CHAPTER 14 Subject Zero
Frank Donnelly collapsed into the tall grass behind the farmhouse.
His lungs burned.
His prison uniform was soaked with mud and blood.
He had escaped a federal transport convoy less than five hours earlier.
Two guards were injured.
One inmate was dead.
None of that mattered anymore.
Not after what he had read inside the file.
He tightened his grip on the weathered manila folder.
Across the front, the faded red stamp remained unmistakable:
PROJECT GENESIS
Beneath it...
Another line.
SUBJECT ZERO: KHLOE ELIZABETH COLE
Frank whispered to himself,
"God... Michael was right."
Inside the farmhouse, Khloe screamed as another contraction hit.
Eleanor checked the stopwatch.
"Ninety seconds."
Harrison's heart sank.
Labor was accelerating.
Dr. Crane hadn't lied about one thing.
Khloe was giving birth.
Far too early.
Outside, Arthur Sinclair checked his watch.
"She's progressing."
One of his men asked,
"Do we breach?"
Arthur shook his head.
"No."
"Why wait?"
"Because panic makes people negotiate."
He smiled.
"Harrison always chooses logic."
"He'll open the door himself."
Inside...
Harrison looked at his sister.
Khloe's face was pale.
Sweat covered her forehead.
Her breathing was becoming irregular.
"Harrison..."
Her voice trembled.
"I don't think I can..."
He knelt beside her.
"You can."
She grabbed his sleeve.
"If something happens..."
"No."
"Listen to me."
"If I don't make it..."
His expression hardened.
"You're going to make it."
"Harrison."
She looked directly into his eyes.
"Promise me..."
"...save my daughter."
For the first time since childhood...
Harrison couldn't answer.
A sudden pounding echoed from the back of the house.
Not gunfire.
Knocking.
Three slow knocks.
Pause.
Two more.
Eleanor raised her pistol.
"Whoever's there..."
"Hands where I can see them!"
A weak voice answered.
"Frank..."
"Donnelly..."
Harrison immediately opened the reinforced rear door.
Frank stumbled inside and collapsed.
He shoved the folder toward Harrison.
"You don't..."
"...have much time."
Harrison opened the file.
The first page froze him in place.
PROJECT GENESIS
Internal Research Program
Classification: Omega
Objective: Genetic Continuity Initiative
He flipped to the next page.
Medical charts.
DNA profiles.
Bloodline records dating back nearly forty years.
Photographs of children.
Some smiling.
Some crying.
Some...
Marked DECEASED.
Khloe looked up weakly.
"What is it?"
Harrison couldn't speak.
Frank forced himself upright.
"My brother stole those records."
"He hid them."
"They killed him."
"Tell me what Genesis is."
Frank closed his eyes.
"It started as fertility research."
Dr. Crane's name appeared repeatedly throughout the documents.
Richard Harrington's father.
Charles Harrington.
Several senators.
Military contractors.
Private laboratories.
"It wasn't about construction."
"The buildings..."
"...were only funding it."
Khloe struggled to breathe.
"What kind of research?"
Frank answered quietly.
"They were searching..."
"...for inherited resistance."
Silence.
Harrison frowned.
"Resistance to what?"
Frank looked toward Khloe.
"They believed..."
"...certain bloodlines carried rare genetic traits."
"They tracked families."
"They collected samples."
"They manipulated pregnancies."
Khloe felt ice spread through her body.
"My miscarriages..."
Frank nodded slowly.
"They weren't accidents."
The room fell completely silent.
Khloe covered her mouth.
"No..."
"My first miscarriage..."
"My second..."
Frank lowered his head.
"They wanted you to keep trying."
"Why?"
"Because..."
He looked directly at her.
"...you were the only successful match."
Harrison flipped through the folder.
One report stopped him cold.
A photograph of Khloe at age seven.
Standing beside her father at a county fair.
The date...
Twenty-nine years earlier.
She had been under surveillance...
Since childhood.
Eleanor took the folder.
Another page.
Medical terminology.
Embryo viability.
Genetic markers.
At the bottom...
One handwritten note.
Subject Zero remains fertile despite repeated intervention. Continue observation.
Her hands trembled.
"They caused it..."
"What?"
"The infertility."
Khloe broke down.
Years.
Years of believing her body had failed.
Years of hormone injections.
Endless surgeries.
Doctors apologizing.
Richard pretending to comfort her.
Every painful moment...
Part of an experiment.
Outside...
Arthur Sinclair received another update.
"Sir."
"The thermal scans show four people inside now."
Arthur frowned.
"Four?"
"Someone entered from the rear."
He immediately understood.
"Donnelly."
Arthur's calm expression vanished.
He grabbed the radio.
"Move!"
"Now!"
The tactical teams surged toward the farmhouse.
Inside...
Frank reached into the folder one last time.
He removed a sealed envelope.
"Only one copy exists."
"What's inside?"
"The founder."
Harrison opened it.
A single black-and-white photograph.
Taken in 1978.
Seven people stood together outside a research facility.
Charles Harrington.
A young Dr. Crane.
Several unidentified scientists.
And...
One man standing in the center.
Harrison's blood froze.
"I know him."
Khloe looked over.
"Who?"
Harrison barely whispered the name.
"Judge William Ashcroft."
The retired federal judge...
Who currently owned the farmhouse.
The very man Harrison trusted enough to hide Khloe here.
At that exact moment...
The front door unlocked.
Not forced.
Unlocked.
Someone had entered using a key.
Heavy footsteps echoed through the hallway.
A familiar elderly voice called out calmly:
"Harrison..."
"I'm afraid..."
"...you've been reading things that don't belong to you."
Judge William Ashcroft stepped into the living room.
Still wearing his judicial overcoat.
Holding a polished silver revolver.
Behind him...
Arthur Sinclair smiled.
They hadn't surrounded the farmhouse.
May you like
They had been invited in.
End of Chapter 14
