Why You Were Taken (33 page)

  ‘Next stop: cyborgs,’ says Seth, ‘that’s not a world I want to live in.’

  ‘Dear boy, if the population of the rest of the world keeps growing as it is, there will no longer be a world to live in. We are safeguarding the future for all.’

  ‘For some. For those you deem fit. Others you deny a future altogether. How many cells are there?’ asks Kirsten. ‘How many people’s lives have you stolen?’

  ‘A dozen, maybe more. An infinitesimal portion of the population. Genesis members, however, are in the thousands. They’re in every strata of South African life.’ He lifts his palms to the ceiling, as if he is some kind of prophet. ‘How else would we be able to pull this off?’

  ‘I still don’t understand,’ says Seth, perhaps trying to buy more time, ‘the point of the clone project. So you isolated some interesting genes. Then what?’

  ‘You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.’

  ‘Try me. What was the point? To splice a little army for yourself? Take over the world?’

  ‘The point was to create a superior race.’

  ‘So not unlike Hitler, then,’ says Kirsten.

  ‘To the contrary, dear Kate. It was never about me, never about power. I’ve never liked the limelight. A superior race would get ill less often, work harder, be more intelligent, less violent, have more talents, and lead more fulfilling lives. It was to make the world a better place.’

  ‘But how would it work,’ asks Seth, ‘in your sad, imaginary world? Deserving parents would get their license and then come along to you for a designer embryo? You harvest their eggs and sperm and make a few little tweaks, remove any genetic abnormalities, add some extra brains or blue eyes. Ask them if they’d prefer a boy or a girl. It’s bespoke IVF. You’re fooling yourself. You’re not making the world a better place. You’re in the designer baby business – a fertility quack – there is nothing new or noble about that.’

  ‘You don’t understand how far technology has come,’ smiles the doctor.

  ‘Okay, you straight-out clone them, then.’

  ‘Cloning is now old tech. It was never very successful. The ratio of live births wasn’t good at all. We started with cloning because it was the best technology we had at the time, but now … now we have other means. Besides, cloning is still dependent on the pregnancy and birth being successful. There are just too many things that can go wrong. Too many variables we can’t control. So … we cut out the gestation period.’

  ‘Wait,’ says Kirsten, ‘what?’

  ‘You’ve cut out the gestation?’ says Seth. ‘As in, you grow them in artificial wombs, in the lab?’

Kirsten pictures a room filled with transparent silicone wombs and feels like throwing up again.

  ‘We experimented with that, but it wasn’t a viable solution in the end. It was difficult to get the exact … nuances of the environment right.’

  ‘Right,’ says Seth. He was genuinely interested now. You could see his brain working, thinking of possible alternatives. He comes up blank. ‘Okay, now you have to tell me.’

  Dr Van der Heever’s lips curl up into a smile, there is a snap in his eyes.

  ‘We print them,’ he says, not being able to keep the pride out of his voice. ‘We print babies.’

THAT’S WHAT FRANKENSTEIN SAID

38

Johannesburg, 2021

  ‘You print babies,’ repeats Seth. It’s not sinking in.

  ‘That’s impossible,’ says Kirsten.

  ‘Oh believe me,’ Van der Heever says, ‘it is.’

The doctor gets up from his chair and motions for them to follow him. He activates a door hidden in his bookshelf, which swings open, and he steps through. Mouton pushes them forward from behind, leaving Keke on the couch in the den. Soon they are standing in the white cube of a pristine lab (Immaculate Conception), the dirt and blood on their clothes and skin highlighted by the brightness, adding to the surreal quality of the moment.

Kirsten looks down at her hands, fingernails black with grime, but is distracted by a small cry in the corner. She studies the row of incubators against the wall: a stack of empty Tupperwares. Did she imagine the sound? Is she imagining this whole thing? She wonders if she is lying unconscious somewhere, at the scene of the earlier car accident, or in hospital, having this bizarre dream.

A nearby machine, monochrome, spins. It looks like some kind of body scanner.

  ‘We were already printing fully functional organs in 2010. It was the natural progression to print a whole body. All you really need is good software and some DNA. And stem cells, obviously, which there’s no shortage of in our game. We’ve printed over a thousand healthy babies, and we have a 100% success rate. No more failed fertility treatments. No more mothers dying in labour, no more birth injuries or foetal abnormalities. Just screaming healthy newborns with 10 out of 10 Apgars, every time.’

  ‘But you can’t print a beating heart,’ says Kirsten.

  ‘Ah, that was one of the most challenging parts,’ says Van der Heever, touching his chest where his own pacemaker is, ‘but a quick current to those heart cells and off they go – galloping along. It’s a beautiful thing to behold.’

Seth: ‘I think that’s what Frankenstein said.’

The doctor indulges Seth with a smile.

  ‘Where are they, then? The babies?’ asks Kirsten.

  ‘A lot of them have been adopted out. As you know, the demand for healthy babies nowadays is astronomical.’

  ‘You sold them?’

  ‘In a manner of speaking.’

  ‘So you cause a nation-wide fertility crisis and then set up a designer baby factory,’ says Seth. ‘Genius.’

  ‘What about the rest?’ asks Kirsten.

  ‘We evacuated them when we got confirmation that you were coming in.’

  ‘You evacuated the whole building,’ says Kirsten. The doctor nods, says: ‘I couldn’t take the chance you’d not … co-operate with us.’

  ‘I wouldn’t ‘co-operate’ with you if my life depended on it.’

  ‘That’s what I thought you’d say.’

There is another soft sound from the corner: a cooing. Transparent bubbles float playfully towards her. Kirsten blinks forcefully to wipe them out of her vision.

  ‘That’s why,’ says Van der Heever, ‘I had to up the stakes.’

He walks to the corner incubator, opens the top, and gently lifts a newborn out from inside. He carries the baby back to them like a proud relative. It’s swaddled in a blanket embellished with planes and clouds that float in the sky. The baby squirms, tries to break free, shouts, then fixes Kirsten with an intense stare. She knows she should feel revulsion. The doctor can barely contain his excitement. He raises the baby up, like a trophy, like the prize he’ll never get from his peers.

It looks …
thinks Kirsten.
It looks just like –

  ‘James, Kirsten, meet your progeny. Congratulations. It’s a baby boy.’

WHITE HOLE

39

Johannesburg, 2021

  ‘No,’ says James, breaking his silence. ‘It can’t be.’

  ‘What have you done?’ whispers Kirsten.

  ‘You came to me for help,’ Van der Heever says, ‘you wanted to have a baby.’

  ‘Not like this,’ she says.

  ‘I know it’s still a novel idea to you, but this is how
all
babies will be made in the future.’

  ‘No,’ says Kirsten, shaking her head.

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with him. He’s a perfectly healthy baby!’

  ‘You’re saying he’s ours? Mine and Kirsten’s? You used our DNA?’ asks James.

  ‘That’s what I’ve been telling you! All your best traits, with none of your problematic genes. We switched off two for cancer, and one for dementia, I believe. He’ll have Kirsten’s hair, your eyes. Your fine motor skills, and Kirsten’s artistic talent.’

The baby starts fussing, his skin blooms pink. The doctor motions for James to take off Kirsten’s handcuffs, and as he does so, she feels his fingers slip into the back pocket of her wrecked jeans. A set of small keys: for Seth’s handcuffs, she guesses. She takes the baby from Van der Heever without thinking, just scoops him up with her un-broken arm and rocks him, inhales the warmth of his skin, kisses his forehead. The baby calms, gazes up at her, barely blinking. She can feel him, smell him, and in that moment she knows acutely this is no dream. This baby – her baby – is real. Her whole body stupidly longs for the bundle in her arms.

  ‘Why did you do this?’ Kirsten asks, keeping her voice low. ‘Why bring us in and tell us everything? Why didn’t you just have us killed, like the rest?’

The doctor puts his hands behind his back, strolls towards the empty incubators, leans against one of them.

  ‘I’m getting older now. Softer? My health isn’t what it used to be. It’s too late to switch off the genes that are causing my heart to fail. My career has always been all-consuming. I’ll continue working but it’s time for me to start taking some time off. Play golf. Travel. Watch my grandson grow up.’

  ‘You can’t be serious,’ says James. ‘You think we can just forget all this and play Happy Families?’

  ‘Grandson?’ says Kirsten.

  Van der Heever’s eyebrows shoot up. ‘You haven’t told her?’

‘Why would I tell her?’ demands James. ‘Why would I tell anyone?’

His words hang in the air: the outburst makes Kirsten’s head spin.

  ‘Father?’ she looks at James. ‘He’s your
father?’

  ‘Not by choice,’ spits James. ‘I broke all ties with him as soon as I had an idea about what he was doing. But this … my imagination didn’t go this far.’

  ‘Not your choice,’ says the doctor. ‘Indeed. It was
my
choice.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘My choice, to be your father. You were the first of the 1991 seven to be chosen to be incorporated into the clonotype program. You were the first to be … taken.’

Kirsten thinks of the list, pictures it in her mind, sees the code of the last person on the list: number 7. Sees the colours, and recognises Marmalade’s date of birth. So he was also abducted, she realises, was also a victim. Abducted and then used to lure the rest of us. Bait. A toddler version of Stockholm syndrome.

James blinks.

  ‘I am one of the seven?’ he asks, amazed. ‘I am not biologically tied to you? We don’t share the same blood?’ Something dark and heavy lifts off his shoulders; a shadow escapes his face.

  ‘I did … care for you,’ says Van der Heever. ‘I didn’t make the same mistakes my father made, with me. You were always well-cared for.’

  ‘You abused me,’ says James.

  ‘I never lifted a hand to you.’

  ‘You used me as a lure,’ says James. ‘I was a child.’

Kirsten gazes at the baby who has now fallen asleep in her arms. His energy, like James’s, is orange (Candied Minneola). Fresh, tangy, sweet. Mini-Marmalade. She feels a rush of tenderness.

  ‘So, you now have a choice,’ says the doctor. ‘You can take your baby, walk out the door, and never look back. As long as you keep the Genesis Project a secret, no harm will come to the three of you. We will be watching over you –’

  ‘Surveilling us,’ says James.

  ‘Yes, surveilling you. And making sure you are safe and that life is … easy.’

  ‘What’s the catch?’ asks Kirsten.

  ‘No catch, if you are willing to co-operate.’

  ‘And if we aren’t?’

  ‘Then we’ll take the baby back.’

  ‘Like you took us,’ says Kirsten.

  ‘Like we took you. For the greater good.’

  ‘I have a hard time believing that you’re just going to let us walk out of here,’ says Seth. ‘What are you not telling us?’

  ‘I said I would let Kirsten and James go, with the baby. You, on the other hand, we can’t release. With your history, your contacts at Alba … we just can’t take the chance. I’m sure you understand.’

Seth nods.

  ‘No,’ says Kirsten.

  ‘It’s a good deal,’ says Seth. ‘If I were you, I’d take it.’

  ‘No way,’ she says.

  ‘It’s not like it would be the end for you, Mr Denicker. You would work for us,’ he says to Seth. ‘A chemgineer of your ability would be a great asset to The Project. You would choose your hours; we’d pay you handsomely. Not that you’d need the money. Everything down here is complimentary. And you’ll have an extremely beautiful companion in that journalist who also needs to stay.’

  ‘But I have to live … underground – literally – for the rest of my life?’

  ‘For the foreseeable future, yes. Until people come to understand and accept our work. It’s not as dreary as it sounds. Think of it as … living in a high-end hotel with every one of your needs met.’

The doctor takes a clicker out of his lab-coat pocket and switches on a hologram in front of them. It’s like a hotel brochure in 4D: there is a picture of a beautiful suite, impeccably furnished, followed by other images the doctor clicks through.

  ‘We have a heated swimming pool, sunlight rooms, halls of trees for nature walks. Movies, games, room service 24/7. As a bonus, you’ll have a personal assistant who will make sure that your every need is fulfilled. Mouton, remind me, what is the young lady’s name again?’

  ‘Fiona,’ says Mouton. ‘Fiona Botes.’

Seth’s face flushes. 

  ‘The finer details will all become clear once you settle in.’

The doctor switches the projection off.

‘You’ll also have access to all of this,’ he says, gesturing at the lab equipment. ‘Everything you need. We have equipment you wouldn’t believe exists.’

  ‘But I’ll be your prisoner.’

  ‘That’s looking at the cloud, instead of the – rather significant – silver lining. I’m giving you – giving all of you – a way out. A unique mercy. I’d advise you to give it some serious consideration.’