The stadium was filled with a thick, heavy silence of shock.
Every single eye was fixed on the finish line.
One moment, Julian Cross had been in the lead, a picture of arrogant, athletic perfection.
The next, a shimmering blur had rocketed past him.
That blur was now standing there, chest heaving slightly, looking like he'd just gone for a light jog.
Miles Vane.
Julian stood frozen a few feet behind him, his mouth hanging open, his face a perfect mask of utter disbelief.
He had lost.
He hadn't just lost; he had been publicly, spectacularly, and impossibly defeated.
Miles turned around slowly.
He ignored the gasps from the crowd and the whispers of the race officials.
He locked his gaze onto Julian.
Then, he held out his right hand, palm up.
It was a simple gesture.
Quiet. Unspoken. Devastating.
Pay up.
Julian's face showed a rush of different emotions in just seconds.
Shock.
Rage.
Humiliation.
And finally, a deep, burning hatred.
"You cheated," Julian hissed, his voice a low, venomous rasp that only Miles could hear.
Miles didn't even blink.
[ANALYSIS: SUBJECT 'JULIAN CROSS' IS CURRENTLY EXPERIENCING CATASTROPHIC EGO FAILURE.]
[PROBABILITY OF ATTEMPTING TO RENEGE ON WAGER: 68%.]
[RECOMMENDED ACTION: MAINTAIN NON-THREATENING POSTURE AND ALLOW PUBLIC PRESSURE TO ENFORCE THE AGREEMENT.]
In other words, just stand here and let him self-destruct, Miles thought. I can do that.
"I said, you cheated!" Julian repeated, louder this time, wanting the world to hear his accusation.
But the world wasn't listening to him in the way he wanted.
Whispers started to ripple through the stands, then through the athletes gathered nearby.
"Didn't two of Julian's guys follow him into the bathroom right before the race?"
"I saw them… they looked pretty angry."
"And what was that slick spot on Vane's lane? Looked like someone spilled oil or something."
He had been so sure of his plan, so confident in his power to manipulate the world around him.
He had never considered that people would actually talk about it.
That they would see through him.
His social armor had been cracked, and the whispers were the cold wind whistling through it.
He looked from the suspicious faces in the crowd to Miles's calm, waiting hand.
He was trapped.
Every second he delayed, his humiliation grew.
With a snarl that was more animal than human, Julian yanked out his phone.
His thumbs jabbed at the screen with furious, violent energy.
Miles's own phone buzzed in his pocket a moment later.
A notification from his banking app appeared on the screen.
[Payment Received: $1,000.00]
[Sender: Julian Cross]
[Note: You got lucky, freak.]
Miles lowered his hand.
He gave Julian a slow, deliberate nod.
It wasn't a thank you.
It was a confirmation.
A receipt.
Julian's face twisted into a mask of pure rage. He shoved past a race official, stomping off the track. "I'm out!" he yelled to no one in particular. "Pulled a hamstring! This whole competition is a joke anyway!"
He limped dramatically for three steps before forgetting and storming away normally, a final, pathetic performance that fooled no one.
Miles watched him go, a cold, empty satisfaction settling in his gut.
The rest of the decathlon was almost a blur.
With Julian gone, the only real competition had vanished.
Miles didn't have to push his system to its limits anymore.
He just had to be efficient.
During the long jump, the system fed him the precise angle and velocity for a jump that would beat the next best competitor by a mere six inches.
For the shot put, it was all about physics.
[SYSTEM RECOMMENDATION: APPLY 45-DEGREE LAUNCH ANGLE WITH 320 NEWTONS OF FORCE FOR OPTIMAL TRAJECTORY.]
Right, Miles thought, hefting the heavy metal ball in his hand. Or, you know, I could just chuck the heavy thing really, really hard.
He did, and it landed him in first place.
He won event after event, not with overwhelming, superhuman displays, but with precise, calculated perfection.
He did just enough to win.
It was less suspicious that way.
When the final scores were tallied, it wasn't even close.
Miles Vane, the invisible bookworm, was the Northwood Athletic Decathlon champion.
As he stood on the podium to receive the grand prize check, he felt a thousand eyes on him.
For the first time, he wasn't invisible.
He was an enigma. A question nobody knew how to ask.
The check was for one thousand dollars.
Added to Julian's wager, he now had two thousand dollars.
It wasn't a fortune, but it was a start. It was gear. It was resources. It was a war chest.
[NEW ASSETS ACQUIRED: $1,000.]
The system's voice was crisp and immediate in his mind.
[TOTAL LIQUID ASSETS: $2,000.]
[RECOMMEND IMMEDIATE TRANSFER TO A SECURE, DECENTRALIZED DIGITAL LEDGER TO PREVENT TRACKING OR SEIZURE.]
You mean a high tech piggy bank, Miles thought. Fine by me.
Later, in the noisy, steamy locker room that smelled of sweat and ointment, Miles changed out of his sports clothes.
He was trying to be quick.
He just wanted to get home.
"Well, look who it is."
He turned.
It was the two thugs from the bathroom.
Julian's friends.
The one with the buzzcut was leaning against the lockers, trying to look intimidating but mostly just looking sore. The other one, the one with the taser, was pointedly avoiding eye contact.
"You got lucky out there, Vane," Buzzcut grumbled, rubbing his bruised knuckles. "Real lucky."
Miles said nothing.
He just looked at them.
The system provided a quiet, unnecessary update.
[ANALYSIS: SUBJECT A EXHIBITS BRUISED METACARPALS AND ELEVATED CORTISOL LEVELS. SUBJECT B EXHIBITS A MILD WRIST SPRAIN AND A SUDDEN, INTENSE DESIRE TO BE ON A DIFFERENT CONTINENT.]
[CONFIRMATION OF PREVIOUS HOSTILE ENGAGEMENT: 100%.]
"Next time, you won't be so lucky," Buzzcut muttered, though his threat was as weak as wet paper towel. "We should've finished the job."
The other guy flinched, finally looking up at Miles with eyes full of a new, dawning fear. He had felt that unnatural strength. He knew this wasn't about luck.
Miles slowly pulled his hoodie on, carefully easing the sleeve over the arm that had, just a week ago, been broken.
He met Buzzcut's gaze.
"There won't be a next time," Miles said.
His voice was quiet.
It was level.
It was not a threat. It was a statement of fact.
The two of them seemed to shrink under his gaze.
They said nothing as Miles picked up his bag and walked out, leaving them in the silence of the locker room.
He thought he was in the clear, but as he exited the gym, a voice stopped him.
"Miles."
It was Clara.
She stood there, arms crossed, her expression a complex mixture of curiosity, admiration, and profound suspicion.
"That was… something," she said, her sharp eyes scanning him from head to toe.
"I got lucky," Miles replied, echoing the thug's pathetic excuse.
Clara let out a small, humorless laugh. "No. No, you didn't."
She took a step closer. "I've seen your academic records, Miles. I've seen your physical education grades from last semester. You were ranked near the bottom in every athletic evaluation."
She gestured back towards the stadium. "That was not the same person."
He remained silent, his mind racing.
[SECURITY PROTOCOL: INFORMATION DISCLOSURE TO NON-SYSTEM ENTITIES IS A HIGH-RISK ACTION. RECOMMEND EVASION TACTICS.]
Yeah, because that's been working out great so far.
"And your arm," she continued, her gaze dropping to his left arm. "The clumsy splint is gone. There's not even a bruise. Compound fractures don't just heal in a week."
"It wasn't as bad as it looked," he lied.
It was a weak lie, and they both knew it.
Just then, a student walking by stopped, his eyes wide. "Whoa, Vane! Did you see this?"
He held up his phone.
It was a video of the 100-meter dash, played in super slow-motion.
And there it was.
For a single, undeniable frame, Miles's body became a shimmering, transparent afterimage as he seemed to skip over the oil slick on the track.
The video looped, playing the impossible step again and again.
The comments below were a wildfire of speculation.
"CGI. Has to be."
"Nah, it's a camera glitch. A lens flare."
"Looks like a lag switch. Is this guy a hacker?"
Miles felt a cold dread creep up his spine.
This was exactly what he had feared.
Exposure.
He looked at Clara.
Her eyes were locked on the phone, but she wasn't looking at the video. She was looking at his reflection in the dark screen.
She had seen it in person. The video just confirmed what her own eyes had told her.
It was real.
She looked up from the phone, her gaze meeting his. Her expression was serious, her curiosity having hardened into a need for the truth.
"How?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper. "How did you do that?"
Miles looked into her perceptive, intelligent eyes.
He saw no fear. No mockery.
He only saw a direct, unwavering challenge to the wall of secrets he had built around himself.
The system screamed at him to lie, to deflect, to run.
But for the first time, he considered a different path.
He couldn't tell her the truth. Not yet. It was too dangerous for both of them.
But he couldn't lie to her either. Not anymore.
He owed her more than that.
He took a slow breath.
"Thank you," he said, his voice quiet but sincere. "For rooting for me."
He turned to walk away, leaving her standing there in the crowded hallway.
He took three steps before he stopped and looked back over his shoulder.
Clara was still watching him, a determined look on her face.
"When I can," Miles said, a promise hanging in the air between them. "I'll tell you everything."
He then turned and walked away, disappearing into the flow of the student body, leaving Clara alone with a slow-motion video of an impossible feat and a promise that felt more dangerous, and more important, than any secret.