Image by SplitShire from Pixabay
She was angry, fearful, and determined to confront him. The commute home usually took her twenty-five minutes. But traffic was light today. She made it home in less than twenty.
She pulled into the driveway and sat there. Car running. Foot on the brake.
Christine is Head of AI research at Syte, a booming tech company on a mission to create the world’s first primary care doctor powered by artificial intelligence. She’s the highest-paid employee at her company. A fact which she doesn’t consider noteworthy.
She shifted the car into park.
Christine met Landon at a coffee shop near work about 3 months ago. He approached her and they hit it off. Landon was tall, with shoulder-length blonde hair and high cheekbones. He had a swimmer’s build and a way of talking that made Christine feel like she was sliding into a warm bath. She wasn’t used to this kind of attention.
She opened her car door and placed her feet on the pavement.
Five weeks ago, she let Landon to move in with her. It was supposed to be temporary. He had a story about a failed venture into refrigerated trucks and a business partner who had emptied the company account and left town. Christine was happy to help him find his footing.
She closed the car door behind her and walked towards the house.
Over the last few days, she had noticed a couple things that didn’t sit right. Landon was rarely without his phone, and sometimes when texting, he’d ever so slightly angle it, as if trying to keep her from seeing the screen. She tried to convince herself she was just seeing things.
She unlocked the front door.
Last night suspicion got the best of her. Landon was taking a shower and had left his phone on the dresser. She had to know if only to reassure herself all was well. She ran to her office to retrieve a homemade GreyKey device she had built in college. She hooked it up to his phone and she was in:
Unknown: How’s it going with the whale
Landon: I’ve got her
Unknown: That didn’t take long. You’re getting better
Landon: I’m telling you, these Forbes girls aren’t used to the attention. They eat it up
Unknown: Is she ready?
Landon: yeah
Unknown: Fantastic. I’ll keep setting ‘em up, you keep knocking ‘em down
The phone fell out of Christine’s hands onto the bed. She felt like she was going to throw up. Her ears started ringing. She could hear her heart beating faster. They went to bed. She left for work before Landon got up.
She stepped inside the house.
Someone grabbed her from behind. It was so forceful it knocked the air out of her lungs. She tried to scream but he covered her mouth with his hand.
“Shhh, hold still. I’m going to move my hand, but if you scream I’ll have to gag you.” Landon said. His tone was flat. Emotionless. He held a gun.
He sat her down on the couch and stood in front of her, the barrel of his gun vaguely pointing in her direction.
“What are you going to do to me?” she asked.
Landon didn’t answer. He pulled his phone out and dialed.
“She’s here,” he said.
Tires screeched and a van stopped in front of the house.
“How much do you want? You can have it all! Just don’t hurt me.”
Landon didn’t respond. She studied his face for any information she could glean. His eyes were different. They looked empty. Or dead. Like they were looking through her.
A man came through the door holding a large black storage tub. His face was uncovered.
Christine had seen enough movies to know this was a bad sign. She was going to die.
She braced for her life to flash before her eyes, but it never did.
Within 5 minutes she was knocked unconscious, folded into the black storage tub, and loaded into the van.
Christine was never seen again.
MW 