Welcome to Gaia! ::

Another national store chain's database had been hacked this weekend - or, the breach in security had been discovered, or something? She wasn't too sure about how that stuff worked, but Claire had been asked to do a piece on cyber-security, so she'd started looking up local specialists in the field. Liam Noor was personable, photogenic, and had been amenable to the idea over the phone - though there'd been a weird sort of buzzing, or maybe it was a whine or whistle, or maybe it was static, whenever he'd spoken. She'd laughed and lightly suggested that he might want to get a new phone. He made no comment on that, but told her when he was available for the interview.

Fast forward a few days, and the tech crew was setting up the interview studio, carefully rearranging the furniture and fake plants to make the background Just So. Claire was sitting primly in an extra chair off the set, playing some game on her phone to pass the time, when the general murmur of the studio was interrupted by a new sound - one that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. It wasn't really creepy or scary, and it wasn't even very loud, but there was definitely something weird about it. She looked up to find the source of it - but was distracted by the arrival of her guest, whom she rose to greet.

"Thanks again for coming out for this interview, Mr. Noor," Claire said, extending her hand for a shake. "I hope the makeup team didn't give you a hard time?"

The noise continued as Mr. Noor spoke. Where was it coming from? What even was it? Was it something Liam had with him? Was it her own ears?

Shunting her questions to the back of her mind, Claire laughed at his joke with convincing professional cheer. "We're almost all ready here - the camera and sound crews just need to do a check with us on the stage before we begin. Make sure everything's pointing in the right direction," she added, covering one side of her mouth in mock secrecy.

(The guy manning the boom mic rolled his eyes somewhere in the background.)

Claire stepped onto the stage and gestured to one of the pristine leather armchairs on warmly decorated, if blandly neutral, set. "If you could just sit in the chair on the left, Mr. Noor, we'll run through some of the questions I'll be asking today."