Subject E-16
1053 Words
The Bell rang once.
The sound traveled through the walls.
Then disappeared.
Nobody moved.
Emma stared at the machine.
SUBJECT E-16 — CURRENT STATUS: ACTIVE
The words remained on the screen.
Lila swallowed.
“Active means alive, right?”
Nobody answered.
Harper slowly approached the monitor.
“That’s what it means.”
Mia shook her head.
“But who is E-16?”
Emma looked at Calder.
His face had lost all its color.
“You know.”
Calder didn’t respond.
Emma stepped closer.
“Who is E-16?”
Still nothing.
Evan grabbed Calder by the collar.
“You knew my mother was involved.”
Calder pushed him away.
“I knew nothing about your mother.”
“Liar.”
“You don’t understand what you’re dealing with.”
Evan laughed bitterly.
“I’ve spent a year trying to understand.”
Calder looked at the four girls.
“You shouldn’t have come down here.”
Emma’s voice hardened.
“You keep saying that.”
“Because every answer you find creates another question.”
“Then start answering.”
Calder stared at her.
Finally, he said:
“E-16 isn’t your mother.”
Evan froze.
“What?”
Calder looked toward the monitor.
“Your mother was never assigned E-16.”
Evan stepped forward.
“Then who was?”
Calder hesitated.
“The first girl.”
Harper frowned.
“The original subject?”
Calder nodded.
“The one who started everything.”
⸻
THE ORIGINAL FILE
Calder walked toward a filing cabinet.
He entered a combination.
The drawer opened.
Inside were hundreds of folders.
Most were covered in dust.
One wasn’t.
It was perfectly clean.
Calder pulled it out.
He placed it on the table.
The label read:
E-16
Emma stared at it.
“Open it.”
Calder didn’t move.
“Open it.”
He slowly lifted the cover.
Inside was a photograph.
A teenage girl stood outside LenWood High.
She had dark hair.
Pale eyes.
And a small scar across her eyebrow.
Emma stared at the photograph.
Her breathing stopped.
The girl looked exactly like her.
Lila looked from the photograph to Emma.
“Why does she look like you?”
Emma couldn’t answer.
Evan stepped closer.
“Who is she?”
Calder said:
“Her name was Evelyn Carter.”
Emma’s eyes widened.
“Carter?”
Calder nodded.
“Your grandmother.”
Silence.
Emma stared at the photograph.
“My grandmother?”
“You were told she died when you were young.”
“She did.”
Calder shook his head.
“No.”
Emma’s voice dropped.
“What?”
“She disappeared.”
Harper opened another folder.
There were newspaper articles.
LOCAL TEEN VANISHES FROM LENWOOD
FAMILY CLAIMS GIRL RAN AWAY
POLICE END SEARCH AFTER SIX MONTHS
The date was 2009.
Emma’s hands trembled.
“That was the same year as the original four.”
Calder nodded.
“Evelyn was the first.”
Lila looked at the photograph.
“Then why was she called E-16?”
Calder looked at her.
“Because there were fifteen subjects before her.”
Mia’s eyes widened.
“Fifteen?”
Calder nodded.
“And every one failed.”
⸻
WHAT LENWOOD REALLY WAS
They gathered around the table.
Calder finally told them the truth.
LenWood had originally been created as a private research facility.
The school came later.
The program studied memory.
Fear.
Trauma.
And the human ability to bury painful experiences.
The Bell system was created to trigger those memories.
But something went wrong.
The subjects began remembering things that hadn’t happened.
Dreams.
False memories.
Other people’s memories.
Some became convinced they were living someone else’s life.
Others disappeared.
Then came Evelyn Carter.
“She was different,” Calder said.
“She could remember everything.”
Emma stared at him.
“Everything?”
“Every conversation. Every face. Every experiment.”
Harper whispered:
“So they tried to erase her memory.”
Calder nodded.
“And failed.”
Mia looked at Emma.
“Then what happened to her?”
Calder closed the file.
“She escaped.”
Emma’s heart raced.
“Where is she?”
Calder looked at her.
“We don’t know.”
Evan stepped closer.
“My mother knew her.”
Calder nodded.
“Elena helped Evelyn escape.”
Evan froze.
“My mother was part of this?”
“She was one of the original researchers.”
Evan stared at him.
“No.”
Calder continued.
“She eventually realized what they were doing and turned against them.”
“Why didn’t she tell me?”
“Because she knew they were watching you.”
Evan looked away.
For the first time, Emma saw something different in him.
Not anger.
Fear.
⸻
THE MESSAGE
Emma’s phone vibrated.
Everyone looked down.
One message.
CALDER IS LYING.
Another appeared.
ASK HIM WHAT HAPPENED TO E-15.
Emma looked up.
“What happened to E-15?”
Calder’s face changed.
Harper noticed.
“You know.”
Calder didn’t answer.
Emma stepped toward him.
“What happened?”
Calder whispered:
“E-15 survived.”
“Who?”
Calder looked toward the hallway.
“She became one of the researchers.”
Lila frowned.
“Which researcher?”
Calder’s eyes moved toward Emma.
“The one who has been sending you the messages.”
Everyone froze.
Mia whispered:
“Elena?”
Calder shook his head.
“No.”
He pointed toward the photograph of Evelyn.
“E-15 is her daughter.”
Emma stared at the photograph.
“Evelyn had a daughter?”
Calder nodded.
“And that daughter grew up inside LenWood.”
Harper’s voice became barely audible.
“What’s her name?”
Calder didn’t answer.
A sound came from the hallway.
Footsteps.
Slow.
One.
Two.
Three.
Someone was approaching.
Evan moved toward the door.
“Who’s there?”
No answer.
Then a woman’s voice came through the darkness.
“You’re asking the wrong question.”
Everyone froze.
The woman stepped into the light.
She looked to be in her forties.
Dark hair.
Pale eyes.
A scar above her eyebrow.
Emma stared at her.
It was the same face.
The same eyes.
The same scar.
The woman looked directly at Emma.
“My name is Evelyn.”
Emma couldn’t speak.
The woman smiled.
“And I’m your grandmother.”
The lights went out.
A gunshot echoed through the hallway.
Then silence.
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