Chapter 10
The rustic cabin grew warmer as Maya fed dry kindling into the old iron woodstove, sending a thin column of white smoke curling out of the stone chimney. Leo was still sleeping soundly on the cot, his breathing quiet and peaceful, insulated from the terrifying reality of their situation.
Elena sat at the wooden table, carefully organizing the financial records Maya had retrieved from the attic crawlspace. Her fingers traced the letterhead of the pharmaceutical corporation listed as the primary benefactor of the Elias Project.
"Vanguard Bio-Tech," Elena read aloud, her voice trembling slightly. "Your father—David—he’s been utilizing their private research grants to fund his private guardianship of Leo. But why? What do they actually want with a seven-year-old child?"
Maya leaned over the table, tapping a dense medical report dated a month prior. "Look at the genetic markers. Leo isn't just adopted, Mom. Read the parentage notes. He's a direct descendant of the original lead scientist who founded the project back in the nineties—a scientist who mysteriously disappeared right before the facility was shut down."
Elena’s eyes widened in horror. "David didn't just adopt him out of the goodness of his heart. He tracked Leo down to complete the genetic lineage. He believes Leo possesses hereditary resistance markers that Vanguard needs for their neurological trials."
"Exactly," Maya said, her jaw set. "Which means David isn't operating on his own whim. He’s answering to people who are far more dangerous than he is. But it also means we have leverage."
"What kind of leverage?" Elena asked, looking up skeptically.
"Public exposure," Maya replied, pulling her smartphone from her pocket. "These files contain bank account numbers, encrypted server addresses, and internal corporate emails proving illegal human experimentation on minors. If I upload these documents to a secure whistleblower database and leak them to an investigative journalist I follow in Seattle, Vanguard’s entire operation implodes by noon."
"Won't that put a target on our backs?" Elena warned, her hands trembling as she clutched the edge of the table. "If these people are as powerful as these papers suggest, they can track a phone upload in seconds."
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"That’s why I'm not going to use my phone," Maya said with a grim smile. She reached into the metal lockbox and pulled out an old satellite communicator David had hidden beneath the false bottom—a military-grade uplink device designed to bypass traditional cellular towers entirely.
Maya powered up the satellite device, watching the small green light blink as it established a secure connection to an orbital network. She prepared the digital archive of the files, attaching a short, direct message to the investigative journalist detailing every illegal document in the cache.
