Chapter 15 - PROJECT LAZARUS
Thomas disconnected the hospital network cable.
The shutdown request vanished.
Eli’s monitor stabilized.
Claire stood beside the bed, every muscle tense.
“Can they try again?”
“Not while the device is isolated.”
“Who sent the request?”
Thomas checked the log.
“The source is masked.”
Edward entered with Ortiz.
Claire turned on him.
“Tell me everything about Project Lazarus.”
Edward looked at Eli.
“Not here.”
“Here.”
“Claire—”
“No more secret rooms. No more private conversations. He is the person this happened to.”
Eli looked between them.
“I want to know.”
Edward’s expression softened.
He pulled a chair closer.
“Project Lazarus began twenty-five years ago.”
Julian entered behind him.
His face was grave.
Edward continued.
“It was a medical research program funded by Bennett Industries.”
“What was the goal?” Claire asked.
“To preserve organ function after cardiac arrest.”
Thomas nodded slowly.
“Induced suspended animation.”
“Yes.”
Julian added, “It was intended for trauma victims, soldiers, patients awaiting transplant.”
“What went wrong?”
Edward looked at Julian.
Julian answered.
“The treatment caused genetic instability in some test subjects.”
Claire looked at Eli.
“The mutation.”
“Possibly.”
Thomas studied the records on the screen.
“Was the program tested on children?”
“No,” Edward said.
Julian’s silence contradicted him.
Claire noticed.
“Tell me.”
Julian sat down.
“Officially, no.”
“And unofficially?”
“Daniel found the research after Arthur died.”
“How old was he?”
“Twenty-three.”
“He restarted it.”
“Yes.”
“Without approval.”
“Yes.”
Claire felt sick.
“Where did he get test subjects?”
Julian looked at the floor.
“Private clinics.”
Thomas’s face went pale.
“The clinic where Eli was born.”
Edward nodded.
Claire stared at Thomas.
“You knew?”
“No.”
His answer was immediate.
“I knew the clinic participated in experimental cardiac monitoring. I never knew children were being treated.”
Claire looked at Eli.
Daniel had not merely staged his death to hide a family scandal.
He had used the situation to test whether a child could be brought close to death and revived.
“Was Eli the only one?”
No one answered.
Claire’s voice sharpened.
“How many children?”
Julian closed his eyes.
“We found eleven names.”
The room became silent.
“Alive?” Claire asked.
“Three confirmed.”
“And the others?”
“We don’t know.”
Claire felt fury rise.
“Where are the records?”
“Inside a secure Bennett research server.”
“Daniel controlled it?”
“Yes.”
Ortiz stepped forward.
“Federal cyber teams are already seizing company servers.”
Edward shook his head.
“The Lazarus archive is separate.”
“Where?”
“No one knows.”
Eli spoke quietly.
“Grandma knew.”
They turned toward him.
“What did Martha say?” Claire asked.
“She said there were other kids.”
“Did she name them?”
“No.”
“She said we had numbers.”
Claire remembered the file marked Samuel Reed.
Not Eli’s real name.
A false identity.
Perhaps not random.
“What number were you?”
Eli looked confused.
Thomas opened the recovered medical records.
On the lower corner of each page was a code.
LZ-07
Claire stared.
“Seven.”
Edward looked grim.
“Then there were at least six before him.”
Eli touched the bandage over his chest.
“Did Daniel make me sick?”
Claire sat beside him.
“I think he let people do something dangerous to you.”
“Why?”
“Because he valued control more than people.”
Eli looked toward the window.
“Grandma said bad people don’t always look bad.”
Claire squeezed his hand.
“She was right.”
Ortiz’s phone rang.
She answered and listened.
Her expression changed.
“Daniel’s transport was attacked.”
Claire stood.
“What?”
“The armored vehicle crashed entering the federal facility.”
“Is he alive?”
“They don’t know.”
“Did he escape?”
Ortiz ended the call.
“Yes.”
Edward swore quietly.
Claire looked at Eli’s disconnected device.
“The shutdown request came from him.”
Thomas shook his head.
“Not necessarily. The request was sent three minutes before the crash.”
“Then someone planned both.”
Julian looked toward the hospital hallway.
“Kane’s network.”
Ortiz drew her weapon.
“We need to move Eli.”
“No more transports,” Claire said.
“This hospital is compromised.”
“The last helicopter was sabotaged.”
“Then we lock down this floor.”
Edward turned to Julian.
“Could the archive control the implant?”
“If the device uses Lazarus protocols, yes.”
Thomas checked the implant documentation.
“The serial number was from the abandoned clinic.”
Nina had used an old device.
A device possibly tied to the program.
Claire stared at the machine that had saved Eli’s life.
It was also a door someone could use to kill him.
“Can you replace it?”
“Eventually.”
“Now.”
“He just survived surgery.”
“I don’t care.”
“You should. Removing it now may kill him.”
Eli watched them.
“What happens if we leave it?”
Thomas answered gently.
“We keep it offline and monitor you.”
“Can Daniel turn it off?”
“Not if we protect it.”
Eli looked at Claire.
“Do you believe him?”
Claire looked at Thomas.
The man had helped fake Eli’s death.
Then he had saved his life multiple times.
Trust no longer felt simple.
“I believe he is trying to protect you now.”
Thomas accepted the answer.
Ortiz ordered agents to secure the floor.
Edward and Julian began examining old research files.
Claire stayed beside Eli.
Sophie fell asleep in the chair with her head against the bed.
For almost an hour, the hospital remained quiet.
Then the lights went out.
Emergency power activated.
A voice announced a system malfunction.
Claire stood.
“No.”
Thomas entered.
“Someone cut the main power.”
“Can the floor remain isolated?”
“The cardiac unit has backup power.”
A loud click sounded beneath Eli’s bed.
The monitor flashed.
EXTERNAL ACCESS RESTORED
Thomas reached for the cable.
It was already disconnected.
Claire stared.
“How?”
“The implant has its own cellular receiver.”
“Can you disable it?”
“Not without opening the incision.”
Eli’s heart rate increased.
A message appeared.
CALIBRATION MODE
Thomas’s face went pale.
“What does that mean?”
“The device is changing its shock threshold.”
“Stop it.”
“I’m trying.”
Eli gasped.
His body jerked.
The implant shocked him.
Sophie woke screaming.
Claire grabbed Eli’s shoulders.
“Thomas!”
Another shock.
Eli cried out.
Thomas entered commands.
“Override rejected.”
Claire looked around.
“There must be another way.”
Thomas grabbed a magnet from the emergency cart.
“If I place this over the device, it should suspend remote therapy.”
He pressed the magnet against Eli’s chest.
The implant beeped.
The calibration stopped.
Eli collapsed against the pillow, breathing hard.
Claire held him.
“You’re okay.”
He shook his head.
“It hurts.”
“I know.”
She looked at Thomas.
“Keep the magnet there.”
“I need to hold it in place.”
“Then hold it.”
Ortiz entered with two agents.
“We found an unauthorized signal in the basement.”
“Who?”
“Unknown.”
Claire looked at Edward.
“The archive is here.”
He shook his head.
“Impossible.”
Julian understood.
“Not the full archive.”
“A relay.”
Ortiz spoke into her radio.
“Search every lower-level room.”
Claire thought of hospitals, clinics, laboratories.
Places Daniel had used for years.
Then she remembered something.
“Mercy Central belongs to the Bennett Foundation.”
Edward nodded.
“Partially.”
“What was here before the hospital expanded?”
He frowned.
“A research annex.”
Julian’s face changed.
“Lazarus.”
Claire looked toward the floor.
“The archive is beneath us.”
Ortiz left with her team.
Edward followed.
Claire stayed with Eli.
Minutes passed.
Then gunfire echoed from below.
Sophie grabbed Claire’s hand.
Thomas kept the magnet pressed against Eli’s chest.
The hospital door opened.
Rachel stood there wearing a nurse’s coat.
Claire froze.
Rachel lifted a syringe.
“Move away from the boy.”
Thomas stepped between them.
“You are under arrest.”
“Not anymore.”
Rachel’s face looked wild.
Desperate.
“Daniel said he would protect me.”
Claire stared.
“Daniel uses everyone.”
“He paid for my mother’s treatment.”
“And killed Martha.”
Rachel’s hand shook.
“She would not stop.”
“She was protecting a child.”
“She was going to expose us all.”
“Good.”
Rachel moved closer.
“Give me the implant.”
Claire looked at the syringe.
“What is that?”
“Something that will stop his heart before the device can shock him.”
Eli began trembling.
Claire stepped in front of the bed.
“You’ll have to go through me.”
Rachel’s expression hardened.
“I already did once.”
Claire froze.
“What?”
Rachel smiled.
“You don’t remember the clinic?”
Claire’s mind flashed back to Eli’s birth.
A nurse with dark hair.
A woman standing behind Daniel.
A hand adjusting Claire’s IV.
“You sedated me.”
“I gave you what Dr. Warren ordered.”
Thomas stared at her.
“I never ordered that dose.”
Rachel laughed.
“You signed enough papers.”
She raised the syringe.
A gunshot sounded.
Rachel dropped.
Ortiz stood in the doorway.
The syringe rolled across the floor.
Rachel clutched her shoulder.
Agents rushed in and restrained her.
Claire turned toward Eli.
He stared at the blood.
At Rachel.
At the weapon.
His breathing became rapid.
Claire moved to block his view.
“Look at me.”
He did.
“Only me.”
His eyes filled.
“Is it over?”
Claire wanted to say yes.
But she had promised to stop lying.
“I don’t know.”
Ortiz picked up Rachel’s phone.
The screen displayed a live call.
A distorted voice spoke through the speaker.
“You failed.”
Claire recognized Daniel.
Ortiz lifted the phone.
“Where are you?”
Daniel laughed.
“Ask Claire.”
The call ended.
Claire stared at the screen.
Why would she know?
Then Sophie spoke.
“The room under the stairs.”
Claire turned.
“What?”
“Dad said he always knows what happens in his house.”
The hidden cameras.
The sealed basement.
The tunnel.
The old estate.
Daniel had built his first prison there.
Perhaps he had also built his last refuge.
Claire looked at Ortiz.
May you like
“He went home.”
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