Gene Drifters: The Clone Soldier Chronicles-Book III (33 page)

“Let’s get this done, Max,” Chad said, showing considerable
annoyance. He had been up for the last ten hours watching the coms of Rose in major
surgery, fighting for her life. Then he, Gimlet, and Stephen had to cobble this
plan together. He was on a short wire at the moment; you don’t really want to
piss off a clone soldier. Chad was an inducible clone, but he still got angry
just like anyone else, except he was ten times stronger than the average human
male.

“I’ll read from it and you recite the rest of the page,” Max
replied, and took out his reading glasses from his inner jacket pocket. Several
days ago Max had gotten the glasses when he’d noticed his eye sight was getting
worse.

“You look at page four, third item down,” Chad instructed. He’d
also memorized the formula. Chad recited the entire remainder of the next three
pages from memory, to prove he had it in his brain. He never told Max that
Stephen and Michael Segev had also memorized it. But of course Stephen would
not chance a face to face with anyone because the WME thought he was dead and
he wanted to keep it that way. So Chad had to deal with this lying bastard.

Max thought it was too bad he didn’t have a weapon to
eliminate one of the walking formulas. Bad idea; Chad Yac can read minds.
Remember?

“Don’t even consider it, Max. You don’t want to screw my day
any more than it already has been. Follow me.” Chad signaled for Max to follow
him down the hallway to a door leading into a lighter and more occupied version
of bubble-stop #5. He was following the round-about route he’d memorized back
at Stephen’s cottage.

To Max, this looked like the commerce area of the bubble-stop,
with regular food stores, a bar, the church, and a whore house. Max relaxed,
thinking maybe #5 was not as bad as everyone thought; it was similar to those
he’d visited while on philanthropic duty for the WME, back when he had to do
that for his charitable work credits in law school.

But Chad didn’t stop there; he just kept on at his fast
pace, not saying a thing to Max. “I don’t understand. Where am I going? Where
are you taking me? I’ve determined you have the formula memorized. Why can’t you
just com my chopper, and I’ll leave now? I have no interest in a tour of this
ridiculous place.” Max kept talking to Chad as they continued down an alley,
then another alley, and another. He did not notice they were going downhill, or
that this was just level 1, and had nothing to do with why he’d come there.

They arrived inside the pedestrian portal to mid-level #2,
and that stupid com voice repeated that same thing about getting ready for
entry, blah, blah, blah, and have a nice fucking day. The slime oozed all over
them, while check drones came so close to Max, he thought they’d decided to extract
his nasal hairs. Finally after what seemed way too long, the slime pulled back,
and Max ran to keep up with Chad as he walked down yet another dimly lit alley
to what appeared to be another security wall. Chad had taken Max around level 2,
so he would not see their industrial capabilities. They were actually at the
back of a main building, near the trash bins. Chad was happy to note that Max
thought this was some garbage area for the #5ers.

“Why are you taking me through their dumps? Did I ask you
for a tour, clone? Take me back to the chopper area immediately, or I will see
that you are culled and not sold at market,” Max threatened, without any
apparent effect. He could not understand why this clone was not terrified of
him like the others had been; those he’d been collecting and selling to clients
for the past three years.

They reached a security wall, which was opened by an old
fashioned metal key Chad carried in his right hand. He motioned for Max to
follow him into the next room, actually the stairs down to level 3. Taking a
side route, Chad guided Max around the nano-drone reprogramming center and past
the facility where the freeze-thaw prison rejects worked in their sonic weapons
refurbishment factories. Max did not get to see any of the robotics design
labs, or the hospitals where individuals could be salvaged from the flash
freeze damage, if possible. But, Ching Shih would have been a poster girl on
level 3. She’d spent several years there for restoration to her current self.

The hallway continued to drop downwards, narrowing as they
went. Chad had never been to this section of #5, but he used his memorized map
to guide the way as it gently sloped downward. Max did not seem to notice
anything around him anymore. It was either because it was too dark or he was
too nervous.

“Why can’t I just leave now? I know you have the formula
memorized. I demand that you take me back to the chopper deck immediately. I
want to leave. What is this place?” Max whined, as he noticed the ground had
gone from plasmon bubble to more like scruffy concrete. He was in one of the
older excavation tunnels used by the builders back when they made the low-ways.
This meant he was following Chad under the ocean floor.

“Why are we here? Is this the exit? I have to contact Mr.
Songtain right away. He’ll want to know the results of my visit; that you do
indeed have a memorized version of his formula. He’ll want me to negotiate the
terms of the deal.” Max was getting more desperate with each passing minute. He
finally noticed they were descending down deeper into #5. But, Chad just kept
walking, past level 4, where the results of bad clinical trials lived, in
whatever manner made them happy. Chad’s first visit there had made him realize
how enlightened the citizens of bubble-stop #5 were. Where else on the planet
would a city of individuals with damaged minds and bodies find kindness.

Chad passed level 4, taking a concrete hallway near one of
the main buildings. You couldn’t see, but Chad knew that each had a beautiful
flower garden in an inner courtyard. The plants had been provided by a kibbutz
in the Israel Free Zone, and were brought in by Rachael Geffen, each year.

Finally Chad keyed in a code to a huge hydraulic concrete
and titanium door; the door to the last and bottom zone, level 5. Chad quickly
entered before the door shut. Max had to follow.

As subsequently reported by the Ben Gurion scientists…it was
time. Max started his nonstop rant. The toxic nutria-blend had finally reached
home in his nasty little bottom-line limbic system.

“I’ll get even with you, clone. You can’t go around stealing
from an official Inc. CEO. You can’t outwit a chief CEO legal counselor like me.
You wait, I’ll have this place flooded again, like I ordered that last time,
when all of you low life demanded stocks and jobs. I had you all killed back
then; I can do it again. You think you deserve to live; to have a decent
standard of living? You think you are equal to us; that we should give you some
fucking minimum wage? You think we want to help you survive? You’re here to
serve us; that’s all. I’ll kill you all, just like the last time!” Max, who had
reached critical CEO nutria-blend toxicity point, began to rant more and more
as he followed Chad down into the lower levels of #5, to what even the other
#5ers called
the zone
.

Chad stopped at an opaque wall, allowing the final slime layer
to pass over Max. This time no voice welcomed him, and no nano-drones checked
for contamination. This time, the slime smelled like something vaguely familiar
to Max. He couldn’t identify it. But it was reflective, like a mirror, not see
through. So Max got a full look at himself. He screamed in terror, before he
fainted. All he could think, as his world went black was, who was that
one-hundred-year old, hunched over, white haired old man staring back at him?

Then, everything went black.

Chad watched from the other side of the slime wall, as the
Uns grabbed Max and took him to his very own cubicle. He then turned around and
passed back through the door, leaving Max behind in his very own personal
Dante-divined ninth circle, the one for treachery.

Much later, Max woke up in a very dark place. At first, he
thought he was in hell.

And two days after her surgery, Rose awoke, fully repaired
and regenerated, in a sunny room, with her head in the lap of Leo Songtain, who
was singing to her, in his best Van Morrison;

…In the misty morning fog, with our, our hearts
a-thumping, and you, my brown-eyed girl, you, my brown eyed girl….sha la la la
la la la la la la la de dah…..

And, at first Rose thought she was in hell.

She tried to get up, but gave out a pitiful moan. No, she
felt fine, but remembered she was in regular dog disguise, and unfortunately,
back with Leo Songtain.
Oh shit, not another escape plan. On the other
hand…there is the Kobe beef.

“Oh, my sweet Rose, you’re awake. My physicians said you can
have food today. Would you like another slab of Kobe beef?” Rose moaned, and she
moaned some more. Then, she noticed another individual in the room, Michael
Segev. “
Okay, everything’s gonna be alright
,” she thought.

“You can’t keep her Leo. You know that now, right?” Segev
was standing with his back to Leo’s bar, drinking a chilled Fueblaster, and
eating some left over pink abalone steaks in huge chunks, with his hands. He
looked scruffy, had not changed his clothes or shaved for days, but otherwise
looked unruffled, in other words, like typical Michael Segev.

“Why not? She’s my pet,” Leo protested, and stamped his red
satin encased foot.

“Because she’s Roxanne’s co-pilot, the one who watches her
back. Look what happened to Roxanne without Rose. You want her snatched by some
other competing Triad, Leo? This could bleed you dry, paying out ransoms to
every Triad in China.” Michael was not always romantic, but always logical.

“Yes, I suppose you’re right. Roxanne needs her co-pilot to
watch her back. You’re right, she has to go back. But I do hope she visits me
someday. Are you going to visit me, Rosie, sweetie?” Leo whined. Rose thought
she would vomit.
But hey, the food was not too bad…so maybe.

Leo looked resigned, like he was weighing a pet versus his
cash flow. But actually, he was thinking about Roxanne. He’d almost lost her.
What would have happened if she took the bullet and not Rose? She could have
been killed. Leo was so happy his Roxanne was alive! And Max had been dealt
with. Although Michael Segev had not told him exactly how. Leo only knew Max
would be staying in #5 for a long time.

Leo walked to his desk, turned his back to Segev and Rose,
and thought of all this as he looked out his penthouse window over the Hong
Kong Harbor. He had no idea that he was in the same room with the only man
Roxanne Smoot would ever consider being with. No, he thought he would be noble,
and then maybe Roxanne would love him. Thus for the first time ever, in Leo
Songtain’s bottom-line, CEO-driven, trickle-down life, he did something
unselfish. It was a tiny light, in a dark world of supply and demand.

Rose went home the following week, on one of Leo’s personal hoverjets
to Tokyo, then by way of Morton’s rig, eastbound to San Fran, for a long Thanksgiving
visit at Eldridge Smoot Bubble-stop #4. She had to get back to the bar; she was
a bridesmaid at two weddings. No, it wasn’t Roxanne and Michael; that’s not in
the cards for this story, (
sorry folks
). No, Rose had to walk down the
aisle for Eldridge and Irma, and for Gimlet and Chad, in that little church/whore
house, in bubble-stop #4. Roxanne was the maid of honor for both couples.

The reception was at the bar, of course, with copious
quantities of Green Weenies and Fueblasters imbibed by all. Food was provided
by a mysterious donor, a sumptuous banquet sent all the way from Tokyo, care of
a clueless mid-level manager who got only half his holiday bonus that year. It
meant he would only get a two carat diamond for his mistress, not the bigger
one. Dorian was in perfect form on that sat-hack.

Just after the ceremony, but before the dancing started,
Dina walked over to a fairly nervous Chad Yac, gave him a hug, and presented
him with an old pre-WME black leather rebel jacket, worn by her dad, the famous
Jordan Nampeyo, in the battle of Kyoto. It was full circle. But not quite,
because somewhere, deep in one of the bilge #2 tanks, just off Lanai, a group
of nano bacs heard the wedding music playing over the com…and they began to
think…and sing to the music.
But that’s another tale of trouble...in sewer
city
.

Two individuals were notably absent from the wedding at #4.
Dorian had things to attend to in his control room at Donner Pass, including
getting those vaccines to #3, blowing up a warehouse of robots in Kuwait, sending
#5er-refurbished sonic weapons to that rebellion in Mibu, spreading those
modified nano-drones over a couple of cities, and overseeing the graduation of
his latest class of Un rebel fighters.

The second absent individual, to Roxanne’s regret but not
surprise, was Michael Segev. But Michael sent a present…to Roxanne. The morning
after the wedding, Roxanne woke up inside one of the satin lined coffins used
for those rig-ryders to sleep in, because she had given up her room as a
honeymoon suite to Chad and Gimlet. Under the pillow inside of the coffin was a
small envelope. It had her name written on it, in Michael Segev’s hand. Roxanne
slowly tore the envelope open and peeked inside.

Two official forms were folded inside the envelope, one was
a round-trip hoverjet ticket from San Fran to Amsterdam, and the other was a
paid-up voucher for the study sessions, exams, and licensing fees for Master
level III rig-ryder status. She was enrolled for spring session.

If anyone ever thought Michael Segev was not romantic, that
thought would be finally dispelled by the next objects under that pillow. One
was a humongous diamond, and it was crap-wrapped to a single white sheet of
paper with a picture of an Ultrajock 8500 with the newest upgrades added. On
the paper, again in Segev’s handwriting, were two words, “
Drive Fast
.”