NEW LIFE : A SECOND CHANCE

Samantha glared unhappily at Kyle, who was simply sitting there and not looking at her. She refused to say anything, though she was hoping that he would plead, beg or even cry at having to break up. Why was he so calm?

"Well, since there's nothing else," Kyle said as he got up, not looking at her in the face, "I'll be leaving now."

Samantha didn't say a word, and just watched him go.

Samantha was not happy, not happy at all but there was nothing she could do about it. If he had only said something. If he had only looked like this was something he didn't want, then ... then she would have ... she certainly would have not let him go so easily.

As it was, both were silent until the the door closed, and the sound of the door hitting the frame seemed to echo in the room. Samantha sighed, and started crying again.

Outside, Kyle leaned on the door for a while, shaking his head.

[Ye Gads, that was tough] he said with a sigh and he started walking off.

[Breaking up is always hard to do, even if it's fake] Kay commented.

[No, not that part] Kyle said [It was trying to walk normally out the door. I wanted to run, seriously. She looked like she was going to give me make-up sex or something if I showed even a little hesitation ... ]

[BROTHER!] Kay shouted, making Kyle wince.

[Oi, Kay. Easy on the eardrums, will you?]

[We're communicating telepathically. How are your eardrums affected, hmmmm?]

[Fine, easy on the mind then. That actually hurt]

[Well, at least now we know shouting would have an effect as well] Kay said and Kyle could swear she was grinning now.

[Don't you feel pity for your poor brother who broke up with his first girlfriend?]

[Nop-pah] Kay said, popping the last sound out [Not even a little bit].

[Ah, the cruelties of life] Kyle lamented with such a sad voice [That even my own sweet sister ... my twin sister, no less, not care for me].

[Save your acting for someone who actually cares, oh dear brother]

Kyle chuckled at that, but his face didn't show it. In fact, anyone who saw him would have seen a young man who appeared to be broken-hearted, his face reflecting intense pain yet was being strong. He cut a sad, lonely figure as he walked out of the Mansion and back to the movie set area.

Some of the maids around did see and they found their eyes watering for some reason. They dabbed the corner of their eyes, took a deep breath and continued where they left off.

?? CSI Cyber Unit ??

"What do you mean, there's nothing in there?" growled Detective Chance as he looked at X.

X had a name, but he refused to answer to it and insisted on "X". X was the infamous black hat now turned white hat* and working at the CSI Cyber Unit was part of his punishment after being caught.

He found that he quite liked the life now, though he never showed it. He could hack to his hearts' content, challenge and capture black hats and get paid for it! Whilst black hats generally hated authority and lived for creating havoc to 'the shackles of society', X's passion was actually 'fighting' against others in the cyberworld.

It was the challenge. Pitting his skill against another.

X was now looking at Detective Chance in a very bored manner. He picked up the phone, waving it in front of Detective Chance's face and said, "This ... is a phone. It has contact numbers. Text messages - some very mushy ones, too. Loads of pictures. In short. Normal."

Detective Chance narrowed his eyes, "Nothing in the messages?"

"Nothing. Nada. Zilch," X said, "The messages were all with these two girls, Samantha and Kayla and a guy, Xing Han. Just normal talk."

Detective Chance wasn't satisfied, "There's no code?"

X looked at him strangely, sighed and took a deep breath to be patient. He hated people like Detective Chance. First, for thinking he was actually incompetent enough to not notice anything unusual and secondly, for asking stupid, obvious questions in the insane hope of finding something.

"Not unless pillow talk, food and complaints about parents are code," X replied with a straight face.

X handed him a thumbdrive, "Here's a copy of all the text messages. Have fun reading them."

Detective Chance took it, and the phone. He had to return it since it wasn't truly an official part of the investigation. Since there was nothing to pinpoint Kyle as a suspect, holding on to the phone would be against procedure.

Chance walked away, disgruntled. The moment he walked out the door, the girls behind X were staring at him with big, pleading eyes.

X grinned and handed them another thumbdrive with a stern warning, "Remember, private viewing only. If you spread them, and I get caught, I'll go back to prison and you'll never get such goodies again."

"We know, we know!" squealed the girls, holding onto the thumbdrive like it was a treasure.

In it, were the photos from Kyle's phone. Scenes from the movie were there, especially some black and white ones of him exercising. When he had been going through the phone contents and the entire thing was being displayed on the big screen in his room, he almost fell off his chair upon hearing screams.

After checking that the pictures were really just pictures, he made a copy and gave it to the girls. Happy girls in the workplace meant lotsa food and snacks. It was a good deal.

?? ??

Kay smiled to herself as she was busy typing on her keyboard, her fingers flying over it like a hummingbird. Those who could see her were mesmerized as it looked like poetry in motion, but at high speeds.

The various monitor screens around her were full of codes and finally, after making one last hit on the keyboard with a satisfied shout, Kay leaned back. Soon, the screens in front of her changed.

It showed a huge room, whereby one wall was filled with three huge flat screens on the top half and below it, four slightly smaller flat screens. All the screens were filled with images, some just tests some appeared to be a map with moving lines on it and so forth.

There were people at desks and computers facing the wall and were hard at work.

[Success, brother] Kay reported [The honey trap worked]

[All thanks to Sam's good photography skills] Kyle commented [Are you sure your virus is not detectable? The security there is very tight]

[Are you looking down on me, dear brother?] Kay asked in a huff.

[No, hardly] Kyle said gently [But you know we can't be too careful]

[Yeah ... yeah] Kay said dismissively but she didn't really blame him. She did the same to him whenever he goes on missions. She would ask him whether it was safe, whether the plan would work and so on. Not because she didn't think he couldn't do it but ... anything could happen, right?

Kay sighed and knew she was being a bit unfair so she reminded herself not to keep nagging Kyle about his missions.

"The virus that I hid in the pictures is only activated when it's copied and viewed from a computer] Kay explained [And it hides like a chameleon within the system. Any security prompt would bypass it or accept it as one of their own]

[So it's a ninja virus?]

Kay laughed and tapped on the keyboard, disconnecting from the Cyber War Room [Very apt, brother. I shall name it that. The Ninja Virus]

Kay was satisfied. She now had access into one of the most secure databases in the world and would be able to be privy to a lot of information that was not readily available anywhere else. She marveled at the foresight her brother had in this.

From the start, he had it all planned. The phone was brand new and was a normal phone. Kay had tinkered around with it and made it as if Kyle had the phone for at least a year (so there were some old text messages from long ago and some pictures from before the movie shoot).

When Kyle told Kay to create a virus that would allow them to hack into a really secure place, she did it without question. Though she never thought it would ever be used in such a manner.

[How did you know?] Kay asked [How could you have possibly known you'd meet a Detective, who would take your phone to the CSI unit?]

After all, there were so many variables that for it to happen in exactly the manner that they had been planning for, was rather incredible and far-fetched.

[I didn't know] Kyle said [But it doesn't hurt to be prepared, right?]

Kay shook her head. Sometimes the way he planned things were just too ... scary.

?? ??

The movie crew members were cleared and allowed to leave two days later.

On the day they were to leave, Detective Chance returned Kyle's phone. He looked at it and noticed that there were a lot of missed calls from Samantha and hundreds of text messages that had been sent after the whole break-up incident.

Sam saw it and raised an eyebrow.

Kyle shrugged, switched off the phone and put it in his pocket.

"You're ghosting her?" Sam asked.

Kyle smirked, "No. She's the one who broke up with me so technically, it's not ghosting."

"You're cutting off all communications completely," Sam pointed out, "That's ghosting."

"It's the only way. Samantha's the clingy type, you know?" Kyle said, "Anyway, it's not like she's Nick Fury."

Sam snorted at that.