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Saturday, December 22, 2012

Interview with a Clone

Interview with a Clone,
by Mary E. Gerdt 2012
all rights reserved


Chapter 20

The Letter…Part 2

On Earth, in a little beach house, slept a normal human, non clone named Alice Karma. She slept very deeply tonight, after being hit by a freight train of new information. She was the victim of an overzealous mother who did what she thought was right at every junction. Perhaps it was right.

In the beginning, Susan Wolf suspected that cloning was becoming more than science. The politics was a part she was removed from, until she stumbled onto the plans of certain powerful people living in Switzerland. She found out their true motivation was not for good, but for creating slaves for labor, and organ donors to harvest. They pressured her to say she was successful and they saw the child who was the result. Susan gave the leaders phony documents loaded with math and scientific jargon. She then returned to the US to begin planning her next phase of undercover island living and dabbling in science.

Susan never wanted to put Alice in the middle. She did bear and rear Alice after all. Alice had a deep affection for her Mom and vice versa.

So why did Susan feel compelled to maintain the lie?

Alice woke up in a start. Her eyes stinging from the sunlight streaming in her window. She shook her head and breathed deeply.

Her life was being clarified, normalized instantly without knowing what normal is. And it felt fine, another breath, cleansing out all the oddity of being a clone, no one else knew right now. It was a secret she held with her Mother, her biological vehicle mother and environmental/nurturing/mentor mother. Alice would never again question her mother’s motivations about what she did, lying, posthumous confessions. Her whole life was coming into focus, instead of the old blurry Alice.

Alice shared the letter with Georgia. Georgia was visibly shaken which in turn shook up Alice. Georgia was more like a mother than Susan. When she implanted the embryo, Georgia was certain she was doing the first clone birth. Even still, she was resistant to doing the procedure. Susan basically bribed Georgia with a long term commitment and a very high salary and expense account. In turn, they could only leave the island at prescribed times. Security was tight.

As it turns out, there was no clone, no documents, no miraculous wonder of modern science in the 2060’s.

There were criminal elements afoot, who trolled constantly for the clone data. There was a bounty for who brings any information forward.

Meanwhile, on Mars, Gigi Fairweather stopped by the infirmary to check on her niece, Dawn Fairweather. Dawn was delirious and sick with fever. They were down to their last antibiotics. Dawn had a kidney infection which threatened to shut down her kidneys. Gigi knew Dawn’s father Tommy would be furious Dawn was here, on Mars. Another disastrous outcome with Gigi, Tommy’s sister. The problem is, Dawn stowed away against Gigi’s advice. Once they took off, she was on her way too.

Gigi looked at her watch and had one more solar Earth day before her next show with Alice. She grew to enjoy the discussions and back and forth debates over the air (and space) waves punctuated with laughter and applause from Mars.

Gigi still did not know the truth about Alice, why she looked an awful lot more like Gigi than like Susan Wolf her clone mother, but not.

A supply ship was due any day. A day later, the transport rescue ship would take them all home.



 

 

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