Chapter 11 - The Facility Under the Lake
Meridian’s abandoned facility sat beneath a decommissioned hydroelectric station forty miles outside the city.
From above, it looked like ruins.
Below ground, Elise said, it was still active.
We arrived after midnight.
Mara stayed with Emma inside an armored vehicle two miles away.
Leaving my daughter felt like tearing away part of my body.
But bringing her closer would have been worse.
Luka checked the handgun beneath his jacket.
“I still think you should stay with Mara.”
“And I still don’t care.”
Elise opened an old service entrance.
Cold air rose from below.
We descended three levels.
Metal hallways stretched into darkness.
My father had walked these corridors.
My mother had suffered here.
Luka’s son had been treated here.
Every step felt like entering the inside of a nightmare.
We found Ethan inside laboratory C.
He was still strapped to the chair.
His face was swollen.
When he saw me, his eyes widened.
“Clara?”
I ran toward him.
Luka stopped me.
“Wait.”
A red light blinked beneath the chair.
Pressure sensor.
If Ethan stood, an alarm would trigger.
“Elise.”
Luka said.
She examined it.
“Thirty seconds.”
Ethan stared at me.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
“That makes two of us.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not now.”
“I need you to know—”
“Not now, Ethan.”
His eyes filled.
“I thought she wasn’t mine.”
“Your father made sure you thought that.”
Ethan froze.
“What?”
I looked behind him.
A glass wall separated the laboratory from an observation room.
Thomas Cole stepped into the light.
Ethan stopped breathing.
“Dad?”
Thomas smiled.
“Hello, son.”
Ethan’s face collapsed.
“You’re dead.”
“Legally.”
“You let me bury you.”
“It was necessary.”
Ethan began struggling against the restraints.
“You bastard.”
Thomas looked almost bored.
“Emotion makes you predictable.”
“That was always your weakness.”
I stepped toward the glass.
“You arranged our marriage.”
Thomas looked at me.
“Your compatibility was extraordinary.”
“I’m not a laboratory animal.”
“No.”
His eyes moved toward my abdomen.
“You are a successful second-generation carrier.”
Luka stepped beside me.
“And Matteo?”
For the first time, Thomas’s expression changed.
“An unsuccessful branch.”
Luka moved so fast I barely saw him.
He slammed his fist against the glass.
“You murdered my son.”
Thomas did not flinch.
“Your son contributed valuable information.”
Luka hit the glass again.
A crack appeared.
Alarms suddenly screamed.
Elise cursed.
“I didn’t trigger it.”
Thomas smiled.
“I did.”
Steel doors slammed shut behind us.
Gas began leaking from vents in the ceiling.
Ethan shouted.
“Clara, get out.”
Luka fired at the glass.
Once.
Twice.
On the third shot, it shattered.
Thomas disappeared through another door.
Elise cut Ethan free.
The gas thickened.
Luka grabbed my hand.
We ran.
Behind us, Ethan stumbled.
I turned.
He had collapsed.
For one second, I considered leaving him.
The man who had left me in the hospital.
The man who had humiliated me hours after childbirth.
Then I ran back.
I grabbed his arm.
“You do not get to die before answering me.”
Ethan coughed.
“That sounds fair.”
May you like
Together, we dragged him toward the emergency stairwell.
And somewhere above us, Thomas Cole was escaping again.
