Tina, can you delete the video from that guy’s phone?

Nathan sits in the room, listening to the growing noise outside. Through the curtains, he sees the teenager across the street still showing his phone to the man, while the woman with the trash bag gestures wildly, clearly recounting what she saw. Nathan realizes that if the video hits the internet, his life will turn into chaos. He grabs his phone and whispers:

“Tina, can you delete the video from that guy’s phone?”

Tina’s voice in his head responds:

“Yes, Nathan. I’ll need internet access to hack his device. It’ll take a few seconds. Shall I start?”

“Yes, hurry!” Nathan nods, nervously fidgeting with his fingers.

The phone screen lights up, showing the process:

{Connecting to network… Locating device… Deleting data…}

A moment later, Tina says:

“Done. The video is erased from his phone. But I must warn you: interfering with other devices increases the strain on ibod.”

Nathan exhales in relief and peers out the window. The teenager looks at his phone in confusion, tapping the screen and shaking his head, clearly baffled about where the video went. The man shrugs, and the woman heads back into her house, muttering to herself. It seems the crisis has been temporarily averted.

But then Nathan notices the ibod device on the table blinking even faster. The red indicator now glows almost constantly, and the device feels hot, like a sizzling pan. A faint crackling sound comes from inside, as if something is breaking.

“Tina, what’s happening?” he asks, pulling his hand back.

“The system is overloaded,” Tina replies. “Creating Selena, deleting her, and hacking the phone—it’s too much for ibod’s current state. If the strain continues, the core might fail.”

Nathan stares at the device in horror.

“Fail? You mean it’ll break?”

“Possibly,” Tina says. “Or worse. I can’t predict exactly what will happen if the core is damaged. This is your uncle’s technology, and its limits are unknown to me.”

At that moment, Nathan’s phone buzzes. He looks at the screen—a push notification from a news app:

“Strange disappearance of a girl in the suburbs: trick or mysticism?”

Nathan opens the article and sees a blurry photo taken from a distance—the moment Selena dissolved into thin air. Apparently, someone else managed to record it, maybe from across the street. The teenager wasn’t the only witness.

Tina interjects:

“Nathan, the video still made it online. The source is different, not that phone. We’re running out of time before it goes viral. What do we do?”

Nathan feels despair creeping in. The device crackles, and the situation worsens by the second.