Chapter 14 - THE WOMAN OUTSIDEThe woman stood beneath the rain.
She was older now.
But Stefan recognized her immediately.
It was the face from the photographs.
His biological mother.
Her name was Elena.
She walked into the ship carrying no weapon.
Pavel raised his gun.
"Stop."
Elena ignored him.
She looked at Stefan.
"You're my son."
Stefan said nothing.
Lidia stared at her.
"You were supposed to be dead."
Elena smiled.
"I was supposed to be many things."
Adrian appeared behind her.
Pavel fired.
Adrian fell.
Again.
But this time, blood appeared.
Real blood.
He could die.
Stefan approached.
"Who are you?"
Adrian looked at Elena.
"Ask your mother."
Elena shook her head.
"You are not ready."
Stefan laughed bitterly.
"After everything I've seen?"
"You still don't understand."
She pointed toward the screens.
"The archive isn't evidence."
"What is it?"
"A warning."
Elena explained.
The facility had not been created to manufacture people.
It had been created because someone had discovered a biological phenomenon.
Human memory could be transferred.
Copied.
Edited.
Stored.
The people taken over the years were not experiments alone.
They were data.
The government had intended to use the technology for intelligence operations.
But the program evolved.
They discovered they could create people carrying selective memories.
Witnesses who could not lie.
Operatives who remembered nothing of their orders.
Entire identities could be rewritten.
The missing villagers had been chosen because their memories contained incriminating information.
"The massacre?" Pavel asked.
Elena looked at him.
"It wasn't one massacre."
She pointed to the archive.
"It happened every year."
Silence.
Pavel's face went white.
"For thirty years."
"Yes."
"And my mother?"
"She tried to expose them."
"Why did she give me to the program?"
Elena looked at Lidia.
"Because she knew they would take you anyway."
Lidia began crying.
"I chose the only chance you had to survive."
Stefan turned away.
Then an alarm sounded.
The transmission counter hit 99%.
Everyone froze.
"One percent," Pavel whispered.
Adrian suddenly smiled.
"What?"
He pressed a small remote.
The entire facility began collapsing.
"Destroy the ship."
The walls shook.
Elena shouted:
"Stefan!"
He looked at her.
"Finish it!"
The counter moved.
99.1%.
99.2%.
99.3%.
Then the screen changed.
TRANSMISSION INTERRUPTED.
Stefan screamed.
"What happened?"
Adrian laughed.
"I told you."
He raised the remote.
"The system has always belonged to me."
Then Lidia stepped behind him.
She was holding a knife.
"Not anymore."
She stabbed the remote.
Adrian stared at her.
Then Lidia whispered:
"Run."
The transmission restarted.
99.4%.
99.5%.
99.6%.
Outside, sirens approached.
Inside, the ceiling began collapsing.
Stefan looked at Lidia.
"Come with us."
She smiled.
"I have been running for thirty years."
99.7%.
"I am tired."
99.8%.
"Go."
99.9%.
The final number appeared.
100%.
Every screen went black.
May you like
For three seconds, there was silence.
Then every phone in the world began ringing.
