CHAPTER 9 – THE CHILD WHO HAD NOT BEEN BORN
CHAPTER 9 – THE CHILD WHO HAD NOT BEEN BORN
Eduardo’s hand went limp inside mine.
For one horrifying second, I believed he was dead.
Then his chest moved.
Barely.
A thin, broken breath escaped his lips.
“Eduardo.”
I pressed both hands against the wound in his chest.
Blood surged between my fingers.
“Stay with me.”
His eyes did not open.
Behind us, Beatriz’s speedboat cut across the lake, carrying Nicolás toward the island Eduardo had warned me about.
The boat grew smaller every second.
Daniel cried out from the boathouse.
“Daddy.”
He tried to run toward us.
Elena caught him before he reached the burning section of the dock.
“Stay back.”
Daniel fought against her.
“Let me go.”
“He needs me.”
Lucía wrapped both arms around Daniel from behind.
The curly-haired boy stood frozen beside them.
Smoke rolled across the dock.
Pieces of the burning yacht cracked and fell into the water.
Rosa remained on the floor inside the boathouse, bleeding from the gunshot wound in her back.
Two people were dying in front of me.
One child had been taken.
Three others were trapped beside a burning structure.
And somewhere across the lake, Beatriz was preparing to create a fifth child from the remains of an experiment that should never have existed.
Police sirens grew louder.
Officer Salgado appeared through the smoke with four armed officers behind him.
“Everyone down.”
“We need paramedics,” I shouted.
“Two gunshot victims.”
Salgado rushed toward Eduardo.
Another officer entered the boathouse and found Rosa.
A police boat approached the dock from the eastern side of the lake.
Its blue lights flashed through the smoke.
I pointed toward the disappearing speedboat.
“She took a child.”
“Silver-haired woman in a white suit.”
“They are heading toward an island.”
Salgado looked across the water.
“There are three islands in this section.”
“Elena knows which one.”
Everyone turned toward her.
Elena still held Daniel by the shoulders.
Her face was pale.
“I know the property.”
“How?” Salgado asked.
“My father’s company purchased it fourteen years ago.”
“Which island?”
“Isla Cardenal.”
“Approximately six kilometers southwest.”
“Is there a medical facility there?”
Elena hesitated.
“There was.”
My anger snapped through the shock.
“There was?”
“My father said it closed before Mateo came to live with them.”
“You knew about a private hospital on an island owned by your family?”
“I knew there had been a research clinic.”
“You knew enough to hide it from me.”
“I did not know children were being kept there.”
“How many more secrets are you going to remember only after someone gets shot?”
Her face tightened.
“I deserve that.”
“We do not have time for what you deserve.”
I looked at Salgado.
“Take us to the island.”
“No.”
“My son is on that boat.”
“Nicolás is not legally your son.”
“He is biologically mine.”
“That has not been independently confirmed.”
“He is a kidnapped child.”
“That is enough.”
Salgado spoke into his radio.
He ordered the police boat to pursue Beatriz.
Then he looked at the burning dock.
“You remain here with the other children.”
“I am going.”
“You are injured.”
I looked down.
Blood covered my hands and clothes.
Most of it belonged to Eduardo.
A shallow cut crossed my forearm from the shattered glass.
“I am not injured enough to stay.”
“Mrs. Ríos.”
“Beatriz knows I will follow.”
“She expects me.”
“That makes you a target.”
“It also makes me useful.”
Salgado stepped closer.
“This is not a negotiation.”
“No.”
“It is a warning.”
“If you leave me here, I will take the first boat I find.”
He stared at me.
Elena spoke behind us.
“She will.”
Salgado looked toward the children.
Daniel wiped his face with both hands.
“I am coming too.”
“No,” I said immediately.
“You said you would not leave me.”
“I am not leaving you.”
“You are staying with Elena.”
Daniel looked at her.
Then back at me.
“You said she lied.”
“I did.”
“Then why should I stay with her?”
The question struck all of us.
Elena knelt in front of him.
“Because your mother needs to go after Nicolás.”
“And because I will protect you even if you never trust me again.”
Daniel’s lower lip trembled.
“Will you lie to me?”
“No.”
Elena’s voice broke.
“Not anymore.”
Lucía moved beside Daniel.
“I will stay with him.”
The curly-haired boy stepped forward.
“So will I.”
Elena looked at him.
Her lost brother.
Or the child she believed was her brother.
She still did not know which name truly belonged to him.
“What should I call you?” she asked softly.
The boy looked down.
“Mateo.”
“But Rosa said my name might be Gabriel.”
“What do you want me to call you?”
He thought for several seconds.
“Mateo.”
Elena nodded.
“Then Mateo it is.”
Paramedics ran onto the dock.
They placed Eduardo on a stretcher.
One of them cut through the blood-soaked bandage across his chest.
“The bullet entered high on the right side.”
“Pulse is weak.”
“Possible lung injury.”
I walked beside them.
“Is he going to survive?”
“We need to move him now.”
Eduardo’s eyes opened as they lifted him.
His fingers moved toward me.
I leaned closer.
“Isla Cardenal,” he whispered.
“We know.”
“Lower level.”
“What is on the lower level?”
His lips barely moved.
“The womb room.”
My stomach turned.
“What does that mean?”
“Elena’s father built it.”
Elena heard him.
Her face changed.
“My father built what?”
Eduardo looked toward her.
“The artificial gestation lab.”
The paramedics pushed the stretcher toward the ambulance.
Elena stood motionless.
I grabbed her arm.
“You knew nothing about that?”
“No.”
“I swear.”
The words meant very little now.
Salgado ordered two officers to remain with the children.
Elena refused to stay behind.
“Isla Cardenal is held through several shell companies.”
“I know the service entrance.”
“You need me.”
I looked at Daniel.
Every instinct told me not to leave him again.
But Nicolás was alone with Beatriz.
He had just learned his name.
He had just learned that I was his biological mother.
Then he had been dragged away before I could tell him that I would come for him too.
I knelt and placed both hands on Daniel’s face.
“You stay with Officer Romero.”
“You do exactly what she says.”
“What about Elena?”
“She is coming with me.”
Fear filled his eyes.
“Then who do I know?”
The question broke my heart.
Lucía took his hand.
“You know me.”
Daniel looked at her.
Mateo stood beside them.
“You know me too,” he said.
Daniel swallowed.
Then he nodded.
I kissed his forehead.
“I will bring Nicolás back.”
Daniel caught my wrist.
“Bring yourself back too.”
“I will.”
This time, the promise felt heavier.
I boarded the police boat with Elena, Salgado, and four tactical officers.
The engine roared.
We pulled away from the burning boathouse.
The children became smaller behind us.
Daniel stood between Lucía and Mateo.
All three watched until smoke hid them from view.
The lake wind struck my face.
Blood dried across my hands.
Salgado gave Elena a satellite image of Isla Cardenal.
The island looked like a dark green oval surrounded by steep rock.
A large villa occupied the northern side.
Several smaller structures stretched toward the center.
A dock extended from the eastern shore.
“There,” Elena said.
She pointed toward a narrow inlet on the southern edge.
“The service entrance is hidden behind a retaining wall.”
“How do you know?” Salgado asked.
“My father brought me there once when I was sixteen.”
“What did you see?”
“Almost nothing.”
“He told me the property belonged to a medical charity.”
“There was a tunnel for deliveries.”
“Why would a charity hide its delivery entrance?”
“I asked him.”
“What did he say?”
“That some patients needed privacy.”
I looked at her.
“You believed him?”
“I was sixteen.”
“At sixteen, you knew tunnels were not normal.”
“Yes.”
She stared at the map.
“I also knew my father did not like questions.”
The police radio crackled.
The pursuing unit had lost sight of Beatriz’s boat near the western side of the island.
No vessel had arrived at the main dock.
Salgado looked at the image.
“She entered through another opening.”
“The old surgical dock,” Elena said.
“Where?”
“Northwest cliff.”
“It is covered at high water.”
“Can we reach it?”
“Not in this boat.”
“There is a lower tunnel from the service entrance.”
Salgado ordered the driver south.
The island rose ahead of us.
From the water, it looked abandoned.
The villa’s windows were dark.
No guards stood on the main dock.
No vehicles moved on the narrow road.
Birds circled above the trees.
The stillness felt manufactured.
Beatriz had arrived minutes before us.
There should have been movement.
Instead, the island looked as though no one had lived there for years.
We entered the southern inlet.
Elena pointed toward a wall covered in vines.
The driver slowed.
Behind the hanging plants was a metal door built into the rock.
There was no handle.
Only a black scanner.
Salgado studied it.
“Biometric?”
“Yes.”
“Whose?”
“My father’s.”
Elena raised her hand.
“It may recognize family members.”
She pressed her thumb against the scanner.
Nothing happened.
She tried again.
A red light flashed.
“Access denied.”
Salgado signaled an officer carrying a breaching device.
Elena stopped him.
“There may be internal alarms.”
“They already know we are coming.”
A voice emerged from a hidden speaker.
“I hoped you would bring Laura.”
Beatriz.
Her voice echoed across the inlet.
“Elena was optional.”
Salgado looked toward the surrounding rocks.
“Beatriz Armenta.”
“You are surrounded by law enforcement.”
“Release the child and come out unarmed.”
Beatriz laughed softly.
“You brought six people to an island with twenty-three exits.”
“You are not surrounding anything.”
The speaker clicked.
Then Nicolás screamed.
The sound was brief.
Sharp.
Terrified.
I struck the metal door.
“Nicolás.”
Beatriz returned to the speaker.
“He can hear you.”
“Let him go.”
“You have something I need.”
“What?”
“Your blood.”
“Open the door.”
“Laura,” Salgado warned.
I ignored him.
“Open the door and take it.”
“No.”
“You will enter alone.”
“Absolutely not,” Salgado said.
Beatriz continued.
“If anyone follows, Nicolás receives the first extraction without anesthesia.”
My body went cold.
“What extraction?”
“You know enough.”
“Bone marrow?”
“No.”
Her voice became almost gentle.
“His testicular tissue.”
Elena covered her mouth.
Rage erased every remaining trace of fear inside me.
“He is seven years old.”
“He carries a unique germline modification.”
“You are not touching him.”
“I already have.”
I hit the door again.
“Open it.”
Salgado grabbed my shoulder.
“This is what she wants.”
“She has a child.”
“She wants you too.”
“Then she gets me.”
“No.”
I turned on him.
“You heard her.”
“If we breach the wrong entrance, she hurts him.”
“If I enter, you find another way inside.”
Salgado’s jaw tightened.
Elena looked at the satellite image.
“There is another access point.”
“Where?”
“An underwater ventilation shaft.”
“It connects to the lower laboratory.”
“Can your officers use it?”
“With diving equipment.”
Salgado stared at me.
“You enter only far enough to keep her occupied.”
“You keep the transmitter active.”
“You do not surrender your weapon.”
“I do not have one.”
He removed a compact pistol from his vest.
Then he hesitated.
I shook my head.
“She will search me.”
He handed me a small ceramic blade instead.
It fit inside the lining of my boot.
The metal door opened with a mechanical hiss.
Darkness waited behind it.
Beatriz’s voice came through the speaker.
“Laura only.”
I looked at Elena.
“Find the lower level.”
“I will.”
“Find Nicolás.”
“We will.”
I stepped through the doorway.
The door closed behind me.
A narrow corridor extended into the island.
White lights turned on one by one.
The walls were smooth concrete.
No windows.
No cameras were visible.
That did not mean they were not there.
I walked forward.
My footsteps echoed.
At the end of the corridor, a glass door opened automatically.
A woman in blue medical scrubs waited on the other side.
She held a handheld scanner.
“Raise your arms.”
“Where is Nicolás?”
“Raise your arms.”
I obeyed.
She checked my sleeves, waist, pockets, and shoes.
The ceramic blade did not activate the scanner.
She removed the hidden police transmitter from beneath my collar.
Then she crushed it beneath her shoe.
“Move.”
The corridor led to an elevator.
There were five buttons.
The lowest one had no number.
Only a symbol shaped like a circle around a small human figure.
The woman pressed it.
The elevator descended.
The numbers passed below ground level.
Minus one.
Minus two.
Minus three.
Then the display went blank.
My ears popped.
The island’s lower level was much deeper than I expected.
The doors opened into a medical complex.
Bright white corridors stretched in both directions.
Doctors and nurses moved between glass rooms.
Some wore masks.
Others carried tablets.
No one looked surprised to see me.
They had been waiting.
Behind the first window, rows of frozen biological samples filled steel cabinets.
Behind the second, robotic arms moved above sealed containers.
The third room held artificial wombs.
I stopped walking.
Twelve transparent chambers stood in two rows.
Each one was filled with amber fluid.
Inside several chambers, small shapes floated beneath blankets of tubing and sensors.
Some were only tiny clusters.
Others had developed arms, legs, and recognizable human faces.
I could not breathe.
“The womb room,” I whispered.
Eduardo had told the truth.
The woman in scrubs pushed me forward.
“Do not stop.”
“How many children are here?”
“They are not children yet.”
“That is what Beatriz told herself when she stole my embryos.”
The woman said nothing.
We passed a chamber labeled A-5.
It was empty.
The next chamber carried a different label.
SUBJECT FIVE.
GESTATIONAL AGE: 31 WEEKS.
My legs stopped working.
Inside the chamber floated a baby.
A real baby.
A little girl.
Dark hair covered her head.
Her hands were closed near her face.
A thin monitor traced her heartbeat across a screen.
Subject Five had not been born.
But she already existed.
Beatriz had lied by using the smallest possible truth.
The fifth child was alive.
She simply had not left the artificial womb.
I moved closer to the glass.
The medical attendant grabbed my arm.
“Do not touch it.”
“Whose child is she?”
“You will be informed.”
I looked at the data screen.
GENETIC SOURCE A: L. MARTÍNEZ.
GENETIC SOURCE B: E. RÍOS.
My blood froze.
The child belonged to Eduardo and me.
Another stolen embryo.
Another biological child we had never known existed.
Nicolás was not the only embryo Beatriz had taken.
Subject Five was his biological sister.
“She is mine.”
The attendant pulled me away.
“She belongs to the program.”
“No.”
I struck her hand from my arm.
“She is my daughter.”
An alarm sounded.
Red lights flashed along the corridor.
The attendant reached for a radio.
The ceiling speakers activated.
Beatriz’s voice filled the laboratory.
“Laura.”
“I see you found her.”
“Open this chamber.”
“Not yet.”
“What do you need Nicolás for?”
“The embryo was edited with markers gathered from Subjects One through Four.”
“Her cardiac system developed perfectly.”
“Her immune system did not.”
“What does Nicolás have?”
“The final compatible sequence.”
“You are going to use him to save her.”
“Yes.”
“At what cost?”
Beatriz did not answer.
My eyes moved to the medical screen.
A procedure had been scheduled.
GERMLINE EXTRACTION.
FULL REPRODUCTIVE HARVEST.
The words made me feel physically ill.
Nicolás might survive.
But he would be permanently harmed.
Beatriz did not care.
To her, one child was raw material for another.
“Where is he?”
“Come to Surgical Theater Three.”
The medical attendant pointed down the corridor.
“Move.”
I followed her.
As we passed the artificial wombs, I counted every chamber.
Twelve.
Seven were occupied.
Five were empty.
The program had not ended with our children.
It had expanded.
We reached a set of double doors.
The attendant entered a code.
The doors opened.
Nicolás lay on an operating table.
His wrists and ankles were restrained.
A surgical cap covered his dark hair.
An intravenous line ran into his arm.
His eyes were open.
He saw me.
“Laura.”
He did not call me Mom.
I did not need him to.
“I am here.”
Beatriz stood beside the operating table.
She had changed out of her damaged white suit.
She now wore a sterile gown and gloves.
Two surgeons waited near a tray of instruments.
A transparent wall separated the theater from an observation room.
Inside that room stood Elena’s father.
His hands were tied.
A bruise darkened one side of his face.
Beside him was Silvana.
She was alive.
A guard held a gun behind them.
Beatriz removed her gloves.
“You came exactly as your mother would have.”
“Do not compare us.”
“She also walked into a laboratory to save her child.”
“What happened to her?”
“She escaped.”
“For a while.”
My heart tightened.
“My mother died in a car accident.”
Beatriz smiled.
“No.”
I stared at her.
“She died when I was twenty-six.”
“You buried a body.”
“You signed papers.”
“You watched a coffin lowered into the ground.”
“You did not see her face.”
The memory returned.
The accident had been severe.
The coffin had remained closed.
The coroner had advised against viewing the body.
I had accepted the identification based on jewelry and dental records.
My mother’s gold pendant had supposedly been recovered at the scene.
The same pendant now hung around Lucía’s neck.
“That was not my mother.”
“No.”
“Where is she?”
Beatriz looked toward the observation room.
A second door opened.
An elderly woman entered slowly.
Her hair was completely white.
She wore a plain gray dress.
A thin scar crossed her forehead.
Time had changed her face.
Pain had changed it more.
But I knew her.
I knew the shape of her eyes.
I knew the way she held her shoulders.
I knew the small trembling movement of her left hand.
My mother stepped into the light.
“Laura.”
The sound of my name in her voice destroyed twenty years of grief in a single second.
I could not move.
I could not speak.
She pressed both hands against the glass.
“I am sorry.”
My eyes filled with tears.
“You are alive.”
“Yes.”
“Why did you leave me?”
“I did not.”
Beatriz looked pleased.
“She tried to expose the program.”
“So we gave her a choice.”
My mother closed her eyes.
“What choice?”
Beatriz walked toward the controls beside Nicolás’s operating table.
“Disappear willingly.”
“Or watch us use you as the next donor source.”
My mother looked at me through the glass.
“I thought you were safe.”
“You let me believe you were dead.”
“I was told they would take your children if I contacted you.”
“I did not have children.”
“You had embryos.”
The truth landed.
My mother had known.
She had known Beatriz stole them.
She had stayed hidden because Beatriz threatened them.
“Why did you not tell the police?”
“I tried.”
“Every person I contacted disappeared or changed sides.”
“Judge Medina.”
“Tomás Cordero.”
“The Vargas accounts.”
“They controlled everything.”
Beatriz pressed a button.
The surgical restraints tightened around Nicolás’s wrists.
He cried out.
“Stop.”
I moved toward him.
A guard stepped between us.
Beatriz looked at the clock.
“The procedure begins in four minutes.”
“What do you want from me?”
“A transfusion.”
“For Subject Five?”
“Yes.”
“Then let Nicolás go.”
“Your blood alone is not enough.”
“You need both of us.”
“I need your blood.”
“I need his reproductive tissue.”
“And I need your mother’s marrow.”
My mother went pale behind the glass.
Beatriz had collected three generations of the same family.
My mother.
Me.
My biological son.
All to preserve a bloodline built on stolen children.
I looked toward the baby floating inside Subject Five’s chamber on the monitor.
My daughter.
Thirty-one weeks developed.
Alive because of a crime.
Dependent on another crime to survive.
Beatriz understood the conflict inside me.
Her voice softened.
“One child will be altered.”
“One child will be saved.”
“You are asking me to choose between them.”
“No.”
“I already made the choice.”
She turned toward the surgeon.
“Begin preparation.”
The surgeon lifted a syringe.
Nicolás struggled against the straps.
“Laura.”
Fear broke through his voice.
“Please.”
I stepped toward him.
“I will not let them hurt you.”
Beatriz laughed quietly.
“You cannot save both.”
I looked at my son.
Then at the monitor showing the unborn girl.
Then at my mother behind the glass.
I understood why Beatriz believed she had won.
She had built a room where every choice required sacrificing a child.
But she had made one mistake.
She believed love made people predictable.
She believed a mother would obey any command if the word save was attached to it.
She had never understood what my mother had done thirty years earlier.
My mother had not obeyed.
She had run.
She had destroyed records.
She had hidden me.
And she had spent twenty years pretending to be dead to keep the program from finding me.
I looked through the glass.
My mother’s left hand trembled.
Then she raised three fingers.
The same signal I had taught Daniel.
The same signal Daniel had shown the school camera.
The same signal Lucía had copied.
My mother could not have known about it.
Unless someone had told her.
Behind Beatriz, the surgical theater door opened silently.
Daniel stood in the doorway.
Lucía was beside him.
Mateo stood behind them.
Elena and Officer Salgado crouched farther back with weapons raised.
Daniel held up three fingers.
My mother had seen him through the glass.
They had found another way inside.
Beatriz had not noticed.
I kept my eyes on her.
“What happens if Subject Five does not receive my blood?”
“She dies.”
“How long does she have?”
“Less than twenty-four hours.”
“And if Nicolás undergoes the procedure?”
“He may survive.”
“May?”
“Medicine offers no guarantees.”
Nicolás’s eyes filled with tears.
I moved closer to the operating table.
The guard reached for me.
I allowed him to grab my arm.
Beatriz watched my face.
She believed I was surrendering.
“I will do it,” I said.
Nicolás stared at me.
“No.”
Beatriz smiled.
“I knew you would understand.”
“I will give you my blood.”
“You release him first.”
“No.”
“Then you get nothing.”
“I can take it without permission.”
“Not if I am dead.”
Her smile vanished.
I pulled the ceramic blade from my boot.
Before the guard could react, I pressed it against my own throat.
Everyone froze.
Nicolás stopped struggling.
Beatriz’s face changed.
“You will not do that.”
“You spent ten years studying me.”
“You should know what I am capable of.”
“You would kill Subject Five.”
“You are the one killing her.”
“Put down the blade.”
“Release Nicolás.”
“Now.”
For the first time, Beatriz looked uncertain.
Then a monitor alarm sounded.
Not from the operating table.
From the artificial womb room.
Subject Five’s heartbeat began falling.
One hundred and twelve.
Ninety-eight.
Eighty-four.
A nurse shouted from the corridor.
“Her circulation is collapsing.”
Beatriz turned toward the door.
That single movement was enough.
Salgado entered the theater.
“Police.”
“Do not move.”
Elena rushed toward Nicolás.
Daniel and Lucía remained behind the doorway.
The guard beside me reached for his weapon.
My mother struck the glass from the other side with a metal chair.
A hidden panel opened.
She had already loosened it.
Silvana attacked the guard inside the observation room.
Gunfire exploded.
The surgeon dropped to the floor.
Beatriz ran toward the corridor.
I grabbed her gown.
She turned and struck me across the face.
We fell against the instrument cart.
Scalpels and clamps crashed across the floor.
Elena released one of Nicolás’s wrists.
Salgado exchanged fire with the guard near the observation room.
My mother crawled through the broken panel.
She reached me.
For the first time in twenty years, her hands touched my face.
“My girl.”
I stared at her.
There was no time for questions.
No time for grief.
No time for reunion.
The alarm became continuous.
A nurse screamed from the womb room.
“Subject Five is crashing.”
I looked at Nicolás.
One wrist was free.
The other remained restrained.
I looked at my mother.
Then at Beatriz running toward the laboratory.
My unborn daughter’s heartbeat dropped to sixty.
Fifty-two.
Forty-one.
Beatriz reached the artificial womb controls.
She turned toward me through the glass.
In one hand, she held an emergency release lever.
In the other, she held a detonator.
“If the police enter this room,” she shouted, “every chamber loses power.”
Seven unborn children floated behind her.
Seven heartbeats appeared across the monitors.
Seven lives held inside machines controlled by a woman who saw them only as research.
Beatriz lifted the detonator.
“Laura.”
“Choose now.”
“Your son.”
“Your unborn daughter.”
“Or every child in this laboratory.”
Then the main lights went out.
May you like
The emergency power failed.
And one by one, the heart monitors began to stop.
