The Clone Republic (Clone 1)

by Steven L. Kent

  A voice in the back of my head said that I was far out of my depth as we approached the admin area. That was the holy of holies on most ships, officer country, but we were headed for far more hallowed halls than mere officer country. At the far end of admin were the six elevators that led to the Scutum-Crux Command deck. The lieutenant approached one of these elevators and rolled the thumb, pointer, and middle finger of his right hand against a scanner pad. The elevator call button lit up.

  “Ever been back here before, Corporal?”

  “No, sir.”

  The elevator door slid open, and we stepped in. I stood silent, watching numbers flash on a bar over the door, my mouth dry and my throat parched.

  We stepped onto the twelfth floor. Staff members from every branch sat at desks. An Air Force major stood in front of a large glass map moving symbols. A colonel from the Army walked past us and ducked into a small office. No one seemed to notice us.

  At first glance, SC Command looked very similar to the admin area at the base of the elevator, except that here you saw men in Air Force blue and Army green. The lieutenant led me past the cubicles and lesser offices, and the surroundings became much less familiar. Even the ceiling was higher on this part of the deck. We entered a large waiting room. The naval officer/receptionist glared at me. “Is this Corporal Harris?”

  “In the flesh,” the lieutenant answered.

  “He is in conference,” the receptionist said, “but he said for you to go in.”

  “In conference?” I asked.

  “That means we need to keep absolutely quiet,” the lieutenant whispered. We approached a convex wall with a double-paneled door. As the panels slid open, I heard Admiral Klyber speaking. The officer put up a hand, signaling me to stay outside as he peered into the circular room. A moment later, he turned back and signaled for me to follow.

  Admiral Klyber and Vice Admiral Barry sat along the edge of a semicircular table facing a wall with several screens. I recognized the faces on the screens from stories I had seen in the news. Admiral Che Huang, the secretary of the Navy, a member of the Joint Chiefs, spoke on one screen. Generals from the Army and Air Force, also members of the Joint Chiefs, showed on other screens, along with a member of the Linear Committee.

  “You said Ezer Kri would not pose a problem, Barry,” Huang said in an angry voice. His image glared down at Admiral Barry, his lips pulling back into a sneer.

  “The planet has no standing military and no registered capital ships,” Barry said. Clearly shaken, the vice admiral wheezed and snorted as he spoke. Beads of sweat formed on his mostly bald scalp. “Those ships could not possibly have come from Ezer Kri.”

  “I quite agree,” said Klyber. “Admiral Barry had no reason to anticipate the attack on the Chayio .” He leaned back in his chair, laced his fingers, and spoke in a calming voice like a mediator who had come to settle a squabble among friends. “As I read this, it appears that the reality of the Atkins threat is finally showing itself. Admiral Barry was only briefed about hostilities with the Yamashiro government.”

  “Atkins?” asked the member of the Linear Committee.

  “We’ve all seen the record; those destroyers broadcast themselves to the scene,” Klyber said. “Did you look at the design of those ships?”

  “I’d need clearer pictures,” the Committee member said. “I saw your notes; but after all of these years, I can’t believe it.”

  “Fair enough,” Admiral Klyber said. “But we do agree that those ships are of an obsolete U.A. design and manufacture? I am sure we agree that this was not an extragalactic attack.”

  The faces in the television screen nodded in agreement.

  “We know that the Mogat population vanished after the attack on our platoon,” Klyber continued. “A number of ships launched during the attack on the Chayio . Intelligence traced that launch to an uninhabited island. It seems safe to assume that the separatists massed on that island as they planned their escape.”

  “I am aware of that, Admiral,” Huang hissed. “If those ships came from the GC Fleet, they would be hopelessly outdated.”

  “Not necessarily,” Klyber said. “The Kamehameha was commissioned before we began exploring the Galactic Eye. They may have updated their ships just as we reoutfitted this one.” He shot a furtive grin at Vice Admiral Barry, who fidgeted nervously and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand.

  “So how do we proceed, assuming those ships were from the GC Fleet?” asked the member of the Linear Committee.

  “There were hundreds of ships in that fleet,” Klyber pointed out.

  “Even if they reoutfitted it, I don’t think the GC Fleet would be much of a threat,” Huang said. “Not against a modern navy.

  “The GC Fleet was a one-dimensional fleet designed for invasions, not ship-to-ship combat. It did not have frigates or carriers. It will be helpless against fighters.” No one seemed interested in Huang’s opinion, however.

  “Perhaps we’d better double the patrols guarding the broadcast system,” said the general from the Air Force.

  “Would there be any way to track the fleet’s movements?” asked the Committee member.

  Klyber shook his head. “Once we get a psychological profile of whoever is commanding the fleet, we may be able to predict his steps. For now, the best we can do is to go on alert.”

  The Army general sighed. “It’s the enemy that you can’t see . . .”

  “Do you think Crowley is behind this?” asked the Committee member.

  “I’ve put a great deal of thought into this,” Klyber said. “Crowley has a mind for tactics, but he has no skill for coalition building. He is no politician. If a civil war is brewing, Crowley will need allies . . . political allies.”

  The Army general smiled. “Thank God Morgan Atkins is dead.”

  “Atkins?” asked Admiral Barry.

  “Is he?” Klyber said. “I don’t know how we can rule Atkins out of the picture.”

  “My God, he would have to be a hundred years old,” Barry said.

  “I never call them dead until I see a tag on their feet,” said Huang, who clearly enjoyed needling Barry on every topic.

  “With the right ambassador, Crowley won’t have any trouble finding plenty of support in the House of Representatives,” said Klyber. “We will need to observe how the politics play themselves out in the House. Crowley’s allies will expose themselves sooner or later.”

  “If he’s tied in with Atkins, he’ll have lieutenants on every planet,” the member of the Linear Committee observed.

  “We must choose our next step wisely,” Huang said. It seemed like he was trying to regain control of the conversation by reviewing what everyone else said. “If you are right, Admiral Klyber, we have no way of knowing where or when Crowley will strike.”

  “What do we do about Ezer Kri?” Barry asked.

  “We should make an example of Ezer Kri,” said Huang, the faces in the monitors nodding their agreement. “Blast the planet until nothing is left. We cannot show any weakness in this situation.”

  Admiral Klyber leaned forward, placed his hands palms down on the table and took a deep breath. “If that is the consensus.”

  Huang made a weary sigh. “You have other ideas, Admiral Klyber?”

  “The Mogat Separatists have already abandoned the planet, and the rest of the population seems sufficiently loyal to the Unified Authority. Governor Yamashiro is a smart politician; he knows he’s in a fix.”

  “We cannot afford to appear weak,” Huang said. “If we let Ezer Kri get away with attacking a U.A. ship, other planets will follow.”

  “Of course,” Klyber said. “But we have already agreed that the attacking ships did not launch from Ezer Kri. Destroy the planet now, and you will only kill innocents. What kind of lesson is that?”

  “And your suggestion?” asked the Committee member.

  “Once we have captured the people responsible for the attacks, we return them to Ezer Kri for public trial and executi
on on their own home planet.”

  “We’ll look like fools if they get off,” said Huang.

  “Rest assured,” Klyber said, “these terrorists will be found guilty. We will see to it.”

  “Found guilty on their home planet; I like it,” said the Committee member.

  “Absalom Barry is a capable officer,” Admiral Klyber said, as we walked back across the empty lobby toward his office. “He lacks vision, but he runs an efficient fleet. When I was transferred to Scutum-Crux, I put in a request for him.”

  I had not asked about Barry. I never asked one superior officer about another; such inquiries inevitably came back to haunt you.

  We entered a short hall that led to Klyber’s office—a surprisingly small room with a shielded-glass wall overlooking the rear of the Kamehameha . The galaxy seemed to start just behind the admiral’s desk. While trying to speak with him, I constantly found myself distracted by the view of Ezer Kri or a passing frigate. His desk faced away from that observation wall, and, disciplined as he was, I doubted that the admiral turned back to look out often.

  “Please, sit down,” Klyber said. As he spoke, he picked up a folder that was on his desk. He studied it for a moment, then looked at me. “Our work on Ezer Kri is just about finished. I’ll be glad to leave.”

  I said nothing.

  “Corporal Harris, we’re going to take on an important visitor over the next few days. The secretary of the Navy will be joining us. He has a mission he would like to conduct. In order for Huang’s mission to succeed, we will need to draw upon your particular abilities.”

  “Sir?” I said, sounding foolish.

  Klyber took a deep breath and leaned forward on his desk, his gray eyes staring straight into mine. “You grew up in an orphanage, Corporal?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What did they tell you about the cloning process?”

  Just hearing an admiral mention the word “clone” left me dizzy. I knew he had not brought me there for a casual chat. I felt a prickling sensation on my back and arms. Clenching the arms of my chair, I felt nervous, genuinely nervous.

  “The teachers never discussed cloning,” I said. “I heard rumors; we talked about it when the teachers weren’t around.”

  Without releasing me from that intense stare, Klyber leaned back in his chair again. He picked up a pen in his right hand and tapped it against the palm of his left. “Tell me about the rumors.”

  I pried my eyes from his for a moment and stared out through the viewport behind him. I could see Ezer Kri, a blue-and-green globe with patches of clouds. I could see a frigate off in the distance. Far off in space, I could see the star that was the system’s sun. “They never know they are clones,” I said, fighting to take control of my emotions. I was not a clone. I had nothing to fear. “They can’t see it. Two clones can stand side by side looking into the same mirror and not see that they look alike.” I knew that—I saw it every day.

  Klyber’s mouth formed an amused smile. “Yes, the infamous identity programming—clones don’t know that they are clones. Have you also heard rumors about their dying if they learn the truth?”

  “I’ve heard that,” I said.

  “They weren’t thinking about the works of Plato when they came up with the death reflex, but a similar idea is found in The Republic . Plato did not want mobility between his classes. I think he was most concerned about ordinary citizens trying to become warriors or rulers. Are you familiar with that?”

  We had studied Plato when I was growing up in the orphanage, but I could not think at that moment. I shook my head.

  “No? Plato said that if people challenged their station, you were supposed to tell them that they were made yesterday, and all that they knew was just a dream. Sounds ridiculous. It sounds a bit like the death reflex. Plato thought you could control the masses by stripping them of all that they knew with a little lie . . . Plato’s lie.

  “The Senate wanted something a little stranger. If clones saw through the lie, the Senate wanted them dead. Putting guns in the hands of a synthetic army scared them. They wanted to make sure they could shut the synthetics down if they ever saw through the lie. I was against it. A mere scrap of neural programming seems like thin protection against a danger that could potentially wipe out our entire defense. The Senate debated it in an open session.

  “The hardliners won out, of course. The majority argued that renegade clones would be the greatest threat to the Republic, and they had a point. They said that once the clones realized they were not human, there would be no reason for them not to rise up. Fear of the warrior class goes all the way back to Plato, himself.

  “What else do you know about clones, Corporal Harris?”

  His questions were torture. “How do they die?” I asked. I could not remember my mouth ever feeling so dry.

  “What kills them?” Admiral Klyber gave me a benevolent smile. “A hormone is released into their bloodstream. It stops their hearts. It’s supposed to be fast and painless.

  “Do you know why Congress is afraid of its own cloned soldiers?” Klyber asked. The humor left his smile, and his gaze bored into me.

  “No, sir. I don’t.” By then I felt more than dizzy; my stomach had turned. Arguments took place in my head as I considered the evidence that proved my humanity, then shot it down with questions about clone programming. I never knew my parents. Did that make me a clone?

  “No, not because of a mutiny . . . because of me,” Klyber said.

  “When I was a young lieutenant, I oversaw the creation of a special generation of cloned soldiers. It was done during the troubled times, Corporal Harris. Our first explorations into the central region of the galaxy ended in disaster. A fleet of explorer ships simply vanished, and everyone feared the worst. That was the only time I can ever remember when the politicians stopped talking about expansion and colonizing the galaxy.”

  The words “central region” seeped through my whirling thoughts. I focused on them, considered them. “Were you stationed with the GC Fleet, sir?” I asked.

  “No,” Klyber said, putting up a hand to stop me. “I was safe on Earth, a recent graduate from Annapolis, with a promising career and some highly placed friends. My father was on the Linear Committee, Harris. I had guardian angels who kept me safe and put me on the fast track. I was assigned to oversee a special project. It was important that Congress not get wind of the project, or the Senate would have canned it. My father knew about the project, of course, but he was the only member of the Linear Committee who did.

  “Morgan Atkins was the senior member of the Linear Committee at the time. The entire Republic worshipped him. Did you know that Atkins was on the Committee?”

  So confused that I did not even understand Admiral Klyber’s question, I shook my head.

  “Atkins was big on manifest destiny. ‘Humanity can never be safe until it conquers every inch of known space,’” Klyber said, lowering his voice in what I assumed was a parody of Atkins. “No one challenged Atkins. He single-handedly ran the Republic.

  “The Galactic Central Fleet was Atkins’s idea. He wanted a fleet that was so powerful that all enemies would fall; and when Atkins called for action, by God, people jumped. The problem was that Atkins’s fleet had to be self-broadcasting. We usually sent self-broadcasting explorer ships to set up discs; but with explorer ships disappearing, he wanted a self-broadcasting fleet.”

  Klyber rubbed his eyes. “God, what a nightmare. The Galactic Central Fleet was just like they say—bigger and more powerful than any fleet ever assembled. Just building the broadcasting engines cost trillions of dollars. In the end, each ship cost five times what normal ships cost.

  “It took three years to build the fleet. Three years, and all of that time the military was on high alert looking for any signs of an invasion.”

  Klyber stopped speaking for just a moment. His gaze seemed far away, but his eyes stayed focused on mine. “We tested for every contingency. The explorer ships could have been dest
royed by some kind of broadcast malfunction, so we bounced the GC Fleet back and forth across the Orion Arm until no one knew where it was without daily updates.

  “Once we were sure of the broadcast engines, we sent the fleet to explore the inner curve of the Norma Arm . . . the center of the galaxy. The ships flew near Jupiter. They initiated the self-broadcast, then they were gone. It was just like the explorer ships; we simply never heard from them again.” Klyber sat up. “Atkins accompanied the fleet. It was his pet project.”

  “I don’t understand, sir.” I said. “Atkins went with the GC Fleet?”

  “My father never trusted Atkins,” said Klyber. “He had me assigned to research a new class of clones around the same time Atkins proposed his grand fleet. Congress never knew what I was doing. Atkins never knew. It was strictly a military operation.”

  “Liberators,” I said.

  “Liberators,” Klyber agreed. “You’ve probably heard rumors about Liberators having animal genes . . . We experimented with genes from animals, but it didn’t work. Liberator clones were not very different than earlier clones except that they were smarter and far more aggressive. We gave them a certain cunning. We made them ruthless. They needed to be ruthless. We thought we were sending them to fight an unknown enemy from the galactic core—something not human. Do you understand?”

  Klyber did not pause for me to answer.

  “One of the scientists came up with the idea of ideas . . .” Klyber smiled for just a moment, then the smile vanished. “Hormones. Classical conditioning. We mixed endorphins in their adrenal glands. The mixture only comes out in battle. A drug that would make the clones addicted to war. Only a scientist could come up with an idea like that, Harris. It never occurred to us military types.

  “You need to understand, these clones were our last hope, and we had no idea what was out there. We were sending them into hostile space. Whatever was out there had annihilated our most massive fleet.”