Chapter 14 - The Final Twenty-Seven MinutesThe archive countdown resumed the moment the screen went black.
Twenty-seven minutes remained.
We had to return to the mansion, recover the original receiver, and stop Daniel from transferring the administrator role to the system.
Mother believed the receiver was still in Vincent's study.
The black capsule I'd removed from his ear was a transmitter, but the larger network required an external relay to interpret the data. Without that relay, the archive would lose its ability to update the records in real time.
Vincent studied the route map.
He divided our remaining team into two groups.
One would enter through the east garden and reach the security room. The other would approach the mansion through the old service tunnel beneath the wine cellar.
I insisted on joining Vincent.
He didn't argue.
Before we left, Anna took my hand.
She placed something in my palm.
A small silver pendant shaped like a crescent moon.
I recognized it from the photographs of Elena Moretti.
Anna typed a message.
MAMA GAVE ME THIS BEFORE THEY SEPARATED US.
I turned it over.
On the back were two engraved letters.
E.M.
Elena Moretti.
Beneath the letters was a tiny screw.
I opened the pendant with my fingernail.
Inside lay a microSD card.
Mother inhaled sharply.
“That's the original project key.”
Anna nodded.
She had hidden it for eleven years, believing it was the only thing that could help her escape.
The card contained an encrypted backup of the earliest Project Echo records. It was small enough to fit inside the pendant, but powerful enough to unlock the original archive if we could connect it to the master relay.
Mother took the card carefully.
“You've kept this safe all these years?”
Anna nodded again.
I hugged her.
Then we drove toward the mansion.
The rain had stopped, leaving Chicago's streets shining beneath the streetlights. Vincent sat beside me, checking his phone while his right hand rested against the bandage around his ear.
His face looked exhausted.
I touched his shoulder.
He turned toward me.
“Are you afraid?” I asked.
He considered the question.
Then he typed.
“Yes.”
The honesty surprised me.
“Of dying?”
He shook his head.
“Of losing the chance to hear you.”
I stared at him.
He had never said anything like that before.
I took his hand.
“Then let's make sure you get that chance.”
When we reached the mansion, the front gate was open.
No guards stood outside.
The cameras tracked our car without interruption.
It felt like entering a trap that had already closed around us.
We split up.
Vincent and I entered through the underground passage, while the others approached the security room from the garden.
Inside, the mansion was unnaturally quiet.
The hallways were empty.
The chandeliers glowed above the marble floor.
Everything looked exactly as it had on our wedding night, except for the faint bloodstain near the staircase.
I remembered the photograph beneath my bed.
The message warning me that I had never been sold for fifty dollars.
The room that should have been my refuge.
The night my life became something I could no longer recognize.
We entered the study.
Daniel stood beside the desk.
Tyler waited near the window.
On the desk sat the metal case containing the original receiver.
Daniel smiled when he saw us.
“You came home.”
Vincent raised his pistol.
Daniel held up a hand.
“Before you do anything, you should know something about your wife.”
Tyler stepped forward.
“Emily, he doesn't want to tell you the truth.”
I looked at my brother.
“What truth?”
Daniel opened a folder.
Inside were medical records dated twenty-three years earlier.
My birth records.
My mother's surgical notes.
And a photograph of me as a newborn.
Daniel pointed to the document.
“Your mother did more than create the key. She used her own biological material to stabilize the original prototype. Your DNA carries a unique sequence that makes the archive recognize you.”
I stared at the photograph.
The file continued.
SUBJECT E.C. WAS EXPOSED TO INITIAL DEVELOPMENT PROTOCOLS IN UTERO.
I couldn't breathe.
My mother had been pregnant with me during the original research.
The system hadn't selected me by chance.
I had been connected to Project Echo before I was born.
Daniel smiled.
“Your father sold you because he knew the system would eventually need you.”
Tyler looked at the floor.
I turned to him.
“You knew?”
He nodded.
“Dad told me years ago.”
Something inside me went cold.
“You watched me suffer, and you knew.”
Tyler started to speak.
I slapped him.
The sound cracked across the study.
For once, he had nothing to say.
Daniel picked up the receiver.
“Enough family drama.”
He connected it to the terminal.
A progress bar appeared.
ADMINISTRATOR TRANSFER: 10%.
Vincent fired.
Daniel ducked behind the desk, and the receiver fell to the floor.
I crawled toward it.
Tyler grabbed my ankle.
I kicked him away and reached for the device.
Then a gunshot rang through the room.
Vincent fell to his knees.
Blood spread across his white shirt.
I screamed his name.
Daniel stood behind him, holding the pistol.
The transfer continued.
ADMINISTRATOR TRANSFER: 64%.
Vincent looked at me.
He couldn't hear my voice.
But he could see the words forming on my lips.
I love you.
His expression softened.
Then the screen flashed.
TRANSFER COMPLETE.
Every camera in the mansion turned toward me.
Every monitor displayed my face.
And a voice whispered through the speakers.
“Administrator Emily Carter recognized.”
The black receiver began blinking.
May you like
My husband's blood covered my hands.
And I had become the one person in the world who could control the machine that had destroyed his life.
