Clone Killers

by Raylan Kane

  CLONE KILLERS

  Raylan Kane

  Copyright 2017 by Raylan Kane

  All rights reserved.

  For Melissa

  Ever brightening our post-collapse bunker

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE 7

  CHAPTER TWO 9

  CHAPTER THREE 11

  CHAPTER FOUR 12

  CHAPTER FIVE 13

  CHAPTER SIX 14

  CHAPTER SEVEN 15

  CHAPTER EIGHT 17

  CHAPTER NINE 18

  CHAPTER TEN 20

  CHAPTER ELEVEN 22

  CHAPTER TWELVE 24

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN 26

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN 27

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN 28

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN 29

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN 32

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 33

  CHAPTER NINETEEN 35

  CHAPTER TWENTY 37

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE 39

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO 41

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE 43

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR 45

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE 47

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX 49

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN 50

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT 51

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE 54

  CHAPTER THIRTY 56

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE 57

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO 60

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE 62

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR 64

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE 66

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX 67

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN 69

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT 70

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE 72

  CHAPTER FORTY 73

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE 75

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO 78

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE 79

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR 80

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE 81

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX 83

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN 84

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT 88

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE 90

  CHAPTER FIFTY 92

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE 94

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO 96

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE 99

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR 102

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE 104

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX 106

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN 107

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT 109

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE 110

  CHAPTER SIXTY 113

  CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE 115

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO 117

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE 119

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR 120

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE 121

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX 124

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN 125

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT 127

  CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE 129

  CHAPTER SEVENTY 132

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE 134

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO 137

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE 139

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR 140

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE 143

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX 146

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN 149

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT 152

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE 154

  CHAPTER EIGHTY 155

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE 157

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-TWO 159

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-THREE 160

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-FOUR 162

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-FIVE 164

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-SIX 165

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-SEVEN 166

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-EIGHT 168

  CHAPTER EIGHTY-NINE 170

  CHAPTER NINETY 172

  CHAPTER NINETY-ONE 173

  CHAPTER NINETY-TWO 176

  CHAPTER NINETY-THREE 178

  CHAPTER NINETY-FOUR 180

  CHAPTER NINETY-FIVE 181

  CHAPTER NINETY-SIX 183

  CHAPTER NINETY-SEVEN 185

  CHAPTER NINETY-EIGHT 187

  CHAPTER ONE

  In mid-summer the days are 20 hours long. I feel like I've been in the fields forever. Me and the farm hand, Sterne, have bundled an entire parcelage of hay. The best we’ve ever done. We're both soaked through with sweat.

  “That was a day wasn’t it, Bram?” Sterne said.

  “It surely was,” I said.

  Sterne gathers his tools in a dirty rag and we walk together to the edge of the fields.

  “See you in two morns?” Sterne said.

  “Assured you will,” I said as I wipe sweat from my brow. “I’ve no say in the matter.”

  Tomorrow I am to drive the bale truck to Hyll where the hay will be boiled and turned into resin. From there the resins are made solid and bottled for clone farms. The cloned humans are raised for their meat. I don’t enjoy the taste of cloned people as much as I did when I was young, but I always remember to keep that to myself.

  “Be cautious in Hyll, will you?” Sterne said.

  “Always,” I said. “Good eve, Sterne.”

  “Good eve, young Bramen.” Sterne walks the east path to the small home he shares with his sister and her husband.

  I'm walking the southern path home, the best part of my wakeful hours. I walk slow to savor this time. I love the sound of the night creatures as they spill out from all their mossy corners. It’s a wonder I ever make it home. The faintest lights twinkle above. I always stare at them. Worlds unto themselves, of a kind I cannot conceive. No one in the whole world can imagine what might exist beyond our mortal plane. Not even the High Council could know such things. Father Brigg calls me foolish for thinking about those other worlds up there.

  “Bramen, there you are,” Mother said.

  “Hello Mother Dyer.”

  “Your father has a broil on for you,” she said.

  “Thank you.”

  I've sat at the table in our regent room. Father Brigg stands at the counter where he plates broiled clone.

  “Bramen,” he said. “There you are.”

  “Here I am.”

  “We thought to wait and eat with you,” Father said, “our hunger for the meat thought otherwise.”

  Father makes all our meals. He must be the only man in five regions who insists on preparing human flesh a dozen different ways. After a long day, the broil is welcome news. It is one of the more palatable ways to enjoy the human meat. Strangely enough, a bowl of Yellowfruit sits in the middle of the table. I'm pointing right at it.

  “A strange sight forms before my eyes,” I said.

  “Momma Dyer thinks they’re pleasing to see,” Father said. He's grinning.

  “I do,” Momma said, she smiles back.

  I have hold of the fleshy fruit. It has some heft. I'm taking a big bite out of it, just to get a reaction. My mother gasps. The fruit is sweet. The juice runs through the whiskers on my chin.

  “Bramen Hold, you devilish creature,” Mother said.

  “The boy wants to die young. I’ve often said it, Momma,” Father chuckles.

  My father believes I am of the reckless sort. A trait he says I inherited from my uncle, Soren, Father’s brother – a military hero, and our region’s most famous son. He died in battle 600 years ago, I met him only once when I was three.

  Father Brigg places the platter down on the table and has sat by my mother on the bench.

  “Whenever you’re through with that yellow junk food,” Father said, “try this bit of mastery.”

  “You’re both going to sit there and watch me eat?” I said.

  “Of course.”

  My father takes great pride in his culinary skill. The bit of flesh looks wet and gray on the fork. I bite into the morsel and swallow. The taste of Father Brigg’s broil is less satisfying than normal, but I know better than to say as much, for fear my father will find co
urage and insist on traveling with me tomorrow to Hyll.

  “Mmm...excellent,” I lie.

  “Isn’t it?” Father smiles proudly. “You see Mother? I still have my ways.”

  “Indeed,” Mother winks at me.

  Still, regardless of my misgivings, the hard day of work has brought a hunger out in me I haven’t experienced in some time. I'm hoping for a second helping. I've handed my plate to Father.

  “Ain't we humans delicious?” I laugh. It's a twisted thing to say. Mother grimaces at the awful truth of it.

  “Best bed down now,” Father changes the subject. “You’ll want to leave for the city by sun up.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “68 bales by my last count,” Father said.

  “Mine too,” I said. “Sounds about right.”

  “Don’t come back without at least 500 Fold.”

  “500?”

  “You heard me,” Father said.

  He always places a higher value on our stock than I believe we are due. 500 Fold is a lot of money for 68 bales of dead grass, mind you we are one of the last families in the region to hand-bale our product and the only farm around that cultures our grass chemical-free.

  “Secure load?” Father asks me, as I check around the exterior of the truck.

  “Secure load, Father.”

  “Be cautious, Bram.”

  “Be cautious, Father Brigg.” I live to tease this man, it's true.

  I'm firing up the truck and rolling out. It'll be nice to get away for a little while. Hyll is the largest city in Region Jye, the closest region to our west. It is known for its mountainous land and large forests. Hyll is just across the border from Region Gust, my region, the plains region, the grasslands of Sydin, our planet. Hyll, like all cities is a dangerous place, I know this.

  Most of the world’s people live in cities, they have become over-populated, and violent crime has risen in kind. I take this trip into the city to sell our hay twice a year. My father used to come with me, but he has decided against it in the three years since he was attacked by thieves and injured badly. It happened early on our second morn in town, I had yet to rise, but I awoke to his screams. I killed the men with my bare hands. The local constabulary offered me full pardon for “Cautious Defense of Product”, and we were offered the meat off the thieves’ bones. We were thankful for the show of compensation, but we declined, who knows what awful genetic traits lurked within those scabbards.

  The morning sun has moved high, I am thankful not to be toiling in today’s heat. Poor Sterne. I can hear my father now, barking orders from the porch at all the hired hands. I am thankful not to be there. In addition to the fun of spending two days away from the farm, the drive to Hyll is a pleasure. Hours of pastureland swirling by, making faces at the harvesting machines spread across Gust’s plainscape.

  I am four hours into my eight hour journey. An old lady stands in the road. Were my father here, he would convince me to plow her over citing “Cautious Defense of Product”, I am not my father.

  “State your trouble, miss?”

  “Such a young man. So helpful to stop,” she says.

  “Happy to, miss.” I'm startled by her wrinkled skin. Eating nothing but human flesh guarantees you a life of tissue regeneration. We don't age. “Pardon, miss,” I say, “but you’re the oldest person I’ve seen in some time. Are you missing proper meals perhaps? Eating too many greens?”

  “Cheeky one you are,” she says.

  “I mean no offense. Your advanced appearance. It’s a rarity to behold.”

  “I suppose it is.”

  “Why are you in the road?” I said.

  “You see that swath of trees o’er yonder?” She says.

  “I do.”

  “My Liebling is there,” she said. “He’s in pain.”

  “He’s hurt?”

  “He is.”

  “Is he your son?”

  “He is.”

  “Stay here,” I said, “I will fetch medical transport.”

  “No. That won’t do,” the lady said. “You must come and attend to him. There is no time.”

  “I have no medical knowledge,” I said. “I have other matters.”

  “No, please.”

  The lady is pulling at my sleeve with desperation. She is tiny. She doesn’t have the look of a thief or a liar, but I have been fooled before. I have potentially 500 Fold worth of product on my truck, it might not be worth the risk to delay any further, though I also do not want to leave an injured man alone in the middle of nowhere.

  Still, if thievery is this one’s game, she poses no physical threat, and whoever this Liebling may be, as always I am up to the challenge.

  “Let’s make this quick,” I said.

  “Oh thank you, dear boy.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The frail lady walks ahead of me, away from the road to the patch of trees. The truck is still running – this shouldn’t take too long.

  “He’s just over here,” she said, “you are ever most gracious.”

  The only sound besides our steps is the westerly breeze. The land in all directions is flat save for this small forested plot, I see no dust being kicked up by ambushing vehicles. There is nothing but golden fields along the road, there are neither buildings nor other living souls within sight.

  The evergreen trees are close and now reach above me. The old miss walks down a small slope to a boulder parked at the base of a tree.

  “Come, come,” she said.

  I look back at the truck, I can hear the engine gently idle, something feels off.

  “He’s right here.”

  Why do I place myself in such scenarios? I’m walking down the slope, I look behind and see the truck disappear from view.

  “Oh, you’re a golden soul,” she beckons me along.

  I am behind the boulder with the miss, and there’s nothing.

  “Well?” I said.

  A crackle of pine cones sounds off to my left and a young fat man steps into view.

  “Liebling, I presume?” I say.

  He’s stepped toward me and extended his hand.

  “Of course,” he said. “Kind of you to stop. Might I ask your name?”

  “Might I ask your injury?” I said.

  “This one suspects antics,” Liebling said to the old miss.

  “Name’s Bramen,” I said. “Apologies, it's not my nature to-”

  “Bramen, you needn’t be so cautious,” Liebling says with a grin.

  I’m looking at the miss, she’s shrugging.

  “No?” I say, “and why is that?”

  The man places his hand on my shoulder. “Because assuredly, sir,” he said, “your truck along with your product is already gone.”

  Curses! I knew it!

  My attempt to run back to the truck is for naught, the man grabs me, knees me in the gut, slugs me good across the forehead, and runs for the road, the frail lady sprints ahead of him, antics indeed. Thundering over the bluff behind me is a horde of screaming men, wild eyed, running with full abandon. In my pain I can barely stand. The men have rushed past me as though I am scenery and carried on to the road. I’m able to make it to the top of the small slope ahead to see the whole lot speed away with my truck. 500 Fold, Father? How do you fancy zero?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Mine is a special kind of stupidity. Mother Dyer has often spoken of it, albeit in more indirect terms. “Your heart is often bigger than your head,” was a common utterance in my formative years. My mother’s brother, Uncle Thereen, was a champion prizefighter in his younger days – taught me everything he knows – perhaps so much that I believe myself to be invincible in all circumstances. Clearly this delusion is what’s led me here. Where am I going to find 500 Fold in the next two days? Worse – where am I going to find 500 Fold and a new heavy product truck for Father Brigg in two days? I may only be 611 years old, but I’ve always prided myself on being wise beyond my
years, I cannot go home with nothing and prove the opposite is true. It’d be decades before Father would think to give me this kind of responsibility again.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The sun is still high. My backside is numb from sitting on gravel. Chewing a dead stalk of redweed often soothes the mind, but I am out of ideas. Prudence would dictate that I carry on to Hyll on foot, logic says the sun will be gone long before I reach the city. The night is no place for a living soul who wishes to remain such. The High Council enforces the “Rule of the Hunt” which states anyone out as the skies reach Full Dark is therefore presenting themselves as dietary fodder for everyone else. Of course, in this scenario the hunters also can be hunted, but that is the way of things. Father Brigg has, on many occasions, brought home the cleaned body of a lonely night traveler. The meat off his bones has a tendency toward a gamier taste than that of a mass produced clone, but we ate our fill, as anyone else would.

  I take no pleasure in the hunting of another man, woman, or child, I refuse the practice, and the last strange meal Father brought home I opted for clone instead. My family said nothing of it, but I’ve seen sons and daughters disowned for less. I have read about city folk ostracized, even imprisoned for daring to raise an opposing view, or for the refusal to consume human flesh in the first place. Much of the time these deviating few are laughed off as their lives are cut short by choosing to consume something as hazardous as plant life. It’s hard to be an activist and change the world when you’re dead. I sympathize with their views, but I also enjoy living.

  A vehicle approaches from the east. I’m standing in the middle of the road waving my arms. They’ve stopped.

  “Please avoid my means of transport,” said a bespectacled man standing behind his driver’s side door. There’s a woman in the passenger seat, eyes as wide as chestnuts.

  “I mean you no harm,” I say.

  “Says one who means antics,” the man's voice quivers with fear.

  I’m running a gentle finger across the tender lump above my brow.

  “Forgive my appearance,” I said. “I know, I look disheveled. I was ambushed. My name is Bram-”

  “We cannot help you,” the man says, “we have no medical training.”