Chapter 22 - WILLIAM’S CHOICE
William could stop the gas.
All he had to do was accept control of the Carter Protocol.
The system requested his biometric confirmation.
If he refused, the basement would seal permanently.
If he accepted, every hidden server would recognize him as Samuel’s successor.
Margaret believed that once he saw the power, he would keep it.
William placed his hand on the scanner.
I caught his wrist.
“What are you doing?”
“Saving Hope.”
“And then?”
He looked at the gas rising around Matthew’s knees.
“I don’t know.”
That honesty frightened me.
Power rarely announced itself as corruption. It arrived as the only available solution.
Emily opened the wall panel beside the vent.
“The airflow is connected to the nursery pressure system.”
Matthew joined her.
Together, they followed the wiring faster than any adult. Their childhood had trained them to recognize medical machinery by sound.
Margaret raised a gun.
Ramirez fired first.
The bullet struck Margaret’s shoulder and spun her against the cradle.
Her hand caught the emergency lever.
The bassinet tilted.
Hope slid toward the edge.
I reached her before she fell.
Her body was burning with fever. The blinking device on her chest sent electrical pulses through a patch above her heart.
William ripped it away.
Hope gasped.
Then cried.
The sound gave all of us something to fight toward.
Emily and Matthew reversed the ventilation.
Gas pulled out of the room.
William kept his hand away from the succession scanner.
The system began a destruction countdown.
Margaret laughed through the pain.
“You will lose every file.”
“No,” William said.
He looked at Emily.
“Memory-resistant line.”
She understood.
The protocol had been designed around her biology. Her fingerprint pattern had bypassed Samuel’s suppression devices before.
Emily placed her hand on the scanner.
The screen rejected her.
Matthew covered her hand with his.
Twin subjects recognized.
The system paused.
Grace’s voice came through the radio from the surgical unit.
“Add mine.”
William connected her hospital biometric feed.
Three related profiles aligned.
The Carter Protocol opened without transferring authority.
Every active record appeared.
William copied the database to federal evidence servers.
Then he selected a command Samuel had never expected anyone to use.
PATIENT OWNERSHIP: REVOKED.
The system asked for successor confirmation.
William spoke clearly.
“No person owns another person’s body.”
Emily repeated it.
Matthew repeated it.
Grace whispered it from her hospital bed.
The servers began shutting down.
Margaret stared at the darkening monitors.
“You erased forty years.”
I held Hope against my chest.
“No.”
Tiffany entered with Ethan behind her and took her daughter from me.
“We ended forty years.”
Federal officers removed Margaret.
Before the elevator closed, she looked at Hope.
“Bradley will never forgive you.”
Tiffany kissed her baby’s forehead.
“Bradley will die in prison before his forgiveness matters.”
The basement servers went dark.
But one file remained on William’s screen.
It showed an upcoming guardianship hearing.
PETITIONER: DR. WILLIAM CARTER.
CHILD: DANIEL WILLIAM WALKER.
May you like
The hearing was scheduled for the next morning.
Someone had already filed to take my newborn son.
