Monday, 9:28 AM

Nitin was a frightened man. He wouldn't call himself a coward. In fact, he was among the bravest of the team. And yet, that morning he couldn't be more frightened than he was. And the reason for that was the TL. 

It was a special team assembled for the case, with Lt. Bently leading. The team consisted of ten of the brightest detectives and officers, who all fondly referred to Lt Bently as the TL, meaning Team Leader. The purpose of the special team was to discover evidence against Henshui, the fastest growing and most brutal gang lord. 

Nitin was the IT man for the team. They had infiltrated the gang, planted undercover cops, converted informers, and had been gathering information on Henshui. The operation was going successfully. Until that morning. That morning, when Nitin woke up, he found his system wiped clean. The backups were gone too. Everything they had collected over the past dozen weeks was gone. Henshui was once again as untouchable as ever. And that was what had Nitin so frightened, the fact that he had to tell this to the TL. 

"Lt Bently, I have some bad news," Nitin started hesitantly as he walked into Lt Bently's office. 

"I doubt it can get any worse than this Nitin," Bently replied, showing Nitin the screen of the desktop he was looking intently into. 

Nitin couldn't believe his eyes. He was looking at photographs of bodies. Bloody, and broken, bodies of the informers in the Henshui gang. He knew what Bently had on his mind, if they did this to the informers what would they do to the undercover cops?

"I only pray they don't know about the undercover cops," Bently said. 

"I am sorry Lt Bently, that is what I came to tell you about. Our systems were hacked and wiped clean. We lost everything. And we can safely assume they have it all."

"S**t Nitin. Is there any good news at all?" Bently asked, putting in great effort to not explode at Nitin. Nitin was not to blame, but he was the IT guy, he was supposed to protect them from such an attack. 

"I am sorry sir," Nitin apologised. 

"Pull back everyone," Bently screamed into the phone. He had been tense until then, but with Nitin's input he was sure of it. This was the worst case scenario. And right then, the most important thing was to pull back and manage their losses. He was afraid how many of the team would live through the day.