The Clone Sedition

by Steven L. Kent

  I leaned helplessly against the man I had just disarmed until he shoved me backward. I dropped to the floor. There was liquid in my mouth. I felt like I would drown any second. I wanted to roll over so I could see the man who had shot me. My legs swung, but my torso did not follow.

  Taking lazy steps, the unseen assassin sauntered beside me. He pointed his shotgun into my face, tapping the muzzle against my visor. He asked, “Are you still alive in there?”

  I did not answer. I couldn’t speak. I felt like I was drowning, but my combat reflex kept me cognizant. I did not know the man, but his face was familiar. He had a scar, a circular dent in the center of his forehead. I focused on that scar and struggled to clear my thoughts.

  He cocked his shotgun, and said, “You’re pathetic, Harris; and it’s your own fault if you die. You walked right in. Mister Liberator Clone…Mister Super Marine…Pathetic.

  “I should finish you off. You’ll probably die anyway, but it would mean more if I had done it on purpose.”

  He laughed, and added, “You have fans in Navy high command, people who think you’ll be useful. Me, I think we should have killed you the first time. I bet you don’t remember the first time, do you?”

  He kicked his boot across my visor. The blow did not break the glass, but the jolt spun my body a quarter turn.

  The man laughed. He turned to his partner, the man I had disarmed, and fired his shotgun into his face. The man’s head vanished in a red spray that decorated the wall behind him.

  The bastard lowered his shotgun and smiled down at me. He said, “If anybody asks, Harris, do me a favor and tell them he shot you.” Then, still smiling, he knelt beside me.

  “Harris, if you survive this one, you should know that I’ll come back for you. I’ll keep coming and shooting you until you don’t survive.” He smiled, tapped the muzzle of his shotgun to my visor, and said, “They don’t even need to pay me. You just go ahead and survive, Harris; I’d love to go another round with you.”

  He rose to his feet, stared down at me for a moment, and I realized that this was it—this was the face of evil. “In case you were wondering, the name is Franklin Nailor,” he said. “Now you can tell your friends you met me…if you live.”

  This was the man the Unifieds had sent. He said I had fans in the U.A. Navy, people he must have known. The Night of the Martyrs, the bastards who chased me in Hawaii, whatever reprogramming had happened in my head, this son of a bitch was behind all of it. Here he was, standing over me, and all I could do was lie there helplessly and wonder if I would even live to fight another day.

  Nailor dropped his shotgun on the headless corpse of the man he had shot. After that, he started down a hall and vanished into the complex. I struggled to watch him as long as I could, but I blacked out.

  EPILOGUE

  Location: Bethesda

  Date: June 7, 2519

  Our combat armor was designed by a committee that included physicians, engineers, and politicians. The physicians made sure the armor shielded our vital areas. The engineers wrestled with finding a balance between weight and durability. The politicians made certain that the physicians and engineers stayed within the budget.

  Given sufficient funding, the physicians and engineers would have produced graphene armor, stronger than shielded steel and lighter than helium, in which soldiers could have pranced like ballet dancers without fear of bullets or lasers.

  Unlimited funding, honest politicians, perfect worlds…fairy tales.

  The budget-constrained physicians and engineers made intelligent compromises that enabled me to walk out of the hospital. Hoping to protect our spines, they placed extra plating down the center of the back of our armor.

  Surgeons removed pellets from my shoulder blades, my ribs, and my lungs; but my spine was untouched. After four days of operations, reconstructions, and soaking in tissue baths, I went home with a robotic joint in my right shoulder. I didn’t care. Why should a clone care about synthetic implants?

  Putting me back together took a few days, but my rehabilitation was an ongoing concern. Doctors prodded my muscles and bade me walk along an endless pathway of lines and risers. They kept me in a naval hospital and told me to use a wheelchair whenever I climbed out of bed. When I refused, they gave me a walker. When I said no to the walker, they gave me crutches. We finally agreed on a cane.

  My body was on the mend. I wasn’t so sure about my head.

  My doctor found new ways to torture me on a daily basis. He dug his fingers into shredded muscles and called it a massage. He stuck me with needles, wired my ribs, stabbed electric prods into my joints, and stimulated my blood circulation with chemicals. The man was my enemy. I spent many happy nights planning his death.

  My physical therapist was not my worst enemy. That title belonged to the psychologist who dug his fingers into my shredded head, stuck needles into my brain, stabbed electrodes into my scalp, and pumped me full of chemicals…all in the name of repairing my mental health.

  My physical therapist frequently updated me on my progress. The psychologist simply nodded and scribbled notes I would never be allowed to read. I hated the bastard.

  “You have fans,” Franklin Nailor had said. “They think you will be useful.”

  If I had fans, they never visited. Not Cutter. Not Watson. Not Freeman. Colonel Hunter Ritz came to see me one day. The psychologist interviewed him and sent him away. He sent a message to Cutter recommending that Ritz undergo therapy as well.

  The psychologist told me that Cutter had watched my meeting with Franklin Nailor. I later learned that Freeman and Watson watched it as well. The equipment in my visor had dutifully recorded the entire conversation. Combat visors record everything. In the Marine Corps, privacy is a low-priority concern.

  “This Franklin Nailor fellow, he says that he met you before,” said the psychologist. “Do you recall when you might have met?”

  “No.”

  “He seems to have a grudge against you. Do you have any idea why that might be?”

  “No.” I was lying. If Nailor was an officer with the now-defunct Unified Authority, he’d have plenty of reason to hate me. Then again, my instincts told me that Nailor’s anger toward me was of a personal nature.

  “How do you feel about Nailor?”

  “I want to kill him.”

  “I see.”

  I want to kill you, too, you specking bastard; and I want to kill my physical therapist and my physician, and I certainly wouldn’t mind injuring Don Cutter if I got a clean shot at him, I thought. That thought did not bother me. Another thought did.

  I was scared of Franklin Nailor. Just the mention of his name raised my pulse, and the psychologist knew it; equipment in the chair read my heart rate, pulse, temperature, and probably any changes in my sphincter dilation. Could the chair tell the difference between hate and fear?

  When I was finally released from the hospital, no one told me about my status in the Marine Corps.

  Location: Washington, D.C.

  Date: June 11, 2519

  I felt some trepidation as I drove myself to work that first day. I did not know if I was entering the Pentagon as a three-star general, a civilian advisor, or a pariah.

  My ID and uniform got me into the underground parking, but civilian workers parked in that structure as well. I climbed out of my car and walked to the elevator, my back straight, my chest out, my shoulders back, every bit the proud Marine. I took the elevator to the lobby and joined the queue through the security station.

  I was not scared as I slowly marched toward the posts, a security device that checked identity using DNA. I still did not know what was going on inside my head, but I knew I was Wayson Harris, a Liberator clone, and that any identity I had was associated with the Marine Corps.

  That much I knew.

  In order to enter the Pentagon, I needed to walk through posts for a DNA reading. The person ahead of me stepped through, and the guards sent him on. I stepped through.

  The MP r
eading the computer signaled the one ushering people through. He said, “Sir, I need you to step this way.”

  “Is there a problem, Sergeant?” I asked.

  “No, sir. No problem. I just need you to come this way.”

  The MP was a clone. All the MPs were clones. I suppose they all looked like mirror images of each other to the untrained eye, like goldfish in a bowl all look alike to the casual observer. I noted differences. I noticed age, weight, muscle tone, scars, and posture.

  The MP did not reach for his weapon, but three others standing about ten feet away had their hands on their pistols.

  I had not come to make trouble. I came because, in my mind, I had no place else to go. “Where are you taking me?” I asked.

  “There was a message to bring you to the security office.”

  “Are they arresting me?” I asked.

  “No, sir. No, sir,” he said.

  I followed him through a path that led between two sheets of bulletproof glass. Behind us, a new MP took his place behind the posts, and people continued filing into the building.

  The sergeant led me into a little room with a metal table and a metal chair, both of which were bolted into the floor. He asked me to wait inside the room. I did not take it as a very good sign when he locked the door behind me.

  A few minutes later, there was a knock at the door. A voice called, “You in there, Harris?” and the door swung open. Travis Watson stood at the door. So did four MPs.

  As I climbed out from behind the table, Watson asked, “Where are your stars?” When I left the hospital, I found a uniform, but I never did find my stars. I explained that to Watson. He nodded thoughtfully, and said, “I’m sure it’s only an oversight.”

  I wasn’t so sure.

  Watson and the clones escorted me deep into the Pentagon, to Admiral Cutter’s domain. He didn’t just have an office, he had his own security detail, a bank of secretaries, and an accounting office. He had one set of rooms for meetings regarding civil issues and another set of rooms for meetings regarding martial problems.

  Cutter met me at the door to his office. He and Watson walked me in. They checked the MPs at the door. We all sat down, Cutter behind his carrier-sized desk, Watson and me opposite him.

  “How are you feeling?” Cutter asked. Given a choice between being probed by a psychologist and questioned by an overly sympathetic friend, I’d go with the psychologist.

  The expression on Cutter’s face suggested he thought of me as a cripple, and I did not like it.

  When I said, “I want to go back on active duty,” Cutter and Watson exchanged glances.

  “Are you up to it?” asked Cutter.

  “I’m not setting any speed records, but I’m running a couple of miles per day.”

  “I meant, are you mentally up to it?”

  “I have a score to settle,” I said. “That bastard shot me in the back.”

  That made Cutter smile. He said, “Glad to hear it. I have three stars waiting for you. I also have a letter giving you a clean bill of mental health.”

  “From the psychologist at Bethesda?” I asked, feeling genuinely surprised.

  “Oh speck no,” said Cutter. “He thinks we should lock you away for good, says you’re a sociopath; but Howard Tasman doesn’t think you are a security risk. Do you remember anything about Tasman? He was the one Freeman went to rescue.”

  “Yeah, I know about him,” I said. I’d never actually met the man, but I knew all about him. I knew about Freeman and Watson and the history of neural programming.

  “Tasman says there is only so much the Unifieds could do with you,” said Cutter.

  “With me?”

  “With Liberators. He did a little tinkering with neural programming during the Liberator program, but it didn’t get far,” said Cutter. “Do you know why we kept you isolated in the hospital?”

  “To see if I was a security risk?” I asked.

  Cutter nodded, and said, “Tasman says the only thing programmed in your brain is the inability to commit suicide.”

  “That’s it?” I asked.

  “That’s it.”

  “I could have committed suicide,” I said. “I pulled a pin from a grenade.”

  “We found the grenade,” said Watson.

  “You searched my billet in Hawaii?”

  “We knew it was there from the start,” said Cutter.

  “I think there are other problems,” I said. “I’ve got new fears.”

  Cutter laughed, but Watson didn’t. Cutter said, “You have a lot of new fears. I looked at your psychological profile. If I hadn’t known it was you…Scared of water?”

  “You know about that?” I asked.

  Cutter nodded. He said, “Tasman says it’s classical conditioning, not reprogramming. Face it, Harris, you were an obsolete model. You were the no-frills, stripped-down version of cloning. They couldn’t reprogram you because there wasn’t enough programming in your brain for them to corrupt.” He laughed.

  I did not think it was funny.

  Watson said, “It might have been worse for you than for the others. They couldn’t reprogram you, so they tried to brainwash you instead. They tortured you. That’s what the psychologist found, evidence of prolonged torture.”

  “I see,” I said. “But you still trust me.”

  “I do,” said Cutter.

  “So why did you have security stop me?”

  “Are you crazy?” Cutter asked. “Harris, you’re a killing machine, and I have a letter from a licensed military psychologist warning me that you’re insane. I’m giving you back your stars, but that doesn’t mean I’m not scared of you.”

  Cutter dismissed me, and I went to my office.

  I tried to find Freeman, but he had disappeared. I spoke with Hunter Ritz as well. He had moved into Camp Lejeune. He wanted to rename the place Fort Roanoke.

  “Roanoke, that’s Virginia,” I said.

  “Yeah. Before it was a city it was a colony. All the colonists disappeared,” said Ritz.

  “The Marines in LeJeune didn’t just disappear, they switched sides,” I said. “They were reprogrammed.”

  Ritz said, “Don’t get too technical, General. You’ll give yourself a headache.”

  At five o’clock, Travis Watson came to visit. He asked, “What do you plan to do about Franklin Nailor?”

  “I plan to kill him,” I said.

  Watson rubbed his jaw for a moment. He said, “Well, that’s good to hear. I have a score to settle with that man, but I think you might be better at settling old scores than I am.” He smiled, and added, “I’d trade a year’s salary for a ringside seat.”

  “Have you met Nailor?” I asked.

  He said, “Yes,” and nothing more.

  We talked about other things. In the month I had been gone, Watson had given up prowling. He was engaged to a woman. He asked me if I wanted to go to dinner with them that evening. I said I did.

  I went home. I showered. I shaved. I dressed in my best civilian clothes, a pair of khaki slacks and turquoise shirt. It was either those pants and that shirt or my uniform. I brushed my hair and ran the blue light over my teeth, then I drove back into town.

  Watson and his fiancée met me at a restaurant named Don Francisco’s. I’d heard of the place but never been there before. It was a trendy bar and grill meant for people my age, but I felt out of place. I was a Marine, not a politician or a lawyer or a businessman. I ate in mess halls and drank in officers’ clubs. The dim lighting and soft music did not put me at ease.

  When I mentioned my name, the hostess said, “Your friends are waiting for you.”

  She led me to the table.

  Watson and his fiancée sat in a booth way in the back. They sat on one side of the table, leaving the bench on the other side for me. The rest of the restaurant was dim, but the candles on the tables sparkled like stars in this dark corner. Even by that flickering, glowing light, I recognized the girl Travis Watson had an arm around.

 
; “Wayson, this is Emily Hughes,” he said as I sat down.

  “We met on Mars,” I said.

  She smiled. The girl had a dazzling smile. She said, “There’s nothing wrong with your memory, General.”

  “Call me Wayson.”

  “Wayson,” she said.

  “I heard about your grandfather this afternoon,” I said. “I’m sorry. He and I had a long history.”

  “He told me about it.”

  After that, we sat in an awkward silence, which Emily finally broke. She said, “Thanks to you, he got the thing he wanted most before he died. They’re finally evacuating Mars.”

  “Did you know about that?” asked Watson.

  I didn’t know about anything. I said, “They kept me pretty far out of the loop at the hospital.”

  “Cutter is closing down Mars Spaceport,” he said. “We’re going to close it down and blow it up.”

  I started to say, “No shit,” but I caught myself. I said, “No kidding. Blowing it up? I guess he isn’t taking any chances.” Good move, I thought. As far as anybody knew, Mars and Earth were the only planets in the galaxy with buildings and life-support infrastructure. If the Unifieds were out there and building an army, Mars was the only place they could do it.

  As we sat and talked, a woman approached our table. Sitting with my back toward the restaurant, I did not see her coming; but Watson went quiet in midsentence, and Emily seemed interested as well.

  A familiar voice said, “I’m sorry to interrupt you, but…”

  I recognized the voice before I turned to look.

  “General, it is you!” Sunny Ferris said enthusiastically, and she illustrated her sincerity by placing a hand over her left breast. “I thought I recognized your voice.

  “We met several weeks ago. I’m Sunny Ferris. I represented…”

  “You represented Arthur Hooper,” I said.

  Apparently glad to be recognized, she gave me a wide smile.

  She said, “Well, actually the Arthur Hooper thing was a mistake, he really wasn’t our client; but we did represent the New Olympians, and now they are being repatriated. I didn’t think it would ever happen.”

  She was so beautiful. I turned to Watson and saw that he appreciated her as well. Emily looked a little less impressed.