Chapter 13

‘It can’t be!’ Libby whispered, staring at an image on the screen and scarcely able to believe her eyes. She tilted her head as she gave him an unrelenting stare and tried to regain control of her breathlessness. She ignored the other Passengers and confusion in the inquest room to concentrate on just one face.

The person you’ve spent six months searching for is trapped inside a driverless car.

The rational side of Libby’s brain took charge and questioned whether it was really the man she’d met in the bar six months earlier. Was her mind playing tricks on her? Or was it someone paying him a very close resemblance? She couldn’t be sure.

Slowly, she took in his appearance. The resemblance was uncanny. He was slimmer than she remembered him. His cheekbones were more pronounced and his eyes drained of the sparkle she so clearly recalled. But she was sure that if she were in his position, the shine would have left her eyes too.

The only way she could be sure she was staring at the right man was if she heard him speak. His lips were moving but no sound was being emitted from the speakers in the room. Libby considered sharing her news with the other jurors, but the confidence she had conjured up moments earlier to argue with Jack had vanished as quickly as it had arrived and had taken her voice with it. For now, she would hold her tongue.

Libby looked away from the screen, momentarily distracted by the operative responsible for beaming video footage onto the largest of the walls. He frantically swiped the screen of his tablet in all directions before reaching for the stenographer’s device and repeating the action. ‘Nothing’s happening,’ he said. ‘I don’t understand it; I no longer have any control over what’s being shown.’

‘Then who has?’ his colleague asked. He shrugged.

Meanwhile one of the security men handed Jack a telephone. He strode towards the doorway and hovered under the architrave out of earshot as all eyes fell upon him, awaiting a logical explanation for what was being

broadcast. It was clear from Jack’s slowly reddening face and expanding veins on either side of his thick neck that he was losing his patience.

‘Well, find someone who can tell me!’ he barked and hung up.

‘Jack?’ asked the only other male juror. ‘What’s happening?’

Jack took a moment to gather his thoughts. ‘This has yet to be confirmed, but there’s a possibility a handful of vehicles may have been …

temporarily compromised.’

‘What do you mean by compromised?’ asked the religious rep.

‘Are you saying they’ve been hacked?’ her male colleague chipped in.

Jack said nothing and Libby felt her stomach tighten into a fist-sized ball.

‘I am not saying that is what has happened; I am saying that it is a possibility something along those lines may have occurred. I am awaiting further information from my colleagues in the Home Office and the Ministry of Transport.’

‘Hacked?’ the woman in plaid repeated. ‘But that doesn’t make any sense. These vehicles are unhackable. That’s what we were told from the very start, isn’t it?’

‘It’s how you persuaded the public to place their trust in driverless cars,’

added the dark-haired man. ‘Cast-iron guarantees were made that because vehicles only communicate with the outside world when they have to, there’s no continuous line or cloud to be hacked. Are you telling us now they can be compromised?’

‘I’m sure this is nothing more than speculation and rumour,’ Jack replied, but his thin smile disappeared quickly and he struggled to mask his concern.

Suddenly, another of the twelve television screens became filled with an image: this time of an elderly man with a handful of medals pinned to the left breast of his jacket. His body language contrasted with that of the others

– he appeared relaxed as he stared from the window of his moving vehicle.

‘That makes six of them,’ the male juror commented just as the sound feed to the TV news channel returned.

‘And we have just had Government confirmation that the people you are watching have had their cars taken over by a third party, but by whom and for what purpose, we do not yet know. All we can tell you is that they all appear to be travelling from different parts of the country to the same

destination. Police have also admitted each Passenger has also been warned they may end up dead by the end of the morning.’

‘Dead?’ gasped the religious rep and turned to Jack. ‘You just this minute said it was only a possibility those cars had been hacked! These people are now, what? Hostages? Do you even know what is going on out there?’

Jack could no longer hold back his frustration. ‘Why am I hearing this from a news channel and not from any of you?’ he yelled at the nearest member of his team. ‘If cars on my roads are being hijacked then why am I the last to hear about it?’

‘We are trying to identify who is in each car and the makes and models being driven in the hope the manufacturers can find a way of bringing them to a halt remotely.’

‘ In the hope? ’ said Jack. ‘Don’t give me “hope”, give me results. And why has nobody from my own office called me back? Get me the Government Communications Headquarters online now.’ Jack pinched his eyes and shook his head as the assistant scurried away.

‘There’s number seven,’ the dark-haired man noted as another petrified face filled a screen, this time a woman of Asian origin.

‘When is it going to stop?’ asked the religious rep. ‘Who are these people? How are they being chosen? Why are they being targeted?’

‘Shouldn’t you be praying for them instead of asking so many bloody questions?’ snapped Jack and stared at the phone in his hand.

‘Number eight,’ the dark-haired man continued. A woman wearing a hijab appeared inside another screen. ‘How many more will there be?’

Libby spotted Jack’s hands curling into tight fists, his eyes burning with rage. ‘For God’s sake, I can see what is happening. I don’t need a running fucking commentary! I need you all to shut up so that I can think.’

‘Isn’t that Sofia Bradbury, the actress?’ asked the woman in plaid.

‘No, it can’t be,’ the religious rep replied. She perched on the end of her chair to get a closer look. Meanwhile the news channel focused on Sofia and compared it to stock footage of her in an acting role. ‘You’re right.

Well, I’ll be …’

She was interrupted by the news anchor. ‘The footage we are about to broadcast has been taken from social media sources. It contains the moment each of these people, who are now being referred to as the Passengers, was informed of what is happening to them.’

Each pair of eyes in the room was directed towards the largest of the screens as Claire Arden climbed into her car before it pulled away. Soon after, a voice informed her of her hijack. More Passengers’ stories followed, and all were similarly informed they were facing a death sentence. They reacted with a combination of disbelief, fear and confusion. Libby felt for all of them, but one more above the others. Him.

She absentmindedly twisted a silver ring around her finger over and over again until his clip finally began to play. The Hacker called him Jude, and when he replied, she listened intently to his voice. ‘Who is this and how did you get my number?’ he asked. It was the confirmation she needed and dreaded in equal measure.

It is you, she thought.