"He"s going to recover soon," Dr Tobi said to the elderlyDoctor who was handling Henry"s case before it was
transferred to him. They were in the new ward where
Henry had been placed and were running check up on
him. An x-ray on his body had just been done and the
doctors had found nothing dangerous in his system.
"Thank G.o.d he"s okay, I can"t imagine the kind of troubles
we would have faced from the police and the questions
we would have had to answer them." the elderly doctor
replied.
"Thank G.o.d," Dr Tobi murmured under his breath and
stepped back a little, staring at the patient in silence.
"I just wonder why that lab scientist should attack our
nurses and flee," the elderly doctor put in.
"I wonder too, no one knows the content of the ampoule
he left behind."
"That"ll only be for a short while, Dr Albert is working on
it and I trust him, we"ll get the results soon."
The door flung open immediately the elderly doctor
finished talking. Both doctors turned to see the agent and
two other officers approaching them.
"I was told he was administered the cure and he"s safe,"
Agent Dakolo said to the doctors, fixing his eyes on Henry
who was laying peacefully on the bed.
"Yes sir, he"s alright." Dr Tobi replied him.
"That"s good news," Dakolo gave a brief smile and glanced
at the doctor"s face after feeling Henry"s skin with the
back of his palm.
Dakolo took some steps back, still fixing his eyes on
Henry. He placed his hands behind his waist and stood at
ease and then took his gaze to Dr Tobi. "We"ve searched
all around and have not been able to find that lab
scientist or even discover how he left this vicinity."
Dakolo said to Dr Tobi who replied him with silence.
"In the absence of Dr David the lab scientist, we"ll have to
take you in for questioning." Dakolo continued speaking,
staring straight at Dr Tobi"s face to see his response. "You
worked closely with him, so you may be able to tell us
some things about him."
"I don"t know anything about him more than you do," Dr
Tobi replied in a defensive manner. "Our relationship was
strictly professional."
"So he didn"t mention anything about himself to you?"
"Nothing," Dr Tobi answered.
"Okay, but we still need to question you. He may have
revealed some things to you without you being able to
decipher them."
"All the questions would be done here," Dr Tobi a.s.serted,
"it"ll be done in this hospital."
"No, in the police office, that"s the excellent place for that
kind of session." Dakolo retorted. "Because of the respect
we have for you, we"ll let you come for the session
tomorrow morning."
"I won"t have that kind of session with you," Dr Tobi
protested.
"You don"t have a choice doctor, you worked with him,
don"t make us do it the hard way."
"I won"t," Dr Tobi insisted strongly.
"Then, we"ll have no choice than to go hard on you,"
Dakolo said and turned to Inspector Clem to make a
signal. Inspector Clem began to detach the handcuff
attached to one of his belt holes.
"Agent," Dr Tobi called in a strict and determined tone.
"We worked with him. You permitted it after confirming
that he was from South Africa, so if I"m going to leave
here handcuffed, you"ll have to be handcuffed too and
we"ll have to be questioned together."
Dakolo paused and took in a deep breath, staring at Dr
Tobi narrowly, impressed by the Doctor"s intelligence. He
signaled for inspector Clem to return the handcuff,
remembering that he truly permitted Dr Tobi to continue
work with the lab scientist. He felt a bit embarra.s.sed and
defeated. "We do not mean to hara.s.s you doc," he said in
an apologetic manner. "We only need you to answer our
few questions. We"ll carry out the questioning here as
you said."
"You do not want to hara.s.s me but you just tried to take
me out of here handcuffed?" Dr Tobi said angrily, shaking
his head at the Agent in disbelief.
Dakolo was quiet for a while, he felt he had goofed big
time, he should have used a different approach.
"Excuse me sirs, it"s past closing hours already and I need
to tidy up my office before leaving." Dr Tobi said and
began to walk towards the exit. The officers allowed him
pa.s.s and watched in silence, the older doctor followed
suit.
"We"re moving him out of here tonight," Dakolo
announced to the doctors before the exit door was
opened. "I already requested for that officially and I"m
sure that directives on what you need to do would be on
your table already." he said particularly to Dr Tobi.
Dr Tobi stopped at Dakolo"s announcement, he waited
for Dakolo to finish talking before he turned back slowly.
"You can"t take him away now, it will disrupt all that we"ve
started."
"We will, we have to. It"s dangerous for him to continue
staying here. We"re already making arrangements on
how to fly him out of the country as soon as possible;
most likely in two days time."
"Fly him out?" Dr Tobi eyes widened in surprise, he took
some steps back closer to the officers. "That would mean
paralyzing him totally; it would totally eliminate all his
chances of recovery. It"s not safe for him to fly yet."
"Ermm… Our minds are made up already," Dakolo said,
unconvinced about the Doctor"s claim. "It"ll be safer
there for him."
"Your minds are made up to kill him?" Dr Tobi asked
rhetorically. "Maybe you need to bring one of your
Doctors from the office to read his case file, so that he"ll
explain to you the danger of what you"re about to do." Dr
Tobi said after which he turned back and walked out
immediately. The officers were left with the elderly
Doctor and unconscious Henry in the ward.
Dakolo pondered on what Dr Tobi said before leaving,
maybe bringing one of their doctors to read the case file
would tell if Dr Tobi was being truthful, he thought.
Another thought struck his mind again, "what if Dr Tobi
alters the reports in the file case to support his motion?"
He looked up at the staring face of the older doctor, he
decided that he could trust him more. "Doctor," Dakolo
called, proceeding towards the doctor where the doctor
was standing close to the exit. "Please tell me, is it true
that it"s not safe for him to fly now?"
"That"s the truth you heard already, if you really want to
render him completely useless, then you can go ahead
with your plans." the doctor replied him in a stern voice.
"Far from it Doc, his life is very important to us and that"s
why we want to take this step. We want to fly him to the
US where he"ll be safer."
"You think he"ll be safer there?" the doctor questioned.
"You"re aware that the US also has this same a.s.sa.s.sin
problem and you"re still talking about taking him there?
As far as reports and news have it, we here; I mean you
security officers are doing better than other counties"
officers."
"Ermm… I agree with you doc, but it"ll be harder for the
a.s.sa.s.sin following him here to reach him when we fly
him to the US."
"I thought your IG has said that the a.s.sa.s.sin group here in
Nigeria is in same organization with the ones that are
functioning in other countries too. Don"t you think you"ll
be exposing the patient to great danger instead of putting
him here where you can watch over him by yourself."
Dakolo began to ponder on the Doctor"s words, he began
to question himself if it was possible for him to
personally safeguard Henry and still go about with the
investigations. It would be hard but it could be made
possible in a way.
"Nevertheless, we"ll take him out of this place today."
Dakolo spoke after coming to a conclusion in his mind.
"We"ll move him to a secluded place, Dr Tobi would
continue to treat him; that means Dr Tobi would have to
be excused for some days, probably a month. Do you
think we can trust Dr Tobi."
"Of course yes, I can personally vouch for him. He"s one
of our bests here and he"s also honest. But taking him
away for one month? You have to sort that out with the
authorities of the hospital." The elderly doctor said.
"That wouldn"t be a problem," Dakolo said and began to
walk towards the door.
++++
Benny stepped out of car immediately the engine was
killed. He began to walk towards the door of the house,
forgetting that he wasn"t with the key. He was forced to
stand at the entrance of the house.
Cole and Aisha were watching him mystified, wondering
what the reason was for his behavior. They walked
towards the entrance where he was slowly and Cole took
out the key to the door. Benny kept on avoiding their
gazes until the door was opened. He rushed in at once
and walked to the room he shared with Cole.
Cole and Aisha remained baffled, they stared at each
other with questions in their eyes, they knew that neither
of them had answers to the questions, so they bothered
not to ask each other.
"I"ll go prepare our meal right away, I think Benny needs
some rest." Aisha said with a shrug to Cole before walking
away.
Cole shrugged too and walked to the same room Benny
entered, he opened the door slowly. He saw Benny where
their clothes and bags were placed, searching furiously in
the bags for something. Cole closed back the door and
began to make his way to the room were the Senate
President was kept.
++++
Tarasha kept thinking about her next line of action as she
sat at the back seat of the cab. Now she was supposed to
resume as soon as possible in the NSCC and she"ll be
working in a post close to that of Henry, performing
most of his responsibilities and duties now that he wasn"t
fit and won"t be available; in fact, what she was expecting
was the public announcement of his death. And the most
exciting part about her new job was that she was going to
be working closely with the Vice President and the
Inspector General.
For the the two of them, she was going to attack them
from a distance and also closely too, making use of the
opportunity of her work with them.
She took out her phone and opened her browser, she
typed in the address to a news website and waited for it
to load. In less than thirty seconds, it had finished loading
and she saw the news she was expecting to see.
"Henry E.G attacked again in the hospital," she read the
headline to herself. She clicked on the link to read the
details of the news.
++++
"What details have you been able to gather?" Agent
Dakolo asked as he entered into the computer room. The
two officers sitting in front of the master computer got
up immediately in recognition of his presence.
"Sir, we"ve not gotten anything yet " the lady was the one
who replied.
"What do you mean by that?" Dakolo asked, walking
towards them with Ken behind. He stopped beside them
and looked into the system to see what they were doing.
"Have you not been able to reach the hospital again?"
"I"ve reached them already but they denied having any
previous conversation with us yesterday."
"What?? Were you not the one who spoke with them
yesterday?" Dakolo asked with seriousness in his voice.
"He was the one," the lady replied, looking to the man.
"Yes sir, I was the one who spoke with them. They
confirmed him to be one of their lab scientists and even
sent his profile to us, which I forwarded the summary to
you," the man defended himself.
"Can I see the profile that was sent?" Dakolo asked, folding
his arms.
The man sat back and minimized the application opened,
he clicked on a folder icon on the desktop and began to
search for the profile sent . "Here"s it," he announced as
he clicked on it.
A saved webpage opened on the Google chrome browser
and the profile of the lab scientist opened. Dakolo and
Ken looked into it, they saw the same pa.s.sport and
details that had been seen on the lab scientist"s ident.i.ty
card.
"Then why are they denying having any conversation with
you?"
"I don"t understand sir, in fact, we"ve sent this profile
back to the mail they used in sending and we"re
expecting their reply. They can"t deny this."
"Since when did you send it?" Dakolo asked.
"Thirty minutes ago sir," the lady replied. She also took
her seat and took the mouse from her partner. She
opened the email application to show the message sent.
"Call back now and ask them to confirm receipt and also
send their reply," Dakolo ordered.
The lady took her phone which was on the table and
dialled the number immediately, she placed it on
loudspeaker.
"h.e.l.lo, officer Kemi from the Nigeria Police
Headquarters… I called an hour ago to ask about Dr
David who is a…"
"We do not have any lab scientist named Dr David," the
receiver cut in. "I told you that before and you said you"ll
send a mail to us which I"ve been expecting since and I"ve
not seen."
"You"ve not seen it?" the lady asked in a surprised tone.
"No, it"s better you send it now. I"m about to close for the
day and you"ll have to start from the scratch in
explaining your request to another representative."
"But have you also been able to confirm the person who
spoke to us yesterday?"
"No, I already told you that we don"t have any care
representative named Kelvin."
"Okay, please can you send your email address in a text
message to this number, so that I can be sure that we"re
sending to the correct email address."
"Okay," the call ended.
"But the man that I spoke with yesterday introduced
himself as Kelvin." the male computer operator argued.
"Call the Network provider now and report to them,
request for the recording of your call yesterday to serve
as proof to us," Dakolo said to the man who immediately
took the suggestion and brought out his phone.
"Sir," the female computer operator called to Dakolo. "The
text message is here already," she said squinting into the
computer.
Dakolo bent down to also look. "These emails are
different," Dakolo said, comparing the email in the text
message to the one on the computer screen. "This one is
[email protected] while the fake one of
. You guys have been deceived."
Dakolo turned to the male operator, "are you sure it was
this same phone number you called yesterday?"
"Yes," he answered in an aggrieved tone. "I was surprised
when it was denied today. I was in a serious argument
with the lady who answered until my colleague decided
to help me." he said, pointing to his female partner.
"Then, call your Network provider immediately. Also tell
them to provide you the exact location where the call
came from." Dakolo said to the man and turned back to
the lady. "You send the profile to the new email address
for confirmation."
The computer operators began work immediately.
Dakolo stepped back and glanced at his wrist watch, it
was some minutes past eight pm already, he was
supposed to have closed for the day, same for computer
operators and Ken but the urgency of the case wouldn"t
allow them to. He heaved a sigh as his eyes met with
Ken"s. He felt guilty for being careless and keeping all of
them till that time, he shouldn"t have allowed that Lab
Scientist at all, knowing that the a.s.sa.s.sins have high
technology measures and hacking skills which they used
in deceiving their victims.
"Sir," Inspector Ken interrupted his thoughts. "I think it"s
time to go back to the hospital now, they asked us to be
there by eight thirty."
++++
"It"s the boss," Cole announced to Aisha who was seated
on one of the sofas in the living room. He was peeping
through the front window and he could see Tarasha
opening the gate to drive in her car.
Aisha got up from her seat and they both walked out to
meet the boss. Tarasha drove the car in while Aisha
helped her to close back the gate. She took sometime
before stepping out of the car. She looked quite simple
and relaxed under the bright moonlight that night, she
had stopped at the house in the city to change her
clothes and pick the car.
"Where"s Benny?" she asked Cole, taking in a deep breath
as the cool breeze blew her jacket and hair sideways.
"Ermm… Benny, I don"t really know. He said he wanted
to get something outside and hasn"t returned since then."
Cole replied.
"Boss, Benny has been acting strange since he finished the
task." Aisha added.
"Why? But he was successful, it"s all over the news that
Henry was attacked."
"Yes, I don"t just seem to understand. He was looking very
disturbed." Cole said thoughtfully.