Chapter 5 - Subject Twelve
The operating-room doors unlocked without warning.
Daniel rushed inside.
A nurse tried to restrain Sophie, but Dr. Ortiz stopped her.
“No sudden movements.”
Sophie sat beneath the surgical lights with an incision partially completed below her jaw. Blood stained the drape around her shoulders.
Her eyes were fixed on the ceiling.
“Sophie,” Daniel said.
She did not respond.
The intercom emitted a low tone.
Sophie’s fingers curled.
Thomas entered behind Daniel and froze.
“Turn off the speakers.”
“They’re on emergency power,” a technician said.
“Then tear them out.”
The tone shifted higher.
Sophie inhaled sharply.
When she spoke, the voice sounded like hers, but the words did not.
“Where is the garden room?”
Daniel approached slowly.
“What garden room?”
“The room without windows.”
Thomas looked horrified.
“She’s repeating a conditioned memory.”
“Whose memory?”
“Clara’s.”
Daniel’s heart hammered.
“Sophie, listen to me. You are at St. Catherine’s Hospital. I’m here with you.”
She turned toward him.
For one second, recognition appeared.
“Dad?”
“Yes.”
Then the tone sounded again.
Her face went blank.
“Mr. Mercer,” Dr. Ortiz said, “we must sedate her.”
Thomas grabbed the doctor’s arm.
“Standard sedatives may interact with the compounds.”
“Then tell me what is safe.”
“I don’t know what formulation was used.”
Daniel looked through the glass.
Vivian and Adrian were gone.
The front entrance stood empty.
“They caused the blackout,” Daniel said.
A police officer ran into the room.
“Mrs. Mercer disappeared during the power failure.”
“And Clara?”
“We have units searching the estate.”
Daniel’s phone vibrated.
A message had arrived from Clara’s number.
A photograph filled the screen.
Clara sat in a chair inside a concrete room. Her wrists were bound. A dark bruise marked one side of her face.
Behind her, painted on the wall, was the three-circle symbol.
Beneath the photograph was a message.
BRING ELIAS VOSS TO THE OLD ORISON SITE.
COME ALONE OR CLARA RECEIVES THE FINAL DOSE.
Daniel showed Thomas.
The old man stared at the image.
“The building burned.”
“Apparently not all of it.”
Thomas zoomed in on the wall.
“There were underground levels.”
The tone in the operating room stopped.
Sophie collapsed.
Dr. Ortiz caught her and lowered her to the table.
“We have to remove the capsules now.”
Thomas stepped beside the scans.
“I can help.”
“You are not licensed.”
“I designed the original delivery casing.”
Dr. Ortiz hesitated.
Daniel looked at her.
“Can he improve her chances?”
“Possibly.”
“Then use him.”
Thomas studied the imaging.
“The capsules are arranged in a chain. If you remove the first one incorrectly, the others may rupture.”
“What happens then?”
“The compounds enter her bloodstream at once.”
Daniel looked at Sophie.
“Will she survive?”
Thomas did not answer.
Dr. Ortiz began issuing instructions.
Daniel stepped into the corridor and called the detective now leading the case, Maya Ross.
“I received a ransom message.”
“Send it to me.”
“They want Thomas at the old Orison site.”
“Do not go.”
“My wife is there.”
“We’ll locate the property and deploy a team.”
“They said come alone.”
“They always say that.”
Daniel forwarded the message.
Detective Ross studied it.
“Clara’s phone last connected near the Mercer estate, not an industrial site.”
“The photograph could have been taken elsewhere.”
“Or earlier.”
Daniel looked toward the operating room.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying we should not assume your wife is currently where they claim.”
A call came from Leo.
Daniel answered immediately.
“Dad, the police are here.”
“Are you safe?”
“Yes.”
“Where is Uncle Adrian?”
“He left with Grandma.”
“Did you see Mom leave?”
Leo was silent.
“Leo?”
“I heard them arguing downstairs.”
“What did they say?”
“Mom said Grandma couldn’t use Sophie to open something.”
Daniel felt a chill.
“Open what?”
“I don’t know. Then Mom said, ‘Michael died before he told you where it was.’”
Daniel remembered Clara’s first husband.
The missing man whose body had never been found.
“Did Grandma say anything else?”
“She said Michael wasn’t dead.”
Daniel gripped the phone.
“What?”
“Grandma said he had been waiting for Clara to remember him.”
A monitor alarmed inside the operating room.
Thomas shouted for more suction.
Daniel watched blood spread across the surgical drape.
Detective Ross called his name, but he barely heard her.
A nurse rushed out.
“One capsule ruptured.”
Daniel moved toward the doors.
The lights flickered again.
Sophie’s eyes opened.
May you like
She whispered one name.
“Michael.”
