Chapter 17 - The Fourth ChildThe call ended.
Noah stared at the screen.
His father grabbed the phone.
“Trace it.”
Daniel tried.
“No signal.”
Evan looked at Noah.
“What did he mean?”
Noah shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
The archive continued leaking.
Then another message appeared on every screen.
SUBJECT 0000 HAS AWAKENED.
Mara stared.
“Zero.”
His father nodded.
“That was the original.”
“Your family?”
“No.”
“My grandmother?”
“She was the first scientist.”
“Then who was the patient?”
He didn’t answer.
The hospital network displayed a photograph.
A boy.
Maybe fourteen.
Pale.
Dark hair.
A scar across his chest.
Underneath:
SUBJECT 0000
Born twenty-seven years ago.
Status:
ACTIVE
Evan whispered:
“That’s him.”
Noah stared.
“How could he be twenty-seven if he was in the original experiment?”
His father answered:
“He was never a child subject.”
Daniel frowned.
“Then what was he?”
“An adult.”
Mara looked confused.
“What does that mean?”
His father took a breath.
“The boy in the photograph is not the original.”
“What?”
“He was copied.”
The room became silent.
“Copied from whom?”
His father pointed to Victor Hale’s photograph.
“From him.”
Noah looked at the screen.
The face was almost identical.
Then realization struck.
“Hale is a copy.”
Evan looked at him.
“And the real Victor?”
A new photograph appeared.
An older man.
No red tie.
No smile.
Eyes cold.
Standing beside the grandmother.
His father whispered:
“That’s him.”
Mara stared.
“Then who have we been fighting?”
“A replacement.”
Daniel shook his head.
“This is impossible.”
His father smiled bitterly.
“Ten years ago, I thought so too.”
The replacement Hale had been controlling the Protocol.
The grandmother had been preparing a transfer.
And Subject Zero had been waiting.
Waiting inside a hidden facility.
Waiting for the archive.
Noah understood.
“He wanted me to leak it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His father looked at him.
“Because the archive doesn’t just contain evidence.”
Noah touched his temple.
“It contains identities.”
“All of them.”
“Doctors.”
“Yes.”
“Politicians.”
“Yes.”
“Children.”
“Yes.”
Noah’s face hardened.
“He can use it to replace anyone.”
His father nodded.
“He can create new versions.”
Evan whispered:
“And nobody would know.”
A message appeared.
REPLACEMENT PROTOCOL: 98% COMPLETE.
Mara’s eyes widened.
“What does that mean?”
His father looked at Noah.
“Someone has already been replaced.”
They returned to the farmhouse.
Everything looked normal.
Too normal.
The door opened.
A familiar woman stood inside.
Noah’s grandmother.
She smiled.
“You’re safe.”
Noah stared.
“How did you get here?”
She frowned.
“What?”
He stepped backward.
“Where is Victor?”
Her face changed.
“I don’t know.”
Evan whispered:
“She’s not your grandmother.”
The woman smiled.
Too slowly.
Her eyes changed first.
Then her voice.
Victor Hale.
“Very good.”
Noah reached for the door.
Locked.
Hale smiled.
“You found the fourth child.”
He stepped closer.
“But you still don’t know where the real one is.”
Then the woman’s skin began to blister.
Beneath it was metal.
A synthetic face.
A machine.
Hale’s replacement.
It smiled.
And behind Noah, someone whispered:
“You’re too late.”
Noah turned.
His grandmother stood there.
May you like
Alive.
Holding a gun.
