A Chase and A Thousand Encounters

Lightning slashed the moonless sky. It momentarily exposed what was in it: an antediluvian dresser gnawed by termites, a plastic chair embellished with spider webs, an unkempt folding bed inhabited by cockroaches and mice. October winds forced its way through the rusted window screen. The tempest was coming. They crawled on all fours, feeling with their palms and knees the damp and mossy floor of the abandoned lodge. They avoided bumping into things that would disrupt the sangfroid atmosphere inside the room. Their eyes, this time, were useless. All they depended on was intuition. They rested their weary backs against the wall, smelled their sweat and touched their fresh wounds. They both panted, felt enervated after long hours of relentless running. He suddenly held her hand. She squeezed his palm and they succumbed to the blankness.

His first encounter with her was during the rally of the abantes at Mendiola. Her image was a contrast to the crowd of bronze-skinned and emaciated women. Her complexion was glowing though she was already ruddy because of the heat. She had an aquiline nose and mermaid curls. He saw her earlier while she was having a boodlefight lunch with the other abantes. She did not mind the soiled hands scooping the pile of steamy rice. She did not complain of allergies or did not show any sign of disgust of the sardinas. She embraced the noontime sun. She played with the almost naked street children. He admired what he saw behind his camera.

He tried to sense if someone was lurking outside. But there was only the sound of the gushing wind and the violent rustling of the cogon grass. The seemingly safe state was suspicious and most of the time, for them, it manifested greater perils. 
He remembered the encounter earlier today: The men in fatigue uniforms spotted them on their way to the kapitolyo .They were recognized. Fortunately, they brought their guns with them, so they were able to defend themselves. They were able to escape. He wrapped her in his sinewy arms. Their eyes were getting used to the darkness. His smile was vaguely sketched but it told her that with him, she was safe. As she snuggled in his arms, she fondled with her wooden rosary inside her pocket.

They were formally introduced to each other when she visited Hospicio Sam Miguel. She was cuddling a three-year old orphan when she noticed a well-built man with almond eyes and wavy hair. He was taking pictures of her. The first thing that entered her mind was he was probably a member of the government’s intelligence unit. Since the passage of the president’s new law on terrorism, abantes like her had been stigmatized as terrorists. She remembered what happened to her two fellow abantes who were abducted while they were doing research in a farming community in Bulacan. She felt odd paroxysms of rage for the man though she knew she must not because the man had not shown any harmful or doubtful motives. It was purely irrational and senseless, she thought so she approached Ka Miriam, the head of the abantes, to ask about the man. Ka Miriam wrinkled her forehead and dragged her to where the man was standing.

“ Steven, I want you to meet Almira del Cerna, one of our newest members. Almira, this is Steven Cere, photographer and journalist. He is doing a documentary about us.”

Four in the afternoon, it was time to leave the Hospicio. The abantes were all preparing to leave when some nuns approached them to distribute wooden rosaries, their humble token of appreciation.

The sound of the rustling leaves was soporific. His eyelids were getting heavy but he knew that it was not a good time to sleep. In the life that they had chosen, sleeping is letting Death crawl under your skin. Her eyes were closed but he knew that she was just half asleep. He maintained vigilance and he knew that she was also trying really hard not to give in to her exhaustion. He ran his fingers on the fresh laceration on his forehead which he got earlier when he bumped his head on a rock. With the night that they're going to face, he realized that pain will be an indispensable motivation to stay awake.

His encounter with Almira and the abantes became often. From his conversations with Almira, he found out that she was a daughter of a businessman. Almira often tells him how she loathed the life which she was born into. She also told him how her mother was gunned down by one of her envious amigas after winning a game of mahjong. She witnessed the decadence of her kind and since then she promised to herself that she would not let herself be contaminated by the evils of the high life . She joined the abantes when she decided to quit school at Ateneo during her junior year. She was a Philosophy major and although she was educated in Ateneo, she found her home in UP where she met Ka Miriam and the other abantes. He admired the girl for leaving her well-off life, for having the courage to be one of the abantes, for having sturdy principles. They became good friends, “sitsirya” buddies, they call themselves because during rallies, they would go to one corner and eat “sitsirya” while discussing their ideals and their lives before constantly being with the movement. All was well with their friendship until he found out that Almira hurriedly left for Davao. He asked Ka Miriam about the details of her trip but Ka Miriam was stern and she did not let him know where Almira was and what she was doing. He left the headquarters of the abantes feeling an unexplained emptiness.

She opened her eyes, she noticed he was staring blankly into to the darkness. Blood dripped from his forehead. She wiped off the scarlet drips on his cheek with her hand. He kissed her forehead.

He was assigned to cover a story about illegal logging in Sariaya. It was a project rejected by his colleagues because according to them, Sariaya was like the Basilan of Luzon, reporters get abducted in that area or worse, they get caught in the crossfire between the military and the NPA. His brother, who was his only family, was against his bold decision. Before he left he even had an argument with his brother over the phone. In the end, he prevailed and his brother, as usual, just advised him to take care. After five hours of “habal-habal” ride, he reached the site where he was greeted by toppled and chopped trees. He started to take pictures. The habal driver stayed with him for a while but it did not take long when their welcoming committee arrived. Some men came wearing military attire and one of them grabbed his camera. He was startled. His colleagues were telling the truth when they told him that even the military cannot be trusted in Sariaya. His stubborn journalistic flair was so strong that he tried to snatch back his camera. But after that, another group emerged out of the woods. They were dressed like peasants and they were armed too. He ducked to protect himself from the exchange of bullets between the two forces. During the encounter he noticed that not all the peasants with gun were men. One of them was a woman. Her head was wrapped by a shirt and she wore glasses, probably to conceal her face and gender. He was still ducked when some peasant men took him away from the crossfire. With a blow on his nape, he lost consciousness and when he woke up, Almira’s face smiled at him She was not in Davao all this time.

He lost his battle with sleep.When he woke up, the weak gray morning light and the restless sounds of rain and wind filled the room. He woke her up and they both witnessed the room’s clutter; the dresser, the folding bed, the chair and the other articles like the broken lampshade, stray plastic bags, damp and mold-infested clothes, moths resting on busted fluorescent bulb on the ceiling, frolicking lizards on the walls and stray ferns and vines growing on out from the cracks on the wall. He helped her stand and walk towards the wooden door. She had a fracture on her feet so it was difficult for her to walk. He assisted her until they reached the rickety makeshift ladder. They were about to leave the lodge which served as their sanctuary for a night so he checked his gun. For three months of joining Almira in the samahan, he always does that. There was a typhoon and its wrath had just begun. The violent wind played with the falling rain and they walked outside the lodge until they got soaked in water. They walked, not minding the danger of being caught by the lesser gods of the militia. Now, all they have in mind is this chance to escape.