Designation 261 (The Wholeness Project)

by Catherine Miller

  He knew he was a poor friend for her. He could not clearly see her mouth, but he could imagine the unhappy set of it, the admonishments she would give herself for being his friend in return.

  He didn’t want that for her.

  And it was harder to ignore that her concerns were becoming his own.

  “You are...” he began, wanting to find some method to comfort, to draw her back to him, to promise her that she was whole and perfect, utterly untainted by him. But words failed him, most especially when she looked up at him in that way, eyes wide and questioning.

  Lost.

  She sighed, the sound tinny and wrong when it passed through the mask. “Let’s finish this and we’ll talk when we get back, all right?”

  It was the practical thing to do, and the suggestion should have brought relief. He had her permission to complete his task, and she would not fault him for doing so, even when she clearly was not as she should be.

  But instinct bade him hesitate, if only to offer what small acknowledgement he could. “You are unhappy,” he stated. “I know this. We will discuss it and see how amends can be made.”

  Even if she made the attempt to smile, it was a false one for her eyes did not brighten.

  He wanted to assure her that they could leave soon, that it would be much the same as the last time and she needn’t worry that he would cause them to linger. But watching the host of engineers at their work had given him pause. He wanted to believe they were foolish and overconfident in matters of security, but he could not underestimate them either. He could not pretend that he could so easily exploit the holes in the system as he had done before, and that was a complication. Things would have to be done manually, and that meant time.

  Time when she would see more death, see more of the horrors that were grown so unnaturally in the confines of this place.

  Because of him. Because he had brought her here.

  Somehow the knowledge of that spoiled the sweetness of his victory, the power he felt over those he had long suffered beneath. When he lived and they did not.

  He should resent her for that—for corrupting what should be the ultimate satisfaction.

  But he didn’t. And he could not name why.

  “Come,” he said instead, not able to give voice to the thoughts in his mind, and not yet ready to abandon the work entirely. Not when he was all too aware of what was being grown in the laboratories below, carefully moulded and shaped into all sorts of abominations.

  Ones like him.

  They might look prettier, might be more well mannered by the time their training was complete, but that did not change what they were. Tools. Malleable and entirely empty of personhood.

  Or so the masters would have him believe.

  He wasn’t so certain any longer.

  Clairy sniffled slightly but followed after him as he returned to the lift, much too quiet and unlike herself. And still, there was nothing he could offer her. Just the promise that he would make amends, although he was far too aware that it was better not to have inflicted the hurt in the first place.

  He must have hesitated longer than he realised for her voice softly cut through the mounting silence as he stared aimlessly at the lift’s controls, the doors sealing them away from the rest of engineering. The alarm had quieted when the air had normalised to the new levels had provided, and he almost found himself missing the warning din, if only to distract him from the words he could not speak.

  “What are we going to do now?” she asked, prompting him into action. As subtly as he could, he produced the severed hand and pressed the coordinates he desired, the computer recognising the authority of a man already dead and permitting the action.

  “The tanks will be undisturbed by the gas,” he answered, uncertain if she would realise his intentions from that statement alone.

  He glanced at her, dreading her response, only to see her pale—quite an accomplishment given the pallor she had worn since they had entered through the facility doors.

  Clairy only gave a careful nod in acknowledgement.

  He found that he missed her argument. Wanted her to bargain, her indignation to flare in defence of a people that were not hers, but were worth her attention and care.

  His people.

  As if it was possible for him to feel such an affinity for those he had never met, whose kinship was forged through technological perversion rather than bloodline and anything resembling affection.

  He’d wanted this, hadn’t he? For her to be complacent and helpful, to agree with him and not fuss when violence seemed the most logical course?

  Cydrin pulled out his blaster when they neared the laboratories. He was uncertain if the air was controlled by a separate system given the delicate nature of the work, and it stood to reason that some would have grown aware of the fate of the rest of their colleagues and taken up arms.

  There was also the possibility of more of his kind being in these parts, potentially half-trained and dangerous in their impulsivity, and he would not hesitate to cull such behaviour before harm could be enacted on Clairy.

  The lift doors opened, and Cydrin held out a hand, keeping Clairy behind the comparative safety of the side wall as he assessed.

  There were no bodies lying about, which made him tense with concern. It was possible that this floor would remain empty until rounds were made, each specimen checked for growth and readiness.

  Or it meant that his poison had not worked in these areas at all. Had they already called for help? Did they fear an attack, or did they believe it to be a malfunction of the main environmental controls?

  He wouldn’t learn anything by remaining in the lift, but he loathed taking Clairy out into the open. He turned, briefly allowing his attention to go to her, considering his options. Whenever he had posed leaving her in the past, it had led to begging—even when being left alone was her only viable option for escape.

  If she was found, she would not know what to say. They would find some small detail of her story that proved untrue and take her away for interrogation. He knew what their methods included, and he would not see her endure such tortures.

  It was inefficient to have to construct a rescue rather than keep her with him, even if the environment was not the most ideal.

  Her attention was riveted to the pods, to the bodies lightly pulsing in their fluids, small jerks of movement that appeared so unnatural. Likely because it was. Muscles had to be flexed and toned—matured at an abnormal rate so they emerged ready for use, not limp and fragile as newborns.

  Even if that was quite what they were.

  Or would have been. If they were going to live that long.

  He walked down the halls looking for any sign of a doctor or member of staff, but instead was met with the polished floors that only added to the vast number of tanks being put to use. Row upon row, some less mature than others, but all within the same relative age to be considered the same generation.

  Clairy’s steps were slow and measured, and on more than one occasion he had to cease his entirely to allow her to catch up to him. Their progress was abominable, and though he understood her desire to see, to understand, that was not their purpose here.

  When she came close to him again, he reached out and plucked up her hand and brought it to one of the loops at his waist where a canister had once lain. She eyed him questioningly, and he wrapped her fingers about it until she held it there of her own accord. “Stay close,” he murmured, almost without sound at all. He would not betray their location more than absolutely necessary, although he was far too aware that cameras would line these corridors, ever watchful eyes overseeing the progress of the latest crop.

  They would strike. And soon.

  And he would have to be ready for it.

  There was a long stair on the far end, up toward the observatory deck. If nothing else, it would prove far better cover than what he could utilise down here.

  And there would be controls there. Presumably, at least.

&nbs
p; He would have taken the steps two at a time, hating how exposed they were, but Clairy’s legs were not as long and he would not leave her as a target on her own. So they ascended together, his eyes darting from the door ahead to the room below, looking for any sign of movement. Of life not confined within an artificial pod.

  They came to the landing at the door and with another use of the stolen hand, it eased open to permit them entry.

  Cydrin pushed Clairy behind him, shielding her from view entirely as he held up his blaster, his finger upon the trigger as he prepared to fire.

  Except there were no bodies. There was no one at all.

  Perhaps more disappointingly, there were no controls either. Just rows of viewscreens, some showing the details of certain tanks chosen for inspection, others revealing rooms that were not this one at all. Where were the workers? The doctors and their assistants. Of anyone, they should be the ones upon the floor gasping for breath.

  “Cydrin,” Clairy said softly, drawing his attention to where she’d settled in front of one of the screens. “You never told me there were women too.”

  He crossed the room, an uneasy feeling low in his belly. But she was correct, the vid clearly conveying female figures being incubated in pods of their own. “I did not know,” he answered truthfully. “There were none where I came from.”

  Clairy nodded, her expression grave. “Makes sense though,” she continued, her voice hollow and small. “The next phase, you know? Don’t have to steal from other women if you can make eggs of your own. Much less fuss if they were ever found out.”

  He did not want them found out—that was quite the point. He did not want their research put to use, did not want it influencing others that had not yet thought to take their advances to such extremes.

  She did not take her eyes from the vid, but continued. “Where do you think everybody is?” she asked, watching as the feed flickered to another room. One of the conception rooms, or so he thought. The tanks were much smaller there, where embryos were evaluated for viability before being transferred to a larger tank for accelerated processing.

  “I am uncertain,” he admitted, his eyes drifting over the viewscreens in search of some clue. He had expected blaster-fire, but for there to be nothing at all...

  The room was fairly useless as they could not even control the direction of the cameras, so they abandoned it quickly enough.

  The next room was equally empty aside from the women being matured in their tanks. Clairy kept giving him strange looks that he could not identify, though he could not spare much of his attention to either the pods she found so interesting or even to her, not when he was attempting to ascertain what was going on.

  His speculation was proven correct when they came to the next laboratory. Some babies squirmed in their pods, flipping and twirling in the confines of their glass prisons, while others slept, small arms tucked beneath chins as they looked impossibly small in the over-large space.

  He glanced at Clairy, her eyes filled with pity as she took in the room and all its horrors. He could not conjure the same, not when he had witnessed it so many times before, but there was a newness that came when accompanying her through it.

  A fresh awareness of the lives those infants would have lived should he not have chosen to intervene. In less than a year they would have been forced into artificial maturity, and then the true torture would begin.

  A shift, a body, the blaster going off before he could even process that it was not his own.

  He moved too quickly, taking Clairy with him as he pushed them down onto the floor, covering her as much as he was able before returning fire. The figure was darkly dressed, his face uncovered, which confirmed that these spaces were run on a separate generator, unaffected by Cydrin’s earlier tampering.

  Disappointing.

  The man pressed forward, using pods as cover as he tried to corner his prey, one of the tanks already damaged, evidenced by the hissing and spluttering it produced.

  It was of little matter. Not when they needed cover and they needed it now.

  He pushed Clairy to her feet and shoved her forward, though she needed no coaxing when she ran and hid behind a low table. It was covered in medical equipment, doubtlessly expensive and valuable, but it shattered pleasingly when more blaster-fire was dealt in their direction.

  Cydrin suppressed a growl. This was not how today was to have gone.

  “I am going to offer you the same generosity I did for the rest of your people,” a voice came. “You may come quietly, nice and easy, and this doesn’t have to be all that unpleasant.”

  Cydrin would enjoy ending him.

  There was a tug at his clothing, Clairy desperately trying to hold his attention. “He’s the man from the lift,” she insisted, her eyes darting to where she must have supposed he was hidden. She would have been incorrect, which further confirmed she had no place being here. Not with dangers she was unprepared to protect herself from.

  He wondered why she thought that of great relevance. He would be dead soon in any case.

  He caught only the slightest glimpse of the roll of her eyes before he turned his attention back to the target, his blaster readied. He would prefer to take the time to find something else, a lighter, swifter weapon, compounded by a quick release of another gas. They still wore masks and the man did not, and it was unlikely he would be able to find any emergency respirator tucked away somewhere within the room.

  He gave Clairy a sharp look when her voice answered back. “I don’t think you understand who we are,” she called, her words tight and wavering slightly. “And I don’t think we know who you are either.”

  A part of him wanted to turn off the vocal capabilities of her mask so she would be silenced from such dangerous chatter. Clearly she did not realise that by speaking she gave away their location—just as the man had done by compromising his own place of cover.

  But he supposed if he was ready for it, if she got him to move closer, to show himself even the smallest amount...

  It could be used to Cydrin’s advantage.

  “And who might I be speaking to?” the man called back, all politeness. All the lessons that Cydrin had been denied in favour of cold efficiency.

  His grip tightened on the blaster.

  “My name is Martna,” she said in answer, and something in him relaxed that she was not using this as an opportunity to abandon him. Not yet, at least. “Are you with the Project? Because we aren’t.”

  The man released an incredulous chuckle. “Funny looking clothes you’re wearing then.”

  Clairy released a tremulous breath. “I could say the same about you.”

  Silence fell, and the man had yet to move. If Clairy insisted on conversation, Cydrin could use the distraction to creep forward on his own, to make some ground and draw any additional fire away from Clairy.

  And that was of importance.

  He glanced at Clairy. He would wait until she spoke again, and hopefully from simple gestures he could indicate she was to stay.

  And simply hope it was not a mistake to separate.

  If the man had the same thought, he could double around, and Clairy could become a hostage. And that was not to be tolerated.

  “We seem to be at a bit of an impasse, Martna” the man continued, his voice not altering in direction. That was important. And should that change, Cydrin could easily return. “And I think that big fellow with you doesn’t like me very much.”

  Clairy took hold of Cydrin’s wrist when he made to move, her expression firm. He could dislodge her hold, and easily, but she clearly had an opinion on how to proceed, one that differed greatly from his own.

  “You must have given that speech before,” she redirected, choosing to ignore talk of Cydrin at all. That was for the best. “So what have you been up to today?” She took a quick breath and closed her eyes. “There’s a curious lack of doctors around here, don’t you think?”

  A chuckle, full of satisfaction. “I do think,” the man agreed.
“Nicer, isn’t it? Especially given these lot.”

  Clairy’s grip tightened around his wrist, and her eyes pleaded with him to wait. And despite his instincts decrying his compliance, he did so.

  “I think we might be allies in this,” she answered back. “And our purposes might align.”

  A hum, moving slightly leftward. Cydrin wanted to counter, but that would leave them vulnerable unless they could make it to the next desk some metres away. Too risky. Loathe though he was to release his double handed hold on his blaster, he did so, allowing Clairy to keep hold of his right hand while rifling through his supplies with his left. He did so by feel alone, but that was all right. He’d practiced blind retrieval plenty of times for just such occasions, smooth cylinders carefully etched with identifying marks so he would know which suited his purposes.

  Clairy might want to forge an alliance, but Cydrin wanted better ground before any negotiation began.

  He would still prefer a laser quickly fired, but he would not be picky.

  “You think you know my purposes, do you?” the man countered, a semblance of humour in his voice.

  A hint of irritation entered Clairy’s eyes. Good. Cydrin was experiencing plenty of that on his own. “I am not trying to presume anything. I’m suggesting we talk without resorting to exchanging another round of blaster-fire!” She rubbed her hands along the edge of the mask, and he would restrain her if she attempted to remove it. “I’m not interested in dying today. Are you?”

  “That was not on the agenda, no. But when I noticed all the people dying outside the labs, my plans got accelerated a bit.” The sound of a blaster being deactivated met their ears, but Cydrin did not trust it. “That you two?”

  Clairy looked to Cydrin, obviously not knowing if he would allow her to admit it outright. If the man was as Clairy believed, it might build some manner of trust between them to admit their actions. If he was not, such a confession would see them both executed in the galactic court.

  “I do not see how it is useful to go over our particular dealings for the day,” Cydrin answered instead, sparing Clairy the obvious distress of trying to settle on their story. “But it would behove you to speak plainly about your own.”