Chapter One

Cathy was almost through the gates of Elite Academy when laughter and a voice broke out behind her.

“Hey, Pussy Cat!”

She kept walking. Her fingers tightened around the strap of her worn backpack. She knew that voice. It was Alex Vance.

“Hey! I called you!”

Cathy didn't turn around. Her shoes carried her faster toward the gate, but footsteps pounded behind her until Alex caught up and stepped in front of her, forcing her to stop.

“I called you. Why are you snubbing me?”

Cathy lowered her eyes. “My name isn't Pussy Cat. My name is Cathy.”

For a second, he stared at her. Then he burst out laughing, and his friends immediately joined him.

“What?” Cathy asked.

Alex brought out his handkerchief and wiped his face. “Cathy?” More laughter followed. He pointed at her and asked, “What's the difference between Cathy and Cat?” His friends laughed even harder.

Cathy's cheeks burned. She tried to step around him, but Alex moved with her.

“Look at you.” his eyes traveled over her uniform. “Your shirt is wrinkled. Your skirt is dirty. And that backpack…” He grabbed the strap and gave it a mocking tug. “Did you find this thing in a trash can?”

Cathy yanked it back. “Leave me alone.”

Alex laughed. “You're so sensitive.” One of his friends snickered. Alex leaned closer. “You can go home now. Go and meet your good-for-nothing parents.”

Cathy froze.

His smile widened. “Maybe they'll finally buy you a decent uniform.”

The laughter behind him grew louder. Cathy's eyes stung. She refused to let them see her cry, so she pushed past him.

“Cathy!”

She didn't stop. “Run home, Pussy Cat!”

The laughter followed her through the gates. Cathy walked faster. By the time she reached the end of the street, her vision had blurred. A tear slipped down her cheek. She wiped it away, and another followed. She wiped that one too, but the moment she turned onto a quieter road, she couldn't hold it anymore.

Cathy covered her mouth and cried. Not because Alex had mocked her backpack, or even because of her uniform. It was what he had said about her parents. Her parents had never stopped caring about her. Her father was sick, her mother spent every day caring for him, and neither of them had enough money to change their situation. Cathy lowered her hand and took a shaky breath. She couldn't tell her mother what had happened; her mother already carried enough. So Cathy wiped her face, adjusted her backpack, and continued home.

Hours later, she finally pushed open the door of their cramped apartment. Her mother stood in the narrow hallway, a damp washcloth in her hand.

“You're back late, Cathy.”

Cathy glanced toward the faded floral curtain dividing the room. “How is Papa?”

“He had a restless afternoon,” her mother's voice softening. “He ate some broth.”

Cathy nodded. “Let me see him.”

She pushed through the curtain. Her father lay beneath a thin blanket, his face pale against the pillow. He breathed in shallow, uneven wheezes. Cathy sat beside him and took his cold hand. “Papa?” His eyelids fluttered.

Behind her, her mother entered quietly, her eyes moving to the medicine bottles on the bedside table.

“His drugs will finish in three days,” she whispered.

Cathy looked at the bottles. Three days.

Her mother swallowed. “I don't know how we'll afford the refill.”

Cathy looked back at her father. “My cybersecurity contract pays tomorrow. We'll get the medicine.” She squeezed her father's hand. “Don't worry, Mama.”

She didn't tell her mother about Alex. She didn't tell her about the laughter. She didn't tell her about the tears. Instead, she stood and walked toward the battered computer sitting on a crooked wooden crate.

Her mother watched her. “Cathy, you need to rest.”

“I'll work for a little while.”

She pulled out the mismatched chair and sat. Her fingers hovered over the blank keyboard before she pressed the power switch.

Whirrrrr.

The fans roared to life, and emerald light flooded her face. Her eyes hardened. The girl who had just been mocked at the school gates disappeared behind the glow of the screen.

Her fingers began moving. Three security layers vanished beneath her commands. A biometric gate flashed—bypassed. A satellite relay opened—redirected. One proxy became three, and three became seven: Frankfurt, Singapore, and then a darknet server cluster.

The screen filled with moving data. Cathy leaned closer. And then the company's name appeared: GARRISON INDUSTRIES.

Her fingers stopped. She stared at the screen. A billion-dollar corporate network unfolded before her, revealing financial systems, security grids, and executive communications. Her eyes moved across the architecture. There. A weakness.

Cathy leaned back. One command could lock the administrators out. Another could expose confidential files. Her finger settled above Enter.

Then she remembered the medicine bottles beside her father's bed. Three days. Her contract paid tomorrow. If she compromised Garrison Industries, the company's security response could freeze contractor payments for sixty days. Sixty days without her income. Her father's oxygen supply wouldn't last that long.

Cathy slowly lifted her finger. A bitter smile touched her lips. “Not today.”

She closed the corporate directory and opened the firewall patching interface. Her fingers moved again—fast, precise, relentless.

Outside that screen, she was the poor girl Alex Vance had laughed at. Inside it, she was the Tech Genius hiding under the page name Mirage, without her real name.