He Opened the Nursery Door and Found His Mother Attacking His Wife—Then Her Shocking Accusation Revealed a Secret That Could Destroy Their Entire Family. / Chapter 45 / 80

Chapter 45 - The Garden of Clones

The weight of Julian's words crushed the air out of the room. Leah stood frozen, her eyes darting from David’s trembling hands to the child in his arms, then to the monitoring screens flashing warning lights over Maya's pod.

"David..." Leah whispered, her voice barely audible, laced with a terrifying blend of horror and despair. "Is it true? Have you... have you been feeling sick?"

"It doesn't matter," David rasped, his eyes fixed on Julian. "It doesn't change anything."

"It changes everything!" Julian snapped, his aristocratic composure cracking for the first time, revealing the cold, monomaniacal fury underneath. "Do you think I poured billions of dollars and thirty years of my life into this facility just to watch the ultimate culmination of human evolution bleed to death on my floor? Look around you!"

Julian swept his cane in a wide, sweeping arc across the darkened perimeter of the rotunda.

With a low hum of power transformers engaging, banks of recessed floodlights flickered to life along the concentric outer rings.

David and Leah both recoiled in horror.

The glass bassinets were not empty.

Hundreds of acrylic cylinders stretched into the shadows, each filled with translucent, amber amniotic fluid. Suspended inside each pod was a child. Some were infants, floating peacefully with breathing tubes secured to their mouths. Others were toddlers, their small limbs motionless in suspended animation. And as David’s eyes traveled further into the outer ring, he saw older subjects—young boys and girls, five, eight, ten years old, floating in stasis like specimens preserved in formaldehyde.

And every single one of them bore the exact same facial structure.

"This is the nursery of the Republic," Julian proclaimed, his eyes shining with madness. "The heirs of the ruling class. Senators, industrialists, prime ministers—they come to me when their own flesh and blood fails them. When their biological children wither from cancer, they purchase an uncorrupted vessel from this garden. You were the foundation stone, David! Maya is the cornerstone! You cannot destroy this out of pathetic, sentimental morality!"

Leah began to dry-heave, turning away from the rows of floating children in sick revulsion. "You're a monster," she choked out. "You're farming human beings..."

"I am preserving human civilization!" Julian barked. He tapped his cane sharply against the floor.

From the shadows behind the perimeter columns, four armed guards in tactical gear stepped forward, their carbines raised and leveled at David's chest. Their faces were concealed behind ballistic masks, their movements silent, disciplined, and lethal.

"I offered you the courtesy of a choice, David, out of respect for the blood we share," Julian said coldly. "You have refused. Now, we proceed by necessity."

Julian signaled the guards. "Take Asset 409. Secure the mother. Prepare the centrifuge."

"Leah, get behind me!" David roared, raising the tire iron and pivoting to shield both the baby and his wife.