Caesar Obong Ng'bong ocen
Chapter Seventeen: The Ghost and the Cave (Part III)
We had been trapped inside the cave for almost five days and five nights.
Down there, time ceased to exist. There was neither sunrise nor sunset to mark the passing of another day. Darkness became our constant companion, interrupted only by the glow of our torches and the small fires Peter Kaburu and I built whenever the cold became too much to bear.
Survival demanded that we learn quickly.
The cave was home to countless bats that hung from the ceiling in thick colonies. Whenever hunger struck, Peter and I hunted them. I must admit that they were surprisingly delicious. Necessity changes a man’s palate. Their meat possessed a rich flavour with what seemed like its own natural seasoning, almost as though it contained salt and a faint hint of garlic. We roasted them over glowing embers until the skin crisped, and although it was far from the finest meal I had ever eaten, it kept us alive.
Finding water proved less difficult. Clear droplets seeped steadily through cracks in the ancient rock and collected in shallow pools. We filtered the water through pieces of cloth before drinking it, unwilling to risk disease in a place where no one would ever find us.
Neither of us complained.
There was no point.
Kaburu had always been that kind of man. Years earlier, back in Budama, he had taught me how to survive beneath the earth. While I saw only darkness, he saw opportunity. While I worried about tomorrow, he quietly prepared for it.
As we wandered through the labyrinth, stopping now and then to roast another bat over a small fire, I noticed that Peter had been collecting certain broad leaves from patches of vegetation growing near damp openings. Each time we rested, he carefully spread the leaves beside the fire, drying them with remarkable patience. I paid little attention at first, assuming they were meant for bedding or to wrap our food.
Only later did I realise they served an entirely different purpose.
By then we had begun to understand that the bats themselves knew something we did not. Every evening, vast numbers of them flew in the same direction through narrow fissures high above us before returning again. Peter believed they were leading us towards an opening somewhere beyond the darkness.
“We follow the bats,” he said quietly. “They must leave the cave to feed.”
It was the only clue we possessed.
One evening, after we had eaten, Peter reached into his satchel and produced the dried leaves. He crushed them carefully between his palms before wrapping the mixture inside another leaf, forming a crude roll. Then he lit one end from the fire.
Within moments the smoke drifted around us.
The smell was unlike ordinary tobacco. It carried an earthy sweetness mixed with the scent of the forest after rain.
Peter inhaled deeply before handing it to me.
“Trust me,” he said with a grin.
I took a cautious draw.
At first nothing happened.
Then the world began to change.
The back of my head felt strangely warm, almost as though invisible fingers were gently pressing against my skull. The sensation spread slowly through my body until every muscle relaxed. My worries dissolved into the darkness around me.
Suddenly I found myself laughing.
Not because anything was funny, but because happiness arrived without asking permission. The cave no longer seemed like a prison. The fire danced in impossible colours. Every crack in the ancient stone appeared to move gently as though the walls themselves were breathing.
Peter burst into laughter as well.
For several minutes neither of us could stop.
To this day, it remains the highest I have ever been in my life.
When the feeling finally settled, the weight of reality returned.
Our greatest burden had never truly been hunger or thirst.
It was uncertainty.
We had no idea how vast the underground labyrinth really was. We did not know whether we were moving towards freedom or simply wandering deeper into a forgotten civilisation that had buried itself beneath the hills of Kamuli thousands of years before.
One evening, as we sat beside the fire watching the flames consume another piece of dry wood, I finally broke the silence.
“I’ve stopped wondering what day it is.”
Peter stared into the fire.
“So have I,” he replied quietly. “I’ve stopped wondering what month it is.”
For a brief moment we laughed again—not because anything was amusing, but because laughter reminded us that we were still human.
To keep despair from consuming us, we spoke of home.
I remembered the villages where I had grown up, the River Nile shimmering beneath the morning sun, the sound of children chasing one another through dusty paths, the taste of roasted cassava served with fresh fish, and evenings when entire families gathered beneath the stars while elders told stories that seemed older than the moon itself.
Those memories became our refuge.
As I watched the firelight dance across the ancient walls, my thoughts drifted towards the people who had built this underground city.
Whoever they had been, they possessed knowledge far beyond anything I had imagined.
Their engineering defied belief.
Their language challenged everything Peter had spent years studying.
Their understanding of stone, water, ventilation and the hidden veins of the earth bordered on genius.
Yet they had vanished.
An entire civilisation had disappeared without leaving behind a single living descendant.
Only their records remained.
Patiently waiting for someone to read them.
That night sleep refused to come.
I lay beside the dying fire, listening to the endless dripping of water somewhere beyond the darkness.
Then I heard it.
Footsteps.
Slow.
Measured.
Deliberate.
They echoed through one of the distant tunnels with the unmistakable rhythm of someone walking towards us.
I sat upright instantly.
Across the fire Peter had already opened his eyes.
He had heard them too.
Without speaking, we reached for our torches.
The beams cut through the darkness.
Nothing.
No figure.
No movement.
No shadow.
Only endless corridors disappearing into blackness.
The footsteps had stopped.
The silence that followed felt even heavier than before.
Peter slowly lowered his torch.
“Did you hear that?” I whispered.
He nodded once.
“I did.”
Neither of us slept again that night.
Somewhere in the ancient city, something had been walking.
And deep inside my heart, I knew with absolute certainty that Peter Kaburu and I were no longer alone.
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Written by
Caesar Obong Ng'bong Ocen is a Ugandan writer whose work traverses narrative fiction, cultural memory, and moral inquiry. Drawing on African cosmologies, and reflective storytelling, his writing engages with issues of power, identity, faith, and the human condition within post‑conflict societies. His series blends political realism with interior psychological struggle, articulating the tensions between duty and conscience, tradition and modernity, exile, redemption. Obong Ng'bong's work bridges literary and social worlds: it interrogates African historical and political realities while exploring philosophical and ethical questions that resonate across disciplines. His narratives are grounded in cultural authenticity and moral depth, making them relevant to both literary and humanistic inquiry. He also mentors emerging writers and contributes to dialogue on African storytelling traditions and their place in contemporary literature.
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