FIFTY-FOUR

 

 

FOR WHAT SEEMED like an eternity, Flint sat rigidly, silently, uncertain what to say. He didn’t want to look at his daughter, although he could feel her tension. He hoped DeRicci thought it was all about the severity of the news she had just imparted to them.

They were still standing in the middle of DeRicci’s huge office, the images still frozen on the gigantic screen he hadn’t even known existed. DeRicci had quickly told them a tangled tale of attempted assassinations all over the Moon, but all that Flint heard was “clones.”

Clones. His mind jumped past the emergency, onto the aftermath. Clones were already hated in Armstrong—in most human communities, if truth be told. This would just make matters worse.

And he didn’t dare look at Talia, who was biologically his daughter and a clone. A clone no one knew about except two lawyers, a very reliable cop in Valhalla Basin on Callisto, and Talia. Talia knew. That had been the devastating discovery for her in addition to the realization that her mother had either inadvertently or intentionally committed genocide. And Talia had learned all of that on the day Rhonda died.

Talia’s clone mark was hidden, which wasn’t legal. Most clone marks were on the back of the neck, obvious, even though the clones grew hair over them or covered them with turtlenecks and scarves. They were supposed to be obvious so that people knew they were dealing with someone who had been manufactured, someone who had been created from someone else, someone who—in theory—was the duplicate of the person whose DNA they shared.

Flint had soon realized that Talia wasn’t anyone’s duplicate. Yes, there were five other girls out there as brilliant and as beautiful as his daughter, adopted by people he did not know, but those girls had different families, different upbringings, and through the glory of cloning, they were 29 months older than she was, raised on different planets, in different cities, in completely different ways.

He once told Talia it was as if her genetic material—not her, but the DNA that composed her—got five other chances at life, five other ways to be.

Those girls had hidden clone marks as well.

But these men, these assassins, they wore their clone marks proudly. They were taking action as a unit, dressing the same, and on the same mission in different parts of Armstrong.

“Miles,” DeRicci said, “I know this is a lot to absorb, but I need your help organizing information about these clones. We need to find out who made them.”

Flint nodded, still speechless, worried, not quite certain what to say. For the first time, he regretted not telling DeRicci about Talia’s origin. But at the same time, he was relieved no one knew. Because when this was over, clones would get persecuted throughout the Moon, maybe throughout the Earth Alliance, and he didn’t want that to happen to his daughter.

Whom he was overly protective of.

Whom he loved with a ferocity he hadn’t realized he was capable of.

“They were fast-grown?” Talia asked, and he could hear the hope in her voice. If the clones were fast-grown, they were nothing like her. They were created for one thing, and one thing only—to assassinate the leaders of the Moon.

“I don’t think so,” DeRicci said. “Fast-grow clones aren’t capable of independent thought. Depending on how long they’ve been alive, they’re little more than three-year-olds in adult bodies. These clones are too coordinated, too capable to be fast-grown. That’s the other reason I need you. Because if they were fast-grown, I could put someone in the Armstrong PD on the research and they could find these guys quickly. But these clones look like they’re what—twenty-five, thirty? They could’ve been created anywhere, raised anywhere, trained anywhere. And to track that back, I need someone who knows how to go through more information than I want to contemplate in a very short period of time.”

She was looking at Flint. She knew him well enough to understand that something was wrong, but she didn’t know what. And he couldn’t tell her, not now.

She really did need his help, and Talia’s help as well. Talia had even more experience in this area than Flint did, because Talia had looked for her sisters, as she called the other clones of Flint’s natural born child, Emmeline. Talia had spent months on that search before Flint had caught her and done his best to stop any damage she might have caused.

“Dad?” Talia asked. She sounded scared now. She hadn’t made the mental leap that he had. She didn’t know what was coming once this crisis was over.

He didn’t want to tell her either.

He cleared his throat, and swallowed, feeling really uncomfortable. But he had to go forward. He couldn’t change what had just happened. The best thing he could do was find these assassins and the person who had brought them to the Moon, and then he could worry about the future.

“Miles?” DeRicci said again.

“First of all,” he said, sounding odd, even to himself, “let’s not call them clones. They’re assassins or wannabe assassins. There are a lot of law-abiding people on the Moon who happen to be clones. Let’s not shove everyone into that category.”

“Fine,” DeRicci said impatiently. “I haven’t let any word get out about them. What I want to know is can you help me?”

Talia was looking at Flint, her face pale. She had just realized what he was talking about.

“Yes,” he said. “I can help. So can Talia. But we need a place to work. You’re in a hurry, right?”

“I needed this done before these clon—men—attacked anyone,” DeRicci said. “Which would be yesterday. So yes, I’m in a hurry.”

“Then you probably don’t want us using your equipment. If someone backtraces our investigations—”

“Are you suggesting that you’ll go to your office? Miles, we don’t have time.”

“We’re not going to follow police procedure,” he said. “What we do won’t hold up in court.”

“We’ll reinvent that if we have to,” DeRicci said, surprising him. She usually followed rules, even though she didn’t like them. “I’m not worried about that. These clo—assassins are saying that this is just the beginning, but they won’t say the beginning of what. We need to find out before they establish the ending, because I have a hunch we’re not going to like it.”

Expedience, not legalities. DeRicci was scared.

“All right then,” Flint said. “Get us set up—and not inside your office. We’ll keep this part as far from you as we can.”

“I’ll do it,” she said. “I’m not sure I can trust Hänsel, and I really don’t think Rudra is capable of doing this right.”

Flint nodded. He didn’t think so either. And this was much more important than DeRicci realized. At least for Talia and all the others like her.

Flint had to do this right.