The Recarn Chronicles- Omnibus Edition

by Greg Krojac

  The nurse removed Thomas’s clothing and the engineers set about their task of applying the suit to his body.

  “It’s easier if you just relax sir. We just need to place your limbs and torso inside the relevant parts of the bio-suit. If you could bear with us for a few minutes. I know it’s a strange feeling – being helpless like this – but in a few more minutes you’ll feel anything but helpless.”

  Once the components of the suit were in place the second engineer swiped an icon on the portable calibration equipment and Thomas felt a tightening feeling all over his body as if someone were trying to remove his skin.

  “Nothing to worry about sir. As I said, the suction-cup feeling will diminish and disappear in a couple of days or so. It’ll be like wearing contact lenses – after a short while you don’t even notice that they’re in your eyes.”

  The limbs and torso had locked together using micro-docking tags and all that remained was to attach the electrical inputs that would stimulate and assist his internal muscles. This was why the nurse was necessary. The procedure wasn’t excessively painful, no worse than having a regular injection, but it was invasive, so a qualified medical assistant was required to be on hand. Thomas flinched a little when the inputs pierced the skin at the back of his neck, but it was an inconvenience worth suffering in order to walk, talk, and breathe properly again. Once the inputs were in place there was only one more thing to do.

  “The final thing we need to do is to attach these small and unobtrusive energy packs to your knee and elbow joints. As you walk along or use your arms, these little beauties will use the momentum to charge the main distribution pack that we’ll attach to your right hip.”

  The installation of the exoskeleton now complete, Thomas wondered what was next.

  “So, now what do we do? Do you have to turn it on or something?”

  “No, sir. When all the pieces are installed correctly, the suit is automatically switched on. Try it, sir. Think yourself off that table and standing on your own two feet.”

  Thomas hesitated.

  “Come on, sir. No need to be embarrassed. Take the suit for a test-drive.”

  Thomas concentrated hard on the thought of getting off the table. His legs started to twitch a little.

  “You’re trying too hard, sir. Try to just let the idea flow through your body.”

  This time Thomas didn’t concentrate, instead just allowing the thought of getting off the table to move around his body and flow into the muscles. Before he knew it, he was sitting upright on the table. Thomas smiled a rare smile.

  “How did it do that? How did I do that?”

  The other engineer explained.

  “Your brain sent a message to the tiny receivers in the exoskeleton, which in turn did two things. First, thousands of electrical messages were sent to the relevant muscles to prepare them to work. Then a miniature but sufficiently powerful magnetic force from the suit actually pulled the relevant limb to the correct position. Put normal clothes over the suit and nobody will even know that you’re using one. Except for the high collar. That can’t be helped. But we’re working on it.”

  “Can I walk around?”

  “Try it. You may be a little wobbly at first, but pretty soon you’ll be walking around picking up things just like you used to before you got sick.”

  Thomas eased himself off the table and stood up. This was a good sign. He didn’t feel at all like he was going to fall over. He took a couple of tentative steps. It felt good to walk without crutches again. He borrowed a mobile phone from his assistant and threw it across the room onto a deep green sofa. He walked over to the sofa, picked up the phone, and returned it to its rightful owner.

  “Thank you, gentlemen, Thank you for your excellent work. My assistant will show you out and payment will be transferred to your accounts immediately.”

  “Thank you, sir. Any problems, just give us a call and we’ll come right out and fix it for you. Have a nice life.”

  Thomas was pleased with himself. Yes, this suit would do very well until his scientists found a way to halt the infernal aggressive ageing of human clones.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  15:00. SUNDAY 3 APRIL 2067

  The laboratory was buzzing with excitement. For almost ten years a steady succession of adult human to adult clones had been produced, each one created carrying with it the hope that this one would age normally, that this one would overcome the problem of accelerated ageing.

  Something was different this time. There were rumours that there was a clone who hadn’t only passed the previous record of ninety-seven days of life but smashed it to pieces.

  Jayden 007 had been created four years earlier in 2063. The process had been no different from any of the other human to adult clone experiments except for one thing – the anti-ageing hormone had been applied at the age of twenty-five days. He was the beneficiary of a mistake, a human error that led one of the other adult clones to age more slowly than the others. The clone in question had been forgotten about and instead of having the growth inhibiting hormone injected on his twentieth day of life, he received the GHIH on his twenty-second day of existence. He survived 150 days and eventually succumbed to the same ageing defects as his predecessors but it took him longer to reach his death-date. This led researchers to think that perhaps they’d found the right dosage a while ago, but that the age of application was a factor, a variable that they’d somehow overlooked. It wasn’t necessary for the clone to be a baby; the transfer just had to take place at the correct age – not after twenty days of accelerated growth. If the GHIH was applied at a particular stage of the clone’s development, from then on it would age at the normal human rate.

  More human souls were transferred to adult clones, and the GHIH applied at various ages from 22 days onward. All the clones aged slower than their predecessors but the post-dosage acceleration still existed. One by one, all the clones fell prey to old age, far sooner than the average human would have been expected to – illnesses and accidents notwithstanding. The two clones who were transferred at 24 days and 26 days lasted longer than most, both taking three hundred days for their bodies to turn against them and kill them. Hormone application dates were tweaked until Jayden 007 had shown such remarkable results

  Jayden 007 wasn’t anything special to look at. He had brown, wavy hair and big brown eyes. He was short and looked a bit podgy. His smile wouldn’t light up a room, but he had a very pleasant demeanour. His donor soul was similarly unremarkable and was very happy with the body that he now inhabited.

  But the thing that made Jayden 007 stand out as someone very special was that the clone had been given his soul 1,440 days ago; He’d been living for four years and his twenty-five-year-old body now showed only four years of ageing. Jayden 007 was the first clone to return to a normal growth rate.

  Footsteps could be heard in the corridor. The doors swished open and Thomas McCall strode purposefully into the room. He was now 77 years old and those years could be seen on his face. His body and his mobility, however, belied his age. The exoskeleton that he’d been using for the past nine years was extremely efficient and allowed his seventy-seven-year-old body to move around like that of a man at least forty years younger. He strode over to where Jayden 007 was sitting, reading an e-book. He tapped on the e-reader.

  “Wake up!”

  Jayden put his tablet on the arm of the chair and, realising that he was being addressed by someone with authority, stood up.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How old are you?”

  “I was transferred in 2063 so that would make me around 29 years old now.”

  “Around 29 years old.”

  “Yes, sir. Around 29 years old now, sir. My clone sitter can give you the exact details.”

  “And who are you?”

  “Now or before, sir?”

  “Both.”

  “Now they call me Jayden 007 although I don’t really like the number being added to my name. It makes me feel l
ike I’m a product.”

  “You are a product, Jayden 007. Live with it. Who were you before?”

  “I was Jayden Anderson, a stock-control officer.”

  “Do you remember everything about your past lives?”

  “Yes, Sir. How far do you want me to go back?”

  “Your last four lives will do.”

  “Sure. I was Jayden Anderson – as I just said – and, before that, I was Iska Ancheta, a Filipino prostitute. I was killed by a violent punter. Before that, I was Bethanee Schulhoff, a public prosecutor in Germany. I died in my sleep. That was a good life. I enjoyed that one. Then before Bethanee, I was Herbert Gould. I was a circuit court judge in the U.S.A. and got shot dead by the wife of a man I’d just sent to prison. I like the legal professions, though they can be a bit dangerous.”

  Thomas turned to one of his assistants.

  “Check the database.”

  The assistant verified that the potted history was correct. Thomas smiled. A rare event in recent times. In fact, the last time anybody remembered seeing Thomas smile was when he first put on the exoskeleton. He turned to the doctor who was in charge of Jayden 007’s welfare.

  “No side effects? Nothing detrimental to his health?”

  “No Sir.”

  “Good. In that case, let’s go to the clone storage facility. I want to choose my next body.”

  The doctor was shocked.

  “Do you think that’s wise, sir? I mean don’t you think that perhaps we should do more tests?”

  “Doctor, everything I say or do is wise. If we procrastinate much longer I’ll be dead and who knows where my soul will end up.”

  Understandably Thomas felt a little apprehensive but this was overcome by the urgency of the situation. Thomas was seventy-seven years old so his nemesis, Nathan, must be approaching eighteen years of age. Even with the exoskeleton, he didn’t want to enter what could possibly be a physical confrontation with someone sixty years his junior.

  ***

  The clone storage facility looked like something from a science fiction movie. Row upon row of transparent pods containing frozen clone babies. Thomas knew that making the correct choice of host clone wouldn’t be a simple task. It had to be a good physical specimen, naturally muscular. He hadn’t had a blond-haired host for a while now, so he fancied a bit of a change. He went over to the selection panel and chose a number of candidates from the clone attribute database. He mulled over a few profiles and then called the department manager.

  “This one. Marcus Gallagher 001. Prepare the product for soul transfer. It must be ready to be used on its twenty-fifth day.”

  The manager would have liked to point out that he should really be given the relevant documentation, but everybody knew of Professor Ingram’s fate, and Thomas’s temper, so he said nothing.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  08:31 THURSDAY 28 APRIL 2067

  Marcus Gallagher 001 was lying in the receiver compartment of the Transfer Unit, obediently awaiting his new soul. He was a good-looking young man, just as Thomas had wanted; muscular with golden hair and piercing blue eyes. An unprepared bystander would never have believed that he was only twenty-five days old.

  Even though he was the Pindar, Thomas was obliged to strip naked to undergo the process. He was unable to do so alone, so the same team that had assembled his exoskeleton was there, dismantled the suit in the same reception room. Five minutes later the now suddenly weakened body of Thomas McCall was wheeled to the transfer room – the first time that he had ever used a wheelchair – and he was assisted into the donor capsule.

  The lid was closed, a touch control was enabled and the air was drawn out of the transparent casing of the donor capsule. It didn’t take long for Thomas to die, his body and organs had spent the last nine years being supported by the exoskeleton and once that was gone his body just didn’t know how to cope. A technician gave progress reports during each phase of the process.

  “No signs of life from the Pindar, sir. Anticipating the departure of the soul at any moment.”

  The twenty or so people in the room looked on anxiously. Even the less experienced among them had been present for over a dozen such transfers. However, this was the Pindar, the most powerful person in the whole Illuminati who had just died. The technician called out again.

  “The soul has left the body and is heading towards the airlock.’

  He paused for a second.

  “It’s in the airlock, sealing donor pod now.”

  Thomas’s soul had nowhere else to go. Instinct was telling it to find another body but there was only one option available. His soul passed silently from the airlock to the receiver capsule, where it found the peaceful body of the clone, Marcus Gallagher 001. It hovered above the clone for a few seconds and the technician quickly sealed the space between the airlock and the receiver pod, preventing any return. The soul, invisible to the naked eye but its presence confirmed by monitoring devices, dropped onto its recipient and enveloped his entire body before seeping through the pores of his body and heading into his brain.

  “Soul is located within the clone. Injecting GHIH now.”

  The correct dosage of growth inhibitor hormone applied, all the team could do was wait.

  Two minutes later, the clone opened its eyes. The team leader breathed a sigh of relief.

  “OK. Let’s take the lid off the capsule guys. And let’s keep our fingers crossed.”

  The lid was removed and Marcus Gallagher 001 sat up. He looked around the room and spotted one of the female laboratory assistants admiring his naked body. He winked at her.

  “Don’t just stand there looking girl. Find me some clothes. The Pindar has returned.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  07:54 TUESDAY 15 MARCH 2068

  The mood in the great boardroom was frosty, to say the least. Some of the Council of Thirteen could see the commercial benefits of the cloning process and wanted to further increase the Illuminati’s already astronomical profits. Marcus did not.

  Cavendish stood up and rapped his ceremonial staff three times on the ground, signifying that he was about to speak.

  “Can my Lord Pindar not see that there is an incredible opportunity here? You, yourself, were inhabiting a body that was – how shall I describe it – not fit for purpose. You now occupy the body of a fit and healthy young man, albeit that of a clone. Do you not feel that there are potentially millions of wealthy customers who would pay vast sums of money to avail themselves of this wonderful technology?”

  Cavendish stamped the ground once with his staff to show that he’d finished speaking for the moment. He sat down and arranged his magenta coloured robe around him, hiding his exquisitely tailored Armani suit.

  Marcus stood up and, just as Cavendish had done, rapped the floor three times with his golden staff.

  “Councillor Cavendish. I am perfectly aware of the revenue that could be gained from such a venture. However, my concern is that if we open this technology to a wider public audience we lose control of it. A competitor could not only take our business away from us but, by reverse engineering, could use the technology against us, perhaps creating an army of clones.”

  The thud of Marcus’s staff hitting the stone floor of the boardroom ended the Pindar’s response.

  Three more strikes on the floor and Councillor Bruce began to speak.

  “My Lord Pindar, I understand your concern, but what if we limited the benefits of Clone Transfer to Recarns, such as ourselves. Surely the security risk would not exist then? Even if we limited access to the technology to registered members of our illustrious organisation, we could make millions – for The Order, of course.”

  There was scarcely a gap between the single strike of Councillor Bruce’s staff and the three strikes of Marcus’s.

  “Councillor Bruce. Whilst I understand your point of view, I cannot agree with it. You are thinking only from a financial point of view, you are not thinking of the good of The Order.”

&nb
sp; Councillor Bruce stood up again.

  “But my Lord Pindar…”

  He was cut off in mid-sentence by the roar of his Pindar, as Marcus’s staff pounded the floor three times.

  “PROTOCOL, COUNCILLOR BRUCE! PROTOCOL!”

  Councillor Bruce looked sheepish and apologised. Marcus continued.

  “The striking of staffs is not only a sign of respect to the rest of the chamber but also serves to avoid interruptions and vitriolic arguments. It is a centuries-old tradition. Members of the Council of Thirteen would do well to remember that. You may speak now, Councillor Bruce.”

  The single thud of Marcus’s staff signalled that the floor was open to another speaker. Councillor Bruce struck the floor three times with his staff, slowly and deliberately.

  “My apologies, my Lord Pindar. Please forgive me. No disrespect was intended.”

  Marcus nodded his acceptance of the apology. Councillor Bruce continued.

  “We, the thirteen families, have invested much money in the research and execution of the projects that have led to your illustrious self now inhabiting the body of a fully formed, fully functional clone. We feel that we merit a return on our investment. Surely my Lord Pindar can see that this isn’t only fair and just, but also the honourable path to take?”

  Councillor Bruce’s emerald coloured staff struck the floor to close his question.

  Marcus stood up, hammering his staff on the floor four times, in doing so informing that his next words should be considered a veto.

  “Investments made in the aforementioned projects were made for the good of The Order, not for the good of the individual. Such investments – and I, myself, was a substantial investor – should be considered willing payment for the lifestyle that we, in this room, all share. I expect no reimbursement of monies donated and therefore neither should you. So, let the records show that I invoke my power of veto. You are all dismissed from this session.”

  The thirteen Councillors shuffled out of the room, but Marcus knew that those members of the Council who had shown concerns would not let the situation rest. He knew that they had invested a great deal of money in the research and development of Soul to Clone Transference. They did deserve more. But he was unwilling to accede to their demands. He privately acknowledged to himself these Councillors were correct, that he was the only person to have benefited from the new technology, but he was damned if he was going to relinquish control of its use. Yes, he would allow the creation of new clones but they would be chosen by him, based on loyalty and usefulness. He didn’t need the respect or agreement of these fools. He could do without them. He beckoned over his personal assistant.