by Sean Platt
Ephraim seemed to consider the logic.
“What did you find in the banks,” Jonathan said, his words more like a statement than a question. “Tell me what’s the worse news.”
Another long moment. Finally, Ephraim said, “There are blanks missing.”
“Missing?”
“Yeah.
“How many?”
“I’m not even sure. That’s the problem. The database is glitchy. I had to do a visual inspection. At least a dozen.”
“Which dromes?”
“Blanks, I said.”
Jonathan blinked, adjusting his knowledge to fit Ephraim’s lesser understanding. His alarm ratcheted up a notch. “Wait. You don’t mean the betas.”
“Yes. ‘Betas.’ The ones that aren’t a specific drome yet.”
“But …” Jonathan wasn’t even sure what to say next. It was alarming, yes. But it also just plain didn’t make sense.
“Fiona is stealing our beta dromes? How the fuck is she—?”
“I don’t think it’s Fiona. She sounded unsure, like it was something I should investigate.”
“Who then? And why? Betas are useless without Wallace’s process!”
“I don’t know, Jon. I just know they’re missing, and that the files look all screwed up. Not just now, but going way back. Like this has been happening for a while.”
Jonathan couldn’t speak. Questions piled upon questions.
“You didn’t know about this?” Ephraim asked.
“Does my face look like someone who’s okay with this?”
“What does it mean? Why is it—?”
But Jonathan was away, back to his chair, picking up his tablet, opening the proxy he’d established to access his equipment away from prying eyes. He pulled up the inventory dashboard and poked through the hierarchy, his heart pounding.
Ephraim came to his side, peering down. “What is it? What are you …?”
Jonathan set the tablet aside, feeling the blood drain from his head. “Differentiation hormone is missing, too. I just had one of the robots down there show me video to be sure. Racks and racks of it.”
“What’s … Jonathan, are you okay?”
No. No, he wasn’t.
Jonathan sat, his mouth half-open. “With the right equipment, whoever has taken our betas can mature them into anyone as long as they have a sample.”
“Is that bad?”
“It’s bad for Eden. It’s our signature. Forget the Titus Washington leak; if someone out there can make Eden clones from Wallace’s betas, using his maturation hormone, that’s …” But he couldn’t finish, so he just said, “Fuck.”
“You think someone is trying to set us up?”
Obviously. Consistently.
More and more, Jonathan was beginning to feel less like he’d inherited his rightful empire and more like he’d inherited a scapegoat’s yoke.
“Maybe it’s not as bad as you think,” Ephraim said, reading his brother’s catatonic expression. “I’m pretty sure that Fiona thinks you’re behind this. She thought I should confront you, get you to tell me the truth.”
Jonathan looked over. Ephraim’s face said that he was firmly on Team Jonathan. “What ‘stuff’ did Fiona tell you?”
“She said that we’d better think long and hard about ‘messing with’ Hershel Wood. She said that he’s more of a friend to Eden than we might think. And she said that the same thing that’s making him such a pain in the ass is protecting the database, and that the database is protecting Eden.”
“What database?”
“Dunno. But do you see what I’m saying? Fiona was warning us not to mess with Wood. Since you’re not behind this, we’re obviously not gonna mess with him. We’re protected. He’s more a friend to us than an enemy. Fiona obviously has her wires crossed, believes the conspiracy stuff.”
“But those missing betas. All that missing differentiation hormone.”
“But Hershel Wood,” Ephraim insisted. “She said it like you couldn’t do whatever with the betas as long as Wood is in charge.”
Jonathan nodded. It wasn’t much of a lifeline, but he’d cling to it for now.
“Okay,” Jonathan said, nodding, trying to put the pieces back in place. “I’ll change all the access codes. We’ll watch the hormone and betas. Nobody gets in or out of the vaults. Only you and me. Then,” Yes, this was a good idea. “We’ll leak a report to Wood. To him specifically, not to GEM. Feed the fire. Let him know that there might be others out there trying to make clones. Fiona’s right about Wood; he’s a Boy Scout; he won’t rest if he thinks there’s something wrong.”
Jonathan’s voice was picking up: Yes, yes, this was going to work.
“And they can only make drome-type clones anyway, right? Because even if some rogue lab has all of the equipment and gets a sample from someone, it’ll be a physical duplicate of that person. They can’t drip memories like we do. Not in a rush. They’ll be mindless. And we can explain that away. Hell, we can offer to help GEM take them down!”
Ephraim didn’t get it, but he could hear the change in his brother’s voice and was nodding in kind. Jonathan looked over. Yes, maybe they could triage this mess. Maybe it’d be okay after all. Someone wanted to scapegoat Jonathan Todd? Fuck them; he’d scapegoat them right back.
“So it’s okay?” Ephraim asked.
“I don’t know. But yes. I think so.”
“And we don’t need to worry about the database thing Fiona mentioned?”
“I don’t know what she meant. But I don’t see how it would involve us.”
“Good,” Ephraim said. “Because that part of it gave me the chills.”
Jonathan stopped. “What part?”
Ephraim waved it away.
“No, tell me. What did Fiona say?”
Ephraim, now sheepish, said, “Fiona told me that she understood the temptation, but that fucking with the database would be a catastrophically bad idea. Not just for Eden, but for the world.”
Jonathan’s head cocked, thinking hard: What database?
“And she said,” Ephraim continued, “that we’d better keep our hands to ourselves — because some things were secret for a damn good reason.”
Chapter 18
Rogue Cloning
Kilik crouched behind the back of a long wooden desk in a dark room. For a few long seconds, he didn’t precisely remember how he’d arrived. It wasn’t amnesia or lost time; it was something different. Maybe hypnotism.
He remembered the car ride, parking, the long walk down the street without any streetlights, waiting for the window of time where someone had set a glitch in the security cameras, the door, and the hallway.
Those things were part of his memory, but it was as if he’d been above himself, watching it all, a wee bit curious. And now he was securely back in himself, looking out through his eyes rather than from above his body.
And yes, it was odd. Strange to be crouched here with his unusual friend.
“I want to take these off,” said the other man.
Kilik shook his head. “Leave them on. You will leave fingerprints.”
The gloves stayed on. Kilik found himself thinking of his own words and arguments. It was true that the other would leave fingerprints, but the reason that he mustn’t were only vaguely clear. That particular set of prints was allowed to be here, but forensics, GEM style, had gotten particularly good — and while the prints were allowed, two identical sets in the same span of time might raise suspicions.
The thought made Kilik raise his hands to look at his fingertips. He’d never had fingerprints; his tips were smooth like large erasers. That had never seemed strange before.
But shouldn’t it?
Most people had fingerprints. But Kilik remembered his childhood, a mention here or there that had made him okay with it.
Everyone’s different, Mama used to say. You don’t have to explain your differences to anyone.
Nobody had ever mentioned Kilik’s flat fingertips b
efore. He’d never had problems — not when he’d been in school and needed to be printed for his school’s “Every Kid Safe” initiative; not when he’d landed his last job in law enforcement. GEM didn’t require fingerprinting; it ran DNA typing when it took the requisite blood samples.
Except that Kilik wasn’t sure, thinking about it now, that he’d tried to get printed in school.
Or that Mama had said everyone’s different.
Or that he’d been to school.
Or had a Mama.
Crouched in the dark, he felt slightly drunk.
But he’d never had a drink nor any drugs.
The disorientation remained.
Hadn’t things always been like this?
“How much longer?”
“Any minute now. The receptionist said he’d leave it on Hershel’s desk.”
Because today was the big reelection rally. Everyone knew that Hershel was superstitious; he always dressed up when expecting press, especially when he needed to be at rallies, conventions, or meetups — any of that political bullshit. He always wore his grandfather’s cufflinks. Because they were lucky.
But they’d stopped being lucky today when Kilik had bumped into Hershel and removed one. That single cufflink was sitting across the desk that Kilik and his companion were crouched behind now. And Hershel was on his way to pick it up because he’d gotten a MyLife message from GEM’s receptionist telling him that he’d found it on the floor — but would leave it here because everyone knew that Hershel would never go to an important event without his lucky cuff links.
“My legs are cramping.”
Kilik looked around the office. The blinds were drawn and the door had no window. They could stand. There would be plenty of time to hide when Hershel arrived.
Although in a way, Wood was already there.
“Let me try the computer,” said the new Hershel Wood.
“You can’t access it until he’s gone.”
“Why?”
“It’s keyed to his MyLife. Computer access can’t be re-keyed to yours until it’s removed from his.”
“I want to access the database.”
Kilik looked at New Hershel. Something about the way he’d said that felt wrong. And, thinking it, for just a split second, Kilik had an odd sensation of doubling. Some contradiction he’d been blocking out became smack-you-in-the-face obvious.
In that split second, Kilik realized he’d brought a clone into this office to replace GEM’s director, and that the replacement desperately wanted to do its job — down to requesting it now, in the dark, before its term of service had even officially begun.
The clone should want to access the Gene Crypt; that’s why this was necessary. In many ways, the clone was meant to do what the old Hershel wouldn’t. But at the same time, the idea of “replacing” one Wood with another clanged on his mind. You couldn’t have a second without eliminating the first. And that’s when Kilik realized, fully and completely, that he was on the wrong side of whatever this was. That he was one of the bad guys.
But then the second passed, and the two sides stopped feeling like a contradiction. He simultaneously knew that New Wood was here to eclipse Old Wood and that GEM (including Kilik) was doing what was collectively best. If GEM and Kilik didn’t protect genetic freedom, who would?
“I’m a good man,” Kilik said aloud.
The clone looked at him like he had two heads.
“The database,” Wood’s clone repeated.
“You can’t access it from here. You know that. If that was all it took—”
“I want to try.”
“No.”
The new Hershel Wood looked for a moment like he might challenge Kilik, but then the expression turned into something like petulance. Its personality would solidify quickly once the original Wood was gone from the picture, but for now he had much of his original plasticity. This was a new kind of clone, fully autonomous once untethered. He couldn’t be whispered to or conditioned. Like …
… Like you, finished a voice inside his head.
But that was ridiculous. Kilik was his own man. Had been for however many years he’d been on the planet, without fingerprints and that mother he may or may not have had.
Focus.
And Kilik would need to focus, because until the tethers were removed, New Hershel had all the impulse control of a child. He didn’t fully understand his coming role because those functions hadn’t unlocked; he didn’t know how to sit still. He was already on the computer. About to turn it on.
“No.” Kilik gripped New Hershel’s wrist to stop him from touching anything, and at that moment there was a disturbing flash, slamming into his awareness like a series of strobes:
(you’re one of them you’re a copy you’re a killer you weren’t born you were raised from nothing and when this is over they’ll kill you too)
But then that was all gone too, and in its place was that same soothing voice, making things all better:
Take it easy. He needs you. Everyone needs you. You’re one of the good guys, Kilik.
“The system knows that Hershel Wood isn’t in the building. If his computer turns on now, it’ll leave a trail.”
The clone looked like it might shout or fight — Hershel Wood in rough cut, not entirely there yet — but its hard eyes acquiesced, its jaw rocking menacingly but eventually falling still. The clone seemed defective. Kilik understood (somehow, though he wasn’t sure how) that after Old Wood was gone, his copy would need to attend the political rally in his place. That’s why he was dressed so nicely, missing only his signature cufflinks. He’d be okay by then, his personality solidified. He was only temporarily a mess.
(You’re a killer, Kilik. You can’t do this job without being a killer.)
But the other voice soothed that troubling thought as well, distracting his attention now like diverting a baby’s gaze with jingling keys.
What’s that? On the desk.
An envelope below the big screen, sealed, unmarked.
On its front: Hershel Wood.
Kilik picked it up. Part of his mind understood that he’d leave no prints and that any other genetic evidence would be untraceable. His makers had done such complex disguise work, swapping one identity for an obscure other.
The envelope was sealed. No postmark, or return address. But it bore a scent that Kilik’s olfactory sense — superbly attuned, as if enhanced by the god who’d made him — easily found. Floral, tinged with sea salt.
This came from an island.
And the voice inside Kilik’s mind scrambled to make sense of that, eventually adding its own judgment, urgent in tone: Open it.
Kilik did. And saw that it was an official-looking document, either originally on paper or printed for effect. To Kilik’s eyes, it looked like a manifesto. Something leaked from Eden.
At the bottom, a hand-scribbled note: Possible rogue cloning operations.
The internal voice was silent while Kilik, using that other part of his mind, imagined the envelope’s journey. Born somewhere tropical. Put into an envelope, mailed across the sea inside of a larger envelope, possibly with other envelopes along for the ride. Ending up here, on the Director’s desk, half-veiled as the scantest of hints.
Rogue cloning?
But the inside voice told Kilik: Take it with you. Destroy it later.
Kilik slipped the envelope into his pants pocket and saw a flicker of light in the hallway outside Wood’s office, visible as a bright line around the door and audible as a series of electronic clicks. Someone was entering the building. The system was lighting the hall as a courtesy.
“Someone’s here,” said the clone.
Even as he was — even where they were, meant to do what they’d come to do — New Hershel’s tone was chilling. Deadpan without being neutral, like a starving man might mutter, “food.”
“It’s you,” Kilik explained. “It’s you who’s arrived.”
“But I’m already standing beside you.”
>
“That’s right. There’s been an error. Something we need to fix.”
New Hershel’s hands rose from his sides, forming ninety-degree angles. They opened and closed as if massaging the air.
“Not you,” Kilik said. “It has to be me.”
(Me for what?)
But the other part of Kilik’s mind understood fine. It just didn’t bother to communicate with the side holding his conscience. This would be simple because it was merely what came next.
Kilik did a job. Everyone had their job to do.
“Can I help?”
A pair of feet appeared in shadow beneath the door, blocking the light. The jangle of keys. Real keys, not key cards. Not a thumbprint ID. Keys, in this day and age. What better sign was there that GEM was in need of some new paint?
“Get down. Low, so he can’t see you,” Kilik said.
The clone obeyed, returning to a squat. He looked up, expectant. Perhaps eager. “Will there be blood?”
Kilik didn’t answer. He was flexing his fingers. There wouldn’t be blood; that’s why he couldn’t use the gun. But there couldn’t be a struggle, either; the convenient surveillance glitch would hide the activity but struggles left evidence. This had to be quick.
Fortunately, that had been considered already. Just as Kilik had an unusually strong sense of smell, he also had an unusually strong crush grip. Enough to rip phonebooks. Enough to shatter some vertebrae.
“Should I watch?” the clone asked.
Kilik’s hands flexed. His heart pounded. His mental dissonance retreated, doubts banished. Later, he might forget that all of this happened. He suspected he’d forgotten such things before.
The doorknob turned.
The door opened slowly as Kilik backed into the dark corner. Hershel would see him only when the lights came on and the door began to sigh closed.
And by then, it would be too late.
“I think I’d like to watch,” New Hershel whispered.
Chapter 19
Proper Experimental Protocol
They walked the grounds. Ephraim had wanted more from Papa, but he had to step away for an urgent call. Or so he said. Given the demonstration with the Coca-Cola room, Ephraim wondered if Papa was giving Ephraim another test to see what pushed his buttons.