Critical Path

This time, however, if there was a sacrifice to be made, then his dad wouldn’t have to do it alone. Denver was more than happy to accompany him. Layla aside, he felt no real connection with anyone else to stay behind.

There were the three M’s of course: Maria, Mike and Mai, but he knew they would be fine without him. He liked them, thought of them as a kind of extended family, but they weren’t close to him like his dad—or Layla, but even then, he wondered if he was just imagining things with her…

Not really the time to think about all that, he chided himself, sliding back into the gloom so the guards outside by the door didn’t notice him.

The figure had climbed the fifteen steps up to this current level. Its brown hood appeared above the edge of the step. Crude stairs were carved into the rock, allowing farmers and dwellers alike to easily ascend and descend between levels. A few seconds later the figure approached the guards. From the movement and silhouette he guessed it was a young woman. She held each hand in the opposite sleeve, reminding him of pictures of monks he’d once seen in a magazine.

The guards, two human men with severe buzz cuts and tatty army uniforms patched with a seemingly random collection of fabrics, approached her but without pulling their truncheons from their belt loops.

They must be expecting her.

Their bodies obscured the woman’s face and their voices were too low to hear, but after a few moments, they stood aside and let her approach the door. Denver couldn’t see her from this position, as the window was a couple of meters to the door’s left. Before the robed woman could try the handle, Denver dashed low under the window and across to the right wall beside the door.

A squeak of metal followed a rattle. The handle turned, hinges protested, and then the door opened, flooding the cell-like living quarters with the warm glow of morning. The silhouette of the visitor stretched out to fill the angular shaft of light on the bare wooden floor.

She waited, perhaps sensing Denver was there, behind the door, crouching, waiting, his breath held in his lungs with anticipation. The voices of the guards blew in on the breeze, words that were unimportant, jocular. A laugh or two followed, preceding a pair of footsteps creating barely audible thuds on the floor.

When the figure closed the door behind her, Denver launched forward. He grabbed her by the arms, pinning them to her body, and pushed her back across the living room until her back hit the wall separating the sleeping quarters.

She gapsed with the impact. Denver continued to press with his arms outstretched. “Who are you?” he said with a low growl, not wanting to alert the guards and hoping she wouldn’t scream.

“Let go,” she whimpered.

Denver released her right arm but only to push her hood back and reveal her identity. He staggered back, confused. Words tripped on his lips before he finally got a grip of himself.

“Maria? What the hell are you doing? How did you get past…” He trailed off as a blank expression stared at him, clearly not understanding something. “What? What is it? Maria, talk to me.”

She turned away from him as a shadow moved out from the sleeping quarters.

“Leave her, son; that’s not Maria,” Charlie said.

“What? I don’t understand.”

“Come,” she said, tugging at his arm. “We need to talk in there. I’ll explain everything.”

“Do as she says,” Charlie said. “It’s a wild story, but it’ll make sense.” Charlie gripped his son by the shoulder and urged him away from the woman. She slipped out, smiling nervously at Charlie, and headed into the sleeping quarters. His dad led him in after her.

Once inside, they closed the door and the woman explained who she was.

“I don’t believe it,” Denver said. Clones! How could he even know if ‘his’ Maria was even the same one he initially met? “This is fucked up. Are you even still called Maria?”

She nodded, her cheeks blushing. The poor woman looked scared out of her wits. He realized he was looming over her, his body tense. He relaxed his shoulders and stood back, trying to be less intimidating. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I get it,” she said, reaching out for him and patting him on the arm in an awkward means of friendship. “I’ve known I’m a clone from the day I was activated. They told me everything. It must be confusing for you, but please, let me assure you I’m here to help—and very much my own person.”

Denver shook his head, letting out a small laugh. “This world gets more bizarre by the day, but hey, it’s not as weird as aliens coming to use the planet as a giant drug farm, so sure, I’ll go with it. But why are you here? Is it to do with the plan?”

Charlie remained quiet as Clone-Maria brought Denver up to speed on Charlie’s interaction with Hagellan and the general plan.

“What does he want with us now?” Charlie said.