Mirrored Man: The Rob Tyler Chronicles Book 1 (23 page)

Yeoum smiled. “My, doesn't that sound nice.
I tell you what. After tomorrow, you can have anything you want.
Anything. But today, you just stick to the salad.” He held up his
finger as a warning. “No dressing.”

“Aw, c'mon Doc. Even a condemned man eats a
hearty meal, right?”

“You are hardly a condemned man, Mister
Tyler.” Yeoum's tone indicated that he was done with the
discussion, and he changed the subject. “Up to now, you haven't
asked a single question about the procedure. Would you like Doctor
Cook and Jimmy to explain the process to you now?”

He had put this off as long as he could.
“Why not?” Rob attempted to hide his discomfort as he hopped off of
the table and donned his scrubs.

“Alright! We're taking him to the torture
chamber,” Jimmy said sadistically.

Don, standing beside Jimmy, backhanded him
on the arm.

“Ow!” Jimmy massaged his bicep. “That'll
leave a mark.”

“Don't mind the idiot,” Don said to Rob.
“He's just a Canuck.”

Jimmy immediately snapped to some semblance
of attention and began singing “Oh Canada.” Don stuffed a pair of
surgical gloves into Jimmy’s mouth, nearly losing a fingertip in
the process.

“This way,” Don said as he proceeded out the
door.

Rob put the scrub covers over his shoes, and
followed him down the hallway.

Yeoum and Greg were busying themselves
straightening up and returning equipment and utensils to their
proper places as Jimmy spit the gloves on the floor, grinned at
Rob’s back, and started after him. The professor grabbed him by the
arm and looked at the gloves on the floor.

“It was the dark-skinned guy with the long
curly black hair,” Jimmy said innocently.

Yeoum’s gaze didn't change, and Jimmy knew
it wouldn't. He cocked his head, smiled widely, and picked up the
gloves, depositing them in the bio-hazardous waste container.
“Buh-bye,” he said happily as he left.

Jimmy had given up on his attempt to
intimidate the commander after he had hacked into the Navy's
database and took a look at Rob’s record. Seeing that he was once a
Navy SEAL, he did some research into just what that meant. After
discovering the number of enemy kills Rob had acquired, he
concluded that it would be best not to irritate him too much. A
little teasing would have to do.

Don led them down the corridor where it
ended with another door, this one locked. He punched a five-digit
code into a hidden panel in the wall and the door slid open,
revealing another changing area, smaller than the one at the
entrance of the facility, with only four dressing rooms.

“Really?” Rob asked.

“Really. We even get to wear masks in there.
This lab is absolutely contaminant free.”

Rob and Jimmy entered the chamber and Don
closed the door behind them. The three showered—again. They then
dressed in fresh scrubs, which included a plastic jumpsuit that
zipped up the back, surgical masks, gloves, hairnets, and shoe
covers. Meeting back in the hallway, they proceeded to another door
at the opposite end of the compartment.

Rob had an image in his mind of another
brightly lit room with tables full of beakers, test tubes,
microscopes, and all manner of gadgets, charts, and other
equipment. The kind of things he had seen in laboratories before.
But when Don opened the door and the three stepped in, there was
none of that.

The room itself was small, measuring fifteen
feet square. When Rob first stepped in, the floor under his shoes
felt odd. Looking down, he could see in the low light that it was
carpeted.
Decontaminated carpet? Is that even possible?

On the far wall was a bank of television
monitors, all dark. On the right were three computer stations that
were on but displayed only blue start-up screens. Close to the
center of the room were two rather comfortable looking black
leather recliners angled slightly toward each other with a small
wooden pedestal table between them. On Rob's left, there was a
glass wall with another step-over threshold door in the middle of
it, but he couldn't see anything beyond that.

There were recessed lights in the ceiling,
but only the one in the center was lit, giving off a soft white
glow.  Jimmy went to one of the computers and immediately
started tapping keys.

Don stepped over to the glass wall,
motioning for Rob to follow. Slowly, as the light in the enclosed
room increased, he could tell that the ceiling, walls, and carpet
were mauve.

“Who did the decorating? Mary Kay?” Rob
asked, drawing a chuckle from the others.

“Let's start with this,” Jimmy said. The
light in the enclosed room began to increase, but bathed it blood
red, adding to the submarine feel of the room.

“Who's in there, Captain Nemo?” Rob’s second
nervous quip garnered another laugh from the other two.

The room on the left was of equal size to
the one they were in, but it was filled with equipment. Through the
doorway Rob could see a chamber on the left side that was
featureless except for a computer keyboard and monitor mounted on
it next to a glass portal, which was closed. On the right side of
the room was what appeared to be a large aquarium of some kind. It
was resting on a featureless stainless steel frame three feet high.
The tank itself was another three feet high. It was rectangular,
about ten feet by four feet. The long side was parallel with the
glass wall. It was three-quarters full of some kind of milky
liquid. Behind it Rob could see that there were hundreds of plastic
hoses attached to the wall, each about a half an inch in diameter,
and connected to the back of the tank.

“This is gonna be a piece of cake,
Commander,” Don said, trying to relieve some tension.

“Yeah! No worries, Neel,” Jimmy chimed in
behind them.

Rob looked at Jimmy. “Neel?”

“Don't worry about it. Canadian slang,” Don
said.

“Yeah, it means that you’re a really cool
Yank, eh?” Jimmy added with a grin.

“Uh huh.” Rob turned back and found Don
pointing toward the chamber to their left.

“There’s where you'll be spending about six
hours of your day tomorrow. We call her Chloe.”

“Chloe?”

“I'll explain later.”

Rob’s eyes knitted together. “Six hours?
What is it?”

“That's the specimen chamber … and you’re
the specimen,” Jimmy explained without ceremony.

Don shook his head. “You know Bennett, the
devil has a special place for people like you.”

“What?” Jimmy protested innocently. “That's
what it is.”

“Actually, all bad people are going to the
same place.” Rob looked disdainfully at the chamber, trying hard
not to imagine what went on in it.

Don gave him a strange look. “Do you know
what a mass spectrometer is?”

“An instrument that measures the masses of
concentrations of atoms and molecules.” Rob turned to look at Don,
who was still looking at him strangely. “
CSI
,” Rob offered
in explanation.

“Okay. Then think of this as a mass
spectrometer on steroids. See, the average human body, weighing
seventy kilos, is made up of six point seven
times
ten to
the twenty-seventh power of atoms.”

“What's that in dog atoms?” Rob asked
matter-of-factly.

“A lot. And Chloe here is gonna look at
every single one of yours tomorrow. Sort of.”

Rob gave Don a doubtful look. “Every atom?
Every
one?”

“Yes.” Don attempted the short answer.

“How is that possible when atoms are always
in motion?” Rob frowned.

“I could explain it to you, but it's very
technical.”

“I have a master’s degree in nuclear
engineering.”

Don sighed. “Do you
really
wanna
know?”

Rob paused for effect, staring at the
chamber. “No.”

“Anyway, by tomorrow afternoon, Chloe will
know more about you than is known about anyone else on earth. A
side benefit is that if you have anything going on inside of you
that you should know about, we'll be able to tell you.” He gave Rob
a sideways glance. “
If
you want to know.”

“Some things are better left unknown,” Rob
said stoically. “Will I be knocked out during this?”

Jimmy answered Rob's question. “'Fraid not,
Neel.  Unfortunately, you gotta be awake the
whole
time. And you hafta stay as still as possible.”

“Why?” Rob asked doubtfully.

“Because,” Jimmy smiled, “if you start to
feel all warm and fuzzy inside, and warmer and fuzzier, and
warmer—”

“Enough, Jimmy,” Don interrupted. “It's just
a precaution, Rob. That's all.”

Rob thought about asking what the precaution
was against, but thought better of it.

“One more thing,” Jimmy said, painting on a
serious look. “You're gonna be nekked.”

“Naked?” Rob looked at Jimmy again. “Not
even a hospital gown?”

“Nekked,” Jimmy repeated.

Rob turned to Don. “How about a blanket? Or
a sheet?”

Don gave Rob an apologetic look. “I'm afraid
not. There can't be anything inside the chamber but you when we
start the process.”

“And somebody is responsible for checking
inside the thing for bugs, right?”

“That would be me.” Jimmy waved vigorously
at Rob, grinning from ear to ear.

Rob's expression changed from that of
confusion to one of alarm as he pointed at Jimmy. “He's—”

“
I'm the hardware guy.
” Jimmy sang to
the tune of the Tums jingle.

“That's enough, Jimmy,” Don demanded more
seriously. He looked back at Rob. “Don't worry.  Nothing will
happen to
you
if the chamber is in any way
contaminated.”

“But you said—” Rob began.

“All precautionary,” Don assured him. “It
would only affect your clone.”

“Nekked, nekked, nekked,” Jimmy repeated
over and over, like an obnoxious teenager.

Rob ignored him. “Still—” Rob began to
protest, but Don interrupted.

“And if anything like that happens, we can
terminate the procedure early, before he becomes viable.”

Rob didn’t like hearing the terms Don
was using. Words like “he” and “your” were uncomfortable to
hear in reference to the clone. Since the captain had told him his
purpose for being here, he had made a concerted effort not to think
about the potential results. He thought for a moment. “Is that why
I can't eat or drink anything before?”

“Yes. You can't have anything
in
you
either. Well, at least not much of anything.”

“So you hafta have an enema,” Jimmy
added.

Rob gave Don a disgusted look. “That sucks.
How cold is it gonna be in there?”

Don couldn't contain a chuckle. “Don't
worry, we'll keep it comfortable for you.”

“That is my job, too,” Jimmy sang, to the
same Tums tune.

Rob hung his head. After a moment he turned
his attention to the liquid-filled tank on the other side of the
room. “What
is
that?” he asked.

“That's the nursery. That's where we're
going to make the magic happen.”

Rob glanced at Don and then back at the
tank. “Where the—”

“Where the clone is born,” Jimmy piped
up.

Rob could see Jimmy's reflection in the
glass, twirling gleefully in his chair. “What's that liquid in
it?”

“Amniotic fluid,” Don said.

“Like in a woman's uterus?” Rob wrinkled his
nose, his apprehension replaced with curiosity.

“Yes, with a few extra things thrown in for
good measure.”

“Is it synthetic?”

“Nope.” It was Jimmy again. “It's the real
deal, Neel.”

Don nodded. “Yeah, it's real.”

Rob screwed up his face in disgust. “Well,
whose fluid is it?”

“Yours,” Don said.

“Mine? How could it be mine?”

“We manufactured it.”

“How?”

“What did you think we took all those
samples for?”

Rob smirked. “I don’t have amniotic fluid. I
have man parts.”

“Its all still in there, Commander.”

Rob frowned. “Why is the tank so big? Isn't
the”—he searched for any other word, but he couldn't find
one—“clone going to be a baby?”

Don smiled. “Not with this method. We've
avoided the growth process entirely. The clone will be, in every
respect, a perfect replica of you, as you are today. Well,
tomorrow, to be precise. Except for things like scars, like the one
on your lower back.”

“How did you get that one?” Jimmy asked.

“I can't remember,” Rob said truthfully. He
had been shot while on a clandestine mission nearly ten years
before, but he had no memory of the event. He only knew what Sack
had told him. Besides, the mission was still classified.

But Jimmy already knew how the commander got
the scar, and a few others like it.

Don spoke up to get them back on topic.
“Imagine a man your age that has sclerosis of the liver from heavy
drinking. He needs a transplant. Well, it would do him no good if
he had to wait fifteen or twenty years for a clone to reach
maturity. He'd be dead by then. Using this method, we can grow the
clone to full maturity in a week, harvest all of its organs, and
then terminate it while never having given it consciousness. It's
both efficient and humane.”

Rob nodded. He thought, albeit briefly, that
the way Don described it, the endeavor could actually be a good
thing. The knowledge allowed him to relax a bit more.

“Your clone will be as much you as, well,
you are. He may even have some of your more recent memories. From
the time we woke them, Angelina and Brad recognized and responded
to all of us exactly the way Paris and Charlie did. They knew
us.”

“Wait a minute. I thought you said that you
wouldn't wake it up.”

Don berated himself mentally for the slip.
“Well … we'll need to make sure he’s functioning properly.”

Rob accepted the explanation, but he had
that doubtful look again. “But what if it has … cloned … memories?
Which, by the way, is just way too creepy.”