Chapter 27 - THE MAN BEHIND THE NAME
The two old men stared at each other.
The newcomer leaned on a cane but stood with unmistakable authority.
“My name is Gideon Quinn,” he said. “The other man was once called Arthur Vane.”
Arthur had been Gideon’s research partner.
When Gideon tried to shut down Orpheus, Arthur stole his identity and imprisoned him inside the first Cradle facility.
Arthur raised his hands.
“You allowed governments to bury innocent people under false names.”
“I created protection for witnesses,” Gideon replied. “You turned it into a market.”
Mara looked between them.
“Which one raised me?”
Arthur answered.
“I did.”
That truth hurt more than another lie.
The cruel man before her was not her biological father, but he had still been the person who taught her to ride a bicycle, repaired her broken school projects and waited outside her hospital room.
Love did not erase what he had done.
His crimes did not erase every memory.
Arthur activated Elias’s implant.
Sabine moved toward the medical equipment.
Ward blocked her.
Jonah appeared to raise his weapon toward Mara.
“Mara, step away from the platform.”
She stared at him.
“You chose him?”
“I chose the only way to get close enough.”
Jonah turned and fired into the control console beside Arthur.
The shot shattered the transmitter network without striking anyone.
Sabine immediately began disabling Elias’s implant.
Arthur ran toward the exit.
Cass locked it.
The system announced that Orpheus had lost contact with Elias.
Emergency deletion would begin in sixty seconds.
Every identity in Cradle would be erased permanently.
Mara reached the platform.
The scanner rejected her.
ROOT USER REVOKED.
Arthur held up a small device.
He had transferred Evelyn Shaw’s authority to another person.
May you like
The screen displayed the new root user.
MAY VALE.
