All Chapters of The Alpha Heir Who Put a Baby in His Enemy: Chapter 71 - Chapter 80

The countdown started immediately.23:59:58Then:23:59:57Switzerland.Silas Voss.Generation Zero.Root surrender.For once, the timer was not counting down to something being done to my body.It was counting down to whether we could finish what everyone before us had failed to finish.That should have felt better.It did not.Ronan’s voice came through my earpiece.“Marcus is arranging the flight.”I looked at the root surrender screen.“Private?”“Yes.”“How soon?”“Forty minutes.”“That is too long.”“It is an aircraft, Adrian. Not a taxi.”“I remain disappointed.”A faint laugh.Good.Still him.I looked toward Elias.He had not moved since Silas initiated surrender.For the first time since meeting him, he seemed irrelevant.That almost felt poetic.Almost.“You are coming with us.”His eyes lifted.“No.”I raised an eyebrow.“You have misunderstood the new hierarchy.”“You do not control Generation Zero yet.”“No.”I stepped closer.“But I control the building you are standing

For several seconds after Generation Zero went silent, nobody moved.The final line remained on the screen.NO CONTROLLER EXISTS.No king.No owner.No person with enough authority to decide what another body was supposed to become.I should have felt victorious.Instead, I felt tired enough to sleep for a year.And inconveniently warm.My natural heat had not disappeared just because Cradle had.Ronan remained one meter away.Exactly where I had asked him to stay.“Not yet,” I had said.He had answered, “Okay.”No frustration.No argument.No Alpha pride demanding explanation.Just acceptance.Silas sat beside the dead Generation Zero console as though sixty years of his life had been unplugged with the machines.Elias looked worse.Not physically.Philosophically.I found that satisfying.Helena wiped tears from her face.Gabriel stood behind her wheelchair with one hand on her shoulder.Marcus was already buried in the transfer logs, making sure the medical-support network stayed a

The words remained on my screen.PROJECT HEIRFALL — PHASE ONE ACTIVEThen:AWAITING VOLUNTARY PAIR DECISIONFor once, nothing flashed red.No countdown.No punishment.No command.That should have made it harmless.It did not.I stared at the message until Ronan spoke.“What happens if we do nothing?”I looked toward the phone.“Marcus?”Typing.A pause.Then:“I am still decrypting.”“Useful.”“I know.”Ronan moved toward the window.Not toward me.Good.My heat had climbed again, and his scent was already strong enough from across the suite.Cedar.Smoke.Real.My body noticed him.I noticed him too.Those were no longer the same sentence.That mattered.Marcus finally spoke.“I found the protocol logic.”“Start with the part where Theodore somehow built a reproductive contingency outside Cradle without telling anyone.”“He did not build it alone.”Of course.I closed my eyes briefly.“Who?”“The encrypted signatures are partial.”“Names.”“Daniel Kerr.”Ronan turned.“Daniel.”“Yes

The screen did not change.TRILINEAGE DEVELOPMENT STABLEBeneath it:GENETIC CONTRIBUTORS: 3Adrian Vale.Ronan Ashcroft.Mara Voss.Silas stared at the artificial gestational chamber as though it had become a grave.“She is inside it.”I turned toward him.“No.”His eyes snapped to mine.“Mara’s genetic marker—”“Is inside the embryo.”I stepped closer.“That is not the same as Mara.”Silence.It needed saying now.Before grief did what Cradle had always taught grief to do.Turn biology into ownership.Silas looked back at the chamber.“You do not understand.”“I understand exactly enough.”Ronan remained beside me.Not touching.His attention stayed on Silas.Good.I continued.“O-19 is not Mara returned.”His jaw tightened.“She contributed to its genome.”“Yes.”“So part of her survives.”“Genetically.”“That matters.”“It does.”I held his gaze.“But not in the way you want it to.”Something broke behind his expression.For the first time, Silas looked less like the architect of

My mother’s name stayed on the file.EVELYN VALEAuthor of the seventy-two-hour cutoff.Author of the rule that would eventually force a living carrier.For several seconds, I could not decide whether I was angry, surprised, or simply tired of discovering that every person who claimed to protect me had once written a protocol about someone else’s body.Ronan was the first to speak.“Call her.”I looked at him.“You say that as if this family answers calls.”“Try anyway.”Fair.I called.No answer.Again.Nothing.Marcus was still on speaker.“She may be moving between secure networks.”“Convenient.”“I can ping the Archive channel.”“Do it.”Ronan walked toward the window.Not far.Just enough to give me room.I appreciated that more than I said.Marcus spoke again.“Adrian.”“What?”“The cutoff was written twenty-four years ago.”My pulse shifted.“Before O-19 existed.”“Yes.”“So it was not designed for this embryo.”“No.”“Then what was it designed for?”Marcus hesitated.“I am loo