A Murder of Clones: A Retrieval Artist Universe Novel (23 page)

“But they can be separated,” Zhu said.

“Yes, they can,” she said, “except that someone like you would complain about it in court. And scientists would worry that the cells were contaminated.”

“Which reminds me,” Zhu said. “Cleaning bots collect DNA all the time. It would be easy to get those cells. I’m sure the cleaning bots on this ship already have some of mine.”

“And the bots’ systems, if they are built to the Earth Alliance specifications, which have existed for centuries, automatically break up the tiniest cells. Instant contamination. Your bed is self-cleaning, at least on this ship, and in most places in the Alliance. Your clothing is also self-cleaning up to a point, though if you choose to wear it for five days straight you’ll thwart that system. Pretty much anything you touch cannot store your DNA for long, by Alliance law.”

“And outside the Alliance?” Zhu asked.

“Is like anything outside the Alliance. You’re taking a huge risk any time you leave.” She waved her fork around as she spoke. “When these criminals like your Frémont get arrested—”

“He’s not
my
Frémont,” Zhu said, offended even though he didn’t want to be.

“You know what I mean,” Olivia said. “When these criminals get arrested, not only is their DNA destroyed, but their whereabouts get tracked back decades. Mostly, we’re looking to see if they lived or traveled outside of the Alliance. That’s what you have to watch for. I’d look for it with your buddy Frémont.”

That time she had done it to annoy him, and he realized it, so he didn’t take the bait.

“What’s to stop some Earth Alliance official from stealing the DNA?” Zhu asked.

“Besides the strict and somewhat nasty penalties for doing that?” Olivia asked. “Everything gets destroyed, usually by something really powerful. The preferred system is always fire, at a temperature high enough to melt bone. It’s easiest in space, of course. We could destroy this yacht like that with the touch of a button.”

That made him shiver. He tried not to think about those details. He hated realizing how vulnerable being in space made him.

“But domes or planetside,” she said, “fire gets used a lot. No one wants these bad guys replicated, so we work hard to make sure it’s impossible. Why else would the law call for preexisting clones to be destroyed?”

That detail had disturbed him the most. He’d already done a lot of research at that point, and knew that the science showed the clones were human in all ways except their creation. The fact that the law allowed them to be destroyed because the original had proven both criminal and irredeemable seemed wrong on a variety of levels.

“I don’t understand that,” Zhu said. “Why not destroy the legal biological children, then? And the killer’s parents. After all, they passed on the DNA. All the relatives should be destroyed.”

“Some cultures do that.” Olivia didn’t seem concerned. She had continued eating, while the conversation had destroyed Zhu’s appetite. “Just not human ones. This is as close as we get to the ‘sins of the fathers’ thing that the Wygnin do.”

Zhu hated it. He was also gaining an understanding of why Salehi thought clone law the next frontier in the legal system.

“Besides,” Olivia had said, still focusing on her steak, “the parents, the children, their DNA isn’t entirely from the original. The original is a combination in the case of the parents and a contributor in the case of the children.”

“Can’t you pull apart that DNA to get the original?” Zhu asked.

“All I know is that we were told it’s been tried and hasn’t worked.” She set her utensils down and pushed her plate aside. “Hell, there’s not even proof that the clones will have the same predilections as the original. In fact, the science says that they’ll be different just due to how they’re raised. But the science also postulates that with the right set of circumstances the clones will show the same tendencies as the original, and in the case of guys like Frémont, the Alliance thinks that risk of recreating a monster is too great to allow people like Frémont to reproduce in any way, once they’re incarcerated. No biological children and certainly no clones. Hence the full wipe.”

“Well, somehow Frémont got cloned anyway,” Zhu had said.

“At least twenty times,” Olivia said. “And if I were still in the Earth Alliance criminal justice system, I’d be making sure I knew how that happened to ensure that it wouldn’t happen again.”

“You don’t think they’re doing that?” Zhu asked.

“Haven’t heard,” she said.

“Do you expect to?” he asked.

She shrugged and got up, not even bothering to end the conversation. That had unnerved him almost as much as the discussion had. She had left him alone with his thoughts, which was where he had been too much these days.

Human systems were imperfect. Alliance systems were filled with cracks and mistakes. He knew: he manipulated them all the time to his clients’ advantage.

So he went back to work, digging deep into clone law, and still looking up information about PierLuigi Frémont, who, so far as Zhu could tell, had never once left the Alliance.

Which was even more disturbing.

As if anything could be more disturbing than Frémont, who loved torture in big and small ways, who liked to experiment with various forms of murder, and who often used his charisma to charm people into doing exactly what he wanted—and then killed them as a reward.

By the second night, Zhu didn’t sleep much.

By the time the space yacht arrived at the habitat near EAP 77743, he wasn’t sure what his mission was any longer. He had no idea what he hoped to do when he saw the prisoner who had requested a lawyer.

Zhu promised himself that if he were too uncomfortable, he would just walk away.

After all, he wouldn’t take on a client until all the documentation got filled out. And he would make sure the prisoner who had requested him knew that—and knew it when Zhu gave him the documentation.

If Zhu ever did give him the documentation.

Zhu reminded himself—repeatedly, it seemed—that he wasn’t obligated to the client until Zhu decided to take the case. He’d never really acted on that before, but he planned to act on it this time.

He had to.

It was the only smart thing to do.

TWENTY-SIX

IT COULDN’T BE that easy, could it? TwoZero couldn’t have the solutions to Anniversary Day.

Could he?

Gomez tried not to look pleased. She needed to remain calm.

TwoZero hadn’t moved. He was still assessing her. His damaged hands rested on the tabletop, only a few meters from her. It looked like she could reach out and touch him—not that she wanted to do so—but she knew touching him would be impossible. The barrier between them would have captured her fingers.

“How would you help me find out what your training was for?” she asked. “The people who conducted it are dead. Thirds told me that no one knew what you were being trained for. Was he wrong?”

TwoZero looked down, and she felt a stab of disappointment. So he didn’t know anything. He sighed.

“No one’s contacted me,” he said. “No one would want to contact me.”

She thought he was going to hold up that ruined hand again, but he didn’t.

“I can only tell you what I already know. What I remember. I think it might be enough.” He looked up at her. His eyes seemed clear. She didn’t believe he was lying, but then, she had thought Thirds was a different boy than he had been. This man had lived fifteen years in one of the worst prisons in the Alliance System. Surely, he had learned how to dissemble.

“I’ll be the judge of whether what you remember is enough or not,” she said.

“Of course you will.” That snide tone had returned. “What do I get if I help you?”

She almost shrugged. Then she realized he probably wouldn’t talk to her any longer if she said she could do nothing for him.

“I can petition for you to go to a different prison,” she said. “As your arresting officer, I will have some sway.”

“What would that be? Medium security? Minimum security? A clone prison? Or would I get to mingle with real people?” His mouth had twisted even more, as if the words were hard for him to say.

“You know I am not the person who determines that,” she said.

He frowned at her. She could see him debate what he wanted to do. He was weighing his options.

“You aren’t the only one with this information,” she said before he could speak. “The only reason I didn’t go to the other clone who was injured or go see Thirds is because you were closer. That’s all. I didn’t come see you because I thought you would be more forthcoming.”

“And if I’m not forthcoming, then you’ll go to them,” he said. “I get it. I also get that I shouldn’t ask for much because you’ll go to them if I do, and I get that I should be grateful for anything you give me.”

He bowed his head, and braced his hands on the edge of the table.

“Thank you so much for conferring this great honor on me,” he said. “And for telling me how all the failures died. It’ll give me something to consider, as I mull your offer.”

She welcomed his belligerence. It made her feel less sympathetic to him.

“So,” she said as he stood. “This is all about what you’re familiar with. You’re comfortable. You really don’t want to leave.”

He froze, half standing and half sitting. Apparently, she had surprised him again. “I didn’t say that.”

“That’s the net effect,” she said. “
I
don’t like it here, so I’m not coming back to see a recalcitrant prisoner. If I leave, the offer leaves with me.”

“It’s not much of an offer,” he said, but he still hadn’t moved.

“You don’t have a lot to trade in return,” she said. “Do you even know who your clone parent is?”

“I do now.” He sat back down, although she got the sense he didn’t want to. His limbs were shaking just a little, and she wondered if they would have been able to hold him up much longer. “Apparently, I was cloned from PierLuigi Frémont. If I had network access, I would have looked him up, but the media tells me that this Frémont killed a lot of people. They call him one of the most famous mass murderers of all time and, apparently, he killed people who were his…followers? Which means he led some kind of cult. Which means he had some kind of charisma or he knew how to manipulate something. Can you tell me more than that?”

“Only if it pertains to your past,” she said.

He slapped his good hand on the table’s surface. Her side of the table didn’t even vibrate.

“How would I know what pertains and what doesn’t?” he asked. “I don’t know anything about him.”

“Tell me what you do know,” she said. “Tell me what you learned. Tell me about your training. Tell me who trained you, and what the procedures were. I’ll tell you if that has anything to do with Frémont.”

“No, you won’t,” he said, and even though it sounded like he was striving for bitterness, he couldn’t quite manage it. He clearly did not want this opportunity to pass him by.

“You’re right,” she said, “I probably won’t.”

He sighed. “You can’t guarantee that I will leave this place. You might not tell me about Frémont. What can you do for me really, Marshal?”

She smiled at him, happy that he had revealed this frustration, happy that he
was
similar to other criminals, despite his outward appearance.

“What can I do for you?” she asked. “It’s pretty simple if you think about it.”

His lopsided gaze met hers. He turned his head slightly, so that he could train his undamaged eye on her.

“I can distract you from this hell they have you in,” she said. “For a few hours or a few days or maybe even a week. And that has to be worth something, doesn’t it?”

He bowed his head. This time the movement didn’t come from anger or reluctance. She could actually feel his sense of defeat. Underneath that bravado, this man was truly broken.

“Yeah,” he said softly. “Sadly enough, that’s worth a lot.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

ZHU HAD BEEN to dozens of prisons in his career, but he’d never had an arrival like this one. Before he even left the habitat base, which was uncommonly small for a base that serviced friends, family, and staff of a medium-security prison, he had to submit to a variety of tests.

First, he had to provide all of his identification, including (surprisingly) access to his birth certificate. He hadn’t needed that since he passed the Earth Alliance bar. He still had to provide all of his legal certifications, and then submit to several DNA tests.

Those tests took several hours, not because the tests themselves were time-consuming, but because the habitat base had to send away for his personal DNA profile. The administrator yelled at him for failing to prepare for this contingency.

Zhu apologized, knowing better than to justify his so-called failure. But he wanted to say that in all his years as a practicing defense attorney, he had never before had to prove that he was himself so that he could go into a prison.