His ringing cellphone vibrated, and when he reached for it, his hand slammed into the pistol tucked at his waist, between his trousers and stomach. The weapon nearly clattered to the floor, but he snatched it mid-air, shoving it back into place.
"What the fuck!" he swore.
A jolt of annoyance hit him. How on earth did I forget to leave this thing in the car? he wondered, quickly retrieving the phone from his side pocket. As he started to leave, a man dragging luggage rushed into the departure hall, almost colliding with him at the door.
"Boss," he said, stepping out of the airport.
"Roja," Evans' deep voice rumbled from the other end. He held the phone close to his ear.
"Yes, boss, I'm here," Roja replied, a plume of smoke curling from his mouth and nostrils. He flicked his cigar twice, sending ashes to the ground. The compulsory facemask, pulled down, hung beneath his chin like a curtain drawn to the side.
"Has the flight arrived already?" Evans cleared his throat, using the hand that held his tobacco pipe to gesture to the two captives on the floor before him. They began to eat. He kept an eye on them as he talked. Both boys, between seventeen and twenty, were on their second day of captivity, their ransom still unpaid.
"The plane will touch down in the next fifteen minutes, boss," Roja replied. He'd stepped away from the arrival hall to brief his partners waiting in the car. Besides, he needed a cigar, and smoking was prohibited inside the airport.
"Okay, who's with you there?" Evans took a drag from his pipe, awaiting Roja's answer.
"Luke-the-dude and Monster-J. I hired them for two months," Roja answered confidently.
"Good, very good. I don't want any excuses this time. This is an international job, and our client expects nothing short of success," Evans said, tilting his executive chair back and forth with his legs propped on the office table.
"Yes, boss, nothing but success," Roja affirmed, taking a long drag that billowed smoke into the air. He checked his watch, took another drag, then dropped the cigarette butt and stepped on it.
It was 8:26 AM. Aware of the time, Roja quickly interrupted the conversation. "I've got to go, boss, the plane will soon land." He ended the call and walked toward Luke-the-dude and Monster-J waiting in the car. Reaching them, he relayed Evans's latest instructions and handed Luke-the-dude his pistol pouch, a loaded weapon inside. He then hurried back towards the airport's main entrance, pulling his mandatory facemask back into place as he went. As he approached the large glass doors, still some meters away, he glanced at his watch again, anticipating the flight from Japan. Slipping his phone into his jacket's inner pocket, he headed to the arrival section.
Millions had died worldwide from the pandemic, yet Nigeria had no recorded victims. While the government had implemented several measures to prevent the virus's spread, the opposition party argued that closing international airports was also necessary.
EVANS BLEW THE last puff of smoke. He emptied his pipe into the ashtray and set it on the table. Everyone knew he loved his pipe more than cigars and never touched his tobacco box; he'd kill for it. Roja, in contrast, smoked only cigars, burning two or more packets daily. Both were chain smokers.
Picking up his pistol from the table, Evans looked the boy in the red T-shirt in the eye and pointed the weapon at him, threatening him again.
"Look here! If your father doesn't come with the ransom by noon tomorrow, you're as good as dead! If the stingy old bastard messes with me, I will kill you. So, I'll give you one last chance to talk to him, to advise him to comply with my rules. Understand?" He yelled, his face contorted with malice.
The boy in red, his heart gripped by fear, nodded, and began to weep again. Evans watched him sob, feeling no pity. He was never moved by captives' tears; as he often said, success in kidnapping required mercilessness.
He bent his head for a few seconds, as if pondering, then looked up suddenly and turned to the other boy. His gaze hardened as he slowly raised his hand, pointing the pistol.
"You! Where did you say your father works?" he asked the young man, then spat on the floor, clearing the tobacco particles from his mouth—a regular habit.
"He's a civil servant, and he doesn't have a dime. In fact, we barely manage to eat every day," the rough-looking boy said. He'd shown no fear since his kidnapping two days ago, an attitude Evans despised. He suspected the boy belonged to a street gang; kids with such defiance often lived a gangster lifestyle. His friend had finished eating, but this boy was still chewing a piece of meat, just finishing.
"You must be insane! Who asked you about your family's eating habits? What do your family's problems have to do with me?" Evans yelled, his face contorting with sudden rage.
"Look! You'd better behave, and don't you dare prove stubborn, or I'll waste your life," he snapped, instantly standing. He walked up to the young man and delivered a crushing slap across the face. The blow cracked like a whip, and a sudden flash of stars exploded behind the young man's eyes as he squeezed them shut for a second. The piece of meat he'd been chewing dropped to the floor. Despite the force of the slap, he gave no sign of pain. He slowly raised his head, glaring at Evans with fierce defiance, as if he would retaliate. He breathed heavily, his gaze fixed on his abductor, knowing that if not for the pistol, he would have struck back.
"Only God knows where a decent young boy like the chief's son met this animal," Evans murmured as he took a few steps backward from him.
He assessed the boy from where he stood and concluded that a mere look at him revealed he must be stubborn. Three scars decorated his face: one on his left cheek close to his ear, another at the center of his forehead, and a small one on his chin.
"I'll kill you if your friend's father does not agree to pay the ransom for your release. Trust me! Idiot!" Evans swore between his clenched teeth and picked up the bunch of keys on his table, mumbling in anger as he did.
Holding the pistol, he walked up to the door and ordered the boys out of the room that served as a bedroom and an office for him.
As the boys walked out, he directed them down the passage towards the back door that served as the exit to the back of the house. He walked behind them to the last of the three rooms by the right. This was the room he used as a cell for his less wealthy kidnap victims. It had nothing but a carpet laid on the floor and a pile of novels and old magazines at the far right corner. Although it had an air conditioner, a toilet, and a bathroom like every other room in the house, it was the only room without a window in the whole building. All it had for ventilation was two small square holes, about two feet each, close to the ceiling, one on each end of the wall directly adjacent the door. The little ventilation the holes provided made life unbearable for the captives held within whenever there was a power failure and the air-conditioning system became useless.
Evans threw the bunch of keys at the boy with scars on the face. He ordered him to open the door.
"The key with blue paint at the bottom," he told the boy, who was already confused about which key to use.
When the door was opened and the boys were ordered inside, he followed them in and told them to sit at the far end of the floor beside the pile of magazines.
The child of the oil and gas businessman lay on the floor of the room sleeping. It was his second week in captivity, and his father had refused to cooperate with his abductors. He had disowned him days before he was abducted, so he was not bothered when the kidnappers called him for ransom.
Evans walked up to him and gave him a heavy kick on the tummy for sleeping. The boy woke up, his stomach aching greatly. He opened his eyes, and great anger ran through his veins. Standing up at once like a zombie, he charged at Evans for the first time since his abduction. He wrestled with Evans, and Evans felt insulted by his action. He could not stand seeing a captive rebel against him, so he forcefully held him by the neck, almost choking him, and hit him against the wall. The boy staggered and fell, and before he could gather the strength to stand up, in anger, Evans pulled the trigger and shot him.
The bullet pierced into his skull, and there was a splash of blood on the wall behind him. He crash-landed on the floor and was completely lifeless.
"No one fucks with me!" Evans roared like a madman, and the two other abductees watched in utter shock.
What a cruel world! The Scarface thought. Why did he kill him when he did no wrong? What a life! He sighed. As he watched the lifeless body of the poor boy on the floor with pity, anger built up in him in no time. And as his eyes went to the wall painted crimson by the blood of the dead boy, he wondered if he would not eventually fight to set himself and his friend free from captivity.
Like a robot, Evans shifted his gaze to the two young men sitting on the floor. He pointed the pistol at the Scarface and gazed at him in anger for some seconds.
"I have a feeling you'll end up like this. So, be careful. No one fucks with me. You pull a stunt with me, you are dead!" he threatened.
After this, he stood on the spot with his eyes back on the corpse on the floor like he was figuring out something. Then eventually, he got close to the dead body, bent down, and dragged it out of the room, murmuring and grumbling as he did it. The boy in the red t-shirt shivered and withdrew his stretched legs out of the way for the dragged body. It was all disgusting to him, for he could not stand seeing blood as he felt nauseated. To him, it was obvious now that all the threats coming from Evans were not for fun. He meant every word of it. But as for the scar-faced boy, he felt the urge to retaliate on behalf of the dead boy. He only needed a gun, and he would take his abductors up man to man. He believed that as it all was playing out, he could be pushed to be violent against the brutality of Evans and his co-kidnappers one day.
Evans dragged the dead boy out to the corridor and pushed the body to a corner beside the wall. Then, he locked the door to the room and walked away.
Most times, he acted irrationally, and it was nothing new to all those who worked with him. Anger was one of his weaknesses, and he did not know it.
After leaving the body on the corridor, waiting for Monster-J to come and dispose of it, for he was the one who did all the dirty jobs, he reached for a stick of cigarette and lighted it. Inhaling the smoke and sighing satisfactorily, he remembered that he needed to call his boys and get to know what was happening at the airport concerning the assignment in their hands. So, he reached for his cellphone from his trousers pocket and dialed a number. The phone rang for a while before Roja picked it.
"Hello! How far?" He asked, holding the phone on his left ear, walking towards the room with the inscription, "VIP" on its door. The room was where he kept his stupendously rich captives. Those who were capable of paying the ransom in hundreds of millions of naira. Like he always said, he believed in giving them the worth for their money. "It's a fair deal," he would joke.
The room was directly opposite the room he labeled EXECUTIVE, which he used as an office and a bedroom.
Both rooms were the first rooms on the two rows of rooms separated by the long passage that linked the front door and the back door. It was an old Nigerian house type nicknamed "face me, I face you".
In his VIP cell, was virtually everything to make the captives comfortable, besides Phone, TV, and Radio. Sometimes, it served as his relaxation room too, pending the time another VIP captive was caught.
He opened the door and stretched his right hand to the left side of the wall to put on the lights and thereafter walked to the air-conditioning switch at the left side of the wall to put the air conditioning system on.
Meanwhile, it took Roja a few seconds to respond to his question, because he was busy checking on the just arriving passengers, coming into the arrival hall.
"Roja! Are you there?" Evans asked when he did not hear anything except noise of a crowd from the other end.
"Yes boss, the plane has just landed and the passengers are just arriving at the arrival section," Roja replied.
"Okay then, I am expecting you guys with the target soon. There must be no flaws," Evans warned authoritatively and ended the conversation.
Satisfied with the information, Evans walked up to the bedside and dropped his phone on the stool on which there was a lamp. He stood by the bedside and paused. He could hear Bolt bark outside the building and he knew she was protesting because of hunger. He would have fed her only if the dog food was still remaining on the kitchen shelve. There will not be food for both man and animal until the boys return from the operation, he concluded.
Picking up his phone, Evans searched for the radio app. On locating it, he switched it on and looked for a station with a program that would soothe his mood. He felt sleepy and wouldn't mind a short nap, but he needed something to listen to first. He crashed onto the bed like a log of wood, and as he lay there, his mind returned to the job at hand. He was confident his boys wouldn't fail him. So, with that assurance, he decided to rest.
The three men handling the job were a good combination any day. The only time Roja had failed to perform to expectation was once, when Luke-the-dude and Monster-J were on another assignment and not working with him. Since they were together this time, he expected nothing but success.
He lay face up, still holding the phone, his search for a suitable channel unsuccessful. He moved from one channel to another until he found one discussing the nation's economic recession. He stared at the ceiling, waiting to drift off, and listened as one of the analysts blamed the government for the high rate of youth unemployment. The comment amused him, and he smiled, agreeing that poor governance was causing the percentage of unemployed to rise yearly. As he smiled, he mumbled between his teeth, "Since they can't provide jobs for us, we've helped ourselves to the one we could lay our hands on: kidnapping for ransom," he soliloquized. The small smile on his face transformed into sarcastic laughter.
He continued listening to the radio until he fell asleep, the radio remaining on.
In the arrival hall of the airport, Roja held a picture and looked at it closely. Everyone in the hall, including him, wore a mask covering their mouths and noses. So, he had to be extra careful not to miss the person he and his colleagues were there for.
"Yes!" he exclaimed quietly when he realized the lady in the picture was walking towards him, among other passengers. He might have missed her if she hadn't briefly taken off her dark glasses and facemask to wipe her face with a handkerchief just as he spotted her.
It had taken longer than usual for passengers to clear checks and reach the arrival hall after disembarking. This was due to the mandatory medical screening the government had directed all international airports to carry out on arriving passengers because of the pandemic. It was well-known how the COVID-19 virus had devastated every continent except Africa, and how African countries were frantically trying to prevent its occurrence on their lands.
As the lady came closer, Roja picked up his cellphone and called Luke-the-dude and Monster-J, who waited in the car outside the airport, to inform them of their target's arrival.
"Hello, our friend has arrived and is on her way out. Get set to move," he instructed.
"Okay boss," Luke-the-dude said, pulling the backrest of his seat up from the reclining position. Monster-J did the same. Now they were ready and alert.
Timi approached the Asian woman in the airport's arrival hall to get her baggage.
"Welcome, madam," he said in his usual polite manner.
This was one of the work ethics he'd learned over the years in the trade. Politeness, he had learned, was the first quality a Uber Driver needed to display to potential clients to win their hearts, trust, and love.
"Good afternoon," the Asian lady replied from behind her blue facemask as she walked closer to him.
She had gone through the medical checkups and screening mandated for everyone entering the country and had been certified negative.
Although Africa had recorded a few cases of the Coronavirus, it was not as alarming as on other continents.
Nigerians had hoped that their government would not wait until there was an occurrence of the virus before strict measures were installed, just like Ebola was discovered before strong measures were instituted. Although the swift response after its occurrence was highly commended by everyone for saving the nation from the tears and agony of multiple deaths suffered by other African nations, many were of the opinion that all international airports in the nation should have been in total lockdown, as many other countries had done, to prevent the spread of the virus.
The lady got close to Timi, and he pushed his trolley forward. She had two suitcases: one big, the other medium-sized. Besides the facemask and sunglasses, she wore pink cotton gloves on her hands.
"Do you need a taxi?" Timi asked while already collecting her suitcases to put them on his trolley. He adjusted the suitcases to sit properly in the trolley, waiting for the lady's reply.
"Yes, are you a taxi man?" she asked, trying to dip her sunglasses into her handbag as she engaged the man she had just met in conversation.
"Yes, I am. You are welcome to Nigeria," Timi replied. He started to push the trolley towards the exit door, with the trolley in front and both of them following behind.
As they walked towards the airport exit, he began to engage the visitor in a small chat, as he usually did with his clients, to make her feel at home and get to know her.
"I am Timi," he turned to look at the woman who walked beside him as he pushed her suitcases on a trolley.
"It's a pleasure," she replied and looked away.
A Nigerian woman with a beautiful traditional headwear walked past, and the lady stopped, turned, and remarked, "Wow! That is beautiful!" She stared at the woman who walked in haste for a while, and then turned on her heels again to continue walking.
Really, Timi had expected her to introduce herself as he had, but when she didn't, he didn't press the matter.
They were almost at the airport's exit doors, and she looked here and there, observing virtually everything that seemed strange to her. From these gestures, Timi guessed she must be a first-time visitor. Most things shouldn't be strange to her if she wasn't new to the country.
"It must be your first time in Nigeria, ma'am," Timi glanced at her.
"Yes, my first visit," she replied, still looking around.
Meanwhile, Roja walked at a distance behind them amidst a group of people who were also walking out of the main hall. He reached for his cellphone in the front pocket of his jeans trousers and dialed a number.
"The target sighted and leaving the airport with a taxi man, but closely monitored," he informed Evans and received a commendation. He had to make the call snappy, so he ended it instantly, checked his watch, and put the cellphone back in his pocket.
Timi and his client were already out of the air-conditioned airport hall and now approaching the car park. The weather was sunny and therefore hot. He felt uncomfortable in it.
He was just recovering from malaria fever after two days of chloroquine injections from his doctor, and lingering in the sun could bring back the feverish feelings. For this reason, he wished they could double their steps to his taxi so that he could escape the hot weather quickly, but for his client, he needed to restrain himself from making her uncomfortable in any way. It would be wrong to go way ahead of her, and for this, he reluctantly walked at the same pace with her.
As he walked her to his car, he thought of taking the day's chloroquine shot after dropping her off at her destination. Since he could inject himself, being a trained nurse, he decided to do it. He had bought bottles of the injection and syringes and put them in the cab compartment. As he always said, nothing would debar him from his work and jeopardize his savings towards his traveling plan. He trained as a nurse, and it was unemployment that pushed him to the cab business. His plan was to travel to the United States or the UK where he heard that his nursing education would be more profitable.
His client dipped her hand in her handbag and seemed to be looking for something. Some meters away from the taxi, she brought out a phone and fiddled with it as they approached the taxi. After a while, she asked, "Do you know where Palm Grove Hotel is?" Without thinking twice, Timi answered in the affirmative:
"Yes. Is that your destination?" He twisted his neck to look at her.
"Yes. Take me there!" she ordered and pulled the facemask down from her nose to her chin. Like an obedient servant, "Yes, ma'am," he replied. He followed the rules of the business like his instructor Mr. Jude had advised during the one-week compulsory training when he was just starting out as a Uber driver: In this taxi job, one of the qualities that stands you out as a good driver is humility. You must know that every client is a boss. No matter the age, gender, or social status. So, be humble and polite. And taxi driving could become a gold mine for you someday, Mr. Jude the instructor had said.
Roja kept his eyes on the taxi driver and his client. He reached the SUV he and his team had brought to the airport. Seeing him, Monster-J moved from the front seat to the back. Roja got in, taking the front seat Monster-J had just vacated, and pointed at the Uber taxi some meters away.
"That's our target. Follow the taxi when it moves," he instructed Luke-the-dude, who was behind the steering wheel.
"MJ, where is your weapon?" Roja turned his head to look at Monster-J in the back seat.
"Here and ready, boss," Monster-J replied in his usual subtle voice.
Only those who worked with him knew he was brutal. That was why Evans nicknamed him "the Quiet Danger"; his gentleness could be easily mistaken for niceness.