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Mirage had a curious smile on her pretty face, as if she was debating interally about whether or not she should actually some something about this matter. Ultimately, after several moments of silence, she sighed heavily and chugged her beer in a matter of seconds, as Erich had witnessed her do several times before. Once she was done, she told Erich what he wanted to know.

"Alright, you remember how I told you before that I was once what the IIS refers to as being a Watcher? Essentially, what this means is that I was born and bred to spy on the citizens of the Empire via the grid, and their NeuroLink systems.

I\'m going to be frank with you, there is a very small percentage of the population who knows this, so what I\'m about to share with you does not leave this room. But, essentially, everything you do in life is recorded, and stored in your NeuroLink, literally everything.

That\'s how it was so easy for me to find out about your little secret. By the way, I must say, you have an impressive physique for a man who was genetically modified at birth to be an ideal starfighter pilot, and not something like say a Star Marine….

Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that a really good Watcher, such as myself, is entirely capable of accessing that data storage. And believe it or not, I can do so much more. I\'m talking about everything from managing your vitals to controlling your actual memories.

Hell, I even have the ability to manipulate the biological functions of your body. If I really wanted to, I could slice into your NeuroLink, and make you cream your pants right now. Not that I would actually do that.

So for someone like me, it was incredibly easy to slice into Specter\'s NeuroLink and disrupt the cloning signal from reaching its targeted destination. All that was left was for someone who is more capable of violence than I am to take him out. Which is where you came in."

Erich looked in horror at the beautiful mutant woman who was smiling at him, as if the incredibly daunting news she had just told him was the most natural thing on the planet. He was amazed that someone with her abilities even existed and, as a result, was filled with so many questions, the first of which he could not help but ask.

"So you are telling me that Imperial Intelligence just let someone as valuable as you slip from their fingers and enter the criminal underworld?"

Mirage scoffed at this remark before chugging another beer, where she immediately correcting Erich on his error.

"Of course not! Do you have any idea how difficult it was for me to flee from the clutches of the IIS? I was literally a slave, forced to do the bidding of the party, and spy on the citizens of the Empire all day, every day.

Do you know how many people were punished for stupid shit because of my abilities? No, I had to fake my death and run away, which was not an easy task to pull off. Luckily, Butcher found me while I was all alone and hiding in some distant corner of the Empire. If it weren\'t for him, I\'d be dead by now…

Now I only spy on outlaws like yourself. And occasionally on a few celebrities I follow. You would not believe who has a crush on you, even if she is not willing to admit it yet."

Erich neither knew nor cared who Mirage was referring to, and instead asked a far more important question that he had on his mind.

"So if the IIS has more people like you, then you\'re telling me that they could very easily find out about all the illegal shit I have been doing… If that\'s the case, then why aren\'t I already on the chopping block?"

Once more Mirage scoffed as she looked at Erich as if he were a bit full of himself before responding to the man in a conceited tone.

"Look at you, you manage to pull off three successful jobs in the underworld, and now you think you\'re some kind of bigshot! Kid, they have much bigger fish to fry. In fact, I would not be surprised if a small time thug like you hasn\'t even managed to appear on their radar yet. Which, by the way, let me fix that for you."

After saying this, Mirage leaned in and kissed Erich, which greatly startled the man. He tried to pull himself away, but found that the woman had latched onto the back of his head quite tightly. She continued to kiss Erich for several seconds, and quite passionately at that before releasing him, where she then wiped the saliva from her lips before licking it in an incredibly seductive gesture. After doing so, she made a particularly suggestive comment in order to put the bewildered man at ease.

"Damn, that little succubus of yours is quite the lucky woman…. Oh relax, it is just a kiss. You have done far worse already! Consider yourself lucky that this was the only payment I asked for after what I just did for you! Because if you were single, I would have demanded that you to repay my services with that incredibly hot body of yours!"

This statement caused Erich to be filled with an overwhelming since of dread. He even had to forcibly calm his hands from shaking, which he only managed to accomplish after Mirage grabbed hold of them with her own. Erich then looked straight into the woman\'s blood red irises and asked the immediate question that was in his mind.

"What the hell did you just do to me?"

A seductive smile appeared on the woman\'s near flawless face as she leaned in and whispered to him.

"Now the only Watcher who will be able to spy on you is yours truly… I look forward to watching your growth, Apex. And maybe after you have decided to stop fucking around with alien sluts and instead choose to finally embrace your own kind, we can have a little dalliance of our own. After all, wouldn\'t it be an incredibly exciting middle finger to the party if we conceived a little mutant of our own?"

After saying this, Mirage got up and left the bar, leaving Erich in a state of astonishment. He did not know what he had done to get such a terrifying and beautiful woman to take an interest in him, but he supposed she was just incredibly loose, and this was merely his turn on the carousel. This was something he ultimately decided against pursuing. And instead Erich finished beer before heading back to his personal starship, where he planned to check out the housing market.

---

Immediately upon sitting down in his bunk within the personal starship, Erich received a message from S\'aleth from her home world, where she appeared to have calmed down. It had been over a month since the last time they talked, and apparently she was quite worried he actually went on that trip with his friends, because she was quite flustered when she saw he was in what appeared to be a starship.

"Erich! You didn\'t really go on that trip, did you?"

Seeing how worried the girl was, Erich immediately grinned with a mischievous smile as he decided to play a prank on S\'aleth for storming out on him over something he had ultimately declined. After doing so, he dug up the old photo he had of him and Yumi before sending it to his girlfriend, all while leading her on about his current situation.

"Oh yeah, it\'s been a blast. This is just one of many girls I recently hooked up with. I mean, after all, you did say that I should go on this vacation with the boys!"

If it was at all possible for the crimson skin of the Dvrakian race to pale with fright, then this most certainly happened to S\'aleth just before she broke out into tears and hung up on Erich. The act of which caught the man by surprise, who immediately called the woman back in an urgent bid to inform her that he was just messing with her.

But S\'aleth did not respond, and because of this Erich sent the girl a direct message informing her of the truth, that he had not gone on the trip with Karl and the others, and had stayed behind in the Empire, where he was currently resting in his starship which for the time being was his only domicile.

It took nearly thirty minutes for S\'aleth to call him back, and when she did, she was still visibly crying as she chewed Erich out for playing such a mean prank on her.

"You bastard! I thought you were cheating on me! How could you be so cruel?"

Though Erich felt like he had taken things a bit far, he was quick to remind S\'aleth that he wasn\'t the most cruel between the two of them.

"Okay, I will admit, I may have got carried away with my prank, but you\'re the one who left me on block for the past month! Any reasonable guy would assume that you had broken up with him and moved on. The fact that I didn\'t really shows just how well I understand you. It\'s a shame that you just don\'t get my sense of humor…."

Erich then pretended to be offended, which caused S\'aleth to cry even more, as she revealed it was not her intention to keep him on block for so long.

"It is not my fault! I wanted to contact you and apologize, but my parents are keeping a close eye on me. They received a report from another member of my unit that I have been too friendly with some of one of my Germanic co-workers. Because of this, they now think that I have been fraternizing with the enemy, and have placed me under total lockdown.

In case you haven\'t realized, it has not been long since our two species fought a war with one another, and many of my people still see yours as invaders, conquerors, and murderers! My parents included… They stole my only means of contacting you. After all, we Dvrakian\'s don\'t have implants which allow us to connect to the interstellar network with our minds!"

The implants that S\'aleth was referring to was in fact the nanites which were injected into Germanic citizens at birth, and was more commonly referred to by the term of NeuroLink, the fact that she had called them implants showed just how little the Dvrakians knew about Germanic technology.

Erich did not even stop to think that S\'aleth might have lost the means to contact him, and felt somewhat bad for being so defensive. While he did not outright apologize for his behavior, as he felt under the circumstances it was justified, he did come to an understanding with S\'aleth and inquire more about what she had been up to.

"I understand… I did not even stop to think about what difficulties you might be going through now that you are back on your home world. After all, your entire civilization has been turned upside down as a result of our conquest, and I\'m sure you must be struggling with where your loyalties are at. You said your parents have placed you under lockdown? You are not being treated as a prisoner, are you? S\'aleth please tell me that everything is okay!"

There was a nervous look on S\'aleth\'s face, and just when she was about to say something, she heard the sound of boots walking down the stairs, to which she immediately whispered in a voice so low Erich barely heard her.

"I have to go! It is no longer safe for us to chat, but I will contact you when I am next able to do so. But Erich, you should know that there are things are not as peaceful as they seem to be. There is a revolution brewing, and I think that outsiders are responsible for fanning the flames. Stay safe!"

After saying this, S\'aleth hung up the call, leaving Erich in a state of bewilderment. He could not understand what kind of trouble his girlfriend had gotten herself into, but he had an urge to immediately fly out to her home world and help her in any way that he could.

However, before he could do so, he received a priority message from his squadron, calling for an immediate meeting on board their carrier. For whatever reason, he had been called back into service far sooner than he was supposed to. Whatever was happening, it was abundantly clear that another war with the Dvrakians was just around the corner.