Please Hold

(DISCLAIMER:) So, this story is one of my experiments. What may I be experimenting with you ask? Well the answer to that is Cryptography and the Caesar Cipher. Yes, you heard me right. In a few places scattered throughout the story are some cleverly hidden Coded messages, and within a few are coordinates to specific places. Now here’s what I am proposing: If anybody can decode at least two or three of them, I will promote your page and any stories you release on my Profile for two weeks, and you get a special spot on my page with a special title just for solving them. You’ll know them when you see them. The Key Value to the Cryptographed messages is 10, for each numbered message; there is a letter of the alphabet that corresponds to each number. But be careful, not all number sequences in the story are hidden messages. LET THE GAMES BEGIN!!!

 

It was midnight.

I had just finished working an eight hour shift at work, and I only had one break since that’s all my shitty boss would allow. Today ended like any other day. The same things happened, nothing changed, and my job was still shit. But.. maybe it wasn’t my job that was shit. Maybe it was just my life. I mean, ever since she left me everything seemed so dull. She brought the brightness into life… but fuck her. If she still wanted to be with me she shouldn’t have cheated on me with my god damn brother of all people. I hate him now too. Ah whatever that don’t matter anymore, I just got off my shift and all I care about is driving home and getting to bed.

So that’s exactly what I did.

I went to the break room to retrieve my stuff out of my locker, then left out the back and hopped into my car.

About ten minutes later I was back at the house. I grabbed my stuff from the backseat and went in. After showering up I decided that I would stay up a bit later since I didn’t have to go back to work tomorrow. I sat down on the couch and flipped on the television. AMC was my go to channel at this time of the year mainly because they were showing the new Walking Dead episodes. So, I decided to watch maybe two or three episodes. But then two or three turned into four. Then five. Before I knew it I was out like a light.

* BEEP* *BEEP* *BEEP*

The sound of my pre-set phone alarm woke me up. I reluctantly grabbed my phone and hit the “Cancel” button. The one day I don’t need to be up this early and my phone goes off.. Jesus christ. I rolled over onto my other side and looked at the TV. Fuck.. something was wrong with the cable. On the TV screen there was a bright Green background with some white text on it. Seeing as I had just woken up and was still groggy I could barely make out what it was saying. So I sat myself upright and rubbed my eyes hoping it would clear my vision just a little. leaning in a little bit closer did just the trick. The message read out:

“''NO CONNECTION. PLEASE CONTACT (882)669-3493 FOR ASSISTANCE (334) zvokco ryvn zvokco ryvn zvokco ryvn// zvokco... dro gyynzomuob sc cdsvv sx oppomd lbkmo pyb sxmywsxq wocckqoc''”

Ugh, I hate calling support centers for anything. They leave you waiting for ages and you never get a direct answer, but hell, I need to watch my Walking Dead. I unlocked my Phone and dialed the number into the keypad.

''“Ring, ring, ring… Hello! You have reached the hotline for: CABLE X, THE WORLD’S LEADING CABLE COMPANY! Please hold while we connect you to one of our many helpful employees!”''

The automated message cut off abruptly and was replaced with an upbeat version of some pop song I’d never heard before. Strange.. but kinda catchy. Since this process usually takes a while, I sauntered over to the bathroom to take a wizz. I left my phone on the coffee table on speaker mode just so I could hear if I got connected. Well, by the time I finished washing my hands I was connected. Or so I thought? The music would stop for about a second and I heard an automated voice spit out a number every time the music stopped. All I managed to get out of the first one was 5, nothing else. So having nothing else to do I decided to wait and see if the phenomenon would happen again. I didn’t even question the fact WHY there were numbers being repeated, but then again maybe it was signalling that it was trying to connect to some point. After about maybe fifteen more minutes, it started up again. But this time it was a different voice.''' '''

A British female sounding voice read out these numbers:

“6-14-0-7-4-0-3--19-7-4-18-14-20-19-7--22-8-11-11--17-8-18-4--0-6-0-8-13--3-14-13-19--22-14-17-17-24--18-19-0-24--5-14-2-20-18-4-3--13-20-12-1-4-17--5-14-17-24--4-2-7-14--3-4-11-19-0”

Uh.. okay. What is going on here? And why the hell are there so many numbers?.. I got cut off as I got connected to somebody.

“Hello, CABLE X Help hotline, how may I help you?”

Oh thank the lord, finally someone real. ''“Hi, yes my cable.. Uh I dunno isn’t working. My TV is  showing a green screen and instructions telling me to call this number? How do I fix this?”''

“Sir, please hold as I switch you to the next department over”

“NO NO NO Please don’t!!!” *CLICK*

And that damn music started playing out once again. I slumped back down onto the couch in defeat. Now I’d have to wait another 30 minutes to even hear anything from someone. Why not get breakfast while I’m at it then? I stood up and walked over to the kitchen, once again placing my phone on speaker mode. I opened the kitchen pantry and grabbed the cereal, then proceeded to pour a generous amount into my bowl. I topped it all off with some Milk and went to sit back down on the couch. To get rid of the boredom that loomed around, I grabbed my tablet from the TV stand and went onto FaceBook. I scrolled through my feed and saw nothing of interest really. A bunch of LGBT posts and some Minion text posts (Which are always annoying), and a couple crazy Religion posts shared by some crazy religious “friends” I went to High School with.  

*BEEP**BEEP*  46°48’26″N, 32°13’12″E 17-4-18-15-14-13-3--17-4-18-15-14-13-3”“

What seemed like a set of coordinates was accompanied by another string of numbers. This time they were the same sequence.

''“39.0364° N, 125.7306° E  (332) huifedt huifedt cuuj qj jxu hyiydw ceed jxu xekiu, hucucruh jxu rkybtydw? ryw wbqii”''

Things were getting absolutely fucking weird now. What are these people saying.. WHO ARE THEY? In frustration I picked up the phone and proceeded to yell through it just to see if I could get a response.

“''Who’s there? Hello?! Who are you?”''

“yj yi jxu deed ev dksbuqh tuijhksjyed fbuqiu huifedt fbuqiu huifedt (+89+)”

That was the only response I got. Getting frustrated, I hung up. That was it I was switching from this stupid cable company to a reliable one. Shame on me for getting the cheapest one right? I shut off the TV and put my phone into my pocket. I glanced at the clock on the wall and saw that it was nearly 10:00 in the morning. I figured the stores would be open now so I decided to get into my car and go buy a new cable box.A couple minutes later I pulled into the parking lot at the nearest Best Buy and went in to purchase a new cable box. After getting some advice from an employee and considering price ranges, I went with the $350 dollar brand new cable box which was “Guaranteed” to work or my money back. So I payed for it, exited the shop and got back into my car. I pulled up in my driveway and practically ran to the back door because I was so excited to set it up. As soon as I stepped in the door though I got a call on my cell phone. I picked it out of my pocket and read the number that was displayed across the screen: (989) 453-6692. The number seemed very odd but I accepted it anyways.

“Hello?”

“..*static*..Please Hold Please Hold Please Hold (67+) fbuqiu xebt fbuqiu xebt fbuqiu xebt fbuqiu xebt fbuqiu xebt fbuqiu xebt ECHO X-RAY WOODPECKER EFFECTIVE… *CLICK*”

What the hell was going on? ...No way. The TV was on.

There was only one thing being displayed on the screen

“Please Hold"

~KingoftheUnderground669