Tarasha

"I don"t remember her name" Dr. Hammed stated

for the umpteenth time

He was sweating in the air conditioned room

though he was putting on very light clothes, the

endless sessions of interrogation which started

on Sat.u.r.day had begun to wear him out.

At first, it was the EFCC who started questioning

him on Sat.u.r.day, their lists of questions never

seemed to end. Several of the officials would

come asking questions, most which he didn"t

have answers to, they would leave after they had

threatened him and didn"t get results, only for a

superior to to show up in a s.p.a.ce of two to three

hours with another set of questions when he

thoughtthe session had ended.

He had already sworn to return all the monies he

had stolen and kept in both foreign and Nigerian

banks after the officials at the EFCC cracked

him, so that his judgment in the court would be

tendered with mercy. He now wondered why the

police were after him again, he returned to his

house from the EFCC"s headquarters only to be

welcomed by a letter from the police criminal

investigation department inviting him for another

session of interrogation.

"We heard that you had an unusual experience on

Friday after the Unilag girl visited" An Inspector

whose name he found out to be James asked,

another dark skinned inspector was standing

close to him.

"I didn"t have any unusual experience" the man

countered.

"But you slept off during working hours" James

focused his eyes on him and smiled mockingly.

"Or is that how you sleep off lazily at work?"

James pushed a b.u.t.ton with his statement and it

was visible on Dr. Hammed"s face, he wished he

could land a heavy punch on James" face but his

situation would only worsen if he acted stupidly.

"Sorry sir" James apologized calmly, "but we only

want to help you, if you just tell us the truth , it

would make our investigations easier and we

would stop disturbing you"

"I slept off truly" Dr Hammed finally gave in. "I

think I took something poisonous that day"

"Did you found out what it was you took?"

"No, I didn"t have the time. I"ve been very busy"

"But was sleep the only effect it had on you?"

"No" the doctor stuttered for a while. "It came

with loss of memory, I didn"t remember some of

the things I did before I slept off"

"Like two hours before you slept?"

"Yes" the doctor glanced at his face suddenly.

"How did you know the duration of time?"

"Calm down sir" James said and stood from the

table he was sitting on. "Some of our men had a

similar experience like that recently. For how

long did you sleep that day?"

"I don"t really remember, but I slept until

someone woke me when it was almost closing

hours" He paused, licked his lips and continued.

"But my eyes were still very heavy when I got

home that day, I slept off without even taking

dinner till morning the next day"

"Hmm, maybe you were poisoned with the same

substance as our men" James stated, he

returned to his former position on the table.

"They slept from evening till early the next

morning when they were found"

"Incredible! Someone must have played far on

me" the doctor exclaimed, covering his lips with

his two hands.

"You said you slept off after she visited?" James

pushed further immediately, taking advantage of

the man"s new mood.

"I don"t know when she visited, but everyone said

I didn"t come out of the office for several hours

after I went in with her"

"You see, you need to remember her name so

that we can trace her, she might just be a very

dangerous criminal" James emphasized.

Dr Hammed remained silent for some minutes, he

cracked his brain furiously for answers. "I saw

her name on a notepad she left in my office on

Thursday, I don"t really remember but I know her

first name was not a Nigerian native name"

"Try harder sir, you can remember"

" I"m trying, I don"t just know what happened to

me. Since then I"ve been forgetting things very

quickly"

"Well, our only hope for now is her name"

The doctor scratched his head, looking at James"

face, a feeling of regret suddenly took over him.

He regretted the day he submitted his application

to Derl Pharmacy, the day he was promoted and

started to work closely with Dr Daniel Umaru and

the day he succ.u.mbed to doing dubious deals

with Dr Umaru.

Now, he was going to loose all he had gathered

all his life, both the ones gotten legally and

illegally. The case had prompted EFCC to

investigate deeper and they dug out several

other dubious deals that Dr Umaru had done,

including his name in the ones he didn"t even

know about. There was no way out for him, the

only thing he could get was a very short prison

sentence and that was why he decided to give

up all his a.s.sets.

"Her name is Samantha Osman, she"s a 300Level

pharmacy student of the University of Lagos" Dr.

Hammed recited suddenly, his face glowed as he

spoke.

"Samantha Osman, 300Level pharmacy student of

Unilag" James repeated, scribbling it into his

notepad.

"Yes, that"s it" Dr Hammed affirmed.

"Good" James smiled as he glanced at the details

written down once again. "Do you also remember

now if you saw her do anything suspicious when

she went into the conference room with you?"

"No, I didn"t see her do anything there. She only

helped me move something from my office into

the room"

"Alright, I think it"s okay for now" James got up

from the table again. "Thank you for your

cooperation, we"ll get back to you if we need any

other help from you"

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

+++

**07.11.2030**

*5.30am*

Cole"s mouth was left agape as he watched

Tarasha silently from the window exercising her

body, he was counting the number of pushups

she was doing and she just got to two hundred

without struggling or showing any sign of

tiredness.

He couldn"t hold it anymore, he closed the

curtains and rushed outside to join her. She was

already dusting off herself when he got outside.

He was so disappointed as he hoping to see

more action from her when he got outside.

"Good morning Cole" she greeted first, "how are

you?"

"Good morning Boss, I"m fine" he replied, with a

note of disappointment still hidden in his voice.

"Why did you stay there peeping for so long

instead of coming to join me?" Cole was taken

aback by the questioned.

"How did you know I was peeping?" He asked.

"I saw you" she replied smiling, "even if I didn"t

see you, I feel it when a pair of eyes watches

me"

"Wow! But you didn"t towards the window side at

all?" He was confused.

"I didn"t have to look there with my physical

eyes, every part of me including the physical and

non physical pays attention to the environment"

Cole shook his head, he tried to a.s.similate what

she said but ended up greatly mystified. He

wondered what it would be like if Tarasha comes

against him, he"ll definitely be hopeless and

helpless. Tarasha"s fear increased in his heart

rapidly.

"I noticed you"re the one who wakes up very

early amongst the three of you" she disrupted his

thoughts.

"Yes, I wake up most times before Benny and

Aisha does" he responded.

"That"s good" she said and began walking

towards the well, Cole walked with her. She

suddenly turned and faced him. "You have to

learn very well from this operation henceforth"

He stared at her face, the look on her face

sought more explanation to what she started.

"I have an a.s.signment for you" she continued,

"You have to complete the first operation we did"

"The first operation? Didn"t we finish off the

minister already?" He asked, puzzled.

"Yes, we finished off the minister but did not

eliminate every trace"

"What do you mean?"

"Listen carefully" she said sternly, "we left some

traces that would be used to find us in the

minister"s operation and it is possible that we

are discovered sooner or later"

"What? Why? How?" His heartbeat increased

"Calm down Cole" she said and took three steps

further before going on with the discussion. "If

anyone is going to trace that murder

successfully, it must be a very competent officer"

"But…"

"Shh…" She hushed, a smile gradually appeared

on her face. "Don"t be scared Cole, it"s only a

game, my favorite game and I"m sure you"ll enjoy

it too"

"How? I don"t understand"

"Its a game between myself and the police" she

said and then gave a wicked smile. "You, Cole

will be my avatar for this first round"

"Boss, you"re only confusing further" Cole was

beginning to get frustrated.

"I want to weaken the security system in the

state" She walked further to the well and picked

up the fetching bucket. "The trace is only going

to lead a competent officer and his team to our

trap and you will single handedly handle them

when they come. Ot would be done in a way that

would pount directly to you"

"I"m still confused" he said.

"Don"t worry, you"ll understand later" she said,

drawing out water from the well. "Go in and wake

the others, it"s time to reveal or mission here to

you guys"

Cole"s mind was greatly troubled as he walked

away slowly into the house, he tried to figure out

what she meant. She mentioned that he was her

avatar in the game, that might possibly mean

that she was playing games with him and his life

was in danger.

She also said that she didn"t eliminate all traces

in the last operation so that the police could

trace them and she"d set him up to face the

police. That was something he had never done

before, he never singlehandedly handled a police

team before, he was only good at escaping when

the police pursued a group of them and not when

he was the only one being pursued.

How on earth was he even going to escape if a

team of ten to twenty officers were sent to him?

He wasn"t even supposed to escape, the purpose

of the game was to weaken the police force,

that means he had to defeat the team.

The thought alone sent shivers down his spine

and he quickly uttered a prayer that moment.

"Lord, if it is your will, let this cup pa.s.s over me".

But he wasn"t Christ neither did he follow Christ,

so G.o.d would not answer his prayer. He resolved

in his mind to run away if she insisted on setting

him up with the police.

**

Tarasha walked in after ten minutes to meet

Cole, Benny and Aisha already waiting for her in

the sitting room.

"Good morning Boss" Benny and Aisha greeted.

"Good morning" she answered and took suitable

seat which faced three of them. "I hope you guys

are ready for today"s job"

"Today"s job?" Aisha spoke lazily, yawning. "I

thought we did everything already. We cleaned

the house, cleared the bushes and …"

"Shut up" Tarasha scowled angrily, making the

jovial girl shocked. "Are you crazy? Do you think

that"s all we came here to do?"

"I"m sorry ma" Aisha replied in low tones, greatly

terrified. She wondered what went wrong and

why Tarasha who was friendly with them the day

before had suddenly become cold.

Tarasha got up swiftly, her frown changed into a

smile surprising her audience more.

"Are you scared?" She asked laughin loudly,

mocking Aisha who was shaky already. "I"m not

angry, I was only teaching you something, learn

to switch your mood as it pleases you, don"t let

your feelings control you. So it"s time to switch

to the work mode"

Aisha heaved a sigh of relief, her rapidly

increased heartbeat speed returned to normal.

The two guys just watched in awe, wishing they

could switch modes like that too.

"We"ll start real work today" Tarasha interrupted

their thoughts. "We must drop our target, Kelechi

Edwin before the end of the month"

Realization hit them as she walked away,

Tarasha had brought them on a suicide mission.

Killing the governor of Rivers State in office, with

the quality of security surrounding him was an

impossible mission.