by Greg Krojac
“You can’t go on like this Michelle. I know something is eating you up inside.”
“I’m fine, really.”
“You’re anything but fine, Mitch. I know you. Better than perhaps even your own family.”
“It’s nothing. I’ll be alright.”
“When? Tomorrow? The next day? A month, a year? You’ve been back from wherever you went for a week now. You’re not you. You’re not my Michelle, my Mitch.”
“But what am I supposed to do? Yes, something is troubling me, but I can’t share it with anyone – not even you.”
“If you don’t you’ll go crazy, and that won’t do anyone any good. The resistance needs you. I need you.”
Tears started to form in Michelle’s eyes.
“But I can’t tell you. I can’t tell anybody. It’s my problem and I have to deal with it myself. Me. Just me.”
Danielle couldn’t bear to see Michelle crying like this. Michelle didn’t cry. Michelle was tough. Danielle knew the softer side of Michelle too, but this wasn’t the Michelle that she knew and loved. She had to do something.
“I have to pop out for an hour or so. I have a quick errand to run. Will you be alright?”
“I’m not going to do anything stupid if that’s what you mean. You go. I’ll still be here when you get back.”
Ten minutes later Michelle’s phone rang. She didn’t really feel like taking any calls but when she saw that it was her sister Caitlin calling her, she relented.
“Hi, Cait. What can I do you for?”
“Meet me round mum and dad’s now. No ifs. No buts. I’ll meet you there in ten minutes. Fifteen tops. Bye.”
Michelle thought she’d better do as her little sister said – it sounded urgent.
***
She walked into her parents’ house just after midday to find Caitlin, Maurice, and Karen waiting for her. Her dad spoke first.
“In the old days they’d call this an intervention, but what it is, really, it’s a mother, father, and sister who are worried about you. You’ve something on your mind, something that you’re keeping to yourself. I know that you probably feel that you can’t tell anyone but it’s not going to do your health any good to let it fester. The house is secure. Adam has seen to that. Anything you say can’t be overheard by anybody. Anybody at all. You know how paranoid I’ve always been about being bugged? And how I’ve always taken precautions?”
“Yes, but I always just thought you were a bit paranoid.”
“Anything you say here is strictly confidential. You know that. It’s safe to talk with us, your family. We just want to help you. We love you.”
“I don’t know. It’s my problem. I’ve got to deal with it.”
Karen took her daughter’s hands.
“But you’re not dealing with it, Mitch. It’s eating you up inside. You’ve got to tell us what’s going on. Better out than in. You know you can trust us.”
“Of course I do. But…”
“No buts. Caitlin and your dad and I, we’re here for you. We always will be. Use us. Please.”
Michelle sat on the sofa next to her sister.
“Ok. Sit down. I’ll tell you everything. But you can’t breathe a word to anyone.”
Karen quickly rushed out to the kitchen and returned with a tray holding four mugs of steaming hot tea.
“Everything is always better with a nice cup of tea.”
“Oh mum, you’re such a…”
“I’m such a mum. I know. I’ll never change.”
Michelle took a deep breath.
“I have a problem. A crisis of conscience really. I know something that hardly anyone else knows but it’s something so big that it will affect millions of people.”
Caitlin took a sip of her tea.
“Go on Michelle.”
“Well, you know that One Life’s dream is to create a world where people don’t have past life recall?
Nobody answered but nobody needed to. They were well aware of the vision of the resistance movement; they were all involved in one way or another.
“And you know that when Recarns are reincarnated they recall PLMs and – if they’re not good people – they can and do use these memories to their advantage. Well, One Life is developing a virus that will remove Recarns’ PLMs.”
Maurice decided to ask the questions that obviously needed answers.
“Will it kill people who are Recarns?”
“No. They’ll just lose their PLMs.”
“Will they be harmed in any way?”
“No. They can continue living their lives.”
“Then I fail to see the problem.”
“It’s biological warfare, dad. That’s the problem. It’s wrong.”
“But the aim is not to hurt or kill anyone. Correct?”
“Correct.”
“Would you agree that the eradication of disease a good thing?”
Michelle could see where her father was going with this train of thought.
“Of course.”
“Vaccinations are a good thing?”
“Yes. Of course.”
“But vaccinations are a form of biological warfare.”
“Not against humans.”
“You said that Recarns won’t be harmed.”
“Yes. They won’t be harmed.”
“I still don’t really see what the problem is. The measures to be taken are for the good of all humanity. We’ll be free from Illuminati rule that much quicker.”
“But that’s the easy part. The virus that’ll be used to remove the past life memories is being tested on clones.”
“Can the virus not be tested on humans?”
“That would be ethically wrong.”
“Is testing on clones ethically wrong?”
“I think so, yes.”
“Why?”
“The First Article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that even if clones aren't born the typical way, they are still created ‘born’ and still deserve the same rights as us.”
“I agree. In principle, I agree. But I have another question. A baby conceived in the conventional way…”
“Conventional, as in through sex?”
“Yes. A baby conceived in the conventional way, is it born with a reasonable expectation of human rights being applied to it?”
“Yes. I suppose it is.”
“And a baby conceived through IVF, is it born with a reasonable expectation of human rights being applied to it?”
‘Yes. Just like any other baby.”
This was a strange experience for Michelle. She had never seen her father analyse a problem in such a logical manner before. He’d always seemed an emotional man. Maurice continued his train of thought.
“A clone created through stem cell donation, is it born with a reasonable expectation of human rights being applied to it?”
“I don’t know.”
“I think it’s an important question. IVF and natural babies are born to parents that, on the whole, want them. They are born into families that will love and provide for them. They’re children. Of course, unfortunately sometimes their futures don’t live up to expectations.”
“Your point is?”
“These clones can have no expectations. Under present circumstances, they won’t be raised by a loving family.”
“But they have souls…”
“They have souls, yes, but they have no life experience. Even if they die during these experiments – which seem to be necessary to save humanity from slavery or worse – is their soul destroyed?”
“No. They’ll be reincarnated.”
“The alternative. What is it?”
“How do you mean?”
“The future of humanity. If nothing is done, what’s the future of humanity?”
“More of the same, I guess.”
“And what is the same?”
“Oppression, atrocities, murder, pain, injustice, despair…”
“Hopelessness?”<
br />
“Yes.”
“Is this a future you want for humanity?”
“No.”
“Then you have no choice but to accept the use of clones for experimentation, do you?”
“I guess not. But I don’t like it.”
“You don’t need to like it. I don’t like it either. But the objective of this process is a pure one, one that’ll change society, change the world for the better. Better for us, and certainly better for our children. Would you agree?”
“Yes, but the clones?”
“We’re prisoners of circumstances, and those circumstances are those under which we suffer at the moment. The day may come when clones may be welcomed into families, into society as equal to natural humans. It’s a nice thought but we’re not there yet. If that day arrives, then that’s when we can give clones equal human rights. Until then, we’re subject to other forces and must take those other forces into consideration when making up our minds about how we feel. Our sense of empathy makes us feel that using clones as guinea-pigs is wrong. They look like us, they feel like us, they sound like us. But they aren’t us. Not yet, anyway.”
Michelle listened intently.
“Are you sure you’re my dad and not some clone?
Maurice was surprising himself with his strand of logic.
“If I am a clone, I’m not doing a very good job of protecting my kind, am I?”
Michelle looked at her father in awe as he sipped his tea.
“But remember what the alternative would be. Do you want your children, your children’s children, to live in the same world, to fight the same fight that you are fighting? Or do you want better for them?”
“I want them to have a better life. Of course.”
“Then remember that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.”
Michelle remembered what her father had said to her all those years ago. She could see things more clearly in her mind now. She didn’t have to like One Life’s plan but she did need to accept it. And the alternative was far worse. Sometimes a person has to decide son which side of history she wanted to be and Michelle wanted to be on the correct side. She went over to her father and gave him the biggest hug that she had ever given him in her life.
“Thanks, dad.”
“Just doing my job.”
Danielle was waiting for Michelle when she arrived home.
“Feeling any better?”
“Much better thanks, Dani. For a while there I felt like I was carrying the world on my shoulders.”
“And now?”
“I still don’t like what’s happening but I can accept it. I can live with it and, more importantly, I believe I can live with myself for knowing about it.”
“Well, I don’t know what’s going on and I have no wish to know. You’ll tell me if and when you want me to know. I can live with that.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
05:49 SUNDAY 29 OCTOBER 2079
It was ten years to the day since the Massacre of the Innocents, when Marcus Gallagher callously murdered thousands of Recarn children as a reprisal against a group of Recarn children who had stolen the capsule that incarcerated the soul of Adam Wieshaupt, the founder of the Illuminati. Marcus’s anger and vengeance that day led to an atrocity the like of which had never been witnessed previously, executing any Recarn between the ages of eight and ten years old, hoping to have trapped the guilty parties in his net. The incident had horrified the population and a massive outpouring of grief from both Recarns and non-Recarns led to demands for the day never to be forgotten. The day was assigned the status of a national day of remembrance, with humanitarian memorial services taking place all over the country.
The previous thirty-one months had been normal, if ‘normal’ means ongoing terrorist attacks from One Life. Sabotage and the occasional destruction of some elements of the ONP infrastructure were considered acceptable losses by the Illuminati. Simultaneous international attacks were frequent, a slight increase in terrorist activity was to be expected. The only way to remove the threat of rebellion was to completely destroy the rebels, leaving not one standing. But the Illuminati knew that this was an impossibility and, as long as no major confrontational onslaught occurred, they were happy to tolerate the inconvenience and casualties that One Life inflicted. The position and power of the Illuminati was still strong; One Life could try with all their might but the Organisation would survive with barely a scratch.
While individual Illuminati resources were kept busy repelling One Life attacks, back on the island hundreds of clones were being sacrificed to further the cause of Recarn PLM eradication. Stem cell donation was not a problem; One Life had a large number of Recarns in its ranks who were sympathetic to the cause and found their past life memories to be a burden rather than a gift. They were only too happy to donate if it meant that their curse would be lifted.
The city of Anchorage in Alaska, U.S.A. was renowned for having clear, clean, unpolluted water and had benefited from such high quality water for many decades, since the 1940s when the Anchorage Water and Wastewater Utility constructed a wood-stave water main to carry water to urban Anchorage. Nearby Eklutna Lake and Ship Creek had provided the city and the surrounding area of Chugiak-Eagle River, Peters Creek, Eklutna, and Girdwood with clean healthy water for over one hundred and fifty years. It was a benchmark for the water industry set against a backdrop of mountains, natural streams, and clean air.
It was a cruel irony that it became Ground Zero for the Final Solution. At 6 am local time, a group of shadowy figures arrived at the predesignated virus introduction sites. They carried with them fishing equipment but fishing was the last thing on their minds. Their tackle boxes contained not bait, spare rod components and snacks, but vials of the highly virulent strain of the FS2910 virus.
It was still dark - the sun wasn’t due to rise for another three and a half hours - but the sight of a couple of anglers heading to the lakeshore carrying a lightweight canoe above their heads wasn’t something that would have attracted attention. Peter Gibson, a local motor mechanic and his brother-in-law Richard Rodgers, a lawyer, settled the canoe on the surface of the water and climbed aboard. They paddled to the centre of the lake, the boat bobbing in the early morning breeze and Peter opened his cool box, took out the top tray that contained spare hooks, floats, a pair of pliers, a torch, and other sundry items that a fisherman might need and scanned the rows of vials that were tucked inside. Richard stroked the water gently with his paddle.
“Getting cold feet, Pete?”
“Nope. Just imagining that during the next twenty-four hours this scene is going to be reproduced thousands of times across the globe. There’s not a single waterway that’s gonna to be left uninfected anywhere. It’s a mammoth task.”
Richard took out two vials.
“And it goes against the grain to deliberately pollute such a place of natural beauty, but it’s gotta be done if we’re gonna stop them Recarns.”
He took the caps off the ampoules and gave a final once-over to the contents, a clear harmless looking liquid with no signs that the fluid harboured the microorganisms that would change mankind’s future and return the uniqueness and sanctity of life. Holding the vial horizontally over the water, but not allowing the contents to pour out, he looked at his brother-in-law.
“Ready? Shall we do a countdown?”
“I dunno about a countdown, but maybe we should say something profound, y’know, like Neil Armstrong when he first stepped on the moon’s surface.”
“I know just what to say.”
“Is it deep?”
“Hell yeah. It’s deep.”
“Go for it, bro.”
Richard tipped up the glass tubes and watched the liquid and its payload pour into the clear water of the lake. It would become a shimmering turquoise mirror later on but at the moment it was just a giant dark pool. Richard cleared his throat and uttered the immortal words.
“Fuck you Recarns.”
CHAPTE
R TWELVE
19:30 WEDNESDAY 24 MARCH 2084
In a small restaurant on Deokjeokdo, a beautiful small island of delightful beaches and shaded pine forests off the north-west coast of South Korea, Ki Hwa Ye was celebrating her seventh birthday. Ki Hwa’s mother, In Hwa, and her father, Gil Soo, had owned the restaurant for over ten years and family birthdays had been celebrated there every year. As well as her parents, her ten year old brother, Joon Hyeong, and her younger sister, three year old Soo Won, were looking forward to the party. All her aunts, uncles, cousins, and - of course - her grandparents were there, eagerly looking forward to the traditional birthday meal of freshly prepared miyuk gook (seaweed soup), jaengban gooksu (soba noodle salad), and galbi (grilled short ribs). The adults were laughing, swapping tales of what the island’s tourists had got up to recently, and the children were doing what children all over the world often do at such events – running around between tables playing tag. However, once the food arrived they broke off their playing and sat at the table, ready to play the part of model diners. The promise of a visit to MacDonald’s the next time the family visited Seoul had seen to that.
The scene inside Ki Hwa’s mind was vastly different. Inside the memory cortex of her brain, there was a battle going on; a battle that the memories of Simon Jones, Jake Griffiths, Thomas McCall, Marcus Gallagher, Liam Hillary, and all Ki Hwa’s previous incarnations were never going to win. Previously past life memories had merged with their host’s present day memories seamlessly; the path from where the past life memory was stored gave easy and free passage to her day-to-day memory. But now it was as if a heavy metal door had been welded shut creating a vacuum seal that nothing could pass. The FS virus had done its job admirably. Her past life memories were trapped in the recesses of her mind for eternity.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
07:30 MONDAY 7 NOVEMBER 2089
In a remote building in the East End of London, a group of figures sat chatting around a large table. At least it looked like a large table, but it was actually six smaller tables pushed together, for this was no company boardroom. The room had never seen a company budget ratified, a merger planned, or an export contract signed; it had, however, seen fashion shoots and music videos created. But that was a long time ago. The most activity it had seen in recent years was the occasional homeless person squatting for a few days. It certainly wasn’t the type of venue that you would associate with the conversation that was about to follow. The outside world was hidden by blackout curtains, and all smartphones and comms devices had had their batteries removed and been placed inside a lead lined box, to be returned once the meeting was over. The box was kept under armed guard. The participants had taken great care to ensure that their movements had been unseen, taking various methods of public transport – something that they would never normally do – in order to ensure that the meeting remained a secret.
