The Voice - Episode 4

 

Cole and Akinola waited in anticipation as they both tapped PLAY.

The screen went blank immediately they clicked the play icon. They waited ….

Waited…

But nothing happened.

Still blank…

Long silence…

Then suddenly, both screen lights came on and a timer appeared counting down rapidly, showing
12 mins 25 secs.

Cole and Akinola looked up at each other, their mouth was opened wide agape with both fear and surprise.
They couldn’t comprehend what was happening as the timer looked real like a bomb timer but how the timer got to be reading on their phones was a mystery.
Cole looked back at the screen, the timer was now reading 7 mins 4 secs. his hands were shaking vigorously that the phone almost fell off his hands.
He looked back at Akinola who also looked at him at the same moment . He saw Akinola nodding his head and he knew what it meant.
Without a second thought, they both ran out of the office and off to the cyber division with the phone in their hands which was now giving a beeping sound indicating that they have little or no time left.

••••••••••••
@ the same time
Location: Cole’s residence
••••••••••••

“What’s happening?” Nora asked fearfully, her heart beating faster than normal. The only time her heart had beat that way was on her wedding day with Cole

All episodes of this story can be found here >> https://www.ebonystory.com/story/the-voice

. It was when the priest asked the dreaded question they always asked.

“Speak now or forever hold your peace” The priest said and there was an intense silence in the auditorium.
Nora’s mind had wandered away, she looked on at every prying eyes looking at where their hands were positioned, was it held up or down?
Her heart started beating gradually like it always does, then later it seemed to have lost control that it was almost heard by the audience but Cole suppressed it by clutching to her tight and then, no hands came up which eased the tension and she was at peace, but she wasn’t sure if that would be the situation here too.

“Nora! Nora!” Emily called on top of her voice jolting Nora  back to reality.

“Emily what is it?” Nora asked.

Emily looked surprised and pouted her lips in abhorrence, she looked baffled and shocked.

“Are you out of your mind?” she asked rhetorically.  “Don’t you see there is a bomb timer reading on our phones?”

That was it, that was all she had to hear. She sprung up checking her phone immediately and oops! It was 3 mins 50 secs.
She looked at Emily with a terrified look on her face, scared to the core. Emily was more scared than she was.

“What are we going to do?” came the question from Nora.

Emily shook her head.
“No idea”

“Are we going to die?!” Nora shouted rattled at the thought.

The two phones started giving a beeping sound as the timer read 1 min 00 sec.

Emily looked up at Nora and their gaze met, each having a fearful look. On a normal day, Emily would have laughed and joked about it but it wasn’t something to joke about, it was something more serious than peeing in the pants.

“I think I have an idea” Emily said thoughtfully raising her index finger.

“What’s it?”

“let’s throw our phones away in the pool”

•••••••••
Location: CIB TOWER
•••••••••

The cyber is a division unit in the Criminal Investigation Bureau.

Read " The Taste Of Revenge " by the same author ( Tz Jay )

. It has two large rooms which was well equipped with computer facilities and technology gadgets which helps facilitate in cyber securities and for investigating cyber attacks by criminals, overseas adversaries, and terrorists. The threat was incredibly serious—and growing. Cyber intrusions were becoming more commonplace, more dangerous, and more sophisticated. Citizens were targeted by fraudsters and identity thieves, and children were targeted by online predators. Just as the CIB transformed itself to an anti crime investigator to the terrorist threat  and a similar transformation to address the pervasive and evolving cyber threat. This enhanced the Cyber Division’s investigative capacity to sharpen its focus on intrusions into government and private computer networks which was why the cyber is mostly needed.
.
All eyes in the cyber unit turned to Cole and Akinola  immediately they stepped in. Cole couldn’t hide his surprise on seeing everybody’s phone emitting an intensive beeping sound and almost immediately, showing a blinking red light. Within a second, everybody’s gaze was on their phones and a second later, their face changed to a more serious one.

“Please do something!” Cole shouted more terrified.
All cyber agents sprung up to their feet and started punching the keyboard like a pro which they were. They were computer experts specifically trained to ensure maximum security on cybercrime. Each and every one of them were working on one thing or the other with intense fear.

“Can you stop it? or we devise another plan before this thing goes off” The DG fearfully asked.

“We can’t really say for now sir” Mr Sylvester who was the head of the cyber unit replied without looking at the DG but rather has his focus on the computer screen.

Cole paced the room obviously worried and scared, he rubbed his head with his palm and at the same time checking the screen of his phone. It was counting down rapidly, blinking 57 secs.

He wiped the sweat that had formed on his forehead with his bare palm and continued pacing with worriment.