THE PLANET THAT LOVED PEOPLE (standard:science fiction, 2786 words) [13/18] show all parts
Author: Danny Raven	Added: Mar 04 2016	Views/Reads: 1816/1352	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
PART 1 - CH 12

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

was hard. “Tomorrow's briefing session will concern the mission – where 
you are going, why you are going, what you are expected to do. On the 
following days there will be other sessions, some we'll have here, some 
in the grounds, some in the Ship you'll be using.” He paused to let 
these details sink in. “But before today's session starts, let me 
explain to you what happened on Sirene.” 

They all glanced at each other. 

“If you recall, I instructed you all to leave the Block on the seventh
night at exactly three in the morning and wait on the moor for the 
pick-up.” He grinned at them. “I'm afraid that was a trick.” 

“The first of many,” Kane remarked. 

Tyler beamed at him. “Probably,” he agreed. “I had gambled on the fact
that Kane here would have you all assembled in the Block by the sixth 
night just to be on the safe side, which is when we arrived back. I 
needed to lock down the entire Block, you see, to keep everybody under 
control so we used a Time Freezer on you.” 

Blaze frowned. “What's a Time Freezer?” he asked. 

“Ah, young Blaze!” Tyler said, grinning at him. “As the name implies,
it's a device which freezes time in a beam. Anybody caught in it is 
instantly frozen in time for a maximum of thirty minutes.” 

“Why did you need to trap us?” Miller asked. 

Tyler grinned at him. “So we could anaesthetize you,” he replied. 

“Anaesthetize us for what?” 

“So he could begin cloning us,” Muslik supplied. 

“Bravo Muslik!” Tyler said, mock applauding him. 

“What the fuck's this about cloning, Kane?” Sinto barked. “You never
told us anything about it on Sirene.” 

“That's because I hadn't told him,” Tyler cut in before Kane could say
anything. “But suppose I had told him. Would it have made any 
difference? Would you have changed your mind and turned down the deal? 
Any of you?” 

They all knew the answer to that and it silenced them. 

Tyler sighed theatrically. “Gentlemen,” he said, “did you really think I
would remove you from that God forsaken planet then present you with a 
Ship and send you off into space? You'd have disappeared into the 
Universe somewhere and I'd never have seen you again. No, I had to have 
an effective means of preventing you escaping and accelerated cloning 
was the best way. I shall demonstrate why shortly.” 

“Accelerated cloning's against the law,” Muslik reminded him. 

Tyler smiled pleasantly. “So, gentlemen, are all of you!” 

Miller and Blaze sniggered. 

“Why accelerated cloning?” asked Muslik. 

“Because normal cloning doesn't produce the side effects that
accelerated cloning produces,” Tyler replied, “so we carried out three 
day accelerated cloning on all of you and the processes are now 
complete. Apart from the speed, a useful side effect called clone-pain 
is caused by accelerated cloning and to demonstrate this allow me to 
re-introduce an old friend of yours who has been cloned by the 
accelerated method.” 

He held up his hand next to his mouth and spoke briefly into a
wrist-radio and moments later the room door slid open. The Worm 
sauntered in. 

The filthy rags were gone and he too was wearing clean, yellow overalls
but he was still the Worm – nothing could change the shifty eyes, the 
greasy hair, the fawning. He smiled at the prisoners, showing his 
rotting teeth then he bowed and started to put a finger up to them when 
he remembered what happened last time. He straightened up quickly and 
glanced over his shoulder. Sinto, Miller and Blaze laughed and jeered 
at him. 

Tyler smiled with them then said above the noise, “Gentlemen, you may
not have a very high opinion of the Worm but he did some really 
excellent work for me on Sirene.” 

He knew this would silence them and it did. The laughing and jeering
trailed off and they waited for him to explain. 

“As you now know, the real purpose of my visit to Sirene was to talk to
Kane to find out if he would take on this mission,” he continued. “The 
Chameleon story was used, firstly to remove the Worm and secondly to 
fool the other prisoners. After all, gentlemen, the Fleet would've had 
a riot on its hands if the others had found out only six of you were 
leaving.” 

“Fucking brilliant plan,” Sinto mocked, applauding. 

Tyler ignored him. 

“So what did the Worm do for you?” Miller asked. 

“Spied for him,” said Muslik, reading Tyler's mind. 

“Exactly,” agreed Tyler. “I needed certain information about all of you
– how imprisonment on Sirene had affected you, could you still use your 
various talents, did you have the ability to cope with the mission and 
so on. Who better to spy for me than the Worm?” 

The Worm grinned his putrid grin at them. 

“Bastard!” Sinto roared and another chair went flying across the room.
Unlike Tyler, the Worm didn't have the protection of a force-field 
round him and the chair caught him on the side of the head. He screamed 
and collapsed in a heap, blood oozing from a cut under his lank hair. 

Tyler looked at him for a moment as he lay moaning on the floor then
spoke to the Guards via his wrist-radio. They entered shortly 
afterwards and it was obvious that one of them had had some medical 
training by the way he revived the Worm – he threw a bucket of water 
over him. He sat up, groaning and spluttering, water and blood 
streaming down his face. 

Tyler stared hard at Sinto. “You'll pay for that shortly,” he said
curtly. 

“Fuck you,” replied Sinto. 

The other Guard threw the Worm a towel and when he had dried his face
they helped him into the chair. Tyler gave him a minute to recover then 
the Guards left and he ordered the prisoners to the front of the room. 

He pressed a button on his belt and part of the wall behind him slid
back revealing a window with another room behind it. Tyler pointed to 
the adjoining room where an identical Worm wearing white overalls was 
being led in by the Guards. They sat him in a chair facing side on to 
the window so the prisoners could have a clear view of everything that 
happened. 

“Who's who?” asked Kane. 

“The clone is wearing white,” Tyler said, pointing through the window.
“The real Worm is wearing yellow.” He pointed to the now anxious 
looking former spy. “Watch carefully, gentlemen,” he said, “and observe 
at first hand the effects on the original subject when pain is 
inflicted on the clone.” 

Fortunately for the Worm he was facing towards the door and he didn't
see Tyler as he signalled through the window to the Guards and one of 
them stepped forward and punched the clone on the face. At the same 
time, the Worm's head jerked back and he moaned and held his jaw. The 
other Guard jabbed the clone's hand with a knife and the Worm yelped 
and clutched his, blood oozing between his fingers. The first Guard 
stamped hard on the clone's foot and the Worm screamed and grabbed his 
own. 

Tyler held up his hand and the Guards in the other room stepped away
from the clone. The Worm slumped back in his seat thinking his ordeal 
was over. He was wrong. 

Tyler allowed the prisoners a little time to take in what they'd seen.
“Clone-pain, gentlemen,” he explained. “If the clone has pain inflicted 
on it then the original subject feels the same pain.” He grinned. “A 
useful weapon, don't you agree?” His smile vanished. “Watch this next 
part very closely, gentlemen,” he told them. “Very closely indeed.” 

He signalled through the window again and one of the Guards produced one
of those old fashioned guns, the kind that fired bullets. He stepped 
back a few paces from the clone, aimed and fired. 

The Worm screamed as a bullet hole suddenly appeared in his chest
directly over his heart. Blood fountained out and sprayed over the 
floor. He tried to say something but choked on the words. He just had 
time for a surprised look at Tyler before he slumped sideways off the 
chair, dead. 

As the stunned prisoners stared at him lying on the floor in a pool of
blood, Tyler waved to the Guards next door and they left the room 
carrying the dead clone. They came in and laid the identical bodies 
side by side then left. Tyler let the prisoners look at the bodies for 
a few moments then ordered them back to their seats. 

“Clone-death!” he told them. “If the clone is killed then the original
subject also dies! An even more useful weapon!” He glanced round them 
all. “Do remember it when you're on the mission because if there's the 
slightest evidence of anything amiss,” he said, his voice hardening, “I 
won't hesitate to inflict clone-pain...or worse. It doesn't matter how 
far away you are or how well protected, the pain will still reach you, 
even through a force-field.” 

He allowed this to sink in. 

‘Christ, he's got complete control over us,' thought Kane. ‘He can make
us do anything he wants.' 

“The clones we have taken of you will remain in suspended animation in
the Cryogenics Laboratory here at Fleet Head Quarters,” Tyler 
continued. “Pain can still be inflicted on them in this state although 
they won't feel it...but you will. If and when you return you will be 
de-cloned which reverses the accelerated cloning then you'll be allowed 
to go free.” 

‘Sure we will,' thought Kane. 

“What guarantees do we have that you'll de-clone us?” Miller asked. 

Tyler laughed derisively. “Guarantee!? You're not exactly in the
position to demand guarantees, are you?” 

“How do we know you've cloned us?” Sinto asked. “Where are these fucking
clones? Where's the proof?” 

Tyler smiled. “Proof? Why certainly, Sinto. If you want proof we'll have
one final demonstration before I go. One of you will have clone-pain 
inflicted on them from a distance.” His eyes flicked round them and he 
smiled sadistically. “Guess who it's going to be?” 

He turned his back on them and whispered some instructions into his
wrist radio then turned back. “I've just spoken to the Cryogenics Lab,” 
he explained conversationally. “They are just going to bring out one of 
the clones to inflict pain on it.” 

The prisoners glanced at each other and waited tensely. Tyler strolled
over to the window and looked out at the grounds, whistling softly. 
Then it happened. 

Sinto yelled and arched out of his chair, clutching his back. He knelt
on the floor, breathing hard then slowly raised his head and glared 
murderously at Tyler who had turned and was staring at him. 

“Bastard!” Sinto hissed through gritted teeth. 

Tyler looked at him contemptuously. “Clone-pain and clone-death,” he
said to them all, pointing first at Sinto then at the two bodies lying 
on the floor. “Remember them well.” 

He left the room. 

A small building in a quiet corner of the sprawling Fleet Head Quarters
grounds had been assigned to the prisoners. Each had a room and Tyler 
had provided some diversions to pass the time in the evenings until the 
briefing sessions were over. 

A few black-uniformed, black-helmeted Fleet Security prowled the area
but they were more to steer people away rather than keep the prisoners 
in. Having witnessed clone-pain and clone-death they knew escape was 
now out of the question. 

Sinto, having recovered from the earlier demonstration, was in his room
with a couple of the diversions – two attractive women of whom the 
Fleet seemed to have an abundant supply. Miller was in another room 
with one woman and a Dreamtab. Muslik was making up for all that idle 
Sirene time by building an advanced miniaturized computer. 

Tyler had provided Blaze with a three dimensional game which covered
half of one wall in his room. It allowed him to play a variety of games 
and he quickly mastered the joystick controls. He then alternated 
between playing the games and risking a severe thrashing by 
dematerializing in and out of Sinto's room to watch him and the women. 

Corthan as usual was off on his own, walking in the grounds. As Kane
looked out of the window in his room he came into view, strolling 
alongside the high perimeter wall. Kane watched him till he was out of 
sight then strolled over and poured himself another strong drink and 
carried it back to the window. It was his fourth and he was beginning 
to feel a bit hazy. 

He was still blaming himself for the way he had so easily allowed Tyler
to gain such an advantage over them by the accelerated cloning but as 
Muslik had said, nobody could have foreseen him pulling something like 
that. Anyway they weren't in the position to turn down any kind of deal 
whether it involved accelerated cloning or not. Hell, they were off 
Sirene weren't they? That was a miracle in itself. 

He should have thought of it though. Maybe the time on Sirene had
blunted his edge. Maybe he should turn command of the group over to 
someone else. Muslik maybe. 

Darkness was beginning to fall and he continued drinking and staring out
at the creeping shadows, still lost in thought about the mission. 


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