Chapter 15 - At Midnight, One of Us Opened Her Eyes
Seven minutes remained.
The ballroom had become a sealed execution chamber. Gas hissed through the vents. Children beneath Site Zero lost oxygen.
Celeste and I realized Helena's system relied on blood authentication. We decided to authenticate both of us as Subject 001, merge our memories, and reroute the synchronization back into Helena's own receiver network.
Maya inserted the full blood sample into the central intake. Daniel rewired the system. Evelyn scanned the Final List. Kenneth uploaded recordings. Detective Harris attached his father's files. Charles used the founder's key to open the master archive and transmitted the evidence to police servers, hospitals, newsrooms, and federal databases.
The neural transfer began.
I became both girls: the one with the teddy bear and the one with the bracelet, the one who escaped and the one who remained. Celeste and I shared lives. Helena entered the connection and tried to force a dominant identity.
The system demanded a choice: SARAH, SABRINA, or HELENA.
We rejected the premise.
"No one owns the whole story."
The receiver children joined the network. Lucy's chosen name, Hope, spread through the archive. Helena's memories and crimes were broadcast everywhere.
The system announced COLLECTIVE ARCHIVE FORMING.
Helena's mirrored room shattered. Her younger face flickered, revealing an old and terrified body beneath.
Then darkness.
At dawn, the children were alive. Federal vehicles filled the courtyard. Charles and Evelyn were arrested. Sites were raided and stolen children were being found.
But Celeste had vanished from the second chair. Maya's blood vial was missing.
A screen showed a black SUV moving north. Inside sat a silver-blonde woman in a bloodstained white suit. She could have been Celeste, Helena, or someone wearing one of our faces.
She held the missing vial in one hand and a positive pregnancy test in the other.
She smiled into the camera.
"Subject 003 is already listening."
The screen went black.
Deep inside my mind, a child hummed the piano melody.
Three notes.
Pause.
Five notes.
May you like
Then a voice that sounded exactly like mine whispered:
"Mother is coming home."
