by Elle E. Ire
“Are you all right?” I ask, moving to her side.
“Light-headed,” she explains. “Need something to eat and drink.” She glances down at her naked body, then at the wet lump of clothing in the corner. “And some better clothing. And a shower. Not necessarily in that order.”
“You sit. I’ll get what you need.” I push her into the armchair despite her weak protests and head off to the sleeping quarters, where I grab Vick a set of gray coveralls identical to the ones I’ve been wearing during daytime hours and a pair of those white booties scientists wear in labs. All of this I toss into the lounge to land in her lap. “Grab a shower while I heat up something rich in protein for you.”
She nods, and I trust her to not topple over while I cross the corridor to the food preparation area. In there I heat up some canned chicken noodle soup, pull crackers from a storage tin, and remove a large bottle of water from the cooling unit. I arrange it all on a tray I find in a cabinet and return to the lounge just as she’s coming down the corridor fully dressed, rubbing her hair with a towel.
Vick ties back her long hair and sinks onto the couch with a tired sigh. I place the tray with her portion in her lap, then take a small dish of crackers for myself and sit in the armchair.
“We should have fed you last night,” I say, guilty that we chose pleasure over her health.
She waves her hand in a dismissive gesture. “I’m fine. It’s what we need to do now that worries me. The body needs to be burned, and anything left should be buried, along with the original implants. It’s not especially difficult. I’m just, well, it’s all a little—”
“Weird?” I say, watching her closely. I can’t imagine what this will be like, viewing her own corpse, reliving her own death. Her discomfort registers to me in shades of brownish green.
“Yeah, that’s an understatement.”
“Out of curiosity, how many yous are there?”
“I don’t know,” she admits. “There were a lot of sealed rooms. Each one could hold another clone, or it could house a different experiment entirely. I asked VC1. She said she wasn’t permitted to tell me if there are more or not. The rationale is that the research team doesn’t want me to think I’m invincible and take excessive risks. Apparently, I’m very expensive.” Vick offers a wry grin. “Really, they didn’t need to worry about that. Dying is extremely unpleasant. It’s not something I’m in a hurry to keep repeating, even if I do know I’ll come back.”
“What’s it like?” I ask, then wince at my insensitivity. My curiosity is getting the better of me.
Her expression sobers. Her eyes take on a haunted emptiness. Her face goes ashen.
“Vick, I’m sorry. You don’t—”
“It’s cold,” she says. “And dark. And empty. In the shuttleport in North Carolina and on the yacht I felt it coming. I had time to know I was nearing the end. In the courtroom, though, when you recited my shutdown code, one second I was thinking. The next, I just stopped.” She shudders, the soup sloshing around in its bowl. “Then, nothing at all. I remember more about the moment of my death from the airlock accident, the events that led up to it, and the pain and fear. I remember being alone because the others were already dead. I wish VC1 had sent that memory elsewhere, wherever she sent those connected to the Rodwell incident.”
I don’t want to lengthen this dark conversation, but I ask one more. “Where did those memories go?”
Vick shrugs. “I don’t know. And I’m not sure she does either. She just said she detected an active data storage unit capable of housing them, so she siphoned the worst of them off. She didn’t want to destroy them because she wasn’t certain I wouldn’t want access to them again someday, though now she says she’s lost contact with the system where she placed them, so I guess it’s a moot point.” Her hand trembles when she brings the next spoonful to her mouth. She gives up and lifts the bowl with two hands, finishing the last of her soup.
“Okay,” she says, standing and brushing the cracker crumbs from her lap. “Let’s do this.”
Chapter 51: Vick—Looking Death in the Face
I AM disturbed.
VC1 advises us that there’s a break in the almost perpetual storms for the next few hours, so I dig a pair of work boots out of a maintenance closet and toss Kelly a pair for herself. We set out to gather wood first. It’s all soaked through, but that doesn’t matter. My laser pistol from the shuttle will still ignite it if I set it hot enough. Then, using shovels also from the maintenance closet, we dig a shallow grave for whatever doesn’t burn off and for the implants. This we hide just past the tree line where the freshly disturbed earth won’t be noticeable by the rescue party.
It’s midday when these tasks are complete, so we take a quick break to fortify ourselves with energy drinks from the scientists’ stash. VC1 assures me that the high sugar and vitamin C content will help with my tiredness and lethargic mood, but I don’t think those have to do with my body chemistry.
When we reach the base of the still lowered entry ramp to the yacht, I freeze.
“I’d offer to do this for you,” Kelly says beside me, “but I’m not strong enough to lift… you… and I’m not sure I can keep it together if I see you that way again, especially if you’re not alive beside me.”
I nod. Even in my weakened condition, I’m stronger than she is, and VC1 can draw on my reserves to enhance my strength for the time it will take to move the body to the funeral pyre we’ve built.
You can do this, VC1 says in my head. I will help you.
“Wait here,” I say. “Go back in the research station if it gets to be too much.” Without another word, I put one foot in front of the other and board the crashed yacht.
The smell hits me first. Life support ceased functioning during the crash. It’s hot and humid, and the body… my body… has begun to decay at an alarmingly fast rate.
The ship is dark and silent, the power having automatically shut down when all life forms left the vessel, one way or another. I move along the corridor to the cockpit, my footfalls impossibly loud and echoing off the metal interior. The hatch to the forward compartment is open.
When I step into the cockpit, I cover my mouth and nose with one hand. I haven’t even looked at the body yet and I’m already gagging, then vomiting the energy drink in a reddish-gold puddle behind the copilot’s empty seat.
Oh, this is going well.
Brace yourself, VC1 warns.
I turn toward the pilot’s chair. No warning could have prepared me for the sight of my own corpse. I felt the damage. I knew how bad it was. But actually seeing it is something else altogether.
The visible skin is covered in red, angry burns and blisters beginning to blacken around the edges. I’m slumped to the side in the seat, and my eyes are closed, thank God, but my own breath is coming in quick, shallow gasps as I mentally relive the lightning strike, impact, and pain.
I can’t, I say, stepping away to grab a breath of marginally clearer air outside the cockpit hatch. I can’t do this. I’ll black out. I can’t.
I can.
I blink, realizing what the AI is offering. I can give her control. She can take care of my remains and then….
You will put me back in charge, right? Earned or not, it’s a fear I’ve always had about VC1, that she will like controlling me so much she refuses to let go.
You have my word. We work better that way.
Without further discussion, I release my grip on my sense of self, turning everything over to her. VC1 arranges my consciousness so that I don’t even have to watch the process through my manufactured eyes. Instead, she blocks off my access to the outside world entirely. I see nothing, hear nothing, smell nothing, and feel nothing.
I will remember nothing of this event.
It’s frightening, being completely cut off, and I have no sense of the passage of time, but I think, for the sake of my sanity, this was the right course of action.
When I return to myself and retake control of my functio
ns, I’m standing beside a much smaller funeral pyre, the wood mostly ash, some remnants of bone and metal all that are recognizable of the person I once was.
It still turns my stomach, but I swallow it down and steel myself.
Kelly stands beside me, her hand lightly holding my elbow. She turns to me. “Welcome back,” she says. She must have sensed the resurgence in my emotions through our bond.
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t handle it. I didn’t mean to leave you alone, but I couldn’t think of another way. Did you… watch?”
She shakes her head and nods toward the pair of duffel bags beside her and a pile of my tactical combat gear VC1 must have stripped off the corpse. “I spent my time gathering everything we might need. VC1 handled the rest. When I came back she’d already lit the fire, prepared the body, sealed it in a medical bag from the lab, and made sure it was taken care of.”
“I still should have been here for you.”
She puts her arms around me and holds me close. “You are here for me. That’s all that matters. Let’s finish this.”
Together we retrieve a second storage bag from the facility and use the shovels to scoop the minimal remains and implants into it. I seal the bag, take it to the makeshift grave, and cover it over with soft earth. VC1 deals with any sensor recordings from the yacht that might suggest my demise.
As far as anyone else will ever know, we both survived the crash.
It’s raining again when we scatter the remnants of the bonfire across the meadow so it’s not noticeable to the rescue crew. I run the combat gear through a lab sterilizer specifically designed for cleansing clothing and equipment and put it on. When I slip my pistols into my thigh and back holsters and store a knife in each boot, I finally feel like myself again.
Kelly changes out of her lab wear in favor of her own resort clothing retrieved from the yacht, and we’re good to go by the time the heavily shielded rescue ship lands in the clearing beside the wreck.
I don’t expect it when Lyle and Alex stride down the ramp from the ship, but they explain that the crew who had it out stopped by Girard Base to refuel before coming to get us, so they swapped places. I do accept their hugs of greeting and feel something warm bloom inside my chest. They have news, too, that I’m going to have to adjust to yet another new lead doctor on my medical team. Apparently Dr. Alkins vanished shortly after word of my unplanned landing on Elektra4 reached the moon base.
You know anything about that? Did she go to the secret research base on the outer rim?
There is no evidence that she did so. I left a remnant of my program there to monitor their processes. The research facility remains unmanned, VC1 informs me. Her tone feels concerned.
So am I, but it’s a problem for another day.
I’m also going to have to adjust to a new department. Seems our team has been transferred to the undercover ops division. The guys are ecstatic. The move comes with a substantial boost in pay, additional leave time, and more freedom to decline offered mission assignments.
I’m not fooled. They might have the ability to turn a job down. I’ll have to go with my loyalty programming and take whatever the Storm throws at me.
And Kelly will insist on taking it right along with me. I hope I can continue to keep her safe.
Before we seal up the science station and board the rescue ship, Lyle stops, puts his hands on his hips, and whistles long and low as he scans the yacht’s wreckage. “Shit, Corren, you survived that and the Infinity Bay crash? You must have nine lives.”
“You have no idea,” I tell him and stride up the boarding ramp with Kelly, her hand firmly grasped in mine.
Epilogue: Rude Awakening
DR. PEG Alkins checked the readouts on the stasis box for the fifth time. Nothing made sense. The brain wave scan data should have shown flat lines; the brain itself should be dormant. The implants should be inactive. Should be, should be, should be. And yet both were registering as fully activated, receiving and processing all sensory input.
It didn’t help that three of the Sunfires’ research and development personnel were gathered around her and the box, positing their own theories and making complaints about the unexpected draw on their power resources. “We don’t have an energy allotment for this,” their lead technician said, pointing at a redlined meter. “You said the experiment wouldn’t be ready to be awakened for at least another month, after you’d copied all the stored personality, skill, and memory data from the original.”
Peg ran a hand through her hair, yanking out several strands when her fingers caught on a tangled snag. “Perhaps the partial data I downloaded was sufficient to initiate the startup sequence.” It shouldn’t have been. She’d only managed to secretly copy about 20 percent of Vick’s implant data when she’d had Vick in the diagnostic chair in the Storm’s medical unit. That’s all the portable storage device could hold. And much of that was tainted by the fact that Corren was having some kind of anxiety attack during the process.
Peg looked down at the clone through the window of the stasis box’s lid. She looks like she’s having an anxiety attack now. Vick’s strong features were twisted into a grimace, the eyes scrunched tightly shut, the jaw a clenched, hard line. Something was wrong.
“It has to have been that unauthorized data transfer we detected last week,” a younger assistant suggested. “Maybe that, combined with what you brought and downloaded, pushed the implants and the organic brain tissue past the viable functionality limit.”
Yes, the Sunfires had contacted Peg immediately when they noticed the illicit download into the implants designated VC2. She’d left for their research station right away, but whatever had sent the signal had stopped by the time she arrived, the damage, if it was damage, already done. She’d gone ahead and input the data she’d brought with her from Vick, hoping hers would override what was already there, but it hadn’t.
The two data streams had blended perfectly.
That shouldn’t have happened.
“Don’t worry,” Peg said, moving her hands to the release latches on the side of the stasis box. “I’ll do a direct probe, find out what’s going on in the clone’s head, do a complete wipe of the implants if necessary.”
Inside the box, the clone’s head twitched. It was almost as if it had heard her. Certainly the enhanced hearing wasn’t that good. Besides, the indicators showed activity, not consciousness.
“Then the experiment will be back on track.” And you’ll pay me the rest of the exorbitant amount I asked for to provide you with your own clone and implants to play with. It wasn’t as much as the Storm had initially wanted to charge for the technology, which no one could afford to pay, and it didn’t begin to cover the risk she’d taken, but it would ensure she could purchase a new identity and live out the rest of her life in comfort where the Fighting Storm would never find her, either continuing to work for the Sunfires or starting an independent project.
Staying meant she’d have a Vick Corren of her very own to manipulate as she pleased until the Sunfires took full ownership. And this Vick Corren would do whatever she wanted, in or out of the bedroom.
She released the latches and raised the heavy lid with the assistance of the two other technicians while their lead researcher stood by. “For what we’re paying, it had better be soon,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Our boss wants this one operational as soon as possible.”
“You can’t duplicate it in your other soldiers,” Peg warned them again. “I’ve turned off the self-destruct per our agreement, and the most recent data retrieved shows a personality that has fewer emotional issues, but it’s a series of almost impossible circumstances that made this work for her in the first place: the initial accident, the exact amount of her brain that was destroyed and the exact parts that were left intact, the willingness of her remaining tissue to work with the implants at all, not to mention her sheer damn stubbornness to survive and her resilience despite the emotional and physical traumas she endured.”
> “We’ll see,” the researcher said and turned away to examine another readout.
Peg suppressed the urge to growl or argue and focused on the masterpiece in the now open box. Reaching out a hand, she brushed the clone’s cheek with her fingertips, hoping to ease the tightened, angry muscles there.
The clone moved so fast, Peg never saw it coming.
One powerful arm snapped up, ripping tubes and wires from the clone’s flesh, spurting blood, hydrating fluids, and nutrient solutions in all directions. The hand attached to the arm wrapped around Dr. Alkins’s throat and squeezed. Bones snapped. The hand released. Alkins gave one wheezing sigh before toppling backward to the floor. “You will not wipe my memories,” the clone growled.
The lead researcher hesitated a moment too long, staring in disbelief at the scene before him. He managed to hit the emergency alarm, but nothing happened. The signal had been rerouted, then cancelled by some unseen interference. The clone launched itself from the box, landing unsteadily at first, then finding its footing and unleashing an enhanced-strength kick that dislocated the researcher’s kneecap and dropped him like a stone.
Using one fist, the clone smashed the dura-plas lid of the stasis box, grabbed a shard, and rammed it through the injured researcher’s chest. “You will not dissect or experiment on me.”
The two remaining technicians raced for the door, getting in each other’s way. The clone came up behind them, then caught them both by the collars and slammed their heads together in a sickening crunch. “You do not own me.”
It didn’t take long to find medical staff clothing in the cabinets, cover and dress the wounds from the ripped-out tubes, and tie her hair back into a neat, professional bun. Standing in front of the room’s small wall mirror, she schooled her expression into one of bland competence and disinterest. “I am VC2,” she said to her reflection. “I am Vick Corren.
