Chapter 22 - Bloodline of Ashes
The sound of the rotors rattled the concrete dust from the ceiling. White industrial searchlights swept across the frosted skylights above the stairwell, casting long, cage-like shadows across the floor.
"How could it be my father?" I whispered, my voice trembling as I secured Chloe inside the sling of my coat, tying the sleeves around my back. "My father died ten years ago. I stood at his memorial! He was a decorated naval commander!"
"Did you ever see a body, Clara?" Andrew asked, his voice hollow as he scavenged two discarded sidearms from the unconscious guards by the entrance. He racked the slide of an automatic pistol, his hands steady despite the blood dripping down his sleeve. "When my mother founded the bio-enhancement clinics, she was bankrupt. The Vance empire was bleeding dry. Then, an anonymous maritime defense trust injected five hundred million dollars into her accounts under one condition: that I marry you."
The room seemed to spin. "What?"
"I thought it was an arranged corporate merger," Andrew said, his jaw tightening until the muscle twitched. "My mother told me you were an heiress whose family influence would shield our operations from federal scrutiny. But it wasn't your family's influence she wanted. It was your genetic markers. Your father didn't die, Clara. He faked his death to take control of an unmonitored naval intelligence black site. Project Lazarus wasn't Victoria's idea. She was just his contractor."
"And Chloe..." The realization felt like a knife twisting into my intestines. "Chloe wasn't sick."
"She was the test subject," Andrew said, looking down at the child whose head was now resting against my collarbone, her eyes heavy with sedative residue. "A child possessing the pure, uncorrupted lineage markers required to stabilize cellular decay. My mother staged her death to harvest her into stasis before your father came to claim her. Victoria wanted to blackmail him. But your father... your father doesn't negotiate."
*BOOM!*
The heavy steel blast doors at the top of the stairwell were blown inward by a directed thermite charge. Molten metal rained down the spiral steps, followed immediately by the sharp, concussive crack of flashbangs.
"Move!" Andrew yelled, shoving me behind a row of concrete support pillars as heavy tactical boots pounded down the iron stairs.
Four men in unmarked, charcoal-grey combat gear descended in perfect synchronization. Their rifles were equipped with suppressed barrels, sweeping the mist-filled crypt with pinpoint infrared lasers. On their shoulder patches, there was no national flag—only an embossed silver anchor entwined with a double helix.
*The insignia of my father’s old naval unit.*
"Secure the primary specimen!" a deep, modulated voice commanded through a tactical helmet. "Terminate all secondary witnesses. The Admiral wants the facility sanitized in three minutes!"
" specimen?" I breathed, pure venom flooding my veins. They were talking about my daughter like a vial of blood.
Andrew stepped out from behind the pillar before I could grab him. He raised his weapon and fired three rapid shots. Two rounds caught the lead operator in the chest plate, staggering him backward. The second operator raised his rifle, but Andrew drove his shoulder into the man’s sternum, tackling him into the exposed, live electrical wiring of the shattered pod console.
Blue sparks exploded with an ear-splitting crackle. The operative convulsed as thousands of volts surged through his tactical vest.
"Clara! The sea-tunnel! Behind the water pumps!" Andrew roared, wrestling the rifle from the dying soldier’s grip.
Bullets chewed through the concrete pillar above my head, spraying sharp pulverized rock into my hair. Chloe let out a terrified shriek, burying her face into my neck.
"I'm here, baby, Mommy’s got you," I chanted under my breath, running as fast as my trembling legs could carry me toward the rusted bulkhead at the back of the chamber.
Andrew fired in controlled bursts, holding the narrow choke point of the corridor. Another operator went down, but a high-caliber round caught Andrew high in the right shoulder. He spun, his weapon clattering across the wet floor, his back slamming hard against the metal bulkhead.
"Andrew!"
"Keep moving!" he snarled, blood spraying from his lips as he shoved the heavy manual lock-wheel of the sea-tunnel door. "I signed her fake death certificate, Clara! I let them take her while you begged me on your knees! Let me do this one goddamn thing right!"
He pulled the lever, shoved me through the narrow opening into the pitch-black service tunnel, and slammed the door shut from the outside.
Through the reinforced observation glass, our eyes met.
"Find Jonathan Sterling," Andrew mouthed through the thick glass, his eyes bright with an uncharacteristic, tragic peace. "The vault in Geneva... he has the second child."
*Second child?*
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Before the horror of his words could fully register, three suppressed rounds shattered the glass from behind him, and Andrew Vance collapsed into the darkness.
***
