the caveman didn't seem to think it was too late. With a thrust of her arm she let her spear fly, and it flew true. It speared the forehead of the caveman who had seized Jamal, and the creature went down with a thud. I asked Jamal if he was okay. He nodded. Picking up his guns and backpack, he joined us.

The three young Black women who had battled the cavemen looked at us suspiciously. Doubtless they had never seen brothers who looked like us before. The one I rescued seemed to be in charge of the others. She introduced herself as Princess Bintou, sister of Queen Lasouda. I offered her my hand but she batted it away. Her fellow warriors, both of whom were truly lovely, tall ladies, introduced themselves as Aicha and Safiatou. They offered to escort us to their leader, who would definitely have questions for us. Jamal and I walked with the ladies. Hot damn, their tunics covered only the chest and genitals, and nothing else. Think makeshift bikinis. In spite of our differences, Jamal and I exchanged dap. We hadn't seen hot Black chicks like this in a while. Whoever was the King of this place must have his hands full with all these hot babes! This shows you what little we knew.

We walked for about five miles before we came to a truly beautiful town sitting atop a mountain. Beautiful white houses, walled gardens and neat streets greeted our eyes. I had never seen the like. Neither had Jamal. We were gawking at all the pretty Black women we saw, and the burly Black guys scoffed at us. The women were eyeballing us, doubtless not used to seeing brothers dressed like us. I had on my blue silk shirt, black tie and black dress pants. Jamal wore a Sean John's hooded sweatshirt, black jeans and Timberland boots. He carried his guns holstered at his side like frigging Shaft. The Princess escorted us to a truly magnificent building which towered over all the others in town. The royal palace. Everywhere we looked, there were Black women. The only Black men we saw inside the palace were old men. Jamal mentioned this to me and I nodded.

The Princess walked up to an official-looking Black lady and asked for an audience with her majesty the Queen Lasouda. Moments later, Jamal and I were asked to surrender our weapons. Jamal hesitated to part with his guns. All around us, the women tensed. They had swords, spears and shields. Even though he's a crack shot, Jamal couldn't take them all out. With a sigh, he handed the Princess his guns. He winked at me and whispered to me that he had more in his backpack. I shook my head and said nothing.

After a few minutes, we finally met the Queen. The first time I laid eyes on that woman, I was speechless. She was the most beautiful Black woman I've ever seen. Nah, make that the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. If God took a sister and gave her the face of Alicia Keys, the body of Ashanti, the grace of Beyonce Knowles, the eyes of Rihanna Fenty, the butt of Serena Williams and the poise of Michelle Obama, she still couldn't touch the lovely Queen Lasouda. My jaw dropped right beside Jamal's when we saw her. Without a word I knelt respectfully before her. Jamal didn't kneel but he took a bow. There was just something about this sister that seemed to demand this, somehow. Queen Lasouda smiled at us, and welcomed us to her kingdom. She praised us as warriors of great power. Then she asked for our help in defending her kingdom against the monsters who looked like men but were clearly not human. Eagerly Jamal and I accepted. Thus sealing our fates.

To be continued...