Confessions of a Clone

<snip>
"Don't worry it's a trick I perfected its easy I will show you one
day." Dante looked surprisingly calm behind the swollen face. "My
backs a bit sore from that whip do you mind?" Dante gestured towards
the fresh slices on his back.
"Guards!"
<end snip>
Jayne ducked aside, as an entire Bloodhound Gang taskforce erupted
into the room and swooped on Dante who, weaponless, adopted a
defensive hand-to-hand combat stance. "He doesn't have the
information I need!" barked Jayne, giving orders to her gang, "So do
whatever you need to do to subdue him! Just DON'T let him escape AND
TRY NOT TO KILL HIM!!"
With that Jayne strode out of the room into the corridor dividing
the two cargo-bays where she had imprisoned Jay and Dante.
Once more she slumped against the wall and slid to the ground. "This…
isn't working" she muttered to herself "The alien wouldn't have that
information, and Jay, the only guy who knows BOTH the coordinates
AND the decryption codes – which he doesn't even need, won't talk.
Why the heck did I think he'd give in to torture when as far as he
knows it's going to put lives in danger? He's a good man, with
enough baggage to want to do anything to redeem himself…"
She whipped out a palm-held computer which listed her exact orders
from her employers. "No…" she mused "I'm going to have to tell him
the truth…and hope beyond hope that he actually believes me!"
She sighed, and shook her head and she got back to her feet. Her
chances of actually succeeding in this mission were suddenly very
slim.
She entered the room where Jay was being held.
"Ok." She said "You win."
"What…you're letting me go?"
"No." replied Jayne "But the torture stops."
"So how are you going to persuade me this time?" Jay asked "Tickle
my feet with a feather?"
"No.." Jayne said, grabbing a chair and sitting on it back to front,
her legs astride the chair back. "I'm going to tell you the truth."
This got Jay's attention, what did she have up her sleeve now.
"Jay." She began, looking nervously at her hands "I know, I've done
bad things, to you, to your friends, to the entire crew..but…" she
stopped for a second, "I'm NOT a bad person"
Jay expelled a lot of air in a badly disguised laugh at this
point…."sorry…go on…." he said sheepishly.
"I was new to the world when I was created. And naïve, I hadn't
learned right from wrong, he took advantage of that."
"Who?"
"Your original clone. See, HE was the evil one. The only, evil one…
apart from me, the entire clone army, the animals, the mechs, were
practically stripped of all of their emotion in part of Doctor
FeBuggure's enhancement process."
"Why were you different?"
"Because I needed to be human to complete my part of his mission.
The whole reason for my being created female was so that I could
mingle amongst the crew without being recognised, gathering
information. He used me, convinced me that clones, and other
genetically engineered life forms were seen as second class
citizens, convinced me that to be given basic human rights, we had
to take it by force. I knew no different…I went along with it…but
when he and the other clones died, I survived, due to the antidote
only affecting males, and I began to see what I'd done."
Jay listened, staring intently into her eyes as she spoke.
"I hid, for a long time, in your ventilation ducts as he had done.
Stealing food, clothes, whatever I needed to survive – and watching
the crew. I realised that he'd lied to me. Saw how a clone, of a
HOLOGRAM, Phil FeBuggure made first officer, how his clone, mini-
phil was given a high-level security job, despite being a mute,
perverted lunatic, how Chris Harris became chief of security,
despite being a clone of the original, how your own sister was
brought back, as a clone…Your people didn't dismiss clones as an
inferior race, you EMBRACED us!"
"I had to get off the ship..I knew after what I'd done that, if I
was ever found I'd be punished, quite rightly, for what I'd done…so,
I took the ship that the original clone had built to get off the
ship were anything to go wrong, and fled, on autopilot, to Earth…I
don't know why, I had noone to go to, noone that would help me…and
so again, I fell into a wrong crowd…I stole, I killed, just to
survive…I even killed Rosette LaChance's family…and I never stopped
regretting it…"
"Why?" Jay asked "I mean if you're so moral now, why kill people?"
"Because I didn't know what else to do. Jay, I'm four years old! I
haven't got the life experiences that you have, just your DNA, sure
I picked up some handy skills, I seemed to able to pilot without
even a second thought, for example but I hadn't built the same sense
of morality that most people learn over time! All I knew, was that I
had to do what I had to do to survive in a world that didn't want
me" she looked down at her feet at the point, Jay could see she was
genuinely saddened, and finding it hard to recall.
"It was then that I met up with a member of the `bloodhound gang', a
ragtag bunch of Gelfs, alines and mechanoids. Their leader had been
killed out in the far reaches of space…and they were falling apart
as a gang, - infighting, and disloyalty rife. I discovered that they
had a contingent living aboard the `Dwarf! When they discovered who
I was they immediately hailed me as their new leader, thinking that
if I could help lead an army that nearly destroyed the entire crew,
then I could lead them to victory…..with that I came back to the
Dwarf, with the rest of the Bloodhounds – about 6 months ago. Seeing
the opportunity to make amends, I decided I'd try to slowly steer
them away from a life of crime…and do some good!"
"One of the gang members mentioned to me about an alien he'd met,
from a race called the Mollopholoids. They were starving, their food
supplies gone and their homeworld rendered a barren wasteland
through a war with an alien race…I stole a Starbug to meet them…"
"The `bug I reported stolen last month…"
"Precisely. I agreed to help them, and in return, they'd allow
myself and the Bloodhounds to join their society and live as one of
them, to finally be accepted."
"Help them how?"
"By bringing them food supplies from earth, they agreed to trade
teleportation technology with earth…but there was a problem, noone
knew how to GET to Earth, before, we'd always stowed away on
transports, or I used the clones' ship with a pre-programmed flight
path. We need your encryption codes to get the coordinates so that
we could open negotiations with earth – that, and your ship is the
only one with a wormhole drive, it would take months for the
Mollopholoid ships to reach Earth."
"You could have just asked for help we'd easily help a dying race,
surely you learned that yourself…?"
"But I knew noone would believe me if I just came aboard and ASKED
for help,…that and it would have meant negotiating with Niples…"
"Touche'"
"The Mollopholoids came up with a plan that we'd take control of the
Dwarf, transport the crew off and use the Blue Dwarf to travel to
Earth, we'd crew it with a skeleton crew and use the space freed up
from having so few people aboard to transport back enough supplies
to feed an entire race, then once negotiation were properly open, we
could set up regular trading routes between Earth and their
homeworld."
"And the crew?"
"Their fine, and are being well looked after, the Mollopholoids are
even providing their finest foods, despite the situation….once the
Blue Dwarf returns with enough food to tide them over until the
regular trades begin, we'll give back the ship…I guess, we needed
the crew as a….bargaining chip, in case negotiations fail..I know…
it's wrong but…..well, I've already explained why I do what I do…"
"So you think that after all that, I'm just gonna buckle and hand
over the codes thinking it will save an entire race from starvation."
"No. I don't expect you to believe me, I just felt you deserved to
know the truth."
"I believe you"
"What?"
"Jayne..you're a copy of me, I know all your mannerisms, I can tell
when your lying and when your telling the truth."
"So….you'll help us?"
"Yes." Jay said "Release me and I'll give you the codes."
Jayne nodded excitedly and ran over to cut Jay free.
Jay stood up and rubbed his wrists, and stretched every muscle he
could.
"Alright…the encryption code is Hotel-Juliet-9er-1-3-6-9-mike-india-
golf-7-6-5-Romeo. Earth's coordinates, are 001-001-001"
"….I really should have guessed that shouldn't I?"
"All space corp star charts show the Sol system at the centre…so
yes!"
It was at this point Dante burst in, bruised, battered, but happy.
"Come on Chrysler!" he boomed "We're getting out of here..wait…
you're free…."
"Er…yeah…Jayne and I have kinda struck up a deal"
"You managed to win, against all those guards?" Jayne asked
"Easy"
"How many?" Jay asked
"32" Jayne replied
"And you thought that would stop him? Rookie mistake…."
"So whats going on?" Dante asked
"Turns out all this is to help a starving planet" Jay
explained "Jayne just…got lead off the beaten track a bit…" he
looked at Jayne "Hadn't you better give them the coordinates, and
let them know they can board?"
Jayne nodded, and called the Aphallation Master."
"Excellency" she said "We've got the codes, transmitting."
"Excellent work Chrysler" replied the alien. "I'm sending a crew
aboard the ship now, We shall begin the next phase as soon as the
great banquet is over!"
"How are the crew enjoying the feast?"
"Not very…but then, would you enjoy being blended alive?"
"WHAT? YOU'RE EATING THE CREW? YOU LIED TO ME!!!"
"Guilty….your `bloodhound gang' we're more than happy to deceive you
too…"
"STOP IT NOW!!!" Jayne screamed into the comm, she turned to Jay and
Dante, tears filling her eyes "I…I didn't know…honestly…they…they
tricked me!! And I fell for it, AGAIN!!!"
"We've got to stop them….." Dante said
"It's too late…" Jayne said "They're already teleporting
aboard…..we'll never get off the ship alive!"
<tag Nathan, or onion>