The Nubians are an ethnic group of very old data that inhabit the south of present Egypt and a broad band in Sudan. In the old ages the Nubian warriors were famous as archers and fast riders.
The woman called Alimah, born within that ethnicity had migrated to Ethiopia as a child with her family, and had been educated in an Ethiopian Christian school, leaving aside her original Islamic creed.
Making a great effort to overcome the psychological pain produced by the memories, Alimah told the men who listened attentively a brief summary of her childhood at school, certainly the best time of her life, where as a pupil she was offered to work with the teachers, who were excited by her desire to learn. She was then in charge of the girls training in different disciplines and even teaching classes.
Nubia took breath and her beautiful face furrowed with a bitter gesture.
“Go on, dear girl.” Urged Charley.
The narrative was interrupted thereafter by tears produced by the painful and recent memories.
One morning a band of Eritreans kidnappers fell over the small village and the school, massacred the few men who tried to face them in order to defend the villagers, most of whom tried to escape through the steppe of sparse vegetation surrounding the village, being chased by the looters who managed to kill many of them. School teachers were also murdered and the students abducted, raped and herded like cattle forcing them to cross the border. The village was burned and the few cows property of the peasants taken with the aggressor group. What had been a small oasis of peace was literally wiped off the map.
The subsequent course of events was even worse, the girls were raped and beaten again, barely fed and their wounds were not healed. Several of them could not withstand the level of brutality that they were exposed to and killed themselves in various ways. Finally the survivors were conducted in small groups to be sold in different slave markets that still in the XXI century remain protected by corrupt officials who violate the mandates of the United Nations issued through UNODC and other agencies, and even by their own governments.
Finally, a contingent of twenty girls selected for their beauty was embarked in a port on the Red Sea on an old Greek merchant ship.
Nubia made a nonstop narration of their arrival in New York, their accommodation in a dirty overcrowded room and the moments immediately before the attack suffered by the traffickers at the hands of a suspected rival gang and finally their flight with Sanwarit. On reaching the point when her friend´s throat was slit before her eyes the young woman suffered a seizure and started frothing at the mouth.
“It was my fault!” Exclaimed Nubia in anguish. “I dragged her by the arm even though she did not want to follow me, and then Sanwarit ended up dead”.
Tears and exclamations were accompanied by shaking of her body that threatened to throw her out of bed. Marcos and Charley held her tightly to prevent the girl from harming herself in desperation. Finally the old man introduced a pill in her mouth and forced her to drink a glass of water.
“What have you given her?” Asked the young man.
“A very strong sedative. It will take effect in a few minutes. It is necessary to prevent her nervous system to collapse that can have even cardiac consequences despite her youth.”
“But when she wakes up her memories will come back as well as her guilt feelings.” Said somberly the boy, obviously distraught.
“ I hope not.” Replied the old man. “Don´t you think that what just happened is necessarily bad. The girl was carrying all this inside her and she needed to throw it out. She had to verbalize it.”
“How come a cabinetmaker knows all this?
“I've told you about my time in Vietnam. I have witnessed many scenes of traumatic stress, in some cases associated with feelings of guilt.” Charley made a moment of silence as he rose from the bed. “Now we must let her sleep.”