“She's carrying an embryo bank.”
For several seconds, I thought Margaret had finally said something too impossible even for our family.
Then I remembered the day.
Impossible had become routine.
“What does that mean?” Claire asked.
Margaret enlarged the medical chart on my phone.
“Victoria isn't pregnant.”
“Obviously.”
“She has an implanted storage capsule.”
Nathan frowned.
“Inside her body?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Margaret's expression hardened.
“Because bodies cross borders more easily than vaults.”
My stomach turned.
“How many embryos?”
“The chart doesn't say.”
“Whose?”
“That is what Reginald wants.”
Marcus leaned over the screen.
“You knew about this?”
“No.”
“But you recognized it.”
Margaret closed her eyes.
“Because I carried one.”
Silence.
Victoria's mother had been used the same way.
“When?”
“1953.”
“What did they put inside you?”
“Preserved reproductive material from the original Hart line.”
“Why?”
“Edmund was afraid the biological archive would be destroyed.”
I looked at Edmund's image beside unconscious Victoria.
“So this started with him.”
Margaret shook her head.
“Before him.”
Of course.
“Then who?”
“My grandfather.”
I almost laughed.
“No.”
“What?”
“We are not going back another generation tonight.”
Despite everything, Marcus smiled.
Margaret didn't.
“I am serious.”
“So am I.”
I took the phone back.
“What matters now?”
Margaret pointed toward the medical notation.
“The capsule inside Victoria contains viable embryos.”
“From Project EVE?”
“Possibly.”
“AVA?”
“Possibly.”
“Original Hart lines?”
“Yes.”
“And Reginald wants to use them to restart the program.”
“Yes.”
Claire looked horrified.
“But why implant the capsule into Victoria?”
Margaret's face changed.
“Because she volunteered.”
Silence.
“No,” I said.
“She didn't know what it truly contained.”
“That sounds more believable.”
“She was told it held preserved embryos belonging to women whose fertility treatments had been interrupted when the clinic closed.”
“Why would she agree?”
“Money.”
Of course.
Margaret continued.
“Victoria was young. She had already become involved in financial fraud. Reginald offered her enough to disappear for a year.”
“How old?”
“Twenty-three.”
Long before Ryan.
Long before my marriage.
Before almost everything.
“So Victoria has carried that capsule for decades?”
“No. It was removed.”
“Then?”
“Apparently someone reimplanted it.”
“When?”
Margaret looked at the chart.
“Six months ago.”
I stared.
“Who?”
No name.
Only an authorization code.
**S.P.**
Samuel Pierce.
I turned toward him.
Samuel went white.
“No.”
Every person in the room looked at him.
“You implanted it.”
“No.”
“Your initials.”
“They aren't unique.”
“Samuel.”
“I swear.”
Margaret stepped closer.
“Did you treat Victoria six months ago?”
He hesitated.
That was enough.
“For what?”
“She came to St. Augustine.”
“Why?”
“Abdominal pain.”
“And?”
“I performed imaging.”
“Did you find the capsule?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“A mass.”
“What kind?”
“I thought it was an old surgical implant.”
“Did you remove it?”
Samuel's face collapsed.
“Yes.”
My blood chilled.
“And then?”
“I gave it to Reginald.”
“Why?”
“He told me it was Continuity property.”
Marcus swore.
“You handed him something you removed from a patient?”
“I was still under trustee medical protocol.”
“You mean you followed orders.”
Samuel looked ashamed.
“Yes.”
“Then how did it get back inside Victoria?”
“I don't know.”
I believed him.
Maybe.
Trust had become provisional.
Everything was provisional.
---
We had one advantage.
Quarry Road was only thirty-two minutes away.
Reginald believed we were still dealing with the aftermath at St. Augustine.
He didn't know DANIEL's successor model had been dismantled.
He didn't know the sanitization failed.
And he didn't know Raymond remained at the mansion.
Raymond might know the vault.
I called Ryan.
An ambulance had arrived.
He refused transport until he answered my questions.
Typical.
“Put Raymond on.”
“Ava—”
“Ryan.”
“Fine.”
A moment later, Raymond's voice.
“You people really enjoy phones.”
“Where is the first Hart vault?”
Silence.
“So you know.”
“I know many things.”
“Reginald took Victoria and Edmund there.”
“Then you're too late.”
“Why?”
“Because the vault isn't storage.”
“What is it?”
“A laboratory.”
Of course.
“Operational?”
“Not for decades.”
“Can Reginald restart it?”
“With Edmund.”
“And Victoria's capsule.”
Raymond became silent.
“You know about that.”
“Yes.”
“How many embryos?”
“I don't know.”
“Try.”
“Forty-eight.”
The number hit me.
Forty-eight potential lives reduced to inventory.
“Are they all viable?”
“Some.”
“Who created them?”
“Different programs.”
“Can Reginald use them?”
“Not without the original incubator.”
“Where is that?”
Raymond laughed softly.
“You're standing inside it.”
I looked around St. Augustine.
“No.”
“Not you. The Hart mansion.”
My stomach dropped.
The hidden laboratory beneath the house.
The capsule Gabriel emerged from.
“The chamber.”
“Yes.”
“So why did Reginald take Victoria away from the mansion?”
“Because he doesn't need the embryos incubated there.”
“What does he need?”
“The activation medium.”
I stared at Samuel.
He whispered:
“Edmund.”
His regenerative treatment.
Cells capable of sustaining development.
Reginald had taken both pieces.
Embryos.
And the biological technology to use them.
“What is Reginald planning?”
Raymond's answer came quietly.
“To create replacements.”
Not children.
Replacements.
For whom?
“The Hart family?”
“For everyone.”
---
We left St. Augustine at 9:38 p.m.
Daniel Hart wanted to come.
I refused.
He protested.
I pointed toward his heart monitor.
He stopped.
“Unfair.”
“Effective.”
He smiled weakly.
“Compass.”
“What?”
“Come back.”
The words were simple.
No secret meaning.
No strategy.
“I will.”
For the first time, I said it believing I might.
Rebecca stayed with him.
So did Rachel and Margaret.
Nathan remained to secure the archive.
The rest of us divided.
Marcus, despite being shot, insisted on going.
Daniel Vale physically blocked him.
“You're staying.”
“You're not my father.”
“No, I'm your brother.”
“That isn't better.”
“It is when I'm older.”
“By three years.”
“Still counts.”
Marcus glared.
Then collapsed slightly against the wall.
Decision made.
Claire stayed with him.
Elena coordinated law enforcement.
That left me, Gabriel and Daniel Vale.
Three people connected by Project EVE in different ways.
We drove north.
---
Quarry Road looked exactly like the kind of place people used to hide bodies.
Narrow.
Dark.
Rock face on one side.
Drop on the other.
The barriers installed after Marcus's supposed accident gleamed beneath our headlights.
Daniel Vale pointed.
“Turn here.”
There was no road.
Only trees.
I turned anyway.
A gravel path appeared.
Two miles later, the ruins of an old estate emerged.
Stone walls.
Collapsed roof.
Burned beams.
Moonlight.
At the center stood a small mausoleum.
The Hart crest remained above the door.
“Family crypt,” Gabriel said.
“Cheerful.”
Daniel almost smiled.
We parked behind the trees.
No visible guards.
That meant guards.
We approached on foot.
The crypt door stood open.
Inside were six stone tombs.
Edmund Hart.
Catherine Hart.
Elizabeth Vale.
Alexander Hart.
Several names I didn't recognize.
Some people buried here were apparently alive.
Some living people were apparently buried here.
I no longer trusted tombstones.
Gabriel examined the floor.
“Movement.”
A stone slab had shifted.
Below it, stairs.
We descended.
---
The first Hart vault was older than St. Augustine.
Brick tunnels.
Copper pipes.
Heavy electrical cables added decades later.
At the bottom stood a laboratory.
Reginald had already restored power.
Machines hummed.
Victoria lay on an operating table.
Unconscious.
Edmund stood beside another machine.
Not restrained.
That surprised me.
“You're helping him.”
Edmund looked at me.
“No.”
Reginald stepped from behind the equipment.
Real Reginald.
Left thumb stiff.
Clove scent.
No doubt.
“You came.”
“Let Victoria go.”
“She volunteered.”
“She is unconscious.”
“Currently.”
“What did you give her?”
“Sedation.”
“Why?”
“To remove the capsule.”
Gabriel moved closer.
Reginald raised a gun.
“Stay.”
Gabriel stopped.
His face hardened.
“Hello, Father.”
Reginald looked at him.
“Gabriel.”
No emotion.
None.
That hurt Gabriel more than hatred would have.
“You don't look surprised.”
“I knew you were alive.”
“You left me in a capsule.”
“You were unstable.”
“I was a child.”
“You were data.”
I watched Gabriel's face.
Something inside him shut.
Good.
Not because pain was good.
Because hope could be dangerous when aimed at people like Reginald.
“You don't owe him anything,” I said.
Reginald smiled.
“There she is.”
“Shut up.”
“Protecting everyone.”
“No.”
I looked at Gabriel.
“Reminding him.”
Gabriel nodded once.
Reginald's smile disappeared.
Edmund stood beside the operating table.
“What are you doing here?”
“Stopping you.”
“You cannot.”
“Why are you helping him?”
“I am not.”
“Then walk away.”
Edmund didn't move.
“Exactly.”
His face tightened.
“The embryos cannot survive without my treatment.”
“That sounds like a reason not to continue.”
“You don't understand.”
“No. I understand perfectly.”
I looked at the machinery.
“You still believe survival is automatically good.”
Edmund stared.
“Isn't it?”
“No.”
The answer shocked him.
“Not when survival requires turning another person into material.”
He looked toward Victoria.
Then the capsule scanner.
For the first time, doubt.
Reginald saw it.
“Don't listen to her.”
Edmund laughed.
“You've spent your entire life telling me not to listen to people.”
“Because people are weak.”
“No.”
Edmund looked at me.
“People are inconvenient.”
I smiled faintly.
“Exactly.”
Reginald raised the gun toward him.
“Finish the extraction.”
Edmund stared at the weapon.
Then at Reginald.
“You would shoot me?”
“If necessary.”
Something broke in Edmund.
Nearly a century of believing himself the patriarch.
The founder.
The indispensable survivor.
Reduced to material by the system he helped create.
He laughed.
Then stepped away from the operating table.
“No.”
Reginald fired.
Gabriel tackled me.
The bullet struck Edmund.
He fell.
“Edmund!”
Daniel Vale fired back.
Reginald disappeared behind equipment.
Alarms erupted.
Victoria woke.
Her eyes opened.
Confused.
“Ava?”
I ran to her.
“Don't move.”
“What happened?”
“Reginald shot Edmund.”
She looked toward him.
Edmund was bleeding from the abdomen.
Gabriel pressed his hands against the wound.
Reginald shouted from behind the machinery:
“Finish the extraction!”
Victoria looked at me.
“What extraction?”
My eyes met hers.
She truly didn't know.
“The capsule.”
Her face changed.
“What capsule?”
“You have an implanted embryo-storage device.”
Silence.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Samuel removed it six months ago.”
She stared.
“I had surgery.”
“He gave it to Reginald.”
Her breathing quickened.
“Then—”
“Someone put it back.”
She covered her abdomen.
“No.”
“I am sorry.”
Her eyes filled with rage.
Not fear.
Rage.
“What is inside me?”
“Embryos.”
She looked toward Reginald's hiding place.
“Whose?”
“Many.”
Her face hardened.
“Get it out.”
“We need a surgeon.”
“Get it out!”
“Victoria.”
She grabbed my arm.
“I have spent my entire life taking things that didn't belong to me.”
Her voice broke.
“Houses. Money. People.”
She looked at her abdomen.
“I will not let him use my body to steal more.”
For once, we wanted exactly the same thing.
Daniel Vale approached.
“I can operate.”
I stared.
“You're not a surgeon.”
“No.”
“Then why would—”
“I trained as one.”
Of course.
“When?”
“Before I disappeared again.”
I almost laughed.
“Can you remove it safely?”
“With equipment.”
Victoria answered.
“Do it.”
Reginald shouted:
“No!”
He fired again.
The bullet struck a monitor.
Sparks exploded.
Daniel returned fire.
Reginald retreated deeper into the vault.
Gabriel looked toward Edmund.
“He's losing blood.”
Edmund grabbed his wrist.
“Leave me.”
Gabriel stared.
“You heard Ava.”
Edmund coughed.
“Survival isn't always the highest good.”
A strange peace crossed his young face.
Perhaps, at ninety-eight, he had finally learned something.
Then he whispered:
“Help Victoria.”
---
Daniel began preparing the operating table.
I stayed beside Victoria.
She looked at me.
“You should hate me.”
“I do.”
She almost smiled.
“Good.”
“But I don't want this done to you.”
Her eyes filled.
“That is very inconvenient of you.”
“I've been told.”
A sound came from the tunnel.
Footsteps.
Gabriel raised his gun.
“Reginald?”
No.
A young woman entered.
Dark clothes.
Gun.
Scar along her jaw?
No.
Different.
She looked approximately thirty.
I recognized her from photographs.
Amelia Shaw.
Victoria's biological daughter.
Elena's niece.
Rebecca's adopted child.
The woman missing for fourteen years.
Victoria stared.
“Amelia.”
Amelia looked at her.
No warmth.
“You know.”
“Yes.”
“Since when?”
“Today.”
“Good.”
Victoria almost laughed.
“You came all this way for that?”
“No.”
Amelia raised her gun.
At me.
Gabriel moved.
“Don't.”
She ignored him.
“Ava Hart.”
“Yes.”
“You destroyed the trust.”
“Yes.”
“You gave the archive away.”
“Yes.”
“You had no right.”
The words surprised me.
“You wanted the Continuity Trust?”
“I wanted what it contained.”
“Your identity?”
“My history.”
“That still exists.”
“Not under my control.”
There it was.
Same disease.
Different generation.
“You think owning the archive gives you ownership of what happened to you.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
Her jaw tightened.
“You don't know anything about me.”
“You're right.”
That stopped her.
I continued.
“But I know what it feels like to have everyone else decide who you are.”
Her gun lowered slightly.
“Then give it back.”
“I can't.”
“You can.”
“No individual owns it now.”
“Exactly.”
She raised the gun again.
“I came to change that.”
Behind her, another figure appeared.
Reginald.
His gun pressed against Amelia's back.
Her eyes widened.
He smiled.
“Thank you for finding her for me.”
Amelia froze.
“You followed me.”
“Yes.”
“You said—”
“I say many things.”
He took her weapon.
Then looked at Victoria.
“Perfect.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
Reginald smiled.
“Mother and daughter.”
Victoria went pale.
“What do you need Amelia for?”
“The embryos are only half the archive.”
“What is the other half?”
“Gestational compatibility.”
Amelia backed away.
“No.”
Reginald looked at her.
“You were born from the line designed to carry them.”
Victoria tried to sit up.
“Don't touch her.”
Reginald laughed.
“Maternal instinct. How late.”
Victoria's face twisted.
“Go to hell.”
“Eventually.”
He pointed the gun toward Amelia.
“Onto the second table.”
“No.”
He aimed at me instead.
“Then Ava dies.”
Amelia looked at me.
I shook my head.
“Don't.”
Reginald smiled.
“There it is again. Everyone protects Ava.”
Amelia stared at me.
We had never met.
She owed me nothing.
Then she slowly moved toward the table.
“No,” I said.
She looked at me.
“I'm not doing it for you.”
“Then who?”
Her eyes moved toward Victoria.
“Myself.”
I understood.
She wanted close enough to Reginald to act.
Reginald didn't.
Good.
Amelia sat on the table.
He stepped forward.
Victoria moved first.
She grabbed a surgical tray and threw it.
Metal instruments exploded across the floor.
Reginald turned.
Amelia kicked him.
Gabriel lunged.
Gunshot.
Daniel Vale shouted.
I fell.
For one terrifying second, I thought I had been hit.
Then I saw blood.
Not mine.
Reginald's.
He stared at his chest.
Amelia held his gun.
She had taken it during the struggle.
Reginald looked almost offended.
“You.”
Amelia's hands shook.
“You stole my mother.”
Victoria stared at her.
“You stole my name.”
Rebecca had raised her.
“You stole fourteen years of my life after I discovered the truth.”
Reginald sank to his knees.
Amelia continued.
“And you still think this is about Ava.”
He collapsed.
Silence.
No one moved.
Gabriel checked him.
Then looked up.
“Alive.”
Of course.
Amelia lowered the gun.
“Unfortunately.”
Victoria laughed weakly.
It was the first sound that felt almost normal.
Then an alarm began.
Daniel Vale looked at the operating equipment.
“What?”
The embryo capsule monitor activated automatically.
**DEVICE INTEGRITY FAILURE**
Victoria stared.
“What does that mean?”
Daniel went pale.
“The capsule was damaged during the gunfire.”
“Can you remove it?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Immediately.”
The monitor displayed:
**THERMAL STABILITY: 09:58**
Ten minutes.
Another countdown.
I almost screamed.
Daniel began scrubbing his hands.
Gabriel moved Edmund to another table.
Amelia stood beside Victoria.
Neither knew what to say.
Victoria looked at her daughter.
“I don't expect you to call me Mother.”
“Good.”
“I don't expect forgiveness.”
“Better.”
Victoria almost smiled.
Then she reached for Amelia's hand.
Amelia stared at it.
For several seconds, she didn't move.
Then she took it.
Not forgiveness.
Contact.
A beginning.
Daniel looked at me.
“I need assistance.”
“I am not medically trained.”
“You can follow instructions.”
“Apparently that's debatable.”
He almost laughed.
“Gloves.”
I put them on.
The procedure began.
---
Seven minutes later, Daniel removed a metal capsule no larger than a paperback book.
Victoria remained stable.
Amelia never released her hand.
Daniel placed the capsule inside a temperature-controlled case.
The display stabilized.
**04:12**
Then reset.
**STABLE**
Everyone exhaled.
“What happens to them?” Victoria asked.
“The embryos?”
“Yes.”
Nobody answered.
There were forty-eight.
Potential lives.
Products of crimes.
Some perhaps created without consent.
Destroying them felt like another decision made over bodies that could not speak.
Using them felt worse.
“We preserve them,” I said.
“For what?”
“Until an independent ethics panel decides what is legally and medically possible.”
Victoria looked surprised.
“You're not destroying them?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I