CHAPTER 22: THE DEAD MAN’S COMMAND
Ethan did not lower his weapon.
“You expect us to believe you’re Daniel?”
“No,” the scarred man replied. “Belief is what created this family. I expect you to verify me.”
Adrian approached cautiously.
Daniel extended his left hand.
Two fingers were permanently bent.
Claire remembered Thomas’s words.
The survivor of the plane crash had possessed damaged fingers before the crash.
Thomas had copied the injury later.
Ethan looked toward Helen.
“You recognized him.”
“I recognized what was done to him.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It is the only one you’re getting until we reach the surface.”
Daniel glanced toward the burning elevator shaft.
“There is no surface route. Thermal decontamination sealed the hospital.”
He pointed his cane toward the tunnel.
“The old transfer line leads beneath the Blackwood estate.”
Adrian removed a small biometric scanner from his medical bag.
“This will identify him.”
Helen grabbed his wrist.
“Don’t.”
Adrian pulled free.
The scanner touched Daniel’s thumb.
A green light passed across his skin.
The screen processed for several seconds.
Then two results appeared.
DANIEL BLACKWOOD—DECEASED.
DAVID BLACKWOOD—DECEASED.
Vanessa stared at him.
“It matched both brothers.”
Daniel gave a humorless laugh.
“Because Helen’s records were designed that way.”
Helen’s jaw tightened.
“Thomas built the duplicate identities.”
“Thomas used them,” Daniel corrected. “You created them.”
Ethan stepped between them.
“Enough. Why did Claire’s baby say Daniel?”
Daniel looked toward the newborn.
“Daniel was never just a name.”
He pulled back his sleeve.
A sequence of numbers had been burned into his forearm.
DNL-7-OPEN.
“It was an activation command,” he said. “A verbal key placed inside every subject connected to the continuity program.”
Claire held her son closer.
“He is not a subject.”
“To you, he is your child. To the program, he is the second generation.”
“What happens when the command is spoken?”
Daniel looked down the tunnel.
“A door opens.”
A heavy mechanism moved somewhere beyond the darkness.
One by one, emergency lights appeared along the tunnel walls.
A black door at the far end unlocked.
Helen’s face lost its color.
“We have to leave before Thomas reaches us.”
Noah’s voice suddenly came through a speaker above them.
“Ethan?”
The transmission was weak and distorted.
“Can you hear me?”
Ethan looked toward the ceiling.
“Noah, where are you?”
“Thomas took Margaret. Grant is alive. They’re entering the lower tunnel.”
A sharp sound interrupted him.
Noah grunted.
Then Thomas spoke through the same channel.
“Bring both infants to Door Seven.”
Ethan raised his weapon toward the speaker.
“If you hurt him—”
“He is my son.”
“That never stopped you before.”
Thomas laughed.
“You still don’t understand, Ethan.”
The transmission ended.
Daniel struck the floor with his cane.
“We need to move.”
They entered the newly opened passage.
Inside was a circular chamber surrounded by inactive medical consoles.
A biometric terminal illuminated when Ethan approached.
“Do not touch it,” Helen warned.
The machine scanned him automatically.
Lines of genetic data filled the screen.
Ethan expected to see the Blackwood name.
Instead, the terminal displayed:
SUBJECT ZERO IDENTIFIED.
PRIMARY PATERNAL LINE: THOMAS REED.
GENETIC STATUS: DIRECT DESCENDANT.
Ethan turned slowly toward Helen.
“You told me Thomas had nothing to do with my birth.”
Helen said nothing.
The terminal produced one final line.
MATERNAL DONOR IDENTIFIED.
ACCESS RESTRICTED TO EVELYN CARTER.
Claire’s posture changed.
Her eyes became colder.
May you like
When she spoke, her voice was no longer entirely her own.
“I remember this room.”
