“What did you say???” Ron asked. “Wh- Who are you??”Stuttering in his voice was clearly visible. Unable to comprehend as most people do in these scenarios when something bizarre happens all of a sudden. But for Ron it wasn’t the fact that the other side was someone other than Reux but the fact that he almost instantly recognized the voice of the person.
“He died happily, I can tell you that. Cheating on his wife with some other woman. But you don’t need to know that. Do you?” The voice was little bit hazy due to some static noise from the other side. It seemed as if the person on the other side was not even trying to mask his voice.
“If-..If- you are Reux then stop playing this prank right now… O- ok?” his voice was really shaky. He had no doubt. The voice was of the person who had abducted him few hours earlier. “This call is encrypted how can you- be in France? When you were-“ he stopped suddenly.
“You know you think you know a person and then you find out that they have a whole new family from the other side of town” The person on the other end was almost mocking him. “Well the fact that Reux is dead is true all the same” The person said in the same calm manner in which he had interrogated him earlier.
“Get someone to check on Reux immediately” Ron commanded his security team. The security team for the France headquarters was ordered to check Reux’s office instantly.
Ron was perplexed. Even for a man of his stature it was impossible to act calm in this situation. Considering that the voice of the other side matched the voice of his kidnapper was frightening even for him.
The crowd went uneasy. Unable to comprehend what was going on, they started to chatter among themselves. In these days almost every person attending the conference representing tech news site had one of those tablets which could be rolled like a paper an easily kept into the pocket like a handkerchief. ‘Plasmabots’ as they called it was used to build the display. The microprocessor was built into it. The OS on the tablet was none other than the Excelsior’s own creation.
But the thing that was more important was the fact that they were constantly live streaming the whole show via blogs. Almost instantly the whole world was able to know what was happening. Everyone was eager to know the secrets of Excelsior 5.0. This is why the current events were simultaneously broadcasted to the world.
“If you’re looking for me then let me tell you one thing, I’m not in France. But I know for sure that your regional manager is dead” The voice continued “It’s because I ordered his assassination”
“Who- Who are you? If you are not in France then how are you able to talk through Reux’s phone?” Ron who was feeling more and more uneasy with every passing second was getting more and more scared. Even if he had his split personality on, he could not just shrug this of and scream back at the voice on the other end.
“How can I speak through his phone? Well that’s because I’m currently inside the server room of your office….” The voice continued “I’m routing the call from Reux’s phone to my burner phone”
Ron shocked could not believe what he was hearing. The server room was one of the most secure rooms in any company. It was the same for Excelsior. The entrance required biometric scans which due to the advancement of technology was very hard to crack. The room was filled with motion detection technology too. Hidden cameras, data encryption was one of the few securities of the server room. It was the Fort Knox of any Tech company.
And for the right reasons too. If you get the access of the servers in the room, you get the access of the personal information of millions of the people around the world. Not only the personal info. but their bank accounts, security ID and many more. Provided that you are able to decrypt the information.
The information stored in the server was encrypted in numbers in random formats understood only by applying a secret algorithm. The numbers were further encrypted in 2^54. This made it very difficult to access the information even if you had access to the server room.
But the person on the other side claimed that he not only was in the server room but had .also routed the call. This could mean that he changed the codes from when the voice command were sent to the server room. How was that possible?
“Don’t even try to call the internal security. They’ll not respond. By the time your personal security reaches here I’ll be long gone”
“Wh- Why are you doing this? What do you want? Why keep harassing the innocents?” Ron asked. He was not expecting an answer as what happened few hours before. But what came through surprised him.
“Like I keep telling you I already got what I want. Everything that I need right now is already here” Ron was now getting angry by the second.
[Ron’s Point Of View]
Not only does he abduct me, but he tortures me, interrogates me, kicks me of the roof, forces me to use that…. And now he’s infiltrated my server room. This guy has some balls to freely announce that he’s inside the compound.
He’s definitely one of them. The ‘Syndicate’. But I was lead to believe that they were obliterated. Was I fed false information? Impossible!!
But not many in this world have the ability to go to such great lengths. If he gets his hands on the files, the company will be ruined.
I’ll have to do something quickly.
“System lockdown!!”Ron shouted.
The terminal in front of him asked “Enter the lockdown status and Authorization code.”
“Status disaster… Authorization code BQ196R904QSD” Ron quietly spoke on the terminal, in order to keep the information concealed. It seemed that he finally regained his composure and decided to act calmly to deal with the situation.
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“Status and Authorization code incorrect… Please enter again…. 2nd of 3 chance.” the voice from terminal spoke.
[No way, they even managed to change the passcodes and the internal files. I should forget about keeping the company safe and focus primarily on ending this bastard’s life. Plus if he knows the truth about me then he must definitely be eliminated.]
As Ron was thinking hard at what to do. Voice from the other side of the phone call spoke. “Tell me Ron how long does it take for you to activate that power of yours. How often can you use it?” Ron was bewildered. No idea on what to do. He definitely did not want any information about him leaking.
His kidnapper was doing an excellent job of aggravating him. Repeatedly asking him the same question over and over again.
“I have no idea what you are talking about. This must be some mistake. Look if you surrender even now I’m willing to talk to the Justice’s Paladins to at least not sentence you to death. Just give up now. Sooner or later you will be caught and your punishment will be something you can’t even imagine.”
“Come on Ron. I watched you fall from the rooftop. I saw what you did. Do you think I randomly chose you or your company? We know everything about you. Believe it or not we will know about everyone above you too. And I was already prepared for any punishment or death when I decided to act. We’ve come too far now.”
From the crowd many people who owned the Excelsior products tried to log out from the server but got the error ‘Not Authorized – Current Action cannot be taken’. Not only the people from the conference but the people around the world were getting the same error. People were starting to get desperate, cursing thee company and even more cursing the person inside the server room.
“You haven’t answered my question Ron”
“I don’t know what you’re asking. Even if you ask me again and again I can’t answer the question to which I don’t know the answer of.”
“If you’re gonna play it that way then how about a deal. You give me information about your higher ups and I will stop the hack right now and won’t harm any of the info or credit information. Even the tiniest info will suffice. What do you say?”
Ron was silent. As the head of the company he did everything he could to negotiate. But everybody could see that it was completely out of his hand. Not knowing what to do. He weighted both his options. It was apparent that the better choice would be to feign ignorance and pretend he didn’t know anything. The monetary loss could be compensated by the insurance companies and he could get back on track. He would have faced a lot of public backlash but it wasn’t impossible.
Another Part of the World [At the same Time]
“Syphon are you in position?”
“Yes sir, ready at your command”
“Fine, before he says anything about us, you know what to do. Don’t take any risks”
“Yes sir, but if I may I don’t think he will choose to reveal anything”
“Well anyone in their right mind wouldn’t, but knowing him I’d say there’s 90% chance that he will consider his customers over us.”
“But why? There’s no reason to.”
“You know, I would have told you but, it’s above your pay grade, so keep at the lookout”
Syphon looked through the sniper’s scope. He could clearly make out what Ron was saying through his lip movement.
He was starting to figure out what Ron was trying to say. It didn’t look good. [Why is he even considering the other option?]. He continued looking through the scope preying on his victim waiting for him to make even a slightest mistake.
Suddenly he noticed Ron started to say “If you’re……”
BANG!!! That’s all he needed. He fired his rifle. The recoil was so great that he fell backwards. But surprisingly the rifle made no sound. It converted it’s sound energy into something else.
The Conference[9:15 P.M.]
Finally Ron answered, “If you’re willing to stop the hack then I-“
Before he could even utter another syllable, what appeared like a flash in front of the crowd. It was a projectile but no one could see who fired it. No one could even understand what it was. Within milliseconds the flash projectile disappeared. Ten times brighter than fireworks.
It became silent as night. Unable to comprehend what happened just now the crowd looked towards the direction of Ron.
By the time they could see what was happening, Ron was already on the floor.
When looked carefully, the people around suddenly noticed to their horror that Ron’s body was missing its head. From the root of where the head was before sparse amount of smoke was liberating. It looked as if the head was almost vaporized.
Then at that moment a sound from the speaker breaking the silence and almost frightening the crowd came. “Well that was bound to happen. Might as well do one last thing before I go.”