Exiles
Page 54
Chapter 28 Resurrection
She awoke gripped by a sense of total panic, she was somewhere cold, dark and suffocating. She could feel it clawing at her mouth and nose, trying to infiltrate her body and fill her lungs. She open her eyes, she was under what appeared to be water. Above her, through the murky green fluid, she could make out what appeared to be a bright light in the ceiling. She reached out with her hands, clawing her way out, clutching the sides of the container she was in and pulled herself free. She broke the surface, sending a cascade of the fetid green fluid rippling over the edges of the tank and onto the stainless steel floor. She sat up coughing and spluttering, pushing her wet, matted, dark brown hair out of her eyes and looked around, as she blinked her eyes free of the liquid.
She was in a small stainless steel cubical. It had a surgical feel to it. She was sitting naked, in the middle of the room, in a coffin shaped vat of green fluid. Behind her, off to the left, was a small shower cubicle. Beside which was a cold stainless steel chair, a fluffy white bath robe draped over the back it, a white towel folded neatly on the seat. Directly in front of her was the door. In front of which stood a guard, dressed in the full black body armour of Malstrom’s elite forces. He had his rifle strapped across his back and his pistol holstered by his side, hand clasped in front of him, feet slightly apart, waiting for orders. His visor was down obscuring his face. She turned her head to the right and examined the woman standing over her.
“Remember me?” said the purple robed stranger, tossing her hood back and shaking her golden locks free, staring intently at her with cold green eyes.
“What happened? Where the hell am I?”
She knelt down beside the bath, bringing her face level with hers. Moving her head slowly from side to side like a snake about to strike, as she examined her face, looking for signs of recognition. “I ask the questions.” she said slowly, deliberately. “Do you know who I am? Tell me what you remember?”
Instinctively from somewhere deep within her subconscious her training kicked. “Indra, Marshall, alpha, zebra, zero, zero, eight, five, two, seven.” she surprised herself, as her identity came flooding back to her, repeating the words over and over again. She could feel her interrogators breath on her face now, so close it was almost touching hers. She watched as red and orange flames of anger flicked through the stranger’s eyes and hair and muttered a half remembered phrase under her under her breath. “It I’ll take more than some cheap genetic showmanship to impress me dear.”
Quick as a flash, she grabbed her wet matted hair with her left hand, jerking her head back by its roots, exposing her fragile neck. Wrapping her right hand around it, she pressed her fingers into the soft wet flesh, pushing her face into hers, invading what was left of her personal space and dignity. “That’s better, there is something in there after all. Now I’ll ask you again. who am I? What do you remember?”
“Indra, Marshall, alpha...”
“Wrong answer.” she screamed, plunging her back beneath surface, splashing, struggling, slowly suffocating, in a hazy green watery world, till she thought her lungs would explode.
Strange disjointed memories flashed through her skull and fell into place. Then, just as suddenly, the suffocating sensation vanished, as the robed woman pulled her head back up and released her grip. She sat up coughing, gripping the sides of the bath, spluttering, her chest heaving as gasped for breath, sucking in air to feed her oxygen starved lungs.
“Now do you remember?”
“Yes.” she gasped looking at the guard and back at her. “You're that crazy ass bitch, the High Priestess. You had me killed. Suffocated on my own ship. When you decompressed the bridge. It’s my duty, as a loyal Zodan officer, to kill you.”
The guard by the door tensed and unholstered his pistol, ready to shoot at the first sign of danger.
She smiled and shook her head. “My friends, my very close friends, get to call me Tracy and besides what loyalty do you owe the Zodan? As far as they’re concerned you’re already dead, defeated, your fleet lost to the Brethren.”
She stood up and pulled up a holographic projection of news reports and casualty lists as she gestured to the guard to toss her the pistol and caught it deftly in her right hand.
Indra, scanned the reports. She was listed as KIA, along with Whillans of the Vesperon and Nolan of the Haldyne. Their fleets converted to serve the faith, alongside what was left of Malstrom’s forces, the largest single armada in human history.
“If that’s true the how am I here?”
Tracy held her head back and laughed as the display switched to a recording of their conversation with Henderson before the battle.
She watched the projection of the deceased Komandant “The Malstrom research ship Dobzhansky, we’ve been looking for that for months. I can’t wait to see what you’ve been cooking up in its cloning labs.”
Then heard her own voice muttering in response.“Resurrection technology, the key to immortal life, if the rumours are true.”
“I’m afraid Nolan isn’t her to see it, but what we’ve cooked up in the cloning labs is a fully grown up you. DNA wasn’t a problem we had your corpse after all. What we didn’t have was a neural imprint. So we had to piece you back together from whatever we could find, ships logs, service records, school reports, data files. We had to scan half the databases in the galaxy to put you back together again, you should grateful.”
“That’s a relative perception, considering you killed me in the first place.”
She tutted and dipped the barrel of the gun in the bath between her legs moving it slowly through the water till it bumped against her body. Pressing the cold metal muzzle gently against her soft wet, warm flesh, she slowly pulled it up over her belly button and across her chest. She dragged it under her chin, pushing her head back, before bringing to rest on her lips twisting it slightly to part her lips the cold metal jarring against her smooth white teeth. A thin smiled crossed her lips.
“I’ve invested a lot in you, you really should be more grateful.” she waited for a response and got none. “Difficult to speak with your mouth full?” she lifted the gun away. Running it over the bridge of her nose, bringing it to rest on forehead. “So what do you say? Should I kill you again?”
“So you can bring me back, and kill me again and again, for your own amusement?”
“Don’t flatter yourself.” she scoffed. “You’re not that important, you’re an experiment, a proof of concept. We needed to understand the technology. Know how much, or how little data, we needed to resurrect someone without a neural imprint. Death really will be forever this time if you choose it.”
“So why don’t you stop playing games and tell me what you really want?”
“Why I want you of course, your completed and undivided loyalty, think what a powerful message that would send to my followers. A non-believer, resurrected from the dead, to join the ranks of the faithful and serve humanities crusade for salvation. In their eyes I will be more a Goddess than a priestess, invincible, unquestionable.”
“Funny I though you and this prophet of yours were a team and, even with a gun at my head, I have to ask what exactly is in it for me?”
She released the safety and squeezed the trigger gently, till the gun was on the cusp of firing. “Even now when you’re live hangs by a thread, you’d still bargain for more?” she realised the trigger, slipped the safety back on, and tossed the gun back to the guard. “Good, I knew I made the right choice.” she instructed the guard to wait outside before continuing. “My dear friend, the prophet, controls the fleet. That is not acceptable, I need someone on the inside, someone he can’t touch.”
“A resurrected Fleet Marshall, brought back from the dead, to lead your own personal crusade?”
“Correct, you will be unassailable, venerated by the faithful, he will be unable to move against you. You will be my eyes and ears on the fleet. I will see what you see, hear what you hear, feel what you feel, when I so choose it.”
She giggled mischievously. “I had my man Thane make a few improvements to the original design. Some quite undetectable implants, that allow me to experience the world through you, as and when I feel like it”
“Creepy.”
“The price you pay for your resurrection. I wouldn’t get any ideas about trying to find and remove them. The consequences would be quite messy, not to mention terminal. Still if it's any consolation we have made some other ‘additions’ to the original model you might find useful.”
“Such as?”
“Don’t worry you’ll find out about them when the time is right. Let’s just say for now, safety protocols prevent you from using them against me, or anyone else I deem loyal.” she stood up and held out her hand. “So are you in?”
She nodded and took her hand, as she stood up and stepped out of the bath, standing before her dripping and naked. She opened up her purple robe, revealing the plain white dress with a golden belt and plunging neckline beneath. Wrapped the robe around Indra, pulling her wet body against hers, pressing her lips softly against hers for a fleeting moment. Then pushed her away, wrapping the robe back around herself, pressing her forefinger against Indra's startled lips.
“You know, I always wondered what it would feel like, to make love to myself.” she pulled her hand away smoothing down her robe and pointed to the shower. “Now get yourself cleaned up, you’ve got work to do. I’ll have my man outside sort you out a uniform and some clothes.”
Thane was waiting outside for her when she left the room, learning casually against the cold steel wall. “I take your satisfied with my handiwork?”
She nodded. “You have more than proved the worth of this resurrection technology. Tell Anderson, the Prophet, we are ready to proceed and assemble the information you need.”
“And our test subject?”
“You need not concern yourself with her she has agreed to serve me on the fleet.”
He pushed himself away from the wall and smiled. “Understood.”
Her hair flashed red momentarily. “There is much you do not understand, serve me and serve me well, but never, ever, underestimate me. If you wish to live a long and prosperous life.”
“Don’t worry about me. I’m a survivor, I live only to serve.”
“Service is cheap, its loyalty that counts, now get that information off Anderson and show me just how loyal you really are and how far you can push this tech.”