Chapter 3 - The Warehouse With No Doors
The warehouse stood near the river.
It was officially abandoned.
Unofficially, it belonged to Helix.
Raphael had three cars surrounding the building before we even stepped inside.
Marco entered first.
I followed.
The place was empty.
Too empty.
A metal chair sat in the center of the floor.
A bloodstained IV tube lay beside it.
I stopped breathing.
“Micah.”
Raphael grabbed my hand.
“Wait.”
We heard a noise above us.
A television turned on.
Giovanni appeared on the screen.
“Mara.”
My stomach twisted.
“If you're seeing this, your brother is alive.”
I moved toward the screen.
“Where is he?”
“Safe.”
“You're lying.”
“Not yet.”
Giovanni leaned closer to the camera.
“You've been asking the wrong questions.”
Raphael stepped forward.
“Show yourself.”
Giovanni laughed.
“You always did think violence solved everything.”
“You have my brother's blood on your hands.”
“Your brother isn't mine.”
“Then whose?”
Giovanni smiled.
“Your father's.”
The screen went black.
Raphael turned.
“What does that mean?”
I pointed toward the floor.
“Look.”
A symbol had been painted on the concrete.
Two interlocking circles.
One marked R.
One marked H.
Raphael stared.
“That's not Helix.”
“What is it?”
“Orsini Medical.”
His father had owned the original research company.
But beneath it, a handwritten note had been left.
Subject transferred.
Location: House Nine.
Marco frowned.
“House Nine was demolished.”
Raphael shook his head.
“No.”
“What?”
“It was moved.”
We left.
House Nine was an old private estate outside the city.
It belonged to Raphael's father.
He had spent years avoiding it.
Now we entered.
Dust covered the furniture.
Old family photographs lined the walls.
I stopped at one.
Raphael stood beside his father.
A younger boy stood between them.
Matteo.
But there was something odd.
Matteo looked terrified.
“Raphael.”
He came over.
“What?”
I pointed.
“Look at his wrist.”
A scar.
A circular scar.
Raphael stared.
“Helix.”
“What?”
“Every test subject had one.”
I looked at him.
“You're saying Matteo was tested?”
“Yes.”
“By your father?”
“I don't know.”
We searched the house.
Behind a bookcase, we found a staircase leading underground.
The lower level was a medical facility.
Old equipment.
Patient files.
Children's drawings.
I felt sick.
Raphael walked slowly through the room.
“They used people here.”
“Yes.”
He found a cabinet.
Inside was a file.
MATTEO ORSINI.
Age 14.
Subject 9A.
Treatment incomplete.
I touched the file.
“Your father experimented on his own son.”
Raphael shook his head.
“My father wasn't capable of this.”
“Then who was?”
He opened another file.
A doctor named Dr. Nathan Vale.
I recognized the name.
He had treated Micah.
My stomach twisted.
“Micah's doctor?”
“Yes.”
The man who had signed his records worked for Raphael's father.
“What does this say?”
Raphael read.
Subject 9A displayed memory resistance.
Secondary subject required.
He went pale.
“Secondary subject?”
Another file.
Mara Bennett.
I froze.
It wasn't possible.
The file was dated before I was born.
My mother's name was on it.
She had been tested.
I looked at Raphael.
“What is happening?”
He couldn't answer.
Then footsteps sounded behind us.
I turned.
Evelyn stood in the doorway.
She wasn't alone.
Five armed men surrounded her.
She smiled.
“I was wondering when you'd find this place.”
Raphael moved in front of me.
“You kidnapped Micah.”
“Yes.”
“Where is he?”
“Alive.”
“Give him back.”
Evelyn shook her head.
“You still don't understand, Raphael.”
She looked at me.
“Your mother volunteered.”
I stepped forward.
“For what?”
“For a study.”
My hands went cold.
“What study?”
“Memory transfer.”
I stared.
“No.”
“Yes.”
Evelyn explained.
My mother had suffered a traumatic brain injury before I was born.
Helix had offered experimental treatment.
It saved her life.
But the treatment had altered something.
She developed a rare neurological response.
I inherited it.
Micah inherited it.
So did Matteo.
The Orsini family was not chosen by accident.
They had been part of the research.
And Raphael?
He wasn't naturally immune.
His father had removed him from the program as a child.
That was why he had never understood.
I looked at him.
“You were never part of this.”
“No.”
“Then why are they after you?”
Evelyn smiled.
“Because you're the missing link.”
My mind spun.
Raphael stared at me.
“What do you mean?”
Evelyn looked directly at him.
“Your father discovered something.”
“What?”
“He could preserve a memory pattern through genetic material.”
Raphael's face went pale.
“That's impossible.”
“His research said otherwise.”
“And Mara?”
“She carries it.”
I stepped back.
“Carries what?”
“The ability to remember what others forget.”
That sounded insane.
Until Evelyn showed me a recording.
My mother sitting in a hospital room.
She looked at the camera.
If Mara ever sees this, tell her not to trust the people who claim memories are only memories.
Then another recording.
My mother named a location.
A safe house.
A place where she hid documents before she died.
I had been there.
It was the apartment where I grew up.
I began to understand.
My mother had not forgotten.
She had hidden everything inside me.
Not through science.
Through stories.
Songs.
Childhood routines.
The things I had dismissed as ordinary.
Raphael stepped beside me.
“Why would she do that?”
“To make sure you couldn't be forced to testify.”
Evelyn raised her gun.
“Now you understand.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“You're still missing something.”
She frowned.
I pointed toward the file.
“You said my brother is a secondary subject.”
“Yes.”
“But his treatment started before you found me.”
She paused.
“Who authorized it?”
Silence.
Raphael looked at the file.
Then at Evelyn.
“Giovanni.”
She nodded.
“Exactly.”
Raphael's face changed.
“Giovanni has been running Helix.”
Evelyn smiled.
“Now you're finally thinking.”
A gunshot came from behind.
One of Evelyn's men dropped.
Marco stood in the doorway.
Chaos erupted.
Raphael pulled me down.
I crawled behind a desk.
Evelyn escaped.
But the files remained.
And buried beneath the records was a handwritten page from Raphael's father.
I wasn't trying to create weapons.
I was trying to preserve the memories of people whose lives powerful men could erase.
At the bottom was one final sentence.
Giovanni betrayed me.
Raphael read it.
Then he whispered,
“My father knew.”
May you like
And that meant the war inside his family had never ended.
It had only been waiting for us to uncover it.
