Chapter 19 - The Betrayal
The first shot came from outside the room.
The window shattered.
Glass exploded inward.
Torres shoved me down.
Mercer grabbed my mother.
Sloane disappeared behind the wall.
Then the emergency alarms began.
I crawled toward the table.
The Silver Stars were gone.
My heart stopped.
I looked at Sloane.
He stood in the hallway.
One star in his hand.
He smiled.
“You should have left them in the archive.”
I raised my weapon.
“Drop it.”
“You still don't understand.”
“I understand enough.”
“No.”
He held the star up.
“This isn't a key.”
I froze.
“What?”
Sloane smiled.
“It's a signature.”
My mother shouted,
“Mara, don't let him activate it!”
I looked at her.
“What does that mean?”
She shook her head.
“I'll explain.”
“Now.”
“I can't.”
“Now!”
Sloane laughed.
“She never told you.”
He pressed something on the medal.
A tiny indicator lit up.
Every monitor in the building came alive.
Files flooded the screens.
Names.
Dates.
Payments.
Orders.
Promotions.
Deaths.
I watched one screen.
Then another.
Then another.
This wasn't the archive.
It was a broadcast.
Sloane had opened the entire Northstar database.
Worldwide.
Journalists.
Governments.
Military commands.
Everything.
My mother's face went white.
“You can't.”
“I already did.”
Mercer stepped toward him.
“You'll destroy everything.”
Sloane turned.
“That was always the point.”
I looked at the screens.
A list appeared.
PROTECTED OFFICERS.
I scanned it.
Some names were familiar.
Some were not.
Then I saw my own.
MARA ELLISON.
STATUS: SUCCESSFUL SUBJECT.
I stared.
“What is that?”
Sloane looked at me.
“You.”
“No.”
“You weren't merely protected.”
He smiled.
“You were studied.”
My mother's voice broke.
“Mara, don't listen.”
I turned toward her.
“Why does it say subject?”
She closed her eyes.
“Because you were.”
“What did they do to me?”
“Nothing you could detect.”
“What does that mean?”
Sloane answered.
“Prediction.”
The word chilled me.
“We mapped your behavioral responses.”
“When?”
“Since childhood.”
“For what?”
“To determine whether loyalty could defeat conditioning.”
I stared.
“Conditioning?”
My mother looked at the floor.
“You were exposed to controlled information.”
My stomach turned.
“What?”
“You were given different stories about people.”
“You were taught who to trust.”
“You were guided toward certain assignments.”
“You were tested.”
I shook my head.
“That can't be true.”
Mom began to cry.
“It is.”
I backed away.
Every memory seemed to change.
Every promotion.
Every relationship.
Every assignment.
Every decision.
What if it wasn't me?
What if I had simply been the person they designed?
Sloane looked almost sympathetic.
“That is why your father is terrified of you.”
I turned.
My father stood at the far end of the hallway.
He was holding a gun.
My mother gasped.
“You came.”
He looked at her.
“You should never have told her.”
She stepped forward.
“I couldn't lie anymore.”
He shook his head.
“You weren't supposed to confess.”
“You weren't supposed to come back.”
They stared at each other.
I looked between them.
“What is happening?”
My father raised his weapon.
Not at Sloane.
At my mother.
My heart stopped.
“Dad?”
He didn't look at me.
“She knows.”
Mom began to cry.
“She deserves to know.”
My father said,
“If she opens the final archive, she dies.”
Sloane smiled.
“Unless she does what she was designed to do.”
I looked at him.
“What was I designed to do?”
He pointed toward the floor.
“Open it.”
The building shook.
Somewhere below us, metal doors unlocked.
A low mechanical sound traveled through the walls.
My father lowered his gun.
“No.”
Sloane smiled.
“Yes.”
Then my mother did something that none of us expected.
She stepped between my father and Sloane.
And she pulled a second pistol from inside her coat.
She pointed it at my father.
Everyone froze.
“Mara,” Dad said.
Mom's voice trembled.
“I am sorry.”
My father stared at her.
“You promised.”
“I promised to protect her.”
“And this protects her?”
“No.”
She took a breath.
“This ends it.”
She turned the gun toward the floor.
Then she shot herself.
She collapsed.
I screamed.
“Mom!”
I ran to her.
Blood spread across her coat.
Torres dropped beside me.
“She's alive.”
I looked at my mother.
Her lips moved.
I leaned closer.
She whispered,
“Don't open the archive.”
Then she pressed something into my palm.
A key.
I stared at it.
The key had one word engraved across it.
FATHER.
I looked up.
My father was gone.
So was Sloane.
The monitors continued to stream Northstar's secrets into the world.
The building shook again.
Torres looked at me.
“Ma'am…”
I stared at the key.
“What?”
She pointed toward the floor.
May you like
A hidden door was opening.
And beneath it came the sound of someone pounding from the other side.
