A Hero’s Journey

Could Africa think of a man who would save them from the traditional witches who used to kill male children? No one expected in the continent expected a savior even the religious heads of the tribes thought that the gods had agreed to it and were punishing people for their sins. Just at the right moment, Bozeka and Bazika were born in the village of Wesuze along the slopes of mountain Emba Soira. They were born only as natural as any other babies. Their parents were however fearful that they would lose them to the wickedness of the magicians. So they named them Bozeka meaning the one who never dies young and Bazika, meaning the one who will protect the children.

Just like other children that were born him Bozeka and Bazika used to take herd cattle along the Emba Soira Mountains. Unlike the other children, however, Bozeka and Bazika had some supernatural visitations. They could sometimes fall asleep while grazing their father’s cattle and find themselves traveling in space. One moment while they were deep in the forest grazing alongside Bure and Baroki, their longtime friends, Bozeka and Bazika slept and got carried away. For two hours, they looked dead. Their grazing companions resolved to cry out to the villagers that the twins had already died. Little did they know that the two had been visiting the gods who would reveal to them the hideouts of the witches and give them the powers to kill the witches. 

Bozeka and Bazika were however fearful of the gods’ instructions. He knew that the traditional witches were destructive and could kill him too if he aggrieved them. After returning home that evening, Bozeka asked himself, “Arent the witches stronger than the gods? Why don’t the gods protect people from being killed and now they send us?”  Bazika saw the fear in his brother and encouraged him telling him that the witches would not kill them. Encouraged and having faith, the two planned that they would rise the following day and start their expedition. 

So Bozeka and Bazika rose up the following morning and picked their map and swords. They went up to the mountains and searched for the first witch on the map. Against their thinking, Bozeka and Bazika expected that the witch lived alone and that he was a lonely old man. But oh!  They found a great army protecting the witch. They first feared to engage the army of more than 30 men. When the gods noticed that the two were fearful they all at once made them invisible such that the guards did not see them and they walked past them. The witch, however, had magic powers and could see them. Bozeka and Bazika wrestled with the witch for hours and killed him. It was a win they never expected. The brothers now knew that they had supernatural powers and faced off other five witches, maiming and killing them. 

The story was however different with the seventh witch. He was the head of the other witches; he was the king of evil. Bozeka and Bazika never knew that the very day they thought they would kill the last witch and restore safety to young children across Africa was the day they would almost die. The witch was powerful than he was. He wrestled Bozeka to the ground, lifted his sword and said, “If you can’t kill the witch, he kills you!” The gods would however not allow the Bozeka to get killed; they denied the witch the power to drop his sword on his neck. Bazika, on the other hand, protected his brother and denied the witch from killing his brother. Unbelievably, with his eyes red, the witch told them, “Depart and never return!” It was a terrible defeat for Bozeka; he went home weary. He had helped eliminate the witches, but he did not kill their god. It was now time for the gods of Bozeka Bazika to fight the god of the witches themselves. Bozeka and Bazika had no choice but to go back and live among their people, raise families and live like ordinary people once more. 

Bozeka and Bazika were men who did not know their supernatural ability. They had a call to act to save their people, feared but heeded to the call. They helped in eliminating some part of the problem that faced their society but failed to make a complete elimination of the problem. Bozeka and Bazika, therefore, subscribed to the heroic journey where they met an obstacle to their mission and returned to a normalized state once more feeling weary, yet energized.