Chapter 15 - The Girl Who Had Natalie’s Eyes
The tactical officers aimed their weapons toward the elevator.
The little girl did not move.
Natalie saw no visible restraints, but a thin tube ran beneath the child’s hospital gown and disappeared into the wall behind her.
Ethan approached carefully.
“That line may be connected to an infusion pump.”
“What happens if we pull her away?” Lena asked.
“We do not know.”
The intercom clicked.
Diane’s voice filled the ruined building.
“You have ten minutes.”
Lena looked toward the control team.
“Can you trace her location?”
“Signal is routed through multiple levels.”
“Cut the power.”
Ethan shook his head.
“The child may be dependent on the pump.”
Natalie stepped closer to the elevator.
The girl stared at her with enormous gray-green eyes.
Natalie’s eyes.
Not exactly.
But close enough to make her chest tighten.
“Who named you Anna?”
“Grandmother.”
“Where is your mother?”
The child looked down.
“She says my mother was weak.”
Rebecca made a broken sound behind Natalie.
The recording had claimed Anna Vale was alive.
But Diane’s words suggested something else.
“Do you know Diane?” Natalie asked.
“She visits when I’m good.”
“What happens when you’re not good?”
The child touched her upper arm.
Tiny puncture scars covered the skin.
Natalie felt rage rise through the pain of her incision.
She crouched several feet away.
“Listen to me. You did nothing wrong.”
The girl’s eyes filled with tears.
“Grandmother says pain makes the body useful.”
Natalie looked at Ethan.
He turned pale.
Diane had not stopped the program.
She had continued it through another generation.
The intercom activated again.
“Nine minutes.”
Mark shouted from the transport vehicle.
“Mother, let her go.”
Diane laughed.
“My disappointing son.”
“You said the children would never be hurt.”
“You believed whatever protected your pride.”
“I did everything you asked.”
“And still you failed.”
Mark struggled against the guards.
“I’m your son.”
“You are a failed branch of a successful family.”
The words destroyed something in him.
For years, he had offered Natalie to Diane so he would never have to face his own weakness.
Now Diane dismissed him with one sentence.
Mark began sobbing.
Natalie did not look at him.
She kept her gaze on the girl.
“Anna, what’s inside the silver box?”
“I’m not supposed to open it.”
“Can you bring it to me?”
The child glanced into the darkness behind her.
A red light blinked above the elevator.
“No.”
“It’s all right.”
“She’ll hurt Rebecca.”
Rebecca stepped forward.
“How do you know my name?”
The girl looked at her.
“Mother told me.”
Everyone went silent.
Rebecca gripped Natalie’s shoulder.
“Your mother is here?” she asked.
The girl nodded.
“Where?”
“Below.”
“Is her name Anna Vale?”
Another nod.
Rebecca covered her mouth.
Anna had restored the archive from inside Diane’s hidden facility.
She had never escaped completely.
Lena looked toward the tactical commander.
“We go in.”
The commander pointed at the line attached to the child.
“Not until medical isolates that system.”
Ethan examined the elevator controls.
“There’s a manual port behind the panel.”
Rebecca handed him the brass key.
It fit.
The panel opened, revealing colored wires and a small blood-reader pad.
A message appeared.
CARRIER AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED.
Ethan looked at Natalie.
“I was right.”
Lena shook her head.
“No.”
“If she does not authorize it, we cannot separate the pump from the main system.”
“You don’t know what the reader will do.”
Natalie extended her hand.
Diane’s voice returned.
“Seven minutes.”
Ethan cleaned Natalie’s fingertip and pressed it against the pad.
A needle snapped upward.
Natalie flinched.
Blood entered the reader.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
Then the screen turned green.
NATAL MATRIX CARRIER VERIFIED.
The tube detached from the wall.
Ethan caught the child as she stumbled forward.
Officers carried her toward the medical vehicle.
At the same moment, the freight elevator doors began to close.
Natalie stepped inside.
Lena grabbed her arm.
“Absolutely not.”
“My blood opened the system. You need me.”
“We send officers first.”
The doors continued closing.
From somewhere below, a woman screamed.
“Rebecca!”
Rebecca lunged toward the elevator.
The voice had been Anna Vale’s.
Natalie pulled Lena inside.
Rebecca followed.
Ethan remained with the child.
Six tactical officers entered before the doors shut.
Mark shouted from across the building.
“Do not leave me with her.”
No one answered him.
The elevator descended.
One floor.
Two.
Three.
The burned factory above vanished.
Cold air entered through the seams.
The floor indicator moved past B6.
Then B7.
Then B8.
“How deep is this place?” Lena whispered.
Rebecca stared at the brass key in her hand.
“Deeper than it was twenty years ago.”
The doors opened at B12.
A white corridor extended ahead.
Unlike the ruined facility above, everything below was clean and powered.
Screens covered the walls.
On each screen appeared a live video from a different home, clinic, school, or hospital.
Women slept in bedrooms.
Children sat in waiting rooms.
Doctors entered patient information.
The Mercer program had not been limited to one family or one town.
It was still operating.
The tactical team advanced.
At the end of the corridor, they found a glass cell.
Inside sat a dark-haired woman in her forties.
Anna Vale.
She was thin, exhausted, and connected to several monitors.
Rebecca ran to the glass.
“Anna.”
Anna lifted her head.
Her eyes moved to Natalie.
“You came.”
“Where is Diane?” Lena asked.
Anna pointed upward.
Not toward the ceiling.
Toward one of the screens.
The image showed the hospital command vehicle above ground.
Ethan stood beside the little girl.
Mark’s transport vehicle waited twenty yards away.
Diane emerged from beneath it.
She wore a guard’s uniform.
Before anyone could react, she struck Ethan from behind.
The child screamed.
Diane grabbed her and pulled a pistol from her belt.
“No,” Natalie whispered.
On another screen, Mark saw his mother.
His face changed.
He threw himself against the transport door.
A guard tried to restrain him.
Mark seized the guard’s radio and struck the emergency release.
The door opened.
He ran toward Diane.
“Let the girl go.”
Diane aimed the pistol at him.
“You were told to stay useful.”
Mark stepped between her and the child.
For the first time in his life, he placed himself between his mother and someone weaker than him.
“You have Natalie,” he said. “You don’t need her.”
Diane smiled.
“I never needed you either.”
She fired.
Mark fell.
Natalie stared at the screen.
She felt shock, but not grief.
Mark had chosen one decent act after years of cowardice. It did not erase what he had done.
But it belonged to him.
Diane dragged the child toward a waiting vehicle.
Ethan struggled to rise.
Above ground, officers exchanged gunfire with hidden shooters positioned in the ruins.
The operation was collapsing into chaos.
Lena tried her radio.
No signal reached the surface.
Anna pressed one hand against the glass.
“The silver box,” she said.
“The child carried it,” Natalie replied.
“No. Diane took the real one.”
“What is inside?”
Anna looked toward a sealed door at the far end of the corridor.
“Names.”
“Whose names?”
“Every child produced by the program.”
Rebecca began searching for a way to open the cell.
Anna shook her head.
“There’s no time.”
“We are not leaving you.”
“You have to stop Diane.”
Natalie stepped close to the glass.
“What does the sixteenth capsule mean?”
Anna’s expression filled with fear.
“It means they succeeded.”
“At what?”
“Creating a carrier who can activate every generation.”
Natalie looked at the blood-reader pad beside the sealed door.
“My blood opens the facility.”
“Not only the facility.”
“What else?”
Anna glanced at the screens showing hospitals and homes around the country.
“The children.”
Natalie’s stomach tightened.
“What happens when they’re activated?”
“I don’t know. Diane never told me.”
“Then who knows?”
Anna raised one trembling finger.
She pointed toward Ethan on the screen above.
“He does.”
Natalie stared at her.
“Ethan said he left the program.”
“He left the Mercer branch.”
“That isn’t the same thing?”
“No.”
Rebecca stopped working on the cell controls.
Anna continued.
“There were three founding doctors. Mercer was only one of them.”
“Who were the others?”
“One is dead.”
“And the last?”
Anna looked directly into Natalie’s eyes.
“Cole.”
The corridor lights turned red.
A mechanical voice announced a containment failure.
Heavy doors began closing between each section of the underground level.
Lena shouted for everyone to move.
Rebecca refused to leave Anna.
Natalie pressed her palm against the blood reader.
The sealed door opened.
Beyond it stood rows of cryogenic chambers.
Some were child-sized.
Others were large enough to hold adults.
At the center of the room sat a metal case marked with the number seventeen.
Natalie approached it.
The case unlocked when she touched it.
Inside was a photograph.
It showed Ethan Cole standing beside Diane Mercer and a third person whose face had been covered with black ink.
The picture had been taken recently.
Not twelve years ago.
Not during the original trial.
Recently.
Beneath the photograph lay a handwritten message.
Natalie recognized Ethan’s writing from her medical chart.
DIANE IS NOT THE FINAL THREAT.
Behind her, Anna screamed.
A tactical officer collapsed with a needle embedded in his neck.
The lights went out.
In the darkness, someone whispered beside Natalie.
“You were never supposed to find generation seventeen.”
Natalie turned toward the voice.
A hand closed around her wrist.
And on the black surveillance screen before it died, she saw Ethan place the little girl inside Diane’s vehicle.
Not as a prisoner.
As an accomplice.
The vehicle disappeared into the night.
Natalie tightened her grip around the metal case.
Diane was free.
Ethan had lied.
Mark lay bleeding above the facility.
Anna remained trapped behind glass.
And somewhere beyond the rail port, a network of children connected to Natalie’s blood was waiting for a signal.
Then the case in her hands began to vibrate.
A countdown appeared on its surface.
00:09:59.
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Below it, one sentence flashed in red.
GENERATION SEVENTEEN ACTIVATION HAS BEGUN.
