The 24th day of Ramadan began like any other day in Khartoum—or at least, that is what we forced ourselves to believe. Gunfire had become background noise, a cruel rhythm we tried to normalize. I was at the warehouse, waiting for instructions that would never arrive.
Then the illusion collapsed.
Our guard, Mohammed Haroun—a quiet man in his forties who guarded by day and laid tiles by trade—burst into the warehouse. His face was drained of color, his breath broken into fragments. He did not look like a man; he looked like someone who had just seen the end of the world.
Between gasps, he told us what had happened. While running from stray bullets, his closest friend had been shot beside him. One moment they were alive together. The next, he was alone. No one stopped. No one helped. Everyone was running.
Something inside me shifted.
My tongue felt heavy. My throat burned dry. The fragile shield of denial finally shattered. Without speaking, I picked up my bag. One thought echoed in my mind: "I have to get back to Wad Madani."
Outside, the streets were no longer streets—they were a current of fleeing bodies. I moved with the crowd, southward, away from the thunder of artillery that shook the sky. The road toward Wad Madani was said to be “quieter.” But quiet meant only that death was less visible.
Bullets still sliced through the air. A child was crying somewhere behind me. A man had frozen in the middle of the road, unable to move, as if terror had nailed his feet to the ground. And in that moment, I understood something terrifying: sometimes fear stops the heart before the bullet ever reaches it.
We passed abandoned houses. Doors left open. Lives interrupted mid-sentence. Faces carved with a pain too deep for language. But we could not afford to look for long. Compassion was a luxury that day. Survival was not.
At last, we reached Salama Intersection—a chaotic artery of escape. Buses and vans swallowed whoever could pay. Strangers pressed shoulder to shoulder, bound by nothing except the same primal instinct: To survive.
Missed the beginning? Read Part 1: The Calm Before the Inferno here
