Elvis couldn’t bring himself to mutter a word after reading the message, he had to go over the message countless times before he could understand what’s written therein. A word keeps appearing in block and keeps on pummeling his thoughts ‘Spy’, he glared at it for some time before he could register it meant informant. Who could that be?
He raised his head to meet the quizzical gazes of his other teammates, Dauda and Timileyin. The piercing looks on their faces seems to see right through him but the anxious looks showed they can’t, they need him to fill them in, fill them in about the latest update. He gazed at the eyes before him; two of these might be the spy. It might be members of the other teams too who’s close to them, close enough to know their plans. He has to find out who that is.
The spy is not really the real problem now; the real problem is saving Ben, if he’s still alive. He had thought of the possibility of it been a trap but he had thought otherwise, firstly he thought he hasn’t got on enough bad side of the bad people to warrant him been wanted and secondly he trusted Ben. Ben is his responsibility and he has to save him.
He had no choice than to trust the beings behind the four eyes glaring at him, they all have to save Ben, I don't know if Ben’s still alive. He told them about the message although keeping the ‘Spy’ part secret for now, till he can find someone he trusts. He understands the shock that spread across their face when he told them about Ben being captured, their eyelids dropped and they collapsed deeper into themselves. He could sense the tense insecure atmosphere building in the room. They are losing trust in him. He foiled his first two infiltration exercises as a team leader, his first real tests; maybe he’s not capable after all.
He doesn’t have a way with words; not much of a talker; a poor orator; he knows he sucks at saying the right time. The current situation is not an exception either he doesn’t know the right things to say, he looked around the room and saw the bent heads of Dauda and Timileyin, they are low in confidence. All he can do to reverse this is to get a way to save Ben, saving Ben will go a long way in boosting the low confidence and earn him some trust. He has to save him, but how will he?
An idea struck him.
“Timileyin, Ben sent a message with his phone, can we get the phone’s location?” he asked visibly excited. A pair of heads turned in his direction.
“Yes we can, if it’s still on” Timileyin managed to say after locating his voice.
“Then we can get Ben’s location with that” Elvis replied almost jumping, understanding looks
diffuses into the pair of faces glaring at him, they are now seeing some senses in what he’s saying.
Timileyin set to work, punching the keyboard before him with indescribable viguor, all eyes glued at the monitor before them, flashes of rays from the screen begetting thousands of words meaningless to two pairs of eyes. Timileyin worked oblivious of his surroundings, brows of sweat gathers on his forehead from nervousness, Ben’s life is at stake.
After several minutes that look like hours, he heaved a sigh of relief.
“It’s in an office in the western part of the 20th floor of the building” Timi said.
“Great, that’s where Ben is” Elvis said.
“If Ben is there, how will we get to him” Dauda asked,
“I’ll have to enter the building, and extract him out”
“What!!!” Dauda and Timileyin shouted in unison.
……………………………………………………………………
06:30 PM
Convincing them was not as easy as he had expected but they later agreed, Timileyin had managed to bring up the blueprint of the firm, Elvis hurriedly studied it, cramming as many detail as he could, the red dot (Ben’s phone) blinking incessantly at the highest floor of the firm. Dauda will serve as lookout while Elvis will go in and save Ben while Timi will give directions from the office. Timileyin wired them with the minute earphone, pistols and some other gadgets, peradventure their need arises.
Ellie walked out of the office, freshened up, but not as bright as her normal self, Elvis had thought nobody was in the whole office, since its past closing time and everybody has left. He swallowed hard when he saw her.
“I never thought you are still around, I thought you had left” He managed to say
“Sir, can I have a word with you?” Ellie said
“Not now Ellie, we’ll talk tomorrow” he said with a falsified plain face
She turned and dragged herself out of the office. The hurt in him escalated.
09:00 PM
The night is still and quiet, the well illuminated surrounding of Emerald and other firms around lit up the street, giving the otherwise still, cold, night warmth. The atmosphere is still cold, pedestrians are few; the expected traffic of the industrialized part of Lekki and also after 9 is an unbecoming hour to walk if one doesn’t want to be accosted.
A drunkard can be seen staggering along the street, rendering his panegyrics and appraising himself, junks only he could understand poured down freely from his ajar mouth, with saliva trickling down the sides of his mouth. He stopped abruptly and walked towards the entrance of Emerald firm much to the dismay of the two guards on duty. He pounded furiously at the thick glass surrounding the frontage of the firm. The guards shooed him away but he only increased pounding on the glass.
One of the guards opened one of the sliding doors and ran out to restrain him, it seems the alcohol made him stronger than usual; he shakes the guard off with ease, as if the guard’s feeble, the guard called to his partner to come help him restrain the mad drunk. The other guard ran out and they managed to drag the drunk away from the glass. They had not dragged him far when they fell down one after the other unconscious, knocked out by the content in the syringe Dauda’s holding.
“Nice work” Elvis said, advancing from the shadows, towards Dauda who’s taking off the smelling rag he had acted with simultaneously stripping the clothes off a guard.
“That’ll knock them out for a few hours” Dauda said breathing heavily
“Good job guys, we have to hurry, the phone’s battery won’t last for too long” Timileyin said from the other side.
“Good luck’ Dauda said as Elvis hurried past him towards the opened door of the firm.
Elvis walked gingerly towards the elevators, Timileyin instructed him to take the door by his left which he did but it was locked. He took out a pair of thin metals and after some minutes, he picked the lock and the door opened, he held it to prevent it from hitting the wall and opened it slowly. He closed it after him. It opened to a short passage, a door at the opposite side too, another set of lifts on his right. Timi told him to get on them and he did, clicking the 20th floor. The elevator hummed away.
It stopped on the 20th floor, he walked quietly out, his pistol armed and pointing straight ahead while he walked with the pose of detectives in Hollywood movies, he listened attentively to any sound whatsoever but heard none. He inquired softly from Timi if Ben is on this floor, Timi affirmed it, just straight ahead and then the office by the right.
He walked further down the passage, he stopped in his tracks
“F--k” Timi muttered
“What’s wrong” Elvis asked
” The signal just disappeared, it seems the phone’s dead.” Timi replied
“How far am I from the office” Elvis asked
“Just ahead, the next office by the right” Timi replied
He walked to the office described, he poised himself, gun in hand and turned the door knob, locked. He got to work with his lock picking tools, succeeded after some minutes, he barged into the room.
“He’s not here” He said.
EPISODE FOURTEEN
Elvis took a proper look around the room; he now discovered that he’s in an office, a large office. He walked around searching for any object of interest; anything at all that will direct him to Ben. He saw a sofa out of place and walked towards it, behind the sofa almost underneath it lies Ben’s phone. He took it and pressed it, as feared its battery is flat.
“I’ve seen the phone but Ben’s not here” he said into his earpiece.
He could hear audible sighs of dejection from two sources. He decided to walk around the office and find out whatever he could. He walked towards the desk, it’s kind of empty with few files on it, he scanned through them but saw nothing of importance. He walked towards the book shelf and swept his eye over them; they are mostly political journals and write ups, some of war too. A book looked odd, a romance novel, he made to pick it up, as his fingers pulled the book out, the book refused to bulge, he applied more pressure, just then he heard a tumbling sound behind him.
He turned and saw a section of the wall pulling away from its previous position; a secret door. He walked stealthily towards the door, his gun pointing forward as he moved. The door opened to a smaller office with a chair and a table and a computer system sitting proudly on the table – now he noticed that there’s no system in the main office. There must really be something interesting on the system. He pressed the power button and watched as the monitor screen lightens up, he smiled to himself as the system starts up. His smile was cut short when the monitor display requested password.
He updated Timileyin of what he saw, Timileyin told him to connect the flash drive he had earlier given him to the system and he’ll try to bypass the security and access the content of the computer. Elvis did as he was instructed and returned to searching the room for clue to Ben’s location.
“I’ve got a hint sir’ Timi said from the other end.
“Have you bypassed the security of the computer?”
Elvis said nonchalantly, obviously occupied with finding Ben
“Not that sir, it’s about Ben sir, I think I just found his location” Timi replied
“Really?” Elvis replied excited
“I gave him some heat sensor transmitters…”
“Heat sensor transmitters?”
“Yes, they senses heat, detecting anything that passes and transmits heat immediately, they also send the location”
“Oh, go on”
“The news is that the heat sensor transmitters just got activated and their signals is active”
“Where’s it transmitting from?”
“The ground floor of the building, almost the rear of the building, the southern part of it” Timi explained
“Wow, nice job Timi, hope you can direct me towards the location?”
“Of course sir” Timi replied elated
A sigh of relief spiced with optimism could be heard from Dauda’s end.
Elvis ran out of the office and headed for the elevator. The elevator dinged as it stopped on the ground floor, Elvis looked around carefully with his gun pointing straight ahead.
“Take your right sir” Timi said.
The door on the right is the one directly opposite the one he broke in with the other time. He went towards it and turned the knob. It opened with a slight squeak, the slight squeak is enough to give him away, he waited patiently but with utmost alert for any sign of movement in the room he just entered, he took a deep breath and pushed the door a bit wider to accommodate him and he entered.
He remembered the warehouse he saw from the kiosk he had stayed the previous day, it looked kind of different maybe because of the different angle of sight. It looked different, the boxes are absent and more spacious, some trucks are packed close to the door he came through so he used that to shield himself from detection as he tried to scan the contents of the room.
Across the room lay a man, with big stature, he is tied to a chair which has fallen on its side. The man’s still attached to the chair, his head hanging loose at a side obeying gravity, his hands tied behind his back to the chair and his legs tied together. From where
Elvis is, he could see the ridges on his face; a sign that he has been knocked out from a very good beating.
Not far away is a guard sitting on a chair, headphones running across his big head to his two ears, shaking his head to the music he must be hearing, lost in his world; now Elvis sees why he didn’t hear the squeak of the door earlier. Elvis grabbed a plank nearby and walked quietly towards the guard from behind, he raised the plank and dealt the guard a heavy blow to his head. The earphones ran down his head to his chest as the guard fell down unconscious. He ran to the unconscious man, shaking him furiously.
“Ben, wake up, come on, Ben, Ben” Elvis cooed breathlessly
He shook him furiously and aggressively, slapped him, pinched him, anything he could think of just to make Ben awake. Carrying him is not an option as Ben is much bigger in stature and weighs more than him. He continued shaking him, calling out to him when a shot is fired. Everything went still for a split second then a soft thud of someone turning.
Elvis turned to see Dauda holding his 9-mm pistol before him, smoke still finding its way out of the nozzle of the gun; he turned to see a guard lying lifeless on the ground, a gun laying a few inches from the lifeless guard’s hand.
“What” Ben almost shouted, seems the gunshot woke him
“We’ve got to get out of here” Dauda said, “Some new guards are coming, maybe to switch shifts”
They dragged Ben up; he could manage to walk albeit leaning on someone. Sounds can be heard of people talking excitedly from the main entrance, they walked hurriedly to the gate of the warehouse, shrieks of tyres screeching to halt at the entrance of the gate they are approaching.
“Let’s turn back” Elvis said, turning away from the gate
“What? we should go back in?” Dauda replied almost shouting, fear smiling radiantly n his face.
“Trust me” Elvis replied as convincing as he could muster, he didn’t trust himself on the risk he’s about taking.
They turned and rushed towards the door leading towards the elevator, their task made easier by Ben who’s trying not to drag them behind, thanks to him seeing the grave danger they are in. They got to the elevator and huddled in just as someone opened the door opposite the one they just came in from; they waited impatiently for the elevator door to close. A shot fired missing Elvis head narrowly as the Elevator doors slid close.
They hurried out of the elevator on the 20th floor just as another elevator dings beside theirs; they ran towards the office Elvis has visited earlier, they bolted the door from inside as hurried steps could be heard from the outside. They dropped Ben on a chair and rested a bit before going into the inner office.
Elvis had earlier noticed a small door in the office earlier, the door must lead to somewhere, somewhere he’s gambling will save them. Dauda look squarely at him when Elvis blurted out the plan like Elvis had just admitted to poisoning him, his eyes with absolute disbelief. The light from the system lighten up the room, rousing Elvis’ memory”
“Have you accessed the files on the system” Elvis asked Timi over the earpiece.
“I have, I’m trying to download the files on it, I’m almost done, I’ll be in the next 5 mins” Timi replied.
“5 minutes?” Elvis and Dauda said in unison, like a memory verse.
They have to wait, Elvis have to remove the flash drive and shut down the system too.
“We have to get out of here now” Dauda said impatiently
The pounding on the door is getting louder with every seconds that breezes past, footsteps of men running around and shouts for the key to the door could be heard. 2 minutes more.
Dauda was breathing furiously and agitatedly with every passing second, shouts for the key has changed to shouts for objects to break down the door outside……1 minute more. Now Dauda is becoming unbearably furious, Elvis is still adamant on his decision to tarry a while longer.
“I’m done” Timi said from the other end
Elvis dashed to remove the flash drive and hurriedly start the shutdown procedure of the system as the creaking sound of the breaking door ooze in. they made for the small door and opened it; luckily it’s not locked, it’s a food carrier.
They squeezed themselves into the food carrier and closed the door as the door cave in, they felt themselves floating down the building. They got out in the kitchen on the ground floor, with Timi’s guidance; they were able to locate the building entrance. They peeped on the lobby for any sign of movement, none, all the guards must have chased them up the building leaving no one to watch over the entrance.
They made their way into the darkness where their car was parked half dragging Ben.
“You almost got us all killed" Dauda said driving into the darkness.
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