It was about 7 PM in
the evening. I was sitting in my room, deep in thought, when the phone rang.
An unknown number.
Who would it be?
I picked up.
Me: Hello!
The other person (Let’s
call it ‘Op’ in short): Hello! Am I talking to Mr. Ashmur?
A girl voice! Strange
‘cause very few people, that too only my close friends, call me that. Who is
this then?
Me: Yes. Tell me!
Who’s this?
Op: Never mind
who I am. I wanted to talk to you.
Me: Sorry? Talk
to me? About what? And why should I talk to someone who I do not know?
I felt strange. A
sweet girl voice. An unknown number. Not revealing their identity. Must be some
friend of mine who’s playing with me.
Op: About
something important. Please listen to me. And if it’s important, my name is
Lavanya.
Lavanya? I only know
of 2 Lavanyas and I could confidently say that it was neither.
Me: Lavanya?
Which Lavanya? Stop playing with me. Tell me who is this and what do you want?
Op: I told you.
My name is Lavanya. I know you from your blog. I follow it. And I do know
things about you that no one else would know.
That’s strange!
Me: Like what?
Op: Like you just
watched the Nirbhaya documentary ‘India’s Daughter’ and you are disturbed
because of that – especially the graphic reconstruction of the horrific event.
I was taken aback. How
did she know that? Did I write about it somewhere? Oh yeah, I tweeted about it.
Must be following me on Twitter too. But I don’t recollect any Lavanya
following me on Twitter. And how did she get my number? By now, I was convinced
that it was a friend who was trying to play a prank on me.
Me: You must be
following me on Twitter. But tell me, who are you? Who gave you my number? Stop
playing with me. I don’t have time for this. I am cutting the call if you don’t
reveal your identity.
Op: Stop! No. Don’t
cut the call. I’m serious. I’m not any prankster. You do not know me, but I
know you. Beyond Twitter & blog too. I know you because I have seen you. I’m
a journalist. But that’s what the world thinks I do. I moonlight for the
intelligence bureau.
Me: What? Enough
of this kidding. Tell me who this is. Or I’m cutting the call now.
Op: I know you
won’t believe me. I’ll tell you something about you that no one else in this
world would know. You’d probably believe me then.
She told me. I was
stunned.
Op: Hope you
believe me now. Just listen to me. The reason I picked you to make this call is
because I felt that you are the most responsible of the 3 persons I had in my
list. Now, I want you to do as I say.
By now, I was numb. Is
it for real? What’s happening? Whatever she told me, stunned me to say the
least. How could she know? Like she said, no one in the world knows.
Me: I dunno what
to say. Please tell me.
Op: I am
recording this conversation. I’ll send you the audio file once we end this
call. I’ll send it via mail. You are to write about this phone call in your
blog within the next 3 days. Please quote me verbatim in the conversation.
Me: What purpose
will that serve?
Op: It holds a
cryptic message to what we are doing. I’m involved in an assignment with the
IB. We are tracking down some cyber attacks. In that fight, we post such
messages in some random blogs. That’s all I can say for now.
Me: What you say
is scary! What if you are just lying?
What if I’m being used as a pawn here? What if you don’t belong to the IB but
some terror network?
Op: Even if that
were the case, do you have a choice?
Now, that was really frightening.
Me: What do you
mean?
Op: I mean to say
that you’ll write it anyway, irrespective of whether you believe me or not.
Me: What?
Op: Yes, you
will. Open your mail now. Your personal mail, not your institute id.
I hurriedly opened my
mail in my laptop, while the call was still on. There was a mail from someone
called Lavanya. I opened it.
Hi Ashmur,
It was nice talking to you on the phone. PFA the audio file recording
of the call.
Regards,
Lavanya
And there was an audio
file attached.
I was a little
shocked. I got back to the call.
Me: Hello?
Op: Got the mail?
Fine! Let me assure you that there’s nothing for you to worry. This is a
routine intelligence exercise. Just write the blog post and that’s all.
Me: O...O...
Okay!
Op: Now Ashmur,
enough of my business. Let’s talk something else.
Me: Wh...What?
Op: A word of
advice. Do not worry about the days ahead! I know you are evaluating 3 choices
in your mind. Go for the second one. That’s the best for you.
Me: WHAT? HOW DO
YOU KNOW ABOUT THE CHOICES?
Op: I told you I
know more about you than probably you yourself do.
Me: But... But
this?
Op: Ha ha ha!
She laughed loudly
Op: Don’t worry
about it! All your info is safe with the
IB. Now, I’ll end the call. Don’t try to trace the number for you won’t find
such number anywhere in the world! We use a cryptic app for calling. Also, you
won’t find the mail id anywhere. So do not worry about it! Plus the mail will
self-destroy itself in an hour. So download the audio file before that! Do not
try to take any screenshot of the mail! It won’t work. We have fed a worm into
your system that will disable the action. Again, do not worry! The worm will
kill itself once the mail destroys itself. And that’s not all. The worm will
destroy the audio file and all traces of it too.
Me: A well laid
out plan?
Op: Ofcourse! It’s
time for me to go. Just listen to the audio soon and blog about this whole
conversation within 3 days. Your job is done. We won’t bother you again.
Me: But there’s
hardly anything in this conversation that sounds secretive. It’s as plain as
anything else.
Op: Well, that’s
the beauty of it. It appears plain to everyone. But not to cryptologists like
us. Just do what I say.
Me: O…O… Okay!
Op: Fine then!
Nice talking to you, Ashmur! Looking forward to your blog. Keep writing! Bye!
With that she cut the
call. It took me 5 minutes to regain my senses.
I opened the mail
again and checked the id. It said Lavanya <no-name@nomail.com>
I tried to take a
screen shot. It was not functioning. My snipping tool was also not functioning.
I took my phone and tried to take a pic. All that came in the pic were some blurred
lines. Looks like the worm had taken care of this too. The screen resonance was
at its highest, that hardly anything was visible in the phone cam. I downloaded
the audio file and listened to it. It was for 7 mins. Once I was done
listening, the ‘blue screen of death’ appeared and the system restarted.
When I logged in
again, the saved audio file was not to be seen. The mail was also gone and no
trace of it remained. I checked my phone. The number was also not to be seen in
the call records.
What kind of sorcery
is this?
I went to sleep
thinking about it.
When I woke up the next
morning, I once again checked everywhere. No traces were to be found. Was this
all a nightmare?
Must be! I forgot
about it for two days and carried on normally until today afternoon when I got
a message from an unknown number.
Hi Ashmur, hope you are posting that blog. Today is the third day.
Wanted to remind you. By the way, your phone will restart in another 30
seconds.
As soon as I closed
the message, the phone mysteriously restarted. When it started again, the
message was not to be seen.
I was now convinced
that I had to write the blog. And hence this post.
-Ashmur
PS: Lavanya, here's your post. I know that can't be your name. But, I've kept my promise. So don't bother me again.
PPS: Truth is stranger than fiction.
PPPS: Nothing stops you from thinking that this is just a fiction. I'd love to think so too. But what if it's real?
