The recording played.
The once-tense courtroom fell into an eerie silence. The footage showed Ratna being arrested without a warrant, forcefully handcuffed, and shoved into a dark vehicle without any official markings. The faces of her captors were hidden, but one of them wore a watch that the public quickly recognized—worn by the aide of a high-ranking official.
A gasp echoed from the back. A mother wept. A journalist ran out to call the newsroom.
The judge remained silent for a long time. Prosecutor Mahendra didn't flinch.
Sekar wrote down every reaction. Ari stood still, but inside, he knew: from this moment forward, he wasn't just defending Ratna—he had declared war on a power structure greater than anything he'd ever faced.
Three hours after court, Ari's office was attacked with stones. The wall was spray-painted: "Stop playing hero!"
He knew it was a warning. But he also knew: silence was no longer an option.
The next morning, Ari received a summons from the Bar's Ethics Committee. The charge: "Violating professional conduct by interfering in an ongoing case." All he did was speak the truth.
On national television, the narrative shifted. The anchor read:
"Who is Ari Pratomo, really?A lawyer—or a political provocateur?
Sources suggest he may be receiving funds from anti-government groups."
Sekar threw the remote across the floor.
"I'm sick of watching them twist everything!" she shouted.
Ari said nothing. His eyes were locked on his laptop. He reopened Bungas's evidence folder—searching for cracks, names, weak points.
Then he found it. A document, incomplete but enough to ignite something:
Contract for forged fingerprint tech procurement
Signed by someone on the court oversight board.
Ari smiled faintly. "If they think I'll back down… they haven't figured out who they're dealing with."
This wasn't about Ratna anymore.It wasn't even about Ari.It was about a nation silenced by laws bought and sold.
And now, one of them finally stood up to fight.
That night, the courthouse looked normal: dark, quiet, guarded by two security officers watching a soap opera in the front booth.
But from the shadows of the back parking lot, two figures approached cautiously—Ari and Sekar.
They were dressed as janitors. In Sekar's hand was a fake cleaning bottle—inside it, a fingerprint bypass device, courtesy of Bungas.
"If we get caught, we'll be charged with attempting to sabotage the state," Sekar whispered.
"If we don't try, the evidence disappears forever," Ari replied firmly.
They slipped through an emergency corridor, heading downstairs to where the courthouse's main server room was hidden. At the end of the hallway stood a steel door with a blinking red security scanner.
Sekar pulled out the device, pressed it to the scanner. The red light turned green.
BEEP. Access granted.
The door slid open.
A blast of cold air from the industrial AC greeted them. The server racks buzzed loudly. In the corner, a monitor was still on—displaying court access logs, and a list of names who had illegally deleted evidence over the past few weeks.
Ari quickly snapped photos of the screen.
Then he noticed a hidden folder in the system:Classified_SID_Ratna/Overrule/Hidden.exe
Before he could open it, a small alarm began blinking. Someone had detected their presence.
"GET THE HARD DRIVE, SEKAR!" Ari shouted.
Sekar yanked the external cable from the main server. Within 15 seconds, the room lit up in red. Sirens wailed.
Footsteps echoed down the hallway.
Ari and Sekar bolted through a rear corridor, carrying the hard drive and a handful of auto-printed documents.
Just before the lockdown doors shut, Ari kicked them open and the two slipped through, escaping into a narrow service alley known only to longtime staff.
They made it out.
But they were no longer defenders of truth—They were now fugitives.
Elsewhere, a high-ranking official stared at a security feed.
"Bungas was clever," he murmured. "But this kid…"
He rotated the screen to show the faces of Ari and Sekar.
"…it's time they learned: truth always comes with a price."
It was deep into the night. Ari and Sekar hid inside an abandoned house that once belonged to Ari's late law professor. Only one oil lamp lit the room. Two creaky chairs. A pile of documents scattered across the floor.
The hard drive sat between them—silent, yet heavy like a time bomb.
Sekar hugged her knees. Her hands trembled—not from fear, but from the weight of held-back rage.
"If we get arrested tomorrow… was all this for nothing?" she whispered.
Ari looked at her, then replied softly, "If we stay silent… that's what would've been for nothing."
He took a pen and scribbled something on a torn piece of paper:
"If I don't get the chance to speak at the next trial,please deliver this.Not for me. But for those who've disappeared…and were never heard."
Sekar read it. Then nodded.
That night, in a crumbling, quiet house, they didn't feel alone.Because sometimes… the most righteous fightsare the loneliest ones.
And in that silence, a revolution quietly began.