Jarn scrambled to gather his data pads into neat piles. There wasn't much time. The static was designed to give him only a short "get-everything-off-your-veedesk-NOW-unless-you-want -a-mess-on-your floor" warning.
After ten seconds of static, the top of the desk tilted upwards to a 45 degree angle, basically scattering his first edition Web(ma)ster's slang dictionary, and all the other COMPs or MINIs which happened to be left lying across it, across the floor.
This in itself was not unusual; the desk doubled as a veephone. It was an invention thought up by the elite Beyonders to enforce higher standards of cleatliness. A clean and neat desk, after all, was essential to the reputation of a lawman. Especially to a questionable lawman like Jarn, who was a C-6 at only thirty-three years. Cleatliness in the workplace was essential. Actually, cleatliness everywhere was essential.
Jarn watched as the veedesk tilted and the static faded to reveal Sheryle's face.
What the deecee was going on? His wife never called him on the veedesk; it was an unspoken agreement that she avoid contacting him at work. But here she was.
And shouting something, too.
It wasn't Chuck's first death, after all. And these things were easily fixed. Some paperwork, a routine cee-scan to check for any abnormalities, and another Chuck could be cloned from the cell-sample taken during his last check-up. Which had been back in.....
He spoke brusquely towards the screen. "When was his last appointment?"
"Nine months ago." Sheryle licked her lips. "He was due to go back in three more. But...."
"Then we've only lost nine chronological months, Sheryle," Jarn replied. "He was brain-scanned last week. When I come home, we'll fill out the necessary C-4 paperwork; they'll cee him and send him back chrono as he was nine months ago. Mentally, he'll only lose the stuff he learned since the brain-scan."
"No." Sheryle shook her head emphatically. "You don't understand! He..."
Jarn cut her off. "I know why you're worried. It's uncleat. A boy his age hardly ever reaches C-4. C-1 or C-2, most likely; hardly any eight-year-olds are still at C-0 status. Some even reach C-3 if they're especially accident-prone. But C-4? Four deaths; four clones? I've always told you, Sher: the boy is reckless. You've raised a High Cee."
Sheryle looked livid. "He's NOT a High Cee! Just because of a few accidents...."
"A few accidents?" Jarn counted off each thought on his fingers. "I can excuse the time he fell out of his crib as a baby and cracked his skull open. But the Niagara incident? Do you really believe he dove down those macro Falls to take a swim? Dolly, Sheryle! Of all the deeceeing stupidity! And I still think he jumped off the edge of the Grand Canyon instead of that uncleat story he gave us about being pushed. I love my son, Sheryle, but he doesn't give a cleat about how many times he has to be reeceed."
"He's a baby!" Sheryle shot back, holding a book close to her chest. Jarn realized it was Chuck's journal. "He's only eight years old! How is he supposed to know what re-cloning does to his status?"
"He's chrono -eight! Mentally, he's eleven. That's more than old enough to understand!"
Sheryle looked confused. No matter how many times Jarn explained the difference to her, she still never quite got the point. He sighed.
"Think, Sher. Chuck's been set back almost three years on the chrono scale: a year when he was upgraded from C-0 to C-1, another from C-1 to C-2, and now nine months. Remember? I've explained this over and over. The cee-labs use our cell-samples to make the clones, and since the samples only have a shelf-life of a couple of years, we have to keep going back to give them new samples. You, and I, and Chuck go once a year, and since Chuck has the nice little habit of dying right before his next appointment, they have to combine the cell-sample from months before, with the most recent of his weekly brain scans. Think, Sher! He's mentally eleven years old. His body is three years younger than his mind. Get that in your head! Eleven is more than old enough to know the difference between accidental deaths and intentional ones!"
"Not anymore." Sheryle's voice came over the veedesk sounding flat. "Chuck's been deeceed."
"He's been what?" Jarn was stunned. His son - deeceed? Discontinued? Decommissioned? Decloned?! "There must be some mistake. They can't do that. Not to a kid."
"It's those rebels, Jarn - the Darwinists and the Primes. They're worming their thinks into the Beyonder Senate."
The Beyonders and the Darwinists. As a lawman, Jarn had been worried about the rebel Darwinists for a while. He'd arrested and deeceed plenty of them lately; enough to know that the movement was growing. In fact, he'd caught one only yesterday. Even while locking the guy up, the fellow had tried to preach to him the so-called evils of the Cee system, and its destruction of some nonsense or other, called natural selection. Apparently, they wanted to abolish cloning altogether, and claimed the process messed up human genes, not to mention humanity in general. The more a person was cloned (the higher their cee-status), the more inhuman they were.
In fact, all of Darwinism was ridiculous.
The Beyonders, on the other hand, were the high-status law-makers, the respectable and intelligent elites who exceeded C-10 status legally. Their ten or more deaths had not occurred haphazardly and intentionally like Chuck's, but in the legitimate and acceptable terms as listed in the revised Cee section of the Constitution. People who lived their lives like Chuck, killing themselves off for sport, were deeceed once they reached C-10 status. They were called "High Cees"; a derogatory term pinned on children at a young age. Children who were expected to be deeceed at their C-10 trial.
For the more law-minded Tenners, the trial was a mere formality; a coming-of-age tradition. But for those who had multiple deaths to their credit which were against the Cee-Constitution amendments, or even questionable in nature, it was a time of stress and fear.
That a rogue group like the Darwinists could pressure the Beyonders effectively, meant that something must be wrong. Seriously wrong.
Jarn felt himself go white at his wife's announcement. "You mean.........The Law?"
Sheryle nodded. "They got the Beyonders to pass it. Yesterday."
Jarn hadn't known this. Like most Am citizens, he'd stopped keeping track of politics and elections since the Election Amendment had been passed a few decades ago. He swallowed hard. "And Chuck?"
"He's the first," Sheryle replied.
Last Modified: 4/17/98
Wendy Elizabeth
Kemp