RESTLESS
Restless-Episode 31(Back to bethanna III)
Story By
Oyin Oluwatosin Emmanuel.
“Yea, how much are we getting compensated with for this training?” Another person asked instead of Cole. She took a step forward, it was the cook, Jenny. “You never told us we would be fighting against the FOX. How can we fight the FOX with just two weeks training?”
“We aren’t fighting the whole corporation, just a few bad eggs working with the terrorists and I would be leading our team.” Henry tried to explain.
He looked at Cole and Jenny’s faces, there seemed to be no willingness to continue on their faces. He felt shattered. He couldn’t imagine how he would explain to Sheila that he had made the wrong choice of people and would have to waste some more time to get other people.
“You’d be compensated with a million Anthanna Dollars,” Henry answered them reluctantly. From the look on their faces, he was almost certain even the others would want to take the money and leave, it was a whole lot which could set them up for life if used wisely. “So are you in or out?”
Come giggled and shook his head. “How can I be out for that amount? I can siphon far more than that in a transaction. I would never miss the opportunity of fighting with the Legendary Carl Winston and the opportunity of hacking into systems of African top most secured country – Bethanna.” His face carried so much excitement as his words.
“I love adventures and would not miss being in this team, even if we’re fighting the whole world.” Jenny also put in.
Henry heaved a deep sigh of relief. A bright smile appeared on his face on seeing the team laugh at him.
“Is this a revenge for the prank I played on you during the training?” He asked, laughing heartily as the volumes of their laughter increased.
He stepped forward again and stretched out his hand. “So we do this as one team, one mind, one spirit.”
“One team, one mind, one spirit.” they chorused as they joined their hands with his.
________________________
February 2016
Location: Bexford, Bethanna.
They drove into the company in a grey coloured Camry sports car. Four of them in total in the car, and all except Henry dressed in fitted black suits and white inner shirts. They had navy blue ties to match their outfit.
Henry was dressed in a sky blue shirt and black pants, neatly tucked in but without a tie or suit jacket. He was the official driver of the team for that occasion. Cole was seated beside him at the front while Samantha and Dave sat behind.
Henry halted the car as directed by the official in the car garage of the company. He took a glance into the rearview mirror to see Samantha and Dave’s face as he turned off the engine.
He sat in the car while they all stepped out, one after the other. He watched as they all straightened their suit jackets and then proceeded towards the building. Cole and Samantha had only their devices in their hands while Dave carried an additional briefcase. Henry took out his one side wireless earpiece and plugged it in his left ear.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning sir, welcome to Lux international.”
Henry heard their voices through the earpiece and his eyes located them at the entrance of the building, exchanging pleasantries with the security guards.
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“Good morning sirs,” the managing director greeted as he and the other executives sitting at the same side of the table with him got up from their seats to welcome the visitors.
“Good morning,” Cole’s voice was louder than his colleagues. They all shook hands with their hosts.
“You may be seated please,” the managing director said after pleasantries were exchanged.
“Thank you,” the visitors replied pleasantly and took their seats.
“Let’s go straight to business, please table your offer here so we can have a good view of it again.” the MD spoke after clearing his throat.
“What we have come with is not totally different from what we sent in the mail,” Cole began. Dave placed the brief case on the table gently, he opened it and began to bring out the paper documents. He handed over some copies each of the same document to their hosts.
The discussion continued for more than twenty five minutes and the visitors were yet to convince their hosts about the offer.
“Your proposal seems so attractive, but we can not take it, the risk to bear is so much.”
“But we would be taking this risk with you, we know it’s much but it’s certainly going to be a success.” Cole interjected.
“Mr Andrew, we are not sure of the outcome yet, bearing the risk together would only reduce our loss, but it would not avert or avoid it. The main point here is we cannot afford to lose anything at this time of the year, it’s crucial.” The MD replied.
“I don’t know why you don’t see this already succeeding sir, I think you need to take your time to look into it very well, I’m sure you would change your mind totally.” Cole tried to persuade.
The MD shook his head. “I’m not sure I would change my mind,” he said pessimistically. “We only have one Shelling company here in Bethanna to provide us the shells but this company has not been in partnership with any other for a long time and seems to be totally closed to partnership. There’s zero percent likelihood of getting a partnership deal with them, and our company can’t afford to purchase the shells from them now, it would crash all of our other activities and…”
“We can get partnership from them, it’s easy…” Cole interjected again.
The man looked at his face as if to confirm if he was talking in his right senses.
“You come from Europe and don’t stay in Bethanna, you obviously don’t know the way things are run here.” the MD dismissed his interjection.
“No sir, we did a lot of research before coming to you with this offer,” Cole insisted as he leaned closer to the table and placed both arms forward. “We are very certain that Shelling would be no problem to us, your company would secure the partnership.”
“You speak in parables, it would be of more benefit to all of us if you speak in clearer terms and tell us why you are so confident.”
“Your CEO has a very good relationship with the CEO of the shelling company, we do think this can be used as an advantage to get us the partnership.”
The MD squinted thoughtfully. He leaned forward and placed an elbow on the table. “Can you explain this further?”
“If you make the CEO see the advantage this deal would provide for your company, it’ll urge him to explore his friendship with Richard Brad,” Cole explained. “We can talk to him if you want us to.”
The MD glanced at the faces of his colleagues and they both nodded thoughtfully.
“Don’t worry, thanks. We would talk to him about the offer and call on you in case he needs to see you,” the MD said to Cole.
“That’s fair enough.”
“Yeah, but for now, I can’t promise you anything.”
“Understood sir,” Cole nodded and leaned back. “I guess now is a good time to take our leave,” he said and made way to get up.
“Thank you so much Mr Andrew,” the MD and his colleagues also got up. They exchanged handshakes and remained standing until the visitors stepped out of the room.
__________________________
The next day
10:00AM
In the CEO’s office. Cole, Dave and Samantha were seated on the visitors seats. The CEO of the company, Benson Mike was sitting behind the table.
Ten minutes into the conversation, Cole had been able to make his point to the man.
“Everything you said to me is exactly how your message was relayed yesterday, I was told the only disturbing factor is the shells and that you have an idea on how I can use my personal influence to procure that.” Benson said in response to Mr Andrew.
“Yes sir, we’ve done a proper study of your profile and found out that the CEO of the shelling company was a special adviser to you while you were the governor of Benuit state…” Cole was explaining when someone let out a loud sneeze. All eyes turned to the person.
“Oh! Sorry,” Dave covered his nose and mouth with an handkerchief and sniffed in.
Cole was about to continue when he sneezed twice again.
“Take care, I see you’ve caught cold.” Benson asked in concern.
“Yea..yeah,” Dave replied, wiping his nose with the handkerchief. He sniffed in again. “May I use your restroom please?” Dave asked nodding in direction of a door situated at the right hand side behind the seated CEO. He adjusted his suit jacket properly.
“Oh, please, you may.” The CEO said with a wry smile. He got up and led Dave there, he opened the door for him to step in. He closed it back and returned to his seat. He was silent for a moment, wondering if they should continue with their conversation or not.
Normally, he would have called a staff of his to lead the guest to another restroom and not the one for his personal use but since the guest had nodded in direction of the door, he could not refuse.
“Sorry about that sir, he wasn’t sneezing on our way here, he must have sniffed in maybe some fragrance of perfume he’s allergic to,” Cole apologized on his behalf.
“Oh, no problem. Can we conti…”
“Excuse me sir,” Dave called from the toilet door. “Someone seems to have dropped some documents here, one of the papers is flying around, it’s a blue paper file.”
Benson raised a brow. He had not used the toilet for more than five days and he couldn’t recollect leaving any document there the last time he used it and even if he had left any, the cleaners should have discovered it.
Dave closed the toilet door and proceeded to his seat, holding the paper in his hand.
“This is one of the documents there,” Dave handed over the paper to Benson before taking his seat.
A frown appeared on Benson’s face as his eyes scanned through the paper. “You said there’s a file there,” he asked Dave to confirm.
“Yes sir.”
Benson let out a breath as he got up from his seat. “Please excuse me,” he said before proceeding to the restroom.
The paper in his hand was part of a file which he had no idea how it got to that office. He had left the file in his other office in one of his very small companies.
He got into the bathroom and located the file on the window behind the water closet. He picked up the file and opened it, he was shocked to find all complete documents of a dubious deal he had done while he was Governor. He couldn’t explain how the file got into the restroom. He tried to recall if Dave held anything with him while entering into the restroom. He didn’t see anything with Dave, he was sure.
He took in a deep breath and arranged the document in the file quickly, then he proceeded back into his office with the file. He apologized to his guests for taking their time and they continued with their meeting.
Thirty Minutes later.
A lady dressed in black skirt suit and three other women dressed in the cleaners’ uniform stood behind the visitors chairs in Benson’s office. He had called the corporately dressed lady who was his secretary immediately after the guests had left and asked from her those who had been cleaning his office throughout his days of absence. The secretary in turn had called the three cleaners who worked during that time.
“Who cleaned this office today?” Benson asked in a strict tone.
“It’s me sir,” the woman standing a the left end answered with courtesy.
“You saw this document in the toilet, why did you not bother to tell me or her about it?” He asked, pointing with the direction of his eyes to the secretary. He picked up the file and raised it up for her to see.
She squinted her eyes like she had never seen the document before and shook her head in negative.
“Can’t you talk?” the man fired angrily.
“I’ve never seen that file before,” she answered.
Benson frowned at her. “How did it get into the restroom? I found it behind the water closet.”
The women stared at him cluelessly. None of them could give a reply.
“Nobody can reply me?” he fired.
They trembled in fear but remained silent for the lack of answers.
“You all, just get out of my office, I’ll make sure I deal with you later.” He dismissed them angrily and turned his swivel backwards to face the wall.
He turned only after all of them had left his officer. He heaved a sigh and got up to his feet. He was sure one of the cleaners must have seen that document in the restroom and was careless to leave it there, but what bothered him the most was how the file got into that office. He did not remember taking it out of the other office which was in an entirely different state in the country, far from the capital which they were presently.
_________________________
“How did it go?” Henry asked as they all got into the car. “I was listening and I know he agreed to speak with Richard, but were you able to distract him?”
“Yeah, we did and installed it on his phone. He promised to get back to us before evening tomorrow.” Cole replied.
“Okay, let’s keep tabs on his calls from now.”
___________________________
13:45PM
“Good afternoon, Benson Mike on the line. I would like to speak with Mr Richard Brad.”
“Good afternoon Mr Benson, Mr Richard is not available right now. Is there anything you would like us to help you with?” A female voice answered.
Benson sprung up to his feet and proceeded immediately to the window. He muttered some words under his breath. He had not spoken to Richard Brad for more than five years but he had heard how Richard Brad had grown big and so unavailable even to his family and friends.
“I’ll like to speak with Richard directly, when would he be available?” Benson asked.
“We can’t tell for now but you can call back to confirm tomorrow,” the voice replied.
“I’m not calling back to confirm, I’m calling back in the next thirty minutes, tell him that Benson Mike has something important to discuss with him.”
“Sir…”
“Tell him what I just told you.”
Benson did not wait for her to reply before he cut the call. He found it irritating to now have to go through protocols before he could speak with Richard Brad whose boss he used to be. Getting in touch with the President of Bethanna wasn’t even as difficult as the process of reaching Richard as he had been told.
He returned to his seat and begun to round up his office work in preparation to leave. Fifteen minutes after the call, he received another call on his phone.
“Hello, Benson Mike on the line.”
“Good afternoon sir, it’s Richard.”
__________________________
“Hey, tell the boss Benson Mike is on with Richard Brad now.” Cole shouted in a loud voice from the door and quickly fixed back the second earpiece into his ears before he returned to his seat.
The seat was somewhere at the center of the ten squared metres room, at the edge of a long table with four computer desktops arranged straight with half metre space between each.
Cole tapped the keyboard of his computer and the desktop came on, the details on the screen also being projected on the wall in front. It was a 2.25 squared metre projection, displayed half metre below the ceiling of the building.
Cole clicked on a software and it processed within two seconds, a page of codes appeared on the screen.
Cole turned as he heard some sounds behind him.
“Sam, where is Henry?” Cole asked.
“He’s coming,” Samantha replied as she moved closer to him.
_______________________
“Oh Richard! Thank you for calling back so soon. I need to have a brief meeting with you, I want some services from your shelling company.”
“Okay your excellency, but have you made any prior contact with the director?” Richard asked.
“My MD has tried to make some contact but returned with the report that your MD doesn’t want to offer a partnership. I believe I could get you to see the advantages of the partnership if we see and discuss it.” Benson Mike answered.
“Sir, I do not really interfere with the running of that organization at this time of the year. I only get to come in and review twice in a year.” Richard replied.
“I know Richard but you’ve got to do this for me, it would benefit the two companies.”
“Are you in Bexford currently?” Richard asked.
“Yes,” Benson replied.
“I’m flying into Bexford this evening, I’ll come straight to your apartment from the airport.”
“What time?”
“The flight kicks off by four o’clock, I’m coming from Benuit, the flight time is twenty five minutes.”
_______________________
“Sam, get seated and log on to check the airlines operating in Benuit. You’d find out which ones take off to Bexford by four o’clock while I try to get information about this number,” Cole turned to talk to her and then took the earpiece off his ears.
“Alright,” Samantha replied him and quickly sat on the seat at the center. She tapped on the computer and clicked open the browser immediately.
Henry joined them in the room two minutes later.
“Hey Cole, you called for me.”
“Boss,” Cole turned immediately. “Benson Mike has reached our target on phone. Our target’s number is protected as expected and I can’t retrieve the digits and his location.”
“Did they make any agreement yet?” Henry asked, rubbing his hands with a face towel as he moved closer. It seemed he had been involved in washing.
“Yes, they are meeting at Benson Mike’s apartment this evening.” Cole answered. “Richard Brad is coming somewhere from Benuit and Sam here is trying to …”
“Erique Airlines, trip from Dalas City, takes off at four o’clock and would be dropping the Bexford passengers at the International airport by four thirty.” Sam interjected before Cole could complete his statement.
Henry and Cole moved towards her to view from her screen. She typed in the commands to project it on the wall but they kept their gazes on the desktop’s screen.
“Cole, check if you can get a list of the passengers on the flight from the airline’s database while I go with Sam to make arrangements for the evening.” Henry said and beckoned on Sam for them to leave. She picked her cellphone on the table and got up quickly.
Dave walked into the room as the two others turned towards the door.
“I’m here boss,” Dave announced after closing the door behind him.
Henry proceeded silently until he got to Dave’s position beside the door.
He held Dave by the arm. “We need three cars for the evening, you, Sam and Jenny would rent the cars from a neighboring town and park at three different public garages close to Benson Mike’s house before three thirty PM, how feasible is that?”
Dave took out his phone to check his time. “We need forty minutes to do that, it’s achievable.”
“Do go with your communication gadgets,” Henry added quickly. “I’ll tell you what the plan is as you move,” he patted Dave on the shoulder and Sam at the back before opening the door and stepping out. Dave and Samantha made some signals to themselves with their eyes before following Henry.
To be continued
“Stay at your positions, I have a clear view of Richard Brad now. He landed and he’s got an escort of seven well armed men.” Henry spoke into the earpiece receiver. “Cole, connect to the surveillance cameras on the roads leading in and out of Benson Mike’s street.”
EPISODE 32
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