Chapter 5 - Beta
Evelyn Shaw was alive.
At least someone using her Level Three identity was.
That distinction stayed important.
Avalon’s root credentials were harder to fake than ordinary email.
But not impossible for someone who built the system.
The Beta message originated inside Avalon itself.
Timestamp aligned with the helicopter route change.
Text:
CHANGE PROCEDURE.
DO NOT BRING AMELIA TO FACILITY.
ABORT SUCCESSION.
Richard received it.
Thirty eight seconds later, he pushed me.
What did he think abort meant?
Kill me?
Or did he decide that independently because his takeover plan had failed?
Federal investigators questioned him again.
He refused further answers without negotiation.
His attempted immunity request became more urgent.
He said:
“Beta will kill everyone involved.”
Naomi read the statement beside my hospital bed.
“Convenient.”
“Maybe true.”
“Yes.”
“Do you think Evelyn is Beta?”
“I think Evelyn designed Beta.”
Different answer.
Adrian’s team traced Simon Vale.
A private flight left Los Angeles the morning before my helicopter ride.
Passenger manifest listed Samuel Vail.
Fake identity.
Photograph at the terminal looked like Simon.
Destination:
Monterey.
No onward record.
Simon may still be in California.
Why flee if he maintained Avalon?
Maybe because something changed.
Four months earlier, someone created the warning email from my old tablet.
If Richard takes you to Avalon, do not enter with only one key.
That person knew Richard’s plan.
Could be Simon.
Could be Evelyn.
Could be someone inside my father’s old house.
Greta Lewis, the house manager, finally agreed to review visitor logs.
One unusual entry.
Four months earlier.
Woman.
Late sixties.
Signed:
Elizabeth Stone.
Stayed forty three minutes in my father’s office.
Greta remembered her because she wore gloves indoors.
Description matched Evelyn Shaw.
I showed her an old photograph.
Greta nodded.
“That is her.”
Evelyn entered Dad’s office.
Used my old tablet.
Possibly scheduled the warning email.
Why not contact me directly?
Why hide?
Because she did not trust digital channels?
Because she was implicated?
Because she wanted me prepared but not informed?
Again, someone deciding what truth I could handle.
I was growing tired of being protected by secrecy.
Investigators found another message on the tablet backup.
Draft unsent.
Amelia,
Your father did not close Avalon because it failed.
He closed it because Richard found a way to use continuity law to capture it after succession.
I stared at the sentence.
Eight years ago Richard was not my husband yet.
We were engaged.
He worked in mergers.
He advised my father on corporate restructuring.
Could he have identified a succession vulnerability back then?
Maybe.
The draft continued.
Charles intended to redesign ownership before reopening Avalon.
He became ill first.
Simon promised to maintain the system until you were ready.
Richard learned enough to wait.
That implicated Simon as caretaker, not necessarily conspirator.
Why give Richard Evelyn’s keycard?
Maybe Simon did not.
Richard said he did.
Richard had lied before.
Then another draft:
If you are pregnant when this activates, do not allow Richard to become continuity trustee.
Too late.
He already was.
But my new amendment would remove him at the baby’s birth.
That explained the timing.
Richard had a narrowing window.
Before birth:
He remained trustee under my existing documents.
After birth:
Removed.
If I died now and the forged majority amendment survived long enough, he could reopen Avalon using continuity authority.
But Beta’s message aborted succession.
Perhaps Evelyn discovered the forgery and refused.
Richard’s plan collapsed midflight.
He then chose murder anyway because a living Amelia could expose everything.
That fit sequence better.
Naomi agreed.
“Still hypothesis.”
“Yes.”
We needed Richard’s communications.
Court authorized seizure of his devices under the attempted murder investigation.
Messages with a contact named SV.
Likely Simon Vale.
Richard:
Amelia changed birth amendment. Window closes when child is born.
SV:
Then do not move until Beta confirms.
Richard:
I cannot wait.
SV:
You do not understand Avalon.
Richard:
I understand ownership.
SV:
That is exactly the problem.
Interesting.
Simon warned him.
Later:
Richard:
I have Beta key.
SV:
How?
No reply.
Simon did not give it to him.
Richard lied.
Then:
SV:
If you took that from Evelyn, she will know.
Richard:
She is gone.
SV:
You have no idea where she is.
Richard knew Evelyn’s key existed.
He obtained it elsewhere.
Where?
His office security footage showed a woman arriving two weeks earlier.
Dark hair.
Forties.
Name:
Laura Shaw.
Evelyn had a daughter.
I had met her once.
Corporate compliance attorney.
She left Hayes years ago after an argument with my father.
Laura spent twenty minutes with Richard.
Then walked out carrying an empty document case.
Investigators contacted her.
No response.
Her apartment was empty.
On her kitchen counter sat one photograph.
Evelyn Shaw.
Simon Vale.
My father.
And Richard.
Taken seven years earlier.
May you like
After Avalon officially shut down.
Continue to the next part: Richard had secret contact with Avalon’s creators even after Amelia was told the project no longer existed.
