Hacker

Chapter 13 - Strike

I walked in the building and took the elevator to floor 4.

The room should be there, I thought.

A few seconds in the elevator felt like hours to me. The door opened, exposing a white hallway containing many rooms. I walked out with nervousness, unfamiliar with the surrounding and glancing around with curious eyes. A few rooms were transparent. I could see staff sitting in front of the computers; all of them. So focused. No one was talking or even seemed to notice me passing by.

I looked at the door in front of me as I reached the end of the hallway.

Mr. Kaine, it's written.

I knocked 5 times. Instead of getting a "come in" order, the door opened, exposing Ed who flashed me a smile. I automatically smiled back.

"Come on in." He gestured.

I stepped in with a silent prayer.

"That's why you have to do it the first time - he wouldn't expect it." Zack's voice repeating in my head.

I came here today with a mission. The mission. This should be the ending of everything. The plan was pretty simple: get into the secret room and connect this pen drive to the main computer in there so that the virus will spread to his whole company's system and acquaintances', then I'd leave.

I asked Zack to do it another day as I hadn't known the layout of this company pretty well yet. But he forced me to do it today as Ed would expect it the least. Getting into the room wouldn't be a problem, according to him, as Ed would surely trusted me enough to let me.

I sat down on a red sofa - contrary colour of the room's. Ed went to the right part of the room where the water heater was located. The smell of coffee filled the room not long after. He sat on the sofa for one, at the short side of the rectangular glass table, by my right. The cup of coffee was put in front of me.

"So, what do you think about my company?" He asked.

Pushing the uncomfortable feeling of us two being alone in a room, I answered, "Bright, and quiet... Too quiet for my likings."

He smiled at my honesty. "It clears the mind, though." He leaned back to his seat.

I couldn't help but imagining the staff as robots with no minds. Literally, they're too focused with their works. It's disturbing. It came to my mind if they were, in fact, robots. But that'd be more terrifying. I refused to acknowledge that possibility further.

My eyes went to the left side of the room. There's a door. The colour camouflaged with its wall. If Zack didn't tell me about it, I probably wouldn't have noticed.

Ed leaned back to the front. "You have sharp eyes." He stated, noticing where my eyes landed on. There's an unusual expression as he said that, but it's gone as fast as it came.

I started my acting. "What's that for?" I asked about the room. "Is it like an escape room where... you know, if something happened then the boss could fly first?" The dark humour was celebrated with only a half-smile from him.

"Do you wanna know what's in there?" He asked me back.

I already knew. "Yes." I replied, hoping the fake curiosity sparked from my eyes.

"Alright, come with me." He said as he stood up and started to walk to the door.

My nervousness was begging to be calmed, so I took the cup of coffee and drank it. Unexpectedly, I gave a hint of whimper as the liquid touched my tongue. Forcefully, I swallowed it. "How much coffee did you put in this?" I complaint.

"Shit, sorry." He said regretfully as he changed his way to the right side of the room again. "Let me get you some water. I used to drink espresso -"

"Edward you know I don't drink plain espresso." I reminded.

"It's been years. I've forgot." He said with a slow tone. "My bad." His body still faced the counter.

Low key, my heart broke a little knowing he forgot something about me.

You can't expect someone to still remember every detail about you when you've broken up, though, right?

I agreed with my mind.

Ed's office phone rang out of the sudden. He turned around and walked towards his table to push a button.

"Your 4 pm guest is waiting, Sir." The female voice spoke.

He glanced at me for a second before answering. "Alright. I'll be there in a second." The call was ended and he looked at me. "I need to meet them just for a few minutes, okay?"

I nodded.

Ed started to pick some files and walk to the office's door. "Make yourself home." He smiled before closing the door.

My eyes darted again at that door. I mentally slapped myself as realizing there should be a CCTV here. If Ed noticed I was particularly interested with that room, he could've suspected something fishy.

He currently isn't the room, and Zack can clean the CCTV. It's now or never Rae what else are you waiting for?

The pressure was getting to me. I stood up and got myself to the counter located at the right. Intended to fill myself a glass of water, I found a weird packet with a hard-to-pronounce word instead. My hands were started to shake slightly when I tried to pick up the packet.

Breath caught up in my chest. I felt dizzy. My ears started to ring as my heart beat faster.

Then I realized it was a drug.

My arms straightened on the counter to steady myself. I couldn't focus.

I need to call Zack. The urge made me slowly turned myself around - only to come face to face with Ed.

"I'm sorry..." He whispered before holding my shoulder.

The sharp pain went through my arm before my visions got blurry. I felt Ed catching me as everything went black.