Ex Vivo (#2 EX TRILOGY)

Chapter 29

Dr. Alberta Anane cleared her throat and looked up from the podium at the crowd at the premises of the Ex Vivo building undergoing renovation. She straightened her glasses and sighed before she continued, "As the new managing director of Ex Vivo, I use this opportunity to reach out to our opponents – the terrorist organization that loosely mimics our reputable name by calling themselves Ex Gratia, informing them that we hold no grudges against them for the assault on our premises a week ago. Unfortunately, we suffered a great loss – ", a giant screen behind her showed the giant picture of Felix. "The creator of this great dream to serve love at the doorsteps of Ghanaians was assassinated by our enemies. We see this as martyrdom because his noble death will cause the vision to take a giant leap that will immortalize his concepts even more. It is our purpose to forever deliver quality dating services to our Users and bring happiness into their love lives again. We believe that we are taking a giant step in the evolutionary chain of our prestigious app, and tonight, I am proud to unveil to you the premium version of the Ex Vivo dating app – ". She had hardly landed when the crowd burst into a roar of cheers to drown the rest of her words. She paused to flash a grin for the numerous cameras to capture and continued when the roar died down after five minutes continuously, "I am proud to unveil to you the premium version of the Ex Vivo dating app with new features, upgraded services, in-app payments – well, we do pay taxes to the state so, yeah." The crowd burst into laughter. "The official release for download is only two weeks away. There will be promos for Users who will successfully answer trivia quizzes on the Ex Vivo Wiki feature that will last for the first two months of release. Allow me to tease you to a quick run through of the new features. Take a look." She turned to face the screens as Felix's picture was replaced by a five-minute promo video of the premium version of the Ex Vivo app and services.

Dr. Anane touched her left ear while pretending to adjust her glasses and whispered off the microphone, "What do you think?"

"You're doing just brilliant. Well done, doll," came Felix's voice through Dr. Anane's hidden comm device. She grinned with satisfaction as she watched the awe on the faces of the crowd as they watched the video. Out of excitement, her pupils dilated with a click sound and returned back to normal in three dramatic jerky movements - only that it was fast enough for the cameras to miss it.

******************

Akoma stood before Mama's grave staring dreamily into the sky, dressed in black clothes in the scorching sun and sweating profusely. She took of her shades to wipe sweat off her face and sighed deeply. Her eyes were sunken and she felt sick. She had not been able to sleep well for a week since Poku's death, and somehow, PTSD was already setting in and making her feel more miserable that she had ever imagined it could turn out. She shut her eyes and turned her back to the tombstone when she finally could not stand seeing her mother's photo again and again. She had fled to their hometown in the Eastern Region shortly after leaving the Ex Vivo premises to lay low until she was sure Felix was not going to send any of his dolls after him. There was no mobile phone or laptop with her for fear of being traced. She had recently heard a rumour that the creator of Ex Vivo had been assassinated by Ex Gratia terrorists, but she saw right through the lie and shrugged it off. She was not prepared to wage war at the company singlehandedly because she did not have neither the guts nor the assistance. Poku might not have succeeded in joining forces with her to stop Felix while still wired partially to commands and programming, but at least she would have stood a chance of getting through a bit further until Felix probably regained control over him.

Few hours later, she packed her stuff and set off for the Northern Region after changing her appearance a little bit – short spiky haircut with a cap to hide her face anytime she was outdoors. The entire bus ride was both painful and stressful because it was both long and the road got bad at certain points of the journey. She arrived later that night and took refuge in a guesthouse. She finally slumped onto the bed and looked up the ceiling in deep thought. She felt so lonely that she began to regret making some decisions that had cost the lives of people who cared about her enough to have their lives jeopardized for her sake. Louisa got run over by Ender more than five months earlier for getting almost too close to knowing about Ex Gratia, Mama died with no idea of the danger in using Ex Vivo, and Poku died with Stallion to buy time for Akoma to escape. The need for a man was totally out of the picture because the wounds Poku's death had left in her despite learning that he was not completely human, was becoming increasingly unbearable. She was so desperate about seeking to know who he used to be without Ex Vivo that she believed carrying a piece of him with her could make a lot of sense.