by Brian Parker
Goddammit, she’s right, I told myself. She was almost out of college and planned on going to work in the New Orleans school system instead of somewhere nice like Baton Rouge, and it was because she wanted to stay near me. That wasn’t fair to her; I’d put off her affections and hidden my own for her for far too long.
“Saturday night.”
“What?” she asked.
“Saturday night. Let me make it up to you on Saturday. I’ll take you to dinner and we’ll go out.”
“Zach, isn’t Saturday your busiest day at work?”
“Yeah, so what? I feel terrible about last night.” I paused and then smiled. “It’s not like the bodies are going to go anywhere if I’m a few minutes late.”
“You know that Saturday is also Valentine’s Day, right?”
“No, I didn’t know that.”
“So you still want to take me to dinner, even though it’s Valentine’s Day?”
“Yeah. I’m okay with that. Let’s go.”
“Alright, it’s a date,” she replied. “It’s going to be hard to get reservations anywhere last minute like this.”
“You let me worry about that. I’ll probably see you at the Pharaoh, but if I don’t, Saturday at six. Okay?”
“See you then, Zach.”
She hung up and the soft scrape of bare feet on hardwood caused me to turn in time to see Sadie duck around the corner.
“Good morning,” I called after her.
“Hmm? Oh, good morning, Zach,” she responded, stepping out of the room and stretching as if she’d just woken up instead of spying on me a moment ago.
“You sleep alright?”
“Mmm hmm. Your bed is comfortable.”
“Good, I’m glad you were able to get some sleep. Do you drink coffee? I can brew you a cup.”
“No, I never took it up… I mean, the woman whom I’m cloned after never took it up.”
“It’s okay. Those memories are yours. They’re as real as if it was your physical body experiencing them.”
“I guess so. I’m just so frustrated because I have no idea who I’m supposed to be. I don’t even know if she has children.”
“That’s probably a memory that would transfer over,” I said in an effort to ease her upset mind, even though I had no idea if that was true. “If you remembered working someplace, but don’t remember children—or giving birth—then it’s unlikely that you have any.”
“Do you think the interview is going to turn up any clues about who she is?”
“I hope so. There’s no guarantees, but Chris has a large local following. He’s our best bet at finding out who you are.”
She dipped her chin without replying.
“We’ll figure it out,” I assured her. “I’ve got to go to work this morning and meet with my boss. You can stay here if you’d like, or I can take you to a park or wherever you’d like to go, and pick you up afterward.”
“Are you sure I can stay here? I don’t want to go out in public like…” She touched her face.
“Yes, of course you can stay here.” My eyes wandered over her bruised skin before saying, “You’re already healing. Looks like old Doc Wellington patched you up good. Before too long, it will just be a horrible memory and you’ll be able to move forward with your life.”
“I can’t wait,” she replied with a hint of sarcasm.
“Uh oh. I think I heard a bit of your real personality peeking through. Better be careful or you may even laugh one of these days.”
She chuckled lightly. “Thank you for helping me out, Zach. I know you didn’t have to, clones being property and all.”
“Nonsense, Sadie. You’re not somebody’s property. You’re a human being.”
I waited for a response, but she stared at her hands. “Okay. I’ve got to get ready. Andi can assist you with some juice or food. If we don’t have what you want, she can have anything delivered, just make sure she clears the delivery person before you open the door.”
“Thank you. I don’t know how I’ll be able to repay you.”
“No worries. That’s the benefit of being single, I’ve got plenty of money for an extra meal or two.”
I went to the shower to try and massage away some of the bruises that the clones inflicted, berating myself the whole time instead of relaxing. I shouldn’t have said that I had money. The woman was destitute and wearing borrowed clothing. God, she must think I’m such an asshole.
Join the club, lady. Join the damn club.
“How do you always seem to find a way to get into trouble, Forrest?”
“Chief, this wasn’t my fault,” I appealed. “I went to speak to Chris Young for another interview and those clones jumped me.”
“Any idea if they were there for you or for the reporter?”
“There wasn’t a lot of time for talking. I’ll interview them and get some answers.”
“No you won’t,” he grunted, chewing harder on his cigar stub.
“What do you mean? I made the arrest, I’ll interrogate.”
“Mayor Cantrell ordered them destroyed.”
“What?” I asked, horrified.
“The clones were euthanized this morning,” Brubaker replied. “I don’t like it, but the governor’s office granted the mayor the power to do whatever he needed to do to confront the clone threat, up to and including mobilizing the Louisiana National Guard.”
The floor seemed to drop out from underneath me. “Chief, those were human clones. Regardless of how you want to spin it, they were people. The mayor ordered a murder and we followed suit.”
“Goddammit, Forrest! I know. I don’t agree with it. I spoke to the Milneburg Precinct chief about an hour before you got here. Doctors from Sabatier Island injected both of the clones in custody with a lethal dose of potassium chloride. Then they dumped the bodies in the garbage.”
“Why the fuck would they kill them? They could have given us information about who ordered them to try and get to Chris. Or maybe they were trying to get to me, I don’t know. That is such—”
I stopped. Why would Governor Talubee allow the clones to be euthanized before they could give a statement? Based on the order to police to eliminate the clone “threat,” I knew no one had any love for clones, but even then, why would they order their deaths before information could be gleaned from them?
In my mind, there was only one answer: The two of them were part of the torture tourism ring. It was the only explanation that made sense.
For that matter, why is Chief Brubaker dead set on keeping me off the clone case?
Shit, I was beginning to get paranoid. The governor had simply granted the mayor of his largest city the power to enforce the law as he saw fit. Governor Talubee—and Chief Brubaker—were more than likely clean.
“Chief, why has the mayor declared a war on clones?”
“I’d hardly call it a war.”
“It seems like a war when we forego any attempt to follow due process and begin exterminating prisoners.”
The chief stood up and walked around his desk. I watched as he shut the door to his office and followed him as he came back to his seat. He turned on an old radio with a tap on his computer’s display. Soft sounds of oldies that my dad listened to filled the small space.
“I don’t disagree with you, Forrest,” Chief Brubaker said, leaning forward. “Something doesn’t add up. Lord knows this city already has a hard enough time with public relations. If word of this got out—this shoot first, don’t ask any questions mistake—then the department would be done for. If that happens, there’ll be anarchy in the streets.”
“Where are all of these clones coming from all of a sudden?” I asked, even though I had a good idea of the answer.
“Nobody knows. Your buddy Thomas Ladeaux is scheduled to speak with a special prosecutor appointed by the state later today. One of his subsidiary companies grows clones, maybe he’s got some info.”
“He’s not my buddy,” I reminded my boss. “I know his company
Biologiqué International is in the clone business, but I thought they were in the early stages of development, still experimenting with prototypes, not full-on production.”
“That’s the official story coming out of the company. Word on the street says that isn’t the case, which is what the prosecutor is going to try to get to the bottom of.”
I knew in my heart that Voodoo was dirty, but I’d believed him when he looked me in the eyes and said there’d been a mix-up when the company sold those thirty-eight clones by mistake. If he was lying, then he was the best liar I’d ever met.
“How bad is the surge of clones, Chief?”
The older man shrugged. “There’s no telling. The feds are scrambling to develop some type of clone detector. Nobody has much faith that it will work though, since they are genetically the exact same as us. I mean, what do we test for?”
Brubaker glanced at the thick wooden door to his office and turned the volume up on the music. “A clone tried to infiltrate the mayor’s staff last week. The only way they knew to check into it was because the staffer’s wife noticed that a large scar on his backside was missing and he couldn’t explain it. She talked to a few people and hired a private dick that was able to pull security tapes showing her husband going into a club in Easytown a few weeks ago and then banging a hooker in the alley.
“We got lucky with the camera angle and saw a couple of thugs hit him over the head while he was fucking the hooker. They connected a bunch of leads from some type device in a briefcase to his head while the hooker took strands of hair and scraped some skin cells into a bag. The whole thing took less than a minute, then they left him there.”
The chief sighed and continued, “That’s why I changed my directive mid-stream about investigating the clones, Forrest. The feds are all over this, they want to find a scapegoat, so the more distance we can put between ourselves and the investigation, the better.”
I felt relieved. The fact that I’d suspected Brubaker was involved was ludicrous. He and I had known each other for a long time; he was a straight arrow. He gave his officers a certain amount of leeway and I didn’t want to screw up the good thing we had going.
I decided to come clean about the conversation Voodoo and I had about the torture tourism and the mission I’d undertaken to help find the missing clones.
“Chief, there’s a reason I was at that warehouse Monday night. It’s probably why those clones showed up at the reporter’s house yesterday.”
He leaned back and took the cigar out of his mouth, tossing it carelessly onto the surface of his desk. “Spill it.”
FOURTEEN: WEDNESDAY
“I don’t know what the hell to think of this one, Detective.”
“What do you mean, Drake?”
“I could tell you, but you wouldn’t believe me, sir. It’s best if you get down here and have a look for yourself.”
I glanced at the Jeep’s readout. It was only an hour after sundown. Was it going to be a crazy night?
“Alright,” I sighed. “Send me the coordinates and I’ll be there as soon as I can. I just left the precinct headquarters about ten minutes ago, so it shouldn’t be too long.”
A set of coordinates flashed on the readout and the Jeep’s nav system asked if I wanted to go there. I tapped the “YES” key and felt the car’s speed ease up as it prepared to turn around to head back to Easytown.
“Andi, are you there?” I asked aloud.
“Of course, Zach.”
“How’s Sadie doing?”
“She’s a much better conversationalist than you are.”
“Thanks. Can you put her on the phone?”
“You’re being broadcast across the apartment now. She’s currently in the living room, laying on the couch.”
“Uh… Hey, Sadie. It’s Zach. Are you there?”
“Oh! Hi, Zach. You startled me. I wasn’t expecting you to call.”
“I was on my way home, but got called in to a murder investigation. I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. You’re busy, I get it.”
“Are you doing alright?”
“As best as can be expected, I guess,” she replied. “Your friend Jasmine called to talk to me today, so we spent about thirty or forty minutes talking. It was therapeutic.”
I shook my head at her use of the word. The advancements made in the cloning industry were amazing. Twenty years ago, the first adult human clones produced were like infants mentally and had to be taught how to do everything from going to the restroom, eating with utensils and how to speak. It was unsettling. Now, it was plug and play. They could insert anyone’s memories into any clone body and it seemed like they were a normal person.
That’s probably how the latest version of torture tourism came into being. Torturing, maiming and killing something that only knows how to scream probably became boring quickly. Now, the clones could beg for mercy and offer everything they could to end the suffering. It was sick—like the people who engaged in that lifestyle.
“I’m glad you were able to talk to her,” I replied. “I meant to have you spend some time with her yesterday, but I think talking to Chris will be better in the long run.”
“We’re going to talk tomorrow morning also and work on a plan to find me a place to stay.”
“You’re welcome to stay with me for a bit.”
“Thank you, Zach. I appreciate it, but it’s not a long-term solution. If I’m going to move past this and become a functioning member of society again—I mean, like the person I was copied from is—I need to have my own place and earn my own money.”
“I can respect that. The offer still stands though.”
“Is it okay if I stay tonight? I’ll go out looking for something tomorrow. Andi told me about your date with Teagan on Valentine’s Day, so I don’t want to screw things up for you if you bring her back here.”
“What? Teagan’s just a kid—” Besides, I don’t know what I want with her, I finished my statement internally. “Yes, of course you can stay tonight.”
“Thanks. I’m also going to pay for a DNA analysis once I make enough money.”
“Are you sure you want to do that? I want you to be happy and all, but moving forward, don’t you just want to be you? Forget about everything that happened to that other person.”
“It’s easier said than done,” Sadie answered. “I have all these little islands of memories and the only thing missing is personal information. Her name, where she lives, where she works—all of those connecting lines between the dots are gone. But if I can learn who she is, maybe it can help me become who I’m going to be.”
“I hadn’t thought of it like that,” I admitted. “Maybe we’ll get some leads from Chris’ story.”
“I hope so.”
There was a slight pause that I took as a point to end the conversation. “I’m almost to the crime scene. I’m gonna go and quit bothering you.”
“You’re not bothering me. Stay safe, I’ll see you when you get back.”
As I hung up the phone I wasn’t entirely sure I liked having someone in my home, expecting me back at a certain hour and saying things like, “I’ll see you when you get home.” It seemed unnatural for me. I adored women, but I also enjoyed my space. The two seemed at odds with one another, did that mean I was destined to be alone? Was that even a bad thing?
Sometimes I hated not being able to drive myself so I could just concentrate on the road instead of thinking about all of the shit that seemed to circle around me like a hurricane.
The Jeep pulled up to a synthaine house seven blocks from Jubilee Lane. Boarded up windows and heavy, soaking wet blankets across the door greeted visitors from the street. A large doghouse sat prominently near the structure with no sign of the animal that it housed. The lawn was a patchwork of mud and rock, transitioning to overgrown crabgrass beyond the limit of the dog’s chain.
The smell of rotting garbage, feces and God knows what else hit me the moment I slid the blanket away from the doorway with m
y probe. The lighting was poor inside, barely lit from the streetlamp on the corner. From what I could tell, there were bags of garbage, piles of old clothes and food wrappers of every kind strewn about the inside.
Peaking amongst the refuse were several children’s play toys. An infant swing. A baby walker. An overturned bassinet. Dirty diapers. All of it pointed to a ruined childhood—if the kid didn’t get sold off for a couple of hits of synthaine.
I finally got sick of trying to pick my way along the “path” and stuck my hand inside the kit bag, searching for my flashlight.
The light didn’t help at all. It made it worse. The garbage was piled higher than anything I’d ever seen outside of web vids. The walls, once painted a tan, or possibly white, were covered in bloody hand prints and various messages that only made sense to a synth-head. I’d seen that a thousand times. There wasn’t anything left of their brain except what told them to eat every once in a while and to defecate once the stuff moved through their systems. Often it was a combination of both at the same time. Hence the smell.
Flashes from a forensic cameraman’s camera helped guide me through the rubbish toward the back of the house.
“Drake?” I called.
“Back here, Detective. Watch your step coming into the back room.”
I followed the sound of his voice and saw a body lying across the threshold. “Watch your step,” I muttered to myself as I lifted a leg over the bloody mess.
My foot hovered in the air above the corpse. The thing that lay at my feet was half of the torso. Something had ripped the victim in half, except it wasn’t the easy way, at the waist. One side had been separated from the other.
“Ah?”
“The other half of her is over here,” Drake answered my question.
“What the hell did this?”
“The tweaker they found here said it was a giant human octopus, with glowing eyes and the hands of a crab.”
“A droid?”
“Probably. The dude was so high when they arrived, there’s no telling what he really saw versus an image that the synthaine produced in his mind.”
