CHAPTER 10 THE FALSE BLOODLINE
Marcus froze.
The words echoed inside his head.
"Marcus is Margaret's son."
"No."
His voice was barely a whisper.
"You're lying."
Charles leaned against the wall behind Ava's compartment.
"I wish I were."
Marcus slowly lowered his weapon.
Every memory from his childhood suddenly felt uncertain.
The foster home.
The sealed adoption records.
The anonymous donations that had paid for his education.
The missing names.
None of it made sense anymore.
Margaret's breathing became shallow.
She looked at Marcus with an expression Ethan had never seen before.
Not hatred.
Not manipulation.
Regret.
Marcus stared at her.
"Look at me."
Margaret hesitated.
"I said look at me."
She finally raised her eyes.
For the first time, there was no carefully crafted mask.
Only exhaustion.
"You abandoned me."
Margaret shook her head.
"I was told you died."
Marcus laughed bitterly.
"That sounds familiar."
Ethan stepped between them.
"Enough."
His attention never left Ava.
She continued trembling inside the glass chamber.
Her eyes remained open, but they constantly shifted as if she were watching events from different decades.
Charles spoke again.
"The memories are colliding."
"What does that mean?" Ethan asked.
"She's experiencing my past and her own present at the same time."
Ava suddenly gasped.
She grabbed both sides of her head despite the restraints.
"I can hear children crying."
Her voice shook violently.
"There are two babies."
Charles closed his eyes.
"It's beginning."
Harris quietly backed toward the corridor.
Marcus noticed first.
"He's running."
Marcus sprinted toward the maintenance controls.
"There has to be another transport."
Harris disappeared through the steel doorway.
Before it closed, he looked back.
"You'll never reach us."
The door slammed shut.
Heavy locks engaged.
Marcus struck the control panel with the handle of his pistol.
Nothing moved.
Ethan turned toward Charles.
"How do we reach Level F?"
Charles pointed weakly toward the ceiling.
"There isn't a direct elevator."
"What?"
"The hospital was only a disguise."
Lena frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"The original laboratory existed decades before the hospital."
Charles coughed.
"The lower levels connect to the abandoned Caldwell Research Center through maintenance tunnels."
Marcus looked at the building schematics displayed on one monitor.
"There are no tunnels on these plans."
Charles nodded.
"Because they were erased."
Eleanor stepped closer to the camera.
"You designed them."
"I did."
"Why?"
Charles lowered his head.
"To hide my work from investors."
"And Margaret used them to hide people."
Charles never denied it.
Ethan's fists tightened.
"You built the prison she turned into hell."
Charles looked directly at him.
"Yes."
Silence settled over everyone.
Then Charles continued.
"I've regretted it every day since."
A sudden alarm interrupted him.
WARNING. BIOLOGICAL INSTABILITY DETECTED.
A second message flashed across every monitor.
TRANSFER SUBJECT REQUIRES IMMEDIATE ISOLATION.
Ava screamed again.
This time the sound was different.
Not fear.
Memory.
She stared at Charles.
"You promised Eleanor you would come back."
Charles's face drained of color.
Only Eleanor knew those words.
Only Eleanor had heard them.
Yet Ava had spoken them perfectly.
Charles whispered,
"It's working."
Margaret backed away from the monitors.
"No..."
Ava looked at her.
"You locked Eleanor in Room Twelve."
Margaret didn't answer.
"You painted over the blood."
Lena covered her mouth.
Marcus slowly turned toward Margaret.
"There was blood?"
Ava continued speaking.
"The little boy saw everything."
Ethan's heart skipped.
"What little boy?"
Ava looked straight at him.
"You."
The room became deathly quiet.
Charles nodded slowly.
"You found the room when you were six."
Ethan tried to remember.
He saw flashes.
A dark hallway.
A crying woman.
A locked white door.
Someone pulling him away.
Then nothing.
"My memories..."
Margaret closed her eyes.
"I erased that day."
Marcus looked at her in disbelief.
"You admitted it."
"I protected him."
"You manipulated him."
She said nothing.
The silence was enough.
Suddenly every monitor flickered.
The video feed from Ava's compartment disappeared.
Static filled the screens.
"Harris."
Marcus immediately recognized what had happened.
"He's cutting the cameras."
One monitor remained active.
Instead of Ava, a blueprint appeared.
Charles stared at it.
"No..."
Ethan looked closer.
"What is it?"
Charles answered quietly.
"The original laboratory."
Red lights began blinking across the map.
One after another.
Marcus counted them.
"Twelve heat signatures."
Charles shook his head.
"That isn't possible."
"What?"
"The laboratory was abandoned years ago."
Another light appeared.
Then another.
Fifteen.
Seventeen.
Twenty.
The computer identified them.
AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL DETECTED.
Lena frowned.
"Personnel?"
Marcus looked toward Charles.
"Who else is down there?"
Charles didn't answer immediately.
When he finally spoke, his voice barely rose above a whisper.
"The patients."
Eleanor's eyes widened.
"No."
"I thought they were all gone."
"They never left."
Marcus felt a chill run through his body.
"What patients?"
Charles swallowed hard.
"The memory experiments never stopped."
A metallic voice echoed through the tunnel behind Ava's last known location.
It reached Sublevel E through the speakers.
Level F security protocol activated.
Release Team Alpha.
Marcus looked at Ethan.
"What is Team Alpha?"
Charles closed his eyes.
"I prayed no one would ever activate them."
The corridor camera suddenly came back online.
Everyone looked at the screen.
The steel doors of a massive underground ward slowly slid open.
Rows of dim lights illuminated a corridor lined with reinforced cells.
One by one...
The cell doors unlocked.
A pair of bare feet stepped into the hallway.
Then another.
Then another.
Men.
Women.
Different ages.
All wearing identical gray hospital uniforms.
Each had the same small black tattoo behind the left ear.
None of them spoke.
None of them blinked.
They simply turned in perfect unison toward Harris.
He smiled.
"Find Ava Caldwell."
Twenty emotionless faces lifted together.
Then every one of them answered with the exact same voice.
"Yes, Doctor."
Charles whispered in horror,
"They still remember the command."
The camera suddenly zoomed toward the last person leaving the corridor.
Ethan's breathing stopped.
The woman paused beneath the light.
She looked almost identical to Ava.
The same eyes.
The same face.
The same scar near her wrist.
Only her expression was completely empty.
Marcus stared at the monitor.
"Who is she?"
Charles's lips trembled.
"I buried that file myself."
Eleanor slowly stepped toward the screen.
"No..."
She recognized the woman before anyone else.
The woman lifted her head.
The monitor identified her.
SUBJECT A-01
ORIGINAL DONOR: AVA CALDWELL
Ethan looked from the screen to Charles.
"What does 'original donor' mean?"
Charles couldn't force the words out.
Instead, Margaret answered.
Her voice was almost inaudible.
"It means..."
May you like
"...the Ava you married may not be the first Ava."
END OF CHAPTER 10
