2010-03-21, 18:04
Mikar looked at the face in the mirror. The face that looked back was tired, and he hadn't even started his shift yet. There were bags under the sad eyes, the skin sagged, emphasising the lines, imperfections, little spots on the skin. The cheeks looked hollow, and the lines in the face looked like it had never smiled.
Amazing what six months of grief could do.
Mikar straightened the collar of his uniform, pulled carefully at the sleeves and nodded goodbye to the face in the mirror. He patted the breast pocket of his jacket to confirm the small lump was still there, then opened the door to his apartment and left.
The public transport to the med-bay was crowded at this time of day. Mikar had to stand, hanging from the overhead rail. He could have worked another shift, but it had to be this one. Mikar had matched his shift to that of his target. He'd taken this job, on this station, to match his target. Nobody smiled at him, the man with the sad eyes.
He arrived at work and swiped in. Alain, the previous shift supervisor, looked pleased to see him at least. Mikar paid attention to the shift-change briefing; he needed to know what was happening. Apparently there was a large battle on somewhere - there had been several customers in the last hour. None of them were the target though, nor would they be. The target had his med-clone somewhere else.
The shift officially changed. Alain waved goodbye, and headed off for his train home. Mikar looked around the screens and started monitoring the data feeds. This would probably be another fruitless night.
After only a few minutes an alert arrived from the jump-clone system. The displays ran up their amber warnings, the body was pulled from storage and moved to the arrivals area, and the tell-tales gradually moved into the green. The monitors showed Mikar the body, strapped to a padded table with a sheet draped tastefully over it, providing for a modesty it did not yet possess.
Mikar looked through the display window at the steel bench with the green sheet draped over it. The contours and ridges below the sheet did not match the memories in his fingertips, the smooth curves and warmth of her skin replaced with sharp angles and freezing cold.
SHOW ME!
The masked woman pulled back the sheet to reveal the ruined features. The blasted eyes and angled cheekbones. Ellen had ended up with her face against a metal slab, producing a strange planar surface where there used to be a smiling cheek.
It was still Ellen though, the punishment of vacuum couldn't hide that from him, even though he'd hoped the DNA scan had lied. He should think himself lucky the body had been recovered, let alone in such good shape. But he couldn't. He couldn't. His heart cramped, the pain a physical thing. He could feel his heart dying.
Mikar watched as the process continued, monitoring the gradual warm-up and the insertion of the chemicals. The cables to the sockets were live, with initial carrier signals and diagnostics. The safety interlocks wouldn't start the transfer until the target tested as green.
Mikar moved into the room, manually checking the details the remote sensors had told him.
Then suddenly the body was a person. A pilot. A shuddering breath, and the eyes flicked open.
Mikar smiled down at him, doing his best to reassure the new arrival. "Welcome to Illamur, Ser, please wait a few moments before attempting to stand." Mikar removed the cables, undid the straps, and helped the pilot to sit, then passed him a complimentary robe.
The pilot looked young: the taughtness of young skin and curves of carefully-maintained muscle just under it. The mind inside there need not be so young though. Nor sane.
"Would Ser care for a complimentary breakfast? We recommend eating something fairly quickly, and in any case before flying." The pilot brushed aside the offer without speaking, climbed off the bed and walked to the exit room without asking for guidance. Been here before then. But then all the jump clones had.
Mikar watched him go, nodding at the inattention. Many pilots didn't see a person when they arrived. Mikar was just a piece of functional furniture to them, no less than the cables or the bed.
Ellen had taken the job after being told that the hauler would stay in highsec. But the pilot had decided to do just one run to deliver some equipment to a lowsec station. The pirate was waiting on the other side of the gate in a sensor boosted battleship - the hauler had had no chance. The warship had moved in close before the kill and as the hauler exploded fired off it's EMP Smart bombs, wiping out all the crew escape pods, in a failed attempt to kill the hauler's pilot. Wiped out Ellen. Without seeing her as a person, just debris.
Mikar cleaned up the room prior to the next arrival, and went back to the monitoring station. The next hour of the shift went quietly. Three med-clone activations and no more jump clones.
Then the moment came. The moment Mikar had waited and planned for for months. The reason he was still alive.
The alert came up, and the call sign matched. Mikar's heart suddenly beat faster and his mouth was dry.
Mikar watched the tell-tales carefully, willing them to fail so he wouldn't have to go through with it; they stayed stubbonly amber and then climbed into the green. Mikar entered the room slightly earlier than strictly called for. His deft fingers reaching into his pocket for the ampule that he held in his palm. He did not remove the straps.
Sweating nervously, Mikar swallowed as the eyes opened. The transfer had happened. Reaching forward to support the head he looked into the eyes of the pilot, looking for a sign of bestiality, something that would make this easier.
It wasn't there.
For Ellen he thought. And reaching as if to support the head of the pilot he slid the ampule against his neck, triggering the manual release. Mikar watched carefully as the pilot's eyes dilated and his breathing sped up. Suddenly the monitors for brain activity went amber and then red. Mikar smiled. Regardless of what happened now, Ellen was avenged. Even med cloning him out wouldn't help, the brain state wasn't stable. The neurotransmitters firing oddly, hyper-sensitive, overloading the neural pathways. Soon his heart would go into fibrillation, confused by the messages from the brain.
An alarm went off, the med computers finally deciding that someone needed to be alerted, the medical staff summoned.
On this shift, Mikar was the medical staff.
The face looking up at him wasn't scared, it just looked confused. Perhaps he'd even lost awareness at this point. Mikar wanted to explain why, but there was little point. He just stroked the man's brow and whispered "There there, it will all be over soon..."
The alarm was getting more insistent. Mikar reached over and hit a button that claimed he was working on the problem. He didn't look away though. He kept looking into the eyes of the man dying on the table in front of him. Forcing himself to watch.
Finally the body stopped breathing. the eyes stopped flicking left and right, and just stared uncomprehendingly at the ceiling. Mikar lowered the corpse's head to the table and pulled the sheet up to cover the face.
He marked the corpse for storage - standard procedure was to autopsy failed clonings - then the weight of the deed hit him.
Done. Finished. It was over. The drive that had kept him going was gone. There was nothing left.
Time to join Ellen.
((Entered in Silver Night's fiction competition))
Amazing what six months of grief could do.
Mikar straightened the collar of his uniform, pulled carefully at the sleeves and nodded goodbye to the face in the mirror. He patted the breast pocket of his jacket to confirm the small lump was still there, then opened the door to his apartment and left.
The public transport to the med-bay was crowded at this time of day. Mikar had to stand, hanging from the overhead rail. He could have worked another shift, but it had to be this one. Mikar had matched his shift to that of his target. He'd taken this job, on this station, to match his target. Nobody smiled at him, the man with the sad eyes.
He arrived at work and swiped in. Alain, the previous shift supervisor, looked pleased to see him at least. Mikar paid attention to the shift-change briefing; he needed to know what was happening. Apparently there was a large battle on somewhere - there had been several customers in the last hour. None of them were the target though, nor would they be. The target had his med-clone somewhere else.
The shift officially changed. Alain waved goodbye, and headed off for his train home. Mikar looked around the screens and started monitoring the data feeds. This would probably be another fruitless night.
After only a few minutes an alert arrived from the jump-clone system. The displays ran up their amber warnings, the body was pulled from storage and moved to the arrivals area, and the tell-tales gradually moved into the green. The monitors showed Mikar the body, strapped to a padded table with a sheet draped tastefully over it, providing for a modesty it did not yet possess.
Mikar looked through the display window at the steel bench with the green sheet draped over it. The contours and ridges below the sheet did not match the memories in his fingertips, the smooth curves and warmth of her skin replaced with sharp angles and freezing cold.
SHOW ME!
The masked woman pulled back the sheet to reveal the ruined features. The blasted eyes and angled cheekbones. Ellen had ended up with her face against a metal slab, producing a strange planar surface where there used to be a smiling cheek.
It was still Ellen though, the punishment of vacuum couldn't hide that from him, even though he'd hoped the DNA scan had lied. He should think himself lucky the body had been recovered, let alone in such good shape. But he couldn't. He couldn't. His heart cramped, the pain a physical thing. He could feel his heart dying.
Mikar watched as the process continued, monitoring the gradual warm-up and the insertion of the chemicals. The cables to the sockets were live, with initial carrier signals and diagnostics. The safety interlocks wouldn't start the transfer until the target tested as green.
Mikar moved into the room, manually checking the details the remote sensors had told him.
Then suddenly the body was a person. A pilot. A shuddering breath, and the eyes flicked open.
Mikar smiled down at him, doing his best to reassure the new arrival. "Welcome to Illamur, Ser, please wait a few moments before attempting to stand." Mikar removed the cables, undid the straps, and helped the pilot to sit, then passed him a complimentary robe.
The pilot looked young: the taughtness of young skin and curves of carefully-maintained muscle just under it. The mind inside there need not be so young though. Nor sane.
"Would Ser care for a complimentary breakfast? We recommend eating something fairly quickly, and in any case before flying." The pilot brushed aside the offer without speaking, climbed off the bed and walked to the exit room without asking for guidance. Been here before then. But then all the jump clones had.
Mikar watched him go, nodding at the inattention. Many pilots didn't see a person when they arrived. Mikar was just a piece of functional furniture to them, no less than the cables or the bed.
Ellen had taken the job after being told that the hauler would stay in highsec. But the pilot had decided to do just one run to deliver some equipment to a lowsec station. The pirate was waiting on the other side of the gate in a sensor boosted battleship - the hauler had had no chance. The warship had moved in close before the kill and as the hauler exploded fired off it's EMP Smart bombs, wiping out all the crew escape pods, in a failed attempt to kill the hauler's pilot. Wiped out Ellen. Without seeing her as a person, just debris.
Mikar cleaned up the room prior to the next arrival, and went back to the monitoring station. The next hour of the shift went quietly. Three med-clone activations and no more jump clones.
Then the moment came. The moment Mikar had waited and planned for for months. The reason he was still alive.
The alert came up, and the call sign matched. Mikar's heart suddenly beat faster and his mouth was dry.
Mikar watched the tell-tales carefully, willing them to fail so he wouldn't have to go through with it; they stayed stubbonly amber and then climbed into the green. Mikar entered the room slightly earlier than strictly called for. His deft fingers reaching into his pocket for the ampule that he held in his palm. He did not remove the straps.
Sweating nervously, Mikar swallowed as the eyes opened. The transfer had happened. Reaching forward to support the head he looked into the eyes of the pilot, looking for a sign of bestiality, something that would make this easier.
It wasn't there.
For Ellen he thought. And reaching as if to support the head of the pilot he slid the ampule against his neck, triggering the manual release. Mikar watched carefully as the pilot's eyes dilated and his breathing sped up. Suddenly the monitors for brain activity went amber and then red. Mikar smiled. Regardless of what happened now, Ellen was avenged. Even med cloning him out wouldn't help, the brain state wasn't stable. The neurotransmitters firing oddly, hyper-sensitive, overloading the neural pathways. Soon his heart would go into fibrillation, confused by the messages from the brain.
An alarm went off, the med computers finally deciding that someone needed to be alerted, the medical staff summoned.
On this shift, Mikar was the medical staff.
The face looking up at him wasn't scared, it just looked confused. Perhaps he'd even lost awareness at this point. Mikar wanted to explain why, but there was little point. He just stroked the man's brow and whispered "There there, it will all be over soon..."
The alarm was getting more insistent. Mikar reached over and hit a button that claimed he was working on the problem. He didn't look away though. He kept looking into the eyes of the man dying on the table in front of him. Forcing himself to watch.
Finally the body stopped breathing. the eyes stopped flicking left and right, and just stared uncomprehendingly at the ceiling. Mikar lowered the corpse's head to the table and pulled the sheet up to cover the face.
He marked the corpse for storage - standard procedure was to autopsy failed clonings - then the weight of the deed hit him.
Done. Finished. It was over. The drive that had kept him going was gone. There was nothing left.
Time to join Ellen.
((Entered in Silver Night's fiction competition))
