PART 3 — The Device Behind the Crib
Nobody moved.
The tiny black device sat on the polished hardwood floor, its green light blinking with eerie consistency.
Tick.
...tick.
...tick.
The silence inside the nursery became unbearable.
Rodrigo was the first to speak.
"What is it?"
No one answered.
Not Mariana.
Not the security guards.
Not even Doña Mercedes.
Only Nicolás continued staring at the object as though he had seen something similar before.
"Don't touch it yet," he said quietly.
Rodrigo frowned.
"Why not?"
"Because if someone hid it..."
"...they may know when it's moved."
The words sent a chill through the room.
Rodrigo immediately turned toward the head of security.
"Call the security office."
"Now."
"And nobody enters this room."
The guard pulled out his radio.
Within seconds, two additional guards hurried upstairs.
Mariana couldn't take her eyes off the strange object.
Her voice trembled.
"You think..."
"...this has something to do with Santiago?"
Nicolás looked at her.
"I don't know."
"But I know one thing."
He pointed toward the toy chest.
"When I walked into this room..."
"...that smell came from behind it."
"What smell?"
He struggled to explain.
"It's difficult."
"Not perfume."
"Not mold."
"Not medicine."
"It's..."
He closed his eyes for a moment.
"...hot."
Rodrigo exchanged a puzzled glance with the guards.
"Hot?"
Nicolás nodded.
"My grandmother taught me something."
"When machines become too warm..."
"They leave a smell."
"Very small."
"Most people never notice."
Mariana remembered something.
"The toy chest..."
She looked toward Rodrigo.
"Have you ever touched the back of it?"
He shook his head.
"No."
"It has never been moved."
Nicolás crouched again.
Without touching the device, he leaned closer.
"The smell is weaker now."
"Because we moved the chest."
He looked toward Rodrigo.
"It was trapped behind the wood."
Rodrigo's heartbeat quickened.
For the first time in weeks...
Someone had noticed something every doctor had ignored.
Ten minutes later, the mansion's chief of security arrived.
His name was Arturo Salinas.
A retired military officer who had supervised Rodrigo's estate for almost twelve years.
"What happened?"
Rodrigo pointed toward the floor.
"Tell me what that is."
Arturo knelt carefully.
He didn't touch it either.
Instead, he removed a flashlight from his belt and examined it closely.
His expression changed almost immediately.
"I've seen something similar before."
Rodrigo looked at him.
"Where?"
"Military surveillance."
The room fell silent.
Arturo adjusted the flashlight.
"It's not exactly the same..."
"...but it's close."
"What does it do?"
"I can't be certain."
"It could be a transmitter."
"It could be a locator."
"Or..."
He hesitated.
"...something else."
Mercedes immediately scoffed.
"This is absurd."
She folded her arms.
"So now we're pretending spies are attacking babies?"
Arturo ignored her.
He looked carefully at the device again.
"It has a battery."
"Antenna."
"And ventilation holes."
Rodrigo frowned.
"Ventilation?"
"Yes."
"It generates heat."
Nicolás quietly nodded.
"I smelled it."
Arturo looked toward the boy.
"You did?"
"Yes."
The retired officer stared at Nicolás for several seconds.
Then, surprisingly...
He smiled.
"You've got an excellent nose."
Rodrigo immediately called the private technology consultant who managed security systems across all his companies.
Less than forty minutes later, a white van arrived at the mansion.
Out stepped a woman carrying several equipment cases.
She introduced herself.
"My name is Elena Vargas."
She wore jeans, safety glasses, and no makeup.
Unlike the fourteen physicians who had visited before, Elena didn't look toward Santiago first.
She walked directly to the strange device.
After photographing it from every angle, she carefully slipped on protective gloves.
Only then did she pick it up.
She examined it for nearly five minutes without speaking.
Finally...
She slowly exhaled.
"This..."
"...isn't commercially available."
Rodrigo frowned.
"What does that mean?"
"It wasn't purchased in a normal store."
She turned the object over.
"The casing has been modified."
She removed four tiny screws.
Inside sat a compact circuit board unlike anything Mariana had ever seen.
Tiny wires.
A miniature fan.
Several metal plates.
Elena's face became increasingly serious.
"What is it?" Rodrigo demanded.
She looked directly at him.
"I need laboratory equipment to be certain."
"But..."
She paused.
"I believe this device emits electromagnetic energy."
Mariana blinked.
"I don't understand."
"It continuously releases low-frequency electromagnetic waves."
Rodrigo folded his arms.
"Can that hurt someone?"
Elena hesitated.
"There are conflicting studies."
"But..."
She looked toward Santiago.
"...an infant."
"...especially one exposed twenty-four hours a day..."
"...could potentially become very ill."
The room became silent again.
Mariana felt the blood drain from her face.
"You mean..."
"...someone put this beside my baby?"
"I don't know who."
"But someone certainly placed it here."
"And they hid it carefully."
Rodrigo's expression darkened.
"Check every room."
Arturo immediately nodded.
"Yes, sir."
Within minutes, security guards spread throughout the mansion.
Every bedroom.
Every hallway.
Every office.
Every storage room.
They searched behind furniture, beneath carpets, inside air vents, behind paintings.
Nothing.
Only Santiago's nursery contained the mysterious device.
Which made one fact impossible to ignore.
Someone hadn't targeted the house.
Someone had targeted...
the baby.
While the search continued, Mariana remained beside Santiago.
She gently stroked his tiny hand.
His breathing still sounded weak.
But something seemed different.
She frowned.
"Rodrigo."
He hurried over.
"What?"
"Listen."
Both parents leaned close.
Santiago's breathing remained rough...
Yet it no longer sounded quite as strained.
Rodrigo looked toward Elena.
"Is that possible?"
She shrugged.
"If the device was affecting him..."
"...removing it could produce changes."
"Not immediately."
"But gradually."
Mariana's heart pounded.
For weeks...
Every hour Santiago had become worse.
Now...
For the first time...
He seemed slightly calmer.
It was only a tiny difference.
Barely noticeable.
Yet every parent in that room heard it.
Hope.
Suddenly another voice interrupted.
"It can't be."
Everyone turned.
Doña Mercedes stood near the doorway.
Her face had become strangely pale.
Almost frightened.
Rodrigo noticed immediately.
"Mother?"
She forced a smile.
"I mean..."
"Perhaps the machine is unrelated."
"We shouldn't jump to conclusions."
Rodrigo stared at her.
Something about her tone felt...
off.
Too defensive.
Nicolás noticed it too.
The boy quietly watched Mercedes without saying a word.
She refused to meet his eyes.
Instead she looked toward the toy chest.
Then toward the empty space where the device had been hidden.
Only for a second.
But Nicolás saw it.
So did Mariana.
It wasn't curiosity.
It looked...
like recognition.
That evening Elena called from her laboratory.
Rodrigo answered on speakerphone.
"I've completed the preliminary analysis."
"What is it?"
"The device definitely emits pulsed electromagnetic radiation."
"Military grade."
Rodrigo's jaw tightened.
"Military?"
"It isn't something an ordinary person could build."
She paused.
"There's something else."
"What?"
"I found fingerprints."
Everyone in the room looked up.
Mariana's pulse raced.
"Can you identify them?"
"If they're in a criminal database."
"We'll know soon."
Rodrigo thanked her and ended the call.
Silence followed.
Mariana looked toward Nicolás.
"You saved him."
The boy shook his head.
"Not yet."
"He still needs doctors."
"I only found something that shouldn't have been there."
Mariana smiled through tears.
For the first time in months...
Someone had given her something medicine no longer could.
Hope.
But downstairs...
Inside her private sitting room...
Doña Mercedes quietly closed the door behind her.
Her hands trembled as she removed a hidden cell phone from the back of a locked drawer.
It wasn't the phone her family knew about.
It was an older prepaid phone.
One that had never been registered under her name.
She dialed a number from memory.
The call connected after two rings.
Her voice was barely a whisper.
"They found it."
A long silence answered from the other end.
Mercedes swallowed.
"No..."
"They don't know who put it there."
"Not yet."
Another pause.
Then the color drained from her face.
"I understand."
She slowly lowered the phone.
Outside the window, thunder rolled across Mexico City.
Upstairs, Santiago slept more peacefully than he had in weeks.
Downstairs...
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Someone had just realized that a secret hidden for six months...
Was beginning to unravel.
