Beneath the Billionaire Mask - Chapter 100: Chapter 100

Abandoned Skytower – Downtown Bogotá – 4:03 AM
The silence inside the old communication tower was almost sacred. Dust hung in the air like smoke from forgotten fires, and the only sound was the steady drip of water from a rusted pipe.
Adrian moved with precision, clearing corners with the fluidity of someone who had done this all before. But this time was different.
He wasn’t cleaning up someone else’s mess.
He was facing his own.
Behind him, Elena’s boots echoed on the metal stairs as she climbed up to join him. Her jacket was soaked, her eyes cold, focused. The datapad in her hand flickered with a live signal—Node 7 had pinged again. The clone hadn’t left the city.
“She’s here,” Elena said. “Somewhere in this building.”
Adrian gave a nod, then looked at her. “You don’t have to do this.”
“I do,” she said. “Not for justice. Not for revenge. For truth. For closure.”
“For identity,” he added.
They moved deeper into the tower, floor by floor. On the 17th level, the power surged on its own—lights flickering. And there she stood.
Elena’s replica.
Same face. Same eyes. But colder. Sharper. The shadow of a woman bred for control.
“Hello, sister,” the clone said with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.
“You’re not my sister,” Elena replied. “You’re an echo. A weapon.”
“I’m the future,” the clone whispered. “You’re a glitch in the code.”
Adrian stepped forward. “You hurt anyone else”
The clone held up a small detonator. “Try me, Blackwood. You forget—I was programmed with your mind too.”
Elena raised her gun. Her hands didn’t shake. “Then you know how this ends.”
“I do,” the clone replied calmly. “But are you sure you’re the real one?”
That question hung in the air like a blade.
“I don’t need to be the original,” Elena said. “I just need to be the one who ends this.”
The clone smiled again. “Then come and try.”
Level 17 – Abandoned Skytower
Time didn’t move the same way inside the tower.
Adrian and Elena stood still as the clone—the third Elena—tilted her head, sizing them both up with an eerie calm. There was no trace of emotion behind her perfect features, only the cold intelligence of someone programmed to outmaneuver every human impulse.
“I’ve read everything about you, Elena,” the clone said, pacing slowly. “Your decisions, your regrets. Your pain. And Adrian… I know your blueprint. Your guilt. Your ambition. Your weakness.”
She paused.
Then looked at Elena. “Her.”
Adrian clenched his jaw, taking a step forward. “You don’t get to weaponize our story.”
“Story?” The clone chuckled, stepping toward the flickering terminal. “This isn’t a story. This is control. And I’ve had it since the moment I was activated.”
She pressed a key.
The tower’s power surged. Every screen lit up—each showing surveillance footage of the Foundation, of Blackwood’s private meetings, of Elena’s apartment. Thousands of files pouring in, including classified records Adrian thought were wiped.
“You think you’ve won because you fell in love?” the clone continued. “Because you chose your ‘humanity’ over the mission? You’re not saviors. You’re liabilities.”
“And yet,” Elena said, leveling her gun, “you’re the one standing alone.”
The clone’s eyes narrowed. “Not for long.”
A sharp beep echoed. Explosives—planted beneath the tower—armed in sequence.
Adrian’s eyes widened. “She wired the building.”
“I told you,” the clone said softly. “I’m the future.”
But Elena didn’t waver. She stepped closer.
“You know what makes us different?” she said.
“What?”
“I chose who I became.”
Then she lunged.
Gunfire ripped through the air—Adrian dove toward the control panel, trying to override the detonation. Sparks rained down as Elena tackled her clone, both women crashing into shattered glass and metal beams. It was brutal, precise, a mirror match.
But there was one difference.
The real Elena bled.
And she bled with purpose.
Pinned against the floor, the clone hissed, “You’ll never stop the program.”
Elena forced the gun against her double’s chest. “Maybe not. But I can stop you.”
A shot rang out.
The clone jerked—then went still.
Adrian slammed his fist into the override one last time.
System Reset Initiated.
Countdown Terminated.
Silence.
Elena stood slowly, trembling, blood streaked across her cheek.
Adrian rose and walked to her—his hands shaking—as he took her face in his.
“You okay?” he asked.
“No,” she whispered. “But I’m still me.”
Later That Morning – Blackwood Foundation Archives
The clone registry had been wiped. Permanently. All files burned, traces gone.
Adrian walked Elena through the silent halls of his once-dominant empire, stripped of deception and rebuilt with transparency. For the first time, his name was no longer a shield.
“Are we really free of it all?” she asked, eyes searching his.
“No,” he said. “But we’re honest now.”
She smiled.
And he reached into his pocket, holding out the data chip that had changed everything.
“Let’s tell the world,” he said.
Elena took it, nodding.
Not as a weapon.
As a witness.
One Week Later – Geneva, Switzerland
The press conference room was packed. Cameras rolled, lights blazed, and journalists leaned forward, gripping pens like weapons. Everyone had heard the rumors—the whispers of an elite clone experiment, of corruption buried beneath one of the most powerful philanthropic organizations on the planet.
But no one expected them to be the ones at the center of it all.
Adrian stood beside Elena at the podium, no longer hiding behind his suits or silence. His tie was gone. His eyes clear. Elena’s hand brushed his lightly under the table, a silent grounding force.
“Thank you all for coming,” Adrian began, voice steady but raw. “For years, I funded projects that walked a razor edge between innovation and manipulation. In the name of control, I let monsters masquerade as visionaries. Today, that ends.”
Murmurs rippled.
Elena stepped forward.
“My name is Elena Cruz. I was an investigative journalist before I was marked for deletion by a system I tried to expose. What I found was a hidden program known as Sleepwalker—an initiative designed to replicate human consciousness. They cloned people. Modified them. Programmed them.”
She took a breath.
“They cloned me.”
Silence.
A beat passed.
And then: flashes, questions shouted, journalists nearly leaping from their seats.
Elena held up the data chip.
“This is every file. Every lie. Every life manipulated under the guise of philanthropy. We’re giving it to the Global Human Rights Commission. No censorship. No NDA. No protection for the guilty.”
The room erupted. But Adrian and Elena didn’t flinch.
They had already survived worse.
That Night – Rooftop of the Blackwood Foundation (Now Defunct)
Adrian watched the skyline, shoulders tense. Elena joined him, resting her head on his shoulder.
“They’ll come after us,” he murmured.
“They already did,” she replied. “We’re still here.”
He chuckled quietly. “You ever think… we were never supposed to find each other?”
“I think fate’s overrated,” she said. “We made choices. We paid for them. And we earned this.”
He looked at her, truly looked.
“No more masks,” he whispered.
She smiled.
“No more ghosts.”
They leaned into each other, the night soft around them.
The empire built on secrets had fallen.
What rose in its place was something no one could program:
Truth. Forgiveness. Love.
Later That Night – Safehouse Balcony
The city pulsed far below, the heartbeat of a world that remained oblivious to just how close it had come to destruction.
Adrian leaned on the balcony railing, sleeves rolled up, wind in his hair. Elena stepped beside him, wrapping her shawl tighter around her shoulders. There were shadows under both their eyes. But the silence between them was no longer heavy. It was healing.
“You know what I realized today?” Elena said, voice soft.
“What?”
“I wasn’t searching for truth… I was searching for permission to believe in something again.”
Adrian didn’t respond immediately. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small, metal key.
Elena blinked. “What’s that?”
He handed it to her. “A vault in Zurich. It holds the last uncorrupted data set from Project Sleepwalker… the original blueprints. It’s yours now.”
Her fingers tightened around it. “You’re giving me the power to erase or expose it all?”
“I’m giving you the power to decide what the future looks like,” Adrian said. “You taught me redemption isn’t erasing your past—it’s owning it.”
She nodded slowly, turning the key over in her hand. “Then I’ll bury it. But I’ll never forget it.”
They stood there, together, as sirens echoed faintly in the distance. Not urgent—just reminders that the world kept spinning, no matter what.
“I still don’t know what we are,” Elena whispered.
Adrian looked at her. “We’re the aftermath. The choice after the chaos. And maybe… the beginning of something honest.”
Meanwhile – Unknown Location
A computer terminal blinked to life in the dark.
SLEEPWALKER BACKUP NODE 3: ACTIVATED
INITIATING: CR-01.2
TARGETS: ADRIAN BLACKWOOD. ELENA CRUZ.
A mechanical hum stirred.
Then a figure stepped out from the shadows, identical to Elena—but colder. Programmed.
Controlled.
She opened her eyes.
And smiled.
Then a figure stepped out from the shadows.
Identical to Elena—but colder. Sharper. Her movements were unnaturally smooth, like a memory on repeat. The same face, the same eyes, but they didn’t see. They scanned.
Her gaze flicked from Adrian to Elena, expression unreadable.
“Target recognized,” she said in a voice that was Elena’s—only hollow. “CR-03. Status: corrupted.”
Elena’s breath hitched as she stared at her own reflection come to life, stripped of warmth, wired with intent.
“You’re me,” she said quietly.
The Replica tilted her head. “I’m what you were meant to be. Before deviation.”
Adrian stepped forward. “Turn her off.”
The Replica’s eyes snapped to him. “You built me to survive. Now you beg for mercy?”
Julia backed into the console, her hand trembling over the manual override. “She wasn’t supposed to activate this soon…”
“She’s not activated,” Liana muttered grimly. “She’s awake.”
A low hum began to build in the chamber—lights dimming, systems syncing. The Genesis protocol was feeding her—knowledge, commands, access.
“You wanted control,” the Replica said, taking another step forward. “Now you’ll see what happens when the mask wears you.”
She opened her eyes fully.
And smiled.
A cold, perfect smile—unburdened by doubt or empathy.
The kind only something manufactured could wear.
The cold smile on the replica’s face didn’t waver as she took a step forward.
Elena instinctively moved in front of Adrian, her heart hammering, her body screaming with a hundred conflicting instincts. Fight. Flee. Freeze. Or beg the mirror version of herself for mercy.
But this thing… this version of her wasn’t made for mercy.
“You’re not me,” Elena said, her voice tight. “You’re what they wanted me to be. A machine wrapped in skin.”
The replica tilted her head, an eerie mimic of curiosity. “You were the prototype. A failed attempt at emotional autonomy. They reprogrammed the next model to avoid… anomalies.”
Liana’s voice cracked through the rising tension. “She’s still synced to the Genesis server—we can disable it, but we have less than ninety seconds before she reaches command override.”
Adrian stepped beside Elena. “Then pull the plug.”
“She’s not connected physically,” Liana said, her fingers flying over the tablet. “She’s broadcasting from an embedded neural node. Wireless. Autonomous.”
Julia’s face paled. “She’s untethered.”
The replica’s eyes gleamed.
“I was never tethered.”
Without warning, she lunged.
Adrian shoved Elena back as the clone moved like a blur—too fast, too precise. But this wasn’t an assassin’s strike. It was surgical. A test. A warning.
The blow struck Adrian across the chest, sending him crashing into the wall.
“Adrian!” Elena screamed, scrambling toward him.
He groaned, clutching his ribs, blood seeping through his shirt.
“I’m not here to kill you,” the replica said calmly, her gaze locked on Elena. “I’m here to replace you.”
“Not a chance,” Elena snarled.
Behind her, the emergency lights began flashing crimson.
Liana’s voice echoed from the corridor. “We’ve got incoming! Genesis isn’t just waking up one—they’re activating all nodes!”
The replica looked to the ceiling, as if sensing her kin waking like a hive. “Too late to stop it now.”
And then, she simply vanished—back into the shadows she stepped from.
Leaving silence.
Leaving Adrian bleeding.
Leaving Elena trembling.
And leaving the world moments away from a war built on them.