The Girl Who Cheated Death

June 8

The silence was relieved by the echo of my footsteps as I walked through the gloom of the Terminus. 

The walls of the chamber arched upwards until they were lost in the dark. A navigator's tank sat empty. Its glass stained orange. The odor of spice still lingering in the air.

Before me, on the deck, rested an egg shaped vessel flanked by two cuboid panels. The panels were covered with an array of miniature screens. Within the egg floated a figure, small and shriveled, curled into a fetal position.



"The figure spoke, "My life might not look like much from appearances."

It was the voice of Ardra Aurotharius.

"Hello Audrey," I greeted her.

"Salutations to you, Major Siamendes," she replied. "This is me stripped of all adornment."

I knelt down and examined the readings on the machine.



"The minimum life support and communications," she explained.

"And the Process?" I asked, speaking of the process of linking the Audrey/Ardra mind to the young Audrey clone.

"This part of the process of this entity is complete," she said. "How is Audrey progressing?"

"She developed a fever," I reported, "We have been doing everything we can to stabilize things."

"We rushed," confessed Ardra.

"Can you not feel her?" I asked.

"She dreams. She is reliving her memories and incorporating new memories."

 

"I will contact people who can help her," I said, "teach her breathing and relaxation exercises." I immediately thought of the Bai Feargananym from the Bihar Sanctuary.

Ardra cautioned, "When she awakens, she will want to see Wylder."

"I will arrange it," I said.

"It would be better if she did not know of me like this," she continued. "Let Wylder and Audrey forget this terrible mistake."

"Understood. We will keep you safe."

"Do you know who Henrietta Lacks is?" she asked.

"I do," I replied. "Your father told me about her."

"She was the first immortal," said Ardra. "Her cells anyway. It is an immortal cancer cell line. This body is similar. They will want to study it." She added, "Mercedes thinks she took the original."

Professor Wylder Aurotharius thought his efforts were a failure. He used all his resources at his disposal to save the life of his daughter. When he thought she had passed away, he loaded her corpse into his craft, put himself into cryo sleep and launched himself into the Black.

Mercedes Celestalis hired a crew to salvage the ship and remove the corpse, leaving the frozen Wylder for me to find. But Audrey's body was never aboard the Colchester. Audrey was here.

Audrey had never died.



"The spice treatment your father attempted... this is the result," I said plainly.

"Yes," she replied, "They did not know about overdoses."

"You will have the best doctors in the Alliance looking after you," I promised. "There is much you can teach us."

"Umbrella, Weyland, Blue Sun, all have operatives within the Alliance," she warned.

"Then we will have to be careful," I added.

Ardra continued, "MacMoragh will not repeat his previous mistakes I hope."

I paused, considering her words.

"Someone tried to clone him," I said, "Three years ago. About the time your drone came in contact with LilyBell. They used material stolen from Angels of Mercy. Blastomeres."

"It was a prototype process," she replied, "not yet perfected."

"What can you tell me about the incident?"

Ardra explained, "There are two processes they are hoping to perfect. Clones are detectable by various means. They look to make it possible to mask that."

"Who is 'they?'" I asked.

"Blue Sun, Weyland, Umbrella."

"Working together?" The thought was chilling.

"No."

I nodded. "Who cloned the Colonel?" I asked directly.

Ardra replied. "Zebes rents out to Umbrella and Weyland. Faith Industries has the other part, but it is imperfect yet. Treadstoning. Over-writing memories. They have experimented with the Faith scion himself and the Rhiadra person."

I thought this over. "Faith had yet to acquire blastomeres when the Colonel's clone was found.... he purchased them later. That leaves Umbrella and Weyland as candidates."

"Neither has the treadstone," said Ardra.



"Treadstone?" I asked.

"It is the name of the original MKULTRA program to over-write memories and personality," she explained. "Our observation of Faith and Rhiadra is that it is still primitive. Surface changes, many gaps. Neurological maladies such as migraines and seizures, blackouts."

"And that is the second process they are trying to perfect," I said.

"The masked cloning is the first project," she said, "Treadstone is the second."

"Undetectable clones with memories and personalities of the prime," I said, adding things together.

"Correct," she confirmed. "You will be tempted to ask Wylder for assistance. It would possible destabilize him to see this." She spoke of herself. "Let him forget and tell himself it did not happen."

"what would you suggest, Audrey?" I asked.

"Let him have his wife and daughter as if nothing ever happened."

"And what about you?" I said, "You must want to see him."

"I am distributed," Ardra said, "I live my life everywhere. It is only my body that is imprisoned."

"Will you be able to speak with him," I asked further, "through the young Audrey?"

"I won't."

I nodded slowly, solemnly, acknowledging the sacrifice.



Ardra continued, "Audrey will live out that life for me. I will experience it. William James was the inspiration of the original ARDRA program. The multiplicity of social selves. Separate selves that do not see themselves as separate. Audrey will live her life without the tragedy and subsequent problems. I will be able to experience that."

I felt moved by both duty and compassion. Our Great Alliance would protect Ardra. We would keep her safe. She might well represent humanity's first toddling steps to significant life extension, to immortality. She was precious to us all.

"Are you fit to travel?" I asked gently.

"This is the travel pod, ready for pickup."

"Then," I said, "we should get you home."

"Avalon or Zenobia?" she asked.

"We will take you to Zenobia."

"Thank you, Major," she replied, "it has been a long time."

"You're welcome, Audrey." I stood up. A hologram of Ardra in her exo-skeleton flickered nearby.



"I accept my fate as a special project," she said almost formally. Then she added, "My tear ducts ceased being able to function 20 years ago."

Silently, I summoned my shuttle and then, with the greatest of care, I carried Ardra Aurotharius into the waiting craft.

-----



"The time will come, when long increase of days will so contract me from my present size and so far waste away my limbs with age that I shall dwindle to a trifling weight, so trifling, it will never be believed I once was loved and even pleased a god. Perhaps, even Phoebus will not recognize me, or will deny he ever bore me love." 
- Ovid