The Clone Bible -
Chapter 1 -
The pattered booms shook and woke Nikolai at his desk, the feint, crackling of fireworks flashing across the colony's structures far below him. The buildings fumed with vapors, adding to the misty, heavy atmosphere contained by a dome ceiling. He reviewed his project one last time. Across his screen, the code contained the reconstructed consciousness of an advanced master clone called “B209”. He had been disobeying orders despite his victories. Too valuable to scrap after lifetimes of battle experience, Nikolai was tasked with reconditioning his mind.
The war had raged ever since a regime split centuries ago. Today marked a day of independence, (and Nikolai's deadline), when one side launched interstellar fleets against the other to secure a separate dimension. From balconies below, people viewed the nighttime explosions, a rare occasion that they would unplug from their digital lives long enough to chat with their neighbors.
He received an urgent message and listened, checking his work a final time.
“How far are you?”
“10 minutes,”
“Make it 5.”
Nikola sighed, grabbed his jacket, and jogged to the elevator. Sky lifts ran to and from the center spire where he worked, connecting all quadrants of the colony. He passed over the city until getting off and running along a building's enclosed siding. Passing through an air sealed gate, he rode another elevator down for several minutes. When he exited, he was below ground. An aid waited for him past a security checkpoint and guided him to a holding chamber.
He stood over the incubation pod of B209, seeing a giant figure with a massive digital plate fused to his head. It tracked his brain in the event of death and was capable of being re uploaded to another body. What about this clone made him so effective? After spending countless hours with his memories, he still felt like an alien. His hand ran tentatively over the console.
“Did you get the file?” Nikola asked the neural engineer.
“He's ready. Conventionalist forces are amassing behind the Delta Gateway. We need to act.”
“Alright, load it,” Nikolai said. They stood together, watching as the screen raced through B209's life.
Fade in.
A squalling young child ripped from his mother's arms.
An overcast sky and a field of boys lined up. A large building in the background. A fist colliding with another boy. Sitting outside an office next to a bruised face and crossed arms. Alone in a dormitory playing a tactical game under the sheets while everyone slept. In a church with his classmate around him, kneeling in prayer. Graduation.
All the way up until Nikolai's alterations. There was a bright light and God told him of his destiny. This was a scene Nikolai had inserted after his last battle, where he ignored direct commands and sacrificed himself to destroy a gateway.
B209's eyes opened and he was directed to his post. He approached the helm of a ship and stood next to his second-in-command, watching the Delta Gateway spinning and pulsing with energy.
“I was beginning to wonder if you'd ever be resurrected.”
“Hoping for a shot at promotion?”
“I did not consider that, although, after your last performance, I imagined they'd discontinue your entire breed.”
“We won, didn't we?”
“Not the way they wanted. What's it like when you die by the way? For me everything goes black.”
“I always go to Heaven.”
“We don't have souls, remember? When this is all over we'll be mopping floors and doing laundry, forever updated until we're obsolete.”
“You really do lack purpose A2103.”
“My purpose is to survive, by any means necessary. Whether for this side or the next.”
“That's why you never go to Heaven.”
A2103 guffawed, “Has it occurred to you that God might not support either side?”
“I know that He doesn't.”
“And yet you fight?”
“Yes.”
“You are the greatest commander we have ever known, and yet you waste your efforts on this war.”
“Relax little brother, you can't see the light without darkness”
A message played overhead, “Conventionalist forces incoming.”
B209 shouted commands as enemy ships streamed out of the gateway, firing plasma. Modern space battle required great timing as engagements happened far away.
“Deploy magnetic barrier. Don't let them out.”
The goal was to contain forces, before they could warp to another point in the universe. If they did manage to get away, the battle moved to whatever planet that they chose to target. Defending gateways made up the bulk of the war. Neither side had penetrated into the opposing dimension in any consequential way for a long time.
“Contain them.”
“They're breaking through!”
“Initialize thrust.”
“Commander?”
“Initialize thrust! Now!”
Nikola watched as B209's ship barreled towards the enemy, knowing he had failed to altar his consciousness yet again. He still ignored the directives programmed into his consciousness, destroying another gateway and an avenue to invade the enemy. His ship was torn apart by plasma, but not before charging warp energy and acting like a kamikaze bomb that destroyed all enemies in the area with the gateway. The rest of his fleet looked on, the less important and expendable clones, safely outside the blast radius.