Echo- First Pulse

by C Scott Frank

  “What?” Damien glared at Gibbs. “That’s murder, Zachary.”

  “I don’t see it that way. He’s probably a clone. He switched uniforms before we opened the airlock,” Gibbs said in open defiance. Lincoln knew he had let his team get away with a lot, but Gibbs was getting out of hand. Lincoln liked to maintain a hands-off leadership style, but that may have been his own undoing. “And even if he is a person,” Gibbs continued, “we’d probably be doing him a favor, saving him from PTSD and stuff.”

  “Unbelievable.” Damien turned to Lincoln. “Where’d you find this guy?”

  The team remained silent as Damien stormed out of the infirmary. Lincoln straightened his shoulders and addressed the rest of the scientists.

  “Keep it together. We still have—”

  “More clones to kill today, yea we get it,” Gibbs cut him off and walked out of the room toward his workstation.

  Lincoln stood silently, watching the rest of the team slip from the room to their tasks for the day.

  “What are you going to do?” Keri stopped in the doorway and turned back to Lincoln. “He may have a point, you know.”

  “I’m not sure,” Lincoln replied. “I don’t see any way he could have switched uniforms in the time it took for the shuttle to dock.” He looked at the medical equipment around the lab. Damien was a perfectionist to be true. Every beaker, scope, tool, and solution had a place, organized with uncanny meticulousness. He envied that about his friend.

  This was in stark contrast to Gibbs, whose workstation Lincoln all but refused to visit. The floor in Gibbs’ area had disappeared under a layer of filth within a few weeks of his arrival. Scraps from ration packs and half-filled coffee mugs provided a bed of refuse that Gibbs seemed to enjoy living atop. But, the man’s code was impeccable. Lincoln had observed that more than once. Life was full of strange contradictions.

  “Even still, it is odd,” Lincoln mused, trying with difficulty to wrap his head around, well, all of it.

  “Gibbs or this whole event with the shuttle?”

  “Everything, I guess. It’s all been pretty routine for a whole year, and now this. Maybe someone upstairs is getting bored.” Lincoln smirked at the cheap humor.

  “Are you talking about God or the people who hired us?”

  “Maybe they’re all playing on the same team. Maybe we’re the butt of some cosmic joke.” Lincoln’s mouth creased in a half smile, half resignation sort of gesture.

  “Then why is Gibbs the only one laughing?” Keri raised an eyebrow. Lincoln looked at her with a dark expression, but when he met her eyes, she simply laughed. “Don’t be so serious, Lincoln. It’s all going to be fine, don’t worry. Teams have friction, and that’s okay. Gibbs and Damien will get over it.”

  “Let’s hope so. I would very much like to go home.”

  Day 359 - 18:04

  “This is Doctor Damien Fuller, day 359 of the Frequency program. The time is eighteen hundred hours, four minutes. Subject number ninety-one. We are preparing for the test.” Damien placed the audio recorder on the lab table and positioned the antenna around the subject’s head.

  Lincoln and Edward had spent the first few months of the program developing the device. Supposedly, it could communicate with the receiver implanted in every clone’s head. They all had them, and the going theory pointed to the device as a means of communication for the Sardaan to relay orders to the clones. The mission of Frequency’s team was simple: tap into that device and deliver new orders. Orders that didn’t involve wiping out the human race.

  So far, no luck. Each clone had died on the operating table as soon as Lincoln’s antenna was fired up. Damien wasn’t sure exactly how it worked, but he was losing confidence that it ever would. And it killed him inside.

  Once the antenna was secure and in place, Damien couldn’t help but study the clone’s face. He was a young man with short, brown hair. Eyes closed in a medically induced slumber, oblivious to the world around him. When Damien had signed on with the Frequency team, he had never imagined he would find himself here. Treating these clones—these people—like lab rats. For the greater good, he supposed.

  He flipped the switch on his comms to always-on and settled himself into his role. “Zachary? Edward? Are we ready to begin?”

  “Yeah, everything looks good here. Just ready to let this little white rabbit down the hole,” Gibbs replied, his playful smile almost palpable in Damien’s ear.

  Damien felt Lincoln and Keri watching from an overhead observation deck. Emily entered the lab and placed electrodes and sensors all around the young clone’s head and chest. She plugged them into the machines one by one, and a steady beep filled the air.

  “I’m trying something new with the syntax,” she told Damien. “I was thinking, what if their communication is based on some kind of neural network? What if their minds are networked in a very passive state? That would make transmitting communication easier, because they could simply branch off of nearby neural points. So I’ve been working on a stochastic grammar pattern, applying a Markov technique.”

  “That explains why you needed so much of the computer’s resources last night.” Lincoln’s voice chimed over the speaker in the room. “Modeling the syntax that way is a hefty processing job.”

  “Okay, am I the only one who’s not following here?” Damien responded, looking up at Lincoln through the window.

  “You’re the only one who cares,” Gibbs scoffed through his comm.

  Emily didn’t miss a beat. “Basically, the way humans communicate is generally linear, at least in modern language. Our sentence structures have a preferred pattern and order, but that wasn’t always the case.”

  “Look what you’ve done,” Gibbs sighed.

  Emily ignored him. “In the earliest forms of Latin, word order didn’t matter. Sure, there were some common patterns in use, but essentially, sentences could mean the same exact thing, no matter what order the words were in. As a doctor, you must be quite familiar with Latin, I assume?”

  “Right, but we weren’t taught the language as a study in linguistics.”

  “Sure. So, thus far we’ve been operating under the assumption that these clones are thinking in modern languages. But that may well be a dangerous assumption. So, I’m trying a random model, or a stochastic pattern. Maybe the aliens communicate in a nonlinear fashion, so I’m hoping that by randomizing our impulses, we can see better results.”

  “That’s really quite clever.” Damien nodded his approval. He still wasn’t sure if he understood everything going on under the hood, but he had to respect her ingenuity.

  “Thank you. I feel good about this,” Emily responded with a curt nod.

  “Alright, let’s see it,” Lincoln said from the observation deck.

  Damien reached forward to power on the antenna. He hesitated when his finger found the small, metal switch. He had grown weary of sentencing these people to their death. The tests never worked. Lincoln was an optimist, that much was clear. Damien had once been an optimist in his own right, but that ship had sailed months ago. Now, he looked at the young face in front of him: peaceful, serene, ignorant. Ignorant of the fate that would likely befall him in a few short moments.

  “Is there a problem, doc?” Lincoln’s voice broke Damien from his thoughts.

  “No, it’s just—no, we’re all good.” Like he had learned to do so well over the last months, Damien filed away the part of his mind—the part of his soul—that harbored his conscious and told himself he was doing good works. He flipped the switch on the array and the device thrummed to life, the sound of electricity echoing in Damien’s ears.

  “Ed, fire up the transmitter array,” Damien called. A gentle whine from the transistors was the reply. “Okay, Zachary, pull up the most recent script. Execute on my mark.”

  “Waiting on baited breath, dear,” Gibbs said in an awkward falsetto.

  “Sicko. Okay, three. Two. And one. Execute.” Damien’s hand shook as it hovered over a keyboard. Data
would need to be recorded, especially in the event of a termination. His heart shuddered at the term. Words like that only served to distance people from the acts they were taking part in. Was it termination or senseless killing?

  Four long minutes passed in near total silence.

  “Readings look good.” Emily stood near one of the screens, analyzing the feedback from the sensors and electrodes she had attached. “Wait. Oh no.”

  What had started as a steady beep began to increase in tempo. The digital EEG readout began to look more like a seismometer than a measurement of brainwaves. Lincoln cursed in the comms as the clone on the table began to seize violently. Damien grabbed the defibrillator and wheeled the cart over to the bed.

  “Emily, get the helmet!” Damien pounded the button to prime the paddles.

  “Forget it, Damien,” Lincoln came over the comm, “We’ve lost another. Terminate the subject.”

  Damien applied the electrolyte gel to the ends of the paddles, rubbing them together in a fever. “What? No, the EEG—”

  “I said terminate, doc. There’s nothing more we can do for him.”

  “Unbelievable,” Damien threw the paddles back onto the cart and stormed to the IV tree. He switched one of the baggies and toggled the drip. Within a few seconds, the convulsions stopped. A few moments later and the room fell silent, except for the hum of the air handlers.

  One by one, Damien felt the team retreat to their own duties. He stood, unmoving, looking at the young clone. Hardly more than a child. What a waste. What was the team doing? He had to figure out a way to break through. He knew there must be a way. But then, would that be better? If someone doesn’t behave the way they ought, should it be okay to reprogram them? Perhaps death was the easier way out.

  Damien jumped when the intercom sounded in his ear. He looked up to find Lincoln still in the observation deck, watching. His stoic friend keyed the intercom and told him to call the code. Damien grabbed the audio recorder as he pointed the bed toward the cold storage room for later disposal.

  “Test number ninety-one: failed. Subject number ninety-one time of death: eighteen hundred hours, thirteen minutes.” The doctor paused for a long moment in the doorway, eyes locked with Lincoln’s before continuing. “Subject returned to cold storage for processing.”

  Day 360 - 06:03

  Breakfast in the dining hall was quiet the next morning. Emily sipped coffee while flipping through a book. Gibbs and Edward played a lazy game of chess. Lincoln held his datapad, working on his report from the day before, while Keri compiled all of her notes to add to his report. Damien fixed himself a protein pack and a coffee at the counter. No one spoke.

  Damien flung his breakfast tray against the far wall. The team jumped in unison at the loud crash. Before his tray had settled on the hard floor, he turned and faced the group.

  “Am I the only one here who is tired of killing human beings?”

  The room was silent for a few tense seconds. Emily tucked her nose deeper into her book. Gibbs was the first to speak.

  “I’m not killing human beings,” he said, voice even. Detached.

  “Oh, for—”

  “Get it through your head, Union Jack, these aren’t people. They’re tools. We are trying to reprogram the tools to work for us.” Damien could tell from the look in the programmer’s eyes that he meant every single word. He didn’t want to believe anyone could be so cold. So inhuman.

  “That’s just my point, isn’t it?” Damien insisted. “What makes it okay to reprogram a person? Who decided that we should have that power?”

  “You’re thick,” Gibbs accused. “How can they be people? They don’t have identities. We can do whatever we want with them.”

  “Oh, bollocks.”

  “No, seriously, I want you to tell me, what makes them human? What makes them so indispensable? Because those aliens think they’re pretty disposable.” Gibbs’ hands flew wildly around him as he spoke. Edward scooted the chess board closer to himself to prevent the pieces from becoming collateral damage.

  “That’s a ridiculous question,” Damien stammered. He couldn’t believe he was having this discussion. “Look at them. They are our brothers and sisters. Just because they were created with science doesn’t make them any less real. Or any more disposable.”

  “How many clones is it worth to save the human race? What if it takes a thousand? Ten thousand? Will you sacrifice a portion of those echoes to make sure we survive?” Gibbs punctuated his speech with loud raps on the table now. Edward watched the chess board with growing unease at each impact.

  “I would ask the same of you, how many people would you sacrifice to save us?” Damien shot back. “If it takes ten million people to end this war with violence, is that a sacrifice you’re ready to make? Will you give your own life? The life of your family?”

  “Don’t.” Something changed in Gibbs’ face. His eyes darkened and his jaw clenched under his scraggly beard. “Don’t you talk about my family.”

  “The memories these clones have are as real to them as your memories are to you. You are no different than they are.”

  “Don’t you dare.” Damien could feel the ice in Gibbs’ voice. “I’m nothing like those cheap monsters. You’re deluded. That’s why you can’t bring yourself to kill that clone you have in your infirmary. I wish Lincoln would hurry and tell you to pull the plug.”

  “Okay.” Lincoln stood. “That’s about enough.”

  “Lincoln, what is he talking about?” Damien turned on his friend. “Don’t tell me you’re actually considering this? That’s murder, Lincoln.”

  “No, we’re not seriously considering it at this point. But you need to understand that we may need to. How long do we keep him on life support?”

  “As long as it takes. He’s a human being, Lincoln.”

  “Bull,” Gibbs said.

  “He’s not a clone, Gibbs,” Keri interjected. “We have the manifest. He is one of the pilots. All the clones but the one who broke loose are accounted for.”

  “What?” This was news to Damien. When did they recover the manifest?

  “It’s true,” Lincoln answered. “We were able to pull the shipping and the crew manifest. Everything checks out: your man was—is one of the pilots. Every clone is accounted for, save one: the dead clone we pulled. Everything seems pretty straightforward now.”

  “Yea, right.” Gibbs stormed out of the room.

  Edward looked around sheepishly, moved a bishop and whispered, “Checkmate.”

  Day 360 - 06:41

  Lincoln Harris gazed out of an observation window at the rough horizon of the dwarf planet, Ceres. He always tried to be here for this, one of his favorite moments of each day. A shimmer caught his eye on the horizon, followed by bright white beams lancing through black of space from the point. The brilliant flash of white light as the sun emerged into full exposure was quickly dampened by the automatically tinting windows.

  “Sunrise twice a day for a year, and it still never gets old, does it?” Damien approached the large picture window. The small observation deck managed to feel cavernous despite the size—lack of furniture or other trivialities combined with a floor-to-ceiling picture window that occupied an entire wall lent to that effect. Lincoln stood in his favorite spot on the space station. The only place he didn’t feel cramped.

  “It really doesn’t,” Lincoln replied, without looking away. The view was captivating. Uncountable stars as a seamless backdrop to the bold sphere of fire that was Sol. The harsh light cast long shadows across the craggy surface of the planet below. Lincoln loved catching sunrises here. It was almost a religious experience for him. Almost.

  “Do you believe in God, Lincoln?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe.” Lincoln shrugged. “You?”

  “I do,” Damien replied. “Now I’m no choir boy or Bible-thumping saint, but I look at sights like this”—he gestured at the vista—“and can’t help but question the idea that it was all a cosmic accident.”
/>   “Sure.”

  “It’s just, there’s too many unanswered questions for God to not be an answer to some of them,” Damien kept on. “And my mother was a Baptist. She wanted me to be a preacher, but I couldn’t do it.”

  “Oh, yeah?”

  “You can imagine the talk in med school,” Damien chuckled. “God is pretty unpopular in higher education, you know.”

  “Many people would say that education is the enemy of religion.” Lincoln’s voice lacked conviction. He didn’t have a hard opinion either way on the issue. He couldn’t convince himself that it mattered.

  “Many people are short-sighted.”

  “Maybe so. What’s on your mind?” Lincoln turned toward his friend.

  “I can’t help but wonder,” Damien said thoughtfully. “Let’s say there is a God. When he creates man—or woman—he imbues him with a soul, right?”

  “Okay.”

  “But when man—or alien, rather—creates man, like these clones, man can’t give it a soul.” He paused as if he wanted to say something else, but lost the words.

  “I guess not.” Lincoln encouraged his friend to talk it out.

  “Or maybe they can, I don’t know,” Damien shrugged. “What is a soul anyway? I can’t see it on a scope or an EEG. I can’t feel it in me.” He stabbed his hand at his chest.

  “A lot of people have asked that question over thousands of years.”

  “Right, but none have asked with quite this much baggage.”

  “You’re not wrong.” Lincoln turned back to the view.

  “What are we dealing with here, Lincoln?” Damien said with a hint of frustration. “What lies in the hearts of these captured shells?”

  “Maybe the answer isn’t binary,” Lincoln said.

  “What?”

  “I mean, maybe it’s not just black and white. Few things in life are ever so cut and dry. It’s like—”

  “No, that’s it,” Damien said excitedly. “Lincoln, you’re a bloody genius.”