Reboot: Mechanic

Vanessa, her eyes fixed on her clone's movements on the screen, was puzzled by Shi Tian's remark. She hadn't intentionally moved her clone closer to his; in fact, she was trying to keep her distance to create effective diversions.

As she continued to manipulate her clone with the arrow keys, she furrowed her brow in concentration. "I'm not trying to get us killed, Nathan. It's like my clone is drifting on its own."

Shi Tian frowned, glancing at her screen. It was indeed peculiar. Vanessa's clone was acting as if it had a mind of its own, veering closer to Shi Tian's avatar despite her efforts to the contrary.

Mary, still busy fending off the cybersecurity bots, couldn't divert her attention to this unexpected development. 

The situation was growing increasingly tense, and any distraction could lead to a catastrophic failure of their mission.

Shi Tian, realizing that this anomaly might jeopardize their operation, tried to maneuver his own clone to create more space between them and Vanessa's rogue clone. 

However, it seemed like the closer they got, the more they were drawn together, almost as if some invisible force were at play.

"This is weird," Shi Tian muttered, his fingers dancing across the keyboard as he attempted to regain control of his clone. But no matter how he directed his avatar, Vanessa's clone kept inching closer.

Amid this digital chaos, Mary finally managed to fend off the cybersecurity bots and had almost completed the mission. She was about to leak the vital information they needed when she noticed the strange behavior of Vanessa's clone.

"Vanessa, something's not right with your clone!" Mary exclaimed, her attention divided between the screen and Vanessa. "It's like it's being pulled toward us."

Vanessa was equally perplexed. She tried desperately to regain control of her clone, but it seemed to have a mind of its own, defying her commands.

As the avatars continued to converge, the invisible force seemed to grow stronger, making it impossible for Vanessa or Shi Tian to control their clones effectively.

Realizing the predicament they were in, Shi Tian took a deep breath as he made a completely unexpected decision. 

Without any warning at all, Shi Tian controlled his avatar and moved toward Vanessa, dumbfounding her. 

They were trying their best to get away from each other, so why would Shi Tian suddenly move closer to them, the complete opposite of their objective.

Vanessa was unable to figure out Shi Tian's intention. However, it didn't take long for her to realize his intention. 

"Goodbye to your clone, Vanessa." Shi Tian flat-out said, aiming at Vanessa's "V" clone and firing at it. 

"What are you doing?" Vanessa was stunned– to the point that she stood up from her chair and grabbed her forehead with her two hands, seemingly in disbelief. 

Her eyes were fixated on the screen in which Shi Tian had committed a team kill on her clone. 

The moment Vanessa's clone or supposed avatar was killed by Shi Tian, the invisible force that seemed to be attaching them closer, vanished completely. 

It was as if the magnetic force didn't exist in the first place that forcefully dragged them closer. 

"H-H-Huh??" Vanessa was astonished, seemingly confused by the development.

"Are you alright there, Nathan?" Mary, who was still focused on her screen, heard the outburst from their side.

She didn't hear much but was curious if they were struggling. 

"Yeah, we're alright, Mary. Just focus on your task and don't get distracted." Shi Tian responded swiftly, not wanting Mary to be distracted and lose focus because of their mess. 

Mary nodded her head, not planning on responding any further. She was close to the finish line in the final security breach, so she could not afford any distraction.

Meanwhile, Shi Tian glared at Vanessa and whispered to her, "Sit back down and don't make any noises. You've caused enough trouble already." 

Although feeling wronged, Vanessa didn't dare to make any sound and quietly sat back down, almost as if she were a little girl who had just been scolded. 

While this was occurring, back in the other party, in a room labeled Cyber Security Team, a man was slamming his palm at the desk in disbelief.

"Damn it, they caught on quick!" A man cursed in anger. 

"Hmph, I've told you to kamikaze them both already, but you refused to. Now look at the great result you were looking for. We lost control of their clone and can only rely on the cybersecurity bots now. If Brad knows about this, you're taking all the blame." Another man that was standing behind him said, shifting all the blame at him.

"Shut up! I controlled it perfectly fine, but you intervened with the integrated force, causing them to realize something was wrong. The fault is yours!"

"No, it was your fault for refusing to shoot the other clone down. And it's still your fault to only be able to infiltrate and hack into the useless clone and not the other one." 

"Shut up, that other clone mechanics can be seen. Does it look like I even have a chance at all? The cybersecurity bots can't even touch it at all, almost as if it was installed with scripting, allowing them to know when and where our cybersecurity bots were going to attack!" 

"Then what do you suggest we do? We lost all vision on the main hacker component and only these clones might give us a hint. But now we lost the clone that we were able to somewhat manipulate, and only this scripting clone." 

The man was silent, clearly not having a single clue. He had tried to manually control one of the cybersecurity bots to attack Shi Tian's clone.

However, the result was clear and he was even worse than the not manually controlling ones. 

Rubbing his temples, the man could only resign his fate and admit defeat. 

The firewalls that he put up to block the movement of the clone ended up in shambles, and he was utterly helpless now.

"Tell Brad that the only solution is to shut down the system. Otherwise, there's no other way to salvage this situation." The man placed his head down on the desk, seemingly giving up on life.