Lost Media Novels & Stories

The girl disappeared at exactly 8:17 p.m. on a quiet Thursday evening. Yet the first thing the world lost was not her body. It was her existence because before anyone realized she was missing, her photographs vanished from every social media account she had ever owned. Her school records became inaccessible. Her online purchases disappeared from retail databases. Her music playlists dissolved into empty folders. Even birthday messages posted years earlier returned an impossible error, as though they had never been written.

She wasn’t fooling anyone. Suddenly Moses’ expression changed. His fingers froze on the trackpad. “What’s wrong?” I asked, confusion spiking. He started stammering. “Actually, ma’am… the footage for that particular time on the 87th floor seems to be… missing.” “What?!” I yelled, rushing forward and pushing him gently aside so I could see the screen for myself. Sure enough, the files were gone and deleted. I cursed inwardly. “That bitch. Lila must have done this.”

But Kate’s too fired-up to notice. Glitch is a video livestreaming app that she downloaded to her laptop, because once she actually went through a wannabe-online-streamer phase. It’s technically a livestreaming service but she changed the settings so it auto-archives any broadcast or, basically, any game for later viewing. Or at least for 10 days before being deleted. With luck, her video archive wouldn’t be zero. {Please God, don’t let it be zero.}

Even with Mia standing right in front of her, there was no way to prove she was Mia. Mark looked crushed. "Do you still have her old phone?" Jessie asked. "Everything was lost in that fire," Mark said. He sounded defeated. "She used to go to the company a lot. I checked the facial-recognition system, but hers wasn't saved. The house had facial-recognition locks too. Those systems store backups in the cloud. Do you remember the login info?" Jessie pressed. Mark looked embarrassed. "She handled all that stuff. I never touched it. Even if backups existed, she probably wiped them."

Come on… Come on… It worked. The screen opened. I clicked into the archived folders. Scrolled until I found the security videos. The folder for 2019 was there—but the party date? Gone. Just missing. Someone had wiped it clean. My hand hovered over the mouse as I stared at the empty directory. A whole life. Gone. Erased like it never mattered. Like she never mattered. A sound behind me made my blood run cold. Footsteps. I yanked the flash drive out and spun around.

she said slowly. “I know.” “They dismantled it.” “I know.” She looked at me again. “This is worse than I thought.” I didn’t respond because there was nothing to add. She turned back to the screen, her fingers hovering slightly like she wanted to touch it but stopped herself. “Your backups?” she asked. “Gone.” “Cloud?” “Compromised.” “External storage?” “Encrypted.” She went silent. Kiara doesn't go silent unless something is serious. I leaned back slightly.

"This is related to my company too, you know? I got the news and came here to see the damage." He was right but I hadn't considered that. Before I could reply though, Leah came rushing and gave me the reports of damage. Apparently, every information regarding our joint companies was lost, including those of our upcoming project. The same project that Eva had worked so hard for. I shook my head a then remembered that I had taken special course for recovering lost data from server crash. I doubted that it was a server crash because there would still have been backup in that case. The loss of backup as well made me feel uneasy about the whole case but I decided to leave that for later. The most

I jump from folder to folder and growl in annoyance when the same error message continues to pop up over and over. Error 204: Deleted files cannot be retrieved once removed from the server. Growling in frustration, I stare at my screen and think. Someone must have gathered all the materials while I was distracted by Nolan and Chloe’s tasks. They either destroyed the files or removed them from the company database, but either way, I have no way to get them back. Suddenly, an idea pops into my mind. Pulling out my phone, I scroll through my contacts and click one of the newest names.

"This is related to my company too, you know? I got the news and came here to see the damage." He was right but I hadn't considered that. Before I could reply though, Leah came rushing and gave me the reports of damage. Apparently, every information regarding our joint companies was lost, including those of our upcoming project. The same project that Eva had worked so hard for. I shook my head a then remembered that I had taken special course for recovering lost data from server crash. I doubted that it was a server crash because there would still have been backup in that case. The loss of backup as well made me feel uneasy about the whole case but I decided to leave that for later. The most

I ask him as I walk over to where he's sitting and staring at the desktop in front of him, but the sight only confuses me more. "There are no records of the victims anywhere on the internet. The footage of the crime scene has disappeared, and also the photos we took at the scene," He releases the bombshell to me, and I squint my eyebrows confusingly because I don't seem to understand what he's saying. The last time I checked, the photos and videos were saved in the system for evidence, so how the hell did we lose everything?