The Clone who Didn't Know (The Genehunter) Read Free Page B

was important. Worked on the cloning vat technology. Like, he created it all. At the start of the last century people sometimes referred to clones by Grendel’s own term for them: s imulacra .
    ‘So you think clONE wants to punish all his copies because of what he did?’
    ‘For all I know they want to worship them. I stopped understanding clONE a long time ago.’
    ‘But you got nothing on surviving clones?’
    ‘Zip,’ said Devi. ‘But I think clONE is right and they do exist. Or did exist anyway.’
    ‘Why so?’
    ‘You must know Grendel’s reputation. Used to experiment on himself. Cloned himself repeatedly to test out his devices. Mostly it didn’t work, in the early days. Later, he had more success.’
    ‘But even if those early clones survived they’re going to be dead by now.’
    ‘Sure. But there may be second or third generation copies still around.’
    ‘Why would there be?’
    ‘I don’t know, Simms. You want me to do your damn job for you? But I found out something else, too. There’s not much in the public domain about Grendel. I don’t even know what he looked like. His research was extremely controversial and he went to great pains to stay in the shadows. But there is a surviving grandchild. Maybe she knows something.’
    ‘You got an address?’
    ‘I managed to find it by, let us say, talking nicely to the right people.’
    ‘You’re a bad person, Devi.’
    ‘I love my work, Simms. But listen, talking to Grendel’s offspring may not go well.’
    ‘Why so?’
    ‘His family despised him. He wasn’t a nice man. I mean, even I think he wasn’t a nice man. He didn’t just use himself in his experiments.’
    ‘His family too?’
    ‘His children, anyone he could get his hands on. A real fucking charmer.’
    ‘Maybe that explains any second or third generation clones,’ said Simms. ‘Plenty of collectors out there who go for the evil dictators and the Dr. Deaths.’
    ‘So I heard.’
    ‘OK, thanks, Devi. I got one other thing I need to do, then I’ll pay a visit to the offspring. I owe you, yeah?’
    ‘You always owe me. Remember it when you come looking for me with your clONE death squad.’

     
    Simms stood in the shadows at the back of the church of Santa Sofia in Sienna. Sunlight streamed through high windows. The cool interior reverberated to the beautiful harmonies of the choir. He listened for a time, letting a far-away gaze play across his face, like any worshipper or tourist. He pretended not to be watching the door to the crypt.
    Of course, he shouldn’t be there. If his new friends in clONE found out it wouldn’t go well for him. Somehow he didn’t think they’d believe him if he said he’d found God. But he had no choice; he didn’t live in clONE’s simple, black-and-white world. He had Forty Days on one shoulder and the GMA on the other, making their demands. If he didn’t do what they wanted he’d wind up dead or locked away for the rest of his life. Somehow he had to keep them all happy.
    How did life get to be so complicated? He was just trying to do his damn job.
    He’d taken precautions before coming here. To any casual passer-by he wasn’t Simms at all. Anyone browsing him for an ID would now see him as Felippe Lombardi, a wine-maker on pilgrimage from the Mezzogiorno. He’d spent good money to download precisely the right Italian accent. He had a whole damn life-story worked out: family, job, a villa in the sun-kissed hills. His story was so good he found himself envying the fictitious man he’d created. Lombardi’s life seemed so straightforward in comparison to his own.
    He waited for ten minutes more, apparently listening to the singing or lost in prayer, before he acted. He walked down the aisle at the side of the church, stepping past soaring gothic pillars, footsteps echoing in the great space. Half-way down he stopped, as any pilgrim would, to cross himself before the holy remains of Saint Sofia. Her head was kept in an elaborately