Snatched

by Vijaya Schartz

  Clutching her satchel close, Zania hoped the Collectors had turned off the monitoring function of her implanted device when they sold her. Can you hear me? No voice answered in her brain as it had when she was a captive on board the ship.

  At regular intervals, bolted metal beams reinforced the bulkheads. Zania noticed closed doors with more inscriptions. Other entrances to the landing bay or maybe cargo bays? The corridor ended abruptly and they faced a door. When it slid open, the guards stepped to each side but remained in the corridor. The container floated into the chamber.

  Zania followed the container inside. She heard the door close behind her. An uneasy feeling twisted her gut. Why did she accept this mission?

  The breathtaking view of the blue-green Earth with its clouds and its belt of satellites filled the clear wall as it had before. It was the same chamber where she had met the Collector before being sent to the Amazons. The container stopped and levitated in front of the ornate bench of red metal, where the plump Collector sat, cross-legged.

  Zania recognized the man she’d spoken to an hour ago... The man who had sold her before. He wore the same gold-trimmed burgundy robe.

  Staring at her, the Collector drummed the side console with bejeweled fingers. "What could possibly motivate a slave to recklessly endanger her life? And all that to save citizens who have no respect for her."

  "I don’t expect you to understand." Zania adjusted the satchel on her shoulder. "It’s a matter of honor, not profit."

  "Bad transaction if you ask Us." The Collector shook his head and pursed his fat lips. "What have you got in that bag?"

  Zania might as well establish a position of power. She wasn’t a slave anymore. "Weapons, just in case."

  The Collector raised a bushy unibrow. "Our scanners didn’t register any weapon technology. Your crude blades are useless against us."

  Zania motioned toward the container with her chin. "Now you have your first payment. Do your job."

  The little man touched the lock of the cubic container with the tip of his cane, and the lid popped open. He gazed at the bright ingots of white Rhodium with obvious fascination.

  "And what prevents us from just taking the money?" He had an annoying high-pitched voice. "We could just seize your shuttle, and leave."

  "You would find the result most unpleasant." Zania hoped he couldn’t hear her thoughts, or her bluff would fail.

  "How so?" The man seemed amused.

  "All the planet's satellites are armed and poised, ready to strike your vessel if you so much as power your engines." Zania struggled to remain calm. The destruction of Dagora’s main computer prevented this option, but the Collector didn’t know that.

  He paled and his skin reminded Zania of mint milk. He’d taken the bait.

  "Well, We’d better make sure that it doesn’t happen." He pressed a key on his side console. "We wish to target the defense satellites of this planet for immediate destruction."

  A foot high hologram of the same Collector appeared above the console. Did he have a twin in another part of the ship? "Are We sure?"

  The Collector focused on the hologram. "It seems this Zania gives Us no other choice."

  The hologram made wide arm gestures as if in great distress. "I knew this flawed unit would give Us trouble. She was wired wrong from the start. She is too emotional for a fighting unit and too strong and aggressive for a sex slave. We should have destroyed her and started from scratch."

  "But We didn’t destroy her." The Collector fidgeted on his bench. "She fetched a decent profit."

  Confused, Zania couldn’t think. Flawed unit? "What do you mean by starting from scratch? What’s your twin talking about?"

  "We are not twins." The Collector held his head high, as if taking offence. "We are many. We are alike. We are the Collectors."

  Zania marveled at the revelation. Now she understood their strange way of speaking in plural. "You mean you are all the same? You are clones?"

  The Collector nodded. "If you want to call it that, yes, we are clones... just like you."

  "I’m not a clone!" Shocked, Zania couldn’t breathe, as if someone had punched her stomach.

  "But of course, you are." The little man seemed to enjoy Zania’s outrage. "Didn’t you know?"

  "You are lying!" To her dismay, although Zania couldn’t accept it, she suspected deep down that the Collector spoke the truth. Her mind swirled at the thought, but in this new light, everything suddenly made sense.

  Zania had never known Morrigan in the Andromeda sector. Another Zania had. It explained her near death experience, when past Zanias told her it wasn’t her time to die. The one who asked her to be kind to Morrigan must have been Morrigan’s lover... so, that Zania must have died, too. It also explained her newfound virginity on her first night with Svend.

  "But if I’m a clone..." the very word stabbed Zania like a spear. "What happened to the original?"

  "The sample is here, on our ship, with all the other samples."

  "Samples?" A sudden cold spread through Zania’s veins. "I want to meet her." Only a confrontation could persuade Zania she was a mere copy.

  The Collector studied his dumpy manicured hands. "This is not part of our deal..."

  Was he fishing for more money? How dare he? "You better let me talk to her if you want to see the rest of your precious metal, you greedy bastard."

  "You meant this in anger, but in our culture it is a great compliment." The Collector shifted uneasily and averted his eyes. "You may see the sample, but she cannot talk. The sample is not really alive."

  "What do you mean?" Zania’s throat tightened. "Is she dead?"

  "No, but she wasn’t worth mending." The man finally met Zania’s gaze. "She had, however, very desirable genetic components. So We keep her in suspended animation and use her DNA to manufacture brand new Zania units."

  Suspended animation? Zania had a flash back about lying in a cold pod with a clear lid, and seeing her own face looking down at her with compassion. What did it mean? Another Zania clone had looked upon what? Her unfinished clone? The original Zania?

  Still, she couldn’t accept what she knew now to be the truth. "How many of me did you manufacture?"

  "Several thousand. We sold them in as many parallel universes, at various periods of each respective history, whenever the circumstances allowed for optimum profit."

  "So, you travel through time, and into parallel universes?" At least, Zania had guessed the time part right.

  The Collector studied her with a measure of respect. "We have knowledge of where and how to travel between universes."

  "You mean worm holes?" In Zania’s world they’d only been a controversial theory.

  "Something like that."

  Zania cleared her throat. "You better blow up these satellites, before the time is up and they destroy you." She had to keep her bluff going or all would be lost. "And when that’s done, I demand to see the original Zania."

  "If you insist." That chilling snake smile again. "But you will not like it."

  If the Collectors thought they could just snatch her back because they manufactured her, they were mistaken. This time, Zania refused to play the victim. High technology or not, old fashion stubbornness had to count for something. "Just do the job."

  The Collector knitted his unibrow then consulted the hologram. "Should We?"

  The hologram shrugged. "Follow the path of safer profit."

  Zania wondered whether she would become a source of more profit.

  "We agree..." The Collector switched off the hologram and punched other keys on the side console.

  Zania gazed expectantly through the chamber’s clear wall.

  "Darts away!" the Collector ordered.

  For a long second nothing happened, then a swarm of arrowhead-shaped silvery projectiles streaked the blackness of space and scattered away from the ship, in an irregular zigzag pattern, toward the belt of satellites circling the blue planet.

  The satellites turned their
weapons toward the volley of attacking projectiles. Several silvery objects exploded before reaching the satellites, but soon the swarm overwhelmed their targets, shooting beams of blue fire at close range. One by one the satellites exploded in a light show that reminded Zania of fireworks.

  To her surprise, the projectiles then returned to the ship in impeccable formation, like a victorious army. These were not just heat seeking missiles but intelligent weapons that could fight and survive, to be re-used as often as necessary.

  Zania exulted. Mission accomplished! Whatever happened next, at least the citizens of Dagora would be safe on the surface, once they left the doomed city. "Very efficient weaponry." She couldn’t help the admiration in her voice.

  "We thank you for the compliment, although coming from such a primitive unit, it has no bearing." The Collector unfolded his crossed legs and stood up, relying heavily on his cane. "Now, let’s get the rest of our payment."

  "Aren’t you forgetting something?"

  The Collector pulled a tablet from the folds of his robe. "Is this really necessary?"

  "If you want the rest of your precious Rhodium." Zania wouldn’t let them bully her around. Not this time. "I promise, after that, I will leave you alone."

  "Very well." The Collector shook his head disapprovingly. He sighed then lumbered toward her with the help of his cane.

  Remembering the magnetic field that protected his body, Zania stepped aside to let him pass. The man waved his tablet and the door opened. Upon his signal, the guards saluted but remained guarding the chamber and the treasure inside.

  Zania followed the Collector along the corridor. The man walked fast despite the limp. Could the infirmity be a trick and the cane a weapon?

  Zania caught up to him. "How far is it?"

  "Nothing is far on this ship." The man smiled at her obvious surprise.

  "This is a very large ship." Kliks across, according to Zania’s estimations, with many decks, at least forty or fifty levels.

  The little man shook the tablet at her. "We only have to designate a particular area, and it naturally comes to us."

  "You warp space on a small scale?" This couldn’t be good. Zania remembered sci-fi flicks about this. "Don’t you fear your technology might unsettle the space time continuum?"

  "We are above such concerns." The tone reeked of scorn. "The sad fate of any particular planet or any universe doesn’t mean much to Us. There are infinite numbers of them, and We can always escape to one more hospitable."

  "You mean more profitable." Zania couldn’t help the loathing in her voice.

  The Collector smiled, unabashed. "That’s all that matters to Us."

  Zania realized the nasty little man had no respect for life at all, not for this planet or this universe. "Have you ever encountered a technology superior to yours?"

  "We avoid such civilizations." He frowned, visibly uncomfortable. "We remain where it’s safe."

  "You mean where you are not challenged." Zania started to understand how the Collector’s mind worked.

  The corridor came to an abrupt end.

  "Ah!" The man stopped in front of the door blocking the way and read the inscription.

  Zania realized that since the arrangement of the ship shifted constantly, the only way to know what lay behind a door was to read the script. Good thing she’d memorized the inscription for the landing bay.

  "This is the sample bay."

  Zania hated the word sample when talking about people, but she hid her disgust. Her heart beat faster. She would soon be confronted with the truth. Who was she? All this time she believed to be Zania Nolev, of the North American Federation army. Would she now discover otherwise?

  The man waved his tablet at the metal door, which slid open. Zania walked behind him into a brightly lit gallery with white floors, white walls and a high ceiling. It seemed to go on forever. Thousands of white pods stood on anti-gravity plates, waist high off the floor. Rows upon rows of them… like the white markers of a military cemetery.

  As soon as they approached the first row, Zania glanced through the transparent lid of a few pods and realized that each of them contained a body. Some looked human, others had strange features. They didn’t look dead, but not quite alive either, stuck with transparent tubes flowing with fluids of various colors, like a symbiotic link between person and machine.

  Zania pointed at the pad on one pod. "What are these controls on the lids?"

  "The screens monitor life signs, and the keys allow for the manual regulation of life preserving fluids whenever necessary."

  The Collector pressed a few keys on his electronic tablet. "The Zania sample is this way." He pointed with his cane then started in that direction.

  Overwhelmed by the number of bodies in the bay, Zania strived to remain calm. The evil of the Collectors’ work seemed too great to behold. They needed to be stopped. But how?

  The Collector halted at the foot of an unremarkable white pod in the sea of white pods and stared at it.

  Zania’s heart pounded in her chest. She felt cold all over. "Is that her?"

  The Collector nodded.

  Zania didn’t dare look. What would she find? But she had to know.

  Cautiously, she approached the pod, then stared down through the clear lid. All the pain she had felt on that sandy battlefield, all the anguish at losing her unit, hit her full force as she gazed into the face of the woman lying there, in an artificial coma.

  Pale and barely recognizable among the network of tubes, she had Zania’s chestnut hair, high cheek bones, along with her military tattoos, and many battle scars on her naked body. Although Zania remembered receiving each wound with perfect clarity, she no longer bore these scars.

  Her throat constricted at the sight. "How dare you treat human beings like this?" she hissed at the Collector. "This is an outrage."

  The Collector shrugged. "We said you wouldn’t like it."

  Tears blurred Zania’s vision. "Put her out of her misery."

  "She is too valuable. Besides she is not suffering."

  "Yes she is." How could she not? "I remember the pain of being in that pod. Make it stop."

  "We can increase the anesthetic." The Collector bent over the pod and pressed a red key twice.

  The body inside seemed to relax, but Zania couldn’t stand the sight of such violation. She searched for an off button on the pod but couldn’t read the script. "How do you turn off this thing?"

  "We cannot. The pods are part of the ship’s vital systems." He glanced at the ceiling.

  Following his gaze, Zania noticed a large white disc, twenty meters in diameter, hanging from the ceiling. Probably some kind of computer. Did it control the pods? Her gaze returned to where the original Zania lay. "Will she die if she gets too much anesthetic?" Zania pushed the red key over and over.

  "Stop! You are damaging our property!" The cane pointed at Zania, confirming that it must be a weapon.

  Drawing her sword in one sweep, Zania knocked the cane out of the Collector’s hands. It clattered to the white floor. But when she tried to skewer the man, Zania’s sword bounced off his magnetic shield and she received a jolt. The sword escaped her grip and fell away.

  "Crooked bastard." As Zania shook her paralyzed hand, an idea hit her. Why not fight fire with fire?

  "We do not deal kindly with aggressors, Zania." The Collector chuckled, making fun of her futile attempt. "Now We are justified to destroy you, as We should have done when We noticed your flaw."

  But Zania had pulled the prodding rod from her belt and activated it. "And how do you plan to fight this?" She threw the prod at the man.

  The collector didn’t duck fast enough. The prod sizzled against his egg-shape shield that shimmered and flashed brightly. The rod bounced off onto a nearby pod. The pod sparked, starting a chain reaction among other pods.

  As the shimmering energy field around the Collector collapsed, he stared at Zania with unadulterated hatred. "You, primitive unit. You do not know what yo
u have done."

  "I don’t expect you to understand." Zania snatched the fallen sword and pointed it at the unprotected chest of the Collector. "You have no sense of right and wrong and do not deserve to live."

  "Killing one will not affect Us." The Collector still held the tablet and punched keys with one hand.

  "Giving the alarm?" Zania nicked his hand with the sword.

  The Collector dropped the tablet and ran for the cane. Before Zania could react, he pointed the weapon at her and fired.

  Without thinking, Zania ducked as blue fire sizzled overhead. She lunged at the man with the sword, piercing his cold heart. He let go of the cane and Zania watched him squirm as he collapsed in a pool of red blood on the immaculate white floor.

  Bending over him, Zania felt for a pulse at his throat but found none. The nasty little man was dead. Then she retrieved the tablet. Could she use it to get back to the landing bay? She hoped so.

  But Zania had one more thing to do. Opening her satchel, she placed a charge of explosives on top of the original Zania’s pod. "I’m sorry, old friend. But I know you well, and in your place I would want someone to do this for me."

  More pods sparked, and some crashed to the floor. Zania used her satchel to knock the rod off its still sparking pod and returned to her alter ego. "This is my gift to you." She kissed her fingers then touched the clear lid. "Farewell, my friend."

  Then Zania lit the fuse with the prod. As the fiber ignited, she ran three steps and hit the floor. The explosion rocked the bay. She could feel pain, or was it guilt? At least these degenerates wouldn’t make anymore Zanias. Sobs shook her whole body as she grieved.

  The smoke of the explosion rose quickly and dissipated. Zania spotted the cane on the floor. What could such a weapon do to the ceiling computer that controlled the lab? Snatching the cane, she studied the mechanism in the pommel. The trigger seemed simple. She aimed for the disc on the ceiling and fired as she’d seen the Collector do.

  A blue laser sizzled through the air and the large disc overhead flashed with many colors. Deafening alarms sounded all around. Then sparks flew and half the lights went out. Zania kept firing the weapon. She hoped to destroy the evil thing. Smoke slowly filled the bay as tall flames surged at the base of many pods and more of them slammed to the floor.