by Rob Steiner
Right now, she felt like they were going to die of old age in this room.
Even Varo lay on the gel bed next to her, staring up at the ceiling with glazed eyes. He had not spoken in… She couldn’t remember.
Hours, days, weeks, months?
She couldn’t even feel a hum or vibration from the ship’s engines. They could be deep beneath the surface of a rocky planet for all she knew. The wall display above showed unchanging stars. The blue lights in the room and the corridor never changed.
But it was the complete silence that attacked her sanity.
She looked down at the remains of the Lucia golem. Its face and head were a pulpy mash of yellow fluids and biological circuitry similar to the innards of human-made golems. Was this more tech that came from the Muses?
Had humans ever made anything on their own?
Her growling stomach broke the silence, and she giggled. She glanced at Kaeso and Varo. Neither one looked at her.
“Come on, gentlemen,” she said, her voice sounding shrill even to her ears. “Let’s play a game. Let’s see whose stomach can growl the loudest. I just went first. Who’s next?”
Varo rolled onto his side, his back to her. “No thanks,” he murmured.
Kaeso only stared at the display.
“Fine, how about a flatulence contest?” When neither man responded, she said, “Belching?”
She shook her head. “I’m stuck in a room with the only two human males not interested in flatulence or belching. Are you men or what?”
Without turning around, Varo growled, “How about you shut your mouth?”
“Excuse me, pilot?” Ocella said slowly. “Watch how you address your centuriae.”
Varo sat up and faced her. “Sorry, Centuriae. How about you shut your mouth, Centuriae, sir, madam, my Lady? Is that better?”
Ocella stood. “Calm down, Varo. You’re losing your grip.”
He laughed. “You’re the one suggesting fart competitions, Centuriae. Who’s losing her grip, Centuriae?”
She knew Varo was right. Her juvenile suggestions proved it. And picking a fight with Varo wouldn’t help their situation. But she just wanted to feel something other than apathy.
Ocella strode to Varo, who stood up from his gel bed with his fists balled at his sides. She stood before him, nose-to-nose, and growled, “Stand down, pilot.”
“Eat my cac, Centuriae.”
She brought her knee up in a shot that should have connected with his groin. But he was ready for it and averted his body at the last second. Instead, her knee plunged into his abdomen. The air exploded from his lungs and he doubled over. It was not quite the location she had planned, but it would do.
“I said, stand down—”
Varo rammed his shoulder into her midsection. Both flew into the side of the gel bed on which Kaeso sat. Varo tried straddling her, but she kicked away from him before he could set himself. She tried to stand. His foot shot toward her legs. She jumped over his foot and then brought her elbow down on his face as he tried to tackle her again.
His nose crunched beneath her elbow. Varo howled as blood spurted from his nose. He fell onto his back. Ocella straddled him, then landed blow after blow on his forearms, which covered his face. She knew she was hurting him, but she couldn’t stop.
Hard, muscular arms looped through her arms and pulled her backwards. She screamed in protest, but Kaeso’s voice was deep and calm in her ear. “Enough,” he said.
His voice broke the spell she’d been under, and she slumped to the ground. She stared at the blood flowing from between Varo’s hands. He was shaking and sobbing.
“We’re going to die here,” he said between sobs. “We’re never getting out…”
Ocella pulled on the left sleeve of her jump suit near the seams. It ripped a little, so she pulled harder. Kaeso saw what she was doing and helped her pull the sleeve apart. It came loose with a loud tearing sound. She gathered the sleeve in a bunch and crawled over to Varo.
“I’m sorry, Varo,” she said, trying to pull his hands from his face. He let her do so. Blood and mucus flowed from his crooked nose, and he stared up at her through tear-filled eyes.
“We’re going to die here,” he repeated. “We’re going to die here...”
Ocella put the bunched up sleeve on Varo’s nose. “Sit up, Varo. You don’t want to choke on your blood.”
He meekly did as he was told, and leaned is back against his gel bed. “Better to end it now than wait forever.”
“Stop it,” Ocella said. She held the sleeve firmly against Varo’s nose. “We can’t think like that. Not ever. No matter how long they keep us here, we cannot think like that.”
If I could only follow my own orders…
Varo didn’t say anything. He leaned against the gel bed and took the sleeve from her hands. “I can take care of my own nose.”
Ocella nodded and then sat back. She brought her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. Kaeso was staring at her.
“Welcome back,” she said.
He averted his eyes. “Sorry. I don’t know what happened.”
“You watched your home world die.”
“You did, too. You didn’t lose your mind.”
She glanced at Varo. “Didn’t I?”
“Your hands are bleeding.”
She noticed her swollen and bleeding knuckles for the first time. They suddenly felt on fire, as if they’d been waiting for her to see them before producing pain. She tried flexing them, but they only hurt worse.
A loud, metallic clang echoed from the corridor outside the room. Ocella jerked her head around to the opening. Faint footsteps came from down the hall. She scrambled to her feet. Even Varo stood on his own after some struggle. She was heartened to see the self-pity had fled from his eyes, replaced with a hardness that his bloody face made even more menacing. Kaeso stared at the opening, his body in a defensive stance.
Ocella took on the same posture as Kaeso and Varo. They were not defeated yet.
The footsteps came closer and then stopped just outside.
A face peeked around the corner. It was human, a young woman with dark hair and—
Kaeso gasped. “Claudia!”
26
Claudia stepped from around the corner, her eyes wide. “Father?”
She issued a quick sob, then ran into the room and wrapped her arms around Kaeso. Kaeso stood wide-eyed, his arms at his sides.
“They just took me. Oh gods, I don’t know where my son and husband are…” Her words turned into unintelligible sobs.
Ocella stared transfixed at Kaeso’s daughter. How did they find her?
And how did she know Kaeso was her father? Umbra had surgically modified his face when he joined to make him unrecognizable to anyone who might have known him. Kaeso had briefly visited her six years ago, but he had done so under the guise of an old soldier friend of her father’s.
She shouldn’t be able to recognize him.
Cold dread swept through Ocella as she studied Claudia grasping Kaeso like a scared child. Ocella glanced at the Lucia-golem on the floor and then back to Claudia. It had not taken the aliens long to perfect the Lucia-golem…
Kaeso seemed to realize the same thing. His wide eyes slowly turned to Ocella. She had no idea what to say to him. Leaving Claudia was a wound that had never healed for him, and Ocella could only imagine how painful it must be to see her again like this.
Kaeso slowly grabbed Claudia’s arms and pried loose her embrace. He held her at arm’s length, his face muscles twitching. She stared up at him through confused, tearful eyes.
If Claudia was a golem, she was the most perfect golem ever made. The emotions, the tears, even the eyes. They were all indistinguishably human.
“What?” she asked.
Kaeso seemed incapable of speaking, so Ocella gently pulled Claudia away from him. He let his hands drop to his sides once she was out of reach and continued staring at the spot where she had stood.
“Claudia,
” Ocella said, “how did you get here?”
Claudia continued staring at Kaeso as she said, “I was home. Alone. Abram took Pullus to the market to buy dinner. I was in my studio listening to some recordings I made yesterday. Then the emergency sirens started up outside. I thought it was another drill. We’ve had a lot since the Roman siege, but they’re always scheduled. This was a surprise. I went to the window and saw…” She sucked in a quick breath, and her chin began to quiver. “I saw a black object hovering just above the ground in front of the house. Then these things jumped out—”
Claudia started crying again, so Ocella hugged her. Golems produced internal heat that was far warmer than a normal human. But Claudia felt the same as a real human.
“And then I was standing in front of this room,” she said when her sobs eased. “I don’t remember how I got here. Have you seen Abram and Pullus?”
“I’m sorry, we haven’t,” Ocella said. She studied Claudia’s eyes. Brown, just like Petra’s. Tears streamed from them, but they were nothing like the inhuman eyes the Lucia-golem had. Was this Claudia? Was this really Kaeso’s daughter and Ocella’s niece?
“Claudia, how do you know this is your father?”
Claudia looked at Kaeso, who continued standing where he was, his arms at his side and his gaze on the floor.
“He came to me six years ago,” she said. “Said he was a friend of my father’s. But I knew it was him from his eyes.”
“How?” Ocella asked.
“My son, Pullus, has the same eyes.”
“No!” Kaeso suddenly screamed. He turned to Claudia and pointed at her. “You are not real! They made you! They gave you Claudia’s memories and then threw you in here for whatever sick experiments they’re doing on us. YOU ARE NOT REAL!”
Claudia flinched backward as if Kaeso had struck her. But she recovered quickly, her pain turning to anger.
“So that’s it,” she snarled. “You’ve abandoned me before, so why not now? I spent the last six years searching for you, thinking you had good reasons for leaving me. Turns out you just never wanted me. You were a waste of time. Pathetic.”
Ocella watched Kaeso, wondering if he would do to Claudia what he did to the Lucia-golem. She didn’t know if she could stop him, but she would if he tried. The Claudia standing before them could be a real person, or it could be a golem. They didn’t know.
But Kaeso’s rage dissipated as quickly as it had struck. He laughed, but the mirth did not reach his eyes. He started clapping at the ceiling and yelled, “So you can make a better golem than we can. Well done!”
Claudia stared at him for several moments and then asked Ocella, “What’s wrong with him?”
Ocella pulled Claudia to one side of the room as Kaeso continued clapping. Varo glanced at Ocella and nodded at her unspoken order to watch Kaeso. Varo would not likely stop Kaeso from attacking, considering the wounds she had just inflicted on him, but he could sound a warning while Ocella talked to Claudia.
“There’s more going on here than you know,” Ocella said. “There’s more to him, than you can imagine.”
“What’s to imagine?” she said bitterly. “He pretended he was dead. It killed my grandparents. They both died within a year after he disappeared. He’s a selfish bastard. And apparently insane.”
“Perhaps we all are right now. But you need to know why he thinks you’re not real.”
Ocella quickly told Claudia how the vessel had used Lucia to create a golem that it then sent to them. Claudia stared in shock at the golem body on the floor, as if seeing it for the first time.
“He thinks I’m a golem?” she said. “I’m not a golem.”
Ocella tried to soften her words. “But we don’t know that.”
Claudia threw up her hands. “Well I don’t know how to convince you then. I remember everything about my life, at least as much as any normal person can. Golems don’t have personalities.”
“Not golems created by humans. That one on the floor came to us in different iterations, and each one was better than the last. Perhaps they perfected their techniques with you.”
Claudia’s lips started quivering again. “I am Claudia Abiff. My husband is Abram and my son is Pullus. I know who I am. I am not a golem.”
Ocella glanced at the remains of the Lucia golem, then back to Claudia. “That golem also had Lucia’s memories.”
Claudia had been on the verge of sobbing, but anger seemed to win out again. Her emotional swings were much like Kaeso’s used to be.
“In the last few minutes,” Claudia said through gritted teeth, “I’ve been kidnapped by aliens and imprisoned on their starship with my dead father. That’s enough to drive the sanity out of any person. Now you want me to believe that I’m not really me, that I’m a golem with the memories of—” She turned to Ocella. “How do you know you’re not a golem?” She raised her voice. “How do any of you?”
Ocella didn’t know what to say. How could she prove she wasn’t a golem?
She looked at Varo, his face still covered in dark red blood. At least his nose seemed to have stopped bleeding.
Ocella bit her lip. She looked from the yellow fluid of the Lucia-golem on the floor to Varo’s red blood.
“There is one way to tell,” she said. She explained her idea to Claudia, who flinched.
Claudia swallowed once and then asked, “Do you have a knife?”
“No,” Ocella said. She looked at Claudia’s fingernails. They were well manicured, painted purple, and longer than Ocella’s short nails, which were trimmed to the skin. “You have beautiful nails.”
Claudia looked at them and sighed. “I’ve nicked myself with them before. They’re certainly sharp enough.”
Ocella nodded. “I’ll go first.”
She held out her forearm, and Claudia asked, “Where do you want me to…um, do it?”
“Anywhere but an artery.” Ocella grinned, trying to put Claudia at ease, but the Liberti woman only looked pale.
I don’t know if she’s a “Liberti woman” yet.
Claudia took hold of Ocella’s forearm, then dragged the nail of her index finger over an inch-long stretch on the top. The nail barely broke the top layer of skin.
“Not deep enough,” Ocella said.
Claudia winced, then dug deeper.
A line of red drops welled up from the scratch. Claudia and Ocella looked at each other, and Claudia said, “Congratulations.”
They went to Kaeso, who by now had sat on the gel bed with his shoulders slumped. Ocella was about to explain her idea to him, but he simply held his forearm out to Claudia without looking at her. She grabbed his forearm with more force than she had with Ocella. Her cut went longer and deeper than Ocella’s and had no trouble drawing bright red blood.
Claudia looked at Ocella. “My turn.”
Without hesitating, Claudia drew her nail across her own forearm. It took many agonizing seconds for the bright yellow drops to well up along the cut. It was more viscous than human blood, for it did not drip down Claudia’s arm like the cuts she’d made on Ocella and Kaeso.
Claudia stared at her arm with a blank expression. Her mouth opened and closed. “I can’t— How—?”
Her legs gave out, and she fell backwards onto the floor before Ocella could catch her. She stared at her forearm and tried to push herself along the floor with her feet, as if she could get away from her own arm.
“This is a dream. I’m going to wake up any second now. Any second now…” When her back met the wall on the other side of the room, she stopped pushing and stared at her arm.
Behind Ocella, Kaeso wept quietly.
Varo approached Ocella. “Gods, every time I think this can’t get worse...”
“I’m sorry I lost control earlier.”
“I lost it, too, Centuriae. At least you woke me up.” He grinned. Though it made his bloody face more hideous, Ocella felt better knowing that Varo wasn’t gone like Kaeso and Claudia.
Claudia. It wasn’t Claudia sitt
ing in the corner. It was a golem, a biological machine constructed from the remains of the real Claudia, which the aliens had destroyed to assemble this one.
She could barely contain her rage at the aliens. They killed her niece! Ocella had not seen Claudia since she was a child, just before Ocella had ‘died’ to join Umbra. She remembered a precocious, talented, and beautiful little girl. She had followed Claudia’s singing career from afar and felt nothing but happiness that Claudia’s life had taken such a wonderful track.
It wasn’t fair that this woman had to die just because these godsdamned aliens wanted to experiment on Kaeso and Ocella. To create “witnesses”.
She had so many questions. How could they create this golem and make it so much like the original human? How did they even find her on a planet of three billion? Why did they create her in the first place and put her here?
But all those questions were irrelevant. The golem was here. They were here. The only question was what were they going to do? Were they going to sit around on the gel beds until they lost their minds?
Ocella glanced at the opening. It had not closed since they returned from their walk. Did the aliens want them to leave? Maybe so, and she was loath to do anything the aliens wanted. But sitting in this prison cell was slowly driving them all mad. If they left again, at least they would be moving. At least they would be doing something.
And if they were doing something, they might find a way to truly resist the aliens.
“We have to leave this room,” Ocella finally said.
Varo objected, “We tried that—”
“Then we try it again. It’s either that or we end up killing each other in here.”
He thought about it and then sighed. “Maybe we’ll find some ice for my nose.” His voice had taken on a nasal quality, and Ocella gave him a sympathetic smile.
He nodded to Kaeso and Claudia. “What about them?”
Kaeso had his head in his hands, and Claudia continued staring at the yellow golem blood on her arm. Ocella went to Kaeso, sat down next to him, and put an arm around his lower back.