Nebula Nights: Love Among The Stars

by Melisse Aires

  “Please, call me Solia. I didn’t know we were expecting guests.”

  Giancarlo was reluctant to shift his gaze from the stunning woman and lingered for longer than was appropriate, but couldn’t help notice the way Mol’s eyes widened and her lips curled in the direction of Marius. Oh, it was pretty damned clear who she thought the mole was. A little pot stirring might bring something else to the top.

  “Seems that the mother of one of your employees has been talking. There are rumors back at command of cloning, and OSA sent me here to investigate. I’m sure you know cloning privileges extend to certain medical entities and then only in regards to organs and appendages. Total-body cloning-”

  “Is the logical next step. I refuse to believe you’re so naive as to think it hasn’t been happening in private facilities around the star system. People have been doing it for years. And I’ll have you know, so there’s no confusion at all, no laws have been broken here.”

  “That’s what I aim to find out.”

  “You’re wasting your time. Laws forbid the creation of genetically identical human beings,” she said, unfolding her arms and resting her hands on her hips. “These were laws written by scientists for the protection of politicians. We have not made genetically identical human beings. What things we have copied, well, they weren’t properly human in the first place.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “We have made copies, yes, but not of humans. Perhaps a tour of our facilities will help clarify a few things.”

  “That’s mighty brazen of you.”

  But Mol shrugged it away. “All legal, brilliant loopholes.”

  “And you’ve somehow convinced yourself that I won’t report what I’ve seen here?”

  “Only if you hate progress. What’s the alternative? Earth is dying and our people are growing exponentially. As a matter of survival to save not just ourselves, but as much of original Earth as possible, we have to spread out. Even to little Enceladus. Someday this place will be able to hold four point five billion people, with room to grow for generations. Each family would have one thousand feet of space. And from here, who knows where? Don’t you think we deserve to give humanity a chance? Oh, wipe that look off your face. Have a little faith. Solia, get Lee up here and tell him to bring the cruiser. We’re going to show the sheriff the benefit our workers can provide to humanity.”

  Chapter Four

  Solia’s attempts to position herself near the dark lawman went unnoticed, though not unaided. By the darts Mol’s eyes shot to the back of Marius’s head, the boss didn’t want the computer analyst anywhere near Giancarlo. The woman pushed Marius into the front passenger seat beside her favorite security agent, Lee. Stuffed in the backseat were Solia, a still glaring Mol and, next to her, the first man she’d ever loved. She’d laughed at him once for wanting to be a hero. Now she needed one in the worst way.

  What were the odds he’d be the one to answer her call?

  Okay, pretty good. She had, after all, directed the message to his station.

  Solia started to peek around Mol, but turned away and bit her lip. It was hard not to stare. The years had been kind to him. Older, sure, but rougher and bigger too. Not for the first time, she wondered what her life would have been like if she’d married him instead of Thomas. Solia tried to make eye contact again, but it was tough going with Mol around and after several minutes, she leaned back in the seat and turned toward the window.

  She knew the precise moment he’d seen the clones. Five miles down the road, they reached some of the construction areas. Clone workers dressed in one-piece linen shifts dug trenches while humans worked alongside in heavy machinery.

  A shiver ran through Solia as Mol explained, “There are some areas the equipment can’t easily get to. Hence the clones. Terraforming and colony building is dangerous work. We can’t send people down there. Should the worst happen, how are we to explain to their families that clones could have been used instead, but ethics stood in the way? Where’s the morality in that? Never mind the money that can be saved in benefits and compensation.” Solia held her breath, hoping Giancarlo would say something, but the man kept his mouth shut. She’d give anything to see his face. Had his silence meant approval? What were the odds that she’d totally miscalculated the whole situation and he would allow torture for profit?

  No. Not her Gian.

  When Mol leaned back, Solia tried looking again, but the sheriff kept his face toward the opposite window. The only thing her effort earned her was a pair of rolling eyes from Mol. She returned the gesture, nodding toward the silent man.

  That produced a cringe-inducing chuckle from Mol. “Think about how much we’re reducing fuel use. Fuel that can be redirected elsewhere. If you’ll look over there—to the right—you’ll see construction on the future receiving center. With a faster acclimation rate than most of the other extra-Earth habitations, we can expect this place to fill up quickly. We’re already signing preliminary contracts for business unions and civilian interest is high when it comes to residential. Fresh air, readily available clean water—this can be the haven that Europa and Venus were for so many people. Imagine a place where a child can be born and take in deep gulps of air without threat of a hacking cough. I offer a new Eden.”

  Solia didn’t bother to mention the obvious, that the colonization teams on Europa and Venus had managed to accomplish that without slave labor. Mol’s voice went uninterrupted. The one-sided conversation was so obnoxiously and emphatically self-congratulatory that Solia considered punching the woman in the throat to end it then and there. Actually, it did present a good way to get off Enceladus. If she did that, Giancarlo would have to arrest her.

  “Now, if you’ve seen enough to satisfy your curiosity, Lee will turn us around up here and take us back to civilization.”

  “Keep going.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Keep. Going.”

  Solia bit back a smile. What she’d heard in two words sounded to her ears like equal parts disgust and outrage. The last time she’d heard that tone, a man was hobbling down the street, crying and attempting to hold a crushed jaw in place.

  Yep. Her hero had returned.

  “I mean to see this through.”

  “It’s more of the same really. We have building projects stretching out for miles in every direction. Um, turn around here Lee.”

  The car started to slow, but a kick to the back of Lee’s seat kept it pressing on. Giancarlo pulled out his omnitablet and raised a three-dimensional projection of the screen. “These are the blueprints you submitted, correct?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Thirty-eight miles east of here, you have a building that’s been coded for storage.”

  “So? What’s so important about a storage unit that we should be kept from lunch to see it,” she asked, twirling her hand above her head.

  The image rotated another seventy degrees. “You haven’t put any proper roads or electrical conduits heading out there. Nothing to regulate temperature, humidity—”

  “Done with terraforming.”

  “Lady, I keep my grandfather’s old beat-up car stored in better conditions on Earth, than whatever you’ve got out here.”

  “You care so much for axes and shovels? Anyway, we don’t have the electrical charge for that. This was meant for a quick trip, not some silly ghost-hunting expedition.”

  “Driver, do we have enough to make it there,” Giancarlo asked.

  The grunt from the front was less than enthused. “My name is Lee and yeah, but not all the way back.”

  “So go. We’ll call in a pickup for the return trip.” Giancarlo typed something on his omnitablet and cleared his throat. “Your assistance has already been duly noted. Now let’s keep moving, unless I need to send another amendment to this report?”

  Mol exhaled deeply and shook her head. “No, no. Fine. Go ahead, Lee, let’s get this over with. I’ve got nothing to hide.”

  The next fifteen minutes were cloaked in silence, interrup
ted by the brief swears of Giancarlo whenever they passed another construction site or saw a gang of clones. With each mile, her confidence that she’d done the right thing grew.

  “This is the part where you explain to me how this isn’t illegal.”

  “Ahh, we come back to those loopholes. And again, you can thank our politicians for that. These things you seem to care for aren’t human. We took human genes and changed them up a bit.”

  Giancarlo’s grip on his omnitablet went white at the knuckles. “How can you say that with a note of triumph in your voice?”

  “Because it’s a modern damned miracle. You can’t deny it. They have no desires, no wishes. In short, we’ve removed the essence of humanity. Our previous doctor, rest his soul, was a bit of genius. He increased their… uh… Dr. Calian?”

  “He enlarged their primary motor cortex. That’s what increased these people’s physical abilities to—”

  Mol’s fingers snapped close enough to brush her nose. “Genetically modified workers, Solia. GMWs—that’s the proper phrase, not people. Go ahead.”

  Solia rolled her eyes, not giving a single damn who saw what at this point. “Right, well, they made them stronger, faster and with super motor function. The occipital and temporal lobes have all been severely damaged, making them mindless slaves.”

  “Tools,” corrected a glaring Mol. “And because of those very slight modifications, they don’t know the difference. So even if we were doing something untoward, what harm does it do if they can’t figure it out?”

  But Solia wasn’t finished. “They nearly ripped out the frontal lobe and that causes—”

  “Whose side are you on, Doctor? Don’t forget that you’re our lead physician here.”

  “I had no part in any of that and—”

  Lee interrupted them both with a low-voiced, “We’re here,” before drifting back into silence. Marius sank lower into his chair and even Mol’s face lost its flare.

  Solia turned to get out, but Mol caught her hand before she could push open the door. “Look, this is where we keep the…uh…the rest. Sometimes things don’t always go as planned. Go on and get your curiosity sated. I’ll be right here waiting. Just have to make a call.”

  Giancarlo hopped out first, followed by Marius, quick on his heels. Solia stepped out soon after, but not before hearing Mol ask, “Has the situation been cleared up,” as the door closed behind her.

  She turned and all thoughts of Mol evaporated when she came face-to-face with one of the housing units, or better worded, storage boxes for the clones.

  Sounds of disbelief were the only things coming from the man ahead of her. He kept one hand on the old-school percussive Earth firearm at his side while the other held his omnitablet.

  The sight before them was far worse than what she’d seen back at the main facility. Here, someone had stuffed them in four cages with only inches to spare between bodies. Some clones slouched, others leaned on bars. Few had room to lie down. The overwhelming majority stood, their faces following their every move. Her eyes watered at the stench.

  “What have you done,” asked the owner of the hand tightening on her shoulder.

  “I swear I wasn’t here for this. I definitely don’t condone it,” she hissed back at Giancarlo. “Who do you think called you?”

  Relief swept through her as some of the tightness in Giancarlo’s face relaxed. Odd, but she didn’t like the idea of disappointing this man, and for her own part, she was glad he shared her outrage.

  “Solia—”

  “I knew you’d come. Now comm someone and get us out of here.”

  Marius’s coughing approach cut off anything else she had to say. “For what it’s worth, Mol is legally in the black. Even if you bring this forward, and I’m sure you will, what’ll happen, huh? They’ll spend years getting a new law written and agreed on by all the Earth League Nations. Even then, she’ll get nothing. They can’t retroactively punish her.”

  Giancarlo lurched forward, nose to nose with Marius. “And that’s why you sat on your ass doing nothing?”

  The computer analyst pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. He wiped sweat from his balding head and stepped back. “All employees, as far as I know, signed airtight contracts with financially crippling penalties if we disclose anything we’ve seen here.”

  “Marius, did you know I sent that message out?”

  He didn’t answer.

  Giancarlo threw up his hands at the both of them and went back to the four holding units. “Their eyes, you can see they understand.”

  “Basic commands,” said Marius.

  “They can understand they aren’t free. You don’t need to be a genius for that. A chained dog would know it. I’m calling this in right now.”

  “I’d hold off on that if I were you.” Marius’s voice trembled and he looked over his shoulder. “Mol and Lee are coming. And the last doctor didn’t exactly die of old age.”

  Chapter Five

  Giancarlo didn’t give a Martian rat’s ass about Mol or her security chief, only Solia and those…things. She might have been dumb enough to leave him then, but he wouldn’t abandon her now.

  He dialed out for backup, but couldn’t catch a signal. Even holding the omnitablet up to the sky didn’t help. Someone shuffled behind him and his eyes watered at the accompanying heavy perfume. “Yes, Ms. McDermott?”

  “Good luck getting a connection. My call was cut off in the cruiser. There’s an electrical dust storm headed this way. Happy? It’s already hit the main facility and thanks to you, we’ll have to wait for everything to recharge before they can send someone to get us. Appreciate that.”

  “Your lapdog informs me that no matter what I say, you’ll get off scot-free. I imagine you counted on that.”

  Mol gave a slow shrug and raised her hands, palms up.

  “Whatever. What do you have around here for shelter?”

  “Guess you should have thought about that before you dragged us out here.”

  He jerked a thumb toward the clones behind him. “Let me rephrase and I’ll do it very slowly. Where do you put them when these storms pop up?”

  “We need to get in the car and use the little power we have left to—”

  “I asked you a question.”

  Mol shrugged and he supposed he was meant to take that as an answer. Not good enough. “Lady, if you’re telling me that you leave these people out there to suffer—”

  “For the thousandth time, they are not people!”

  He’d kill her. If she said one more thing, he would lay her out right here. Giancarlo glanced back at the caged bodies and, sure enough, he could just make out the thin, crisscross scars, evidence of having been caught in the cutting sand before. He turned away, trying to focus on finding some way to minimize their suffering. “If it’s already hit the facility, that means it’s coming from that direction over there. If we move the cruiser here, we can at lease shield some of the ones in these two crates from the sand.”

  Solia nodded, watching the horizon. “We only have a few minutes—things move faster here than on any other moon. We can take shelter inside the cruiser but as for them… well… I suppose it’ll be better than the last time they went through a storm.”

  “The only other person with some sense around here.” Giancarlo held out his hands and barked for Lee to toss over the keys.

  When nothing happened, Giancarlo drew out a string of swears and cracked his neck. “I’m not normally a man for violence before lunch, but I’m in the mood. We can do this now and get caught in the storm or finish our discussion later.”

  The keys clinked at his feet. Giancarlo shot the older man a look and flexed his hands, ignoring the keys altogether.

  “I hate to interrupt the chest-beating, but whatever you intend to do needs to happen soon,” Solia whispered behind them.

  Towering rolling clouds of white, tan, and brown loomed threateningly to their left. No matter how they looked, nothing of them would feel light and fluff
y. He sprinted for the car and had it positioned within a couple of minutes. For good measure, he wrapped his tunic around the steering wheel. It wouldn’t offer much protection to his chest if the winds picked them up, but something was better than nothing. Half a second later, the doors of the cruiser opened, then slammed, as everyone scrambled inside for safety.

  No, not everyone.

  Giancarlo whispered a prayer for the souls outside, then braced himself as the first of the winds began to rock the vehicle.

  Chapter Six

  Solia blinked away tears. “My medical kit… if I had it… I just didn’t think to bring it.” Her chest tightened as she looked at the people, bloodied from the razor-like grains of sand.

  “We’ll fix this.” Giancarlo’s voice was low but strong, and she took the comfort it provided along with the warm hand on her back.

  “I’m sorry I waited this long.”

  “You did the best you could. I’m proud of you. I’m sure what’s his name is going to be too. Now come on, get off your feet awhile.”

  She countered that with something halfway between a sob and a chuckle. “You know full well what his name is. What you may be less aware of is that we separated three years ago. The divorce was finalized a while back. I suppose that makes you happy.”

  “Never wanted to see you sad, Solia. You left me, remember?”

  “I didn’t leave. I just…well…I was at med school and you were in OSA training and I guess I got-”

  “Uppity?”

  “I was shooting for ‘too focused.’”

  “Hmm. Okay.”

  They’d separated into groups while waiting for pickup. Mol’s fingers danced through the air while she spoke to Lee. Although her boss’s voice was impossible to hear, she’d contorted her otherwise attractive face into the worst of looks. Only the top of Lee’s head could be seen, but the graying blond nodded in time to whatever Mol was saying. Then there was Marius, who paced around the cages, one hand on his hip, the other over his mouth.

  “Do I even want to know what he’s thinking?”