The Clone Empire

noticed.

Only a day had passed since I left Olympus Kri. Time might have been running out, but I did not think we had reached the midnight hour just yet.

The door opened. “Okay, Harris, so why did you come back?” the man asked as he stepped into the interrogation room. He was a natural-born, of course, a tall man with a slender build, his black hair combed back and oiled.

He could have been a hard-living twenty-year-old or a well-preserved quadragenarian. He had a trace of stubble across his cheeks, chin, and throat, and he projected confidence with his cold gaze. I looked at him, sized him up as someone of minimal importance, and dismissed him all in an instant.

How long would it take the Avatari to reach Terraneau? I wondered. A week? I had time, but I wanted to be out of this jail and off the planet I when they came. I was in a basement, but it wasn’t very deep. If the attack occurred while I was down here, my cell would turn into a crematorium.

“I asked you a question,” he said, demanding my attention. He had the demeanor of a gangster; but, of course, now he was an idealist working for Ellery Doctorow. Gangster, militant, pacifist; chameleons like this guy presented themselves as true believers in any cause that kept them in power.

I glared back at him and said nothing.

“I asked you why you came back to Terraneau,” he said.

“A mission of mercy,” I said. “I came to save you.”

“To save us from what?”

“From an invasion,” I said. “Look, I’m sure you’re a very big man around here; but I need to see Doctorow.” That was my best attempt at being polite. I had no idea how I might act on my next approach.

“Maybe he’s already listening,” the man said. He pointed to a little glass window built into the wall. The window was a square inch of bulletproof glass with a tiny surveillance camera peering out behind it. “Tell me what you got, and maybe we’ll both hear it at the same time.”

“He’s not watching,” I said. I knew assholes like this guy. They’d do anything to increase their sphere of influence, the unscrupulous specks. The problem is, by the time this fool figured out that he was in over his head, it might be too late. “He’s not watching, and this situation is out of your pay grade.”

“What makes you so sure?” the man asked.

I ignored the question and delivered the punch line. “The aliens have attacked Olympus Kri and New Copenhagen. They’ll come here next.”

“Aliens?” He looked back over his shoulder, giving the camera a nervous glance.

“Are you lying to me, Harris?” the man asked.

I did not answer.

“Are they the same aliens as before?” He did not sound like he believed me. He sounded like he was humoring me, allowing me a chance to pitch my shit, so to speak.

“Yes,” I said, though, come to think of it, that was only an assumption. We didn’t really know if the Avatari were behind the last attacks.

“Think you can beat them?” he asked.

“Beat them?” I repeated, stunned that I had not anticipated such an obvious question. “I just want to outrun them.”

Silence. I was not sure if my message was getting through. I watched him cycle through several emotions— suspicion, doubt, fear, then more suspicion. When he finally spoke, he asked, “Why would they come here?”

“Look, we really don’t have a lot of time,” I said.

“Then start answering my questions,” the man demanded.

“They’re taking back planets,” I said, stating the obvious.

Apparently, that was enough for him. He moved to the next question. “Got any proof?”

I knew that question was coming; and the answer was no. Without virtual Sweetwater and his video feed of the destruction, I had nothing to show. Because I had not prepared for one obvious question, every last person on Terraneau might die, and that included me.

“Maybe I should leave,” I said.

“What?” he asked.

“I don’t have any proof,” I said. “The mission’s a bust, and I might as well head home.”

The man laughed. “An act like this doesn’t get you in with Doctorow.”

“You’re right,” I said, throwing up my hands. “You are exactly right. The problem is, I don’t have anything more to give you. I shouldn’t have bothered you, I’ll just leave.”

“You’re not going anywhere.”

“So I’m a prisoner,” I said.

Looking exasperated, the interrogator sat and stared at me, slowly shaking his head. After a few seconds, he said, “We’re all friends here. I’m trying to help you.”

“So why do you need the guards?”

“What?”

“Why do you need armed guards if you are trying to help me?”

“You’re a dangerous man, Harris. We all know that.”

“Look, you’re out of your depth,” I said.

I did not mean to offend the bastard, but obviously I had. He yelled at me, but I didn’t listen. He ranted, and spit flew from his lips. If I had been an average prisoner, he might have turned off the camera and had his guards beat me; but I was a prisoner who came with an implicit threat. For all he knew, I had an armada circling the planet.

Not knowing what else to do, the man simply stormed out, and my interrogation room once again became a prison cell. Time passed slowly. I sat in my metal chair and glared up at the camera in the ceiling, occasionally giving it a one-finger salute.

At some point I climbed out of the chair and stretched out on the table. Since there was nothing else to do, I caught up on my sleep.

The sound of the door woke me from my nap, but I remained on my back on the table, my fingers laced together over my chest. My shoulders and neck felt stiff.

“You’re awfully calm for a harbinger bringing tidings to a doomed planet,” Doctorow said.

Like the revitalized city in which he lived, Ellery Doctorow had a new face. Gone were the long hair and beard, replaced by a square-cut coif in which the white hairs had been dyed coal black. He wore a navy blue suit, tailored to make his shoulders look wide and his waist look small. He’d been dressed in a suit the last time I saw him as well. Gone were the days of fatigues and ponytails.

Doctorow entered the interrogation room alone. He might have had a dozen bodyguards outside the door, but he entered the interrogation room alone.

“Have a seat, and I will tell you about the end of the world,” I said.

The comment earned me an enigmatic smirk.

As I climbed off the table and returned to my seat, Doctorow pulled a chair close. He sat there, stroking his chin while staring at me, apparently deep in thought. Finally, he said, “You say you’re here because the aliens attacked two other planets.”

“New Copenhagen and Olympus Kri,” I said.

“Both planets in the Orion Arm,” Doctorow noted.

“Liberated planets,” I said.

“Yes, yes, you defeated the aliens on New Copenhagen. I’m guessing that you rescued Olympus Kri the same way you rescued Terraneau. That much of your story makes sense to me.”

“They’re coming here next,” I said.

“So you say,” Doctorow said. “Why would they come here? Olympus Kri and New Copenhagen are in the Orion Arm. Why jump from the Orion Arm all the way to a planet in the Scutum-Crux Arm? Wouldn’t Earth be the logical next stop?”

“Olympus Kri was the first planet we liberated after the war,” I said.