Chapter 9 - My Father Left Me a MessageThe video lasted twelve minutes.
I wanted it to stop.
It didn't.
The man on screen introduced himself as Nathan Rivers.
My real father.
He told me things I had never heard.
He hadn't abandoned my mother.
He hadn't died.
He had disappeared because he discovered what his own research had become.
Project Lullaby had begun as a medical program.
It studied newborn brain development.
Then money entered.
Military contractors.
Private companies.
Political donors.
People who wanted to predict behavior before children could even speak.
Nathan tried to shut it down.
They threatened him.
Then they threatened my mother.
Then they experimented on me.
“Your childhood memories were manipulated,” he said.
I stared at the screen.
“What?”
Emily squeezed my hand.
Nathan continued.
“You remember being afraid of thunderstorms.”
I frowned.
“I was.”
“No.”
He leaned closer to the camera.
“You were afraid of the sound of gunfire.”
My blood ran cold.
I remembered nothing.
But suddenly fragments flashed through my mind.
Bright lights.
A hallway.
A red door.
Someone screaming.
A man holding my hand.
My mother crying.
Nathan's voice.
“Your brain created another memory to protect you.”
The video changed.
A file appeared.
SUBJECT 001.
My name.
My birthday.
A list of neurological responses.
Then another document.
SUBJECT 001 OFFSPRING: ETHAN RIVERS.
I stopped breathing.
The room spun.
Nathan's recorded voice continued.
“Your son carries the same marker.”
Emily collapsed into a chair.
Linda covered her face.
I looked at both of them.
“You knew?”
Linda whispered:
“I suspected.”
Emily shook her head.
“I didn't.”
Then the screen displayed another message.
TRANSFER STATUS: PENDING.
“What does that mean?”
Linda stood.
“It means they want Ethan.”
“We know that.”
“No.”
She pointed to the screen.
“They don't want to kill him.”
I stared.
“Then what?”
“They want to take him.”
“For what?”
Linda swallowed.
“To continue the experiment.”
A sound echoed from the hallway.
Metal against metal.
Someone had opened the outer door.
We all froze.
Then footsteps.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Coming toward us.
Linda grabbed a weapon from beneath the desk.
Emily pulled Ethan into her arms.
I switched off the monitor.
The footsteps stopped outside the room.
Then a man's voice came through the steel door.
“Daniel.”
I recognized it.
The same voice from the phone.
“Your father left you a lot of answers.”
A pause.
“But he never told you the truth about your mother.”
Linda went pale.
The voice continued:
May you like
“She didn't protect you.”
“She sold you.”
