Chapter 26 - The Shadow Over St. Jude's
A cold fury unlike anything Daniel had ever felt washed over his entire being.
He stood up, looking at Emily and Liam.
"Liam, stay with the doctor and secure this floor," Daniel commanded, his voice turning into hardened steel. "Emily and I are going down."
"Daniel, you need backup," Liam insisted, checking his magazine.
"If Evelyn hears three sets of boots on those metal stairs, she will drop Sophie into the water before we clear the doorway," Daniel said grimly.
Emily stepped up beside her husband, her face completely pale yet entirely devoid of fear.
"We go together," Emily said firmly. "As Sophie's parents."
Daniel nodded once, handing Emily a heavy tactical flashlight from Liam's pack.
They pushed through the heavy iron door marked *Restricted Ward: Hydrotherapy*.
The concrete stairs descended deep into the bedrock beneath the asylum, the air growing colder with every downward step.
Water dripped steadily from the ceiling, echoing like a ticking clock in the subterranean silence.
At the bottom of the staircase, a corridor lined with rusted steel bars opened into a massive cavernous hall.
In the center of the room stood three massive Victorian glass holding tanks, each twelve feet deep and filled with murky green water.
Heavy industrial pipes hummed along the walls, feeding ice-cold groundwater directly into the reservoirs.
Suspended by iron chains above the middle tank was a small wicker chair.
Sitting inside the chair, bound with thick nylon ropes, was Sophie.
Her little face was tear-streaked, her lips blue from the frigid subterranean air.
"Mommy... Daddy..." Sophie whimpered, her tiny voice echoing across the water.
"Sophie, don't move!" Emily shouted, her maternal instinct almost throwing her across the catwalk.
"Stop right there, Emily," a mocking, aristocratic voice purred from the shadows.
Evelyn Vance stepped out from behind the control console, holding a rusted iron lever in her gloved hands.
She was dressed in a dark cashmere coat stained with prison grease, her eyes wide with unhinged malice.
Beside her, tied to a metal examination chair on the platform, was an older woman with wild silver hair and Daniel's exact blue eyes.
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"Meet your real mother, Daniel," Evelyn sneered, resting her boot on Victoria's broken chair.
"And say goodbye to your daughter."
