SSS-Rank Corporate Predator System

The silence in the office was a living thing.

It was thick and heavy, punctuated only by the quiet, terrified sobs of the shop owner and the low hum of the computer monitor.

Miles stood in the middle of the room, surrounded by the damage he had caused.

Every breath was a fresh stab of pain.

His body was screaming at him.

Screaming to run.

To hide.

To curl up in a ball and wait for the world to go away.

But the mission wasn't over.

Leaving a trail of bodies was sloppy.

Leaving witnesses was stupid.

Leaving a digital footprint was suicide.

He looked at the computer on Spike's desk.

It was his last, and most important, loose end.

He walked over to it, his steps feeling heavy, his body protesting every movement.

The screen showed a half-finished game of online poker.

Pathetic.

"Alright, Captain Obvious," Miles muttered to the system in his head, his voice a low, pain-filled rasp. "I'm here. What's the plan? You want me to just hit delete on the history folder?"

[NEGATIVE,] the system replied, its tone as flat and emotionless as ever. [STANDARD DELETION PROTOCOLS ARE INSUFFICIENT.]

[A SOPHISTICATED FORENSIC ANALYSIS WOULD RECOVER THE DATA WITHIN HOURS.]

Well, that's just great, Miles thought. So I need to be a super-hacker now, too? Is there an app for that?

[INITIATING NEW SUB-ROUTINE,] the system announced, seemingly in response to his silent, sarcastic question.

[ACTIVATING: DATA GHOST PROTOCOL.]

A new icon, a stylized ghost phasing through a circuit board, appeared in his vision.

You have got to be kidding me, Miles thought, a wave of bleak humor washing over him. Data Ghost Protocol? Did my parents secretly write spy thrillers in their spare time?

What's next? The 'Shadow Ninja Disappearing Act'? The 'Super Secret Cover-Up Machine'?

He placed his good hand on the computer's mouse.

The moment he touched it, he felt a strange, tingling sensation run up his arm.

It wasn't painful.

It was like a low-voltage electrical current, a direct link between him and the machine.

The computer screen flickered, and then lines of code began to fly across it at a speed no human could possibly read.

[LINK ESTABLISHED,] the system said. [HOST MIND IS NOW INTERFACED WITH WAREHOUSE 7 LOCAL NETWORK.]

[COMMENCING DATA PURGE.]

He watched, fascinated and horrified, as the system went to work.

It was a digital predator, swift and merciless.

It found the warehouse's security server in less than a second.

The footage from the past hour didn't just get deleted.

It was meticulously overwritten with looped footage from the previous night, seamlessly blending the old with the new.

The moment of the power outage, his infiltration, the fight… it was all gone.

As far as the recordings were concerned, it had never happened.

[SECURITY FOOTAGE ALTERED,] the system reported.

Next, it attacked the building's entry logs.

The digital record of the front door being opened was wiped clean.

The system logs for the power failure were corrupted, rewritten to look like a simple, random surge from the city grid.

He was a ghost in the machine, erasing his own footprints.

But just erasing wasn't enough.

A vacuum creates suspicion.

He needed to create a story.

A plausible, believable lie that would send the police sniffing down a completely different rabbit hole.

[CREATING FALSE NARRATIVE,] the system said, already one step ahead of him. [SUBJECT: INTER-GANG CONFLICT.]

Miles watched as the system began to weave its web of lies.

It accessed the phones of the two dead thugs, which were still in their pockets.

It bypassed their screen locks with contemptuous ease.

Then, it started to write.

It fabricated a series of angry, threatening text messages between them and a number belonging to a known enforcer for a rival gang, the Diamondbacks.

The texts spoke of a secret meeting.

A deal for stolen military-grade hardware.

A double-cross.

It was a perfect, self-contained story of greed and betrayal.

[COMMUNICATION LOGS FABRICATED,] the system stated.

It moved back to Spike's computer.

It created a hidden file, buried deep in the operating system.

Inside, it planted a series of encrypted emails between Spike and a shell corporation, detailing a plan to sell Cross Corp secrets to the Diamondbacks.

It made Spike look like the ultimate traitor.

[FINANCIAL MISDIRECTION PLANTED.]

[PROBABILITY OF SUCCESSFUL NARRATIVE DECEPTION: 98.2%.]

Only 98.2%? Miles thought, a grim smile touching his lips. You're getting sloppy in your old age.

He was almost done.

The digital evidence was a masterpiece of misdirection.

But now he had to deal with the physical world.

He looked down at the bodies.

His work.

The system had no instructions for this part.

This was on him.

He had to make the scene match the story.

He forced his body to move, the pain in his shoulder now a constant, blinding roar.

He knelt beside the first thug, the one he had killed with the Phantom Edge.

The wound was a clean, thin line across his throat.

Too clean.

Too precise.

It wasn't the work of a common street thug.

He pulled the multi-tool from his pocket, his hand shaking, and opened the serrated knife blade.

This was going to be the hardest part.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and got to work, mutilating the wound to make it look messy, jagged, and brutal.

Like it had been made in a desperate, ugly knife fight.

He did the same to the other thug.

Each moment was an eternity of grim, bloody work.

He felt a wave of nausea roll through him, but he pushed it down.

This was the price of being a ghost.

Finally, he moved Spike's body, dragging it behind the desk to make it look like he had been trying to take cover when his own men turned on him.

The scene was set.

A deal gone wrong.

A bloody, internal betrayal.

It was a story the cops would understand.

A story they would believe.

He looked over at the shop owner, who was still staring at him, his eyes filled with a mixture of terror and awe.

The final loose end.

"You saw nothing," Miles said, his voice low and heavy.

"You were in the back, in the bathroom. You heard shouting. You hid until it was over."

The man nodded quickly, his eyes wide.

"You found them like this. You ran. You called the police."

Another quick nod.

"If you ever mention me, or what you really saw," Miles said, taking a step toward him, "I will know."

"And I will come back."

The threat was absolute.

It was a promise.

The man squeezed his eyes shut and nodded a final time, whispering, "I swear. I swear."

That was good enough.

Miles turned and left the office, leaving the man, the money, and the dead behind.

He slipped out of the warehouse, melting back into the thick, wet fog that clung to the docks.

He was a block away, a shadow moving through other shadows, when the first distant sound reached his ears.

A lonely, wailing siren.

It grew closer.

And closer.

Joined by another.

And another.

He looked back toward the warehouse, its dark shape now being painted in flashing strokes of red and blue light.

He had done it.

He had completed his first mission.

He had taken a life.

He had covered his tracks.

He was in agony.

He was alone.

But as he turned and limped away into the darkness, the sirens at his back, he felt a strange, chilling sense of peace.

He wasn't just a scared kid anymore.

He was Project Revenant.

And his war had just begun.