DOPE Season 2 Episode 12 by Erasmus Ugochukwu Okafor

DOPE Season 2 Episode 12 by Erasmus Ugochukwu Okafor

**The Battle of wits**

With the song ‘let it be’ always in his mind, Hugo decided to let everything concerning his enemies to be, and then focus on recovering the entire assets that Octavio left for his daughter.

With one of his private jets, Hugo, Tessie, and Maxx were to embark on a journey to Mexico, keeping in mind the part of Octavio’s letter that said that he has some cash of sixty billion USD in a Mexican bank, ten billion USD in New Zealand bank, and forty billion USD in Santa Catarina bank. They travelled with Octavio’s letter with them.

When Hugo pulled out his secret drawer and wanted to collect his gun for the trip, Tessie went to him and said: “You may not need this for now. Keep it.”

Hugo couldn’t get it because carrying arms along is always his thing and it wasn’t just easy travelling that far without his firearms, especially going for an uncertain trip.

“This is second to my nature,” Hugo objected as he persisted on taking the firearm, “so I don’t…”

“Then keep that nature away for the first time,” Tessie advised. She put her hand into her cloth and slowly slipped out a beautiful pen from her bra.

“What a secret place to keep a pen,” Hugo thought aloud without knowing that Tessie heard that.

“You wouldn’t know what and ordinary pen can do,” Tessie whispered and cleared her husky throat. Better a pen than a gun,”

As she was busy with the gesture, Hugo took a sweeping look at her. It was the first time he took his time to see that he’d never met any girl as beautiful as Tessie; a girl looking like a mixed breed of Indian and Brazil. His heart pounded with happiness when he saw her but didn’t have to allow those thoughts to metamorphose into lewdness that could make him amorous for her.

Tessie was dressed on a very hot and sexy pink bodycon, embellished with cute sexy high-heeled and a sweet classy makeover that made her look like a cute damsel. Her tallness is an outstanding feature that made her look like a supermodel.

As Hugo was lost in thoughts, Tessie, who already noticed what could be going through his mind waved over his face to bring him back to present and then handed over the pen to him. “Seems your mind is filled with the itinerary of the trip or is there something else?”

Hugo shook his head as if he wanted to shake awake the lascivious thoughts that overtook him momentarily.

“Oh! Yeah. But why is it just a pen of all useful instruments?” He asked trying to catch up.

Tessie already knew what was happening with Hugo, so she smiled and thrust the pen in his palm and said: “This is for the trip. But I have something to add, that’s if I knew Ignacio well,”

That statement got Hugo’s full attention, so he took the pen, smiled, and said: “I think I’m eager to hear about Mr. Santiago. What about him should I be abreast of?”

Tessie held him on the shoulder, pulled her lips close to his lips as if she wanted to kiss him, making Hugo bring his lips closer too in high expectation but the pretty damsel slowly shifted her lips to his ear and whispered: “You will heavily need the assistance of your computer programmer because Ignacio may know more than you think he does. I hope your programmer is as good as you claim,”

“You bet,” Hugo said and still fixed his eyes into her eyes.

“I’m sure Octavio must have been trying to be the smart guy but Ignacio is always one step ahead,” Tessie said as the thoughts of what could have happened to Octavio wafted through her, “Don’t be surprised that my mom and Ignacio may have cleared the entire money in the bank accounts. No wonder he’s been missing since the day you captured me. Whenever Ignacio is silent, he’s being secretly mischievous somewhere. Don’t doubt this,”

Hugo’s adrenalin was nudged by that statement, making him not waste time at all to call Jose Fuentes on the phone. As the phone rang, he sauntered in the room as he waited for Jose to answer.

Immediately Jose took the call, Hugo didn’t hesitate to go straight to the point: “I’m heading to the Mexican Bank for one of the accounts where Octavio left some money as a legacy, and the amount in question is sixty million USD. So you can imagine the worth. Can you hack into their server?”

Jose knew that it was a strong task that may need some time, so he took some time thinking without saying anything.

Hugo waited as his heart pulsated with both hope and uncertainty.

After a while, as Tessie watched to observe what could be going on, she said: “Is he still there or lost in thoughts?”

“I think, yeah but for Mr. Jose to be mute, this task could be beyond him…”

“It’s not,” Jose finally broke his silence, “But this isn’t an easy one but I just got something. The coordinates for this Mexican bank is 235e2#i43byho&mexiculum0090…”

“Sorry, can you stop speaking in strange tongues, sir,” Hugo said and stifled his smile, “This sounds funny and confusing to my ears. I guess you were calling out what you should be inputting into the computer system. How am I to understand?”

“You don’t need to, son,” Jose muttered smilingly, “The account number of Octavio Jesús is….wait….it seems someone is already making some contacts or transactions on the aforementioned account and it’s definitely…Oh, wait,” he said and continued typing fast as he hacked into the account, “Bingo!” he shouted, “you need to be so fast because it’s showing that the person doing the transaction is no other person but the supposed Octavio, the owner of the account,”

Being that the Phone was on loudspeaker mode, Tessie heard everything, making her think fast to know how to tackle the issue.

“We need to go now because my mom is at it again,” Tessie yelled and dragged Hugo out of the room into the limo as the driver was waiting to take them to the airport.

“Driver hit the streets and be fast about the movement to the airport. We have no time,” she announced; to make Hugo know the urgency of the situation.

“You need to be fast, but ensure you’re so smart this time,” Jose said, “I repeat, no guns are needed please,”

“Tessie already clued about no guns,” Hugo said as they zoomed off while he hung up.

Hugo and Tessie fixed earpiece into their ears which would be a means of communication with Jose when they get to the bank.

As they headed to the airport, Hugo couldn’t help but think about Tessie’s words about her mom instead of Ignacio.

He wanted to ask questions but his entire attention was locked on getting to Mexico first, then he could ask his questions.

Getting to the airport, they boarded the private Jet and took off.

While on the air, Hugo sent the account names and numbers of the other two banks to Jose to help him trace the accounts and know if they had been tampered with already.

Checking through the accounts, Jose discovered that nothing has happened to the two accounts except the one in Mexico that housed the hugest amount in cash.

As Hugo was checking through his computer to know how to connect with Jose who was about to send the blueprint of the bank to help them manoeuvre the situation in case it gets ugly, Tessie came close to him and handed over a cup of coffee to him.

“Drink because it’s getting cold here, and you may need to warm your body and be ready for this battle of wits and clash of technology,”

Hugo didn’t understand Tessie’s statement, so he looked up absently at her, knitted his brow in confusion, and said: “What am I missing here? How can Octavio be alive?”

Tessie sat quietly beside him, held his cold palm, and tapped gently on it to make him feel better.

“I know you may not understand the technical jargons, but the truth is that there are some things you may need to know that could make it harder for us to get hold of this money, except if your man in the US is so advanced that he could beat my mom this time. Don’t joke with Margarita when it comes to the computer and scientific world. She knows a lot than you may imagine,”

Mentioning her mom again got Hugo thinking deeper this time because it seems that there is something about her mom that he should be afraid of.

“Please explain the part your mom would play that could outplay my intelligent programmer,” Hugo said as he listened ardently.

“Margarita Santiago is the brain behind Ignacio’s success in the drug business, and if my guess is right, it wasn’t Octavio that came back to life but Ignacio trying to pretend to be the signatory to the account instead of you,” Tessie revealed as Hugo listened to get the theme of her message, “she is so sophisticated in technology that she can hack into any account. She’s the master of chips and camouflage that she can plant any chip or bug on anyone without being detected. Even though I don’t trust her, I’m the only one who doesn’t have a chip in the body because she plants deadly chips that have serious aftermath that could kill the host.

If not for the kind of toxin that the chip would deposit in my body, she’d have planted one inside of me, and that could have made them know my location by now. She’s a scientist, not just any other scientist but a renowned one in the US and over the world, no wonder she could make a clone of Ignacio, making him have many other Ignacios; so that it would be hard for the original one to be detected. She can even change a man to a woman in looks that no one would ever suspect.

My mom’s real name is Pooja Samrat; a name from Indian origin but she was born and bred in the US. She grew into a computer guru and a powerful scientist. As her name resounded in the ears of everyone as a powerful scientist, pride made her boast of making a robot that would look exactly like a human that could be used as nuclear weapons for war. That project was a breakthrough but her robotic soldiers ended up being killing machines that even killed the vice president and his entire household instead of protecting them.

This was the reason why she faked her death making it seem as if she committed suicide, but what she did was to induce one of her subjects into a coma, making the lab rat expendable. She put her identity; both physical looks and anatomy into the cloned girl. It was widely announced that Pooja Samrat died out of remorse for what her scientific discovery caused the US.

The poor girl was seeing hanging in her apartment, making people think that the great scientist took her own life but the real face of Pooja Samrat had disappeared. To perpetuate her existence and importance, she changed herself into one of the renowned scientists known as Margarita who she murdered and then took her identity just to remain perpetually hidden. People until now think that my mom is the real Pooja but never knew she’s the real threat to the US. Shortly after the transformation, she met my Octavio who knew nothing about her real identity,”

“But sorry for interrupting this interesting story,” Hugo said and sipped his coffee as he remained wowed by the revelation, “If you knew how she met your biological dad, why didn’t you figure out that Ignacio isn’t your blood?”

Tessie smiled and said: “My mom told me everything when she realised that I was ready to take over from her, but she didn’t know that I wasn’t even ready to step into the shoes of the monster she was. I simply needed to know her secrets, but that was when I began to suspect and doubt her sincerity, so I had to pretend that I was ready to be her shadow. She made me realise that she was sorry though, but I never believed her at all. Meanwhile, she lied to me that her former hubby was dead and she had no child with him. I never knew that he was alive and was my biological dad too. She kept that secret from me,”

“That is gross indeed,” Hugo said and shrugged, “This will make it easy for these guys to take over the money because it’s possible that …”

“Oh my God!” Tessie hollered, “Your statement just revealed something to me, “Don’t be surprised that when we get to the bank…wait…do you have the picture of my biological dad with you?”

“Google will always have it,” Hugo said and used Google to search for it.

On seeing it, Tessie was surprised because she’d seen the face before and recognised him as a supposed traitor.

“Oh, that’s the greatest enemy that my mom told me that was after my life,” Tessie said pointing at the screen of the computer, “I’m suspecting something but let me wait until we get there,”

Silence stole the moment as each of them got busy thinking of how to handle the situation when they get to Mexico. As these continued, Tessie became sleepy and slept on Hugo’s arms.

Hugo slowly took a duvet and covered her, then jabbed a button under the seat, making it flat like a bed.

Tessie slept comfortably while the journey lasted.

Maxx was busy roaming the plane and ensuring that there was no security threat; that’s how he’d been trained.

Getting to Mexico, Tessie woke up and realised she’d slept off for long. She saw how covered she was in the duvet and smiled, knowing full well that Hugo could be a caring guy.

On getting to the Bank, they entered with confidence to avoid suspicion but made sure that they weren’t being monitored. Meanwhile, Jose already studied the blueprint of the bank that would help them manage their ways into the bank to avoid being detected by the enemy.

To their greatest surprise, they saw Octavio discussing with one of the stakeholders of the bank, making them wonder how the dead man came back to life.

“I don’t understand this,” Hugo said in great confusion, “Does it mean that Octavio lied to me or faked his death? What could be his reason…?” as he was still talking, the Octavio turned to their direction making them pretend to be busy while hiding their faces away from him. “What’s going on?”

Tessie pulled Hugo closer and began to kiss him, making him surprised because he knew she was up to something but didn’t know why she’d be kissing him.

“Pretend and kiss me back,” Tessie clued.

Hugo started kissing her too while their lips locked, but as the kiss lasted, he began to lose it because the lips of the girl were so soft and sweet, so he almost got lost in the staged kiss.

“I’m suspecting that this isn’t the real Octavio,” Tessie whispered into his mouth, “Margarita is at work again and this could make us lose the entire money my dad left in the bank,”

“I hope not, and won’t be despaired,” Hugo affirmed.

“Me too,” Tessie said and continued feigning the kiss as she tried not to lose sight of Ignacio.

As the kiss continued, Tessie pulled Hugo away into the toilet and then collected the pen from Hugo, pushed a button on it, and then exhaled some warm air. “Now, we can be undetected. Here, I’ve observed a powerful security camera that can scan anyone even without getting close. Meanwhile, the entire toilet isn’t safe too. We need to remain incognito, hence the need to activate the invisible mode of the pen. This isn’t just a pen but a powerful scientific instrument that my mom handed over to me the day you guys came after me to capture me in the bunker. I don’t know why she could give out such valuable,”

“What if she put a secret camera or chips to know your location with it?” Hugo asked trying to be sure that they were safe.

“I know a lot about this pen,” Tessie replied, “It’s called Exigency instrument. It has a tracking function too but I deactivated that immediately you convinced me that she was someone I should be afraid of. Right now, we need to act fast and not waste time….”

“So what…what should I do?” Hugo interjected stutteringly.

“Tell your programmer to check the CCTV footage to know if he could see supposed dead Octavio. And if he does, then the money is either gone or about to, because my mom would have changed Ignacio’s look to Octavio’s, making it easy for him to penetrate,”

“Are trying to say…”

“Yes,” she cut in, “The person you saw isn’t Octavio but Ignacio Santiago,”

“But not without his fingerprints,” Hugo hinted making Tessie pause for a while to think.

“You have a point, but wait,” she said and read through Octavio’s last letter once again, “This letter made it clear that Ignacio traced Octavio to the Netherlands and this simply means that the chips that led them to him were in his body. And if this is true, that means they must have discovered his body…OMG!”

“Meaning they must have collected the real fingerprints from the dead man,” Hugo said, making it clear to him that Ignacio and Margarita were smarter than he thought.

“You got it, dear,” Tessie said and snorted in anger, “If the face of Octavio and fingerprints are available at their disposal, then the real Octavio is created and the money is gone,”

To be continued..

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