Chapter 5 - The Sister in Black
Claire lowered Helen gently to the ground.
The bullet had struck her shoulder, not her heart.
The woman in black had aimed carefully.
"You missed," Claire said.
"No."
The stranger stepped closer.
She had Claire's eyes, Claire's jawline, and the same faint crease between her eyebrows when she was angry.
But a thin scar ran from her left temple to her cheek.
"My name is Cassandra," she said.
Claire kept her weapon raised.
"You expect me to believe that?"
"I expected you to shoot first."
"I still might."
Cassandra smiled faintly.
"Then Phoenix trained you better than it trained me."
More footsteps sounded at the far end of the tunnel.
Cassandra moved instantly.
She fired twice past Claire. Two armed men fell in the darkness.
"Those weren't mine," Cassandra said. "Move."
Together they carried Helen through the passage and emerged near a frozen river. A helicopter waited beyond the trees.
Claire hesitated.
"You want me to board an unknown aircraft with a woman who just shot my only witness."
"If I had wanted Helen dead, she would be dead."
Helen groaned.
Cassandra looked at Claire.
"Vale's men will reach us in less than a minute."
Claire heard engines approaching.
She climbed aboard.
The helicopter lifted as gunfire erupted from the tree line.
Inside, a medic treated Helen's wound.
Claire sat opposite Cassandra.
"Start talking."
Cassandra removed her gloves.
A Phoenix emblem had been burned into her palm.
"They took us from the clinic when we were infants. Phoenix wanted to test whether identity could be engineered."
"For what purpose?"
"Leadership."
Claire's expression did not change.
Cassandra continued.
"One child was raised inside controlled systems. The other was placed with Gabriel Vance and given a normal childhood."
"Which one were you?"
"The controlled child."
"And I was normal?"
Cassandra laughed bitterly.
"You think your life was normal?"
Claire thought of the erased records, the secret training, the Council, and the father whose death had been staged.
"What happened to our mother?"
"Which mother?"
"The woman who gave birth to us."
"Alive."
"Where?"
"I don't know."
Claire leaned forward.
"You found me. You knew where Helen lived. You knew Vale was coming. Do not pretend ignorance."
Cassandra's smile disappeared.
"I know where our mother was held. When I arrived three weeks ago, the facility was empty."
"Who moved her?"
"Gabriel."
Claire's heartbeat changed.
"My father."
"Our father."
"You said we had two."
Cassandra reached into her coat and removed a photograph.
Gabriel Vance stood beside another man.
Dr. Adrian Vale.
"They designed the Phoenix succession program together."
Claire looked from one face to the other.
"Vale is our father."
"Biologically, yes."
The helicopter cabin seemed suddenly smaller.
"And Gabriel?"
"The man who saved you from being terminated."
Claire looked down at the old photograph of the infants.
"Why save me and leave you?"
Cassandra's eyes hardened.
"That is the question I have waited thirty years to ask him."
Helen opened her eyes.
Both sisters turned.
"Gabriel did not abandon Cassandra," Helen whispered.
The medic tried to calm her, but Helen pushed his hand away.
"He returned for her. The facility had already moved."
Cassandra stepped closer.
"Where?"
Helen looked at Claire.
"The red file."
Claire felt a chill.
"You know about it."
"Gabriel created it. Every name. Every experiment. Every child."
"Where is the file?"
Helen's breathing weakened.
"Inside the only place Phoenix cannot search."
Cassandra gripped the edge of the seat.
"Where?"
Helen's eyes moved toward Claire's wedding ring.
The ring Emily had kicked across the bedroom floor.
May you like
"The marriage," Helen whispered.
Then the monitor beside her went flat.
