Chapter 10 - the memory inside Dr. Voss
Roger lunged toward Dr. Voss.
Federal agents restrained him.
“You took my wife!”
Voss did not resist.
Her eyes remained on Henry.
The boy hid behind Mary.
“Why does he remember you?” Mary asked.
Voss looked toward Lydia.
“I will speak only if my daughter is protected.”
Lydia sat in her wheelchair beside a medic, refusing to meet her mother’s eyes.
“You no longer control the conditions,” Mary said.
Voss lowered her voice.
“Melissa discovered that Bellweather intended to replace her. She knew the evidence in Henry’s toy would not be enough. She needed someone with authority inside the program.”
“You.”
“Yes.”
“You expect us to believe she trusted you?”
“No. She hated me.”
“Then why help her?”
“Because she offered me something I needed.”
Roger’s face twisted.
“Henry’s tissue.”
“No.”
Voss looked at the boy.
“She offered me her memories.”
Mary stared.
Voss explained that Bellweather’s experimental process could transfer behavioral patterns, voice rhythms, and emotional associations through repeated stimulation. It could not move a complete consciousness.
At least, that was what Voss had believed.
“Melissa volunteered for an illegal procedure,” Voss said. “She insisted that her memories be copied into my neural profile.”
“Why?” Mary asked.
“So I would become emotionally incapable of harming Henry.”
Roger looked sick.
“You put my wife inside your head?”
“Fragments.”
“Which fragments?”
Voss closed her eyes.
“A yellow kitchen that is actually gray. Roger’s paper flower. Henry’s first fever. The moon song. The sound of the radiator in winter.”
Roger began crying without making a sound.
“Those are hers.”
“They may be.”
“May be?”
“The process creates overlap. I do not always know which memories belong to Melissa and which were constructed.”
Henry stepped forward.
“Where is Mom?”
Voss looked at him.
“She made me promise that if she died, I would protect you.”
“You didn’t.”
“No.”
The single word carried no excuse.
Lydia spoke from across the room.
“You hurt him because of me.”
Voss turned.
“I was saving you.”
“You were making me the reason.”
Mary saw the connection to Roger’s hunger. Adults had been sacrificing themselves and others for children who had never asked for the burden.
Henry had tried to send his father to jail so he could eat.
Lydia had nearly accepted another child’s body because her mother called it love.
Warren had buried Olivia’s case because he believed obedience might keep her alive.
Every act of desperation had become a door Bellweather could enter.
Mary asked Voss where the other Melissa replacements were located.
“Most were placed near trial sites.”
“For what purpose?”
“To test whether a family could accept different levels of resemblance.”
Roger looked at M-1.
“Was she ever in my apartment?”
“No.”
“What about M-12?”
“She observed Melissa and Henry through recordings.”
“Then where is the woman who lived with us?”
Voss hesitated.
Mary saw it.
“There was a replacement.”
“For eleven months.”
Roger staggered backward.
“Before Melissa disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“Which eleven months?”
“The final year before the reported disappearance.”
Henry looked confused.
Roger’s face emptied.
“You’re saying the woman who went for a walk wasn’t Melissa.”
“No.”
“Where was my wife during that year?”
“In Bellweather custody.”
Roger looked at Henry.
The child had spent nearly a year living with someone trained to imitate his mother.
“Did the replacement hurt him?”
“No.”
“Did she know who she was?”
“At first.”
“And later?”
“She began believing she was Melissa.”
Mary looked at M-1.
“Is this her?”
Voss shook her head.
“Her designation was M-7.”
Ben searched the ledger.
M-7.
STATUS: ESCAPED.
LAST KNOWN LOCATION: HALE RESIDENCE.
Roger stared at the line.
“The woman who left our apartment escaped?”
“Yes,” Voss said. “She found the original Melissa and learned the truth. They planned the evidence transfer together.”
“Where is M-7 now?”
“I don’t know.”
Mary reviewed the timeline.
Melissa had hidden the memory card.
M-7 had delivered the toy to Henry.
Captain Warren had visited the apartment.
Then M-7 vanished.
“What happened the night Warren came?” Mary asked.
Voss looked toward the captain.
He did not answer.
Olivia did.
“My father was ordered to kill M-7.”
Warren’s eyes filled with shame.
“I went there to warn her.”
“Why didn’t Roger see you?” Mary asked.
“M-7 drugged him. She said he had to believe she left voluntarily, or Bellweather would take Henry immediately.”
Roger touched his forehead as if a buried memory hurt.
“She made tea.”
Warren nodded.
“M-7 gave me the location of the original Melissa.”
“Did you find her?”
“No.”
“Then who took M-7?”
“Olivia.”
Everyone turned toward the woman in the blue coat.
She stood slowly.
“I moved M-7 through the tunnels.”
“Where?” Mary asked.
Olivia looked at Voss.
“To the one place Bellweather would never search.”
Lydia’s private treatment wing.
Voss’s face changed.
“My daughter’s room?”
Olivia nodded.
“M-7 became Lydia’s night nurse.”
Lydia looked up sharply.
“Anna.”
Voss whispered, “No.”
The girl’s eyes filled.
“Anna sang the moon song.”
Mary looked at the patient ledger.
M-7 had been hiding in the Voss home under another identity, close to the child Henry was expected to save.
“Where is Anna now?” Mary asked.
Lydia pointed toward the emergency exit.
“She left when the alarms started.”
Ben checked security footage.
A woman in a nurse’s uniform had exited the lower facility carrying a medical case.
Her face was partially hidden.
She entered a black SUV.
Captain Warren stared at the vehicle.
“That’s mine.”
Mary turned toward him.
“You said Bellweather tried to kill you.”
“They did.”
“Who gave you the SUV?”
Warren’s face went pale.
“Olivia.”
Everyone looked at the blue coat.
Olivia smiled faintly.
Then she pressed a hidden control beneath her sleeve.
Mary’s scar exploded with pain.
Officers collapsed throughout the corridor.
Olivia stepped over them and picked up the glass patient ledger.
Warren struggled to remain conscious.
“Why?”
She looked down at him.
“Because Bellweather was never Voss’s company.”
“Whose was it?”
Olivia’s expression became empty.
May you like
“Mine.”
👉 Olivia revealed herself as the true power behind Bellweather and escaped with the patient ledger while controlling the implants inside Mary and Warren.
