Chapter 6 - Version Six
They left Aurelian Tower through a federal evacuation corridor before local authorities could be redirected against them. Mercer moved the group to a subterranean safe facility beneath an abandoned courthouse. The place had no networked equipment, no windows, and no electronic locks. Every door used mechanical keys.
Lily sat at a steel table while a medic removed the residue from the neural patch. Claire stood behind her, one hand on the girl's shoulder. Harrison remained across the room.
"Tell me what you saw," Mercer said.
Lily described a memory that had arrived in fragments during captivity. A snow-covered warehouse. Claire's former husband David Arden tied to a chair. Harrison entering in combat clothing. A gunshot. David falling. Harrison kneeling beside him and taking a metal capsule from his mouth.
"When did David die?" Harrison asked.
"Eleven years ago," Claire said. "Officially in a ferry accident."
Harrison had been deployed in North Africa at the time. He could prove it, unless the proof belonged to the system that had already declared him dead.
Mercer placed the recovered adjudication wafer beneath an optical reader. The carrier stolen by Rourke held the main ledger, but Claire's copied fragment included the Vance records. She searched for Version Six.
The file was larger than the others.
VERSION SIX
DEPLOYMENT STATUS: DOMESTIC ANCHOR
TERMINATION STATUS: DISPUTED
LAST VERIFIED CONTACT: DAVID ARDEN
Claire stepped away from the screen.
"Version Six lived with us," she said.
Harrison felt the room narrow. "During our marriage?"
"Not openly. He was deployed to observe us after I began investigating Meridian. I thought he was you during several periods when you were supposedly home between missions."
"You could not tell the difference?"
Pain flashed across her face. "Could you identify a false memory if it loved you back?"
Lily lowered her eyes.
Claire continued. "David discovered the substitution. He helped me separate the timelines. The man I married and the man who returned after certain deployments did not always carry the same scars, habits, or emotional responses. Version Six became unstable when he learned he was replaceable. He wanted the original life."
"And he killed David."
"I never knew."
Harrison walked to the far wall. His reflection in the dark glass looked like a suspect waiting for a witness. "Which version fathered Lily?"
Claire's voice softened. "The embryo was created from stored genetic material taken before any confirmed replacement. Biologically, she is connected to the earliest verified Harrison profile. Legally and morally, David was her father."
Lily looked at Harrison. "So the man in my memory could be you."
"Yes," he said, though the answer hollowed him.
Mercer opened the remaining encrypted files. One contained a map of facilities linked to Version Six. Another contained an audio message recorded by David Arden the night before his death.
David's voice filled the room.
"Claire, if you hear this, Meridian has breached the family. The man using Harrison's face is not obeying Rourke anymore. He calls himself the Custodian. He believes all continuations deserve one permanent life. He has been collecting them, hiding them, teaching them to replace their originals. Version Six is not the danger. He is the beginning of a revolt."
A metallic sound echoed in the safe facility corridor.
Everyone turned.
One of Mercer's agents checked the nearest door. The mechanical lock was still engaged.
Another sound came from the ventilation shaft.
Harrison drew the weapon Mercer had reluctantly returned to him. "How many people know this location?"
"Five," Mercer said.
"Count again."
The lights went out.
A calm voice spoke through the vent.
"I am not here to kill Harrison."
Claire gripped Lily's hand.
The vent cover fell inward. A man climbed down wearing prison-gray clothing. His hair was longer, his face thinner, but he was unmistakably another Harrison Vance.
He raised empty hands.
A burn scar covered the left side of his neck.
"I am Version Six," he said. "And the man in Lily's memory was not me."
Harrison aimed at his chest. "Prove it."
Version Six looked at Claire. "The night David died, he hid the metal capsule inside Lily's music box. Claire never found it because Patricia replaced the box before the funeral."
Every eye turned toward Patricia's empty chair.
Mercer checked the holding room.
The door was open.
Vale asked for water, then drank with his left hand. Harrison used his right. The difference seemed trivial until Claire explained that Version Six had damaged his dominant hand during the years he lived inside the House. The body adapted, but the inherited memories continued reaching for weapons with the other hand. Every movement contained a disagreement between past and present.
"That is why I left," Vale said. "The Custodian promised freedom, but he expected us to remain proof of his suffering. We could choose new names, new work, even new families, as long as we never questioned his war with the originals."
Lily studied him. "Did you know David?"
Vale's expression softened. "He found me hiding near your school. Instead of reporting me, he asked whether I was hungry. He was the first person who looked at my face and did not ask which Harrison I was."
"Why did he help you?"
"Because he believed a person became real the moment someone accepted responsibility for how they treated him."
Harrison remembered dismissing David as Claire's convenient protector during the divorce. He had never met the man, yet he had hated him easily. Meridian had not programmed that hatred. Patricia had encouraged it, but Harrison had chosen to feed it.
That recognition mattered. If he claimed every failure was implanted, he surrendered the very personhood he wanted to defend.
"I was cruel to Claire," he said.
No one responded.
He looked at Lily. "And my suspicion made your life dangerous. Whatever number I am, that belongs to me."
May you like
Lily nodded once. It was not forgiveness, but it was the first honest ground between them.
Patricia was gone.
