Josh Roseman - The Clockwork Russian and Other Stories

“Did Michael—”

“It doesn’t look like he did anything physical,” Jenn said. “But it was definitely intentional.”

“How so?” I didn’t know a whole lot about cloning, and I had to think about what was the right question to ask. “Is it the imprint? I mean, my mind? Did something go wrong?”

“I don’t think so.” Jenn looked at the wall screen. “Computer, declarative: display brain scans of patient currently in main exam chamber.” The screen lit up. “Display brain scans of patients Jennifer Fifteen, Jennie Nine, and Jenn Three. Comparative view.” I watched as the scans appeared. “Discontinue command interface.” A beep told us that the computer was no longer listening.

“What am I looking at, Jenn?”

Jenn slid off the desk and pointed at Jennie Ten’s scan. “I’m not a scientist anymore, not like Jennifer Nine, but from what she told me, parts of the imprint were blocked through what she calls primitive methods.”

“Primitive?”

Jenn’s finger traced dark spots on Jennie Ten’s scan, then indicated the same areas on the other three. “Blocks,” she said. “Jennifer Nine believes something went wrong right after the imprint — if you look at the size of the blue area, compared to the others, Jennie Ten hasn’t had very much time to form new memories. Almost everything that was in there was from your original imprint.”

I cursed softly, under my breath. “Michael so insisted on the damned imprint. I wish I’d resisted.”

“If you had,” Jenn said, smiling, “would you and Two be celebrating ten years together?”

“Probably not.” The thought of Two never having existed hurt more than I’d thought; I’d loved Michael once, but now there was no room for anyone in my heart except Two. And my… what were they, anyway? Sisters? Daughters? Except for Two, who was my lover — and Jenn One, who had become my confidant and closest friend — they were just copies of me. Or, at least, I tried to think of them that way; it was easier than thinking about how many times Michael had replaced me.

I sighed. “Can Jennifer Nine do anything?”

“Jennifer Three’s going to try hypnotherapy first, but if not, Jennifer Nine thinks there’s enough in the computers to guide her through imprinting a newly-grown clone.”

“But Jennie Ten’s not newly-grown.”

Jenn shrugged. “Jennifer Nine thinks she’s only been out of the tank for a day. Two at the most. She can clear Jennie Ten’s mind altogether with drugs and electrotherapy, then re-imprint her.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “That sounds like an awful lot of maybes.”

“It is.” Jenn looked up again. “Computer, declarative: clear wall screen.” It went dark. “Discontinue command interface.” Then she waved toward the door. “Jennifer Nine wants the four of us to talk about it, and put it to a vote. We can rehabilitate Jennie Ten as she is, but if this doesn’t work…”

“If it doesn’t work,” I said, following Jenn into the corridor, “then we’ve basically killed her.”

Jennifer Twenty-Seven

Jennie Ten had been the key, and it had taken two months, with four more Jennifers and two more Jenns showing up in the meantime, to prepare.

“Remember,” Jennifer Nine said, leaning down over my bed in the medical center, “you won’t be able to move. If the sedative wears off, try not to panic. It shouldn’t, but just in case.”

“That’s reassuring.” My hands clenched into fists, and I forced them to open. I had to relax. If I was too keyed-up — if there was too much alpha-wave activity coming from my brain — then whoever was controlling the liftship would know I was awake and might turn back.

That was how Michael did it: each clone was imprinted with sensitivity to a certain range of sound that put her into a catatonic state until it was shut off. Only I was immune, so I had to be awake to start our countermeasures. Every one of the others had a program on her handheld that emitted a canceling sound, but I had to start it, and when the disabling sound stopped, I would have to shut off the countermeasures — the sound coming from the handhelds would make the others’ ears start to bleed and, shortly thereafter, their imprints would start to scramble. Without both sounds working in concert, the others wouldn’t survive.

Jennie Four had been our volunteer during that phase of the testing. Her body was in a stasis drawer in the morgue. The only one of us in thirty years to die.

Michael would pay for that. For exiling us, and for killing… well, when it came right down to it, for killing me. He’d nearly killed Jennie Ten as well, but he didn’t have it in him to do that kind of violence. He’d just blanked her and shipped her down to the island after that first night.

Jennie Ten had told us about it the moment she’d woken up from surgery. She hadn’t been able to sleep that first night after Michael had had his way with her — and oh how I remembered our first night on the station and how good the sex had been — had gone to the medical bay for a sedative, had seen a robot cleaning the cloning room, and then her natural inquisitiveness — my natural inquisitiveness, I supposed — had taken over. Michael had caught her, but not before she’d learned the truth: she was the forty-fifth version of me that Michael had grown in the past ten years.

“Jennifer?” Except for Two, they all called me Jennifer. Just Jennifer. A sign of respect, I supposed, acknowledging that I was the first. “Are you ready?”

“Ready or not,” I said, “here I go.”

We were gambling, and I knew it. I could remain under for five days; one of the clones held a dead-woman’s switch, keyed to her brainwaves, and if she went catatonic, I would be brought back. But it was our best chance. Jennifer Nine smoothed my hair back from my forehead and, still smiling my most tender smile, pressed the injector to my neck…

…and I was awake. The clock one of the Jennifers had mounted to the ceiling told me that two days had passed. I remembered my instructions and took three deep, slow breaths, then sat up.

Jennifer Twenty-One was sitting beside my bed, eyes open and unfocused. I reached down and cupped her cheek, but she was catatonic, just as we knew she would be.

As they all undoubtedly were.

All I had to do was tell my handheld to activate countermeasures and they’d all wake up, but one thing we couldn’t know in advance was how much time we had between the catatonic state and the arrival of the next clone. Jenn One had suggested a four-hour window; one of my REM cycles was four-and-a-half, which would give them — whoever they were; we still didn’t know — enough time to drop off whoever had displeased Michael and get away before I woke up.

I left the medical center and walked briskly along the streets. I passed the fabrication center that, after the automation had failed, Jennifers Five and Twenty had been maintaining tirelessly to ensure we had food and raw materials. I passed the garden plot tended by the robots left behind when the island settlement had been evacuated fifty years ago. I passed the houses of my friends.

I passed my friends, standing in the street, unmoving, captured like the finest statues, and fought the urge to wake them early. I felt lonely even as I passed Jenns, Jennifers, and Jennies, and I hadn’t been lonely in ten years.

Finally the port came into view. I sat on the ground, just out of sight, and told the computer, via my handheld, to display the feed from the camera we’d set up back when it was just Two and me.

It took an hour before anything happened. I saw the liftship slowly glide into position, its thrusters glowing white-hot, the acid sea burning red below them. It backed up, closer and closer, but I waited. We’d planned this. The Jennies had planned this. The Jennies, and the Jenns and the Jennifers; every single one of us working together to escape.