Chapter 13 - THE MEMORY VAULTThe original Marlowe estate sat eighty miles away.
Abandoned.
Or so Gabriel believed.
At midnight, Gabriel, Claire, Julian and the two boys entered through the old servant's gate.
The mansion looked untouched.
Dust.
Broken windows.
Dead gardens.
But beneath the floor was another world.
A vault.
Gabriel's father's personal archive.
Thousands of files.
Photographs.
Recordings.
Medical experiments.
Names of victims.
Gabriel opened one folder.
His own name.
SUBJECT CONTROL.
Claire's name.
RESISTANT VARIABLE.
Julian's name.
PRIMARY HOST.
Eli.
MEMORY CARRIER ONE.
Noah.
MEMORY CARRIER TWO.
Gabriel stared.
“Host?”
Claire stepped closer.
“Your father discovered that the enhanced neural pattern could store other people's memories.”
Gabriel frowned.
“And Julian?”
“He was compatible.”
“With what?”
“The transfer.”
Gabriel looked at Julian.
Julian's expression was empty.
“They've been putting memories into me for years.”
Gabriel understood.
Julian carried the memories of dead subjects.
Hundreds of them.
Maybe thousands.
His mind was a living archive.
“And the twins?”
“They can hold even more.”
Noah spoke quietly.
“That's why Grandpa wants us.”
Gabriel turned.
“You remember him?”
Noah nodded.
“He used to talk to us.”
Eli looked at Noah.
“You knew him?”
“No.”
“He talked to me through the walls.”
Gabriel felt sick.
The boys had been raised in separate rooms.
But they had learned to communicate.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
Just like Eli had done earlier.
Three taps.
A signal.
A language.
Gabriel looked at the vault.
Then he heard it.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
Someone was inside the walls.
Julian's face changed.
“It's him.”
The lights came on.
Gabriel's father appeared on the central screen.
Older.
But very much alive.
“Welcome home, Gabriel.”
Gabriel walked toward the screen.
“You stole my memories.”
His father smiled.
“I protected you from them.”
“You killed Claire.”
“No.”
“I knew you would say that.”
A file appeared.
Security footage from the night of the explosion.
Gabriel watched.
Claire stood beside Eli.
Julian stood across from her.
Then Gabriel entered.
But this time, Gabriel saw what he had never remembered.
He was carrying a gun.
Claire looked terrified.
Gabriel pointed it at Julian.
Then his father appeared behind him.
Injected something into his neck.
Gabriel collapsed.
His father took the gun.
Then fired.
Not at Claire.
At the ceiling.
Creating the explosion sequence.
Claire grabbed Eli.
Julian tried to stop the guards.
The blast happened.
Gabriel woke afterward with no memory.
His father had rewritten the story.
But one detail remained.
Claire had survived.
Gabriel looked at the screen.
“You framed me.”
His father smiled.
“I improved you.”
“You destroyed my life.”
“I gave you purpose.”
Gabriel's voice shook.
“Why?”
His father looked at the twins.
“Because humanity is limited.”
Silence.
“I wanted to create memory without death.”
Gabriel stared.
“You murdered children for that?”
“I made sacrifices.”
“No.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“You made victims.”
His father smiled.
“History will call them necessary.”
Then steel doors slammed shut.
Gas began filling the chamber.
Claire shouted:
“GABRIEL!”
The boys began coughing.
Julian searched for an exit.
Nothing.
Gabriel looked at the screen.
His father said:
“This is where you finally become useful.”
A machine behind Gabriel turned on.
A neural transfer device.
Gabriel understood.
His father wasn't trying to kill them.
He was trying to transfer everything.
The memories.
The evidence.
The identities.
Into one person.
Gabriel.
The machine locked onto his head.
Claire screamed.
“NO!”
Gabriel looked at her.
Then at his sons.
He whispered:
“Don't let them forget.”
The machine activated.
And Gabriel saw everything.
Every murder.
Every experiment.
Every hidden room.
Every victim.
Every memory.
Including the moment his father had secretly ordered Claire's death.
But there was something else.
One final memory.
A memory that did not belong to Gabriel.
A woman's voice.
A nurse.
Speaking to Claire.
“The baby survived.”
Claire had asked:
“Which one?”
The nurse replied:
“Neither.”
May you like
Gabriel's eyes opened.
A third child.
