Dreams Of The Shattered World: Part One

by Alex SisterWolf

Prologue

April, 2001

GENETIC ENGINEERING IS THE DEVIL'S WORK, the signs held by the demonstrators proclaimed, and STOP MAKING FRANKENSTEIN MONSTERS.  They surrounded the broad steps of the National Genetic Research Center, shouting "No more monsters!" and trying to stop workers from entering the building.

The police tried to break up the demonstration, pushing the rioters back with clear plastic shields.  Three security guards escorted me through the crowd, shoving through the mass of people.  The noise was deafening.

I huddled between the guards as we made our way through the demonstrators, terrified by the noise and the threat of violence.  I hated this daily running of the gauntlet.  The demonstrators had been camped out in front of the Center for more than a week and they refused to be dispersed.

"Clones are people too!" a shrill voice shouted in my ear.  I shrank back from the woman, seeing the light of fanaticism in her eyes.  She was soon lost in the surging crowd.  I stared back in her direction and saw a man watching me, incongruously calm amid the commotion, his eyes hidden by dark sunglasses.  He smiled and raised a hand to wave.

The security guards finally hustled me through the front doors and closed them behind us.  I smiled and thanked them automatically, but my mind's eye still saw that one man who had waved at me.

For when he raised his hand, I had seen the glint of cold metal, a techno-organic prosthesis that replaced his left arm.  I knew everything about that man, everything from his design specifications to his psychological profile.

"Silver," I whispered.  Now I knew who was behind the demonstrations.

Silver hated geno-cybernetics, the science of creating cyborgs.  Cyborgs began as genetically engineered clones with altered nervous systems   Later mechanical additions, grafted onto their bodies, made them human weapons.

The government wanted to make cyborgs the secret weapon in the war against the Pan-European Alliance.  They were the perfect soldiers: fast, strong, tough, and completely obedient to the United Americas government.  We'd made them obedient by implanting in their brains computers about the size of pins to control their thoughts and behavior.

Silver never understood that controlling the cyborgs was necessary, that to give them free will would be to loose destruction on the world.

Of course Silver didn't understand.  He was a cyborg himself, the only one that had ever managed to escape.  Dr. Essex should never have designed him to be so smart.

***

Chapter One

March, 2000

"Dr. Winston, Dr. Essex, how good of you to stop by.  I'm afraid I don't have any tea to offer you, but I suppose that's just as well.  As you can see, I'm rather tied up at the moment."  The cyborg wiggled his fingers at us mockingly, about the only gesture he could make considering the extensive metal restraints holding him to the examination table.

"Mind your tone, cyborg!" Dr. Essex snapped.

"Please, gentlemen, let's try to be civil," I sighed.  "Dr. Essex, thank you for accompanying me, but as you can see, I'm in no danger.  Surely you have much more pressing matters to see to."

"Very well, Dr. Winston.  Don't cause any trouble, cyborg, or I may just have to run a few more test series on negative reinforcement with you," he warned, his voice icily cold.

"Ta ta, Dr. Essex!" the cyborg caroled.  For a moment, it seemed that he had gone too far, but the thin, tall man only gave him a warning look before he left the room.

"Why do you do that?  You know it just makes him angry." I marked down the dosage on his chart and prepared the hypodermic needle.

"It's my only source of enjoyment, Dr. Winston."

"What, annoying Dr. Essex?"  My hands were on his lower arm, below the metal restraints.  I tried to ignore the way his gray eyes followed my face.  He did that whenever I was in the room and it was frankly unnerving to be unable to escape that steady gaze.

"But I lied.  I have one other source of enjoyment, Dr. Winston of the raven hair and amethyst eyes."

I sighed in exasperation.  "Don't tell me, let me guess.  Embarrassing me, right?  Well," I said, administering the hypo with a certain amount of mean satisfaction, "I have been embarrassed by better than you.  There."  I slid the needle out of his arm.

"What are they going to do to me?"

I paused and really looked at him.  For the first time I could remember in the year I'd been working at the Center, I could see fear underlying his defiance.  Moved by a vague feeling of pity, I ignored the regulations and answered his question.  "They're just going to upgrade your pin-comps, nothing more.  It's nothing to worry about."  I patted his hand, immobilized at his side, and had my hand captured in a gentle grip by fingers that could bend steel.

"What is your name, Dr. Winston?"  Those unsettling eyes were still on mine.  I glanced away uncomfortably and answered, "You know that's against regulations."

"I have a name."  Surprised, I looked at him and was captured by his clear gray eyes again.  "We all have names, but they're private.  We don't share them with anyone.  But I want you to know my name.  If something goes wrong with the operation I don't want it forgotten."

He paused and continued, "My name is Silver."

"Mine's Dominique."  The sterile white room seemed warmed by the heat of a cyborg's hand in mine.

"Dominique.  Dom.  Dom with the lavender eyes, will I still be myself after they dig into my brain and try to make me obedient?"

"I don't know, Silver.  But I'll keep your name safe."

The intense gray eyes closed, surrendering to the pull of the sedatives, and his powerful fingers tightened once and then relaxed.

***

April, 2000

Rain ran in rivulets from the jackets of the men as they dumped their burden on the floor.  He lay there, seemingly lifeless, water tinged with pink spreading in a pool about him on the white tiles, as the Director of the Center and Dr. Essex argued over his fate.

I hung back from the commotion, standing in a back corner and trying to become invisible.  I worried about the condition of the unconscious man on the floor, knowing that the searchers were sure to have been rough with him, even though I knew it was pointless.  Dr. Essex was arguing for immediate euthanasia of the fugitive, and the Director rarely contradicted his star cyberneticist.  Silver would be killed for daring to attempt to escape.  Though I knew it was the only sensible choice, I couldn't help grieving that Silver's very nature had made it inevitable that he should try to escape, and thus seal his fate.

His face was turned toward me, bruised and bloody.  I pictured his clear gray eyes in my mind and knew that I had gone too far, that I was thinking of him as Silver, a decent man, rather than as a renegade cyborg.  I had compromised my professionalism by giving him my name and then had compounded the error by growing fond of him.  I closed my eyes against a contemptible rush of tears and concentrated on the argument between Dr. Essex and the Director.  Silver would soon be dead and with him would die this strange confusion I felt.

("Dominique.  Dom.  Dom with the lavender eyes, will I still be myself after they dig into my brain and try to make me obedient?")

("I don't know, Silver.  But I'll keep your name safe.")

I opened my eyes, seeing the cold, white lobby and the two angry men at the center of it, ringed by a circle of tough, rain-soaked men, impatiently waiting for their pay, and, lying to the side of it all in an abandoned heap, the cause of all this commotion, the escaped cyborg.

His eyes were open, I saw with a jolt.  Despite his pain, his silver gaze was still calm and lucid. He gestured with one hand and mouthed something that I could not read because of his split, swollen mouth.

I shivered, wanting to help him but afraid to.  I glanced at Dr. Essex, knowing that my job and my scientific reputation were in his hands, and glanced back helplessly at Silver.

I couldn't help him.  Even offering him my medical aid could mean my job, with Dr. Essex as angry as he was.

I shook my head and mouthed the words, "I'm sorry."

***

"I'm so sorry," I whispered to the wreck of a man who lay on the operating table.  Dr. Essex had taken him apart and left me the task of putting him back together again.  A part of me wondered if it might not be the kinder decision to let him die.  But Dr. Essex had left me specific instructions:  the cyborg would be functional by nine, when the doctor came in.  Or else, was the unstated addition.

Dr. Essex had been furious when the Director had refused to allow him to euthanize the escapee, and he had taken his anger out on the helpless cyborg's body, though making sure not to damage him enough to kill him.

It was nearing two a.m. and I was exhausted, but there was a chance that I might be able to repair some of the worst damage.  I could not leave the cyborg in the state the doctor had deliberately and cruelly left him, with a crushed and useless left hand and arm.

After I repaired the body, I would attempt to repair the mind.  Dr. Essex had reprogrammed Silver's pincomps with programs that were designed to leave Silver no free will or independent thought at all.  I was tired and I knew that my thinking was confused, but I simply could not allow Silver's persona to be snuffed out so utterly.  Somehow, at some point, the cyborg had become a person to me, and I would not be a party to his murder.

I set to work repairing his left arm.  It was difficult work, even with my experience working with cyborgs.  With a cyborg, unlike a human, it was possible to replace the damaged arm with a techno-organic prosthesis.

My stomach clenched as I remembered how Dr. Essex had twisted his boot heel down on Silver's hand.  The cyborg had never cried out, never lost consciousness, throughout the whole beating, until the end.  The hatred in his normally serene eyes had been shocking.

***

It was dawn outside, but within the windowless underground lab it always felt like the same time.  The cyborg lay on the bloody operating table.  I stood with my hands braced against the edge of the table, so exhausted that without its support I would have fallen.  My eyes kept wanting to close. I looked at the clock and groaned.  6:15!  Dr. Essex and the rest of the staff would arrive in less than three hours and then I would have to put in another full day's work.

I slumped and rested my elbows on the table, my hands over my face.  I couldn't do it.  Not work another eight hours without rest.  "I quit."

"Dom?"  The hoarse whisper came from very close at hand.  I peered through my fingers at Silver, seeing that he was awake.  I remembered that I had forgotten to put the restraints on him, but somehow I couldn't bring myself to care.  "What happened?"

"They caught you.  Dr. Essex beat the slag out of you and then told me to put you back together again.  That's what I've been doing for the last three hours.  Any questions?"

"You look like you were the one beat up, not me.  Why do you have blood on your face?"  He sat up, cautiously, and swung his legs over the side of the operating table next to me. 

I gave him a dirty look.  "I've been performing major surgery for several hours without assistance, why shouldn't I be fresh and clean as a penny?  I've worked on your brain, Silver, I know you're not stupid, so I guess you must just have a really stupid sense of humor."  I closed my eyes and covered my face with my hands again.

"You put me back together again?"  I nodded.  "Thank you, Dom." 

A warm hand came to rest, gently, on my shoulder.  "I really can't thank you enough-  Dom, what's wrong?  Why are you crying?"  I shook my head violently, denying the kindness in his voice as much as I denied that I was crying.  Strong hands grasped my shoulders and pulled me into powerful arms, one of warm flesh, the other of cool techno-organic metal. I tried to pull away from the hug but couldn't.  I relaxed into his reassuring hold and cried.

After a few moments, I straightened up, wiping my face off.  "I'm okay."

"What the hell are you working with these assholes for, Dom?  You're better than this."

I crossed my arms defensively.  "Yeah, Dr. Essex is an asshole, but I'm doing important work here.  War is coming soon and we need the cyborg project if we're going to have a chance in hell of beating Pan-Europe."

"We're not just a project, Dom.  We're human beings."

"I· I know, Silver."  I stared into his somber gray eyes.  "But I love my country."

He shook his head, exhaling sharply.  "Dom, come with me.  Escape with me.  I know the mistake I made last time, I won't make it again.  This time we can do it, we can escape."

I stared at him, shocked.  For a moment, for one wild moment, the word "yes" was on the tip of my tongue, and then sanity returned.

I couldn't help Silver escape.  He was government property.  I could be charged with treason!  Besides, this was not a human prisoner, this was a cyborg.  I could not be responsible for loosing him on the world.  I looked into his eyes and saw that he had already realized my decision.

I opened my mouth, said "No", and had it unexpectedly stopped by a determined kiss.

Somehow I ended up with my hands in his hair, my body pressed against his.  I could feel his heart thudding in his chest, his breath deepening, speeding up, just as mine was.   Without a second thought, I would have had sex with him, with a cyborg, right then and there, on the bloody operating table.

"Remember me, Dom.  Sorry about this," he gasped, and punched me in the jaw, knocking me out cold.

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