Maya knew that she was in a dicey situation and
she knew that she had to do something fast to send her father signals about her
location. She had tried to move the chair she was tied on to no avail. Her hands
were so securely tied behind the chair that she could not even lift it an inch.
She began to think of strategies to use to get the attention of the guard who
was sitting outside and smoking. She had heard the driver who abducted her
talking in low tones with the man after which he had disappeared. She wondered
where he had gone to, probably to get the ransom she heard him talk about from
her father. She knew that her father would provide them the needed ransom if
need be but she would be damned if she allowed these illiterates cheat her
father of his hard earned money without putting to use the tracking device that
she had brought all the way from London. An idea struck her head and she
decided to try it out, doing anything was way better than sitting and not doing
anything at all. She began to cough and gasp for air, she thought it would
attract the man’s attention but she was wrong. He was obviously carried away
with his drinking and he didn’t even look her way. She increased the tempo of
the cough and intensified her game. She began to jerk and move the chair as if
she was going to fall off with it.
“Hey, wetin dey do you for there? You be
imbecile?” he barked causing her to startle.
Maya: “I…I…”, she started coughing harder as
one having a seizure.
Man: “Talk, jare. Abi you be witch? No die yet
o, wait until your papa pay us before you die. All these ajebo children wey no
strong so”.
Maya: “I am having an attack”.
Man: “Which attack? Which animal dey there dey
attack you? Abi you don dey mad?”
Maya: “Asthma attack, if I don’t use my inhaler
now, I will just die in few minutes”.
Man: “Where the inhaler dey?” he was obviously
getting fooled by the act that she was putting up.
Maya: “In my bag, no my box. In fact, I don’t
know where it is”.
Man: “You go die be that for here if you don’t
know where it is”.
Maya: “Please have mercy on me, see, I am sure
that my father will not hesitate to pay you the money once he hears my voice.
If I die, he will never give you the money and he will inform his military people
who would fish you out and bring you to face the law after all he has nothing
to lose again. So, allow me look for the inhaler and you will soon be a
millionaire courtesy of my father”.
Man: “Tell me where the inhaler dey make I
bring am for you”.
Maya: “You will not see it. Just allow me and I
will find it in few seconds”.
The man got up from where he was seated. He
knew that he had to release her, after all he had nothing to gain if he allowed
her die before they got hold of the money. His staying out to smoke was his way
of dealing with the fear that was creeping in on him after he had gotten
himself involved in the shaddy deal. This was the first time he was
participating in a kidnap deal and he promised himself that he would set up a
legitimate business with the money he would make from it and that the first was
certainly going to be his last. He untied her hands and went back to the door
backing the entrance. She seized the opportunity and reached for the tracking
device in her car, it was a new innovation from the best graduating student of
Engineering in her university some years ago when she had just secured
admission into the university newly. The university had waged into the
innovation and with the right capital and environment, the project had seen the
light of the day. She turned it on, dialed her father’s number and watched as
the command initialized, she was hoping that the command would be sent to her
father before the battery went off. At its request, she turned on her GPRS
setting and this enabled the tracking device to access her location and send to
her father alongside her phone number and the details with which she had
registered the number before she left Nigeria. She heaved a sigh of relief when
she saw the green pass mark, signaling that the alert had been sent to her
father.
“You never inhale finish?” the man barked
causing her to jump with fright and causing the tracker to fall off from her
hand.
“Wetin be this?” the man asked as he sprang
into the hut and snatched the tracking device from her hand.
Maya: “Its my tra…erm, my inhaler”.
Man: “You think say I be mumu ba? No be bomb be
this? Even though I no go school, I no as bomb dey be. So you wan set time bomb
for this place abi? Okay na, your plans no go work”. He threw the device on the
ground and crushed it under his feet, shattering it. Hot tears began to flow
from Maya’s eyes. In her inner most hearts, she prayed that the device had been
able to send the signal to her father before it was crushed.
====
Mr Lanre was trying to contact a private
investigator he knew for professional advice on how to go about the kidnap of
his daughter when his phone beeped. He picked it eagerly and it was the
kidnapper.
Man: “Do you have the money ready now?”
Mr Lanre: “I cannot think of getting any money
when I have not heard my daughter’s voice. How am I even sure that you have her
and that you are not playing pranks with me?”
Man: “Mr man, are you trying to play smart with
me? Do you know that I have the powers to kill your daughter right away?”
Mr Lanre: “I am not trying to play smart. All I
ask for is, allow me speak to my daughter, that way I will be sure that she is
there with you and then I will run around to get money and make it available
wherever you want to pick it”.
Man: “Okay, I will give your daughter the
phone, remember, if you get the police or any security agency involved in this,
your daughter is dead”.
Mr Lanre: “I know that too well”
The man ran back to the hut where Maya was kept
and brought the phone to her ear. “Say something to your father”, he shouted at
her.
Maya: “I will be fine, daddy. Innovation by an
engineering student that I told you about, watch out signal”.
Mr Lanre: “Baby, hold on and stay strong, you
will be fine okay?”
The man collected the phone from her hand. She didn’t
know if her father would be able to decode the coded things she told him about
the tracker but she hoped that being the intelligent former military personnel
that he was, he would be able to add one and one together and understand what
she was trying to tell him.
After the call went off, Mr Lanre began to
think of what his daughter had meant by what she had said to him on phone. He
knew that she had said those few words because she didn’t want to give what she
was saying away to her abductors. “Whatever it was that she said must be
something that can help her. But, I cannot even think of a thing right now”.
His phone beeped and he cursed under his
breathe. “The damn kidnappers won’t allow me rest”. He picked it up and saw
that it was a link from an unknown application. He thought of clicking on the
link but he was afraid of clicking the wrong link. Suddenly, the coded words
that his daughter has said to him struck, he remembered her talking about a
student engineer who had invented a tracking device and she had promised to
bring it home anything she was coming into the country. “Could it be the signal
from the tracker that she was talking about?” he quickly clicked on the link on
his phone and because the network was very poor, it took a long while before it
opened. It read:
“Location: Kambal Forest, 45 kilometers away
from Zuba, East of Doka, North of the Kakau train track. Time sent: 4:10pm”
Mr Lanre: “Amazing! This is superb! I know
where my daughter is. He quickly picked up his car keys and drove himself to
the Police Force Headquarters at Edet Lois house. he didn’t trust his driver to
drive him there, apart from his wife and daughter, experience had taught him
never to trust anyone in cases like this. He was going to inform the police so
they could storm the forest and rescue his daughter, he meant business and
there was no going back.
Question: Can he trust the Police to help him
rescue his daughter? How reliable is the information provided by the tracking
device, considering the fact that it has been crushed?
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