deepfake

Tamara's husband is being held for ransom. Again. Maybe.

“Hello?”

“Tamara? I’m in trouble. But just listen, and it’ll be fine. Okay?”

“Ollie, what? What are you--?”

“Just listen.” Oliver was gasping between his words. Panicked. Scared. “They want money. Bitcoins. You have to send it right away or they’ll hurt me.”

A different man came on the phone. “Did you hear that? Twenty Bitcoin Cash. Go to your computer, open your account, and I’ll tell you the number to send it to.”

Tamara leaped to her feet like the computer was toxic. Her coworkers were watching.

“Who--" Her voice cracked. Her breathing hitched. She closed her eyes and tried again: “Who am I speaking to?”

“You can’t ask that.”

She gripped the edge of the desk. Again. Just like before. She knew to stay calm. Breathe. Buy time. Verify.

“Why are you doing this to us?” she said.

“You need to get on your computer and transfer the funds. Twenty BCH.”

“How much?”

“Twenty BitCoin Cash.”

“We don’t have that much.”

“Don’t lie. Do it now or we have to kill your husband. Is that clear?”

She cursed herself for not being able to stave off the tears. “Let me talk to him.”

“You already did. No more talking. Send the currency.”

“I need to talk to my husband.”

“You need to take this seriously or else this weak little man name Oliver is going to get his throat cut open. Do you understand?”

“Yes.” She moved the phone to her other hand and wiped her palm on her pants.

“Well then?”

“I really don’t think we have twenty Bitcoins.”

“You do.”

“We don’t use that account anymore.”

“Stop lying. Hurry up.”

“Just let me talk to him for ten seconds. After that, I’ll send the money.”

“Send it first.”

“I don't know the password for the account. I have to ask Oliver.”

“He doesn’t know.”

 “Please. It’s the only way …”

She heard muffled arguing in the background.

“Ten seconds.”

“Tamara,” Oliver said, “these guys aren’t messing around. You better hurry.”

“Ollie, what’s the code word?”

“I’m so scared, Tammy. I can’t think. I need you. Please. Just send them the money. I love you, Tamara. I don’t want to die. Don’t let them kill me.”

“Ollie. I love you, too, but--”

“I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know. Please, hurry …”

He was hysterical. He wouldn’t listen. Couldn’t focus on her words.

She kept trying. “Not for the bank account, Ollie. Ollie, listen to me. What’s our code? Our secret word. Our verification word.”

“Just hurry up. Send the money or they’ll kill me.”

“Say it, Ollie. Come on, Ollie. Say it!”

“Hurry. Hurry. I’m so scared. Please, Tammy. Just send the money.”

“You have to say our word. I can’t help you if you don’t say it.”

“Hurry the f**k up!” the kidnapper yelled into the phone. “Time’s running out, b***h. Send it now. Last chance or he dies. Got it?”

“Okay, okay.”

“Now!”

“Okay …”

She put her hand on the mouse and the screen came alive. She made herself take a breath but still, her hands were shaking so much she could hardly navigate to the search bar. 

“Hurry.”

“I’m doing it,” she snapped.

She typed in the name of the bank but had to redo it twice because of typos. Then she paused.

Around Tamara, her boss and coworkers had gathered. Someone held up a note to say they’d called Oliver but he hadn’t answered. Her arms went limp. She was numb, only able to feel the incessant punching of her heart against the walls of her chest.

“Why is it taking so long?” said the man on the phone.

She read off the screen. “It says, ‘Enter your login information.’” 

“So do it.”

“I can’t,” she said. “I don’t know the password.”

“You f*****g liar! That’s enough …” Away from the phone, the man yelled to someone. A second later, Tamara’s work computer chimed, and a video popped up.

It was Oliver. Tied to a chair in front of a blank wall of dark curtains. “Tammy,” the exhausted, sweating man looked up into the camera and said.

Her hand flew to her mouth as she gasped. But, unconvinced, she zoomed in, only to confirm it really was her husband. Panting hard, he repeated her name and begged her to hurry.

“Ollie, I’m sorry,” she said, tears streaming. “What’s the code word. I have to hear it from you.” He slumped down and began to weep, his shoulders trembling. She asked him again, but Oliver gave no indication he could hear her.

“Kill him,” the man on the hone yelled to his cohorts. “Cut his throat. No more waiting. Do it.”

A man in a mask rushed at the chair and threw a bag over Oliver’s head. Another man appeared with a hunting knife.

“No! Wait, wait, wait! Please. No. Just wait. I have to get the password. I have it. I can get it.”

“How long?”

“Not long. It’s at home. I can get it. Ten minutes.”

“F**k!” More background arguing on the phone. The video went black. “Make it five. Don’t hang up.”

Tamara stormed past her coworkers for the door.

“You can’t keep doing this,” her boss called in Tamara’s wake.

 

At the intersection, she made a choice on impulse and instinct. Not to run the red light--to head left up 12^thStreet instead of right toward home. She might have recalled the bank password if she could’ve focussed, but she needed to buy time. That’s what the detective had said last time. Buy time and verify. That’s what the code word was for--to verify.

“Why aren’t you home yet?” the voice yelled from her phone on the passenger seat.

“Almost there,” she replied. And a minute later: “Okay, I’m going the house now.”

The tiny parking lot in front of Ollie’s building was empty. She walked briskly, trying to keep control, past the first room of offices, then the next, and finally to the room that belonged to Oliver’s company.

“Welcome to LMC Technologies. Please use the touchpad to locate the person or…”

Out of breath, she stumbled past the automated reception and around the partition. The sun streamed in through the open blinds. 

“Ollie?” she called.

From her phone, the voice screamed, “Where are you? What the f**k do you think you’re doing? Do you want your husband to die?”

Nobody was in the office.

“Ollie?” She thought he’d be there. She didn’t think it was real. Like last time. “Ollie …” The room was small. She’d easily see him if he was there. “Please, Ollie, if this is some kind of joke …”

“B***h, you’ve got one minute to send that BitCoin or your precious Ollie gets his head sawed off. The clock starts now. One minute. Fifty-nine. Fifty-eight…”

The loud ticks of the wall clock drew her attention. Quarter past twelve. Lunch break. They were out of the office on lunch. That was it. Was it? It could be. She didn’t know.

“Okay, okay,” she said into the phone.

From the jacket hung over the chair, she found Oliver’s computer. She jiggled the mouse to wake the screen, and instead of databases and reams of computer code, a video player appeared.

“Forty-three. Forty-two…”

She clicked re-play. There, on screen, like a mirror reaching through from another dimension, she saw herself in a chair in front of a dark curtain, tied up and weeping.

 

 

Kaz Morran is the author of the novel Tribulation: A Science Fiction Thriller and the 550AU series. Search social media for "550U" to follow.

 

Cover art courtesy of Youness Taouil

Author's Note

If you liked it, you might like my novel, Tribulation: A Science Fiction Thriller Amazon