The Lockdown
943 Words
LOLA’S POV
The sound of the alarm echoed through every floor of Starsign Tech.
Red emergency lights replaced the soft white glow of the offices, bathing the corridors in crimson.
Heavy steel doors slammed shut one after another, sealing off every department.
Employees froze.
Some exchanged nervous glances.
Others instinctively reached for their access cards.
A calm computerized voice echoed through the building.
‘Executive Lockdown Protocol Activated.
All personnel remain in your designated zones until further notice.’
I instinctively stepped backwards, the scenery unfolding before me was chaotic.
‘What just happened?’
Orion’s jaw tightened.
‘This has never happened before.’, he says in a calm voice.
His voice may be calm but I notice the tension in his eyes.
ORION’S POV
Several security officers rushed towards me.
‘Sir, we need to escort you to the panic room.’
I shake my head.
‘Not until I know what’s happening.’
‘Sir, company protocol…’
‘I wrote the protocol!’
The officer fell silent.
I look at Lola.
‘Stay close.’
She raised an eyebrow.
‘I thought journalists weren’t welcome.’, she asks, folding her arms.
‘They’re usually not.’
‘And today?’
‘Today you’re my responsibility.’
The words came out before I could stop them.
My statement catches me off guard.
Neither of us commented.
Lola, Adrien, our head of security, Marcus Reed, and myself enter the Security Operations Center.
The room was lined with enormous digital screens displaying every corridor, laboratory and office within Starsign Tech.
Marcus typed rapidly.
‘We’ve confirmed someone accessed Project Helios.’
‘Who?’, I asked.
Marcus frowned.
‘That’s the problem. The access logs have been erased.’
Adrien looked confused.
‘Impossible.’
Marcus shook his head.
‘Not erased,’ he says enlarging his screen ‘they’ve been rewritten.’
The room fell silent.
Someone hadn’t merely broken into the system.
Someone had expertly covered their tracks.
LOLA’S POV
While the others studied the screens, I walked around the control room.
I was not a cybersecurity expert, so I had no idea of what was going on.
My input wasn’t going to be necessary anyways.
I looked at people instead.
Fear, confusion, shock; those were the order of the day.
Then I notice someone.
The secretary, Stacy.
She stood perfectly still.
Too still.
Unlike everyone else, she wasn’t asking questions.
She wasn’t surprised.
She simply watched.
When she realized I was looking at her, she smiled politely.
‘Everything would be fine.’ she said.
The reassurance sounded rehearsed.
I made a quiet mental note.
I turn to Orion.
‘What exactly is Project Helios?’, I ask
Everyone looks at him.
He hesitates.
‘Project Helios is our most advanced artificial intelligence.’
‘What does it do?’
‘It predicts cyber attacks before they happen.’
I frowned.
‘That’s impossible.’
He looks at me, meeting my eyes.
‘It's not impossible. It's extremely difficult.’
He continued.
‘It protects hospitals, banks, airports and emergency services.’
‘If someone steals it, they could disable entire national infrastructures.’, he continued.
I immediately understood.
The weight of his words settled heavily on the room.
This wasn’t corporate espionage anymore.
It was a national security threat.
Marcus projected the timeline of the breach.
The unauthorized access lasted only forty-seven seconds.
Long enough to copy data.
‘The attacker knew exactly where to look.’, he says.
‘Meaning?’, Adrien asked, folding his arms.
‘They had inside knowledge.’
No one spoke.
I thought deeply about this information.
Someone inside Starsign Tech had betrayed them.
ORION’S POV
Later when Marcus and the security team continued their investigation, I found Lola standing beside the window overlooking the city.
‘You’ve gone quiet.’
She didn’t turn around.
‘I thought I was investigating a billionaire,' she says.
‘You are.’
‘I didn’t realize I was walking into something this dangerous.’
None of us spoke for a moment.
‘You can still walk away.’, I finally said quietly.
She laughed softly.
‘You really don’t know journalists.’
‘I know enough.’
‘No.’
She faced me.
‘You know reporters who chase headlines.’
She stepped closer.
‘I chase the truth.’
I smiled, for the first time.
A genuine smile.
It was small,brief but real.
She noticed.
‘So you do smile?’, she asked, amused.
‘It appears I do.’
3RD PARTY’S POV
Miles away, inside a hidden apartment illuminated only by computer monitors,a masked figure watched Starsign Tech’s internal security feeds.
A voice came through an encrypted headset.
‘They’ve discovered the breach.’
The figure smiled.
‘They were supposed to.’
‘What about the journalist?’
The figure enlarged Lola’s photograph on the screen.
‘She’s smarter than expected.’
‘And Orion?’
‘He trusts her.’
The figure’s smile widened.
‘Good.’
Everything was unfolding exactly as planned.
ORION’S POV
Just before the lockdown was lifted, Marcus rushed into the executive conference room.
‘Sir.’
He placed a flash drive on the table.
‘We found this hidden inside one of the server racks.’
Everyone stared at it.
‘There are fingerprints?Adrien asked.
Marcus shook his head.
‘It was wiped clean.’
I picked up the drive.
A single handwritten label was attached.
It read:
LOOK CLOSER.
Lola exchanged a glance with me.
Someone wasn’t trying to destroy Starsign Tech, someone wanted us to find the truth.
But why?
As I inserted the flash drive into an isolated forensic computer, the screen flickered.
One encrypted video file appeared.
The title froze every person in the room.
THE TRAITOR IS ALREADY BESIDE YOU!
The room fell silent.
No one moved or breathed.
We were all probably wondering the same thing.
Who could we no longer trust?
- Writer
