Chapter 3 - The Boardroom Blueprint
The arrival of the Boston speech therapy team transformed the Vale estate into a high-security corporate compound. Two strict, professionally detached therapists named Dr. Aris and Ms. Gable took over the east wing, turning the sunroom into a clinical space filled with audio equipment, speech monitors, and behavioral charts.
Matthew was subjected to four hours of grueling vocal training every morning and three hours of auditory simulation every afternoon. The goal was simple: force his vocal cords and remaining neural pathways to mimic natural speech patterns in time for the annual Vale Group Shareholders Summit in November, where Alexander planned to showcase his son as living proof of the company’s technological supremacy.
Lucy was strictly barred from the east wing, but she refused to let the distance break the bond they had formed. Every evening at exactly 9:00 PM, when the therapists were dining in the staff hall and Alexander was confined to his study, Lucy would slip out to the gardens beneath Matthew’s third-floor window.
Using a powerful LED flashlight she had found in the garage, she would blink out a simple code they had developed: three short flashes meant I am here.
A moment later, the small window would open, and Matthew would look down, his private flashlight responding with two long flashes: Friend.
One Friday night, however, the window didn't open immediately. When Matthew finally appeared, his silhouette against the bedroom light looked erratic, his movements panicked. He held up his phone, the screen exceptionally bright, and began to sign with frantic, large motions that Lucy struggled to read from the ground.
Danger, he signed over and over. Inside the house.
Lucy ran to the side entrance of the mansion, using the security code her mother had given her for emergencies. She slipped through the darkened kitchen and up the service elevator, bypassing the security monitors by utilizing the service keys. Within minutes, she was sliding into Matthew’s room, her breath catching as she saw the state of the space.
Books were scattered across the floor, and a laptop was open on his desk, its screen displaying an internal corporate database filled with financial spreadsheets and medical trial logs.
Matthew grabbed her arm, pulling her toward the screen. He pointed at a document highlighted in red: Auris-2 Clinical Trial Report - Phase III (Internal Only).
He handed her his leather notebook, where he had already translated the complex corporate jargon into simple, terrifying sentences.
They are lying to the board, Matthew had written, his handwriting shaky. The Auris-2 implant system isn't ready. The internal data shows that forty percent of the trial patients suffered severe vestibular nerve damage and permanent vertigo within three months of activation. The chip overheats. My father knows this, but he’s pushing the launch anyway because the company’s stock will collapse if the product is delayed.
Lucy read the document, her eyes widening as she realized the magnitude of what she was looking at. "Your father is going to put this inside people?" she whispered, forgetting for a moment that he couldn't hear her.
Matthew took the pen and wrote furiously: He wants to put it inside me first. At the Shareholders Summit, he’s going to announce that I am undergoing the surgery the following morning to prove to the investors that it’s completely safe. He thinks because I’m his son, the public will trust the technology implicitly. But it’s a trap. If they perform the surgery, the nerve damage could be permanent. I’ll lose my balance, my health, everything.
"We have to tell someone," Lucy signed, her hands shaking as the gravity of the situation hit her. "Your uncle? The police?"
No, Matthew wrote, his face pale under the desk lamp. My father controls the board. The lawyers belong to him. If I try to run or speak out, they will say I am an unstable child who doesn't understand the science. They will lock me in a medical facility 'for my own protection' until the surgery is done. I need the actual source code and the unedited trial videos from the main server in his private study downstairs. But that room is protected by a biometric lock.
Lucy looked at the boy who had become her brother in all but blood. Her great-grandfather’s voice echoed in her mind: Never leave anyone behind.
"I know how to get into the study," Lucy wrote in the notebook. "My mother has the master override key card for the entire house in her office for fire safety. If we can get that card while she’s checking the inventory tonight, we can open the door."
Matthew looked at her, his eyes filled with a mixture of terror and awe. He reached out, touching the gold lettering of the poetry book that Lucy had left on his desk.
May you like
Are you sure? he signed. If we get caught, your mother loses her job. You lose your home.
Lucy straightened her shoulders, her chin lifting with the same courage her great-grandfather had shown in the frozen hills of Korea. Friend, she signed simply. We do it together.
