Tarasha - Season 1 - Episode 58

Episode 5 years ago

Tarasha - Season 1 - Episode 58

Tarasha stood transfixed, temporarily unable to utter any word or move from the spot. The knife in her left hand fell off and blood began to drip down to the floor.

‘Omotara’ Henry called softly as he proceeded forward.

‘We need to talk’
His phone rang out, disrupting the moment. He quickly took it out and silenced it without checking the caller’s ID.

‘Jeffery’ Tarasha’s lips moved repeatedly. The colours in her eyes were changing, it looked like she wanted to cry but there was no tears formed in the eyes. ‘Where did
you see him?’ Tarasha asked calmly. She released the knife in her right hand to the ground.
Henry’s gaze moved away from her. He took a quick glance at the window at the balcony of the house, someone was opening the curtain to peep. ‘Let’s sit somewhere and talk’


Tarasha inhaled deeply and walked back to the car , she entered back into the front seat she was before. Henry followed her slowly. His phone rang again, he checked the screen this time, it was Agent Dakolo calling. He silenced it again and dipped it into his pocket. He entered
and sat in the driver’s seat.


He looked at Tarasha’s face, she seemed not to have noticed that he was now in the car with her. Her face had turned pale, her body was right there with him but her mind had journeyed far.


~~FLASHBACK~~
** May 27, 2014 **
Omotara sat on the floor of the bus which was covered with a dirty rug. Still crying, she was feeling so uneasy and dirty in her blood stained clothes. She wiped the tears off her face from time to time but it was still uncontrollable, it kept flowing down like a river. No one
could have imagined that such a calamity could befall a happy family like hers, especially on her day of joy. Her parents and two of brothers were brutally murdered, her virginity was stolen in the most gruesome way and now she and the rest of her siblings were being carried to an
unknown place, only God knew where they were taking them to and what they wanted to use them for.

The bus vibrated on getting to a rough side of the road
after which the motion was slowed down and finally
brought to a stop. Some of their captors went out of the
bus and returned two minutes later. They began to lead
the youngest group of which Jerry was among, outside. It
was very dark, so Omotara could not see where they
were being led to.
‘Ahhh!’ She heard a loud groan which she recognized.
Her elder brother, Jeffery had fallen to the floor where he
was in the bus, a man who was holding a gun was
standing over him and looking at him with mean eyes. It
seemed as if Jeffery had tried to peep through the
window and the man had hit him on the head with the
butt of the gun. Her eyes met with her brother’s own , his
lips were vibrating, he was trying to say something to her
but he was inaudible. His eyes closed slowly and
gradually. Omotara’s cry increased, she couldn’t tell if he
died or fainted.
‘When we get out of this bus, I’ll make sure his head is
cut off’ the man who hit Jeffery said in a warning tone to
others. Omotara he felt like getting up to do something
like hitting the man furiously until he kills her too but she
couldn’t, her bones were so weak that she couldn’t even
lift her legs without vibrating. It wasn’t easy to be forced
on several sex rounds with the evil man whose body
weight was four times hers.
The main aim of the rapist was actually to molest her till
death, but she somehow survived. He had to give up after
he had gone several rounds with the innocent girl and
she wasn’t showing any signs of dying soon.
Jeffery was still laying down unconsciously when the bus
stopped again, that was after another hour of traveling.
Some of their captors went out again and returned few
minutes later to transfer another group of kids to
another bus. Omotara was part of the new group to be
transferred. Her peers began to get up and follow the
directions given by the men to move out of the bus.
Omotara was too weak to get up, she tried to, but her
legs failed her. She was still there with her back rested on
the bus wall as she struggled to get up, she noticed a pair
of boots stop in front of her, she looked up to see the
person. It was the same man who led the group into her
house and molested her, she could recognise his mask
and color of clothes. He took off his mask gradually,
revealing his mean face. He snarled and stared at her
wickedly.
‘Didn’t you see your mates going out?’ He barked and
landed a thunderous slap on her face. She rolled on the
floor with crying aloud. The intensity of her headache
increased, her vision was becoming blur. She stared into
his face, still weeping before she blacked out.
It was until the next morning she opened her eyes, very
hungry she was. She found herself in a forest, laying on
grass, clad only in her pant. Her stomach grumbled as
she tried to sit up, she could see her peers passing by her
side and carrying several logs of wood on their heads, all
dressed only in pants also.
Something landed on her head softly, a loaf of bread. She
picked it up hurriedly and started devouring it like an
hungry lion without trying to find the source. A man
came to stand in front of her, she looked up at his face.
He didn’t look like a Nigerian, but he was African.
‘Eat quickly. You can get water at the river over there’ the
man said, pointing in direction of the river. His intonation
and pronunciation further confirmed his non Nigerian
citizenship. ‘Join your mates immediately you finish,
there’s lot of work to do’ he concluded and walked away.
She paused a little while and turned around to look, it
seemed that the work had begun a long time, all the girls
were sweating heavily. Her headache began again.
~~PRESENT~~
‘Omotara’ Henry called. She blinked her eyes and turned
slowly to him, her eyes looked heavy but there was still
no tears in it.
‘Jeffery is dead. How do you claim to have seen him?’ She
asked in a threatening voice.
‘He’s not dead, I saw him, he came to me and we spoke.
He told me exactly the same story of how your parents
were killed, his account was in no way different from
yours…’ Henry’s phone interrupted again. He took it out
and silenced it after taking a look at the screen, Mr
Sylvester was the one calling now. He silenced it
permanently and returned it into his pocket.
‘Where did you see him?’ Tarasha asked.
‘He came to look for you and found me’ Henry answered.
Tarasha blinked her eyes, she was doubting his answer.
‘You’ve also seen him before’ he quickly added. ‘The man
who I saw you with in the Catholic Church premises’
Tarasha paused to think. Jefa’s picture flashed back into
her mind. She tried to connect his face with Jeffery’s but
she couldn’t find any connection. The man was way older
than Jeffery should be. She shook her head in
disagreement, mumbling some words to herself.
‘He told me your story, your full name and even showed
me one of your childhood pictures.
Tarasha shook her head in disbelief, she opened the door
and stepped out. She couldn’t take all what he was
saying, it couldn’t be true. Jeffery was dead, the man who
hit him with the butt of the gun had promised to take off
his head.
Henry stepped out of the car and turned to join her at
the other side.
‘Where is he now?’ She asked him.
‘He’s in town, I have his phone number’ Henry said
excitedly, he took out his phone and began to search
through his contact details. He dialed Jeffrey immediately
he saw it. Unfortunately, the line was switched off.
‘His phone is switched off now’ Henry announced,
looking disappointed.
‘Henry, please leave’ Tarasha said with a strict tone and
began to walk into the building without looking back.
‘Tara, we still need to talk’ Henry pleaded for her to wait
stop but to no avail. She was done with him already.
~~~
Jefa continued to flip through the pages of the diary. The
writings on each day increased as he progressed. He
realised that the events of older days were actually
recopied into the diary, they were transferred from the
previous ones and compiled into that one, it could be
seen from the writing and ink of pen used. Their mother
must have summarised and removed somethings she
considered irrelevances from the older ones because she
had about five to ten older days on a page while she had
the days which were closer to her death more detailed.
Precisely, two months before May 27, 2014 more
detailed; each days within that period took at least half a
page. But the ones were before that period were very
brief, the most brief ones were the ones of the early
2000s, each day contained only a line or even half a line.
His mother could not have recopied it alll by herself, she
must have paid someone to do it for her. The detailed
ones were the only ones written by her, it was evident
from the handwriting and neatness of pages. The total
writings ended at the third quarter of the book. He finally
stopped at some pages after the middle page. March 27,
2014. He began to read.
“Today, my family finally moved from our comfortable
duplex in Victoria Island, Lagos state to an hideout in
Gwaskara, Borno state. That was the only place we could
think of running to since my husband is an indigene of
the state. The conspiracy and threats of our enemies had
become more serious and it looked like the police could
do nothing about it. Even the Inspector’s advice was for
us to hide for the main time until they were less angry
with us. The house is not that bad, it just doesn’t look as
comfortable as our home is. It also needs thorough
cleaning and washing. Thank God schools have not
resumed yet, I would do the cleaning together with my
kids tomorrow.”
Jefa placed a finger on the page and closed the diary. He
raised up his head, deep in thoughts. He remembered
that Sunday several years ago, a mini van had arrived
into their compound as early as 3am, their parents woke
them up and asked them to start arranging their clothes
and books into bags. Jeffery did not understand what was
going on then, all his efforts to get an explanation from
his parents failed as they gave him no response. His
mother even shouted at him angrily to shut him up, only
for her to apologize two days later in the new house and
promise to tell him the reason for the movement when
he comes of age. He never got that explanation till his
parents were sent forcefully out of the land of the living.
Who could those enemies be? He thought. Who were
those who sent his family out of Lagos to a place of
unrest and unsettled security .
Except for an instance where he saw his parents
discussing with so much tension, he had never heard,
seen or suspected that his parents had enemies. He used
to think they were loved by everybody due to their
generous attitude and their selflessness in carrying out
their medical profession.
He opened the diary again and began to flip backwards,
scanning through each page briefly. He stopped at
February 24, 2014
“Today, the threats against us increased. The Chief once
again asked Danjuma to approve the deal but Danjuma
refused. The Chief went ahead to give us a deadline of
one month to consider it. He promised to take our lives if
we do not comply and sign the deal. I’ve never been so
confused in my life. My husband is confused too.
We’ve reported the situation to the police but no step has
been taken to act on our case, I strongly believe that
these Chiefs have a very strong backup in the force. May
God help us and save us from this terrible thing that is
about to befall us”
Jefa closed the diary again, he was more determined now
to find out who the Chiefs were. He opened and began to
flip backwards. A knock sounded on his door. He paused,
looked up and kept quiet to listen well. The knock came
again. He quickly got up and returned the diary to its
former position. He straightened his clothes and went to
the door. The police had come for him as expected, he
had explanations to make about the trouble that ensued
in his store the last night.

~~~~~ Tarasha walked into the house without taking another look at Henry. No one was in the living room when she stepped in, she knew that they were all peeping before and had all run into their rooms when they saw her coming. She saw the widow curtain which was slightly opened. She walked closer to the window and peeped from it. Henry was still standing and bfacing the house, he saw her peeping. She rolled down curtains immediately after their eyes met and turned back to lock the entrance door carefully. She began to proceeded to the rooms section. ‘Cole, Benny, Aisha’ she called in a loud but gentle voice as she stopped in front of Aisha’s room. One after the other, they all came out to meet her. ‘Start packing everything that’s important, we are leaving here in the next one hour’ ‘Cole’ she called and turned to him. ‘Hack into the security cameras system and stop all transmissions from this area and several kilometres surrounding it. I believe we are being monitored, so we have to be careful’ she said and began to proceed into her own room. She stopped at the entrance and turned back. Cole, Aisha and Benny were still standing on the same spots they were, staring at her in awe. They wondered if what you said about them being monitored was true. Then that means that their Waterloo was near. She walked past them to the living room again and went to the window to check. Henry had just opened the gate and was returning to his car. He stopped before entering the driver’s seat and glanced around the house again. Tarasha quickly closed the curtain to hide herself. He fixed his gaze on the window for a second, he knew someone was looking at him through the window but he couldn’t tell who it was. He opened the door and entered into the car. He kicked off the engine and reversed out of the compound. He came out of his car again to close back the gate before driving off. Tarasha left the window and walked back to her room. Benny and the others had already entered their rooms. She got inside her room and locked the door. She sat on the bed, buried her face on her palms and let out a deep breath. She had underestimated the Nigerian police, she began to think. She thought that all her tracks had been covered, not knowing that someone, Henry was on her trail. She was sure in her heart that he was an undercover cop sent to bring her down. That was the reason for all he had been doing. She thought of how he bumped into her at the computer shop when she first came into Abuja, it all began to make sense to her now. She had been too careless to note that his constant running into her was not by mistake but was planned. She was being monitored. Ahe now understood his romance tactics with her, it was very common for undercover cops to have a romantic relationship with their targets, it always worked for them. Now the common saying “Feelings are for fools” taught to them by the Nefary clan was making complete sense. The day an assassin begins to have affections is the day the assassin’s death warrant is signed. How did Henry find out all he did about her? Her real name, the name of her brother and what she did. Of course, he hadn’t seen her brother Jeffrey, he died a long time ago. Or how could her brother even have recognised her after so many years? Henry was an expert agent, she was very sure. She came up with a clue of how her bloodline was traced and how Henry found out that the name of her brother, Jeffrey. Henry must have taken something from her during their time of staying together, likely a strand of her hair when she foolishly agreed to stay in the cameras commission house with him. They must have gotten the strand from her comb when she went out. With that they would have been able to trace her background and find out all about her origin in Nigeria. She got up from the bed and flung open the wardrobe. She began to take out her guns and ammunitions first, she arranged them into their bags neatly. ~~ Henry had driven for thirty minutes before he remembered to check his phone. He had just left the village where he went to visit Tarasha and had gotten into town. He pulled up close to the area where commercial cabs were parked. He took out his phone and drew the security pattern, he clicked on the call logs icon. He dialed Sylvester’s number first. ‘Hello sir’ he spoke immediately the call was answered. ‘Hello, Mr Henry. We’ve been trying to reach you for a long time. What happened? Were you in church?’ Sylvester’s voice came through impatiently. ‘Yes, I was in church today and my phone was on silence mode’ Henry gave the expected excuse. ‘Oh! I never knew you were a religious type’ Sylvester exclaimed. ‘I’m not religious, I’m a Christian’ Henry corrected. ‘Anyways, have you spoken with Agent Dakolo? He’s the one who urgently needs to reach you.’ ‘No, but I’ll call him right away’ ‘Please do’ ‘Okay’ Henry ended the call and dialed Dakolo immediately. ‘Good afternoon sir’ Henry greeted first. ‘Good afternoon Henry, how are you doing?’ ‘Fine sir, what about you?’ ‘I’m good. We need to see urgently’ ‘Where do you want us to meet sir?’ Henry asked. ‘We can meet in your house or any place of your choice’ Dakolo said. ‘In my house?’ Henry sounded uncomfortable with the idea. ‘Anywhere you want. In a restaurant or wherever but not in the office’ ‘I think I should come and meet you in Elymax, we can discuss in the restaurant there’ ‘Okay, I’ll be expecting you in the next thirty minutes’ ‘Yeah sure’ Henry ended the call. He threw his phone to the backseat and let out a deep breath as rested his head. He closed his eyes and his thoughts once again drifted back to Omotara. He wondered what the best way to help her was. Now that she wasn’t acting like someone who was going to easily cooperate with him. The picture of the bullet which he saw with her flashed back into his mind, he also remembered the knife which cut her hand. He wasn’t surprised because he expected that her work as a fraudster would also require her to keep weapons and guns. A thought flashed through his mind, scaring him to death. Could Omotara be Samantha Osman, the mastermind of the assassinations? He shook his head in disagreement with himself, the thought of the possibility alone frightened him extremely. He chose to believe otherwise, Omotara was just an unlucky girl who had found her way to be a fraudster. She couldn’t be the dangerous assassin. He kicked off the engine and drove away to meet Dakolo. **35 minutes later** Henry had no issues spotting Dakolo where he was seated immediately he walked into the restaurant. Dakolo was seated close to the entrance. Several other customers were eating and discussing in the restaurant. ‘Good afternoon sir’ Henry greeted as he approached the table. ‘Good afternoon’ Dakolo stood up to shake hands with him before sitting down. There were soft drinks on the table already which had been ordered by Dakolo. ‘You can change your drink if you don’t like it’ Dakolo said on seeing the way Henry stared at the table. ‘No, it’s okay’ Henry smiled. ‘I was just wondering what the reason could be for the urgent meeting’ ‘Nothing new’ Dakolo adjusted his seating position. ‘Still the same case, just that we’ve been mandated to take more drastic steps. We need to make an headway on the case this week. I’ll be having a meeting with the president this week and also some of the top security ministers and we need substantial progress reports’ ‘Okay’ Henry fixed his gaze on Dakolo, listening attentively. ‘You told me yesterday when we discussed that we can’t trace the source of the past cameras disruption, we can only wait till there’s another attempt on it’ ‘Yes, I did. Any attempt to trace it now may lead us to a trap’ Henry reconfirmed. ‘Okay, but what happens if Chief Jubril’s assassination was the last of the attacks?’ Henry narrowed his eyes thoughtfully without saying any word. ‘Does it mean that they go scot-free with what they’ve done already?’ Dakolo continued. ‘The way it looks now, we are helpless and with little or no clue to lead us to this assassin group. Only the picture of the suspected lady Samantha Osman is what we have’ Henry’s heart skipped a beat as he remembered his suspicion of Omotara being the Samantha again. ‘Can I see the picture please?’ ‘Of course sure, you may have seen the person somewhere before’ Dakolo bent to pick a small briefcase which was in between the legs of his chair. He placed it on his lap and opened it. He brought out an iPad, closed back the briefcase and returned it to the former position. He turned on the iPad and waited patiently for it to boot. After some seconds of searching, he handed the iPad to Henry. ‘That’s her passport, it’s not recent one though. According to our investigations, her real name is Aisha Bello. We believe she’s the one who disguises herself as Samantha Osman. All our efforts to trace her has proved futile’ Henry stared at the passport keenly. His mind was greatly relieved as the person in it did not in anyway look like Omotara. He heaved a sigh of relief and handed the iPad back to Dakolo. ‘I’ve not seen that face anywhere before’ ‘Do you want to see more of her recent pictures?’ Dakolo asked as he took back the iPad, opening a picture which showed the grown Aisha. ‘No’ Henry refused politely. ‘I don’t know that person, I’ve never seen her before’ ‘Okay’ Dakolo switched off the iPad and returned it into the briefcase. ‘So, we need to work. We can’t wait and hope until there’s another attempt made’ ‘Sir, I think the NSCC has done what needs to be done already. The footages which were never stored with us cannot be recovered in any way. We’ve done what we can do to prevent a reoccurrence’ Dakolo bent forward and stared into Henry’s eyes. ‘I know, but the police needs your help now more than ever before. We need you to work with us’ ‘How?’ Henry asked, he frowned slightly. Dakolo rested back into his chair again, he folded his arms. ‘First, you were here when the last attack happened and it even happened in this same state’ ‘Yes sir’ Henry answered. A thought came into his mind. He hope that Dakolo would not ask him questions that would reveal that he was also an attendee at the party. ‘Is there any group or individual to suspect personally?’ ‘Huh?’ Henry was visibly shaken by the question. ‘Do you have anyone you suspect?’ Dakolo asked again, this time in a calmer tone. He stared into Henry’s eyes as he waited for an answer. ~~~~ Cole was seated on the three seater sofa, already dressed up in a black top and black Jean trouser while the others were still in the rooms, gathering their loads. He opened his bag which was on the sofa and brought out his laptop. He placed it on his lap and opened it up to boot. After a minute, the computer was on. He began the assignment given to him to hack the cameras system. After some minutes of following normal procedure, strange commands and notifications began to pop up on the laptop screen. The one which got him more worried was a pop-up window which displayed, “Real Address to be revealed, continue? Yes/No” He closed the whole process and started from the scratch again, taking extra care in following each step. At the end of the whole process, he received the same pop- up window. He clicked on No and the process was aborted. He frowned and thought for a while, something was definitely wrong. He cleared the software cache and history and even restored it back to the default settings. He now had to log in again and make some settings which would require a longer time to complete. ‘Have you stopped the transmission?’ Tarasha asked as she appeared behind him, trying to wear a bag to her back. She was dressed in the same manner as Cole, the same color of clothes but she had black gloves on which Cole didn’t. She was dragging a traveling box along. ‘No’ Cole looked up as Tarasha got to his front. ‘What’s delaying it?’ She asked and sat on the one seater sofa by the Cole’s left. ‘There’s a strange pop-up showing at the end of the process’ Cole answered with a frown. ‘What pop-up?’ ‘I’m almost there. I’ll show you if it comes up again’ Cole replied. After two minutes of continuous typing and clicking, Cole heaved a sigh of frustration. ‘It’s here again’ he said and sank back into the sofa like he had given up. Tarasha got up and sat beside him. She squinted on seeing the message of the pop-up window. ‘Should I click yes?’ Cole asked, looking into Tarasha’s face. She replied him with a warning look and he kept mute. ‘If you click yes, they won’t only be able to find this location but would also be able to recover the stream’ she said as she got up, she bit her lips and stared into the air for some seconds. ~~~ ‘Yesss’ Henry replied, stressing the word. He knew better than to say no because he was sure that Dakolo would catch him easily especially when he had not been able to hide his shock at the question. ‘ I’m thinking that we could have an in-house member of the gang in the NSCC, I’m suspecting those working in the headquarters especially’ Henry quickly added a well thought up lie. ‘Does this include Mr Sylvester?’ Dakolo asked. ‘Hum… Not really. Mr Sylvester seems to naive to be involved in that. But still, everyone is a suspect’ ‘Including you?’ Dakolo suggested with a smile. ‘Yes, including me’ Henry replied with a brief laugh. ‘Then, how do we go about this? How do we investigate your office?’ Dakolo asked, putting back on his serious look. Henry’s phone beeped. A warning notification alarm rang out. His call ringing tone began to sound at the same time. He brought out the phone and checked the caller. ‘Mr Sylvester’ he whispered to Dakolo. ‘Go ahead, answer, hear what he has to say’ Henry answered the call. ‘Mr Henry, the whole office is ringing with the alarms, someone is trying to hack our systems again’ ‘Huh?’ ‘Yes, I can see it on my computer here’ ‘Okay, just wait for me. I’ll be in the office in few minutes. Make sure you keep an eye on it , record every change in direction that occurs’ Henry said and ended the call. He confirmed the Sylvester’s report by the alarm on his phone. From the look on Henry’s face, Dakolo could perceive that something bad was happening. ‘The gang is trying to disrupt our system again’ Henry said to Dakolo’s waiting ears. ‘Wow’ Henry got up quickly and picked his car keys from the table. ‘I have to go now’ ‘Yes sure’ Dakolo permitted. He got up also and took out his phone. He dialed the headquarters as Henry left him and walked away. ‘Send enough men to every entry and exit to the major roads in town. There seem to be another security breach right now, something dangerous may happen’ he said into the phone.

~~~~~~~~~
Tarasha removed the bag on her back and returned to
the sofa. She took out her own laptop and turned it on.
She looked into Cole’s laptop again as she waited for hers
to complete the booting process. She smiled lightly.
Whoever had helped tightened the cameras security
system had done a good job but still had more work to
do. Her laptop was on, she clicked on the start button
and selected the “run” process. The “run window” came
up. She typed in a code. “Nef-Tar-diag-falc.” After some
seconds of loading, the whole computer system display
changed and another window popped up, requesting for
a password. She typed in the password and the window
closed. In just few minutes, she had swapped from the
windows operating system to a personal operating
system created by herself.
‘Go get the rest of the team, get the bags into the car’
Tarasha said to Cole who was staring into the screen in
awe. Cole closed his laptop and got up immediately. ‘You
guys should also get your guns ready, we’ll take out
anyone that tries to stop or monitor us, even if it’s
someone we only suspect’ she added before Cole began
to move.
‘That includes Henry’ she added again. Cole paused and
turned to look at her. ‘Kill him if he ever comes your way
again’ she stared into his eyes and reiterated. Cole turned
and proceeded to the rooms.
Tarasha continued with her work on the laptop. In two
minutes time, Aisha and Benny came out with their
luggages. Cole also followed behind, he picked the Boss’
box and carried it with him outside the building.
~~~
Henry walked in hurriedly into the NSCC head office, he
headed straight for Mr Sylvester’s office without waiting
to greet or respond to anybody’s greeting. He entered the
office without knocking. Sylvester was looking into the a
computer with another technician. Henry sat on the
visitors seat and turned the second computer which was
on Mr Sylvester’s table to himself. He clicked open the
software to check the status.
‘Let’s go to the control room’ he said and got up from
the seat. Sylvester and the other technician followed him.
They proceeded out of the office and headed for the
control room.
‘When exactly was the attempt made?’ Henry asked as he
opened the door to the control room. The control room
was brightened up with yellow bulbs, there were twelve
desktops neatly arranged on three rows. An operator sat
on the third row behind the main control system, he got
up on sighting Henry and Sylvester coming towards him.
‘The first attempt was by 12.46pm, three other attempts
have been made after that’ Sylvester replied. Henry gave
Sylvester an eye signal to send out the two our
technicians.
‘You can wait outside’ Sylvester said to the technicians
and they left reluctantly.
Henry sat behind the main system and began to type on
the keyboard hurriedly. ‘So what locations were spotted?’
Henry asked. Sylvester stood by his side with a hand
placed on the table as he looked into the screen.
‘No location was spotted’ Sylvester replied. ‘It didn’t not
show any point, direction or even distance’
Henry looked into his face, surprised. ‘What do you
mean?’ He questioned with a frown and turned back to
the screen slowly. Sylvester gave no reply since Henry
was almost finding out himself.
‘No, this can’t be’ Henry shook his head in disbelief and
frustration. He was disappointed with the result displayed
by the software. ‘This can’t be’
‘What?’ Sylvester asked softly.
‘Who else apart from the both of us is aware of this new
software?’
‘None, except for Agent Dakolo’
Henry hurriedly brought out his phone. Dakolo’s call was
coming in at the right time. ‘Hello sir’
‘Hello Henry, have you been able to determine the
location and source?’ Dakolo questioned.
‘No’ Henry said flatly. ‘There was an attempt but they did
not break in.’ Dakolo gave no response, his intake of
breath from the other side was heard by Henry.
‘Sir, did you tell anyone about the new software I made
yesterday?’ Henry added another question.
‘No, why?’
‘They didn’t fall into the trap. It’s like the person behind
the security attack somehow knew that his location
would be revealed and did not complete the last step’
‘But you guys got the alarm?’
‘Yes. Sir’
‘So what do you think it is?’
‘I…’ The warning alarm tone began to ring out again from
all the computer systems in the room. ‘S--t! I’ll call you
back sir’
‘I’m coming over’ Dakolo said before Henry ended the
call.
A new attempt had been made again. Sylvester turned to
silence the alarms on the other computers while Henry
got himself busy with the tracking. Sylvester returned
three minutes later to meet Henry staring into the
computer in an agitated manner.
‘What’s wrong?’ Sylvester asked. ‘Did we get their
location’
Henry looked up into his face and shook his head in a
pitiful manner. ‘This time, not only the transmission to
the branch and regional offices was stopped, the
transmission to this head office and the country’s main
control point has been redirected.
Sylvester became dumb instantly, his legs began to shake,
he dragged a seat from the front of another computer
and sat on it before his legs failed him. His lips began to
tremble. Henry could perceive from his lips movement
that the man was complaining about his job. Henry
hissed and got up from his seat. He closed his eyes and
let out a deep breath through his mouth, he stared up to
the ceiling.
His mind began to wander around as he sympathised
with himself for his failure, the first major failure he
would encounter in his job as a software technician and
hacker. He wondered who could be brainbox in the
assassin team, pictures of his friends and top colleagues
in the same job began to roll into his mind, every of
them was now a suspect.
‘What do we do now? I don’t want to lose my job’
Sylvester manager m lamented, looking up at Henry.
Henry hissed and returned back to the seat behind the
computer, Sylvester’s eyes following him around. ‘Do
you think of anything else other than your job?’ Henry
slammed. ‘I mean, someone is in danger of being killed
now and you’re complaining about your job’
Sylvester took his gaze away shamefully. He got up slowly
and began to pace around. Henry picked his phone from
the table and dialed Dakolo.
~~~
‘Henry, I’m on my way to your office’ Dakolo said into
the phone as he hurried out of the police office building.
‘Sir, we couldn’t get the location or source and we lost
transmission too. The assassins must be on their way to
carry out their job’
‘D--n!’ Dakolo exclaimed, stamping his feet on the
ground. He turned back and climbed back the stairs into
the building. ‘You mean, even your head office has no
signal from the street cameras?’
‘No’ Henry replied in a very low tone.
‘Thanks’ Dakolo was about to cut the call.
‘Sir, I didn’t tell you before… ‘ Henry’s voice came up
suddenly again.
‘What?’ Dakolo said, heading for the computer room in
the building.
‘We don’t know if the attempt was made from Abuja,
there’s ninety five percent possibility that it could be in
another state’
‘S--t!’ Dakolo cursed as he opened the door to a large
open office, he stopped at the entrance. ‘And what do we
do now?’
‘Sir, I’ll get back to you when I get a solution’
Dakolo ended the call and walked in, closing the
transparent glass door behind. The open office which
serves over ten police officials had only two people in it
now, Ken and a computer operator. Majority did not
come to the office on Sunday and the few ones that
came had gone out to man the major entries and exits of
the town. Ken’s eyes followed Dakolo from the doorway
until he got close to them.
‘You’re not going again?’ Ken asked.
Dakolo shook his head in negative. He got to the table
and picked up a phone which he dropped before leaving.
‘Officer, call more officers from their homes to join you,
even the ones on leave and make sure that every team is
led by a senior officer. Let no sergeants or recruits head a
team’ Dakolo said into the phone.
‘We still have no signal from the NSCC’ Ken said to
Dakolo after the call was ended.
‘Forget that’ Dakolo dismissed it with a wave of the hand.
‘Even their head offices have no signal not clue of what is
happening on the streets’/
Dakolo dialed the IG’s number. ‘Sir… Yes sir, we are on it’
he replied to a question.
‘Sir, we need to give directives for officials to be deployed
in other states like we’ve done here, there’s no assurance
that the assassin group is attacking someone in Abuja’
Dakolo said, he kept quiet for some seconds to listen to
the reply before he continued. ‘There’s also need for
announcement to be made on all media platforms. We
should warn the public, so that they can report anything
suspicious immediately. Thank you sir’
Dakolo detached the gun from his belt side where it was.
‘We have to join the team now’ he said to Ken who
nodded in agreement.
‘Make a warning post on Twitter and Facebook’ Dakolo
said to the computer operator before walking away with
Ken.

‘Boss, where are we heading for?’ Cole asked for the fifth
time after receiving no answers to his previous attempts.
He was driving with Tarasha in the blue Toyota Camry
while Benny and Aisha were in the other vehicle, the mini
van.
‘Pull over’ Tarasha said calmly in somewhat like a
baritone voice. He obeyed and halted the car after
driving away from the tarred portion to the untarred
area which was close to the bush. Benny and Aisha joined
and halted the van few centimetres behind them.
Tarasha came out of the car after the engine was turned
off. The bright sunlight made her squint as she looked
around the area, she placed her palm above her eyes to
reduce the sun rays getting into it. After a brief eye
survey of the place, she bent to look inside the car.
‘Where are we?’ She asked Cole.
‘Ermm… Let me check’ he replied and took out his
phone, he released the seat belt and opened the door.
Tarasha continued her eye survey of the place. The heavy
breeze made her unzipped black hip-hop jacket and air
fly backwards. The sun intensity reduced as a brief cloud
covered it. Tarasha turned back to car and climbed the
bonnet to look over the thick bushes, she could see a
village hidden behind it. She came down and took out
her phone from her skinny black jeans. She dialed Chief
Gab’s number.
‘Good afternoon Chief’ she greeted.
‘Good afternoon’ Chief Gab answered, his voice sounded
like he had just woken up from sleep.
‘Chief, we need new accommodation urgently’ she broke
the news straight away.
‘Okay’ he said with a loud yawn. ‘I’ll call you back
tomorrow morning’
‘No Chief…’ She was saying when the call was cut. She
called back. ‘Chief, it’s urgent. We need the new
accommodation arranged in a matter of minutes’ she
said, half-shouting into the phone.
‘But why are you just telling me now?’
‘It’s urgent, we need the new accommodation urgently’
‘Where are you now?’ The Chief asked, sounding readier
to help.
‘Where are we?’ She took the phone off her ear and
whispered to Cole who was outside the car now and
leaning on the bonnet.
‘We are close to Baske village’ Cole replied.
‘Baske village’ Tarasha said into the phone.
‘Humm… Give me sometime, let me check what I can do’
Chief Gab replied. His tone reflected very little hope.
‘What next boss?’ Benny asked approaching them from
the back. Tarasha looked at him but replied with silence.
‘We can’t go any further, I’m sure we’ll soon come by a
police post if we continue’ she finally said after some
minutes of silence. Cole and Benny were already standing
in front of her where she sat on the boot.