Chapter 11 - We escaped through the sewer tunnels beneath Chicago.By sunrise, the entire city had changed.
Police checkpoints appeared on major roads.
News helicopters circled downtown.
Banks were temporarily shut down.
Government buildings went into emergency lockdown.
The official story blamed a terrorist attack.
It was a lie.
The real story was worse.
Project Mercy had activated.
And nobody knew who controlled it.
Except me.
Or perhaps Theo did.
We reached a safehouse in Chinatown.
Marco secured the doors.
Elena sat beside Sophie.
Caleb watched every window.
Adrian stood alone in the kitchen.
I placed Theo, Miles, and Nora on the couch.
For the first time in hours, they were calm.
I looked at Adrian.
“You're going to tell me everything.”
He nodded.
“The project began with our grandfather.”
“Our grandfather?”
“He believed power was inherited.”
“That sounds like every rich psychopath.”
“He believed it could be engineered.”
Adrian opened an old notebook.
The pages were filled with formulas.
Genetic sequences.
Names.
Dates.
Birth records.
“There were seven original subjects.”
“Who were their parents?”
“Scientists.”
“Why children?”
“Because children were easier to shape.”
I looked at Sophie.
“She was one of them.”
“Yes.”
“And her father?”
“Caleb wasn't her biological father.”
My eyes moved toward him.
Caleb looked away.
“Then who was?”
Adrian answered:
“Our father.”
Silence.
Sophie looked at me.
“That's why Daddy always said he was sorry.”
I felt sick.
“Elena?”
She nodded.
“Caleb knew.”
“He protected Sophie anyway.”
“Why?”
“Because she was the last child.”
“What happened to the others?”
“Most died.”
“Why?”
“Because the program failed.”
“And Sophie?”
“She survived.”
I looked at the doll.
“What is inside it?”
Adrian suddenly became tense.
“Give it to me.”
“No.”
“Adrien, give me the doll.”
“Why?”
“Because it contains a memory chip.”
I pulled the doll open.
Inside the stuffing was a tiny black device.
I stared.
“How?”
“Caleb planted it.”
Caleb shook his head.
“No.”
Adrian looked at him.
“You didn't?”
“No.”
Then everyone looked at Sophie.
She held the doll.
“I put it there.”
“You?”
She nodded.
“Daddy showed me.”
“When?”
She smiled.
“Before he died.”
I inserted the chip into a laptop.
A video appeared.
Caleb.
Alive.
Standing in the laboratory.
He spoke directly to the camera.
“If you're watching this, I'm dead.”
He paused.
“You think Project Mercy created children.”
A second pause.
“It didn't.”
The video changed.
An image of a brain appeared.
Then a DNA sequence.
Caleb continued:
“The children weren't the experiment.”
I remembered the voice.
The same words.
“What was?”
The screen showed a city.
Chicago.
Then thousands of red dots.
“The experiment was the city.”
My blood ran cold.
“Project Mercy was designed to test whether an entire population could be genetically influenced through a single biological command.”
The triplets.
The network.
Theo.
Caleb continued.
“The control subject isn't Theo.”
I stared.
“Then who?”
The screen changed.
A photograph appeared.
Sophie.
“It's Sophie.”
Nobody moved.
Sophie dropped the doll.
Her face was blank.
The video ended.
I looked at her.
“You knew.”
She nodded.
“I forgot.”
“Forgot what?”
She touched her temple.
“Sometimes Daddy makes me forget.”
Caleb stepped toward her.
“Sophie…”
She looked at him.
“You aren't my daddy.”
Caleb stopped.
“No.”
“You never were.”
He began crying.
She continued.
“You were my protector.”
Caleb nodded.
Then Sophie turned toward me.
“Daddy told me something else.”
“What?”
She whispered:
“The first command is already inside me.”
Before I could ask what that meant, every phone in the safehouse rang simultaneously.
Mine.
Marco's.
Caleb's.
Elena's.
Adrian's.
Even the old landline.
All at once.
Marco answered.
A robotic voice spoke.
“SUBJECT A-07 ACTIVE.”
Then the lights turned green.
Sophie stood.
Her eyes went completely still.
She looked at me.
May you like
And in a voice that didn't sound like a four-year-old child, she said:
“Execute.”
