Chapter One

(Two months ago)

Peter

I was almost halfway to my destination when I remembered not carrying some important documents with me, I was never this clumsy to be forgetting things with high priorities.

I took the next U-turn and headed back to the house Jasmine and I lived in for almost a year now, eleven (11) months to be precise, she's my fiancée for the past two (2) months, we've moved in nine (9) months prior to the two (2) months of our engagement.

I tried calling Jasmine to help me look for the documents and get them ready, so I won't spend more time looking for them when I arrive. But it keeps telling me that the user is unable to answer my call, meaning the phone rang, but the user can't or won't pickup the phone.

This is a bit strange for Jaz, she'd never let my calls go through unanswered, maybe her phone is on silence mode and she couldn't hear it ring, or maybe she's currently in her book-club membership meeting, that she had mentioned earlier today.

On reaching home, I tried to open the door but it was locked, of course it would be, what was I thinking? She might not be home. So, I fish out the door key from the bunch I'm still holding in my hand, I unlock the door and opened it, then entering the house.

I tried heading straight to our bedroom, because it's the last place I remember dropping those documents, I remember putting them in the safe beside our bed that serves as a nightstand. But something caught my attention on the couch, it was Jaz's phone… and another phone.

On reaching closer, I discovered that the other phone looks familiar, but I couldn't pinpoint out where I saw it or something similar to it, I first picked up Jasmine's to check out why my calls were going unanswered by pressing the power button, only the discover that it wasn't on silence mode or vibration and there are about seven (7) missed calls, all from me.

I pressed the power button of the other phone, to get a clue, maybe if I could unlock it, but my hunch was proven right. It is Antonio's phone… it has to be his, because it's the exact model he was using plus there's his photo in the background of the screen-locked phone, which is uncanny to how he plastered his pictures to the background and wallpaper of his phone.

But the question is, why was his phone here? Did he come around while I was out some few moments ago? And maybe he forgot it as he was leaving? But couldn't he have called me, so I'll spare him the efforts of coming here and not meeting me around? But why was Jaz's phone here too?

Lot of questions started popping up in my head, but I just push them aside, some of them I don't like the direction they are heading to, I just walked up the stairs with both phones in each hand.

"Jasmine?! Are you home?" I called out while walking upstairs, she might be in bed taking a nap, or in the shower, I didn't get any response.

I tried calling out again several times repeatedly while still climbing the stairs, but there was no response each time.

On reaching the doorstep, I could hear some muffled sounds, which I'm not sure of the origin, but it sounded like someone was moaning or groaning.

"Jaz, did Antonio drop by while I'm away?" was what I was about to say as I opened the closed door which wasn't locked. But I ended up saying, "Jaz, did Antonio — Jesus Christ! What in the devil's name are you two doing?!"

**********

(Current date)

Leah

Three days ago, the company I work with got hit by a cyber attack, a ransomware they said, it took most of our resources hostage, and locked out everyone denying us access to everything affected. There will payment required for the company to gain back control of the affected resources.

I happened to be at the brutal end of the attack, it happens when I plugged in my phone to my workspace computer.

According to the IT team's report, I was the initiator of the attack, that it was done knowingly or my phone was used as a dummy for the attack. What actually scared me was the accusation when I was being summoned, they told me that I was the hacker or in affiliate with one.

My heart literally almost jumped out of my mouth in fear, I was afraid of losing my job, I can't afford to, it means a lot to me.

I gave them my own version of the incident, I told them how I tried to transfer some files from my work computer to my phone, how both my phone's and my workspace computer's screen turned white a few seconds after I plugged in my phone, how they stopped responding and my unsuccessful attempts to shut them down, my workspace computer being a desktop, I unplugged it from power source, but my phone having inbuilt battery was unlucky, I switched on the computer again, but I couldn't login to it, there's no login screen again, it's replaced by some sort of screen with a strange massage, just as I was about to read what it says, the IT team came in.

They confiscate my phone, saying they'll need to look through it and investigate, I was in a daze after the whole episode of the day, the good thing is that I still have my old phone kept at home, which I didn't part with, that will do for now.

Author

Leah worked at Centurion Graphics, a company owned by an American-based Japanese multi-billionaire, Satoshi Moto. The company deals with anything relating to computer graphics; video effects (VFX), animations, CGI, cinematography, just to name a few.

She was employed right after her graduation with a bachelor degree in arts from a renowned university, she and her friend both got employed at the same time as artists.

A few days ago, the company's computers, servers and cloud infrastructures were attacked by ransomware. Unlike other ransomware that are generic and only locks files and folders, this one holds the entire operating system hostage, locking out every user, for money of course. The identity of the attacker unknown, the real motive of the attack still unknown.