Walls

21

"What the fuck do you mean, Abbie?"

"This is mine - the firewall. I coded it and signed it. It is mine," Abbie squeaked, "And someone got through it to the software and messed with it."

Her voice broke - someone got through her firewall. It felt like living her worst nightmare.

Abbie couldn't decipher the look on Elias' face. It wasn't hatred, it wasn't anger. It wasn't even disbelief. His face was just pale and blank.

"Of course Abbie, you are the brains behind our firewall. It is the best that the world has seen so far," Suresh said.

"Not anymore," Abbie responded.

The hand choking her windpipe was back again and she felt a lot claustrophobic in the windowless server room.

"That's right, not anymore!" a voice that she had never heard before boomed behind them.

Abbie whipped around to face whoever had entered the room and so did Elias and Suresh. The elevator doors shut behind a tall man in sweatpants and a beanie. Abbie had never seen the man before and immediately disliked his lopsided and lazy smirk.

But what got her heart to skip a beat was the person standing beside the beanie guy. It was the gunman. The gunman. And as expected, he pointed two guns at them.

"Step back from the terminal Abbie or I'll have to shoot the thing down," the beanie guy said.

Abbie did not like this new pattern of strangers knowing her and her not knowing them. It was annoying and terrifying, especially when such people showed up pointing guns at her skull.

The gunman did not look like he had any problem shooting through her to get to the terminal. So she stepped aside. Beside her, Suresh was having a mild panic attack.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, eyes wide, pointing at the beanie guy.

"You know, Suresh, It's annoying to wait years to see your plans come to fruition - but it is more annoying and irritating to see other people try to stop them in the middle of their tracks!"

Beanie guy looked like he could slit someone's throat, by the way, he wrapped his fingers around a laptop that he was carrying. Abbie did not recognize the device.

"What fruition, Jonah?" Suresh asked the beanie guy.

Abbie gasped. Beanie guy - Jonah, watched her as she took in the news. His eyes raked over her face, a satisfied smirk spreading over his lips. He looked like he was enjoying the exact moment that Abbie started to connect the dots.

"Jonah?" Abbie turned to Suresh, "You told me he was the one who hacked the bank records-"

She cut herself off to rub her neck which had gone back to squeezing itself. Suresh was having a panic attack if his wide eyes and the way he was breathing in short bursts through his mouth was any indication, and Abbie felt herself absorbing the same panic.

"Jonah?" Suresh turned to beanie guy, "And Nathan? You guys did this? You hacked into the server? How?"

Jonah laughed in a way that made Abbie think of villains in old black and white movies.

"Why do you act so surprised, my friend? I know it took years, but you know I can hack into your servers. There are only so many walls that Abbie can put up before I figure out a way in through them."

Abbie felt a chill run down her spine. She was glad that her past self had made a great decision to break up with the guy - he was acting creepy and it was scaring her to death. Abbie sneaked a glance at the screen with the bar that indicated it was downloading the files of the reinvented software. It was 85% there.

When Abbie turned back to him, Jonah was looking at her like she committed the worst crime on Earth.

"I'm sorry to do this to you guys, but-" Jonah swung an arm in Nathan's direction.

A loud bang echoed in the server room. Suresh screamed unintelligible profanity clutching his right leg. He was shot. The gunman had shot him.

Abbie's heart rate exploded at the sight of Suresh thumping to the floor, clutching his leg and moaning loudly. Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Elias reach inside his coat and pull out the gun he had.

Nathan and Jonah had already walked over to the terminal they were standing at that point. Nathan flicked the gun off Elias' s hand and caught him in a strange death grip.

Abbie did not have enough time to react before she was caged between Jonah's arms. He gave off a strong stench of sweat and coffee that clogged her nose. She struggled against his arms, but in a split second, Jonah pushed her to the chair she was previously on and tucked her arms behind her. She felt a weird material run around her wrists. When Jonah appeared in front of her, Abbie could no longer move her arms.

"What do you want?" Elias groaned, as Nathan pulled him into a similar situation and tied his arms behind him, pushing him to the floor.

Jonah laughed out loud, "Revenge! Bloody revenge, Mr. Castaldo," he came face to face with Elias on the floor as he seethed in his face, "that is what I want - Revenge!"

Abbie felt her heart accelerate to a point beyond return. What revenge was he talking about?

Nathan walked over to Suresh who was crying out loud profanities and dragged him along the floor to the elevator. The doors pinged shut behind them.

Abbie could not hear her own thoughts - there were so many whizzing around her brain. Was he going to kill Suresh? Gosh, what was she going to do? Was she going to die? Was Elias going to die?

Jonah was observing Abbie's face with a look of dissatisfaction. His lips were twisted weirdly and his eyes were narrowed at her.

"You have to feel the pain that I have felt!" he pointed at Elias who looked as clueless as Abbie felt.

"What is this revenge you keep talking about?" Abbie raised her voice over the horrible thoughts running in her mind.

She could see that the bar in the computer screen behind Jonah had reached a 100%. Only if she could press the button that would install it to the system.

"Revenge, Abbie. Fucking revenge! For what you, both of you, did to me!"

"I'm so sorry for whatever I did to you," Abbie said, "I did not know that breaking up with you would have led you to a giant spiral of hate and Revenge!"

Jonah laughed out loud like he could not believe what she was saying.

He shook his head, heaving a dry laugh, "You don't remember do you?" he laughed again, "Of course you don't. I blocked your memory. How could you remember?"

Jonah looked like he was talking to himself. Abbie was sure that this man was a creepy psychopath - which was probably why she broke up with him.

Jonah composed himself - his laughing stopped and he turned to Abbie with determination in his eyes.

"I'll help you remember, Abbie! The pain that I had to go through when you were having the best day of your life!"

He slammed the laptop he was holding onto the tiny desk behind him and flicked it open with angry force. He clicked a few times and slammed his fingers on the keyboard, typing so fast that Abbie could not keep up.

The fierce determination in his face was scaring her. Jonah heaved a determined sigh and turned to Abbie, his finger hovering above the Enter key. His lips tucked into a vicious smirk as he let his finger slam onto it.

Abbie felt a strange chill run down the center of her spine. With a rush of adrenaline and a whoosh of a violent headache, she could remember what had happened the night before.

Her memories had returned.