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#I lost the loving feeling i had with the gen naval officer look because it left me hung up on how to handle the citizenry
demi-pixellated · 4 months
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Freij
Freije Known for their fringed ears, thick dark hair, and natural resistance the frigid temperatures of the north. Freije seals take on a white or pale-blue hue, contrasting against their dark skin. Typically asymmetrical and unique to each individual, they have been widely (and fittingly) remarked as resembling snowflakes and frost, consisting of radial pattern of crystal-like markings.
Matriar The military and naval prowess of Freij is recognized across Elothia, and its Matriar reflects that. As Leader and Admiral, She dons the military vestments of the region, although ornamented and embroidered to indicated Her regal station. She also carries on Her person, just as the officers under Her, a dagger and sabre. Typically these would be highly decorated commissioned works, much like Her chokha and kalpak. However the current Matriar has forgone the tradition, preferring to don and wield the standard arms of her men. As Impero recently saw a Patris leave the throne, Freij is likely to see one on theirs in the coming centuries as the current Matriar has only one son and seemingly no interest in bearing another child.
Czars State officials and Generals to Her Majesty. Much like the Matriar, Czars are outfitted in military garb and keep a dagger and sabre on their person. While still decorated to denote them as officers of import, it is not to the level of the Matriar.
Citizens Despite the high tolerance to the northern climate that they have become known for, Freije are born incredibly susceptible to the cold. Newborns are heavily swaddled in thick furs and kept indoors for the most of their first year. Even when younglings are finally able to be brought outdoors, they do so thoroughly bundled up, almost comically, in several layers of thick clothing and furs.
It's not until adolescense that the Freije's cold tolerance truly begin to build up. They begin to strip away their heavy coats, scarves and furs, and many, many, layers as the years proceed, and by their first century the typical Freije can brush off the low temperatures with far lighter apparel. To the outsider experiencing the bite of Freij's Spring chill for the first time, they may even look underdressed.
In opposition to this are the region's wealthier merchants, barons, and city officials. Setting themselves up at higher altitudes, far above the crowded docks and fish markets, even their natural resistance isn't quite enough to keep out the colder mountain winds. As a result, upper class Draken remain relatively bundled up well after maturing - a fact that's earned the ridicule of many common folk, thinking it make them look childish.
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occupyscifi · 5 years
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The Franchise
The franchise
 It’s one thing to learn that you’re a clone, but it’s quite another to learn that you’re going to be held liable for your clonefather’s debts.
I found out at the after-after-party of a 3rd gen Kardashiclone’s new artesenal dildo brand launch. I was on workation at a trustafarian retreat in what had once been London’s trendy Shoreditch till it had been bought by some anonymous celeb who now rented it out for her fellow members of the 1% so they could pretend they were creatives in a vibrant new media economy. I had been servicing the needs of those much wealthier than me, which mostly involved installing VPN’s on their neural implants to get around their anti bad behaviour mods. This enabled them to eat, fuck, drink and ingest whatever they wanted. Mostly it was carbs, as these were kids who’d been on ultra restrictive diets since birth to ensure their continued their parents good looks. I’d invested heavily in the samizdat underground takeaway railroad, shipping in fried goods from as far afield as Margate.
It had been a good day, I’d earned good lolcoin installing a new VPN code on a couple of clones of an A-lister made famous by her family’s fundamentalist Christian clothing brand. The fact that the church she owned were vehemently against cloning and she’d pretended her daughters were twins only sweetened the sense of natural justice I got from shilling my wares to the super rich.
In fact I had already swooped in on Brandy2 at the after-after party, buying her a couple of ice cold methtails from the narco bar in the corner with the excuse I was just testing if her VPN was working. She had downed both of them and I was on my way to get a third. I was ruminating on how ‘d get into her pants, thinking of a cheesy shit line about wanting to test all the things the VPN could do. I was just approaching the bar when in my digital mind’s eye a banking notification flared red. Still walking I pulled it up, thinking it was just another stupid warning about not investing in Nano scale medicine. I nearly shit myself when I saw what it contained.
However I didn’t have time even for that because the next thing I knew an apparition of a man in his late forties blossomed in front of me. Full contact protocols, able to appear in my visual cortex without even needing to ask my permission. The kind of access I am very careful to restrict to precisely no one.
‘Hi there’ said the guy ‘now, I am sorry to interrupt but I got something to say’ he grinned, his face eerily familiar ‘first the good news. I’m You, only older and more successful. So successful in fact I can afford to have a clone. That’s you. Now, the bad news. I’ve been declared bankrupt and unfortunately since we’re genetically identical all your assets have been seized to pay off my debts’ his grin widened further ‘guess this wasn’t the way you wanted to find out you were a clone, right?’
 At first it had been only celebrities and models who had cloned themselves. They had pretended, of course, that these were children they’d had with as yet un named other halves, but since most celebrities had been famous since birth it was incredibly easy to compare the supposed child with the parent and call bullshit on the whole thing. Besides everyone knew that the average A-lister was too in love with themselves to raise anyone but a 100% copy of themselves. But people expected that kind of narcissism from the terminally famous, the fact that most celebs never married for any other purpose than self promotion had lead to a rash of self weddings. This meant that cloning instead of having children was the next logical step for anyone with a modicum of fame.
Unfortunately in our late 21st century world everyone is famous to one degree or other, engaged from the moment of birth in a race to develop their own personal brand and to incessantly post content that was never more than narcissistic naval gazing, or snarky comment on other people’s narcissistic naval gazing.
So cloning yourself became a normal everyday thing, because much as people loved kids the thing they loved even more was themselves. And what could be more wonderful than having a tiny version of yourself to cherish and cover with affection? Well for my clonefather apparently using them as collateral to prevent himself from being declared bankrupt.
‘What can I say?’ He grinned at me sheepishly. Or rather the software he’d sent to do his dirty work did. He couldn’t even be bothered to contact me personally, either he was too shit scared or else he had god knew how many clone sons and it was easier to send some office script to tell them all he’d gone bankrupt. I’d never even known I was a clone before but I knew myself well enough to know what I was capable of ‘it’s been a bad season. I’ve made some calls that haven’t quite panned out. That’s life’
‘That’s my life, you arsehole’ I retorted, watching in my mind’s eye as the student loan I’d been living off vanished into thin air, along with all the money I’d been stashing away ready to start my killer startup with ‘how can you do that to me? How can you have fucked things up so badly?’
‘can’t we, I dunno, have an understanding?’ he replied, the ghost in my vision wavering as another partygoer wandered past, zoned out in exactly the way I’d hoped to be. Now I didn’t even have enough credit to get the third methtail I’d promised Brandy2 ‘‘We’re the same person after all’
‘Pre fucking cicely’ I threw back, trying not to feel creeped out by the sight of a version of myself, older in the way of people with access to expensive credit are. Credit that bought genetic cosmetic work and the wisdom not to try and look young. Craggy, that was the word for it. Doucehbaggy, perhaps that was more accurate ‘I thought maybe you’d have a little respect for yourself. You just fucked me over completely. All my plans for the future, hell all my plans for right now. All burned because, what you can’t manage an investment portfolio? You put all your cash into crypto memory?’
‘Hey, like I said it’s just business’ the software version of the older me shrugged ‘why the fuck do you think I have clones in the first place?’
‘Well until about five minutes ago I thought I was a normal kid. With normal parents’
‘Seriously? How was I that naïve?’ He said, shaking his head ‘come on man, no one has parents any more. Everyone in the room with you is a clone of some rich asshole. You go to college for fucks’ sake. Hasn’t been a natural born kid gone to college for like twenty years. People who have their kids naturally are either Jesus freaks or just fucking poor, and I’m neither of those things’
‘Yeah, I’m getting an idea of the kind of guy you are’ I replied. I looked about the party, seeing Brandy2 already having lost interest in me and was now finger deep in some girl who was the third gen clone of a celebrity chef ‘so what the fuck? Did you implant me with a real family with a set of instructions to make sure I had the same emotional and cultural inputs you did, or were you so cheap ass you just fleshprinted me off as an eighteen year old with a bunch of false memories ready for my first day at college?’
‘Hey, I’ve always been cost effective when it comes to reproducing’ said my clonefather, half heartedly avoiding the question
‘Meaning, you’re a cheap fuck’ I retorted
‘Hey, why do you think I made you?’
‘To ensure immortality?’ I replied. It wasn’t something I’d thought much about. The idea of cloning yourself is kinda creepy, I couldn’t think of anything clones were useful for but weird murder stuff and even weirder sex stuff. Then again I was only twenty. Or at least I had thought I was until about two minutes earlier. Right then I realised I was probably younger than the bottle of diet water in my hand. Who knew what kind of person I’d be when I was older? Well, clearly I was the asshole standing right there, having just mortgaged his own clones to pay off some stupid debt.
But I’d always thought the reason people cloned themselves in order to avoid death. To have a young version for themselves that they could raise the right way, shelter from the harshness of the world. To support where they felt they had been let down, to nurture where they had felt abandoned. Hell, there were enough sob stories from my own adolescence that I could use as grounds for raising a new me. The time in sixth grade I’d been picked on for liking some outdated old beat ‘em up. The girls who’d laughed at me for not knowing what an iambic pentameter was. Things that event at the grand old age of twenty I knew were not exactly world shattering levels of suffering. Except those were false memories. Fucking asshole clonefather.
‘Really?” Said my software double ‘listen kid, there are two reasons people get cloned. First is cause they’re messed up in the head. Want to make another them that isn’t so messed up. That never works because, you know, they’re fucked up in the head so their clone is always gonna be the same. Don’t matter what they try and do there’s always something to get shitty about’
‘So what’s the other reason?’ I asked, holding my fury in check just because I had nothing to do with it. You can’t punch a hologram that only exists in your own visual cortex.
‘Simple’ he said, grinning in a way I knew I did and that I also knew annoyed the shit out of people around me ‘to make money. You see, I am…or rather was, a pretty rich dude. Self made rich, not like most of those assholes I see you’ve surrounded yourself with’
‘Hey, I earned my way onto this workation’ I said hotly
‘Precisely’ said my clone father ‘you and your clone brothers exist as my insurance policy. I know, cause you’re all me, that you are gonna be out there making money. If you do I can use that as collateral against my debts. If you don’t and one of you fails, well, that’s not my problem. Benefits of running you guys like a franchise’ he did that grin again. A grin that barely wavered as my fist went through it, to impact painfully against the paper mache walls that some robo printer had faithfully spewed out to some trustfarians painfully earnest impression of what a noughties frat house party should look like.
‘See? You’re feeling better already’ said my alter ego, before vanishing along with my life savings.
 ‘Could you have been hacked? I mean, this is kinda life altering news. Feels like a scam to me’
It was half an hour later and I was pouring out my emotions and cooling my bruised knuckles with aid of my NBGBFF Calypso. I’d told ur my story and ee’d made the right kind of noises. Sensible noises. calypso was clone of the first kind, ur copyparent was desperately trying to make up for some past childhood trauma by printing out a new version of urself. Calypso had turned out pretty well, if pretty well meant someone who was managing about fifteen different personality disorders. However ee was mellow that night and in listening mode.
‘that’s what I thought’ I replied as we sat on a ripped-to-pieces settee as various stoned clones tried to jump from the roof to the swimming pool. There had been several near misses, but the nearest fleshprinter was only down at what had once been Moorgate hospital and it was as easy to order in a new body as it was too get pizza. Easier, in fact, anything with a flour base was a controlled substance ‘or, you know, hoped. But I checked it out. My clone father is a solid gold asshole. He registered a whole bunch of us under a franchise agreement. I can’t find anything about him being bankrupt but I guess that’s the sort of thing you can keep from the public’ I shook my head ‘damn, are all cloneparents this big assholes?’
‘Yup’ said calypso, gesturing around the room. Several identical clones were bare-backing each other to the cheers of onlookers and the mock shock of several more ‘Says a lot about a person if rather than having a natural kid with another human being they’d rather hive off a little version of themselves. Says a lot about our society. I mean, shit how vain are we? That’s we’d rather fill the world with little copies of ourselves than fall in love with another human being and create a whole new person to represent that love. What is wrong with our culture that the only offspring we could bear to love is a genetically identical copy of ourselves. What has happened to us that….’
‘Woah there cal’ I cautioned ‘you were full on monoblogging. I was kinda hoping we could focus on my problems for a while, okay?’
‘Sure. Okay’ said calypso, taking a breath. Ee had been raised a strict Social Media Evangelical, forced to express all ur feelings into tweets and livestreams until there was nothing left of her inner self. Ee still slipped into overshare mode sometimes when ee wasn’t paying attention ‘so, how the fuck are you gonna deal with this? I mean, if it were me I could get back at my cloneparent by refusing to send ur a daily update of all my thoughts in chunks of two fifty characters or less. For you. I dunno’ Ee looked despondently around, passing me a contraband ketacocktail ee’d scored. Ur credit was tuned so ee couldn’t give gifts to others, but like most things there was always a way around it ‘can you kill the fucker? You must be able to inherit, right?’
‘Probably’ I replied ‘cause that was why he didn’t show in the flesh. Fucker knows me too well’
‘He’s you’ shrugged calypso ‘or rather, he’s you, I you were a fucking asshole’
‘He’s me with all the same memories up to the age of eighteen’ I said. I’d researched this quickly while Calypso had bound my injured hand and offset the costs of the ice against her charitable deeds tariff. As I was a bankrupt I was now eligible for charity. No wonder the other clone kids were avoiding me. No one liked a freeloader, not unless they happened to be super rich ‘Because that’s the age someone can legally earn money. All the things I’d thought were really happening really happened to him. I’m not some twenty year old with a whole bunch of experience, I’m physically about two years old and I’m fucking washed up. Shit, I got about two hours before my credit on this party runs out. Hell, you won’t even be able to see me then’
“I’m sure you’ll think of something” said Calypso, like all people with neural implants anyone with a zero credit rating is literally invisible. It was originally a mechanism so rich people didn’t have to feel guilty about not helping the homeless “you’re a resourceful guy”
“nothings coming up. I’m sure that asshole would know what to do if it was him”
‘Hey, if you have his memories then there must be something you can use. Think about what he would do in your situation’
‘He’d fuck someone like me over’ I sighed dramatically ‘and I’m just not that kind of guy’
That, however, wasn’t quite true.
 I hit rock bottom twelve hours later after sleeping the night in the boathouse of the frat party. Sleep hadn’t been easy, what with the boathouse basically being the fuck house. That most of the people doing the fucking were using my VPN software to work around the blocks their parents had put in didn’t help matters. I managed about two hours sleep in between the prone bodies of those too shagged out to protest that I had a poor credit rating. However someone must have reported me.
Security are a funny thing, invisible when you have money, incredibly visible when you don’t.
‘Hands where I can see them, sonny’ the voice hissed in my ear and just in case that wasn’t enough to wake me the cold press of a high quality printed taser in my ribs. My eyes flew open to see a girl I was sure the night before had been an innocent little slip of a thing suddenly metamorphose into a deadly serious security agent.
“I think there’s been some kind of mistake….” I began lamely. In my mind’s eye I was paging through all my social networlds and credit accounts. It didn’t take long, since anything of any monetary worth, including my person history had been taken to be sold to advertisers. The Zuckerburg privacy act no longer applied to me, since my copyfather had defaulted on his debt I was legally public property.
“damn right” said the girl, her accent surprisingly gravelly “you aren’t meant to be here. This here party’s only for people with bank accounts with lots of zeroes in them. Far as I can see you’ve only gone one zero in yours and nowt else”
“ah, I can explain, you see….”
The taser, it seemed, wasn’t just for show.
 When I regained consciousness I was on a train, the grimy walls showing me I was in the non person’s cabin, where adverts for things I couldn’t afford roared loudly at me. when I’d come to Shoreditch I’d ridden the same overground train, but the executive carriage was cleaner and didn’t have adverts. Ironic that adverts were most present for those who could least afford it.
However irony was low on my list of priorities, what with being effectively in a foreign country with no source of wealth and only a matter of time before my copyfather’s creditors would come and collect my body and rent it out for whatever desires motivated their perverse minds. If I was lucky they’d just employ me in some astroturfing sweatshop, if I was unlucky I’d be a liveaction sock puppet for some celeb whose need for adulation outstripped their actual fanbase. Id’ seen poor indebted fools like that before, forced to cheer and wail and pretend to love some swollen former idol. That wasn’t really how I saw my future, so I had to act fast.
“so what the fuck do I do?” I muttered to myself, cursing because even my internal monoblog had been taken from me, meaning the other people on the carriage – various drone workers going to or from Shoreditch – could hear me. Did they know that just twelve hours earlier I had been one of their overlords? That the only interaction I would have had with them would have been either to order them around or else hit them up for some illegal substance or other. In fact as I looked around the exhausted faces I was sure I recognised at least one person who’d helped me score fried chicken at 1am or help remove some hapless cloneboy’s penis from someone else’s orifice.
“and exactly what help is that to me now?” I muttered, still unable to form proper thoughts and instead speaking out loud “all my friends literally cannot see me because I’ve got no money. Only people I know are shady fucking characters” then, in a burst of strange clarity I had it. I knew how to get my life back, and how I could escape my clonefather’s debts at the same time. All I would need, I thought, staring sightlessly out the window of the driverless train, would be a complete and total lack of morals. And as the train wound its way around the guts of the south London bonded labour belt the ins and outs of the plan came into my head.
 The first part was easy. The very fact that the one percent couldn’t see me in my current guise could be turned to my advantage. That and the other fact I had a good knowledge of the tunnels and abandoned underground malls that lead into Shoreditch through my various connections meant I had something a lot of shady characters wanted.
“so I’m your man” I explained to a dealer in illicit fried chicken I knew from the underground takeaway trade “I can get your wares in under the fence and to the right people no problem”
“yeah, I got a bunch of guys like” explained the tired looking middle aged woman in her iconic KFC hat and complexion that bored a startling resemblance to her own product. The takeaway underground is filled with tired romantics, people who got into the full fat trade because they believed that a food tradition was being stamped out by health Nazis but after spending a decade feeding trustafarians and the terminally fat addicted saw nothing but pound signs “all of ‘em can get in. all of ‘em are so piss poor the one percent couldn’t see ‘em even if they was spread out all over the pavement. What makes you so special?”
“well for one thing you owe me pretty much your entire last weeks profits” I said evenly “I saw the vital stats of the rich kids I VPN’d. There wasn’t one of them didn’t put on a bunch of kilos and that hadda be down to me. But more importantly” I leaned in over a fat fryer, the fumes almost turning my stomach. I’d never been one for the colonel’s produce. They always say to never get high on your own supply “I know who’s running security up there”
“okay, well that’s something worth knowing” agreed the woman, chewing on some fried monstrosity the colour of melted gold “I lost three good guys the last few weeks. Security’s cracking down hard on our trade. We used to bribe em with mcnuggets but they got wise to that and contracted in a bunch of hardcore vegan types. Bastards” she narrowed her eyes “now, I can’t promise you no more than our regular lads get. I can see your used to something a little better but I don’t think your route to riches lies through us, know what I mean?”
“look, I’m just trying to keep the wolf from the door” I admitted “like, its either this or I’m gonna get repossessed. My clonedad burned a bunch of people and they’re after my arse to pay for it”
“nasty business” muttered the lady, then grabbed a greasy piece of paper from a greasy board. The underground takeaway business likes to keep everything old school, and not just because its traditional. What with us living in a digital world there’s a hefty minority of people who can’t even read, let alone understand that other people might still communicate by little scratches on a piece of paper “you can get going right away. Get this delivery right and we might get a profitable business going”
It wasn’t easy sneaking into Shoreditch. Hitherto I had been on the other end of the deal, and the worst treatment I could have expected would be a half hearted telling off by a security guard shit scared by my bank account balance. Now I could be murdered and dropped in the Thames and the only people that might raise the slightest protest were the creditors who hoped to pimp me out for my clonedaddy’s debts.
However for those who know how to look for it there are routes through London’s privatised zones. Places that are interstitial, borders between the turf owned by this billionaire or that semi sentient corporate giant enjoying a tax holiday. I skirted the Lloyds boundaries, cutting through an old drug running tunnel built originally in the days of the ill fated anti Brexit London independence movement. It took time, but I had the food in a heat sealed bag on my back and I knew I had just one chance to get this right.
So I emerged I to the fake retro hipsterish world of Shoreditch just as it was getting dark and the streetlights were illuminating the carefully restored street art and the one percenters sipping on their artfully fake lattes and deciding which 100% organic street food stand to be photographed beside. I knew I was in the right place. I just had to find the address scrawled on the piece of paper. Luckily it was one I knew all too well.
 The party itself was a thriving dance orgy in an old new warehouse conversion off Brick Lane. Rather conservative but it was the last night and a lot of people’s cloneparents were in attendance. Most of the guests were in various states of nudity and it was quite hard to tell who were the clones and who were the parents but I suppose that was the point. I had hoped that I’d be able to attend this and network my way to a bonded internship with some big A-lister that would tide me over not just for the summer but hook me up for life. Now I was a guy so low down most people couldn’t even see him and with a backpack full of samizdat fried chicken. But I still had a mission to do, and through the dancing bodies I spied the customer I needed to find.
“chicken dude” said the person who greeted me, unable to perceive me but sure as shit able to see the fried goods hovering in the air “man am I glad to see…..”
That was when I struck. The delivery cover had been just that, something that would get me in and unnoticed to the party. Despite what my takeaway contact said delivery folk were never molested on the wharf itself, the security agents knew to turn a blind eye to the fried chicken just as they did the drugs and the parties. However had I simply walked back in they’d have sniffed me out as a former one percenter and figured I was out for revenge. As it turned out I wasn’t, I was out for something worse.
As the innocent billionaire’s clonechild reached out to take the delivery I accessed the VPN I’d installed in them a week earlier, cutting through the back door that I’d left in just in case it was needed. At the time I thought the need might be that I’d forgotten something or if I needed to erase the whole thing in case of getting caught. As it turned out the back door was just as easy to use for obvious criminal intent. Who’d have thought? So at lightning speed and before the one percenter could fall to the floor I blazed through the VPN and into the implant mainframe proper. There I overrode the charity giving protocol and made myself a major recipient of aid. I paused for a nanosecond to infect the contacts list and then I was out. In the real world a little over a second passed. The one percenter, however, was out of it.
“sorry calypso” I said as my former NBGBFF crumpled into my arms. I funnelled her into a nearby chair “but I had to do this to you first. Could only be someone on my friends list. Irony’s an absolute bastard, right? Hope you understand I didn’t have much of a choi…..”
“you little thieving fooking bastard” came a voice in my ear, startling me so much I nearly dropped Calypso on the floor “I bet you thought you were dead clever, sneaking in her cos none of these rich twats could see you. Well I can see you, and this time I int gonna just stun you”
I placed Calypso in the chair, turned around slowly to face the security girl, nude except for her glow in the dark body tattooes. I slowly raised my hands “oh, that in’t gonna save you” she stepped forward to whisper in a voice that carried even over the thumping dance beat “you made a bloody great big mistake coming back here sonny. I’m gonna….”
“do nothing” I said, as the funds I’d stolen from Calypso and the viral worm I’d insinuated into her social networld contacts did their job. I felt my bank account swell and with it the sweet music of my neural implants reconnecting to the social networlds I had been rudely evicted from. I felt a new emotion rising in me as my old life rushed back, added to it a power I’d never realised I had “because otherwise” now I stepped close to the security guard as she shrank back. A taste in my mouth, a scent in my nostrils. “I’ll have you dropped in the Thames, you and your nearest and dearest. Got me? I’m one of them again, you see” I said, pointing to the writhing shapes “and we own you”
Now I realised what the emotion was.
“revulsion” I said to myself as the guard turned and stumbled away “that’s what it is”
“oh no” said a voice behind me “its success, trust me”
I whirled around, expecting to see another security guard behind me and instead saw the last person I either wanted or expected to see.
‘Well played, son’ said my clone father, sat in an armchair clapping slowly behind him the one percenters ground away, oblivious to all that was going on ‘well played. I never thought you’d have it in you’
‘The fuck you doing here?’ I said warily. The last thing I needed after committing a crime was to have my copyfather as a witness. He’d sell me out quicker than I could breath. Hell, he was the kind of guy who’d keep clones around just to pin his own crimes on.
‘I’m here to congratulate you’
‘On what?’ I said, gesturing at my handiwork. At the friend I’d ripped off just for a few lolcoin to keep myself going. At the woman I’d threatened just because she was trying to do a good job protecting her clients.
‘On doing what had to be done’ he said, pointing at my comatose former friend ‘you showed you had what it took. To do what was needed at the right moment. You should enjoy this moment’
“enjoy it?” I asked, my face twisting in disgust ‘Look, I just fucked over my very best friend to commit a crime. All because I have to pay off debts you dropped me into. I should kill you for what you did. Your fucking bankruptcy did this to me. You made me behave this way’
‘Well, confession time’ grinned my clonefather ‘ that whole bankruptcy thing? well it wasn’t real. I just made it up’
“made it up?” I replied “what the fuck do you mean?” then it dawned on me. Surely he could still technically access my assets. Including what I had stolen from Calypso. That had to mean…
‘You fuckjing scammed me’ I said, incredulous at the fact he was even lower than I thought ‘cal was right…’
‘Wasn’t a scam’ he said, winking ‘it was a test’
‘test? What the living fuck?’ I exclaimed, not sure I was hearing right. If there was anything worse than finding your life has been ruined is that finding out that it’s all some great big joke.
‘I told you, I’ve got a bunch of clones”he explained, lounging back in his seat “And this isn’t some charitable outing. I need to make sure that people who carry my name also carry a certain…set of skills’
‘What, those of fucking criminals?’
‘business skills’ he said, that nasty grin on his face again ‘half these fuckers you pall around with haven’t got a single go getting bone in their body” he gestured at the oblvious faces of the trustafarins still grinding all around us. Despite my new wealth I was keeping a low profile, shame being my motivating factor “I need to make sure you do. You can’t clone grit and determination, you see. I need to know that you can make a good earning, especially when the chips are down. You should thank me really, I’ve made you realise some truths about yorusefl you wouldn’t have done otherwise’
“so you’re saying that you delvietaely shafted me over just to give me the inner strength to be a better businessman?” my forehead creased “this is some next level boy named sue bullshit”
‘It’s business’ he said, spreading his arms wide ‘and welcome to the firm, by the way’ in minds eye a whole new set of protocols all opened up, giving me privileged access to data beyond my wildest dreams. The little piece of software I’d used to pry open the brain of poor calypso looked like nothing in comparison.
‘You can hug me now, if you like’ he said, as if expecting me to punch him in the face. For one golden second I almost did, but stopped myself for two reasons. The first was that he was, in his way, correct. I was prepared to do whatever it took to keep myself afloat. I was glad he had shown me that I had it in me to succeed. The second reason was that I kept half an eye on that digital protocol I’d used on calypso. Because I didn’t like that person I would become who stood in front of me, that arrogant manipulator who would cheerfully pit his younger self against certain annihilation just to see if he was up to standard. I didn’t think he should be having any more clones, or doing much of anything to anyone. And thanks to the software I had stolen, and the realisation of my nefarious talents he had awoken I knew I could.
‘Sure thing, dad’ I said, giving him the hug.
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