There were twelve wooden vacation shacks spread out along the curving shore. Deceptively ramshackle looking from the outside, but their interiors were a plush boutique design, promising the clientele a break of unashamed luxury.
Darrin had rented one of the shacks for a week. Darrin was twenty years old, a Natural human like herself, as were most of Mayaguan’s population – a stubborn little External world rejecting both Higher culture and the more prevalent Advancer ethos that so many in the Commonwealth adhered to. Darrin, who had moved to her mainland village only four weeks ago, taking up a position as assistant manager at the local Walland general store franchise. Darrin, who was simply a dream of perfection with his lean dark-skinned body, flat face with a wide smile and soft brown eyes that every girl in town wanted to have gaze at her.
But Alicia was the one who he made a special effort to talk to. And he was slightly shy, and funny, and had the same simple dreams as her. He seemed to understand her so well, the frustration of living in a backwater, her timidity of venturing out into the Commonwealth with all its wonder and strangeness.
‘Just don’t rush,’ he’d told her. ‘It’s been there for a thousand years, and it’ll last a lot longer. Wait until you’re confident enough. That’s what I’m doing. I will see it all, but when I do it’ll be on my terms.’
Darrin, for whom it took four whole days before she’d dumped Tobyn, her steady fella of seven months. Darrin, who she went for long walks with. Darrin, who encouraged her to keep up her schooling. Who seemed to understand her battleground relationship with her sixty-seven-year-old mother who was set in ways that belonged in some distant anachronistic century. Darrin offering support and advice and sympathy. Who was so unselfish and empathized with her own insecurities.
Darrin, who she was completely and utterly in love with like no boy and girl had ever been before, who she wanted to live with forever and give him as many children as he asked for. Darrin, who she would willingly die for.
He’d never made a move on her in those three weeks. Not that she would have said no to him. But instead he talked openly and honestly about them becoming true lovers. And then he’d suggested this week together.
With only a mild reluctance, her mother had agreed she could go. And so they took his ageing fifth-hand capsule to Llyoth’s discreet landing lawn in the middle of the isle that afternoon.
Their shack had a huge circular bed. Alicia blushed in delight as she looked at it; just considering all the possibilities it offered for naughtiness that night made her deliciously excited. Then they changed quickly and went out exploring the sublime isle, running down the vast deserted beach, where they splashed about in the waves. After that they took a paddle board lesson in the lagoon, constantly falling off, they were laughing so much. Holding hands during the walk back through the lush foliage, they discovered a number of sweet little secluded glades. Every time they stopped in one, they kissed, taking longer and longer each time until she just wanted to rip his swimming trunks off there and then.
‘Tonight,’ he said, his gorgeous eyes never leaving hers. ‘I want it to be just perfect.’
She nodded, nearly biting through her lower lip in frustration.
Dinner was served on a big wooden platform at one tip of the cove, with tables for two that had living canopies of scarlet flower vines. The only light came from candles.
Servicebots waited on the tables, but it was a real human chef working at the grill, cooking the fish. Alicia had put on her navy-blue polkadot dress, the one with a very short shirt and a neckline deep enough that Darrin just couldn’t stop staring. It was heavenly being able to entrance him like that.
There were five other couples on the platform that night. But the tables were placed well apart to grant each of them solitude. Alicia smiled round at how fine everyone looked. There was only one person dining on his own, a really old man – like almost thirty or something – with shaggy blond hair, wearing a dinner jacket that was as black as she’d ever seen – but even his table was set for two.
‘A tiff, do you think?’ Alicia asked with a giggle.
Darrin raised his small frosted beer glass. ‘Here’s to us never having one.’
She sighed; it was all so delectable. Until she’d met Darrin, she’d never really understood the term soulmate.
Another man and woman came in. She was wearing an expensive business suit, in complete contrast to all the very feminine dresses being worn by all the other women. Her partner was in an equally sober brown suit.
‘What . . .?’ Alicia began. She didn’t recognize the woman, who had thick jet-black hair styled primly round a very elegant face that had a strong Filipino heritage. A face that looked seriously determined. She turned to Darrin, startled to see how he had stiffened; his expression was no longer suffused with happiness. It unnerved her. She reached over the table for him, but he didn’t move.
The woman stopped at their table. ‘Darrin Hoss, birth registered name Vincent Hal Acraman, I am Senior Investigator Paula Myo of the Commonwealth Serious Crime Directorate. I am placing you under arrest with the preliminary charge of multiple illegal cloning. Please deactivate all your enrichments and accompany Probationary Agent Digby to our capsule. You will be taken in custody to Paris, Earth, where you will be brought before a judge.’
‘What?’ Alicia gasped. ‘This is all wrong. Darrin never did anything illegal.’
‘Unfortunately, Alicia, your assumption is incorrect.’
‘How do you know my name?’
‘Vincent, will you cooperate?’
‘Wait!’ Alicia said as her anger grew. ‘This is crazy. Darrin can’t have cloned anyone. He works at the Walland store, for Ozzie’s sake. Everyone knows that. You’ve got the wrong person.’
‘No,’ Paula Myo said. ‘I haven’t.’
Darrin calmly finished his beer and stood up. Agent Digby applied a small circular patch to the side of his neck.
‘Darrin?’ Alicia asked. But he wouldn’t look at her. ‘Darrin!’ She was too stunned to move. This couldn’t be happening. Not to her – not to her beloved Darrin.
‘Constable Gracill will escort you home,’ Paula told her as Agent Digby took Darrin away. ‘Your local clinic administrator has been informed of the situation, and a specialist psychiatric counsellor will be available for you.’ She gave Alicia a sympathetic smile. ‘Best you see them.’
‘Wait! I don’t understand,’ Alicia cried with rising distress. ‘Darrin couldn’t have cloned anyone, he’s just a store assistant. That’s all.’
‘He’s not. Trust me. We opened a case file on Vincent Acraman eight years ago. We suspect he has been engaged in this cloning activity for a lot longer.’
‘But . . . Who did he clone?’
Paula Myo’s stare was unflinching. ‘You.’
*
There were tears. A lot of tears. Paula had been ready for that. Not that it made watching any easier; poor Alicia’s suffering was awful to behold. She cried so hard. Sobbing uncontrollably as the constable from her hometown helped her up from the table.
‘It can’t be right,’ Alicia wailed dismally as she was gently led off the platform.
Paula let out a long breath and pinched out the candle flame in the middle of the romantic table for two.
Somebody started a slow handclap. A deliberately mocking sound that was disturbingly loud amid the silence of the remaining stunned diners.
Paula turned round, about to order her u-shadow to run an identity scan. Then she saw who it was sitting all by himself. She’d walked right past him earlier, she was so intent on Vincent Hal Acraman, her constant low-level fieldscan reporting no immediate threats.
‘Well done, Investigator,’ Nigel Sheldon said. ‘You got your man yet again.’ He held up a wine glass towards her. ‘Here. I chose a Camissie; you always like a fruity white. Nicely chilled, too.’
It wasn’t often Paula found herself lost for words. ‘Nigel. What are you doing here?’
He played t
he mock innocent well, gesturing at his table with its two place settings. ‘Waiting for you.’
‘Nigel . . .’
‘Oww, come on,’ he grinned. ‘It’s a beautiful night, on a planet that’s a little wild and invigorating. You closed another case perfectly. Don’t waste the moment. Celebrate with me.’
Paula sat down opposite him. ‘You’re not going to propose again, are you? That’s so old.’
He poured some of the Camissie into his own glass. ‘Of course not. I’m happily married.’
‘You always have been.’
‘Monogamously now.’
‘Hummm.’ She raised a questioning eyebrow.
‘You’re such a cynic.’
‘How did you know I was going to be here?’
‘I have a few people who still owe me favours; they checked with your office.’ He nodded at the weeping Alicia’s departing back. ‘That was bad timing on your part.’
‘It was in-the-nick-of-time timing, if you ask me,’ Paula corrected.
‘Poor Alicia doesn’t think so. But surely ’tis better to have loved and lost . . .’
‘Vincent Hal Acraman has been doing quite enough loving, thank you.’
Nigel smiled appreciatively. ‘So you still don’t compromise?’
‘You know the answer to that.’
‘Yes, but – this is really what you’re spending your time doing these days? Chasing after an illegal cloning operation?’
‘It was a weird one.’
‘And you do like your weird, don’t you? They’re the best challenge, I suppose. But, still, isn’t this a bit small for you?’
‘Why do I get the feeling you’re building up to something?’
‘Because you’re the best detective there’s ever been. So come on: chill, tell me, brag a bit to someone who appreciates you, how bad has dear old Vincent been?’
Paula took a sip of the wine, and it was a good choice. ‘Bad. He’s cloned Beatrice Lissard twenty-eight times that we know of, but he’s good at covering his tracks. Digby will give him a memory read when they get back to Paris. I almost don’t want to know what the true number will be.’
‘And who’s Beatrice?’
‘An old girlfriend of his. Very old. I interviewed her a while back. She and Vincent grew up on Kenyang three hundred years ago. And when he was twenty and she was seventeen, they fell in love. It was as wonderful as it always is at that age, then it fell apart.’
‘As it always does at that age.’
‘Quite. He was starting to get obsessional as well as over-possessive, so she moved on and found someone else. He never did.’
Nigel’s green eyes widened in understanding. ‘So he cloned her and lived the romance all over again.’
‘And again, and again, and—’
‘Then Alicia . . . ?’
‘Is Beatrice, yes. The latest one. He’s a Higher, so biononics maintain his body at biological age twenty.’
‘So every time the clone girl reaches seventeen . . . Urgggh.’ Nigel wrinkled his nose and took a large drink. ‘Definitely a weird one. So just to complete the creepiness, does he raise them himself?’
‘No. That’s why he only operates on the External worlds. He finds some Natural human woman who’s having second thoughts about her impending demise. It’s common enough out here. Faith often wavers in the face of death when you can see other Factions of our species carrying on partying for centuries. He poses as a representative from a Higher-sponsored charity that offers her money in a trust which will pay to have Advancer genes spliced in during a rejuvenation. That way she’ll get a couple of extra centuries without even enriching with biononics. But the price of the trust fund is raising a poor little infant orphan girl.’
‘Weird and sick.’
‘Yeah. I’m not even sure what you call this. Serial first-lover?’
‘How did you catch him?’
‘Not all the Beatrice clones turned out devout Naturals after their affair burnt out. Some of them started to migrate towards the Central worlds and got themselves some good new Advancer genes spliced in. Two of them wound up on Oaktier – twenty-three years apart.’ She raised her eyebrows significantly. ‘Eight years ago, when the second one checked in at a clinic and got herself assayed – surprise, her genome was already registered in the government archive.’
‘I’m curious: what specialist?’
‘Excuse me?’
You told Alicia you’ve arranged a specialist counsellor for her. What specialist?’
‘Troubled adolescents.’
‘Ah, right, no shortage of them. So when the memory read gives you the identity of all the clones, will you put the numerous Beatrices in touch with each other?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ Paula started to read the menu. It was printed on a sheet of card, which was a novelty; it reminded her of her official homeworld: Huxley’s Haven. ‘That one I can comfortably kick upstairs.’
‘Paula, you don’t have an upstairs. Even ANA does what you ask. It recognizes your value.’
She grinned. ‘Ah, is this when you tell me what tonight is all about?’
‘I’m leaving the Commonwealth, did you know that?’
‘Your Dynasty’s latest colony fleet will be finished in three years.’
‘Of course you know that,’ he said sourly.
She smiled demurely. ‘Unless you bottle out again.’
‘That’s a little harsh, don’t you think?’
‘Everybody thinks you left on your Dynasty’s big colony fleet in 3000. Why didn’t you?’
‘There was some . . . stuff I needed to do. Besides, living in obscurity has its advantages. Do you know how wonderful it is to be able to walk about in public without anyone bugging me? For a start, I can invite a beautiful woman to dinner and it’s not an instant shotgun event right across the unisphere.’
‘Wait, you weren’t going to ask me to go with you? That’s worse than marriage.’
‘Hey, I’m not that awful.’
‘No. Sorry. That came out wrong. I don’t want to leave, Nigel.’
‘I understand. I’m proud of you, you know that, Paula?’
‘Proud? What am I, a pet?’
‘I made the Commonwealth possible with wormhole technology – well, me and Ozzie. And only something as wondrously crazy as the Commonwealth could create you.’
‘Yeah, I was inevitable right from the moment Ozzie set foot on Mars.’
‘Hey, I was the first one who set foot on Mars, thank you! Ozzie didn’t trust the spacesuit we’d cobbled together. Believe it or not, he was a conservative little nerd in those days.’
‘Oooh, sensitive.’
‘Touché.’ He raised his glass.
‘So why are you finally leaving? Getting bored with your creation?’
‘Exasperated, more like.’
She loaded her order into the isle’s tiny network. Pan-fried choonfish in a garlic butter sauce, with crushed new potatoes and sugarsnap peas. Behind the counter, the chef gave her an approving nod. ‘So we’re at fault?’
‘Now we have biononics, we have effectively killed death.’ His hand gestured irritably at the other diners on the platform, all lovingly lost in each other. ‘And what have we done with it?’
‘Taken over this whole section of the galaxy, discovered alien life and other wonders, built ANA, given people the ability to live exactly how they please. Sure,’ she teased sarcastically. ‘So terrible it’s a wonder we’re not all fleeing.’
‘The Central worlds are fine. People are civilized, responsible. The rest—’
‘Drag you down. Oh the ingrates.’
‘Why do they need you, Paula? Why should they need you? Because they’re unhappy and try to get ahead the wrong way.’
‘Ah, now I get it. If only everyone knew their place and just did as they were told. You’re still the great dictator.’
‘I was never a dictator, I just had a huge amount of political clout. I still do. And just to be the devil�
��s advocate, Huxley’s Haven was all about knowing your place. And it produced you.’
Paula smiled as she twirled the wine glass in front of her face. She might have known he’d bring up her formative years. Huxley’s Haven had been a unique, and massively controversial, experimental society, where its citizens were sequenced with genes that fixed specific psychoneural profiles. In short, their personality and professional aptitude were established before they were even born. Paula had been genetically designed as a policewoman, with an obsessive compulsion to solve puzzles. She’d been taken away from Huxley’s Haven, and adapted to life in the Greater Commonwealth, because there were always crimes to solve. ‘I had to evolve to survive,’ she reminded him. ‘Those old profiling genes were sequenced right out on my fifth rejuve – or was it my fourth? Who knows? Point is: nothing stays the same. Our species has become a living free-will Darwinian organism; we are in a constant state of evolution towards post-physical status. The External worlds will become Higher eventually. Don’t tell me you’re finally becoming impatient?’
‘And when the current External worlds are Higher, there will still be some other planets or new Faction causing trouble.’
‘Of course they will. That’s being human for you.’
He poured himself more wine. ‘Yeah, well, I’m going to found a uniform society. Everyone agreeing to the same philosophy and goals before it starts. There’ll be no dissent because we won’t be taking any dissenters.’
‘I can’t believe you’re being that simplistic. Yes, the first generation will all have the same noble goal, living worthy lives in accordance with the Party rules. But differences will creep in; they always do. By the time the third or fourth generation is born, you’ll have a hundred different factions, just like the Commonwealth.’
‘I disagree. Differences used to creep into societies because of unfairness and inequality. If you eradicate that, and the potential for it, right at the start, then society will remain uniform. Our technology is finally capable of that; we’re effectively a post-scarcity society, Paula. We should be better than what we are.’
The Abyss Beyond Dreams Page 13