Chapter 5
The old aquarium had been closed since Hurricane Irma damaged its eastern wall.
Vale had purchased the property afterward, supposedly to build a rehabilitation center for injured dolphins.
According to Thomas, the public building was empty.
The laboratories beneath it were not.
We arrived forty minutes later in a rusted van. Ruth drove. Thomas sat beside her. I stayed in the back with the baby.
We had started calling her Mira.
It was the name Evelyn had written in the margin of an old journal beside a drawing of a silver-tailed child.
Mira had not spoken again.
She watched everything.
Sometimes, when I looked into her silver eyes, I felt she was listening to thoughts I had not said aloud.
Thomas gave me a tiny transmitter disguised as a button.
“Keep this near her collar.”
“Maris’s collar?”
“If she comes close enough, I may be able to interrupt its signal.”
“And if you can’t?”
“Then Vale can force her to attack anyone he chooses.”
The van stopped two blocks from the aquarium.
I climbed out alone.
Mira was wrapped in a blue blanket. Her legs looked completely human now.
Vale’s guards met me at the entrance.
One scanned the baby with a handheld device.
The screen flashed red.
“Confirmed,” he said.
They took my phone but missed the transmitter.
Inside, the aquarium smelled of rust and seawater.
Empty tanks lined the walls. Sunlight came through cracks in the boarded windows, cutting pale lines across the floor.
Natalie stood in the center of the main hall.
Sophie sat in a wheelchair beside her.
I forgot every angry word I had planned.
My niece looked smaller than she had in the video. Her cheeks were hollow. A clear oxygen tube rested beneath her nose.
“Aunt Claire.”
I hurried toward her.
A guard stepped between us.
“Let her through,” Natalie said.
He looked toward a man standing near the largest tank.
Dr. Adrian Vale was in his late sixties, with white hair and a calm smile.
He nodded.
I knelt beside Sophie.
She wrapped her arms around my neck.
“I missed you.”
“I missed you too.”
“Mom says the baby is magic.”
Natalie looked ashamed.
“She may be special,” I said. “But she’s also someone’s child.”
Sophie studied Mira.
“She’s pretty.”
Mira reached out and touched Sophie’s hand.
The moment their fingers met, both children gasped.
A silver line moved beneath Sophie’s skin.
The monitors attached to her wheelchair beeped faster.
Natalie grabbed her.
“Sophie?”
Sophie took a deep breath.
For the first time in months, she did not cough afterward.
Vale stepped closer.
“Extraordinary.”
I pulled Mira away.
The silver line faded.
Sophie’s breathing became strained again.
Natalie looked at me with tears in her eyes.
“You saw that.”
“I saw something we don’t understand.”
“I saw my daughter breathe.”
Vale folded his hands.
“Claire, no one needs to be harmed. A small blood sample from the infant could give us enough material to create a treatment.”
“Then why did you bring armed guards?”
“Because your father is dangerous.”
“You imprisoned him for fourteen years.”
“He sabotaged a research station and caused the deaths of two employees.”
Thomas had warned me Vale would say that.
“Where is Maris?”
For the first time, Vale’s smile changed.
“I don’t know that name.”
“The woman wearing your collar.”
Natalie looked at him.
“What collar?”
Vale ignored her.
“Give me the child.”
“No.”
Sophie began coughing.
Natalie knelt beside her.
“Please, Claire.”
“I want to save her too.”
“Then do it.”
“What if taking blood hurts Mira?”
“She’ll recover.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know Sophie may not survive another week!”
Her scream echoed through the empty building.
Sophie began to cry.
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
Natalie dropped to her knees and hugged her.
“No, baby. You have nothing to be sorry for.”
Vale walked toward me.
“The infant is not human, Claire.”
Mira opened her eyes.
“She feels fear. She feels pain. That is human enough for me.”
His expression hardened.
“You sound exactly like Evelyn.”
I stepped closer.
“You murdered her.”
Natalie lifted her head.
“What?”
Vale stopped.
I saw the answer in his eyes before he denied it.
“Your mother died in an accident.”
“You called her my mother.”
His jaw tightened.
I had caught him.
“You knew exactly who I was before today.”
“Of course he did,” a voice said from the doorway.
Thomas entered with his hands raised.
Two guards walked behind him.
Ruth was not there.
Vale smiled.
“Thomas. You always did confuse recklessness with courage.”
Natalie stood.
“Dad?”
Thomas looked at her.
“My beautiful girl.”
She crossed the room and struck him across the face.
The sound echoed.
“You let me believe you abandoned us!”
Thomas did not defend himself.
“I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
“I escaped three years ago. I stayed hidden because Vale watched you. If I had approached, he would have known where I was.”
“He found you anyway.”
“Because you led him to Claire.”
Natalie’s face collapsed.
Vale raised one hand.
A guard locked the doors.
My transmitter vibrated.
Ruth’s voice whispered through the tiny receiver hidden in my collar.
“Signal located. Lower level, northeast corner.”
Maris was beneath us.
Vale heard the faint sound.
His eyes moved toward my shirt.
He lunged.
I stepped back.
A deep boom shook the building.
Water rippled inside the empty tanks.
Another boom came from below.
Vale looked at one of his guards.
“Secure the lower chamber.”
The lights flickered.
Mira began making the same clicking sound I had heard in the boat.
Sophie answered.
Not with words.
With the exact same sound.
Natalie stared at her daughter.
“Sophie?”
Mira touched my chest over my birthmark.
A silver glow spread across my skin.
Every tank in the aquarium cracked at once.
Water burst through the floor grates.
Vale shouted, “Take the infant!”
A guard grabbed my arm.
Thomas tackled him.
Natalie pulled Sophie’s wheelchair out of the way as another guard rushed forward.
Then something struck the glass wall behind Vale.
Once.
Twice.
The reinforced panel exploded inward.
A wave poured into the hall.
Maris rose from it.
The red collar flashed around her neck.
She looked at Vale.
Then at Mira.
Then at me.
“Daughters,” she whispered.
Vale lifted a small black remote.
Maris screamed and collapsed.
Mira screamed with her.
The silver light beneath my skin became blinding.
And suddenly, I remembered everything about the night Evelyn died.
May you like
Vale had been there.
He had held the same remote.
