Lagos never really sleeps. It just changes the way it breathes. At night, the city exhales — hot air from danfo exhausts, smoke from suya stands, curses from drivers fighting for lane space. And somewhere inside all that noise, I exist. A small dot of paint and sweat under the Obalende bridge.
They call me Tari, but the streets renamed me long ago — Tari Colours. I earned that one night when I painted a whole danfo in glow-in-the-dark graffiti. The driver woke up, saw angels on his bus, and refused to drive it for a week. Said the bus now "belonged to heaven." Me, I just laughed. I didn't do it for heaven. I did it because paint is the only language that listens to me. I grew up in Mushin, where colours die young. The houses are brown, the air is brown, even the dreams come out in sepia. My mum sold akara by the roadside, the type of woman who could fight NEPA and police in the same breath. My dad? Don't know. I only remember a smell — engine oil and ogogoro. After Mum died in my second year at LASPOTECH, I left school. School couldn't teach me how to feed myself. The streets could. So now I paint. Not for fame — for survival. Some nights I do walls for clubs or street brands. Other nights, I paint for myself — messages no one understands. But tonight was different.
The bridge at Obalende was quiet — which never happens. It was one of those strange Lagos nights when even the air felt like it was waiting for something. The rain had fallen earlier, so the road still glistened under streetlight reflections. A soft mist curled around the pillars. I stood there with my backpack, my spray cans, and one crazy idea. There was a wall I'd been eyeing for months — the back face of the central bridge, just beside the old newsstand. Most graffiti guys avoid that side. They say it's "juju wall." "Guy, that wall dey move at night," one of them told me once. "Move ke?" "I swear down. My guy paint am one time, by morning e disappear. The paint vanish. Even the wall sef crack."
I just laughed then. Lagos people believe anything that happens at night is juju. Generator blow? Juju. NEPA restore light? Juju. But that wall called to me. It was rough, old — like something ancient was buried inside it. Every time I passed, I could almost feel it humming.
So yeah, I came to paint it. I set my Bluetooth speaker down, let Odumodublvck's Dog Eat Dog II roll low in the background — just enough to drown out my thoughts. The beat echoed under the bridge, and the smell of wet concrete filled the air. I shook my spray can and started sketching — broad strokes, fluid lines. I wanted to paint something about Lagos — the struggle, the beauty, the madness. Maybe a giant hand reaching out of the sea, holding the Third Mainland Bridge like a toy. Something loud, something real. But as I sprayed the first arc, my nozzle jammed."Ah, abeg oh," I muttered, smacking the can. A droplet splashed on my wrist — dark grey, almost black. When I wiped it off, I saw something strange beneath the flaking plaster. There were markings. Not graffiti. Not cracks either. Lines — clean, circular, deliberate. Carved deep into the wall like someone drew them with light itself. I frowned, scraping more plaster off with my finger. The patterns formed into curves and spirals, connected by tiny dots. At the centre was a symbol I'd never seen before — three concentric circles crossed by a lightning-shaped line. It almost looked like an eye. I stepped back. "Na who do this kind design?" I whispered. The markings pulsed faintly, catching the yellow of the streetlight — then fading again. I thought it was just my imagination. Maybe reflection from a car. Maybe I was tired. But my chest started tightening, and I swear, the air felt heavier. Still, curiosity is a demon. I took a clean can, crouched low, and started tracing the pattern. My fingers followed the grooves, and the sound of the spray echoed like whispers. That's when I heard it. A voice. Not from behind me — inside the wall. Soft, almost like a song in Yoruba.
"Àṣẹ ń rọ, ẹ̀dá ń gbagbọ́... Àṣẹ ń rọ, ẹ̀dá ń gbagbọ́..."
(Power falls, man believes... Power falls, man believes...)
My whole body froze. The mist thickened, my speaker crackled and died. Then my paint — the one I was using — started to glow. Not bright. Just a dull, deep ember, like fire hidden under ash. The lines I'd traced came alive, crawling over the wall like snakes. And suddenly, I knew — this wasn't a design. It was a sigil. Later, I'd learn that the symbol was ancient — from the days when the Òrìṣà walked the earth freely. It represented Àṣẹ, the divine force that gives everything existence — the word that creates, the breath that commands. But the sigil wasn't meant to be drawn anymore. Centuries ago, the gods used it to seal away their own rebellion, binding power that man was never supposed to touch again. And I, a broke graffiti artist from Mushin, just completed it. The glow brightened, spilling onto the wet ground. My paint spread like water, forming shapes I didn't draw — eyes, faces, masks. They blinked at me. Some were smiling, others looked angry. My breath came shallow. "Ah, omo…" I whispered, stepping back. My heart pounded like generator pistons.
Then — a burst of light. The sigil flared, and for a second, the whole bridge flickered — like the world glitched. The noise of Lagos faded completely. No danfo, no shouting, nothing. Just silence and a low hum, like electricity breathing. And I saw something. A shadow behind the light. Tall. Crowned. Watching me. When it spoke, the voice wasn't sound — it was vibration. It shook through my bones.
"Àṣepọ̀…"
That word. It echoed in my head. I didn't know what it meant, but it felt heavy — like a name older than language. Then everything stopped. The glow faded, the paint dripped normally again, the city roared back to life. My speaker restarted mid-song. It was as if nothing happened. But the wall… the sigil stayed. And it burned faintly under my paint, hidden like a heartbeat.
I packed my cans with shaking hands. My palms were trembling, my skin still tingling. When I zipped my bag, I noticed something strange — my wrist had a faint circle burned into it. Three rings and a line, like the sigil. I rubbed it, but it didn't fade. "Na wetin be this again?" I muttered, trying to laugh it off. Maybe the paint chemical reacted weirdly. Maybe I inhaled too much fumes. Yeah — that had to be it. But deep down, something inside me had changed. I could feel it. Like electricity under my skin. Like the city was whispering my name through its walls.
I was about to leave when I heard shouting from across the road. A madman — one of those street preachers with torn shirts and wild eyes — was staring right at me. His face twisted in fear. He pointed to the wall and screamed, voice cutting through the night:
"The seal don open again!"
The air went cold. I froze. And for the first time in my life, Lagos felt too quiet.