October
15, 1990
(Note that this contest was actually for fiction!)
-
Yvette Edmonds-Hay, Delta, British
Columbia -- Keyed Out (displayed
below)
Honourable Mentions: None.
FIRST PLACE
Keyed Out
By Yvette Edmonds-Hay
Delta, British Columbia
The year: A.D. 2362. Aeskels sat
in front of his terminal in the research centre,
thinking. He didn't like it, didn't like it at
all. Sure he was one of the elite, a privileged
brain, but he resented being merely a right-hand
man, a tool of Zorcia's. He wanted power.
Zorcia sat in front of her terminal,
the tiny disk clasped securely around her neck.
In it, was the secret formula in code form. It
was the only one of its kind, and she was its keeper.
She smiled.
Centuries ago, the human race had
been destroyed in a nuclear war precipitated by
an oil crisis, all except a handful of scientists
led by a brilliant geneticist – Zorcia's ancestor,
Helen. As poisonous gasses raged above, Helen hid
in the warrens previously inhabited by the Mole
People hundreds of feet underground, beneath what
was once the New york subway. The mole People had
been decimated by AIDS. Helen took with her, her
boyfriend, Peter, who was a computer whiz from
Harvard, a small group of devoted researchers,
and whatever technical equipment and scientific
data they could carry. They set up lab underground.
To survive, they grew mushrooms the
size of melons, bred rats the size of pigs, and
drank fermented mushroom juice.
Working feverishly, they continued
with their experiments to recreate human life artificially.
Nuclear fallout had destroyed the female reproductive
system. Years later, Helen discovered the formula
for cloning humans. Peter immediately encoded it
on computer. This secret code was passed down through
the female line, each generation improving upon
it.
"And now it's at its peak," Zorcia
gloated.
She was the Surpeme Commander of
the Confederation of Liberated Humans of Planet
Earth. The City of Vox was the headquarters of
the Confederation. It was situated in what was
once Florida. The site was chosen because the climate
was mild, even balmy, and was ideal for the technological
experiments that were continuously being carried
out by the Brains.
"Life is paradise," Zorcia thought,
pleased with he method of government. It was a
benevolent matriarchy. When the time came for her
to hand over the reins of government, she herself
wold select The Chosen Female from amongst he battalion
of Brains.
Even though society was divided into
Brains and Underlings, she knew everyone was happy.
The Brains were academics, schooled in computer
science and electronics. The Underlings carried
out the day-to-day work necessary for the smooth
running of the Confederation. Males and females
were treated equally, and she made sure there was
no rivalry between the sexes. There was one woman
for every man, each couple perfectly matched. Hedonism
was the norm, and pleasures unrestrained. There
was plenty of good food, good wine and good entertainment.
Everyone owned a two-door helicar fully equipped
with aerofoils to fly as well as wheels to travel
on the gound. She loved to watch the heli drags
on party days when people competed in wide open
desert spaces. Her reverie was suddenly interrupted
by sharp beeps from her electronic phone-cum-watch.
She lifted her wrist to her ear, "Yes?"
"It's Aeskels. I'm all set to receive
and program. Ready to target SE-17?"
"Ready. The info should be on your
screen in 30 seconds."
Earlier, Aeskels had told her they
needed another seventeen thousand people for China,
and she had agreed. Their goal was to repopulate
Planet Earth to capacity within five years.
She reached up and removed the disc
from its pendant-like case hanging from its thief-proof
electronic chain around her throat. She would insert
it into drive "0" and activate the Sperm-Egg Reproduction/Fertillization
code. The formula would be accewpted and decoded
in her computer. As soon as this was done, she
would retrieve the disk, keeping its secret formula
intact once again upon her person. This procedure
was necessary to ensure that the formula did not
fall into opportunistic hands. She didn't trust
anyone. The only other person to see it in her
lifetime would be The Chosen Female.
The command for the production of
the seventeen thousand fertilized eggs would then
be transmitted to Aeskels' receptor, where he was
waiting to diversify batches of these eggs to various
stations throughout the vast laboratory. Brains
would be standing by at their stations to collect
the fertilized eggs, pack them in amniotic fluid
sacs and transfer them to electronically heated
incubators placed on many-tiered shelves. Exactly
six months to the minute, the fully-developed babies
would be removed from their sacs and placed in
large, bright nurseries, where smiling nannies
would feed and nurture them. At the age of three,
the babies would be transferred from the nursery
to the Education Centre, where they would be streamlined
into the two groups of Brains and Underlings. They
would undergo their training here until adulthood
at age sixteen, when they would be shipped out
to populate the various targeted places on Earth.
Zorcia bit her lower lip. Blood spurted.
She became agitated. Try as she would, she couldn't
retrieve the disk. Something was amiss. Sirens
sounded in her head. She checked the circuits and
outlets. Everything was A-OK,. Yet the disk seemed
to have moulded itself into the drive.
"Aeskels, come quickly!" she called
on the intercom. She opened her door electronically
for him.
He rushed into he office. He stared
at her screen. "Mine's fuzzing too," he gritted
his teeth. Red lights were flashing wildly on the
computer. He tugged at the disk. It wouldn't budge.
"You've jammed the computer!"
"Someone's tampered with it!" she
hissed angrily.
His hands flew urgently over the
keyboard.
"Delete disk?" flashed on the screen.
"No!" her brain screamed. She hadn't
been aware of that command. It hadn't been inputted.
Before she could push his hands away, he had already
pressed "Y."
Her own lover!
She jumped up and stared at him,
total disbelief on her face.
A whole race had been destroyed –
peacefully this time.
Copyright
(c) 2004 for the author, all rights reserved.
