Chapter 7 - The Reunion in the Dark
The glass door of the isolation suite was unlocked from the outside by a digital override panel David managed to trigger using the system console near the entrance.
As the heavy glass door slid open, Sarah looked up, shielding her eyes against the bright laboratory lights.
“David?” she whispered, her voice cracking as if she hadn't spoken aloud in months.
“Sarah!”
David crossed the room in two massive strides, dropping to his knees in front of her and wrapping his arms around her frail shoulders. She felt impossibly light, her skin cool to the touch, but the familiar scent of lavender and vanilla that he had mourned for eighteen months was still there.
She buried her face in his shoulder, her body shaking with quiet, exhausted sobs.
“I knew you’d find me,” she choked out against his chest. “I kept leaving traces... the backup phone, the bank statements... I knew if I could get close enough to the house vents or the crawlspaces, Ethan would sense it. Children pick up on electromagnetic and thermal shifts when they’re bonded to their mothers.”
David pulled back, holding her face in his hands, his eyes scanning her pale features. “The nursery wall... the cold spot. Ethan was pressing his face against it every hour because he could feel you through the ventilation chase that connects this subterranean wing directly up to our foundation!”
“Yes,” Sarah nodded rapidly. “When they faked my death eighteen months ago, they locked me in this subterranean medical ward to monitor my metabolic responses for their genetic trials. But the old architectural blueprints of this hospital connect the original foundation tunnels directly to the residential block where we bought our house. I’ve been using a maintenance access tunnel beneath the floorboards to crawl up near your nursery wall just to hear my baby cry through the drywall.”
The sheer horror of what she had endured washed over David. For eighteen months, while he grieved a headstone across town, his wife had been trapped beneath the hospital floorboards, crawling through dark concrete tunnels just to press her ear against the floorboards of her son’s bedroom to hear his voice.
Before David could answer, the red emergency klaxons in the laboratory ceiling suddenly began to strobe, flashing a blinding crimson warning.
Security breach in sector 7. Sub-basement lockdown initiated.
Automated steel shutters slammed down over the laboratory’s exterior windows and exit corridors, trapping them inside the subterranean ward.
Footsteps echoed heavily down the concrete stairs outside—dozens of boots marching in unison.
May you like
Dr. Harrison’s voice echoed over the PA system, cold and devoid of any professional pretense:
“Mr. Warren, you’ve made a catastrophic mistake. You and your wife will remain in containment permanently while we reset the corporate protocols. There is no way out.”
