Chapter 6: The Bloodline Protocol
No one moved.
The room seemed to shrink around Emma as Ashcroft's words echoed through the silence.
"You were their first success."
Emma stared at Dr. Evelyn Brooks.
"Tell me he's lying."
The elderly scientist lowered her head.
"I wish I could."
Emma's voice cracked.
"So... everything is true?"
Dr. Brooks nodded slowly.
"Not everything."
"But enough."
Ashcroft clasped his hands behind his back as though he were giving a lecture instead of holding everyone at gunpoint.
"Your mother volunteered."
Emma's head snapped toward him.
"No."
"She loved you more than anyone ever could."
Ashcroft smiled.
"Exactly."
"That's why she agreed."
Dr. Brooks interrupted.
"Don't listen to him."
Ashcroft ignored her.
"Your mother believed the Phoenix Gene could cure degenerative diseases."
"Parkinson's."
"ALS."
"Early Alzheimer's."
"She believed humanity could be saved."
Emma's chest tightened.
"So what changed?"
Ashcroft's smile disappeared.
"Money."
"The government wanted medicine."
"Private investors wanted soldiers."
"The military wanted people who healed faster, aged slower, and survived injuries that should have been fatal."
Emma looked down at her trembling hands.
"That's impossible."
"Is it?"
Ashcroft pointed toward Jacob.
"How many bullets has your brother survived?"
Jacob remained silent.
Ashcroft looked back at Emma.
"And you."
"You've survived things you don't even remember."
Dr. Brooks stepped forward.
"Enough."
She placed an old videotape onto the table.
"I kept this hidden for twenty-eight years."
Ashcroft's calm expression changed for the first time.
"Destroy it."
None of the soldiers moved.
Ashcroft shouted louder.
"I said destroy it!"
Jacob grabbed the tape first.
"What is it?"
Dr. Brooks whispered,
"The day Emma was born."
The maintenance room still contained an old television and VHS player.
Jacob inserted the tape.
Static filled the screen.
Then an image slowly appeared.
A hospital delivery room.
Doctors rushed around frantically.
Machines beeped wildly.
Emma watched a younger version of Dr. Brooks standing beside a woman in labor.
Her biological mother.
She was crying.
Not from pain.
From fear.
The camera timestamp read:
October 14, 1998
Ashcroft appeared in the video, much younger but instantly recognizable.
He held a metal briefcase handcuffed to his wrist.
Inside were dozens of glass syringes.
Emma whispered,
"No..."
Ashcroft on the recording spoke calmly.
"The serum is ready."
Dr. Brooks shook her head.
"She's too weak."
"The baby won't survive."
Ashcroft replied,
"Only one of them has to."
Emma felt sick.
Her mother screamed as the newborn baby was placed in her arms.
For a brief moment...
She smiled.
Then Ashcroft reached for the child.
Emma's mother pulled back instinctively.
"No."
"Please..."
"Don't touch her."
Ashcroft nodded toward two armed guards.
They took the baby anyway.
Emma covered her mouth.
The video continued.
A syringe filled with glowing blue liquid.
Injected into the infant's tiny arm.
The baby's heartbeat flatlined.
Emma gasped.
"No..."
The doctors rushed forward.
One minute.
Two minutes.
Three.
No heartbeat.
Dr. Brooks cried.
"It's over."
Ashcroft simply watched.
Then...
The monitor beeped.
Once.
Twice.
A heartbeat.
The newborn inhaled sharply.
The room froze.
Ashcroft smiled.
"It worked."
The recording ended.
Emma couldn't breathe.
"My entire life..."
"...started in that room."
Dr. Brooks nodded through tears.
"You died for three minutes."
"The serum brought you back."
Ashcroft corrected her.
"No."
"The Phoenix Gene did."
Suddenly, alarms blared throughout the underground station.
One of Ashcroft's soldiers rushed inside.
"Sir!"
"We've got incoming!"
Ashcroft frowned.
"Who?"
The soldier swallowed hard.
"They're not ours."
Gunfire erupted somewhere above.
Explosions shook the ceiling.
Ashcroft's expression darkened.
"Impossible."
Jacob looked toward the staircase.
"Someone else is here."
A deafening blast blew the steel doors inward.
Smoke poured into the room.
Figures dressed entirely in black tactical gear stormed inside.
Not government.
Not Phoenix agents.
Their uniforms bore a white wolf emblem.
Ashcroft whispered one word.
"No..."
The leader removed his helmet.
Emma froze.
Michael.
Daniel.
Alive.
He looked thinner.
Older.
His face was scarred.
But his eyes were the same.
The same eyes that had looked at her across the breakfast table every morning.
The same eyes that had whispered, "I love you."
He raised his rifle.
Not at Emma.
At Ashcroft.
"Step away from her."
Ashcroft laughed softly.
"I wondered how long it would take."
Michael didn't smile.
"It's over."
Ashcroft shook his head.
"No."
"You still don't understand."
Michael's jaw tightened.
"I understand enough."
"You murdered her family."
Ashcroft looked directly at Emma.
"I saved your family."
Before anyone could react...
Ashcroft pressed a hidden button beneath his watch.
A sharp electronic tone echoed through the room.
Emma suddenly felt a burning pain spread through her chest.
She collapsed.
Her vision blurred.
Her heartbeat accelerated wildly.
Dr. Brooks screamed.
"No!"
Michael caught Emma before she hit the ground.
"What did you do?"
Ashcroft smiled again.
"I activated the failsafe."
Jacob looked horrified.
"The implant..."
Emma struggled to breathe.
"What... implant?"
Dr. Brooks burst into tears.
"We never told you."
Michael slowly looked into Emma's frightened eyes.
"There has been a microdevice inside your heart..."
"...since the day you were born."
Emma could barely hear him.
"Why?"
Ashcroft answered calmly.
"Because Subject Zero was never meant to escape."
Emma's pulse became painfully fast.
The room spun around her.
The monitors beside Dr. Brooks began flashing red.
HEART RATE CRITICAL
REMOTE LINK ESTABLISHED
Ashcroft took one final step toward Emma.
"If I die..."
"...so do you."
Michael's finger tightened on the trigger.
For the first time...
He couldn't pull it.
Because killing Ashcroft...
May you like
Would also kill the woman he had spent years risking everything to save.
END OF CHAPTER 6...
