The Clone’s Mate by Susan Trombley
Eighteen
I sketched a lot in the following days, finding Subject 34 to be a fascinating model. There were so many complex lines to his body, what with the four arms, the wings, the many chitin plates that covered his body, and the rigid chitin plating that protected his head. It was challenging and thrilling to be able to replicate his image as close as I could.
He seemed to love my sketches and squirreled the loose ones away somewhere he wouldn’t disclose, always glaring at the Nirgal wall after examining my drawings as if he knew Nirgal intended to retrieve the sketchbook once I’d filled it.
Nirgal also seemed to be satisfied with my drawings, apparently now convinced that I did have some skill. When I began sketching other things besides Subject 34—like the plants surrounding us—he didn’t protest, much to my surprise, given his lame excuses for why he’d given me the book.
But he did speak up one day during Subject 34’s hunt in the maze when he must have noticed me sketching green guy from memory.
“Why are you drawing Ilyan?” he demanded as soon as the facial features became clear, his voice sounding harsh. “I insist you cease that.”
I glanced up from my sketch, regarding the Nirgal wall only briefly before returning my focus to the drawing. I’d chosen to capture the less chilly look Ilyan had taken on during our time in the cages. The picture showed a wild, mussed, wide-eyed creature with a face too handsome to be human and eyes too haunted to be comforting.
“I kinda miss him,” I said shortly, irritated that he’d decided to be a dick about my choice of subject now.
Things had been going so well between us. I even felt tolerant towards him now.
“You don’t even know him.”
I rolled my eyes, sighing heavily as I closed the sketchbook. “Duh, genius. I don’t have to know everyone I draw. Besides, it’s not my fault the cage you forced me to live in for weeks was soundproof.”
“Ilyan is… was a friend,” Nirgal said in a defensive tone. “He deserves better than to have his face sketched in that condition.”
“He deserves better than to be cooped up in a cage like a fucking animal!” I shouted as I jumped to my feet, tossing the sketchbook and pencil on the sand. “Good god! If you treat your friends like that, I’d hate to see what you do to your enemies.”
“Yes,” Nirgal said slowly. “You would definitely hate to see it.”
I pointed a finger at the Nirgal wall. “Is that a threat?”
“No, you aren’t an enemy of the empire.” Now he sounded almost weary, his tone taking me aback.
“Oh.” Well, he’d just sucked the wind out of my rage sails for a moment. Then I recalled what we were talking about. I crossed my arms over my chest. “Well, you still shouldn’t treat a friend like that.”
“Ilyan is very sick,” Nirgal said, again sounding weary. “He is also brilliant, which makes containing him in a more comfortable manner difficult. That ‘cage’ is the only way we’ve been able to keep him from escaping thus far. I assure you, we kept him in nicer conditions in the beginning of his illness.”
“So, what exactly happened to him, anyway?” I lowered my arms to my sides and stepped closer to the wall. “Why’s he so messed up?”
“He is fractured,” he said the word in a barely audible tone, like someone might use when speaking of a serious, terminal illness. “He imprinted on an enemy female, leading to the inevitable deprivation without access to her pheromones. When he contacted me after escaping the purge of his research facility, I did my best to keep him comfortable. It was my mistake to hold off putting him in cryo to slow his deterioration. I thought we were closer to a viable cure at that time than we were, and we needed him to help us restart his important research.”
“So you let him suffer, for science, huh? How not surprising, Nirgie.”
“Yes. I did. I hadn’t expected him to fracture. It is a rare condition. One I never would have thought him capable of experiencing. I regret my shortsightedness. Now, even though we have cured his affliction, we cannot heal his fracture. Nothing can.”
I realized that Nirgal was wracked with guilt and was confessing to me like I was a priest. It made me feel sorry for him, then irritated at myself for letting him get under my skin. I shouldn’t care one damned bit if guilt was eating him up inside. But damn it, I am nothing if not a softie. The story was getting to me, I had to admit it.
“What exactly does it mean when you say he’s fractured?”
“That is far more complicated than I’d expect you to understand. Suffice it to say, his consciousness has split into two distinct identities, and only one of them retains the friend I remember. The other is extremely dangerous and completely without empathy. Without even the capacity for empathy. He kills without remorse, and still possesses the brilliance of Ilyan’s mind, so the potential for destruction that his escape could unleash upon this galaxy can’t be overstated.”
“You know, I’ve gotta be honest, Nirgal. I haven’t seen a whole lot of empathy coming from any of you guys. Seems to me like green guy is just as bad as the rest of you, if what you’re saying is true.”
He didn’t respond for a long moment, and my ear practically rang with that prolonged silence. “Perhaps you have a point. Yet the rest of us do not redirect asteroids to obliterate colonies for no other reason than because someone residing there offended us.”
I gasped, shaking my head in disbelief. “Please tell me you’re exaggerating!”
“I wish I was,” he said, and again I heard the weariness. “Fortunately, we were able to destroy the asteroid before impact and recapture Ilyan, but it became obvious that we couldn’t risk him escaping again.”
“So your empire, they don’t execute criminals like that?” The idea of what Ilyan had attempted to do, the mass murder he’d tried to commit, shook me to the core.
Sure, he’d seemed a little… cold sometimes. But what Nirgal was saying was far worse than what I’d imagined he was capable of doing.
“When they are fractured, we study them. It would be a waste to destroy a useful subject who can hopefully help us learn how to undo the damage.”
I didn’t like the lack of ethics these aliens had when it came to their scientific endeavors, but if Ilyan’s condition was as bad as Nirgal said it was, then I could understand why they would want to find a cure for it. I honestly couldn’t really blame them.
“And are you all any closer to a cure for this ‘fracturing’ thing?”
“We have cured the imprinting affliction—in some of our subjects, though there are caveats even to that, I’m afraid. With that cure, we might be able to identify what process the mind undergoes to cause a fracturing, but that must be monitored during deprivation. The cure works too quickly to prolong deprivation enough to cause a fracture. In order to break a male before the cure is complete, he would have to endure extreme torture in addition to deprivation. We would not do that to a subject unless we know he can even suffer a fracture. Like I said, it is a rare condition.”
I held up a hand. “Hold up a second! Did you just say you would torture one of your own people just to cause this horrible condition—that you have no fucking cure for?”
“Not unless we knew they would—”
“Nirgal!” I planted my hands on my hips. “Don’t you dare give me this ‘it’s for science’ bullshit! I don’t care how important the cure is that you’re trying to find, you don’t torture human subjects.”
“We are not humans!” Nirgal snapped with irritation. “Nor could we even use humans for such experiments. This condition is unique to our species. What other way would you suggest we find a cure for it? Or would you rather we simply execute anyone unfortunate enough to suffer it? Do not hold us in suspense, oh wise Rhonda! Clearly, you humans have all the answers when it comes to proper scientific research. What fools we Iriduans are not to follow the example of the scrabbling ape-bloods splitting atoms and dropping their bombs on each other or sewing human fetal tissue to rodents for experiments or cloning humans without any concept of how dangerous such technology can be.”
My mouth hung open at his rant, his voice rising until it was almost a shout in my ear. I clapped a hand to it as if that could mute him, but obviously, it did little to shut him up, given the speaker inside my ear.
This time, I didn’t feel such a sense of victory at setting Nirgal off. He was really pissed, and he got snarly and sarcastic with his anger, his tone dripping with condescension with every bitter word he bit out. I had definitely poked a sore spot with this conversation, and as much as I hated to admit he was right about anything, I supposed he had a point about me mouthing off about how wrong he and his people were with their science, while being ignorant of any other solutions to solve their unique problems.
I realized that sometimes, people had no options that weren’t horrible in some way, other than to do nothing at all, and that would lead to yet another horrible outcome. I couldn’t give him an answer for how to treat a terrible condition that had destroyed someone he’d considered a friend. I couldn’t even suggest a more humane and ethical compromise for how to research such a thing. I was just as ignorant as he implied with his insulting comments.
“Look, I’m sorry, Nirgal,” I said holding up both hands in surrender. “I’m not trying to suggest I know better than you.”
“Spare me your apology, human. I neither need it, nor care to have it. You are nothing but a test subject to me. Do what you’re in there to do and stop irritating me.”
He didn’t say another word to me after that, and I wandered listlessly around the enclosure, wondering if I was experiencing Stockholm Syndrome, because I actually felt depressed that he was mad at me, even as I paced the confines of the cage he kept me in.
Subject 34 seemed taken aback when I rushed to hug him as soon as he crawled out of the hatch that led to his part of the tunnel maze. I’d been waiting for him and though it probably hadn’t been more than a half hour since my argument with Nirgal, it felt like it took him forever to return.
Despite his surprise, he hugged me back immediately with his lower arms, dangling the large hunk of gory meat he had in one upper pincer out and away from me, so it didn’t drip blood onto my head. He stroked my hair with the other upper hand, that pincer retracted back onto his forearm.
“What wrong?” he asked, then I felt his body stiffen in my arms. “Nirgal,” he growled in a deadly voice. “I kill soon.”
I sighed against his chest, squeezing my arms tighter around his waist, careful not to bump the silvery marks. “It’s okay, Thirty-four. I’m okay. He didn’t do anything to me. I’m just….”
I shrugged, then released him and stepped back. “How was your hunt?” I said in a falsely bright tone to change the subject, glancing at the meat before quickly looking away as I swallowed my gorge. “I take it you caught all your prey?”
“Not speak,” he promised, gesturing to the meat.
“Good,” I grinned, though I still didn’t look too closely at the meat. “I’m glad you’re taking that into consideration now, Thirty-four.”
“Still kill Nirgal,” he said, glancing towards the wall, which was currently out of view from this angle, though I had no doubt there were plenty of cameras giving the scientist a full view of our conversation. “Not eat.” He lowered his gaze to me. “Nirgal taste bad.”
“Yeah,” I chuckled, though it lacked much humor, “he probably does.”
