Until the first half of humanity was gone, all anybody wanted to talk about was the actress Ava Gardner. By then it was too late.
“She’s from New Copenhagen, you know,” the girl said to me.
“Who’s from New Copenhagen?”
“Ava Gardner,” she said. “Look, they’re showing
I did not respond.
“Do you think Ava’s a clone?” she asked. The girl’s name might have been Katerina. It might have been Leanne. She had told me her name on the beach this afternoon, but I forgot it as soon as I heard it. I remembered the name of her hotel. What more did I need?
“You’re not still going on about that actress?” I asked. “Who cares if she’s a clone? How would I know if she’s a clone?”
Katerina, or Leanne, or whatever her name was, shot me a frustrated look, and said, “I don’t know. I mean, I figured you being a clone and all, you might know.”
“Are you asking if they sent a memo down the clone network?” I asked.
“No, no, nothing like that. It’s just …I thought maybe you, like, you know, recognized other clones when you see them.” Now she sounded nervous.
“It’s not like that. Most clones don’t even know that they’re clones. They die if they …”
“Oh, right. I heard about that. They die if they find out that they’re clones. Is that for real? I heard about that, but I never believed it. How come you didn’t die when you found out?”
She was so pretty. She had brown eyes, deeply tanned skin from a week’s vacation spent entirely on the beach, and black hair that she pulled back into a ponytail. And she had a figure. In another few years she would probably get plump, but right now she had a tiny waist, sharp little breasts, and muscular thighs I could hardly take my eyes off of. She had reached that brief moment of physical perfection when youth gives way to womanhood.
The girl’s half-moon-shaped eyes were just wide enough to give her a look of constant surprise. Her stream of stupid questions did little to change my impression of her as both pretty and pretty stupid.
Back in the Marines, we called girls like her “scrub.” You enjoyed them for a night or two and moved on. This girl’s vacation would end in two days. By that time I’d be glad to see her go. For that face, though, I could put up with dumb questions and conversations about movie stars for a couple of days.
“I’m not a normal clone,” I said. “I’m a Liberator. Liberator clones don’t have the death reflex.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Aren’t Liberators supposed to be dangerous?”
“I make my living beating the shit out of people in an Iron Man competition,” I said. “I guess that makes me dangerous.”
“But you wouldn’t hurt me,” she said, pulling herself closer to me so that our bodies touched. She wore an ice blue bikini top and a green wrap around her tiny waist. I could feel the warmth of her body. Oh yes, I could definitely put up with stupid questions and conversations about movie stars.
We were sitting in a booth in a beachside diner. It had two benches, but she opted to cram in next to me. I noticed that a lot of girls did things like that. Maybe it made them feel like they meant something to me, like they were more than a hobby.
“Nope,” I said, “I would never hurt you.”
She smiled. She practically purred. If someone had told me she was still in high school, I would have believed it; but she claimed she was twenty-one years old. She may have actually been eighteen or nineteen. Two years younger than me …four years younger than me, it didn’t really matter. Leanne or Katerina, whatever her name was, she was old enough to take care of herself.
“Maybe Ava’s a Liberator,” the girl said.
“She can’t be a Liberator,” I said. “All Liberators are male.”
“Then how do you reproduce?” the girl asked, shock showing on her face.
Now disappointment showed on her face.
“Don’t worry,” I said. “All the machinery works.” Until that moment, I had not stopped to think that she might see me as disposable, too.
She smiled and moved in so close that she practically sat on my lap. The idea of mating with something not quite human seemed to have aroused her curiosity.
I looked at my watch. It was almost 1900. I didn’t need to be at the Palace until 2030, and work didn’t really start till nearly 2100.
Sad Sam’s Palace …
The Palace was an old auditorium at the edge of town, a few miles west of the Waikiki tourist district and one mile inland from the harbor. It was a three-story cement-and-plaster castle surrounded by auto-repair shops, warehouses, and bars. Its light-studded marquee stood out like fireworks among the dark alleys that populated the seedier side of Honolulu.
We rolled into the parking lot at 2030. The sun had long since gone down, leaving the sky black with veins of gray clouds. The Palace’s brightly lit silhouette cut an ostentatious figure against the sky. A huge marquee with flashing bulbs spelling the name “SAD SAM’S PALACE” flickered above the facade.
“That’s Sad Sam’s Palace?” the girl asked, as we drove toward the side gate. She seemed more confident around me now that we’d run by my pad; perhaps she thought she had impressed me.
“That’s it,” I said.
“Does it ever scare you, you know, fighting for a living?” she asked. “Are you ever afraid that you’ll get hurt?”
The “are you afraid” question …It almost made me miss conversations about Ava Gardner. “No,” I said. “I don’t worry about it much.”
“You must be really good,” she said.
“Either that, or I just like getting the shit kicked out of me,” I muttered quietly enough that she would not hear me.
“Harris,” the guard said as we rolled into the lot. “Big crowd tonight. You better give ’em a show.”
“That’s the plan,” I said as I drifted past. I parked and climbed out of the car. My date sat quietly, waiting for me to open her door for her, but I was already in fighter mode and opening a door for my date was the last thing on my mind. Seeing me headed to the back door of the Palace without so much as a backward glance, she opened the door for herself and caught up to me. She might not have been brilliant, but the girl was bright enough not to complain.
I didn’t have time to think about her now. I had other things on my mind.
We went into an alley leading behind the Palace. The place was dirty, with an overflowing Dumpster surrounded by a wall of garbage bags. The overly sweet smells of stale beer and old food filled the air. The alley must have made my date nervous; she stayed close to me as I knocked on the pea green metal door.
“Harris,” the guard said as he made room for me to step in.
“How’s the competition look?” I asked.
“Not as good as the company you’re keeping,” the guard said. He stared at my date and made no attempt to camouflage his interest. His fascination with my girl irritated me.
“Do I have anything to worry about?” I asked.
“You’ve seen this guy before. His name’s Monty.” The guard said this while staring at Leanne or Katerina. Whatever her name was, he was still watching her, and she didn’t seem to mind the attention.
“Big guy?” I asked.
“Short. Five-eight, maybe five-ten. You trashed him bad last time. He’s still missing his front teeth.” The guard—I could not remember his name—was missing a few teeth of his own. I might not have been the one who
