TARASHA Episode 20 Pt 6 – Oyin Oluwatosin Emmanuel

TARASHA Episode 20 Pt 6 – Oyin Oluwatosin Emmanuel

‘All these cameras have been optimized to recognize the suspected faces and also send alarm signals to the main point,’ Tarasha was explaining to the Vice President and the three security men who were following him, they came out from one of the rooms in the house into the extension at the left side of the house. ‘The cameras here are responsive and they adjust themselves based on the light available and the image being captured.’ Tarasha continued explaining. She led them closer to the transparent glass wall, she asked the Vice President and his security officials to move back for her to explain something else. They obeyed and paid rapt attention.

The Vice President’s phone began to ring, he took it out from his pocket, silenced it and signaled for Kimberly to continued. Just ten seconds after she continued, the phone rang again. Chief Elvis picked it out and checked the caller again, it was still the same unknown caller. He silenced it again and held it in his hands. He apologized and asked her to continue.

‘The light that comes into here varies with time of the day, weather and even season of the year, that’s why the cameras here had to be optimized specially.’ Tarasha explained, facing the Vice President and his crew. Then she saw what she was looking for on his body, the blur thin red light, it was still moving to and fro, she knew it was Cole trying to focus on his target. The Vice President’s phone rang again, he looked at the screen and silenced again, then he gave the phone to his security officer to attend to the caller. Tarasha continued with her explanation while keeping an eye on the light.

‘Sir,’ his personal security official called him softly after taking some seconds with the phone.

‘Yes, you’ll relay the message to me later.’ the Vice President replied him reluctantly, not willing to take his mind off Kimberly’s explanation.

‘Sir, let’s watch it from here and see if you’ll notice anything’ Tarasha said and began moving towards the man now, she stopped and stood some centimetres by his left side near the second security officer, the red light on the man’s chest had now been balanced. She began to push some buttons with her fingers on the device in her pocket while waiting for Chief Elvis to make his observation. ‘1…,’

Chief Elvis stared at the camera, trying to make the observation, that was the same process he had gone through for every section of the house they had been to.

‘Sir, there’s a dangerous security threat.’ the man’s security officer said aloud.

‘What is it?’ Chief Elvis took a quick glance and shouted at the security officer for disturbing him.

‘2…’

‘Sir, we have to move you out of…’ the security officer persisted and moved close to the man’s front, trying to persuade him to listen.

‘3…’ Tarasha pushed the third button.

As Chief Elvis moved back, annoyed by the security officer’s persistence, the red blur light on chest moved down and two bullets pieced in through the glass wall and entered into his right lap.

+++++

‘Shi*t!’ Cole cursed loudly as he missed the target. The man had suddenly moved back at the Boss’ count of three. He quickly refocused the sniper and tried to aim at the man again but he saw one of the body guards squatting before the fallen man, he quickly placed his focus on the bodyguard’s head and fired two shots in it. Before he could get another clear aim, two more bodyguards had entered into the place and immediately come to the transparent glass wall. He saw one of them looking at the holes made by the bullets on the wall and trying to trace where it came from, he quickly sent another bullet into the guards chest. Before he knew it, more of the guards had entered. There was no way he was going to have a clear shot at the Vice President again, the game was over.

_____

Henry kept trying Chief Elvis’ phone number even though his call was being rejected. He continued to walk fast towards the gate of the man’s mansion, hoping to get there before the assassins release the bomb or whatever they had to release.

He began to think of better ways to reach the Vice President, maybe the man wasn’t even at home, he could be at a meeting and his phone could be with one of his assistants, he then decided to send a message to the number. He stopped some few metres at the opposite mansion to the Vice President’s own. After the message was marked delivered, he decided that that was the best he could do, he turned back to return to his car. That was when he noticed that he hadn’t covered his head with the hood since he removed it.

Suddenly as he took two steps, there came the sound of two gunshots, he needed no prophet to tell him where the shots came from. He increased his speed and began to run towards his car, then more gunshots were heard from the same direction.

__________

As expected, Kimberly the NSCC official ran for cover when she heard the first two gunshots. More bodyguards entered into the place and rushingly carried the Vice President outside, they also led her to safety.

She ensured that her eyes were full of tears as she watched them calling for an ambulance and rush the Vice President for first aid.

‘Hope you were not hurt?’ one of the guards asked with deep concern in his voice.

‘No, thanks.’ she replied in a teary voice. He tapped her shoulder and went back to his work.

Tarasha quietly walked away from the living room, cursing under her breath. The plan had failed, the man was going to survive the two bullets in his laps.

______

** One hour later**

‘Send the names of the guest who took room 654 to the office right now,’ Inspector Clem said to one of his assistants. He was standing in the security room of Godax hotels with three other police officers, three security officials of the hotel and the receptionist who was on duty.

‘Is this him?’ one of the security officials asked the receptionist as he paused and zoomed a video clip on the computer.

‘Yes,’ the receptionist answered, looking into the screen. She saw herself attending to the guest, he had only a small brief case with him.

‘Did he not pass through the security screening or how was he able to take in a sniper into the room?’ Inspector Clem asked.

‘I personally checked this man, there were only two clothes and a laptop in the brief case.’ one of the security officials answered Clem.

‘Then does that mean the weapon was already in the room?’ Clem asked.

‘Sir, we don’t have such weapons with us, I only suspected him.’ the receptionist said thoughtfully. ‘He insisted on using room 654 even when I told him that there were better rooms available that wouldn’t need him to go that far.’

‘Do you not have regulations guarding how you assign rooms?’

‘We have sir, but he said he was a geographer and that he had something to do with his laptop on the tenth floor at that particular side of the building.’ the receptionist replied.

‘And how did he know room 654 was the perfect room for his geographical work?’

‘He said he had used the place before,’ she replied.

‘Okay,’ Clem said and then turned to the security official controlling the computer. ‘Haven’t you seen how he left there?’

‘No,’ he was replied. ‘But there’s something here you need to see. Here’s a lady at the door of room 654,’ he said pointing to the screen where a cleaner was standing with a big bag and knocking on the room’s door. The door was opened and the cleaner entered, she walked out two minutes later without the bag.

‘Interesting!’ Clem exclaimed. ‘Then it means one of your cleaners took the weapon to him.’

‘No,’ the computer operator replied, he rewound the tape. He paused when the focus of the camera was on the cleaner’s face, then he zoomed. ‘She doesn’t look like any of our cleaners,’ he said before minimizing the window. Then he opened a folder which contained the passports of all the cleaners. ‘She’s not one of us,’ he said after comparing the faces of all those in the passports to the face zoomed in the video.

‘On low cut again!’ Clem exclaimed. Everybody’s eyes in the room turned to him. He stared more at the face in the video, ‘that’s Aisha Bello, a member of the Samantha Osman assassin group disguised in another form.’

____

**2 hours later**

‘I don’t think Henry could be seen there, maybe it was someone else,’ Dakolo said to Clem as they made their way to the computer room.

‘It’s him sir, the NSCC cameras captured his face and even the car he drove in.’ Clem replied.

‘When was the file received from the NSCC?’ Dakolo asked.

‘Fifteen minutes after it was requested for,’ Clem answered.

‘Okay,’ they entered into the computer room and went straight to the screen displaying the videos. The computer operator rewound the footage and stopped when it got to Henry’s place, he began to play the footage backwards. Agent Dakolo watched in awe, shocked to see Henry whom he thought was lost somewhere or hidden by the assassins.

Henry was seen trying to make a phone call directly opposite the gate of the Vice President’s mansion, then it was taken back to the car he came out from. He was seen entering the car to pick the binocular, then he climbed the top of the car and looked through the binocular. The computer operator paused the video, he studied the binocular and observed the angle it made with the ground. Then he minimized the footage and traced the angle from the point Henry stood. Another footage popped up and the Vice President’s mansion was showed, then it was traced again to Godax hotels.

‘Interesting! He was even watching the Vice President’s house and Godax hotels. That means he knew what was about to happen,’ Clem commented.

‘He was also at the front of the Vice President’s house when the gun was shot twice.’ the computer operator added.

Dakolo was speechless, he was frustrated and his eyes were teary. He couldn’t get himself to believe that Henry was working with the assassins. Henry who had not fully recovered, who was even attacked at the hospital and Rugbe village by the assassins.

‘Sir, I knew it.’ Clem began in a strong tone. ‘Henry E.G was playing a game all along.’

Dakolo gave him a sharp look, ‘how do you mean?’

‘Sir, looking at it from the hospital when the South African Dr David’s imposter came, if he actually came to hurt Henry, they wouldn’t have injected the cure instead of the poison. I think the plan was to take Henry out that day but because of the police’s presence, they couldn’t. Also, I believe Henry E.G was pretending all along, he knew his mother, he knew everyone, he had his memory and he even had contacts with the other assassins; that was why they could plan together and bomb the hideout in Rugbe village. Think about it sir; why was he the only one that wasn’t killed by the bomb? Even Inspector Ken that wasn’t killed still got killed by one of the assassin’s gun. Then they escaped with Henry.’ Clem let out his thoughts.

Dakolo hated to admit but he knew Clem had made sense and wasn’t far from the truth. The assassins must have also played a game with Henry’s poisoning, that was why the sample for the cure had to be left in Henry’s house. If they really planned to ki*ll him, they wouldn’t have dropped the cure. Henry was surely one of the assassins, Dakolo was dead sure about it.

________

**5pm**

Omotara walked into the house quietly and went straight into her room without greeting Henry and Jefa who were seated in the living room. Jefa got up and followed her immediately, he was worried about her but before she entered into her room and locked the door before he could get there.

Jefa sighed and returned to the living room, ‘I thank God she is safe.’ Jefa said to Henry who was looking less bothered.

‘Yes, thank God she’s safe. Thank God the Vice President is not dead too.’ Henry said. The silence continued. Henry busied himself with the phone.

‘May I come into your room? I have something to say about your attack on the Vice President.’ he typed into his message box and sent to Omotara’s number which Jefa had given to him.

*

Omotara ignored her brother’s knock and began to take off her clothes slowly. She felt stupid and useless, this was the second mission she had failed. The first was failing to ki*ll Henry and the second was failing to ki*ll the Vice President. All started when she began to develop feelings for Henry. She hated to think about it, it made her head ache.

She thought she was made to ki*ll, that was how she lived her life for the past fifteen years and she had never failed in any of her tasks until the past few weeks. If she was really a killing machine and was created to ki*ll, then why was she failing to perform her tasks? Why were feelings taking over her body if she was a machine that was created not to have feelings? Or was Henry right when he said that she had been lied to? As she pondered on these questions, her phone beeped and she picked it up to check the notification. She had already taken off her top and was left in her bra and black trousers.

‘May I come into your room? I have something to say about your attack on the Vice President.’ she read the message from an unknown number. The only person who came into her mind was Henry, but she decided to reply the number first. ‘Henry?’ she typed and sent. In less than twenty seconds, the reply entered. ‘Yes.’

‘Come,’ she sent back and went to unlock the door.

The knock sounded on the door after a minute. ‘Come in,’ she said.

Henry walked in slowly and closed the door. He stood still in front of the door and stared at her.

‘What do you have to say?’ she asked in a cold voice. ‘And how did you know about the attack on the Vice President?’

‘I told you I’ve been watching you through the NSCC cameras, you’ve been keeping the operation running effectively.’ Henry replied.

‘Damn! Don’t you have any other thing to do that to stalk me?’

‘Yes, I don’t have any other thing to do for now.’ he replied calmly.

‘What do you have to say?” She asked after a silence of ten seconds.

‘I tried to stop you from trying to ki*ll him but I failed,’ Henry said, unaware that it was his text message that eventually saved the man.

‘You can’t stop me, no one can stop me ; we only had a little miscalculation.’ she said and turned away from him, she began to take off her bra.

‘God stopped you,’ Henry said.

Tarasha turned her face and gave him a sharp look, then she turned back again.

‘It wasn’t the man’s time to die yet, so God prevented it.’

‘You can say whatever you want to say, but he’s still going to die soon, even before he fully recovers from the bullets in his lap.’

Henry was moved by her words and the fact that she admitted she was still going after the VP, he moved closer to her and stood beside her. He avoided looking at her half naked body and focused his eyes on her face. ‘Omotara, what has he done to you?’

‘Nothing,’ she replied blankly and stared back into his eyes.

‘Then why are you after him?’

‘I don’t breach contracts, he’s the last person on the list of my contract in Nigeria, I have to take him out.’

‘You don’t have to,’ Henry said in a pleading tone. ‘Whoever gave this contract to you is misusing you, this is not what you’re meant to do, you are meant to do something better in life.’

She sighed and stared at him for some seconds, ‘Well, Henry. I’m not convinced yet about all these stories, I’m not convinced about God or love, I’ve never felt God or love in my life, how do I know they’re real and not just deceptive feelings you’re trying to get into my head?’

Henry heaved a sigh of frustration, he didn’t know how to answer her question but he just had to talk. ‘Look here Tara, you don’t have to feel it before you believe it, that’s what is called faith. You believe and it works for you.’

‘Haha,’ she suddenly laughed loudly. ‘What you’re saying is hogwash man, yesterday you talked about the feelings of Love for strong people, now you’re saying I don’t need feelings to believe in your God or Love again? I know you have been brainwashed already but you can’t brainwash me like they’ve done to you.’

‘I’m not trying to…’

‘Shh…’ she cut him short. ‘Do not tell me about God or Love again until you can show them to me.’ she said, staring straight into his eyes. ‘Now leave this room,’ she shouted.

Henry was confused on what to say, he wasn’t knowledgeable about the things of God, so he didn’t know what else to say to her but he remembered once hearing a preacher say that you don’t need to know much about the Bible before becoming a soul winner. He decided to go back and pray about the issue.

‘Get out!’ she shouted at him again when he was sluggish at moving. He began to proceed slowly to the door.

‘And don’t try to stop me again, I won’t spare you.’ she added before he got to the door.

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