Gene Drifters: The Clone Soldier Chronicles-Book III (11 page)

“You could contact
him
, you know.”

“Don’t even mention it,” Roxanne had that look on her face
again. Rose could never figure out if it was pride, fear, anger, or just plain
old embarrassment.

“Why not? You know he’d get the job done. I just don’t see…”
Rose did not get to finish.

“Because it’s not happening, that’s why. No, I won’t.”
Roxanne said it softly, so Rose knew she had a foot in the door. Maybe she’d
bring it up again later.

I should backtrack, and explain.

The “
him
” referred to in the above conversation
refers to one Michael Segev. He is probably the most feared person on the
planet. He should be feared. It is well known that every group, rebel or ruler,
needs someone to do the job, you know,
the kill
. I would say
elimination, but that really does not adequately describe what Michael Segev
does. He is the current designated killer, the alpha, for the rebels of Donner Pass
Mountain; which means he replaced the legendary former alpha, Robert. If you
know anything about the original rebel security chief and slightly psycho
Robert, you understand something of Michael Segev.

Michael Segev is to Roxanne Smoot, what Basel St. John was
to Brenda Starr. Except Basel disappeared into the Amazon jungle to seek out a
mysterious and rare black orchid, while Michael Segev disappears to some place
no one knows about, to confiscate a life.

Let me backtrack yet again
.

For those who are post-pandemic, Brenda Starr was a comic
book character. If you still don’t understand, I would suggest Youndry’s
Parchment
Entertainment Publications
,
Pre-WME
, which can be called up on any archival
bot-com device, after deposit of chits for purchase of a Spindle from Tweekling,
Inc.

As far as I know, no one knows of the connection between
Roxanne and Michael Segev, except for the aforementioned Eldridge, and of
course me, Rose Smoot. Every so often, say three to four times per year,
Michael Segev shows up someplace where Roxanne just so happens to be, and well,
being a canine and not a human, I won’t go into it.

Roxanne never contacts Michael directly, though he did
present her with a birthday present of a direct link bot-com tattoo, in the
image of, understandably, a black orchid. He has an identical one. To my
knowledge, she’s never used hers, and he’s never used his. She’s probably the
only other person who can contact Michael Segev, except for Dorian; who in old
parlance is referred to as his controller. From my understanding, that is the
way Michael prefers it. And, one always takes Michael Segev’s preferences into
serious consideration.

Most likely, he is the source of the current information
regarding the poisoned nutria-blend, which means we should also take that
information very seriously. Michael is not known to pass on idle gossip.

Otherwise, the only thing I can add about him is that he was
formerly a member of the Israeli Mossad, maybe still is, and will not take a
hit on anyone from his former/present country, nor anyone of Jewish heritage,
nor even an enemy under the age of eighteen, or a mother of someone under
eighteen. I’m not sure if he’ll wait until they get older. I’ve never asked
him, because that one time I met him, he just didn’t seem like the sort you
talked shop with.

At any rate, it was apparent from Roxanne’s conversational
tone that contacting Michael Segev would be out of the question for the present,
so I let it drop. But he would come up again.

Let me continue my story with the rest of our
conversation
.

It was eight hours later, after leaving Tokyo and heading
eastbound again. Rose and Roxanne had not talked much. The Verdi was finished,
but with the news of Gimlet neither felt like another opera. Rose had just finished
a midday meal, which tasted like crushed bone and farmed catfish, mixed with
some left over, and usually non-edible animal parts. It was dry food,
compressed into a small ball, and sucked on for several minutes before it
dissolved and had any taste. This culinary delight was called a canine food
ball. It rode well on a trip and did not require refrigeration space. Roxanne poured
her regulation, “rig-ryder nutria-blend, formulated for maximum employee energy,
and another part of the worker efficiency protocol,” into the porta-john, which
flushed into the ocean.

The drink was supposedly tuned to each driver’s metabolism,
providing Roxanne with what she said felt like a pot of coffee mixed with a
kilo of cane sugar, and ten lime flavored neuro-pops. She’d only had it that
one time, the day before Michael Segev told Brad Benton, who told Roxanne, who
told Eldridge, who told Dorian that someone at Inc. may be poisoning the stuff.

Eldridge spread the word to all the rig-ryders, who poured
their nutria-blend rations into the sewage system or ocean. It eventually mutated
some of the organo-nano bacs, those tiny microencapsulated mutant bacteria
added to the sewage for the bilge #2 initial recycling in the sewer city off of
Lanai. Plus, some of the sharks got really weird. But that’s another story.
Suffice it to say, there was trouble in Sewer City.

After an hour of silence, Rose finally broke the ice with a
non-Michael Segev topic.

“It’s unfortunate that bubble-stop #3 is generally off
limits to the rigs, Roxanne. It would be fun to go up top and swim in warm
water for a change.”

“Yes…well, I only got to stop there once, and you weren’t
even on that trip. They needed an emergency supply drop-off, and Morton was off
at the hospital for that nose replacement job after snorting his Fueblaster.
It’s usually his stop. But I’m with you, Rose. Hawaii would be fun. I mean
other than #1 in San Fran and #6 in Tokyo, the others are all just regular
under ocean plasmon bubbles; well, except for that weird #5 place. No one ever
stops there, and for good reason. I know the rig-ryders won’t even enter #5,” Roxanne
said.

“I know, they just drop off and pick up in the neutral zone.
It’s such a weird place,” Rose said, while chewing on another food ball. Roxanne
was eyeing Rose’s food balls, trying to decide if she should eat one, or wait
until they got to the next stop.

“I suppose the close proximity to #5 affected the real
estate prices for Eldridge, when he bought the bar.” Rose was talking from the
side of her mouth, while sucking on her food ball. It made Roxanne hungry, so
she finally capitulated and grabbed one from the doggie bag.

“Of course, it’s why Dad picked #4 for the bar. The real
estate and licenses were about half the price of a land-based tunnel portal
town, and went down to even less due to the neighbors over in #5. On the other
hand, security is better in the ocean-based bubble-stops. So, I guess it’s a
give and take.”

After Rose brought up Michael Segev, Roxanne tried to dance
around the topic. And anyway, she and Rose were really preoccupied with the
news of Gimlet going missing. If anything happened to her little sister, she’d
never forgive herself. And this didn’t sound like Leo’s handiwork. She’d be
unconcerned if it was only Leo Songtain.

“Yes, our little bubble-stop does seem safe for now,
Roxanne. But I do think that Tokyo has gotten rougher.” Rose finished her food
ball and would soon be thinking of genital hygiene. It was that time of day. “I
have noticed the increase in slave-nappings lately. There must be a brisk trade
at the sex auctions. The rebels should be going after that problem, not wasting
human power with clone elimination. I am not sure why Dorian puts up with
Dina’s obsession with killing off every clone soldier on the planet. It must be
a terrible risk for Dorian to do those expensive sat-hacks for clonie purchases.
There are much worse things happening everywhere else,” Rose continued. She was
infuriated at the latest news of the “
de-extinction for meat-food movement
.”
Now, the scientists were busy cloning more passenger pigeons for those ruling
class hunting trips.

“If Gimlet has been napped for the sex auction, she’d have commed
Dorian right away. No, I think it’s someone else this time,” Roxanne replied,
while chewing on another of Rose’s food balls, the chicken-flavored variety.

“Unless someone skinned off her bot-com tattoo,” Rose
replied, but was immediately sorry she’d said it.

“Oh god, I hope not. I don’t even want to imagine that,”
Roxanne replied, wincing. “We’re entering the bridging gate for #3, Rose. Get
ready to rock and roll. Let’s hope it’s easier than the last time. Did you see
the organo report on the rig damage? We almost melted the hover-thruster. I
can’t keep up the nitro at 300 miles per hour anymore. This rig is not a new
hatch bird, even if she is an Ultrajock 8000.”

“Did you see the specs on the new model, the Ultrajock 8500?
Wow, now that’s a badass rig. We can only drool. It’s over a billion gold
vouchers, but comes with the 400 miles per hour guarantee, and a sonic
hover-thruster,” Rose replied, while licking her legs and stomach.

She and Roxanne were cooling their heels in the neutral
zone, trying to relax and take their minds off the disappearance of Gimlet, while
waiting for a #3 entry go-ahead signal. Neither was particularly excited about
passing through the pirate territory again. 

“Maybe it will be quieter this time; I mean it is midday,
not dark-click like the last time. The bars are still closed. Maybe everyone
will be at work.” Rose looked around to see if she could see anyone at the next
gate waiting to ambush them. Her food balls never took the place of fresh
pirate meat.

Two hours later, Roxanne and Rose had passed into the
neutral zone to bubble-stop #2. Their trip through the pirate zone was
strangely quiet, too quiet. It was like someone was watching them, but as if
they’d been given a hands-off command. It was very unnerving.

“That was weird. It’s as if the good citizens of bubble-stop
#3 have disappeared or are hiding something. We’ve had an escort every time for
the last three months. Where is everybody?” Roxanne asked Rose. Both should
have been relieved at the action slack.

Something was screwed.

“I wonder if this has anything to do with Gimlet’s
disappearance. It does seem strange that these events coincide. Don’t you think
so, Roxanne?” Rose had her nose to her front left paw, a habit she’d developed
when pondering.

This made Roxanne sit up suddenly and ask, “When do we haul Westbound
again? Check our job logs, Rose. Can we sign for an overtime run for one of the
summer intern replacements? Find one with a #3 stop. We’ve got to get on that
island.” Roxanne knew Rose was on the right track. She’d found a long time ago,
that Rose usually did have an instinct for things. Most dogs do…even ordinary
ones. And of course, Rose was no ordinary dog. She pawed in the log data and
rapidly scanned the scheduled rig hauls.

“There’s a stand-in opportunity for a haul into #3. It’s
Morton’s normal run. He’s on intern training duty, so he has taken the training
rig. But it will start before we arrive in San Fran, unless we push it and can
get through the nano-checks here in #2 in time. If we run at 285 the entire
time, and forget the down-time here at #2, just get the checks, we’ll have
about an hour to spare, unless the nano-checks find an organo-mechanical issue
with our rig.” Rose mused as she checked the work grids. They would not be
disappointed at missing the #2 down-time.

Bubble-stop #2 was probably the least interesting to Rose
and Roxanne. For some unknown reason, the world’s supply of displaced
mathematics and physics teachers had all retired
en masse
and set up
shop there. It was geek heaven. You could walk into any bar in #2 and find it
in total silence, with one skinny condor-looking Emeritus Professor of Poopity-Poo
chalking on a board as fast as he could, in total number-speak. If you made any
noise, everyone would look up, in unison, with identical startled and astounded
expressions on their pasty white faces.

It was kind of sad. What with the robots and their vast computational
skills, normal ordinary equation solving had become an archaic parlor game.
Plus, the food, which usually consisted of warm British style ale and those
awful meat pies, sucked. But, there was one good thing about bubble-stop #2;
absolutely no one, male or female ever noticed Roxanne Smoot. She’d have to
have an unsolved mathematical equation tattooed to her forehead for that to
occur.

“Should I sign us up for Morton’s haul?” Rose already knew
the answer.

“Do it,” Roxanne replied.

She punched her rig to 285, and chewed on another of Rose’s
food balls. They had to find Gimlet. SHE WAS MISSING!

                                                            
                            
9

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN, THE SECURITY MAN IS MISSING? You assured
me he was your best agent. If Roxanne slips into Tokyo and out again, and we
miss grabbing her this time, you’re all fired! Worse, I’ll transfer all of you
to guard duty in Leavenworth. We’ll see how you like up-top Kansas in summer!”

Leo Songtain was having a royal shit fit. His security chief,
Sheldon Whitey had just come into the outer rooms of his penthouse; he’d interrupted
his morning stock report meeting with Max. Both had been discussing the fabulous
deal they’d made on the clonie sell. Max was contemplating putting out a call
for any and all clone soldiers. They could corner the market, causing a
blow-out rise on Wall Street and Hang Seng; buy low, sell high. He saw a
futures market in clonies. Leo was stoked…until now.

“Sir, we’ve found the security man, wrapped in crap-wrap, I
mean Wraperoll®, in the back of a rig at the Hong Kong Rig Harbor Dock. He was
drugged with fentanyl and an overdose of neuropops. He’s just coming around.”

The head of security had just made a terrible error by
calling Leo’s latest invention crap-wrap, the name given by his customers to
some see-through stuff that came in a roll and was used to wrap bio-materials.
It had built-in temperature and humidity control, but always seemed to gump
itself into a ball the minute you tore off a piece from the roll.

“Well, where is this idiot? Is he available or still wrapped
up?” Max asked that question. It was his bogus attempt at humor. He sensed that
Leo had reached boiling point, and did not want his client to do anything rash.
The Worker Efficiency Protocol clearly stated that management could treat
workers however they wished, but should never carry out such acts in front of
other workers, as it would lower morale, and could reduce worker productivity. You
always called them into your office before you treated them to a dirt sandwich.

“He is waiting in the lobby, Mr. Songtain. Shall I code him
entry?” Sheldon the security chief asked as he walked to the entry code panel. He
knew he would now have to go out into the field himself to remedy the situation.
This made him very angry. You did not make Leo Songtain’s chief of security
angry. Sheldon Whitey was to be contended with. Or so he thought.

“Yes, do it.” Leo flicked a hand impatiently at his security
chief, walked to his inner rooms, and shut the door to change into something
more managerial. Presently, he was wearing a jade green silk over-jacket,
buttoned neatly over a freshly starched canary yellow silk/cotton blend dress
shirt, cuff links of the CEO regulation two-carat diamond each, and color-coordinated
grey wool slacks. The look was finished off elegantly by a hand painted pale
blue silk tie, with a black orchid painted on the front. He’d seen Roxanne’s
tattoo. He had to match it.

Leo dressed all by himself. He was proud of that. He knew of
several CEOs who had their personal assistants help them dress, or at least
select their clothes for them. He wanted to stay independent, be able to fend
for himself, live dangerously, like Roxanne.

“Yes sir, here he is.” The chief of security shoved a tall
white guy, wearing a rumpled white shirt, skinny plain black tie, and black
suit, into the room. Max immediately noticed the bad cut of the suit, then the
pieces of crap-wrap still stuck to his hair, and the red marks on his face from
tearing away the wrapping tape. The guy looked half drugged, barely able to
stand up.

“Well, what do you have to say for yourself? Do you remember
what happened? And, where is the individual you were supposed to be following?
I don’t suppose you saw anything before you got yourself in this state, did
you?” Max was doing the interrogation routine because Leo was still in the
inner rooms changing into one of his CEO costumes, what Max called those dark
grey wool suits Leo wore when he wanted to look especially CEO-ish.

“I didn’t see much sir. I was following the target, Gimlet
Nampeyo, from her domicile, that capsule hotel near the Tokyo fish market
district, to the transport tunnels. It looked to me like she was heading for
the Ginza district; maybe to shop, you know, at Mitzukoshi. You know, they have
great deals on world-food in the basement of Mitzukoshi on Saturday. You know, I
always stop off there after work to get the, you know, inari sushi and spicy
tuna rolls. They’re great, you know, not too sweet or too much vinegar….”

“Where is the target?” Max did not shout; he just wanted the
guy to stay on topic. It was now becoming clear he’d also been stung with
garble
juice
, a common name for one of the latest neuro-enhancers. It was
discovered and originally harvested from saliva of 14-year-old girls, just
post-pandemic, when a brilliant scientist noticed the similarity in
conversation between prisoners given truth serum and girls of that age talking
on what were then referred to as cell phones, or sometimes even smart-phones,
although a later study confirmed they did the opposite.

“Sorry, sir; all I noticed was that the target appeared
confused right before I blacked out. It was like, you know, she had also been
targeted. That’s all I remember, then everything went blank. Do you want me to
get you some inari sushi? You know, they also sell the neatest flavored lip
gloss on the first floor. You know, at the entry near the Ginza stop? You know,
I saw Susan wearing some last week…” The guard continued to ramble, as if he
could not stop saying whatever came to his mind, in one unpunctuated monolog.

He was positively tweet-faced.

“Take him away, and once he’s detoxed, get him a hover pass
to Kansas,” Sheldon Whitey ordered, with Max nodding an affirmative. Max
usually took care of the low level unpleasant tasks for Leo, leaving his CEO
free to make the big financial decisions. And speaking of which, Leo had just
emerged from his inner chambers in full CEO attire, ready to take command.

Leo was wearing his number 778 gluten-free Human Resources
suit, the kind he wore to interview a potential high level employee, finally,
after they’d passed the initial test for employment, the group interview (a
great honor, being selected as one of 500 from the initial 10,000 applicant
pool), the subject test, the first, second, and third cut interviews, the
second to the last one, where you have to write a grant, do their taxes for the
year, and make a presentation in front of the entire work force, and the final
five thing, where you have to show some additional talent, like gourmet
cooking, or be especially good with a musical instrument.

“I heard that last part, the part where you said your target
was also hit. I told you no one was to be hurt. Max, have the team search the
area for her. I don’t want Gimlet injured. Roxanne will never forgive me if
she’s injured. I told you all
posthaste
, not
potash
. Search the
Ginza, her University, her living cube, that, what do you call it…capsule hotel
thingie, whatever. And, search the party tunnels. I want Tokyo torn apart until
you find her,” Leo ranted as he watched himself in one of his wall-length
mirrors.

Leo was in CEO command mode. You could tell because he
checked out his performance in the wall-to-ceiling mirror as he issued those
commands. Later he would watch the play-back vids and have his special CEO
command analysis software assess his execution of CEO-manship. If he found
anything lacking he’d sign himself up for a CEO “
You Can Do It, Inc
.” personality
enhancement two-week seminar on Fiji. And, this time maybe he’d get to the part
where he walked on hot coals.

“Yes, sir,” they all replied in unison, and left the room.
Only Max remained behind with Sheldon, the security chief. He accompanied him
to the lift, put a hand on his shoulder and said, in a whisper,

“I know you can’t search the entire city of Tokyo, Sheldon.
Just do the best you can and report back directly to me, you understand? I
don’t want Mr. Songtain bothered by this little incident. And on another note,
did you find those three missing clone soldiers yet? We must have them ready
for delivery by the day after tomorrow or be ready to reduce the sale price.
Delivery was for twenty-two clone soldiers to Las Vegas in three days. If we
come up short, I don’t want Mr. Songtain to find out. Try to find some clone
replacements at the auctions if you have to. Put out a request. And did you
find out which ones got away?”

Max was much more concerned about the missing clonies than
about the missing Gimlet. He often humored Leo about his obsession with Roxanne
Smoot. He’d even commissioned a Roxanne Smoot look-alike sex slave for his
boss’s Christmas present, two years ago. But for some reason, Leo thought she
just was not the same. As with any work of art, Leo still craved the original.

“We have the names of the missing clone soldiers, sir. I had
to beat it out of the ones in captivity. THERE ARE THREE MALES MISSING, a JASON,
SAUL, and CHAD, ALL OF THE YAC CLONE BATCH,” the security guard replied.