Chapter 6 - THE DAUGHTER WHO WAS TAKEN FIRST
The embryo transfer had produced two viable embryos.
The clinic told me only one survived.
That was a lie.
Cora’s twin sister was born through a surrogate five weeks before my delivery.
Helena raised the child inside Evergreen under the name Elara.
Subject E-26.
Cora was E-27.
The twins had been separated to compare how the mutation developed under different environments.
One child raised inside controlled laboratory conditions.
One child raised by a loving mother who did not know the experiment existed.
I nearly stopped breathing.
“Where is Elara?”
Helena smiled at the camera.
“Safe.”
“You stole my daughter.”
“You carried Cora. Another woman carried Elara.”
“They were created from my egg.”
“Biology is not ownership, Alora.”
She used the principle only when it protected her.
“Who raised her?”
“I did.”
The gas chamber alarms sounded.
Nathan lay unconscious.
Federal agents cut through the doors and pulled him out. He survived after emergency treatment.
Helena escaped through a tunnel beneath the laboratory.
But she left the blood vial and one photograph.
Two little girls stood beside each other.
Cora at eighteen months, photographed through a park fence.
Elara beside her, the same age, wearing a white laboratory uniform.
They were nearly identical.
Elara looked thinner.
Her expression held none of Cora’s curiosity.
Only guarded observation.
The search became urgent.
Evergreen’s surviving financial records showed regular shipments to a private island research station off the Maine coast.
The property belonged to a children’s neurological charity.
A storm delayed aircraft, so federal agents approached by boat.
I insisted on joining the command vessel.
Gabriel came too.
The island facility contained dormitories, classrooms, and laboratories.
Most rooms had been abandoned recently.
Researchers destroyed equipment before fleeing.
But in the lower medical wing, agents found seven children.
Elara was among them.
She stood behind a glass wall, staring silently.
When the door opened, she did not run.
She asked for identification.
“What is your authorization level?”
I knelt.
“My name is Alora.”
She studied my face.
“You are Subject E-27’s maternal environment.”
The phrase broke my heart.
“I am Cora’s mother.”
“Subjects do not have mothers.”
“Yes, they do.”
Her eyes shifted toward Gabriel.
“Are you the genetic source?”
Gabriel crouched beside me.
“My name is Gabriel.”
Elara looked confused.
Names had been treated as secondary data.
She knew every medication, test, and genetic marker.
She did not know how to accept comfort.
When I reached toward her, she stepped back.
I stopped.
“You do not have to touch me.”
That surprised her.
“Why?”
“Because your body belongs to you.”
She stared at me for several seconds.
Then she whispered, “That is not in the protocol.”
The rescued children entered specialized care.
None could be placed immediately with biological families because trauma, legal status, and safety required careful planning.
Cora met Elara through a glass playroom wall.
Cora pressed one hand against the surface.
Elara watched.
Then Cora held up a yellow toy duck.
“Mine,” she said.
She considered the word, then placed the duck on the floor between them.
“Yours?”
Elara slowly touched the glass.
For the first time, she smiled.
Helena had separated them to compare love with control.
The result stood before us.
Cora was expressive, trusting, and secure enough to share.
Elara was brilliant, disciplined, and frightened of every unapproved movement.
No scientific paper could capture the cruelty of that comparison.
Investigators found Helena’s final destination in the island servers.
A pharmaceutical manufacturing site in Vermont.
She planned to use Elara’s stored cells and Cora’s blood to produce the therapy before authorities could stop her.
The treatment itself might work.
That complicated everything.
Independent scientists reviewed the data and confirmed the twins’ mutation could lead to a real breakthrough.
Helena’s crimes had produced knowledge capable of saving lives.
Destroying the research would punish future patients.
Using it without ethical control would continue the abuse.
I convened an independent medical panel including victim families, bioethicists, scientists, and patient advocates.
The Blackwell board demanded ownership.
I refused.
“No company that funded child imprisonment will profit from the treatment.”
Brenda, from jail, claimed Victor’s estate owned the patents.
Gabriel challenged them.
His genetic material had been stolen.
Mine had been used without consent.
The children’s cells belonged to no corporation.
A court issued an emergency order placing all Evergreen intellectual property into public trusteeship.
Helena responded by taking over the Vermont site.
She held twelve employees inside and threatened to release a modified virus if authorities entered.
On a live broadcast, she addressed me.
“You wanted the research removed from private ownership. I agree.”
“You are threatening innocent people.”
“History remembers results, not discomfort.”
“Children died.”
“And thousands may live.”
She demanded that I bring both twins to the facility so she could complete a final comparison.
I refused.
Then she displayed a hospital room.
Maya was tied to a chair.
Helena had taken the detective who helped me from the beginning.
Beside her sat Brenda.
My mother had broken Brenda out during a prison transport.
The two women who created the project now sat together again.
May you like
Helena smiled.
“Bring me the girls, or I release the virus and let the world decide whether your sentiment was worth the cost.”
