“Unfortunately, not everyone’s system accepts the treatment.”
My heart skipped a beat, and my hands went cold. “Please explain.”
“Only a small percentage of volunteers have had such positive results.”
“By volunteers, you mean soldiers, don’t you? Were they given an option? Did they know what was in the injections they were receiving? Were they aware of the risks?” Our earlier conversation with Sgt. McGraw led me to believe they had not been given an option, and they did not know the risks.
Dr. Ross said, “They gave up those rights when they enlisted. It’s all legal.”
“Who else? Soldiers, Keira and April, and who else?” I pressed.
“That’s classified.”
I nodded at Eberhardt who clicked off the safety on his gun and held it against Doctor Ross’s head.
He faltered. “Curtis Ramsey. I warned him about the possible side effects, but he insisted.”
“Side effects? Death is one of the side effects? And you gave this treatment to unsuspecting people? You gave it to Keira?”
“With her it was different. We weren’t even sure the formula could be ingested. I didn’t think it would have any effect at all.”
“What about April?” Keira asked. “You could have killed her!”
“No, my dear, I think not,” replied Dr. Ross. “You and your brother had already responded so well, better than any of our other test subjects. Coming from the same stock, April had a very good chance of surviving the treatment.”
“Did you ask her for permission? Did she know what you were doing?” Keira asked.
“No, I didn’t want to frighten her after what she’d been through.”
A small sound escaped Eberhardt. He’d heard just about enough.
Dr. Ross nervously cleared his throat. “April’s injuries were worse than either of you guessed. She had signs of internal bleeding. It was an emergency, and knowing that her chances of surviving the treatment were high...I really did mean to help her. Is she all right?”
Keira turned away. She was right. He didn’t deserve to know.
I looked at the team. “Have you heard enough? Does anyone want out?” The room was absolutely silent.
There was one more thing I needed to know, for everyone's safety. I pulled Dr. Ross away from Eberhardt and spoke quietly. “What have you told Ramsey about the Resistance?”
“Nothing! I'm a doctor, not a spy. Believe what you will, but I truly value human life. That's why I'm conducting these studies. Ramsey Corps is the best way to finance this project. Elaine Ramsey provides the means to further science. We’re helping humanity.”
“You’re lying. You must have told Ramsey something, or she wouldn’t know that April had been given the treatment.”
“I never said Elaine knew about that. Per our agreement, I never document the work I do for you. Like I said, I gave April the injection to help her. Until I checked her blood work later, I didn’t even know…not that it would have changed anything. Please tell me it worked. I need to know that they’re okay.”
I looked at Dr. Ross in surprise. “They?”
He nodded.
I’d have to tell Keira about this, but not now. Now we needed to focus on Scott.
-Keira-
Infiltration
We drove southeast toward the city limits. Raquelle sat quietly next to me. She fidgeted with the handle of her bag and squinted into the bright sunlight that reflected off the hood of Guy's silver automobile. Eberhardt and Dr. Ross sat in back. Murphy followed with the others in Dr. Ross's red sedan.
I slowed as we neared the main gates. Two guards stood silhouetted in the windows of the gatehouse. As we approached, I recognized their military uniforms. I pushed two buttons, and the front and rear windows rolled down simultaneously.
I smiled. “We're here for a tour with Dr. Ross.” I tilted my head toward the doctor.
“Yes, of course,” said the younger of the two men. He reached over to open the gates.
“What are you doing?” asked the other. “Have you completely forgotten protocol?”
Without hesitation, Eberhardt shot him. He slumped against the first guard who gently set him on the ground and then opened the gates for us. The young soldier looked directly at me, and his gaze traveled down to my gold pendant.
“I’m glad to be of service, Miss. I’ll make sure the security vids are erased and disabled. You’ll have no further trouble from the military personnel on duty here today.”
“Thank you.” His response took me by surprise. Sgt. McGraw had been true to her word. My belief that military personnel were as close to the Gov as one could get without actually being the Gov completely shattered once and for all.
Dr. Ross directed me to an underground parking area. From there, we walked. We kept our tools and weapons hidden or disguised, all except Alexis. John pointed her camera straight at her as she described the building we were about to enter. Raquelle stood to John's side. She carried her own bag of techno tools but looked like part of the media team. It was the same for Guy, only his bag was full of Eberhardt’s explosives.
When Alexis finished her intro, John turned off the camera and held it casually at his side. Dr. Ross led our entourage into the building. Eberhardt followed close behind, and Murphy and I took up the rear.
The doctor led us directly to the receptionist, a pretty young woman in a blue dress. A few other soldiers were stationed at desks around the room working at their data processors.
“Good morning, Lisa. I'll be taking a tour through today. Would you please open the door?”
“Certainly, Dr. Ross.”
Despite what the soldier at the gatehouse had said, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was all too easy. That's when I noticed Lisa's fingers moving toward two buttons. I spun behind her and held a knife to her throat. From the corner of my eye, I noticed that Raquelle and Murphy had pulled their guns and stood ready to protect the group. Eberhardt remained focused on Dr. Ross. The soldiers throughout the room remained intent on their work. It was as if they hadn't even noticed us.
I spoke quietly into Lisa's ear. “Which button are you going to push?”
“The one that opens the door,” she said.
“Good choice!” I patted her on the shoulder.
She pushed a button, and the door slid open.
Dr. Ross, Eberhardt, Guy, John and Alexis passed through the open door and into the corridor beyond. Keeping my knife at the girl's throat, I followed. While we waited for Raquelle and Murphy to confirm that the soldiers in the front room were indeed with the Resistance, I moved Lisa into the first room on our right, a small examination room, and bound her wrists and ankles securely with cable ties from Murphy's bag. That’s when I saw it clearly, the detail that had slipped into my subconscious.
“Your name isn’t Lisa.”
She looked at me in surprise. “How would you know that?”
I indicated her name badge. It read, ‘H. Schmidt.’ “Lisa doesn’t start with an H.”
A short while later, Murphy and Raquelle joined us. Raquelle smiled as she held up a mini data storage device. I knew this meant she had copied at least some of the information we needed.
We moved further down the corridor. A number of doorways led into more empty exam rooms. At the end of the hall, we had two options.
Guy peaked through a small window in the door on the left. “It looks like dorms.” He spoke quietly. “There's an open area at the far end.”
Then he turned to Dr. Ross and asked, “Why do you need living quarters on site?”
Dr. Ross looked incredibly sad. “We really don’t at the moment.”
I was beginning to think the man was insane.
The door on the right required both a passcode and authorized handprint to open. It was there that Dr. Ross finally took a stand.
“No, I won't open it. I rea
lly didn’t think you’d make it this far.”
Raquelle made her way up to the front and opened her case. She attached some wires to the keypad next to the door and pushed some buttons. Numbers, letters and other symbols flashed across a small vidscreen in quick succession.
“Put his hand on the plate,” she directed Eberhardt.
Eberhardt tried to pry open the doctor's fingers, but they kept curling up again before he could press his hand against the metal plate next to the door.
Raquelle sighed and looked at me. “You still have that knife?”
I nodded and approached the doctor. Eberhardt pulled Dr. Ross’s hand up and away from his body. He slid his index finger along the doctor’s wrist and spoke in a casual tone.
“Just hack it off right here. We’ll need the hand intact.”
Dr. Ross’s eyes widened with the grim realization that he was about to lose his right hand, sans anesthesia. His fingers popped open, and Eberhardt placed the doctor’s still attached hand to the metal plate.
The door opened to reveal the central lab.
“Oh...my...God...” Alexis turned on the camera as she spoke. She slowly panned across the room so that viewers would be able to see for themselves.
At first glance, I guessed this looked like any large hospital room. I'd only ever been as far as a reception room before because my father had been denied treatment. Maybe the others recognized the techno devices throughout the room, but other than a data processor in the corner, I sure didn't.
Boxes that looked like refrigerators lined the wall immediately to our right, storage for the tissue and blood samples they took from the soldiers, I guessed. Along the far wall I saw a row of small machines that projected amplified images onto attached vidscreens. Mysterious squiggly things split and moved around on the screens. To the far left were rows upon rows of clear boxes filled with some kind of fluid. Floating in the fluid, were human babies. Some were as small as my thumb. Others were as large as a small purse. Many were moving.
Despite my ignorance, even I could see that the “genetic screening” that Ramsey Corps advertised was just a cover. They hadn’t just crossed the line. They had leaped right over it and sailed far to the other side.
Dr. John Maes was drawn to the babies, and I followed a step behind.
“Are they alive?” I whispered. I moved closer to study the tiny male and female forms in the clear boxes along the wall. There were 18 of them, all at different stages of development.
Alexis turned the camera toward John as he turned toward me. She caught him in the frame, with the containers of babies clearly positioned behind him.
“Yes, they're cloning humans,” he said. “This was outlawed centuries ago, in every realm.”
Four exam tables stood in the middle of the room. Two doctors faced away from us, intent upon whatever or whoever was on the exam table in front of them. What looked like an adult form was covered with a blanket on the far table to my right. Tubes and wires connected that person to even more mysterious medical techno devices.
At the sound of John’s voice, the doctors turned.
Eberhardt grabbed Dr. Ross around the neck and aimed a gun at his head while Raquelle, Murphy and I all pulled our guns and pointed them at the doctors in the center of the room.
“What’s that? Who's there?” It was the voice of a child. He stood on the exam table so he could see what the excitement was all about.
I lowered my gun in shock. “Scott?”
Guy hugged me from behind and whispered, “That's not Scott.”
“But it looks just like him from when he was little! I know I was even younger…but that's Scott.”
Guy repeated, “That child is not Scott.” He turned me toward the figure on the other exam table. “That's Scott.”
-Guy-
Ending It
We had to bring this place down, and we had to work quickly. I started giving orders.
“No names,” I said to the others. I was certain the doctors already knew who Scott and Keira were, and they may have been familiar with Alexis, but there was no reason to compromise the rest of the team.
I nodded to Murphy and gave Keira a little shove in the right direction. “Secure the doctors. Don't hurt them.”
I looked at Alexis. “Get a few more close up shots of the embryos and fetuses. Then pack it up.”
Next was Dr. Maes. “Take whatever you need to help her back up her report.”
Then for Raquelle. “Get to work on the data processor, and make sure you’ve got everything. Then infect the server and bring it down from the inside.”
Finally, I turned my attention to Eberhardt. “Bring him along,” I indicated Dr. Ross. Keira finished securing one of the doctors. She saw where we were headed, grabbed the little boy’s hand and joined us.
Scott had been secured to the bed. Wires and tubes connected him to a variety of medical techno devices. From what I could tell, they were monitoring his heart rate and temperature, feeding him through an IV and removing waste with a catheter.
Scott turned his head toward Keira. The pain in his eyes, so intense...but he smiled at her. Keira and I reached out at the same time to release the straps that bound his wrists and ankles. It had been done to his left hand, so she saw it first. I heard her gasp, but when she looked at Scott, he shook his head and looked pointedly at the little boy. The child climbed up the side of the bed and looked directly into Scott’s eyes.
“Hi, little buddy,” Scott whispered.
“Hi!” the boy responded. “Do you hurt today?”
“Oh, just a little,” Scott lied. “How are you feeling? Better?”
“Yep!” he said, then jumped down and ran over to watch Raquelle.
As soon as the boy was gone, Keira's face contorted with rage. She turned to Dr. Ross. “What have you done to him?” She lifted up her brother's left hand so we would understand exactly what she was asking. Scott was missing two fingers.
I leaned forward and gently helped Scott into a sitting position. The sheets dropped down to reveal a large gash in his abdomen. When I looked up, I saw that Alexis had ignored my instructions and was filming us: Scott’s condition, our reactions and Dr. Ross's explanations.
The doctor backed away, but Eberhardt moved with him. “Calm down. It's not what it looks like.”
“It looks like you're cutting him to pieces!” Keira hissed.
“We were ordered to test his limits. He easily regenerated one finger in just over 24 hours. Now we’re seeing if he can regenerate two at a time. And just look! He'll be fine.” Dr. Ross had the audacity to smile.
“Did you give them permission to do this?” I asked Scott.
“There was no choice.”
“What did they take from inside?” Keira asked.
“My kidney, for a transplant.” He nodded toward the little boy. “I’m glad they did that. I just wish anesthesia worked.”
“An unfortunate side effect,” Dr. Ross mumbled.
The blood drained from Keira’s face. She pulled out her knife and moved toward Dr. Ross and Eberhardt. I could see by the look in Eberhardt’s eyes that he was not about to stop her. The doctor tried to take another step backward, but Eberhardt restrained him. This is barbaric. They’re monsters! But she can’t…
“Keira wait!” She hesitated. “We need to know more.”
Dr. Ross tried to explain. “For some reason we have yet to determine, some of the organs in the clones start to shut down around age four. We tried transplants, but their bodies rejected them. Due to so many failures, we even shut down the cloning part of the program four years ago. That little fellow was the last. But your brother and you,” he nodded at Keira and smiled. “Your DNA holds the key. You're the only ones who have been able to regenerate. You’ve made it possible for us to pick up where we left off.” Dr. Ross gestured toward the unborn babies in the containers. “Their bodies won’t reject the
transplants because genetically, you’re the same.”
“They’re all us?” she asked. She looked at the babies again. “Me and Scott?”
“Yes! The smallest one is even an April.”
Keira looked at Scott. “Did you know about this? I mean, before?”
“No, not until…how long have I been here?” He looked again at the little boy, “None of this is his fault, you know.”
I held up my hand toward Alexis and her camera. “Turn that off!”
She did. Finally, she did.
-Scott-
No Other Way
April once asked me, “Do you think what Keira does is important?” Without a doubt, I do. Like April, I often wish there were another way, but the soldier in me knows that often what we wish for and what is necessary are two entirely different things.
The day of my rescue, Keira stayed behind with Eberhardt. While he set the explosives to take out the lab, she turned off the clone wombs one by one. We couldn’t take them with us, they never would have survived, and we couldn’t leave them behind. The inhumane treatment and testing of human subjects had to stop. So Keira stayed, and one at a time, she turned off the machines. Eberhardt told me later how she’d wept for each one in turn. In some twisted way, they were our children, our nieces and nephews. When they left the lab, Eberhardt secured the metal door to seal in the blast.
Prior to that, Guy suggested that we move the doctors into one of the examination rooms closest to the entrance, as far from the main lab as possible. Keira asked why he was sparing them and argued that they would just pick up their research in another lab somewhere else funded by some other corporation. Plus, she insisted that Dr. Ross knew too much and could not be trusted.
While the rest of the team returned to the main entrance, taking my four year-old clone with them, Keira and Guy continued to argue in front of the doctors. Keira could have just kept quiet and later, on her way out, finished them off without Guy’s knowledge. I think she would have too, in the past. But she wanted this all out in the open. She would keep no secrets from Guy. In the end, they reached a compromise, and Keira demonstrated exactly what she would do should the doctors choose to continue their research. Dr. Renaldt and Dr. Grere were then moved down the hall.