The Bar Code Rebellion

by Suzanne Weyn

“She didn’t give up her principles. I simply helped her clarify what —”

  “Let her talk!” someone from the audience shouted.

  Fake Kayla began rubbing the other eye with her knuckles.

  “She’s crying,” Kayla said.

  With red eyes, the Kayla clone turned to Zekeal. “I can’t do this anymore,” she said, a sob in her voice. “It’s a lie, and I won’t have anything more to do with it.”

  Zekeal realized the microphones were picking up her words. “She’s overwrought. It’s been a tiring tour,” he tried to cover.

  “No!” fake Kayla cried. “I want to tell the truth.”

  Zekeal looked sharply at someone off camera and the screen instantly went blank. In a second, the broadcast was back in the news studio with the anchorwoman. David Young’s face appeared on the screen behind her.

  “In other news, Decode leader David Young remains on suicide watch. He has refused to take the Propeace prescribed for him. He also continues to refuse to leave his jail cell until the last of the hundred protesters still being held in jail have been freed. Global-1 doctors feel that the incarceration is exacerbating Senator Young’s condition and urge him to leave.

  “Ambrose Young, father of David Young, obtained a court order enabling him to have a webcam installed in his son’s cell. ‘I want to make sure those bastards at Global-1 don’t hurt my son when no one is looking. I or one of my lawyers will now be looking every second.’”

  Allyson turned off the TV, and the three of them sat, stunned. Things were getting even more out of control.

  They had to do something about it.

  They activated their plan later that night.

  It started with Allyson banging on the soda machine in the lobby of the bio/infometrics building where she did her research. “My bar code won’t scan on this stupid thing!” she complained loudly. She kicked the machine again.

  “Hang on there,” the guard at the front desk warned sternly. “Calm down.”

  “I won’t calm down. I just want some damn soda!” she said, dealing the machine another violent blow. “What good is a bar code tattoo if it doesn’t even work on a soda machine?”

  “The machine was working before,” the guard said, coming over to inspect it. “Are you sure you have sufficient funds in your account?”

  While Allyson distracted the guard, Kayla and Jack darted past the momentarily abandoned front desk. They took the emergency stairs to the third floor so that the guard wouldn’t notice any activity in the elevator. Once there, they ran to unlock the window that led onto a fire escape at the back of the building. A few minutes later, Allyson climbed in through that window, breathing heavily from the exertion. “I’m going to start exercising,” she vowed.

  Once she had recovered, she unlocked the facility but didn’t dare turn on the light. Using a flashlight, she loaded the e-chip into the infometric computer that had been handling related files. She took the second chip, which she’d taped to the underside of a desk drawer, and fed it, too, into the computer. “Come on, Helen,” she urged it. “Show us what kind of super hacking beauty you really are. Launch a thousand ships for us.”

  The computer ran through the first half of the program before it came to the subfiles. Then it began to whir, a sound that made Kayla uneasy. Was something going wrong?

  “It’s trying alternate ways in,” Allyson explained, although she, too, seemed concerned. “It’ll keep trying until it finds the one that works.”

  A silky, feminine robotic voice made Kayla jump and yelp in surprise. “Retinal recognition required,” the computer’s audio speaker reported. “Provide scan.”

  Allyson cursed, throwing her arms out in frustration.

  “These computers are sucking in info from everywhere, right?” Jack checked with Allyson.

  “Right,” she confirmed.

  “It must be indexing it somehow. How do I access its search engine?” Allyson directed him to a notebook-size unit on a nearby table. It took him close to a half hour, but finally, he stepped back from the computer and smiled. “I am so good!” he boasted. “Jack the hack, that’s me.”

  “What did you do?” Allyson asked.

  “I merely searched until I found the GlobalHelix file of employees with computer file clearance. Then I cross-referenced it with their personnel files and broke into them to get coded copies of their eye scans, which, interestingly, are recorded in bar code form. I sent this info over to our infometric friend, Helen of Troy. With any luck she should be getting it any second now.”

  As if Helen of Troy was acting on his command, a printer buzzed to life, rapidly sending out page after page of material.

  Even female computers can’t resist him, Kayla thought, smiling inwardly.

  Allyson began collecting the papers, reading them with darting eye movements. A crease in her brow deepened as she went. “I don’t believe it,” she murmured, looking up from her stack of papers. “Take a look at this.”

  HIGHLY CLASSIFIED

  GlobalHelix Population Behavior Control by Nanotechnology

  Purpose:

  The purpose of the GlobalHelix Population Behavior Control by Nanotechnology program is threefold:

  To create an orderly global community free of illness and dissent.

  To rid the world of those individuals promoting illness and/or dissent and create the necessary serving class of the genetically inferior.

  To identify the mentally and physically strong so as to create a community of cloned persons healthy enough to be involved in the next phase for a planned posthuman future free of disease, aging, and even death, a future of genetically enhanced humans.

  See ancillary material below to learn about preliminary trials.

  The Program

  Propeace12 Release

  Nanomachinery will be capable of a steady, timed release of this amplified version of Propeace. The maximized serotonin-reuptake pharmaceutical can keep patients in a tranquil state indefinitely with few side effects. The most common side effect is keratoconjunctivitis sicca. This application is recommended for patients with dissident or rebellious tendencies, as indicated in their bar codes, who have not actively engaged in antisocial behavior. It effectively precludes these activities from being initiated by the patient.

  Vagus Nerve Stimulator Release

  Nanomachinery will be able to overstimulate the vagus nerve, which has wide connections throughout the brain, with timed electric pulses, thereby inducing a severely depressive state in the patient. At certain low levels this stimulation can offer relief of depression, but at higher levels of activation it creates anxiety and agitation. Patients in this state lack initiative and are rendered inactive. Reported side effects include a constricting pain in the back of the throat, hoarseness, and other odd inflections to the voice. A quiver in pronouncing the l sound has been particularly noted in patients speaking Romance- and Germanic-based languages. In some case studies the patient was rendered unable to speak at all.

  This application is recommended to patients who are in direct and open rebellion against government directives. Failure to willingly comply with bar code tattoo legislation 16661 constitutes such an infraction of the law and warrants this penalty. Algorithm required for release — highest classification.

  Vagus Nerve Stimulator Intensified Release

  Certain patients have been shown to be resistant to the course of treatment indicated above, persisting in their antisocial behavior. In this event, intensification is recommended, with an amplified and more frequent pulse. In 90 percent of cases, suicidal tendencies arise. Without adequate intervention, an attempt will be made. (See below for data on preliminary trial cases.)

  BC12 Virus Release

  Nanomachinery is able to mimic known viruses. The bar code 12 virus (BC12) has been developed as a fail-safe in the event that the population behavior control methods described above incur unwanted notice. A change of algorithm is all that is required to switch from vagus nerve stimulation t
o virus release. Algorithm required — highest classification.

  Conclusion

  The bar code tattoo program has been highly effective. During the extraction of the mandatory blood sample, self-replicating nanotechnology was injected into the bloodstreams of persons receiving the bar code tattoo. These molecular-size computers can be activated by codes generated from the central GlobalHelix computer. Each of the strategies discussed above is activated by its own algorithm. By associating the genetic maps recorded in the bar code tattoo with specific algorithms targeted at corresponding individuals, each citizen can be controlled in accordance with his or her exhibited behaviors. A Global-1 caseworker will monitor the movements of approximately 100 patients each. Recommendations will be made on a biannual basis as to which algorithm will be activated in each case.

  Ancillary Materials

  Program Activation Dates

  Phase I: Trial period. Selected experimental subjects only. Begins September 1, 2024.

  Phase II: Forcibly tattooed subjects only. Political and criminal prisoners. Begins October 15, 2025.

  Phase III: General population behavior activation. Pending success of phases I and II. Projected start date: January 1, 2026.

  For more information on early trial results, see files entitled:

  Genetic Enhancement/Manipulation Program: Donor Kathryn Marie Reed

  Production of Identical Sextuplet Humans During the First Cell Cycle of Nuclear DNA Transfer

  (Subfile) Offspring of Kathryn Marie Reed:

  As involved in Population Behavior Control Program (JR-1)

  As involved in Genetic Enhancement/Manipulation Program (KM-1-6)

  Allyson swore softly under her breath.

  “It’s the missing piece,” Jack said, stunned by what he’d just read. He leaned heavily on a metal table as though the information had nearly knocked him down. “This has to be what Gene Drake found. He had a friend who was a technology guy for Global-1. He must have had the info file password. If the guy was deep enough inside, he probably had retinal scan clearance, too.”

  Jack looked sharply to Allyson. “It says the algorithms for these programs have the highest classification. Can Helen of Troy get at them?”

  Allyson sighed, uncertain. “I’m not really sure how I would direct it to.”

  Kayla heard them, but it was as if they were speaking from somewhere far away. She was preoccupied with running the information she’d just read through a mental filter of what she’d experienced in the past year.

  It threw everything into a new and clarifying light.

  Her parents had been tattooed with their bar codes in September 2024, the period of the trial experiments. Within two weeks, her father had started acting anxious and depressed. He’d stopped going to work and just sat in their den, staring. Before that he’d been energetic, a man who loved books, photography, his wife, and his daughter. Seven months later, he’d killed himself. Her telepathy had been working even then, because some strange feeling had urged her to cut school and hurry home. She’d arrived in time to see the paramedics carry him out on a stretcher.

  Now she understood. In the end, they’d gone to their third step with him. They’d amplified the vagus nerve stimulation to the point where he became suicidal.

  Kayla vividly recalled the day her father was carried away in the ambulance. Wailing hysterically, her mother had shouted, “The bar code did this to him!”

  She’d begged her mother to explain what she’d meant, but she wouldn’t. How much had her mother known?

  After that, her mother had become like a zombie, drinking alcohol and taking Propeace by the handfuls. Were the nanobots pumping her with Propeace12? Were they zapping her vagus nerve with electrical shocks?

  Did the GlobalHelix people think she’d become a threat, or was she just part of their experiment? Was her drinking and pill-popping a desperate attempt to fight them, to stabilize her emotions, focus her thoughts, find some tranquillity? In the end she’d tried to burn off her tattoo and killed herself in the fire she unwittingly caused.

  Maybe it hadn’t been an accident. It might even have been her way to commit suicide, a rebellious conflagration that could have taken down the entire block. She’d known Kayla was in the house. Had she meant to take her, too?

  Kayla stopped and pictured her mother as she’d once been, strong and positive.

  “Kayla, what are you thinking?” Allyson’s voice broke into her recollection. “You’re so far away.”

  “I was thinking about my parents,” she revealed. “They must have been involved in the test trial somehow. Before we go we have to get into those other files, the ones about the offspring of Kathryn Reed.”

  A flashlight beam swung into the facility and the three of them ducked. The guard swept the light across the room as they bent lower, pulling in tight, trying to make themselves as small and inconspicuous as possible.

  “We should get out of here,” Allyson whispered nervously when he’d moved on.

  “I don’t know if I can find that eye scan information again,” Jack pointed out. “After tonight they might be able to detect that someone was in their files and add even more security. They could even destroy the files. We should get into the files we want to see now, while we still can. We should also copy and print as much as we can.”

  Allyson glanced anxiously out to the hall. “I don’t know.”

  “I have to look into those files,” Kayla insisted.

  Allyson gave in. “Let’s do it fast,” she said.

  They first opened one file, then the next two. Together they read them through. Taken all together, they told a compelling story.

  Kathryn Marie Reed had been a single mother in 1983 living in the Santa Monica area with her four-year-old son, Joey. Joey’s father had left them just before Joey was born, leaving no forwarding address.

  Kathryn eked out a living doing portraits for tourists down on the bustling Santa Monica pier. Then one day Joey became listless. He continued to be fatigued and grew paler.

  Kathryn had no insurance and no money to pay a pediatrician. A woman who sold tie-dyed shirts on the pier told her that she could sell her eggs to a biotech company in Pasadena. It was called AgroGlobal, and it had recently expanded into genetic research. They shipped the frozen eggs to their laboratories in Korea where scientists could work without the same government restrictions as in the United States.

  Desperate, Kathryn Reed went to AgroGlobal and was paid for her eggs. She befriended several doctors there who agreed to look at Joey. They discovered that Joey had leukemia, a disease Kathryn knew had occurred on his missing father’s side of the family.

  The doctors treated Joey well. Kathryn paid what she could toward this care by participating in more scientific studies.

  Joey Reed was eventually cured of his leukemia, but life as an experimental subject had become familiar and comfortable for his mother. With no family other than Joey, it was clear to Kayla that Kathryn Reed had found a place in which she felt at home, and the staff provided the family she’d never had. She apparently liked it at AgroGlobal and stayed on, living full-time at their psychiatric facility in Los Angeles, even when it became GlobalHelix.

  Joey Reed was raised in the biotech complex. There he met a young nurse named Ashley McGraw. They were married right on the grounds.

  One day in early 2007, Kathryn came to her son with a proposal. She had just been told that one strand of her DNA had been successfully replicated and implanted six times. Sextuplet clones of Kathryn Reed had been produced.

  Joey Reed was impressed but not very surprised. He knew advanced human cloning experiments were being conducted by GlobalHelix. These were not the first successful human clones, although they were the first six-way split.

  But there was more to it. These clones were destined to be the first in an experiment with trans-species gene splicing. Heretofore, animals had been spliced with human genes, but a human had never received an animal gene, at least not on the
scale of this experiment.

  Which animal’s genes would be used?

  Not a pig’s or an ape’s as one might expect. The animal was not even a mammal, but a common sparrow’s.

  In this case they were not trying to instill a certain trait. Instead, it was a way to discover what traits would emerge. The DNA of each cloned embryo would be injected with increased amounts of avian DNA from a sparrow.

  Kathryn asked Joe if Ashley would agree to be the host mother for one of the clones. She’d make sure he got the first clone, the one with the smallest amount of bird DNA. Ashley was experiencing problems conceiving a child, anyway, and this way they could have a child who was genetically from Joe’s side of the family. Plus, there would be a large financial reward for this service.

  And so Kayla Marie was born to Joe and Ashley Reed on April 16, 2008, a baby girl with avian DNA spliced into the DNA of Kathryn Marie Reed.

  Across the country, five other baby girls were also born with these bird genes. A new transgenic creature had come into the world, an avian-human hybrid female.

  How would they look?

  How would they behave?

  Would all six of them be the same? Or would the genes express themselves differently in the six girls?

  These things remained to be seen.

  It quickly became apparent that GlobalHelix’s careful planning — their agenda for monitoring the girls as they grew and developed — was not as foolproof as they had expected.

  The surrogate parents reacted in unexpected ways. Some of them were repelled by the offspring in their care. Kara’s mother, a young girl who’d been abandoned herself as a baby, sent Kara directly into foster care.