Chapter 239: Leak Dilemma
<🎧 Song Recommendation: ’Bout It - Instrumental by JMSN>
...
Von’s thumb hovered over the glowing screen of Emily’s phone. He slowly scrolled down the post, his eyes locking onto an embedded audio file attached near the bottom of the thread.
He tapped play and a very familiar sound was heard.
It was the track!
He had worked on this exact song with Patch back in Miami during the H-19 lockdown period.
They had engineered three experimental songs during those isolated studio sessions, but while the other two had already been released, Von had deliberately kept this third song hidden in his vault.
He had saved it specifically to serve as his surprise premiere during the opening night of his North American tour.
Now hearing the finished master playing off an anonymous social media feed, a strange numbness washed over him.
Only a tiny, tightly controlled circle of people working on the tour had access to that unreleased audio file.
’Someone in my circle leaked this,’ Von realized grimly, knowing he couldn’t trust anyone any longer.
His thumb swiped down further. Below the track was a secondary link. Von tapped it and a video popped up.
It was a recording showing Kiana’s dance crew running through the complete, step-by-step opening choreography.
Von pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead, facepalming in anger. The entire element of surprise for his debut tour had been gutted in minutes.
Right then, Emily’s phone vibrated in his hand. The caller ID showed Zack.
Von looked at Emily for approval. She gave him a nod and Von swiped to accept the call and brought the phone to his ear.
"Hey, Emily... Did you see what happened?" Zack’s voice burst through the speaker. "Von’s track got leaked, the tour details too! I’m calling Von, but his number isn’t going through—"
"I know, Zack," Von said quietly. "I’m on Emily’s phone."
There was a pause on the line as Zack caught his breath, startled.
"Von?!" Zack shouted, his tone shifting instantly from panic to sharp interrogation.
"How did you let this happen?! The unreleased master and the rehearsal footage are everywhere! Do you have any idea how much this mess ruins our momentum?!"
Von had no defense to offer. He could only manage a wry smile.
"I know, Zack. If I’d known, I would’ve done a better job in keeping it secret."
Zack let out a breath over the line, forcing his anger down. Scolding Von wasn’t going to pull the files off the internet.
"Look... okay," Zack said, forcing himself to stay practical. "What’s the way forward? Do you have a plan?"
Von thought for a beat, staring out over the arena floor. "I don’t have one right now. I’m going to consult the others upstairs and see what we can pull out of this."
"Okay, that’s fine," Zack said. "In the meantime, I’ll handle what’s out already. I’ll focus on bringing the links down and getting our legal team to fire off DMCA takedowns."
"Thanks, Zack," Von said, and hung up.
Only Von had heard the conversation, but down on the floor, the mood had already shifted drastically. The music had stopped. Dancers, technicians, and crew members were pulling out their phones, whispering and murmuring as the news swept through the arena.
Von clapped his hands together to draw everyone’s attention back to him.
"David, Emily, Max, Tobias, Kiana... Let’s meet upstairs," Von announced.
Von headed for the elevators first. Emily and Max fell into step right behind him. Down below, David, Tobias, and Kiana quickly assigned basic cool-down stretches to the unsettled dancers before following them to the top floor.
Inside the conference room upstairs, Max was pacing back and forth across the floor like a nervous wreck.
For once, his goofy grin was gone. His expression was serious, though his anxious pacing was still distracting.
"Who leaked it?!" Max blurted out, turning to Von. "How did anyone even get a finished master audio file?! Was it a cloud breach? Did someone hack the network?"
Emily was sitting at the head of the table, looking up from her laptop as she tried to find a silver lining. "On the positive side, whoever did this didn’t leak anything from the PARADOX collection. The fashion line materials are completely clear."
Von stood near the window, his hand on his chin in a deep, thinking expression. "Or maybe they figured leaking the cloth designs will cause more good than harm to the collection."
Emily paused, realization hitting her face. "Oh..."
Before anyone else could speak, the glass door opened. Kiana, David, and Tobias walked inside and shut the door behind them.
Von turned away from the window. "David, you’re the experienced one here. What’s the situation like?"
Everyone turned to the man coordinating the entire tour. David remained impressively calm, pulling out a chair and sitting down flatly.
"Facts first," David said. "Everything you saw is real. I’ve checked it myself. Your plans and music are out there for everyone to see."
He rested his hands on the table and looked at the group. "Second thing, and I want everybody to hear this clearly: This did not come from a fan. It didn’t come from the venue staff. Every person with access to that material signed a strict NDA a few days ago. All of you signed it."
"So somebody in our circle did this. That’s a massive lawsuit and a ruined career, and they did it anyway. Which tells me they were paid enough not to care."
"Do we know who?" Kiana asked.
"No," David replied.
"Then what? We just keep working next to them?"
"For now, yeah," David said. "Because that’s a lawyer’s problem, and it doesn’t help us on Friday."
Kiana dropped back into her chair and let out a frustrated sigh. "My crew’s had seven days of practice for this, and now the whole routine is on the internet."
It wasn’t just her; everyone in the room felt the sting of the situation, especially given the grueling effort they had put into fast-tracking the production.
David looked at Von, getting a silent nod from the quiet artist to keep going.
"Let’s be clear about what we actually lost," David continued. "Because it’s not the setlist. Nobody cares about the setlist. Half of it was guessable anyway, and the other half doesn’t matter."
He held up a finger. "One. The song. A finished master is out. Every stream those illegal rips get is a stream Von never sees and a chart position he never gets. Two. The reveal. You’ve all watched what that moment does in an arena. It only works once."
Emily suddenly cut in, glaring across the table with narrowed eyes. "David, you’re going around in circles to waste time without making a single valid point. What are our actual options?"
Kiana and Tobias were taken aback by her snappy tone. But anyone who truly knew Emily understood that beneath her recent soft demeanor, her sharp, uncompromising edge had never left.
David offered a brief, polite apology. "Fair enough. You all might have your own ideas, but these are our options right now. I’ve got three, and I don’t love any of them."
He held up his index finger. "Option One. We postpone. Push opening night back a week, eat the cost of the venue, the crew, and the refunds. Somewhere north of one million dollars, and we walk into this tour looking wounded."
Von vehemently shook his head. He knew how hard it had been to secure that five-million-dollar budget from Vanguard’s board; cutting it by twenty percent and showing weakness before day one was something he could never accept.
"Option Two," David said, holding up a second finger. "We do nothing. Run the show exactly as built. The song’s out, the reveal’s out, so we go Friday and bet the show’s strong enough that people don’t care they saw it early." He shrugged lightly. "That’s the professional answer. The show is strong enough."
Von hummed thoughtfully under his breath. "You mentioned having three options. What’s the third one?"
"Three," David said. "We go legal. Your lawyers file everything, chase takedowns, subpoena the host. It’s the right thing eventually, but it does absolutely nothing for us in forty-eight hours."
Von let out a quiet sigh, rubbing his temple. The third option was completely redundant, Zack was already on track doing that exact job.
David saw how disappointed Von looked and offered a brief word of comfort. "It’s unfortunate, but we don’t have much of a choice."
The room fell quiet. Max looked over at Von, breaking the silence. "So... will you take the second option then?"
Von stayed silent for a long moment, staring at the polished surface of the table. He looked up at Emily, then turned his gaze back to David.
"Nah," Von said coldly. "I’m not interested in any of your options. We’ll be taking the fourth route. Mine."
Every single person in the room straightened up, their attention instantly locked onto Von after seeing how serious he looked.