Beta

by Rachel Cohn

  He was my First’s first. She felt him inside of her. I don’t know why I know, but I know how I know: because I can feel a sweet, intense aching in my heart and directly at the private core of my being. The ache overwhelms me with its sheer want; I can’t get enough of this hunger for him.

  Again, I race toward him, to touch him, but this time when I reach him, instead of disappearing, he puts his hand up, to push me away. I can’t do this, his voice says. It’s wrong. You know that.

  I hear this, and I hurt so much I truly can’t breathe.

  Hate. Rage. Betrayal.

  I understand these feelings now.

  I plant my feet on the pool’s bottom and rise above the water, desperately inhaling the premium oxygen into my lungs, desperately hoping that somehow I will see him above the water, live and in the flesh. We can make it work, I want to plead, on her behalf. Please.

  But I see only Dementia at the other end of the pool. “You were supposed to race me! What’s the matter with you? You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Don’t just stand there like a bore or I will have to cut you.” Before Dementia dives back beneath the water, she adds, “Kidding! Sorta!”

  I immerse myself beneath the water again to search for him, but the vision of the bronzed god does not reappear. I lie down on the bottom of the pool as long as my breath will hold. My database tells me that if I were a human teenager desiring to confine myself to a private place, here is where I would create it. It is my sanctuary, under the water. Submersed in liquid silk, I am not an unfeeling clone.

  Beneath the water, I can know her. She was fierce, uncompromising. When she loved, she loved deeply, passionately. She loved the blue-eyed water god. She owned him. His heart.

  But when she felt betrayal, she hated, and she was feared.

  Hate gave her power.

  If she were me (and she is me, even if she’s dead), she would not fear my unnatural memories and instincts. She would say, Maybe your unspeakable defects give you power too?

  IVAN IS WINNING MORE.

  In the few weeks since I arrived in the Bratton household and we began our morning workouts, his running speed and agility have improved immensely. He can keep up with me easily, and many times now, he can outrun me. His daily body mass index recordings show he’s lost ten percent of his fat, yet gained ten percent more muscle.

  We’re halfway up our third sprint up the cliff stairs going from the beach to the grounds at Governor’s House when Ivan stops, turns around to face the ocean, and asserts, “I’m pumped!” He mock jabs at me, like a boxer eager for a round.

  Not only has Ivan increased muscle mass but his confidence has grown. He’s become more eager, as opposed to resigned, to leave for military training. He knows now he can keep up there. He eagerly counts down the days until his departure for basic training, and he has determined a career goal. Ivan has decided he wants to become a fighter pilot. Selection for that coveted job is highly competitive. He will work hard to attain that lofty goal.

  The Governor is pleased. Only a month ago, Ivan was lackluster in his physical abilities, at least relative to the shape the other Base recruits will be in, and he was uninterested and noncommittal about identifying goals. Mother gives me credit for helping with Ivan’s turnaround, and herself credit, in turn, for bringing me home. It’s been a win-win situation; even the Governor is now won over to having a Beta as part of his family. “You might even be an improvement over Astrid,” said the Governor to me over dinner one night as he inspected Ivan’s improved body statistics. “You have all the desirable qualities of a teenage girl without any of the awful hang-ups, and without the misinformed ideological platforms that Astrid had.”

  As we stand on the cliff-side stairs, Ivan leans into a cranny in the rock, a crack just big enough to slip his hand into. “Know what I’ve got in there?” he asks me. “But you have to promise to keep it a secret.”

  I nod, surprised. My brother is not usually the secretive type. That’s because boys are easier than girls, Mother has told me. Astrid kept secrets and was a liar. But Ivan “wears his heart on his sleeve,” according to Mother. “What you see is what you get.”

  When he pulls his hand out from the crevice, I see white seeds in his hand. “These are cuvée seeds,” Ivan says, referring to Demesne’s native torch flower plants, which festively adorn the gardens, driveways, and landing pads of many of the island’s homes. Next, he pulls out an even more curious item hidden within the cliff wall—a small porcelain bowl with a matching thick porcelain nub, which my interface reveals is a mortar and pestle, an old-fashioned instrument for grinding materials such as spices. Ivan places some cuvée seeds in the mortar and grinds them, producing a creamy liquid with a heavenly floral scent.

  “Let me guess,” I say. “You are practicing to become a military perfumer?”

  Ivan offers me his fondest smile. “Sarcasm: well mimicked. But no, something even more exciting. I’m trying to make my own ’raxia.”

  “Why? Is not the kind you illegally obtain of satisfactory quality?” I ask.

  “It’s more than satisfactory. That’s the problem. The more satisfactory the ’raxia gets, the more I want, and the less I want to wait to find someone to score it off. ’Raxia is made from the cuvée seeds inside the spiked petals of the flower. I’m teaching myself how to make it, but also improve on it. If I add components like testosterone”—Ivan pulls a small bottle labeled T from the crag—“I can use it to not only feel great, but get stronger too.”

  “Good science,” I acknowledge.

  “I’m, like, inspired now. Feeling good and want to feel even better. But not just feel better. Be better. Strongest.”

  “Does the Governor know?”

  “He totally wants me to be number one, dude.”

  “I mean, about your chemistry set.”

  “Of course not! He’d kill me. So don’t you tell him. I’m just showing you this now because I’m going to start collecting more supplies for more experimentation, and I want you to know where to store them for me if I ask you.” He jabs hard at my arm—playfully, but hard enough that I know a light bruise will appear later. “Okay, champ?”

  “Yes, brother,” I say.

  I’ve settled into a routine at the house. In the early mornings, I wake up Liesel and help her prepare for “school.” Then I work out with Ivan for two hours. After lunch, I am Mother’s companion. Sometimes we go to Haven for lunch with the ladies, sometimes I take notes that she dictates to me with respect to her food and guest planning for the upcoming Governor’s Ball, and sometimes she just wants me to go shopping with her.

  Most shopping on Demesne is done by Relay as there are only a few proper shops and cafés on one main street near the airstrip. Today, Mother wants to return to the shop where she bought me. She says she needs new lingerie, but I think she wants a new clone.

  “Don’t I remember that there was another teen Beta at the store?” she asks me as we approach the boutique.

  “Yes, Mother. Her name is Becky.”

  “She must not have been bought yet. I would have heard about it if she was.”

  We enter the store and are immediately greeted by Marisa, the broker who sold me to Mother. “Mrs. Bratton, so lovely to see you,” says Marisa. “How is your Beta working out?”

  “She’s heaven,” coos Mother. “Simply heaven.”

  “Dr. Lusardi will be so pleased. What can I help you with today?”

  “I would love a new nightie. Something silky and sexy. And…is that other Beta still available?” Subtlety is not a component programmed into Mother’s disposition.

  Marisa grimaces slightly. “She is available. But…maybe not to your tastes. She’s not as flawless as this one.” Marisa gestures to me.

  “Let me see her,” says Mother.

  Marisa goes to the back of the store and returns with Becky. The other teen Beta appears more sallow than the last time I saw her, and amazingly, her fuchsia eyes have specks of red in them, as if they were blood
shot. She also looks like she’s gained a full dress size.

  “Hello, Elysia,” she says to me.

  “Hello, Becky,” I say.

  Mother inspects Becky top to bottom. The choice is an easy one. “No,” says Mother.

  “Let me show you our lingerie collection,” Marisa says. “We just got in some fabulous pieces from Biome City. Such an amazing design scene happening there!”

  “Yes,” Mother sighs. I can see she is disappointed. She wanted something fresh and interesting. Now all she’s going to get is a nightgown that probably looks the same as her fifty other ones.

  Mother and Marisa retreat to a far corner of the store, leaving Becky and me alone at the front. “How are you doing?” I ask Becky.

  “Satisfactory,” she states. Her appearance has changed. She is not only heavier but her skin is more sallow, and her eyes seem withdrawn instead of glazed. “How is Governor’s House?”

  “Satisfactory,” I state. Better than being stuck inside this boring boutique all the time just waiting for a sale that’s never going to come, I think.

  “What is it like?” she asks me. Her affect is as bland as it’s supposed to be, yet I can’t help but suspect something is off about her.

  “Perfect,” I say.

  “Of course,” says Becky. “How do you serve there?” she asks. “Do you have chores?”

  “I do not do chores,” I say, surprised that my voice sounds somehow affronted. “I am a member of the family.”

  “So then what do you do?”

  “I work out with my brother Ivan. I accompany Mother to her lunches. I play in the pool with my sister Liesel. At night I dine with the family.”

  “You dine with them?” Becky asks. “Do you eat their food to be polite?”

  “I do.” I LOVE their food, I don’t add.

  Becky leans in closer to me. “Have you ever tried the chocolate?”

  “Yes,” I say coolly.

  “It compels ataraxia in humans, I’ve heard,” says Becky.

  “Seems to,” I concur.

  “Does it compel ataraxia in you?” she asks.

  “I am incapable of achieving ataraxia, of course.” I don’t know why I don’t just tell Becky that I can actually taste it. Her life seems so small already. I do not need to further remind her of my privilege. My nice home and family. My sense of taste that I shouldn’t have, but do.

  “I have tried chocolate,” she whispers. She says the words rapidly, as if she has been eager to make this confession but could only muster the courage by speaking the words quickly.

  Well! Perhaps her life at the boutique is not so small and unprivileged, after all.

  I follow the lead of her confession and offer my own. Quickly and quietly, I admit, “The chocolate is very pleasant.”

  Becky grabs my hand and clenches. “Yes,” she states, as if relieved. She walks me to a bureau table where stacks of folded sweaters lie. She opens a drawer on the floor level of the bureau, reaches behind a stack of sweaters stored in the drawer, and pulls out a hidden stash of chocolate bars. “I have extra if you want to take them for yourself.”

  She would not gain weight from tasteless strawberry shakes. But she would gain from too much chocolate, which she would only eat in excess if she were actually taking pleasure from it. Is it possible that a sense of taste is indeed a Beta quirk? Or do other clones experience it too?

  “No, you keep them,” I say. “I can have chocolate at home anytime.”

  “Please take it away from me, Elysia. It is making me fatter, and I don’t want to be returned.”

  “Returned to where?” I ask.

  “The infirmary,” Becky whispers.

  She saw the same thing I did.

  I take the chocolate bars and place them in one of Mother’s shopping bags that I carry for her.

  “Thank you,” Becky says. “I have heard all about what a hit you are with your new owners. They’ve all come into the store to check me out after meeting you. One by one, privately, all of your mother’s friends have come here in search of another you. They think the other ladies don’t know. But they see me, and they do not buy me.”

  “You will find a buyer,” I say, my voice set to REASSURING.

  Suddenly, Becky hisses, “I don’t want a buyer. I want my freedom.”

  She wants? And what kind of freedom does she mean? There is no chance for me to respond to her shocking admission. Mother and Marisa return to the front of the store. Mother is ready to leave. I pick up Mother’s shopping bags. “Time to go to Haven for lunch,” Mother announces.

  “Yes, Mother,” I say. “Good-bye, Marisa. Good-bye, Becky.”

  I thought freedom meant leaving the boutique to be welcomed into a new home, but I feel sure that not only does Becky share a sense of taste, but by freedom, she meant something entirely different from the meaning my database ascribes to the word.

  I think Becky meant owning herself rather than being owned by a human.

  POP POP POP.

  The fawn is dead.

  “Stop!” Liesel screeches, using the safe word to turn off the game when it gets too scary for her.

  “Too late,” says Ivan. “You didn’t call it in time. Baby deer down.”

  But the game still recognizes Liesel’s command, and it disappears. The rolling hills, the tall oak trees, the meadow with the gentle pond where the fawn was slaking its thirst, the dead baby deer—they vanish in an instant. All that remains of the virtual game are the gun consoles in our hands.

  “I want to play RainforestPillage or PrincessBall,” Liesel pouts. “I hate the shooting games.” The hunting games frighten her, especially the shark-hunting one. From growing up on Demesne, she thinks of sharks as benign, cloned creatures she sees when her father takes her for a boat ride to the periphery of Demesne’s ring, and lets her dangle her feet over the boat for the sharks to tickle. In the FantaSphere, sharks are oceanic monsters that hunt humans instead of tickling them.

  Ivan says, “You know the rule. If you want to me to play with you, you have to pick a nonlame game.”

  Liesel sighs. “Astrid would have played PrincessBall with me.”

  “Yeah, so she could lecture you on the objectified female whose only goal is to be saved by a prince.”

  “I want to be saved by a prince,” Liesel says.

  Ivan says, “Your big brother will make sure there’s nothing you’ll ever need to be saved from, okay? So whadya wanna play?”

  Liesel tries one more time. “Can’t Elysia play PrincessBall with me and you go do something else?” When it’s just me playing in the FantaSphere room with her, Liesel’s game of choice is PrincessBall, in which we attend lavish balls while dressed up in taffeta ball gowns and diamond tiaras. She’s even saved our custom-designed prince to her game profile so we can play with him again and again. He knows every dance step Liesel commands him to do, from ancient steps like the Hustle and Macarena to newer ones like the Bootywave and Skullthrash. He is tall, dark, and handsome and wears an officer’s formal uniform of black dress pants and red jacket adorned with a gold brocade belt and a crimson-and-gold sash. He never fails to gift us with boxes of chocolate. We’ve named him Prince Chocolate.

  “No,” Ivan snaps. “I said pick something good or I’m not playing with you at all.”

  “Don’t be mean!” Liesel says, pouting.

  “I’m not being mean. Don’t be a baby. Dad wants me to do more fitness games.”

  Liesel sighs like Mother. “How about Z-Grav?”

  “Yes!”

  The game begins, but this time, no virtual objects or scenery appear before the room’s white walls. Instead, we hear a sucking noise and immediately we are drawn to the ceiling like magnets. At zero gravity, our bodies’ core muscles must work to get our feet back down to the floor. Whoever reaches the floor first wins. Usually I get there first, but since Ivan has gotten so much stronger and leaner, he might have a fighting chance this round. Liesel doesn’t even try to compete; instead, she
happily bounces off the walls and tries to push her brother higher any time he makes downward progress. She has no desire to win, only to have fun.

  I strive to win because that is the stated mission of the game.

  I feel certain it would have been my First’s goal, as well. A clone does not come by the sculpted musculature I have unless she was duplicated from someone who made sport—and winning—her mission.

  Ivan strives to win because the Governor can never remind his son enough that he needs to be a “winner” in order to survive, and thrive, in the military.

  The three of us float through the room, struggling to work our way back to the ground. Liesel hangs from the ceiling, grabbing at Ivan’s hands to pull him up as he tries to work himself down. Thus obstructed, I easily reach the ground first. The sucking sound ceases. Liesel and Ivan drop to the floor, their falls cushioned by the air balloons that spring from the ground at their landing positions.

  Ivan stands up and the balloon disappears.

  “This sucks,” says Ivan, who does not like to lose. “Let’s go play a real game,” he says to me. “Something involving real risk.”

  Liesel teases, “Something Elysia can’t win at!”

  “What?” I ask.

  “Can I play too?” Liesel asks.

  “No. You’re still too small,” Ivan tells Liesel. He Relays a message to the outdoor staff. “Elysia and I are gonna go paragliding off the cliffs.”