DR. KWAME POV
The sedan's tires crunched against the gravel of a long, winding driveway that felt more like a burial path than an entrance. I kept my eyes on the rearview mirror. Adam was staring out the window, his expression a mask of analytical coldness, while Eve was fidgeting with the hem of his cotton shirt, his Black Impulse creating tiny, invisible static pops against the fabric.
"Remember," I said, my voice low. "No displays of power. You are guests. You are family. You are humans."
I stopped the car fifty yards from the house. I wouldn't go further. I couldn't.
The front door of the Victorian farmhouse groaned open. Silas Vance stepped onto the porch. He was a pillar of weathered oak, his skin mapped with the lines of seventy years of hard sun and harder grief. He carried a double-barreled shotgun in the crook of his arm—not aimed, but present. A silent statement.
Beside him stood Martha. She looked like a portrait of the woman I had loved, aged by three decades of salt and sorrow.
I opened the door and stepped out, but I stayed behind the frame of the car. "Silas. Martha."
Silas didn't speak. He spat into the dust and walked down the steps, his boots echoing like hammer blows. He stopped ten feet from me. The air between us didn't hum with Impulse; it hummed with a hatred so pure it made the Golden Light in my chest feel like lead.
"You have a lot of nerve showing your face on this ridge, Kwame," Silas said.
"I'm not here for me, Silas," I replied. I gestured to the boys as they stepped out of the car. "I'm here for them. Just like we agreed in the letters."
Martha walked past Silas, her eyes locked on Adam and Eve. She stopped in front of Adam, her breath hitching. She reached out a trembling hand, tracing the line of his jaw.
"Sarah's chin," she whispered, her voice breaking. "But those eyes... they're full of your machines, Kwame. They're cold."
"They've had a hard life, Martha," I said.
"Because of you!" Silas roared, finally leveling a finger at me. "You took a vibrant, laughing girl and turned her into a ghost story. And now you bring these... these things you built in a tube and expect us to provide a nursery?"
Adam stepped forward, his voice a flat, terrifying monotone. "We are not 'things,' Silas Vance. We are the pinnacle of biological—"
"Adam, enough," I commanded.
I looked at Silas, ignoring the sting of his words. "They are her sons. They have her heart, even if I've buried it under too much logic. If you ever loved her, you'll help them find it again."
Silas looked at the boys, then back at me. The shotgun shifted slightly. "They stay. You leave. If I see your car on this road again, I won't be talking."
I didn't argue. I didn't say goodbye. I got back into the car, my chest tight with a pressure no equation could solve. As I backed down the driveway, I saw Martha pulling both boys into a fierce, desperate hug.
Adam stood stiffly, like a statue. Eve looked like he wanted to cry.
I drove away until the farmhouse was nothing but a white speck in the distance. I was alone again. The Doctor. The Creator. The Murderer.
For the first time in fifteen years, I turned off the GPS and just drove, the silence of the car screaming louder than any explosion.
ADAM'S POV
The room smelled of dried flowers and old paper. There were no holographic displays, no nutrient-delivery systems, and no reinforced steel shutters. The windows were just glass—thin, fragile glass that looked out over a dark valley.
Eve was sitting on the edge of a twin bed, poking a handmade quilt as if he expected it to bite him. "It's soft, Adam. Why is everything so soft?"
"It's called 'cotton,' Eve," I replied, standing in the center of the room. I was calculating the structural integrity of the floorboards. "It's inefficient for thermal regulation compared to our tactical suits, but it seems to be the standard here."
"Grandpa Silas looks like he wants to kill us," Eve muttered, flopping back onto the pillow. "And Grandma Martha... she keeps looking at me like I'm a ghost. It's creepy."
"They are experiencing a phenomenon called 'grief,' Eve. Their daughter's genetic material is present in us, which triggers a biological longing for a person who no longer exists. We are a reminder of a failure."
I walked to the window. In the distance, I could see the faint, shimmering line of the state border. Father was gone. For the first time since my decanting, I was not being monitored. I wasn't a project. I was just... a grandson.
"Adam?" Eve's voice was small.
"Yes?"
"Do you think he's coming back?"
I looked at the empty road, my Divine Light sensing the fading heat of the car's engine miles away. "Logic suggests he has completed the delivery phase of the operation. He will not return until the Council forces his hand."
"Good," Eve said, though he pulled the quilt up to his chin. "I hope he stays away. I like the smell of the flowers better than the smell of his lab."
I didn't answer. I stayed at the window, watching the moon rise over the valley, wondering if a machine could ever truly learn to sleep in a room made of wood and memories.