Chapter 8: The Vault Beneath Her Name
The coordinates burned in the back of my mind as I drove alone through the city's industrial edge — where the roads were cracked, and the buildings whispered of things no longer spoken aloud.
Night had already swallowed the skyline, and the glow of civilization faded behind me. Ahead, the landscape turned skeletal — brick warehouses, rusted fences, long-dead factories left behind like secrets no one wanted to admit they buried.
The location led to a gated facility with no name.
The kind of place that shouldn't exist.
The kind of place you don't find unless you're meant to.
I stepped out of the car, my heels crunching over loose gravel. A chill wind whipped through the alley as a lone security light flickered above a steel door, half-buried beneath ivy.
This wasn't just a place from my nightmares.
This was where they'd made them.
---
The keypad was still active.
I didn't know the code, but my fingers moved like they remembered.
4… 7… 1… 9… enter.
A soft click. The door creaked open.
I hesitated.
Then stepped inside.
The hallway was dim and narrow, the walls lined with outdated monitors and old medical cabinets. Somewhere deep inside, machines hummed softly — still breathing in the dark after all these years.
The facility smelled like antiseptic and dust. Like memory trying to erase itself.
I reached for my flashlight and kept walking.
Down a winding corridor, past rusted gurneys and shuttered lab windows.
Then I saw it:
A door labeled "P.1 — Initiation Wing."
I touched it, breath held.
The metal was ice cold.
I pushed it open slowly.
---
Inside was a room I knew and didn't know.
There was a swing set. A low, padded chair. A child-sized bed with restraints tucked into the sheets like they were decorative trim.
And on the far wall — a mural.
Painted trees. A fake sky. Clouds shaped like hearts.
A child's paradise built in captivity.
In the corner, I found a stuffed rabbit — gray, one eye missing.
My hands shook as I picked it up.
The rabbit's fur was worn at the ears.
I'd chewed on them.
A flash — a memory:
> Me, crying in a white room, biting the rabbit's ear while a woman's voice echoed overhead.
"Ava, your mother's not coming today. But you've been very brave."
My knees buckled. I sat hard on the padded chair, my lungs refusing air.
This was where they kept me.
---
Behind a false panel on the wall, I found a console.
Lucian's voice rang in my head: "If you find the Persephone file—don't open it without help."
I didn't listen.
I pressed the screen.
It flickered.
Then loaded.
> FILE NAME: PERSEPHONE_01
SUBJECT NAME: AVA GRANT
AGE: 3.7
CONDITION: UNSTABLE — MEMETIC BREAK EXPECTED
OBSERVATIONS: SHOWS UNPROGRAMMED RESISTANCE; FORMING RECALL NETWORKS
NOTES: MOTHER DISCOVERED ENTRY. PHASE ABORTED. ASSET TO BE SMUGGLED OUT VIA COVER AGENT.
I dropped the tablet.
They had tried to erase me.
And my mother… had stolen me back.
---
Footsteps echoed behind me.
I turned sharply — heart racing.
Lucian.
He stood at the doorway, eyes dark with things he hadn't said.
"I told you not to come alone," he said.
"You followed me?"
"You thought I wouldn't?"
I looked away. "I had to see it for myself."
He walked in slowly, looking around.
"This was real," I whispered. "All of it."
"I know."
I held up the rabbit.
"They trained me like a dog. And when I failed to submit…"
"They erased it," Lucian said quietly. "Until now."
---
We walked deeper into the facility, into the lower levels.
Ava Grant wasn't just a name.
She was a project.
They had measured me. Calibrated my emotions. Built routines into my neural chemistry. Made me afraid of red light. Made me crave praise. Made me perfect… until I resisted.
Then they tried again.
With Lily.
---
In the vault below the main floor, we found a row of cryo chambers.
Empty.
Except for one.
Inside was a metal box.
Lucian opened it carefully.
Inside, photographs. Medical files. Letters from Sophia Grant — my mother.
One letter, hand-written.
I read it aloud:
> "If you're reading this, Ava, then they failed.
I tried to protect you. I gave up everything for you. I knew they'd try again, and I knew you'd never believe me until you saw it with your own eyes.
You are not broken. You are not their doll. You are mine.
Finish what I started. Expose them.
And never forget… you were born to fight."
My hands shook as I folded the letter.
Lucian placed a hand on my shoulder.
"I wish I could give you peace," he said. "But you were made for war."
---
We returned to the surface in silence.
I didn't speak until we reached the car.
"They lied to the world," I said.
"They lied to you."
"No. They told me what they were. I just didn't understand it yet."
I pulled out my phone and texted Naomi:
Schedule an emergency board meeting. All shareholders. Tonight.
---
Hours later, I stood in front of a screen in Grant Tower's war room.
Behind me: files. Images. Evidence.
Of the facility. Of the files. Of the Persephone program.
"This," I said to the board, "is what the Dawson Group built under our name. Under your silence. This is not corporate warfare. This is human experimentation."
Faces paled.
"No more hiding. No more shadows. We go public. Tonight."
---
Lucian stood behind me, silent and steady.
Naomi brought the news feed forward.
> Lily Dawson scheduled for live interview tonight.
I laughed.
"She always did love the spotlight."
Naomi looked at me. "What's the plan?"
I turned to the camera.
"We share the truth."
---
The interview aired at 9 PM.
Lily sat in a velvet chair across from a news anchor, face flawless, expression composed.
"I never wanted to replace Ava," she said gently. "I only wanted to belong somewhere."
A well-rehearsed tear rolled down her cheek.
She was good.
But not good enough.
---
Ten minutes later, the world watched in real-time as Grant Corp released the Persephone Files.
My file.
Lily's.
Photos. Timelines. Voice memos.
The illusion shattered.
---
At 10 PM, Lily fled the studio mid-broadcast.
At 10:15, the Dawsons' legal counsel resigned.
At 10:30, I walked into the studio where the interview had been aired and stood in front of the same chair.
Live feed.
I looked into the camera.
"I'm not here to make you choose between two girls. I'm here to end the illusion that they were ever the same.
I am Ava Grant. The real one.
And I'm done hiding."
---
After the feed, I sat outside alone in the alley behind the building.
Lucian found me again.
"You did it," he said.
"No," I said quietly. "I started it."
He sat beside me.
"There's more, isn't there?"
I nodded. "I don't think Lily was the last one. I think there's a Persephone-3."
Lucian tensed. "And you think she's still active?"
I looked up at the stars.
"I think she's coming next."
---
[End of Chapter 8 ]