Chapter 17 - The Other MotherThey left the estate before sunrise.
Police surrounded the property.
Ambulances lined the driveway.
The mansion that had once looked untouchable now looked like a crime scene.
Sarah sat in the back of an ambulance.
Evelyn beside her.
Her father stood nearby, speaking to officers.
Sarah couldn't stop staring at the photograph.
The woman beside her younger father looked familiar.
Not because Sarah remembered her.
Because she felt her.
The same strange sensation she had experienced around the first machine.
Memory.
Connection.
Something inside her knew the woman.
Evelyn noticed.
“You've seen her.”
Sarah shook her head.
“Not consciously.”
“Then maybe the system left something behind.”
Sarah looked toward her father.
“I'm going to ask him.”
They approached.
Her father immediately looked worried.
“What?”
Sarah held up the photograph.
“Who's she?”
He stopped breathing.
Evelyn crossed her arms.
“You knew.”
He looked at Sarah.
“Yes.”
“Who?”
He lowered his voice.
“Your biological mother.”
Sarah's face went cold.
“You said my mother was dead.”
“I lied.”
Sarah laughed bitterly.
“That's becoming a family tradition.”
Her father closed his eyes.
“She left before you were born.”
“Why?”
“She discovered what the Foundation was doing.”
“Where is she?”
“I don't know.”
Sarah showed him the address.
His face went pale.
“You found it.”
“What is it?”
“A safehouse.”
“Whose?”
“Yours.”
Sarah frowned.
“My safehouse?”
“You were hidden there.”
“For how long?”
“Three years.”
“Then what happened?”
Her father hesitated.
“Someone found you.”
“Who?”
Richard.
Sarah looked away.
Everything seemed to circle back to him.
Then an officer approached.
“Miss Harrington?”
“Yes.”
“We found something in the estate.”
He handed her an evidence bag.
Inside was a small cassette tape.
Sarah looked confused.
“What is it?”
The officer glanced at her father.
“Your grandmother's.”
Sarah took it.
That night, she played the tape.
A woman's voice filled the room.
Her grandmother.
“If you're hearing this, Sarah survived.”
Sarah sat motionless.
The recording continued.
“You think the Foundation was created to preserve life.”
Static.
“It wasn't.”
Sarah leaned closer.
“It was created to replace people.”
The tape clicked.
Then her grandmother whispered:
“The first person replaced was your father.”
Sarah froze.
Her father looked at her.
“What?”
The tape continued.
“The man you call father is a reconstruction.”
Sarah's blood ran cold.
She looked toward him.
He said nothing.
The tape ended.
Silence filled the room.
Sarah whispered:
“Who are you?”
Her father began crying.
“I don't know anymore.”
Then Evelyn looked at the window.
A black car had stopped outside.
A woman stepped out.
Dark hair.
Green eyes.
She walked toward the house.
Sarah's heart stopped.
She knew the face.
It was the woman from the photograph.
Her biological mother.
She had finally come back.
May you like
But she wasn't alone.
Behind her stood Richard.
