Chapter 14 - THE STEWARD’S CHAMBER
The signal ended beneath an abandoned factory owned by the Hawthorne Preservation Foundation.
Emma and Sabrina entered through a loading entrance.
Lila remained with police.
Inside, the factory appeared empty.
Connor guided them by phone from the house.
“Go left at the stairs,” he said. “The signal is under you.”
They found an elevator hidden behind a steel panel.
Sabrina used Ethan’s access code.
The elevator descended six floors.
When the doors opened, they entered a laboratory larger than the one beneath Emma’s home.
Rows of memory-treatment chairs stood beneath white lights.
Hundreds of labeled drives filled glass cabinets.
At the center, Daniel lay unconscious on an examination table.
Adrian stood beside him.
Thomas sat restrained in a chair.
Emma raised Hale’s spare pistol.
“Move away from him.”
Adrian looked tired rather than frightened.
“You came quickly.”
“Release them.”
“You are pointing a gun inside a room containing forty years of unstable chemical research.”
“Then don’t make me fire.”
Sabrina moved toward Thomas.
A guard stepped from behind the cabinet.
Ethan.
His arm was bandaged from Hale’s bullet.
He pointed a weapon at Sabrina.
“You should have stayed loyal.”
“To whom?”
“To survival.”
Adrian continued preparing an injection.
Emma kept the gun aimed at him.
“What is that?”
“A stabilizer.”
“Put it down.”
“Daniel’s memories are collapsing.”
“You caused it.”
“The escape interrupted his treatment.”
Thomas strained against the restraints.
“He is lying. The injection will erase the archive code.”
Adrian glanced at him.
“Thomas has lied to you since before you were born.”
Emma’s hands tightened around the gun.
“Are you the Steward?”
Adrian smiled sadly.
“No.”
“Samuel said he served your legacy.”
“Samuel believes many things I taught him to believe.”
“Thomas called you the Steward.”
Thomas shouted, “Because he is!”
Adrian placed the syringe on the table.
“The Steward is a title given to the person controlling the archive. I held it for twenty years.”
“And now?”
“Daniel does.”
Emma looked at her husband.
“He doesn’t even remember the archive.”
“Memory and access are not the same.”
Adrian touched a sensor near Daniel’s hand.
Screens activated.
A list of names appeared.
At the top was Thomas Bell.
Beside his name were financial transfers, patient records, and authorization codes.
Emma stared at her father.
“You approved the early trials.”
Thomas looked away.
Adrian said, “Thomas did not oppose the program because patients were harmed. He opposed it because the board chose me to lead it.”
“That is not true,” Thomas said.
“Then explain Project Orchard.”
A video began.
Thomas stood in a laboratory thirty years earlier.
He instructed technicians to increase the dosage for two pediatric subjects.
The children were Daniel and Samuel.
Emma felt sick.
Thomas shouted, “The video was altered.”
Adrian played another.
Margaret signed consent forms.
Another showed Thomas meeting military officials.
Another showed him discussing how altered identities could protect intelligence agents.
Emma turned toward Thomas.
“Did you create Daniel’s false life?”
Thomas’s silence returned.
“Answer me.”
“I created the Reeves identity,” he admitted. “But I did it to remove him from Adrian’s control.”
“You erased his childhood.”
“He would have died in the program.”
“You made yourself his rescuer after destroying him.”
Thomas’s face hardened.
“You do not understand what was at stake.”
“That sentence has excused every monster in this family.”
Ethan suddenly pulled Sabrina toward him.
She struck his injured arm.
The gun fired.
The bullet hit a glass cabinet.
Drives shattered across the floor.
Adrian shouted and moved toward the emergency controls.
Emma fired into the ceiling.
Everyone stopped.
“Let her go.”
Ethan smiled at Sabrina.
“You won’t shoot me while I’m holding your sister.”
Sabrina drove her heel into his foot and threw herself aside.
Emma fired.
The bullet struck Ethan’s shoulder.
He collapsed.
Sabrina kicked away his weapon.
Adrian pressed a red switch.
Metal doors began closing around the archive cabinets.
Thomas tore one hand free from the restraint.
He reached for the control console.
Daniel woke.
His eyes found Emma.
“Don’t let him open it,” he whispered.
“Who?”
“Thomas.”
Thomas entered a code.
A countdown appeared.
ARCHIVE RELEASE: 60 SECONDS.
Adrian went pale.
“He is transmitting everything.”
“To whom?” Emma asked.
Thomas smiled.
“To the world.”
Adrian struck him.
The two men fought beside the console.
Sabrina helped Daniel from the table.
The countdown continued.
45 SECONDS.
Daniel leaned against Emma.
“If the archive releases without decryption, patient identities become public.”
Emma understood.
Children.
Victims.
People who did not know their memories had been changed.
Thomas was not exposing Hawthorne.
He was sacrificing every patient to destroy Adrian.
“Stop the transmission!” she shouted.
Adrian tried.
Thomas held him back.
30 SECONDS.
Daniel pressed his bloody hand against the verification plate.
The system requested authorization.
Emma spoke.
“The night Emma taught the stars our names.”
AUTHORIZATION ACCEPTED.
Options filled the screen.
RELEASE ALL.
DESTROY ALL.
SEAL EVIDENCE.
Daniel looked at Emma.
“Your choice.”
Thomas shouted, “Release it!”
Adrian shouted, “Seal it!”
Emma saw a fourth option.
TRANSFER STEWARDSHIP.
“Can we protect the patients and send the crimes to investigators?”
Daniel studied the code.
“Yes. But only a new Steward can control access.”
“Who?”
“A Reeves heir.”
The countdown reached ten.
Emma pressed TRANSFER STEWARDSHIP.
The screen requested a name.
She entered her own.
3.
4.
5.
The transmission stopped.
Thomas screamed.
Adrian closed his eyes.
Every cabinet locked.
A message appeared.
STEWARD EMMA REEVES RECOGNIZED.
Emma looked at the thousands of files now under her control.
Daniel whispered, “It’s over.”
But an alarm began beneath the floor.
Adrian looked toward the exit.
“No,” he said. “Samuel activated the destruction protocol.”
The laboratory began to shake.
Emma supported Daniel.
Sabrina pulled Thomas from the chair.
Adrian lifted Ethan, despite the blood covering the man’s shoulder.
They ran toward the elevator.
Flames moved through the cabinets behind them.
At the elevator, Thomas broke free.
“The archive belongs to me!”
He ran back toward the console.
Emma shouted after him.
He did not turn.
The fire reached the central chamber.
The elevator doors closed.
May you like
Through the narrowing gap, Emma saw her father surrounded by burning screens.
Then the underground laboratory exploded.
