Steven Kent - The Clone Republic

The night we left Ezer Kri, McKay summoned the color guard to his office. I got the message late and was the last to arrive. When I pressed the intercom button by his door, he squawked, “Harris?”

“Sir?”

The door opened. “As I was saying, this is the big one. You have a problem, sailor?”

One of the sailors in the guard looked nervously to the other men for support. “We just received two members from the Linear Committee.”

“Speck me with a hose!” McKay yowled. “Committee members aren’t brass. They can’t send your ass to the brig, boy. They don’t even notice you. Hell, I could show up with my pants off and a flag dangling from my dick, and the only thing those committee members would notice was that the goddamned flagpole looks awfully long. If you so much as fart on this one, you’re specked for life.”

With that he dismissed the others and kept me behind. “Do you have any idea who our guest is this time?” he asked.

“No, sir,” I said.

“Admiral Che Huang from the Joint Chiefs. Are you familiar with him?”

I nodded, feeling a new knot in the pit of my gut.

“I’m going to be straight with you, Harris. I tried to get you pulled from this duty, but Admiral Klyber wants you on it. You had a conversation with Admiral Klyber a few nights ago?” McKay’s nearly clean-shaven scalp gleamed in the bright lights, but his brow formed a shadow over his eyes giving his face a skull-like appearance.

“Huang does not like clones, any clones.”

I had heard that Huang was antisynthetic. “Especially Liberators?” I guessed.

“As far as he knows, you’re extinct.” McKay stood up and put on his hat.

“Thanks for the warning,” I said.

“Don’t mention it, Harris,” McKay said as he started for the door. He turned back. “Klyber likes you. He’s a powerful man, and he knows what he’s doing; but just the same, don’t draw any attention to yourself.”

Klyber, Barry, and Olivera waited by the landing bay for Admiral Huang’s arrival. I noticed nothing unusual about Admiral Klyber or Captain Olivera, but Admiral Barry looked like a man headed for a firing squad. His face was pale, and beads of sweat shone on his forehead and scalp. He mopped that sweat with darting dabs, then crammed his handkerchief back in his blouse. Klyber looked at him and said something that I could not hear.

A red carpet ran the length of the floor, ending at the hatch through which Admiral Huang would arrive. My color guard stood at the other end of the carpet, holding flags representing the Army, the Marines, the Navy, the Air Force, the Unified Authority, the Scutum-Crux Arm, and the Central SC Fleet. We stood as still and intent as our human legs would allow us. The officer of the deck did not need to signal us to attention, we were already there.

A light over the hatch turned green, and the door slid open. Nearly one full minute passed before Admiral Che Huang of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stepped into sight.

Huang appeared to be in his midfifties. He stood around six feet tall, with square shoulders and a narrow waist. He had his cap tucked under his left arm. I could see white streaks through Huang’s thinning, brown hair. There was something about his neatly tailored uniform, or the tilt of his head, or the way he narrowed his eyes as he looked around the landing area, that suggested both breeding and contempt.

“Admiral Huang,” Admiral Klyber said as he led Barry and Olivera to the hatch. “I trust you had a pleasant trip.”

Huang stopped and stared down at the group of officers who had come to greet him. A thin smile played across his lips. “Admiral Klyber,” he said in a stiff voice. The two men shook hands. “Have you read my messages?”

“Admiral Barry and I have discussed them at length,” Klyber said. “I think you will be pleased with the plans we have made.”

“Splendid. I wish to get under way as soon as possible,” Huang said as he stepped away from the hatch. He looked around the hangar and his gaze seemed to lock on the color guard.

“We can start straightaway,” Klyber said with an easy air. Beside him, Vice Admiral Barry managed a tight smile, but the stiffness in his shoulders was unmistakable. All of the blood left his face. As the officers turned to leave the bay, Absalom Barry drifted back and walked several paces behind everybody else.

“At ease,” Captain McKay said, after the brass disappeared.

I was surprised to find Sergeant Shannon and Vince Lee talking when I returned to the barracks. They got on together professionally; but on a social basis, they did not have much use for each other.

I had come to realize that Vince, possibly the first real friend I had ever had, was an antisynthetic clone. I never stopped to think about why he befriended me so quickly after we transferred to the Kamehameha . Now that I did think about it, I decided he liked me because I did not look like every other enlisted man, no matter how subtle the difference. Later, however, I suspected that he had a special dislike for Liberators. That was why he had turned quiet around me when Shannon first landed. First he had thought I was natural-born, then, when he saw Shannon, he realized that I was not just a clone, I was a Liberator. The reason Vince and I were friends was because of a grandfather clause. He and I had already struck up a friendship when Shannon arrived. I suppose that having already struck up a friendship with me and not having any natural-borns to turn to, Lee decided I was okay.

For his part, Shannon simply considered Lee an “asshole of the highest order.” Shannon called him a “synth-hating clone” and said that his quirks were bad for morale…pretty idealistic talk from the platoon sergeant who swept into the Kamehameha with all of the tact of a typhoon.

In this I think he was wrong about Lee. I think it was the reverse. For all of his bluster about bootstrapping his way into a commission and going into politics, I think Vince suspected the truth. I think he wanted to convince himself that he was not a clone and adopted an antisynthetic attitude as a shield because he believed it would protect him. As he well knew, confirmation about his clone origins would trigger the death reflex.

“I hear Admiral Huang is on board,” Sergeant Shannon called out to me as I entered his office. “Was that who arrived on your last color detail?”

“In the flesh,” I said.

“Goddamn,” Shannon said. “Did anybody bother to mention what he is doing here?”

“Not that I know of,” I said.

“Lee, you’re going to be in charge of the platoon for the next few days,” Shannon said. “Scrotum-Crotch Command has transferred Corporal Harris and me to a special detail for an unspecified period. Harris, why in God’s name is high command asking for us?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m not sure.”

“Which is it?” Shannon asked. “You don’t know, or you’re not sure?”

“Do you know why Admiral Huang is here?” Lee asked.

“Unless SC Command is pulling one sergeant and one corporal from every platoon, I’m guessing that this has something to do with our being Liberators,” Shannon said.

“You know you’re a Liberator?” Lee asked me in a loud voice that echoed across the office.

“I should have figured it out on my own when he arrived,” I said, nodding toward Shannon. “He’s the first Marine I’ve seen who was my height and shape. Admiral Klyber must have thought I was an idiot for not finding it out on my own.”

“Klyber?” Lee asked.

“He told me I was a Liberator.”

“And you didn’t die when you found out?” Lee asked.

“Holy Jeeeezus, Lee! He’s standing in front of you, isn’t he! What I want to know is why the hell an admiral is wasting time telling a corporal anything.”