Chapter 4 - The House of SecretsThey hid in an abandoned textile mill three miles outside the city—a property Robert had purchased thirty years ago under a shell company that even Julian didn't know existed.
Ethan was placed on an improvised cot. His fever was spiking again, his temperature reaching a dangerous 104 degrees. The initial dose of Lily’s natural compound had triggered an intense metabolic reaction—a "cleansing crisis," Grace called it.
"He needs the full synthesis," Grace said, setting up a portable lab on an old workbench using equipment she had stashed in the van. "The liquid in the thermos was only a crude extract. To permanently reverse the neurological damage, we need pure, concentrated Lazarus-7."
"Where do we get it?" Robert asked, wiping sweat from his son’s forehead.
"We don't get it. We make it," Grace said, looking up at him. "And the only place with the necessary bio-reactor is inside your personal lab at the Blackwood Headquarters downtown."
Robert let out a dark laugh. "Julian has the building locked down like Fort Knox. He knows that's the first place we'd go."
"He knows you would go there," Lily said, stepping forward. "He doesn't know about me."
"Absolutely not," Robert said instantly. "You're twelve years old. I am not sending a child into a nest of armed guards."
"I know the ventilation blueprints of that building better than anyone, Robert," Grace said. "I designed the ventilation system for the subterranean bio-labs myself to prevent airborne contamination. Lily is small enough to fit through the secondary filtration ducts."
"It's too dangerous," Robert insisted.
"Look at him!" Lily shouted, pointing at Ethan, whose breathing was becoming shallow again. "He has maybe six hours before his brain stem inflames beyond repair! My mother gave me this life, Mr. Blackwood. Now it's my turn to give it to your son!"
Robert looked at the young girl. Her gray eyes held a fierce, unyielding light that no billionaire, no corporate legal team, and no threat could extinguish.
"If we do this," Robert said, "we destroy them completely. Not just Julian. The whole board."
He walked over to his satchel and pulled out an encrypted hard drive.
"This contains the master administrative keys to the Blackwood global network," Robert said. "If we can get Lily into the server room inside the bio-lab, we don't just steal the Lazarus-7. We broadcast the raw clinical data, the suppressed recovery files, and Julian’s private emails to every news network on the planet."
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"A scorched-earth strategy," Grace whispered. "You'll destroy your own company."
"My company was built on a lie," Robert said, looking at Ethan’s pale face. "My son will be saved by the truth."
