The Pride of Parahumans (13 page)

I thought about how the Belt would handle
this information. The cloneclans and wealthy oligarchs who had
families already would benefit the most, as they had more copies of
their genes to spread already. But now that I thought about it, if
we still could reproduce only by cloning, such people would be the
entirety of parahumanity in about a century. If I sent out the
formula their genelines would be a minority of the total
population. And no doubt the powerful could lose power when they
had millions of potential competitors.

And I thought of my friends, dead or on the
run, thanks to one man who would lose everything with just a few
taps of a button.

One by one, I sent my findings to a dozen
different sites. Tab by tab, key by key, I signed the death warrant
for a civilization and hopefully the birth certificate of a new
species.

Chapter
12

The effects of the upload were drastic.
Within days, the blogosphere was erupting with opinions on the
revelation. Most believed that it was fake. I couldn't really blame
them, as it was a rather immense change and posted by someone
virtually unknown. The fact that my only notable claim to fame was
arriving on Vesta with a price on my head and being the only member
of my group who wasn't currently dead or on the run from the
Protectors' Guilds, I decided, wouldn't help me much, so I uploaded
the data under a pseudonym. The following comes from one of the
more notable forum threads on the subject, where I wrote under
another pseudonym, "GoldFoxie":

Genotypist: This has to be fake, you'd think
that if it were this easy the asteroids would be crawling with
mutant cubs by now.

BioStick: Not to mention that we're all
blends of DNA from multiple species, it would have to be almost
impossible for us to breed.

GoldFoxie: @Genotypist: Not if the
information was locked up by the corps, I work at the SPPS and
you'd be surprised how often we run into "clearance required" when
running sequences through the old corporate databanks. @BioStick:
You do know that anthropomorphic parahumans are over 99% human
while uplifted parahumans have nearly all of their genes from a
single species, right?

RedBull: @GoldFoxie: If you're so sure that
the mutagen works why don't you take it yourself and get pregnant
or get someone else pregnant?

GoldFoxie: @RedBull: Once I get some testes
or ovaries I will. Why don't you try it out?

Private message from [email protected]:
GoldFoxie, we have traced your ISP and determined it to be the same
one that the data on the fertility restoration originated from.
Under board rules, you are required to write about your findings
under the same tag that you posted them under. This rule helps to
ensure our rule of transparency. While we do not object to the use
of pseudonyms to publish data, we encourage researchers to take
responsibility for their works instead of hiding behind other names
to influence public reactions to their achievements.

Seriously? They didn't mind false names so
long as you used the same fake name everywhere? How hypocritical
was that? I did not dare post on that forum again, but I returned a
few hours later to see what had sprung up. Sure enough, the
worst:

[email protected]: ISP trace has identified
user GoldFoxie as user DarwinRevolution, author of the fertility
genehack project.

Genotypist: That figures.

RedBull: Of course ze was trying to further
their practical joke. And what other reason would a neuter have for
publishing a means to reproduce by sex?

HoundOfGod: @RedBull: Isn't it obvious?
What other genderless foxes are there that work for the SPPS and
are named after a "precious" metal who have appeared in the news
recently? I'll give you a hint.
(He Hlinked to video about my
friends' deaths.)
Clearly ze has a grudge against the Cloneclans
and wants to break their exclusive access to genetic perpetuation,
even if ze can't benefit from the treatment personally. Me and my
partner are having the CRISPr protein synthesized as I type this,
if it works I will chronicle the progress.

I dropped the tablet in shock. This
HoundOfGod character, whoever they were, had just exposed me. What
gave them the right to do that?

But on the other hand, (1) it lent me a bit
of credibility, (2) they were trying out the more hazardous version
of the treatment, and (3) clearly they did not like the Cloneclans.
Perhaps they could be an ally in the coming revolution that Maximus
was talking about. I would have to ask Max about them the next time
I saw him.

***

The following Monday, I came back to work.
Cautious that someone might recognize me from the Internet, I took
the less traveled paths to the building and wore a concealing
trench coat with a hologram that replaced my face with that of a
red fox. As I was preparing to don my containment suit, a
familiar-looking savannah cat wearing a black robe followed into
the decontamination chamber.

"Oh, Maximus, I was just looking for-" I cut
myself off as I realized that it was not Maximus Griggs but rather
his progenitor, with a rather displeased look on his face. "Jakob,
sorry; I was expecting your son."

"Was he the one who put you up to this?!" He
demanded, angrily. "Did he tell you to release the information
about that gene so he could wrest control from me?!"

"No," I said somewhat untruthfully, "it was
my decision after two of my friends were murdered by one of the
Protectors you claimed you kept in line."

"What exactly are you implying,
Argentum?"

"I'm saying that if some Marquez killed my
friends over high coverage rates, that tells me that either you
lack the control over the Clans that you claim to have," I sucked
in a breath and fiddled with some of my vest buttons as I spoke to
him "or you ordered their deaths yourself."

He looked slightly surprised at my statement,
but not overly so. "What makes you say that?"

I straightened up and started to circle
slowly around to the exit while keeping my distance from him. "You
told me that you were preventing the Clans from acting like feudal
nobles."

"I did," he admitted. "But I can't be held
responsible for every little thing they do. I may have told Marquez
to increase your friends' rates a little, but I did not expect them
to get violent. It's not my fault if he had to defend himself."

"He had cyanide darts," I replied. "He could
have used less-than-lethal paralytics, but he shot them with enough
poison to kill a baseline elephant." Then I thought of something
else he was undeniably responsible for. "And your clones enabled
the Guild leaders to make their own allies and cement their
positions in place. You and your progenitor are the whole reason
why the Protectors' Guilds are known as Houses and Clans in pop
culture."

"I wouldn't give the original Griggs too much
credit. The discounts for the Guild leaders were my idea. He wanted
to charge everyone the same price and even offer financing for
lower-income parahumans. He thought my idea would reduce the
genetic diversity of the asteroid to levels that were somehow
dangerous. That was why he had to go."

I stared at him in horror. "You killed your
own father?!"

"It's not like I shot or stabbed him. A few
loose bolts in his personal shuttle, a few holes in his spacesuit,
some loose wires in his radio… All I needed to do was make a fatal
accident a little more possible, and he was as good as dead."

He turned as if he had suddenly realized
something. "And now that you know that, you should probably die as
well." He began to draw something from under his robe.

"And if the one who brought down your
monopoly dies suddenly, what do you think the blogs will say?" I
asked. He stopped and stared at me as I continued. "As it is, most
people seem to think that the mutation is a joke. Of course that
will change once the first few babies are born, but I suspect that
my death would convince some of the skeptics that there truly is
something to my research."

"Fine." He released the handle of whatever
weapon he had and instead pulled out a mini-tablet. As he scrolled
down the menu, he said, "Your employment with the Society for the
Preservation of Parahuman Species is now terminated. If you are
seen within 100 meters of this building again, our in-house
security will shoot to kill." He showed me the screen that now
listed my employment status as "terminated." "Now get out."

I picked up my trenchcoat and threw it back
on. As I left, I looked at one of the buttons on my vest, in
particular the blinking light on the back side.

***

To: HoundOfGod

From: GoldFoxie

Subject: You should find this interesting

This is Argentum, you know, the one you more
or less exposed yesterday? You didn't have any right to do that, I
was fired and almost killed by Jakob Griggs. I realize that
eventually the secret would have come out, but I would have
preferred at least a week to make a run for it before my life was
truly in danger.

That said, I see the value of having someone
such as yourself on my side, especially as you are testing out my
project yourself. I wish the best of luck to you and your
partner.

Attached is a video I recorded earlier today.
I hope that you will feature it on your blog tonight.

Chapter
13:

The next day, the planetoid erupted into
chaos. There were riots in the streets. Protesters gathered outside
the SPPS and the Protectors' offices. I stayed in my apartment,
having no desire to go out on the streets Odds were that someone
would recognize me and either hang me (as difficult as that would
be in this gravity) or fawn over me. Neither option was
particularly appealing.

It was while I sat there, watching the chaos
I had wrought, that I was caught off guard.

One minute, I was lying back watching the
riots and attempting to hide under the covers while keeping my eyes
just barely uncovered; the next, a team of assassins in camo-suits
was materializing in my bedroom. As the mixed-species team
surrounded me and attempted to grab me, I drew my gun, which I had
hidden under a pillow after Jakob threatened me, and squeezed off
three shots as I attempted to dive for the window. The first shot
hit one of the assassins- what looked like a bear or a large cat; I
couldn't really tell- in the chest, but the other two went wide as
the explosions issuing from the barrel threw me against the wall. I
was momentarily stunned by the impact, giving one of the thugs
enough time to shove a drug spray into my mouth.

I felt a faint sting for a moment as the
nanoparticles burrowed into the roof of my muzzle; then numbness
began to spread across my face. I made a brief attempt to make a
subvocal call, but I couldn't feel my jaw anymore. Then my vision
blurred. I felt myself slipping away. Before succumbing to
unconsciousness, I saw the hit team open a bag made of active camo
material, and one of the massive parahumans dragging me towards
it.

***

After what felt like just moments, I came to
in the bag. It was dark and rough with power cords lining the
interior and digging into my sides. I started to struggle,
attempting to wiggle my way out of the narrow hole, when I was
unceremoniously dumped out onto a metal bed. Two guards held my
arms and legs down while a feline of some sort dressed in surgical
scrubs poked me in the throat with a pair of sharp needles. I felt
my body course with an electrical shock and heard a snap and pop of
frying circuitry. Willing myself to breathe again once my limbs
stopped twitching, I demanded, still somewhat numbly, "Whaaa?"

"My more obedient son here just disabled your
subvocal implant," I heard a rather unpleasantly familiar voice
state. "Octavius was more inclined toward the medical practices,
though he had some trouble passing the surgeon's guild entry exam-
something about his ethics."

The doctor next to me, whose serval spots I
could now discern underneath his mask, snorted as if his progenitor
had said something funny. "Yeah, he had a little chat with the
entry board. Now I help him out whenever he needs some chop shop
work done."

And Maximus came from this gene pool? I was
starting to wonder if someone had spiked his biofab tank with
something. "What do you want now?"

Jakob's face suddenly popped into my field of
vision. "I thought about what you said," he told me. "You said that
if you died after revealing the big secret, it would lend
credibility to the idea that your treatment worked. And then you
put a video of me threatening you online. Now I'm thinking that I
need to limit the damage you can do by making you disappear
entirely."

The thugs picked me up and carried me over to
a large metallic cylinder with a hatch on the side. "This," Jakob
continued, "is a canister for the mass driver that was built here
on Vesta during the last few years of the corporate era. It was
never used, but it would have shot steel cans full of ore back to
Earth for processing."

The two goons dropped me into the cylinder
and started to shut the lid. I attempted to scramble out before it
was closed, but all that accomplished was a heavy steel door
slamming on my right hand. I let out a yelp in pain, and they
opened it just enough for me to pull my hand back in. I couldn't
see the damage but I could feel blood oozing out and I was pretty
sure some bones were broken.

I could faintly hear Jakob Grigg's voice
through the cylinder wall. "Now, I don't want Earth thinking we're
attacking them, so I placed explosive bolts along the seams that
will tear the cylinder apart an hour or two out. But you'll keep
going along your pre-programmed trajectory until you reach Earth.
I'm pretty sure you'll be long dead by the time you are cremated in
Earth's atmosphere."