Forrester’s corpse arrived at Invidious' lab in a life-support capsule; this artificially kept blood pumping around his body and helped to keep the organs and brain tissue from further degradation. Even so, the scientist wasted no time in getting the body in the replicating chamber. With the help of two red technician Daleks he attached tubes to the outside of the capsule and instructed that the nanites be released immediately.
An ambiguous mass of grey gloop began to spread over Forrester’s cadaver; billions of molecule-sized robots began to methodically consume the flesh, ingesting information about the corpse on the way. When this had been sufficiently processed it was excreted again as a replica of the captain. This process had been developed by Invidious as a more sophisticated adaptation of the Daleks’ own method of duplication.
Once the process had begun it would take many hours to complete; hopefully this replicant would have the neural pathways sufficiently intact to preserve the Captain’s personality. Perhaps even his memories.
The scientist dismissed his Dalek helpers and continued to monitor progress directly. He was proud of his achievements in nanotechnology, not so much in its development, but in its application. He had taken technology that the Daleks had more or less left on the shelf for millennia and turned it into a powerful and versatile tool. So far he felt he had barely scratched the surface of how useful these nanites could be.
“Bringing him back to life won’t help.”
Invidious pride evaporated at the sound of that voice. Turning to face Morrison he rebuked his subject sternly: “That is for me to decide and you to live with!”
Morrison looked unmoved; he was another one of Invidious experiments in applied nanotechnology, perhaps not a successful one.
“I still believe that he could be a danger to us.”
“That is not your concern,” snapped Invidious. “Your actions at Dalek Intelligence have cost me dearly. Whom do you owe your allegiance to?”
“To the Emperor of the Daleks.”
“Why?”
“I do not need to ask why, I only serve.”
“If that is so why did you think killing this man would serve us?”
“Because that man posed a threat to the Dalek Empire, he was a deep-conditioned agent, a bringer of death and destruction.”
Invidious stopped to examine his subject carefully. Perhaps he was right, perhaps there really was a threat. “Nevertheless it is now necessary to complete the replication process. I order you not to interfere with that.”
Morrison looked like he was choking on something as he spat out the words. “I…obey!”
Jane dreamt of home that night: Rupert was in the holo-garden, enjoying the delights of virtual roses when their daughter Sara came to visit. Jane had not had Sara until her late fifties, 32nd Century medicine having postponed the menopause almost indefinitely. Women were now fertile most of their adult lives, which meant there was no longer the imperative to have children before the biological clock ticked to a stop. When mother and daughter got together one could think they were sisters. Sara was studying Alien Ethnography at the University of Mars and was back for the end of the Spring Semester.
So it was that Sara appeared in the doorway, her skin a fashionable pallor from Mars’ reduced sunshine, her hair a mass of auburn curls.
“Mum, Dad, I’d like you to meet someone special.”
She introduced her companion, a handsome young man with jet-black hair and a nervous smile. Jane’s eyes locked on his immediately.
“Simon?”
“Run for it Horowitz!” exclaimed Stillman. “It’s right behind us!”
Something large and metallic came crashing through the walls, something evil, ruthless and cold. It cut down her husband and daughter with a wave of a stubby left arm and then turned its attention to Jane.
“Mama…mama!”
Jane woke with a start, her sheets soaked with sweat. Feeling very weak she struggled out of her bed space; the waking world was hardly less of a nightmare then her dreams. She had no time to collect her thoughts before the lights came on accompanied by an intrusive alarm call.
Invidious’ voice came through the intercom: “Come on ladies, time to get up and ready for your tests!” he said in breezy tones. The door to their cramped sleeping quarters raised upwards and Morrison stood in the doorway.
“Report to the laboratory immediately!” he barked at them.
The others grumbled noisily as they crawled out of their bunks. Following Morrison they were obliged to strip and shower within his steely gaze. Jane was too numbed to feel any shame and part of her recognised that Morrison was no longer human, no longer filled with lusts and desires. The thought made her sad.
After this they were weighed and Invidious scanned them all to check the progress of their pregnancies. Marie’s was the most well advanced, her brown skin stretched taut over her well rounded belly, her navel pushed outwards by the pressure from within. She let Jane feel where the baby was kicking against the wall of the womb.
“He’s going to be a big!” she said with a mixture of fear and pride.
“What a place to be born into,” said Horowitz.
After examination they all had to complete some simple cognitive tests in order to be ‘rewarded’ with breakfast. This involved a specially designed maze, followed by a door mechanism, which they had to operate with a series of levers and pulleys. Jane found it more demeaning than trying, what better way to illustrate their status as lab rats?
The door led into the breakfast gallery where Jane found Karen and Oni already tucking into their liquidised food paste.
“Get it while it’s hot!” said Karen sarcastically.
The Galley was a modestly sized room, with a window that overlooked the Dalek City. The orange sun was just beginning its daily crawl up the transit rails as Jane helped herself to a tube of concentrated foodstuffs. It tasted bland, but nourishing nevertheless. Marie joined her at the window.
“Those bloody tests get more difficult, I’m sure they do,” she grumbled, settling herself down on a long semi-circular couch. “Still, can’t complain, better than those poor people in the mines.”
“Yeah, Invidious might be a creep, but he looks after us better than the Daleks,” said Karen sitting next to her. “Things are a lot more basic up there.”
Jane couldn’t help but wonder if this conversation was being orchestrated for her benefit, to make her see the foolishness of escape. Nevertheless, she just couldn’t buy it.
“I dreamt of home last night,” she announced.
“We all do that at first,” said Karen jumping up from the couch once more. “But it’s been so long since I’ve been there I’ve forgotten what it was like.”
Jane looked at the slight, younger woman and wondered where she had heard the accent before. “Where is home?” she asked.
“Centaurus Major,” said Karen, fetching herself a drink from the dispensary. “Our colony was attacked by alien raiders, the Brigands.”
“They were the ones who kidnapped my family as well,” said Oni. “Pleasure cruise in the Orion Cluster, interrupted by those scaly bastards. It was one of them which raped me.” Jane looked at her in horror. “Which is why I’m here, of course.”
“Do the Brigands work for the Daleks?” asked Jane.
“Not really,” said Marie. “They just sell to the highest bidder. I was perhaps more fortunate in that I was captured by the Daleks themselves, at least I didn’t have to go through what Oni went through.”
“So, are you all colonists?” enquired Jane.
Marie answered: “Karen and I are, my colony was Hesperus in the Virgo Cluster, but I’m a native of Earth originally.”
“As am I,” said Oni. “I’m from the Euro-Zone.”
“Snap!” said Jane. “Brit district sector twelve.”
“Fourteen, hell, we’re practically neighbours.”
“A bit more than that now,” said Jane. “Funny how you can travel hundreds of thousands of light years only to find someone who lives a couple of city-blocks away? Life is full of surprises these days.”
The others laughed at this, much to Jane’s dismay, as she wasn’t trying to be funny. She felt awkward in social situations at the best of times, having spent most of her adult life talking to colleagues about microorganisms, she doubted if she could hold a normal conversation any more.
Invidious snickered to himself as he and Morrison observed the interactions from a video link up. “You people must spend half your lives engaged in such inane chatter,” he muttered. “Socialisation, isn’t that what you humans call it?”
“I am more than human now,” said Morrison.
“Yes, yes, of course,” said Invidious swivelling his chair around to face him. “And tell me Morrison, are you happy with the changes I’ve made?”
Morrison blinked, than flexed his right arm. “I feel ten times the man I was before,” he said. “Invigorated, powerful, much more alive than I ever felt possible.”
“So you’ve no complaints?”
“No.”
“Good, I am pleased to hear that,” said Invidious thoughtfully. “Well, believe me when I tell you that this is only the beginning. Already you are changing, becoming more than human, and becoming something transcendent. Not a cyborg, no, nor a robot, but something much more powerful.”
“What is that?” asked Morrison with audible worry.
“I would call it a metanoid, a new form of life altogether.”
“Metanoid?” muttered Morrison. “I will look forward to finding out what that means.”
“Good, and I hope now that you appreciate, from your greater perspective, how unfortunate it was that you killed your Captain?”
A red glow seemed to emanate from somewhere behind Morrison’s eyes.
“I shall accept your judgement on that,” he said pointedly.
Invidious nodded thoughtfully and returned to monitoring the four women captives. He could see that there was still a lot of work that needed doing on Morrison.
Meanwhile, over in his life-support capsule, the new Captain Forrester was taking shape. The quicksilver nanites had nearly finished their replication of the dead man and his flesh began to pinken up as his heart started pumping blood. Slowly his eyes began to open, revealing irises black as pitch. He blinked once more and they returned to their natural blue. He took a gasp of air and exhaled slowly, a smile appearing on his face for the first time in a long while.