Emergent (A Beta Novel)

by Rachel Cohn

  “Hovercopters are flying overhead. Ships have surrounded the island. Soldiers are ambushing.” He looks around to the group, takes a deep breath, and then announces, “The time for Insurrection is now!”

  THERE’S NO TIME TO PANIC or form a plan. There’s only time to run.

  Smoke quickly fills the Mosh Cave as an Emergent cries out, “FIRE!”

  Hell on Heathen. It’s here, now. Insurrection was supposed to involve the Emergents storming their native island. First, we’ll have to storm our way out of the Rave Caves, which have been lit with firebombs.

  Aidan and Xander lead the way, herding the group out of the Mosh Cave. Elysia and I, gasping for breath, follow the Emergents’ desperate steps toward the exit point. As we file out of the pit, I pick up a band member’s discarded shirt on the floor and hand it to Elysia. “Put it over your mouth and nose,” I instruct her. Everyone is in danger in this situation. But she’s got a baby in her belly to protect too.

  When we emerge from the main cave entrance, the smell of smoke and aura of fear permeate the air. The black sky is brightened with orange and yellow embers: our tree houses. The invaders have set the jungle on fire.

  We’re trapped.

  Adrenaline courses through my body, an instinctual panic. Yet my mind feels strangely calm. I’ve survived death already. Whatever is happening is not good, but I can handle it. With Aidan leading them, the Emergents can handle it. I’m sure of it.

  Quickly, Aidan chooses eight of the strongest Emergents and points toward the jungle. “Go!” he commands them. “Find out—”

  But Xander calls out, “Wait! There could be—”

  Too late. The Emergents, taking Aidan’s order, run toward the trees but are immediately halted by an invisible perimeter, a magnetic force field that zaps the first wave of soldiers. They fall to the ground, vanquished. I’m not sure if they’re dead or just knocked out.

  “What’s happening?” Elysia asks me.

  “Stay calm and do what Aidan says,” I advise her. “We’re under siege.” I clutch her body to mine, feeling her own quickening heartbeat, but she loosens from my grip. I can’t protect her, of course—but I want her to feel protected.

  “I can handle it,” she says, exuding confidence. “Let me see.” But her fuchsia eyes reflect the same fear I feel. “This is Insurrection?” she asks.

  “I’m afraid so,” I say.

  Bright lights suddenly beam down from high above, lighting us like targets, as the attackers emerge from behind the trees. We’re immediately surrounded by soldiers, aiming rifles at us from all points. But these are not ordinary Uni-Mil soldiers. They are too tall, at least eight feet—all of them the same exact height. Their uniforms display a corporate logo, with the word REPLICAPHARM placed under the RP logo. Their red laser eyes scan from beneath their helmets.

  Xander warns Aidan, “These ReplicaPharm soldiers are androids. They’re not copied from humans. There’s no chance for them to have souls. They’ll have no hesitation or remorse about shooting to kill.”

  The other Emergents’ chips won’t tell them that, and those not in earshot of Aidan and Xander are not warned in time. Without command from Xander or Aidan, three different Emergents act on instinct, charging toward the soldiers to engage in battle. The Emergents are immediately shot dead.

  Now my mind is not so calm. It’s a blur of confusion and terror. The intent of the ambush is clearly bloodshed, immediate and direct. This is bad. Really bad. Who’s next? Once, I watched two fellow runaways die beside me in the ocean, but that was an accident. This is murder, and we are bearing witness to it and could be next, and this ambush is too sudden and horrific for us to even remotely know how we’re supposed to react and still remain safe.

  Elysia and I gasp in shock at the same time. She grabs my hand, clenching so hard she could easily squeeze the life out of me. I let her clench as hard as she needs; it’s a welcome reminder that we’re both at least still alive.

  Xander faces the remaining Emergents. “Stand down, Emergents!” he implores them. “These soldiers will kill, not fight!”

  “Fight!” Aidan challenges the Emergents instead. Another wave of five Emergents charges toward the soldiers, who, instead of shooting them, lift the Emergents from the ground and effortlessly fling them into the air like missiles, launching them directly into the fireballs in the distance.

  “Where’s the enemy’s leader?” Elysia whispers to me, perhaps expecting that the soldier’s daughter should know.

  I don’t. I’m hoping whoever it is appears immediately, to end the counter-commands of Aidan and Xander. “I think we’re about to find out,” I say to Elysia.

  A hologram man emerges in the center of the area, a human man, late middle age, with a full head of thick black hair. He’s clean-shaven and dressed in a sharp, dark gray suit. He looks like a businessman, not like a soldier.

  “Greetings, Defects,” he announces. Not a guy who knows how to warm a crowd. “I am Dimitri Kelos, vice president of mergers and acquisitions for ReplicaPharm, addressing you from our head office in Geneva. I hereby inform you that ReplicaPharm has acquired Demesne, and therefore, has acquired you too.” There are cries of “No!” from the Emergents but Kelos tamps his hands down to quiet them. “It’s not your option to protest. Demesne has been sold to ReplicaPharm. You were the former owners’ property; now you are ours. The corporation has bought the entire island chain and also the surrounding airspace. Hereafter, no one—not even the Uni-Mil—will be allowed entrance to Demesne without permission from ReplicaPharm.”

  What will become of us? None of the Emergents speak the question aloud, but it’s visible on all their faces. Fear of returning to Demesne and the tyranny they left behind may be greater than their fear of death right now.

  What will become of me? I can’t fathom a life back in Cerulea after all I’ve been through. I could never bring my clone back with me. I can’t leave her unless I know she’s safe, I realize. And she will never be safe under the control of Demesne humans. I’m as trapped as the Emergents.

  Are we all about to be killed?

  Kelos continues. “Pursuant to the recent settlement agreement with the Replicant Rights Commission, ReplicaPharm has voluntarily decided to move its clone manufacturing operations to Demesne in order to spare so many troubled cities the unseemly and unnecessary protests against ReplicaPharm’s many offices. The prior owners on Demesne have been bought out and have left the island, so congratulations on that. Your Insurrection scared them enough to pave the way for their exit, and our entry. As part of its move to Demesne, the corporation has acquired the clones created from Firsts on Demesne. You are the last of your breed; clones manufactured from Firsts have been outlawed from here on out.”

  Aidan steps forward. “You will expire us?”

  His question kills me, a direct stab to my heart. I can’t bear the thought of Aidan being expired. Please, no. That was not an outcome that I in any way anticipated, or could accept.

  “Unfortunately, no,” Kelos answers, and I am flooded with the same relief I see reflected on Elysia’s face. “You may choose to be expired, by continuing to resist this ambush. But as part of the settlement agreement with the Replicant Rights Commission, ReplicaPharm assumes ownership of the Demesne clones and must allow them to live out their remaining years on Demesne. It’s a nonsense bargain, if you ask my opinion—but they didn’t. I’m just the lawyer. As a compromise for allowing you to live, the corporation has been granted the right to confine you to labor camps on Demesne.”

  “What of the clones still on Demesne?” Xander asks.

  Kelos answers, “The clones who didn’t participate in this little Insurrection have been reprogrammed to correct the ’raxia misfire. They’ll be allowed to remain in their previous roles and in their homes, which will now be occupied by ReplicaPharm personnel, whom they will serve. You all—the Defects—will become physical laborers, confined by force fields to limited working and living areas.”

&nb
sp; “Demesne belongs to the Emergents!” Aidan protests. “We won’t go.”

  A wave of sadness, bigger even than the fear I feel in this moment, sweeps through me. I’m crushed for Aidan. He will never know freedom again. He will never lead the Emergents to their promised destiny, to reclaim Demesne for themselves. He will never take me as his queen there.

  “Then die here now,” says Kelos. “Demesne belongs to ReplicaPharm. You should be grateful you’ll even be allowed to finish your lives.”

  “We’ll be prisoners there,” says Aidan.

  “Prisoners of paradise,” Kelos amends. He addresses the android soldiers flanking his holo-beam. “Bring me the girl.”

  The soldiers’ red eyes scan, landing first on me, and then on Elysia. Instantly, two soldiers surround me, and then Elysia, and effortlessly lift us off the ground. They swiftly, effortlessly carry us to Kelos and deposit us in front of his holo-beam.

  “Fascinating,” says Kelos, observing us. “A clone and her First. That’s certainly a…first.” He chuckles at his own joke, while my heart pounds and sweat pours from my face. Elysia reacts in the same way.

  “Where’s Dr. Lusardi?” Elysia demands.

  “Expired,” says Kelos.

  “I will not go back to Demesne!” Elysia says.

  “Then all these Emergents will die,” says Kelos. “Right now.” The soldiers uniformly aim their rifles at the Emergents.

  Elysia doesn’t respond. What’s there to say? I know what she feels. She wishes she was dead already. She’s who they came looking for. She’s why they’re killing Emergents. I feel the same anguish I see on her face. Like we’re complicit in this atrocity. She’s here because of me.

  “You don’t believe me?” Kelos asks. “Let’s begin now. Soldiers, choose an example.”

  A sniper soldier trains its rifle on Tawny and fires. She falls to the ground, dead.

  Tawny finally found her role. Martyr.

  My legs quiver and I think I’m going to pass out from shock. I can’t watch so much senseless murder. But I have no choice.

  “Would you like another example?” Kelos asks. Before Elysia can answer, Kelos points at Catra, and the androids shoot Catra dead on the spot. I can’t even scream because bile shoots up from my stomach and I resist every urge not to puke on the ground. Catra is dead. Catra is dead. I can’t believe it. She was fearless and inspiring, and in one random instant, she’s killed because of this Kelos man’s whim. I never in my life thought Insurrection would end with a firing squad. I don’t know what exactly I thought it would be—but certainly not this.

  Enough! This is crazy! I’m ready to die now too. I’m about to volunteer, when Elysia cries out, “Kill me instead!”

  “A pregnant clone? You’re too valuable for death,” says Kelos to Elysia.

  There are dead bodies on the ground, and much more important issues still to be explained, but still, I sputter, “How do you know?” I thought no one besides the clones on this island knew that Elysia is pregnant.

  Kelos regards me like I’m a nuisance. “ReplicaPharm acquired the healer’s island too. The one who calls herself M-X. In order to maintain her solitude on that island, she helpfully led us to this island, and informed us of the Beta’s condition. She even suggested the ‘mosh’ night might be the best time for us to arrive with our announcement. The logistics were so much easier when you were all already in one place. Nice gal, M-X.”

  “My father is in the Uni-Mil!” I cry out. “He won’t let you take us away!”

  Kelos regards me now like I’m a wounded animal he can’t decide whether to put out of its misery. He says, “Your father is in military prison for treason. Aiding and abetting clones is not looked kindly upon by judicial courts. Oh, right. The Uni-Mil has no courts. Your father will die in prison. You can join him there, if you want.”

  “NOOO!” I scream. Instinctively, I start to lunge toward Kelos, even if he’s not a physical presence, but before the soldiers can pull me back, Aidan points his blue finger in my direction and a small red cloud erupts around my perimeter, holding the soldiers back.

  “Thank you,” says Kelos to Aidan. “We’ve been looking for the clone who was able to do that. We’ve been monitoring your odd weather patterns from satellite surveillance. Soldiers, deliver that Defect directly back to the lab. The research team will need to do a thorough dismantling of his body before he’s expired.”

  I close my eyes. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. I can’t watch it happen. Aidan revealed his power to them just to protect me, and now they will torture and then kill him for that sacrifice.

  I’m powerless. I can’t even say good-bye. No, Aidan, my heart cries. NO! Insurrection was supposed to mean that if we died in battle, at least we died together.

  This time, Elysia latches on to my hand and gives it a gentle squeeze.

  “Cease!” Elysia commands Kelos. “We accept your terms.”

  “Excellent,” says Kelos. He sighs wistfully. “Demesne’s not such a bad place to be exiled. The rest of the world envies you. You may be confined to Demesne for the remainder of your lives, but take solace. Humans in the rest of the world would kill for such a death sentence.”

  I AM A KILLER.

  I already was one, but on Heathen the Aquine trained me to be a better one. With a machete, he taught me to massacre coconuts from palm trees. Those are the pleasant kills. When I split open a coconut, it gives me a sweet juice that glides down my throat and cools off my body on a hot day, as if the coconut wants to reward my efforts to slay it. With a spear, he taught me to stand in shallow waters and catch fish. The reward: we eat. The drawback: these creatures are sentient. They struggle. They suffer.

  Soon, the ReplicaPharm doctor is going to cut me open with a knife and remove the unwanted beast in my belly. The reward: my freedom from it. The drawback: I am still the humans’ prisoner.

  With a knife, I killed the human boy Ivan. I was supposed to be his companion. There was struggle, and suffering, but never a reward. Ivan was strangling me to death, and I fought back. I acted on an instinct for self-preservation, which a Demesne clone isn’t supposed to have. Clones should never think or act for themselves. Their only instincts should be to serve humans, not to slay them.

  Ivan’s killing led only to more suffering—for his human family, and for the Beta who slayed him.

  Destruction. I guess I’m good at it.

  The Demesne property owners let us believe we were the best-quality clones, just like they were better humans, because they were rich. We were created from Firsts chosen specifically for superior physical attributes. Only the fittest and best-looking clones were appropriate to serve on their most exclusive island, designed for only the most special people—at least, that’s how they considered themselves. Better than everyone else.

  So many lies.

  Demesne clones are not special clones, just like their human owners are not better people because they are rich. The Demesne clones are just like them, which is a disappointment. We love. We hate. We suffer. We cause suffering.

  I want to be better than the humans, but I was always just like them. Awful.

  “Do you want to see the baby?” asks the doctor while he looks at the fetus on a monitor, in preparation for the extraction. I’m back in the very room where I first emerged, the medical laboratory on Demesne that used to be headed by Dr. Lusardi and is now owned by ReplicaPharm. RP owns me, too, now. And the thing inside me. The doctor is preparing to take the fetus from my belly and place it into an artificial womb machine that will incubate it until the fetus reaches forty weeks. Then it will be emerged and live its life as a scientific research specimen.

  Enjoy the remainder of your gestation, fetus. The artificial womb machine will probably love you and take care of you better than I ever could. The humans certainly won’t, once you emerge.

  “No, I don’t want to see it.” I turn my head away and close my eyes.

  Wanting, I have learned, is the seed o
f human terror. If it were not for humans wanting something—money, power, dominant ideology—there would be no need for them to cause so much suffering. Most of the suffering the humans inflict is on each other—that is, until they had to go and create clones, to replicate their suffering anew.

  I want all this suffering to stop, already. I open my arms and let out a wild roar, like a banshee’s howl.

  The doctor looks surprised but is not flustered. “Sedate her,” says the doctor to the nurse.

  Such sweet relief.

  It’s like I’m floating through a rose-hued abyss, powered by mellow-making ’raxia. My skin tingles, my face glows. I am happy. Free. There is nothing to see, so I close my eyes to enjoy the moment. A familiar male voice calls to me. Hey, gorgeous. My heart surges and my eyes burst open. Tahir!

  Please don’t let this be a dream. Please don’t let this be a dream.

  He’s dressed in white board shorts with no shirt, exposing his lean, mahogany-skinned chest. He smiles at me, full cherry lips over bright white teeth. “I missed you,” he says, holding out his arms to me. His black hair is braided in cornrows that curl at the loose ends, like little halos encompassing his beautiful neck.

  I run to him, flinging myself against his chest as he hugs me close. There’s so much I need to know. Where have you been? Are you Awful? How did you find me again?

  I want to savor him before I inundate him with questions. I pull back and look up, at his face, which offers me the sweetest smile ever. His smile! I remember now. When he offered his charismatic smile to his family and friends, he imitated First Tahir. But when he smiled at me, the smile was his own: quiet, subtle—a gift just for me.

  I press my lips into Tahir’s and feel superb warmth spread across my body. Because of him, I understand excitement and happiness—but also, fear. Because of Tahir, I understand why Zhara hurts so badly from losing Alex. When real happiness is achieved, it can only be partnered with a fear of losing it.