CHAPTER 5 – THE FILE THEY BURIED TWENTY YEARS AGO
CHAPTER 5 – THE FILE THEY BURIED TWENTY YEARS AGO
Clara sat outside the intensive care unit, unable to stop staring through the glass.
Emma looked impossibly small beneath the white hospital blanket.
Machines breathed and beeped where a healthy little girl's laughter should have been.
Dominic stood a few feet away, speaking quietly into his phone.
"I want every specialist in the country."
He ended the call.
"If they exist," he said to his security chief, "they'll be here before sunrise."
"Yes, Boss."
Before another word could be spoken, the hospital director approached.
Dr. Arthur Hastings was nearly seventy, his silver hair perfectly combed despite the late hour. His reputation was spotless.
Tonight, however, his hands trembled.
"Mr. Moretti," he said carefully. "May I speak with you... privately?"
Dominic noticed the fear in the man's eyes.
"This concerns the child?"
"...Yes."
Clara immediately stood.
"If this is about Emma, I stay."
Dr. Hastings hesitated.
Then nodded.
"Very well."
He led them into a secure conference room.
The moment the door closed, he placed an old, yellowed folder on the table.
Across the front, stamped in faded red ink, were the words:
PROJECT PHOENIX – CLASSIFIED
Beneath it...
VALE FAMILY
Clara frowned.
"My last name."
Dr. Hastings took a slow breath.
"Twenty-one years ago, this hospital participated in an experimental genetic research program funded by several powerful families."
Dominic's expression darkened.
"What kind of research?"
The doctor looked ashamed.
"They claimed they were searching for cures to inherited immune diseases."
"They lied."
Silence filled the room.
"They secretly altered the DNA of several unborn children."
Clara stared at him.
"What are you saying?"
The doctor opened the file.
"There were twelve pregnancies."
"Only three babies survived."
He turned another page.
"The records listed them only by family name."
The first:
Hartman.
Deceased.
The second:
Ellis.
Missing since age eleven.
The third...
His finger stopped.
Vale.
Clara felt her heartbeat stumble.
"No."
"No, that's impossible."
"I was born in another hospital."
Dr. Hastings slowly shook his head.
"No."
"You were transferred here immediately after birth."
He slid a faded photograph across the table.
A young woman smiled weakly from a hospital bed while holding a newborn wrapped in a pink blanket.
Clara.
She recognized the necklace around the woman's neck.
It had belonged to her mother.
"My mother never told me..."
"Because she signed a lifetime confidentiality agreement."
Dominic asked quietly,
"And Emma?"
The doctor's voice broke.
"Genetic alterations can pass to the next generation."
"The disease threatening Emma..."
"...may not be natural."
The room became deathly silent.
Then another knock echoed against the door.
A nervous technician rushed inside.
"Director!"
"You need to see this."
He handed over a tablet.
Security footage.
Timestamp: Eight minutes earlier.
Someone wearing a hospital uniform had entered Emma's ICU room.
They didn't check her IV.
They didn't examine her.
Instead...
They photographed her medical chart.
Then injected something into the IV bag.
The figure walked away before any nurse returned.
Clara gasped.
"Oh my God..."
Dominic's eyes turned cold.
"Lock down the hospital."
Within seconds alarms echoed through every hallway.
Steel security doors slammed shut.
Bodyguards flooded every entrance.
No one would leave.
May you like
Not tonight.
Because someone had just tried to silence a six-year-old girl.
