Reborn to Love Mr. Right – Episode 73
Jeff had interpreted the warning as prophecy rather than prevention. If Derek would someday control Taylor Industries, he reasoned, helping him reach that future was loyalty instead of theft. Ambition transformed a warning into permission.
He showed investigators where he hid the signal copy: inside a toolbox confiscated after North Road. The recording contained older Donald’s voice and a second channel absent from Arianna’s reel.
On that channel, Victor instructed Jeff to ignore the moral language and focus on outcomes. He promised the Davis family wealth if Jeff positioned Derek close to Arianna. The grooming began before either teenager understood the stakes.
Jeff accepted payments through First Light Holdings and encouraged Derek to treat Taylor property as his own. He later allowed Arianna to pay tuition, pretending the arrangement had begun with her generosity rather than a plan.
Arianna listened without surprise. The confession clarified history but did not reduce Derek to a puppet. He had received years of opportunities to choose differently and repeatedly deepened the harm.
First Light’s current owner remained hidden behind nominee directors. Financial investigators followed recent payments to the scientific advisers involved in the government review.
One adviser disappeared before questioning. His laboratory had copied the leaked notebook page and attempted to recreate the copper receiver with modern equipment.
The prototype could not reach another timeline, but it emitted the neural frequency that trapped Donald in foreign memories. Used at scale, it could implant convincing emotional fragments into anyone nearby.
Arianna realized fabricated future memories could become a marketable weapon even without real time travel. Companies could manipulate executives, witnesses, or voters by making invented experiences feel personally remembered.
Hayden ordered Scott Global to audit every research grant connected to the adviser. Three projects used language copied from Evelyn’s S-47 laboratory, linking First Light to the remaining network.
The missing adviser contacted Arianna through a secure line. He claimed First Light had threatened his family and asked for protection in exchange for the prototype’s location.
Police arranged a surrender at an airport hotel. The adviser arrived carrying design files but collapsed before entering the room. A medical patch on his arm had delivered a memory pattern rather than poison.
He woke believing Arianna ordered his family killed. The implanted memory included her face, voice, and a room that never existed. Evidence could disprove the scene, but his fear remained physically real.
Doctors used the Anchor Protocol to separate the false fragment. The adviser then identified First Light’s director as a former prosecutor who had handled Victor’s early financial cases and buried them.
The director, Malcolm Price, had avoided every later indictment because his role predated the red ledger. Present records now connected him to the leak, prototype, and payments.
Authorities raided First Light’s offices. Malcolm escaped through a service elevator but left behind a wall of photographs mapping Arianna’s relationships and public choices.
His objective was not another reset. He wanted to sell believable memories of possible futures to people desperate for certainty. The first buyers included executives, politicians, and grieving families.
One purchase order came from Derek’s new appellate attorney. The attorney planned to implant jurors with emotional doubt during any retrial, turning evidence into something they felt they remembered differently.
The court suspended Derek’s appeal team and ordered neurological screening for everyone exposed to the prototype. Derek denied knowledge, but prison calls showed he approved payment through a coded phrase.
Malcolm sent Arianna a demonstration file. It showed Hayden confessing that his present love was only memory from Iteration Zero—and every sensor classified the voice as genuine.