“Shit!” She frantically grabbed for something and caught hold of a part of the chair. She reached out her other hand to snag one of the belts. It reminded her of a child’s car seat.
“This dream sucks,” she muttered. “A hunky pirate and no sex. At least I don’t have to deal with Sherlock anymore. I hate robots. Horror movies are full of them.” She had to work to maneuver her ass into the seat and get the harness straps secured over her shoulders. It buckled at her waist, and at least, she was secured.
Gemma lifted her head, staring at the open doorway. “Now what?”
Chapter Two
Big glanced at the device on his wrist that linked him to the main computer on his shuttle. Finding the female had put him behind schedule. Not that he could regret that. He didn’t. To hit a transport heading toward Clone World—with a clone onboard—was a blessing he hadn’t expected.
She was a fellow clone, and she needed help. The fact she was an attractive woman was another bonus. She had beautiful pale blue eyes and dark blonde hair.
He was still shocked that he’d hit a transport with a clone aboard. Clone World always had more security when they were hauling bodies. A well-armed cruiser escorted those shipments, as well. Clones were much more expensive than plasma crates.
Then again, Gemma was an illegal purchase Rico Florigo would have wanted to hide from the authorities. The company who’d made her clone wouldn’t have wanted anyone to know about her, either. They’d broken a major law by creating a clone with source material memories. That would get them massively fined, if not temporarily shut down.
It also explained the repair droid. It was there to hide the fact that the clone was an illegal one, in case of a stasis failure. The droid would have been programed to take charge of the situation by refusing to allow the clone to order the automated ship to send a distress signal.
Big had been lying to Gemma when he’d said the asshole owner of Clone World had probably built her a stage to perform for guests. It would be stupid to allow the public to get close to her. Someone might figure out her memories weren’t blanked if they asked her questions about her life and realized she wasn’t speaking from a script.
Birthed beings feared clones with memories. The humans would have demanded that she be destroyed.
Big snorted, imagining it wasn’t just Gemma’s voice Florigo wanted for entertainment. She was a very attractive woman. The Clone World owner must have had her made for his personal use.
He unstrapped another container and sent it floating into the corridor. The repair droid rattled off threats of his pending arrest. He ignored it. He’d have shot the thing to keep it silent but then he’d have to contend with any floating parts that broke off. It wasn’t worth the hassle.
He glanced at the device on his wrist again. Time was almost up. A lot of traffic passed through the shipping lanes to Clone World. The planet not only got regular deliveries of plasma, but also food and other supplies to keep the resort well stocked.
Then there were the guests.
Clone World was a popular vacation destination with people from Earth. With his bad luck, a large passenger cruiser might happen along. They featured heavy weapons systems to protect humans from attacks. One glance at his unauthorized shuttle and they’d attempt to destroy it.
The last thing Big needed was to have to defend himself against living humans. The authorities would respond to that by beefing up security in the travel lanes. They might even send a few shuttles to specifically seek him out. It might not affect him, since he wouldn’t need to hit another transport for a long while. They’d never find him. But his fellow freed clones would be put at risk. They also had to steal to stay alive. Big wasn’t willing to bring heat down on them.
He hurried to take the last crates of plasma stored on the transport. It was a good amount that would last two clones for years to come.
Gemma was a gift from fate—if he could keep her from having a meltdown once she understood the truth. He’d deal with that after he flew them out of the travel lanes and they were safe.
He pushed the last container into the long hallway he’d created by docking with the transport. He had to close the door behind him to keep anything from floating back into the cargo hold. It finally silenced the annoying droid. He worked his way through the crates and around the corner, braced himself, then started to send the remaining crates straight toward his ship, one at a time. Gemma was out of the way of being hit, he hoped. He sent them easy, just in case, not applying much pressure to get them moving. She’d be able to block them from hitting her with her hands.
His thoughts remained on Gemma as he continued to work. Everyone had heard the horror stories about when JDJ Cryo Corp had first tested clones with their memories intact. The original dozen, as they had been called, had all gone very wrong.
Two clones had killed the employees tending to them in a revenge tactic, or possibly in a fit of blind rage over what had been done to them. None of the dozen had volunteered to become clones. They’d woken, only to learn their fate. That couldn’t have been pleasant.
Big didn’t blame them for the murders. They had the minds of free humans, inside the bodies of clones. They were considered nothing but property. It was no wonder they hadn’t taken that reality without a fight. The company should have foreseen that outcome.
Seven of the original dozen had committed suicide by various means. They couldn’t come to terms with waking inside those new bodies. It had been too much for their minds to comprehend. It probably didn’t help that the humans he’d spent time with hadn’t exactly been compassionate toward clones. Big doubted the dozen had been treated any better. It would be even tougher for them to endure intense verbal abuse and lack of empathy, since they’d once been fully human.
He worried about the female clone he’d just rescued, in that regard. Would she go into shock from learning what had happened to her after her death? She said she wasn’t deeply religious. He hoped she hadn’t been lying.
He’d read that a portion of the failed clones hadn’t wanted to exist anymore, were literally unable, feeling as if they were an abomination, a betrayal of whatever religion they had believed in. Those failed clones had reasoned they no longer had a soul; that they needed to die, even if it meant taking their own lives.
The three clones who’d survived past the first month hadn’t been able to withstand all the changes that had taken place since their original deaths. They ceased to speak or interact with the staff tending to them. Months passed as their mental health deteriorated further and further.
The experiment had been deemed a failure within four months, and once the results were known, a new law had been enacted regarding the manufacturing of clones. All of them were ordered to be blanked of source material memories.
Clones were reprogrammed during growth to teach them a working knowledge of the world they were being born into. Programed memories were implanted to make them mentally stable and to accept the roles they were created to fill. They understood that they were clones. It was the only existence they knew, and they didn’t expect to be treated with respect or empathy.
He had interacted with plenty of entertainment models when he’d worked at Clone World. The new ones were eager to perform their parts and considered it an honor to amuse the tourists. They must have gotten more extensive programing than he had, as a service clone. It hadn’t been a joy for him to work security. He’d just been resigned to his fate. Clones weren’t given a choice.