Linewalkers

12 | Codes and Antipodes

Not Edited 

******

She agreed to work for the very same company that killed Elias.  

That thought alone was the most extreme version of irony. She wondered where her life had taken such a spiral out of control. Yet, her eyes settled on the glass of water sitting in front of her. She had asked for it and her head pounded, but it only crossed her mind after the fact that she hadn't been shot. Not with an actual bullet anyway, her guess was a tranquilizer dart. 

Her lower back still hurt like a bugger and Mr. Silva, the man who interrogated her, said it would pass soon. She didn't believe him, he probably enjoyed seeing her in pain. Something about him told her that was not to be trusted. No matter the facade he pulled, it was only a game, and she a pawn that could easily be discarded. 

A few minutes after she had been unhandcuffed, another man entered the room. He carried her computer and a brief case. Mr. Silva received the briefcase and she got her computer. She had insisted that she only needed her computer to crack the codes, she had everything set up on it for hacking. After the man left, it was only Mr. Silva and her. 

"You have four hours to crack the codes." Mr. Silva said. 

"What if I need longer?" She shot back. 

"You value your life, don't you?" 

"You're in a hurry." She mumbled. 

"We have little time left." 

She opened her computer, "None of this makes sense." 

"It wouldn't," Mr. Silva sent her a cold look, "Especially for someone like you. You stuck your nose into business that doesn't concern you and that's why your here." 

She didn't say anything else, it wouldn't have gotten her anywhere. Mr. Silva was a guarded man and he knew how to get information out of his suspects. She couldn't gain any further knowledge of DOTEE from him. So, she settled into the work she agreed to do. 

It would have been an understatement to say that the codes were intense. She had never experienced such codes. They were deeply encrypted and it took her over an hour to begin breaking them down. She wanted to say it was easy work but it wasn't. She used every ounce of knowledge she had because her life depended on it. 

If she couldn't crack the codes, she was scared about what would happen to her. Her instinct told her that Mr. Silva wasn't kidding around, it wasn't just a catch that he used. He was genuinely excited to make her suffer. It was people like him that ruined the world, and an entire company existed. She could only imagine the damage they could do if they weren't obsessed with these codes. 

Her fingers grew tired and numb from continually working. The only thing that she got was a glass of water and she had downed that long ago. Her head still hurt but she kept working. By the second hour, she discovered that the five codes she had stolen were linked. They had to be cracked in an order and in a precise timing. Definitely the weirdest codes she'd ever dealt with. They almost didn't seem to be made by a human. 

Mr. Silva would occasionally rise from his chair and observe her work. There was frown upon his features most times and he would glance at her, as if she was tying her own fate. She felt a little pressured by the time the third hour rolled by. She had to crack them, she worked furiously to untangle the codes. 

Slowly, her time ran out. The clock struck four hours and she was almost sweating. Mr. Silva was quiet for only a moment before he stood up, scraping his chair backwards. 

"Perhaps you aren't as computer inclined as you think you are." He stalked around the table. 

She found something, a tiny loophole in the codes. Her heart soared, the codes began to break down in a sequence. 

"Your time has run out, Ms. Monticello." Mr. Silva said, he unclipped the handcuffs. 

"Wait!" She cried, untangling the codes, "They're cracking."

"What?" He sounded genuinely surprised. 

She was aware of Mr. Silva leaning over her shoulder as she continued to work the codes. She was so close, her fingers moved faster. It was only a matter of seconds before they cracked or she was thrown from the chase. Codes were funny like that, they were either really close or far away.

Suddenly, her screen froze. Then, the codes began unrolling. They shortened by every second and when they reached the right side of her screen, there was twelve seconds of a blank screen. She and Mr. Silva waited in anticipation. 

Her screen glitched, revealing a weird symbol, and then a painful shock traveled up her arms. She shrieked, wretching her hands away from the computer, and then the screen went black. Her entire body tingled, a numbness spreading from her fingertips, and she panicked. 

"What was that!?" She cried. 

"Its the same damn thing," Mr. Silva swore, grabbing her hands and she freaked out even more when she couldn't feel them, "We should have thought this through, now we're losing you." 

"What?!" She shrieked. 

"Twelve hours is the limit." 

Mr. Silva stepped away from her as people dressed in doctor's coat rushed into the room. She couldn't feel anything as they grabbed her and assessed her. A flashlight was shined in her eyes and she cringed away. A pin-prickle of pain traveled up her arm and she looked down to find an IV already inserted. She mumbled an incoherent thought. 

"I told you to wait!" Someone shouted, "She's going to die just like that kid and then we've got nothing! Its like they just disappear!" 

"You wanted to find the link just as much as I did." Another man replied, "There are other people out there capable of cracking these codes. We have something to work from now. Its happened twice, I don't think its a coincidence." 

"Where do you think they go?" Someone was above her but she couldn't see them. 

"Its impossible to know." 

She couldn't remember much after that. She felt trapped within her own body and yet it didn't feel like her body. She had no control, only her thoughts were hers. Somehow, she had made it a different room and she was resting on a bed. It seemed like she was hung in wires attached to her arms, a puppet in play, and she vaguely heard voices while they fussed over her. 

For a company who murdered her best friend, she didn't expect them to care so much about her. But, she knew that it had do with something entirely different. They were after whatever those codes did, they just used her to get to them. She was still confused as to why her computer had shocked her. Now it felt like she was paralyzed. 

She had heard enough to know that she was going to die. Apparently, it is exactly what happened to Elias. Maybe that's why they wanted to find him because he knew just like she did now. Those codes were capable of something powerful and they didn't belong to anyone of this world. She was afraid of the unknown and she didn't want to close her eyes, but she couldn't stop herself. 

It felt like her life was slowly draining from her. Like a hand grasping sand, she filtered through the granules and her mind grew distant. It felt like her body was going somewhere, something was tugging at her soul, and she didn't have the will to fight it. Strange sensations race through her and it was unlike anything she'd ever experienced. 

When the clock struck the twelfth hour, she died. 

.    .    .    .    .    .

*snickers* 

I'm proud of how this is shaping up. 

Now the fun begins.