SSS-Rank Corporate Predator System

Julian held his wrist up, letting the holographic face of his new watch cast a swirling, cosmic glow on the faces of the bounty hunters around him.

He was the center of attention.

He was the sun, and they were just a collection of grimy, violent little planets orbiting his magnificence.

He loved this feeling.

"So, you see," he said, his voice dripping with the kind of smug satisfaction that could curdle milk.

"This isn't just a watch."

"It's a statement."

"It says that the Cross family is always one step ahead."

"Always."

Miles, listening from the diner, felt a wave of nausea.

"Oh, please," he thought, a grimace on his face.

"It's a statement, alright."

"It says, 'I have more money than sense and the fashion taste of a Bond villain's idiot son'."

The clone, however, was not just listening.

It was moving.

It picked up a tray from a nearby service station.

On the tray were two glasses of what looked like very expensive, very bubbly champagne.

It turned and began to walk toward Julian's booth.

Its steps were slow.

Calm.

Deliberate.

It was a predator, disguised as a servant.

Back in the diner, Clara was packing up her books.

"Okay," she said, stifling a yawn.

"I'm officially done with history for the night."

"If I have to read the words 'post-war reconstruction' one more time, my brain is going to melt out of my ears."

Miles nodded, his eyes slightly unfocused.

"Yeah," he said.

"Reconstruction can be tough."

He was trying to keep his two realities separate, but it was getting harder.

He could feel the soft, plush carpet of the nightclub under his clone's feet.

He could feel the cold, smooth glass of the champagne flutes in its hand.

The clone reached the edge of Julian's VIP area.

It navigated through the small crowd of hangers-on.

It was getting closer.

Julian was still monologuing, completely lost in his own reflection.

"For example," he was saying, tapping the watch with a theatrical flourish.

"Let's see the probability of me closing the big merger deal for my father next week."

He focused on the watch, his face a mask of intense, self-important concentration.

The holographic display swirled, and a number appeared in glowing, golden digits.

[92.4%]

Julian's smirk widened.

"See?" he said, as if he had just personally invented mathematics.

"Untouchable."

The clone was right behind him now.

It was in the perfect position.

It took a final, steadying step.

And then it "tripped."

It wasn't a real trip, of course.

It was a perfectly executed, almost balletic stumble.

The clone's body lurched forward, the tray tilting at an impossible angle.

The two glasses of champagne went flying.

But they didn't hit Julian.

That would be too messy.

Too obvious.

Instead, the clone, in its clumsy, desperate attempt to regain its balance, bumped its arm directly against Julian's.

Its hand, holding the now-empty tray, made sharp, solid contact with the spirit-tech watch on his wrist.

The contact lasted for less than half a second.

A brief, jarring impact.

But in that half-second, the clone unleashed a tiny, precise, and completely invisible burst of power.

[MICRO-PULSE BREAK: 2% POWER.]

It wasn't a punch.

It wasn't an attack.

It was a surgical strike.

A single, focused pulse of pure kinetic energy, no larger than a pinprick, aimed directly at the watch's delicate, hyper-advanced internal mechanisms.

There was no sound.

No flash of light.

Nothing.

The clone straightened up, a look of perfect, horrified apology on its masked face.

"Oh my gosh," it said, its voice a flawless imitation of a panicked, clumsy waiter.

"I am so sorry, sir."

"So, so sorry."

Julian, who had flinched away from the near-miss with the champagne, looked down at his arm.

He hadn't been hit.

He wasn't wet.

He was just annoyed.

"Watch where you're going, you idiot," he snarled, his good mood instantly evaporating.

He waved a dismissive hand.

"Get out of here before I have you fired."

He turned back to his audience, ready to continue his speech.

But then he noticed it.

The swirling, holographic galaxy on his watch had stopped swirling.

The glowing, golden numbers had faded.

The face was dark.

He stared at it, a confused frown on his face.

He tapped the screen.

Nothing.

He shook his wrist.

Still nothing.

A flicker of panic, of genuine, childish panic, flashed in his eyes.

"What?" he said, his voice a little shaky.

"It just… stopped."

One of the bounty hunters leaned in for a closer look.

"Maybe the battery died," he suggested.

"It doesn't have a battery, you moron," Julian snapped, his voice rising.

"It's powered by my own bio-signature!"

He started pressing the small, almost invisible buttons on the side of the watch.

Nothing happened.

The priceless, one-of-a-kind piece of technology, his father's gift, the symbol of his own untouchable status, was dead.

It was just a heavy, ugly, and ridiculously expensive bracelet.

A quiet snicker came from the edge of the booth.

Julian's head snapped up.

One of his own friends was trying, and failing, to hide a smile behind his hand.

Then another one snickered.

The bounty hunters weren't laughing.

They were just watching him, their expressions a mixture of pity and contempt.

They had seen his power.

And now they were seeing his weakness.

Julian's face began to burn.

He was being laughed at.

Again.

In his own club.

At his own party.

He looked around frantically, his eyes wild, searching for a target for his rage.

He looked for the clumsy waiter.

But the clone was gone.

It had offered a final, quiet, and deeply insincere apology, and then it had simply melted back into the crowd, a ghost disappearing into the shadows.

It had never been there at all.

Julian was left alone in the center of his VIP booth, a king with a broken toy, surrounded by the quiet, cutting sound of his own status crumbling to dust.

He stared at the dead watch on his wrist, his hands clenching into white-knuckled fists.

He didn't know how.

He didn't know why.

But he knew, with a certainty that burned like acid in his gut, that this was somehow, some way, the ghost's fault.

And he was going to take it out on him.