Chapter 4 - The Betrayal Closer Than Blood
Headline: In A High-Security Lab, A Devastated Father Unlocks The Tragic Secret Of His Daughter's Birth.
Just as the needle’s point touched Ethan’s skin, a loud, piercing alarm began to blare throughout the entire VIP wing.
The overhead lights flickered, turning a deep, warning red.
“Warning. Security breach in Sector 7. Fire suppression systems activated,” an automated voice droned.
The distraction was all Ethan needed.
With a surge of desperate strength, he slammed his head backward, striking the nose of the guard holding his right arm. The man cried out, releasing his grip. Ethan spun, grabbing Dr. Vance's wrist and forcing the syringe upward.
The amber liquid shot into the air, splashing harmlessly against the wall.
Ethan delivered a hard punch to Vance's jaw, sending the doctor crashing into a cart of medical instruments. He grabbed the dropped taser from the floor and fired it directly into the second guard's chest. The man convulsed and collapsed.
"Lily!" Ethan yelled.
Lily had slipped under the bed during the chaos. She crawled out, her face tear-stained. Ethan scooped her into his arms.
Margaret pulled a small, silver pistol from her purse, her eyes blazing with fury. "You won't leave this building alive, Ethan!"
She fired. The bullet shattered a glass medicine cabinet next to Ethan’s head.
Ethan kicked a heavy metal medical tray toward her, knocking her off balance, and bolted out the door into the chaotic hallway.
The clinic was in complete disarray. Red strobe lights flashed, and patients and staff were running in panic. Ethan realized someone had manually triggered the fire alarm.
He ran toward the emergency stairwell. As he opened the door, a figure stepped out from the shadows.
Ethan raised his fists, ready to fight, but stopped.
It was Marcus, his head of personal security—a man who had served in the special forces and had been hired by Ethan years ago.
"Mr. Marlo, this way," Marcus said, his voice urgent. He was carrying an assault rifle and wore a tactical vest. "I triggered the alarm. I found out what Margaret was doing, but I was too late to stop them from bringing you here."
"Can we trust you?" Ethan asked, holding Lily tightly.
"I swore an oath to you, sir. Not to the board," Marcus said, his eyes scanning the stairwell. "We need to get to Sector 7. The sub-basement. That's where they keep the master servers and the biological archives. If we don't get the decryption keys for the Lazarus project, they will erase Clara and Lily’s biological records, and they will hunt you to the ends of the earth."
"Clara..." Ethan looked down at the child in his arms. "Marcus, is Clara really Rachel's clone?"
Marcus hesitated, a look of profound sorrow crossing his face. "It's worse than that, Mr. Marlo. Clara isn't a clone. Clara is the real Rachel."
Ethan stopped on the stairs, his breath catching. "What did you say?"
"The woman you buried two years ago... she was the clone," Marcus revealed, his voice a low whisper as they descended the stairs. "They switched them. Rachel discovered the board’s plan to use her child as a biological source. To protect Lily, Rachel agreed to let them test the replication process on her. But Margaret feared Rachel would blow the whistle. So, they cloned her, induced a fatal heart attack in the clone, and buried her to make you stop looking. The real Rachel has been kept alive down there, her memory wiped, forced to live under the identity of Clara Vance."
Ethan felt like his entire world had been built on quicksand.
The grave he had visited every Sunday. The tears he had shed. The empty side of the bed.
May you like
It had all been a lie.
"My wife is alive," Ethan whispered, a fierce, burning resolve igniting in his chest. "She's in that room. And I am not leaving without her."
