Chapter 14 - The Man Who Raised MeMy father stood in the doorway.
I stared at him.
“Did you know?”
His face looked exhausted.
“Know what?”
“That your identity was forged.”
He froze.
Vivian, standing behind him, began crying.
My father walked into the room.
“Mara…”
“Who are you?”
He closed his eyes.
For the first time in my life, my father looked afraid.
“My name is Daniel Ellis.”
“That isn't what I asked.”
He sat down.
“I was not your mother's first husband.”
“I know.”
“You think that's the secret.”
“It isn't.”
He shook his head.
“No.”
He looked toward General Hale.
“Tell her.”
Hale remained silent.
My father continued.
“Your mother and I met after she entered witness protection.”
“From whom?”
“The Archivist.”
I stared at him.
“So he existed before the network?”
“No.”
My father swallowed.
“The network existed before him.”
“Then who was he?”
He looked at Vivian.
“She knows.”
Vivian shook her head.
“I know what they told me.”
“Tell her.”
Vivian whispered,
“The Archivist was a name passed from one person to another.”
A position.
Not a man.
Not a system.
A role.
Someone inherited control of the archive.
Someone whose identity was never recorded.
My father looked at me.
“Your mother wanted to destroy the archive.”
“She failed.”
“She hid the key.”
“In me.”
“Yes.”
“And then?”
“She vanished.”
“Why?”
“Because she realized someone close to her had betrayed her.”
“Who?”
My father looked at Chase.
Chase stepped forward.
“It wasn't me.”
“I know.”
Then my father looked at Vivian.
“It wasn't her either.”
Vivian stared.
“Then who?”
He pointed toward the screen.
A live camera feed appeared.
General Rourke.
Alive.
Older.
Sitting in a hospital bed.
I felt my stomach turn.
“How?”
General Hale stared at the image.
“I thought he was missing.”
“He was.”
My father answered.
“By his own choice.”
Rourke looked into the camera.
Then spoke.
“Mara.”
I stepped closer.
“You took something from me.”
“I don't have anything.”
“You have the archive.”
“You destroyed it.”
“No.”
He smiled.
“The archive isn't data.”
He pointed toward me.
“It is memory.”
I felt cold.
“You built it.”
“No.”
“I inherited it.”
“From whom?”
He paused.
“Your mother.”
I stopped breathing.
“My mother was the Archivist?”
Rourke nodded.
“No.”
He leaned toward the camera.
“She was the first person to defeat it.”
My heart pounded.
“She created the second key because the first system could not be destroyed.”
“Why?”
“Because too many people depended on it.”
“Who?”
“Governments.”
“Agencies.”
“Corporations.”
“Families.”
He looked directly at me.
“People like yours.”
The room went silent.
Rourke continued.
“Your mother didn't die.”
“She became the only person capable of shutting down the archive.”
“And you?”
“I was ordered to stop her.”
“By whom?”
He smiled.
“Ask your father.”
I turned.
My father stood motionless.
I whispered,
“Dad.”
He began to cry.
“I was there.”
“Where?”
“When your mother disappeared.”
“What did you do?”
“I let her go.”
“Why?”
“Because she asked me to.”
“She knew she wouldn't come back.”
He nodded.
“She gave me one instruction.”
“What?”
“To raise you.”
I stared at him.
“All these years…”
“Yes.”
“You knew she was alive?”
“For eighteen years.”
My knees weakened.
“Where is she?”
My father's face crumpled.
“I don't know.”
Rourke answered through the screen.
“I do.”
Everyone turned toward him.
“She is in the only place the archive cannot erase.”
“Where?”
He smiled.
“Right beneath your house.”
Silence.
My childhood home.
The hidden wall.
The metal box.
The room.
I understood.
There was another level beneath the house.
Rourke's final words echoed through the bunker.
“She has been waiting for you.”
The screen cut to black.
Then my father's phone rang.
He answered.
A woman's voice came through.
Soft.
Familiar.
My mother's voice.
“Mara?”
I stopped breathing.
“Mom?”
A pause.
Then:
May you like
“Don't trust your father.”
The line went dead.
