Like Clockwork

Like Clockwork
By Rok Bloom

She added the finishing touches to the document, a typo correction here, a better word there, and quickly saved before the brewing storm could trip the circuit breaker. Her personal project for the last few months finally was a complete and comprehensive article. Ellen Arnold was an up and coming writer for her town’s local newsfile, the Informer.news. She uploaded the article into her cerebral hard drive, also known as a CHd, and shut down her computer. Now her article exposing the government’s money laundering was safely tucked away in her mind. Tomorrow, the whole country would see how their tax dollars were disappearing. Ellen walked over to her dresser and pressed a round button labeled “sleep.” In a few moments, she was in her pajamas, ready to turn in for the night. As she lied down on her bed, sleep inducing particles swirled around her head and she slipped off into unconsciousness.

The next morning, at exactly 7:15, the sleep-assist particles dissipated and her eyes opened. She sat up on the edge of her bed and rubbed her eyes in an attempt to shake off her sleepiness before she walked over to her dresser. This time, she pushed the button labeled “work” and shortly appeared fully dressed, ready to go to work. She grabbed a breakfast pill and swallowed it on her way out the door.

She looked through her CHd and found her article, bringing to her an aura of calm. The ride was uneventful and took thirteen minutes, as always. She arrived at the station at 7:42, once again, right on time. Everything worked like clockwork these days, everything from tube stations to the weather and everything in between. After disembarking the rail car, she briskly walked up the steps to the grimy lower level of the city. The sky could not be seen from the lower level; upper levels of the city were built right on top of it. She called a transporter, and it took her, for a decent fee of course, to the upper level; home of gleaming white skyscrapers. There was the Informer.news headquarters, one block away. She pulled her coat tighter around her as dark rain clouds formed. Looks like Weatherman is depressed today…Sigh…she thought as she walked by a few of the shops on ground level of the skyscrapers. Suddenly, everything turned black.

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What seemed like only hours later, she awoke. She was slumped over in a chair wearing not her nice, clean work clothes, but a dusty grey jumpsuit and heavy work boots. Everything was deathly still. The walls around were all the same tone of grey, broken only by the image of the government’s seal. She scanned her CHd for anything missing, but everything was in its place. She pushed herself out of the chair and stood up, as if to test her legs’ strength. They could hold her up, but she still felt devoid of energy. She hobbled over to the table. It had a small, grey box on it, but she could not open it. Her mind suddenly felt scrambled as it put the pieces together and the situation hit her full force. She realized the danger she was in. She checked her watch and found it was 17:19; she should be at the tube station awaiting her ride home. She ambled over to the wall to try and find a way out. Her attempts were in vain however, so she sat back down on the cold metal chair. She thought more about her situation. Her mind was now fully concentrated on keeping her from panicking. She decided it was best to just close her eyes and sort through what was happening. So she did.

Something caused her to open her eyes, and when she did, she found herself staring at a mirror. But this mirror moved and talked! She shook her head in disbelief and saw that she was in fact, looking at herself! Her mind was boggled and she was incredibly frightened. Herself stared at her for a moment before speaking two simple words. “Hello Ellen.”

Ellen sat there, not knowing what to think. She just sat still. Again, Herself spoke, “We’ve been a naughty girl, haven’t we…” She chuckled as she patted Ellen’s head. “Let me see here…”

Here eyes filmed over with a red lens, which apparently allowed her to scan Ellen’s CHd. “Hmmm…tsk tsk tsk,” she said as the article about the money laundering appeared on the monitor that was now on the wall. “Now why would you have such a vile thing like this? You know that’s just rubbish…”

Ellen tried to stammer out an excuse. “Well, you see…th-that’s just a-a…uhm-”

“Hush,” the imposter commanded.

“Who are you anyway?!” Ellen shouted out, her anger finally gaining the best of her. “And how the hell do you look like me?!”

“Oh silly Ellen. Don’t you get it? I am you. Well, at least, for all intents and purposes,” she said, sending a wink Ellen’s direction. She turned her back to Ellen. “You really don’t know? Surely you can guess what has happened?”

Ellen did not respond, she was busy burning a hole in the back of the imposter’s head with her eyes.

The imposter moved over to the monitor and tapped the glass. “Don’t you get it? You don’t really think people need to know this, do you? You think you can just write anything you want and show it off to everyone?”

“Well, why can’t I? We have free-“ and she was cut off by a raised hand from the fake Ellen.

“Hush,” was all she said. “Well, since you don’t matter anymore, I might as well tell you what is going on. It all started back when some lunatic reporter decided it would be a good idea to upload a file about the governments…private…affairs. He thought that the public ought to know. Now, we all know what the citizens don’t know can’t hurt them, so we “replaced” him. We kidnapped him and cloned him and sent out our ‘new and improved’ version of him. A version that worked for us and would follow all of our orders and do exactly what we said. No more rebellious reporting,” she finished with a smirk, recalling how successful that project was.

“You monster…” was all Ellen could squeak out.

“Well, soon enough, we found more reporters,” she continued, “and other media personnel, even some citizens, who uploaded things both to newsfile and even the Global Link that we did not find very…flattering. They too were ‘taken care of.’ In fact, that’s when we build this very room. Want to know where you are? You are forty-two stories below the ground. No one can find you here. No one can help you here.”

Ellen stared at her, trying, but failing, to conceal her fear.

“Our cloning lab is located just a few miles away, conveniently hidden from the public eye. You were just there yesterday actually. While you were unconscious, we took DNA samples from you and eureka! A perfect copy of you. It’s oddly convenient, wouldn’t you say? Oh, but don’t worry. The process is totally safe for you. You’re in fine health. And I’m sure you noticed your nice new threads. We needed your clothes for the new you. It wouldn’t make much sense to your friends for you to reappear wearing new clothes, now would it?”

By this point, Ellen was almost in tears.

“I suppose you’re also wondering what will happen to you now, dear. I mean, it would be confusing to have two of you walking around, wouldn’t it? She pushed a button her watch and the mirror image of Ellen disappeared, revealing a very thin woman with long black hair. She spun around, her blood red dress twirling. This sent a chill down Ellen’s spine. “Yes, that’s right. I am not really you. I was just using your clone data. I can look like any of our…clients…” She glanced down at her watch. “Wow, that late already. I have an appointment. I will however, show you one more thing.” She pressed another button on her watch and the clone Ellen came in. The clone Ellen saluted the black haired woman as she walked out.

The clone mysteriously opened the grey case and pulled out a pistol. Ellen’s heart fluttered.

“Hello Ellen. Interesting isn’t it? All of this? Well, things have been working fine for decades, no use in disrupting things now is there? We like to keep things working…like clockwork…” And she pulled the trigger.