REVELATION: Book One of THE RECARN CHRONICLES (27 page)

She felt secure in the
knowledge that she had chosen well. Thomas had been an exemplary
servant to the Organisation until the time came for her to leave
Nathan’s weakening body. Once she had become aware of herself as a
Recarn and aware of her previous existences, she had made it her
business to keep track of what was going on whilst she was growing
up. Impeccable sources had informed her how her pet projects had
made many advances but there were still problems regarding the
deceleration of the aging process and, although souls had been
transferred into adult clones successfully, they had deteriorated
rapidly and none had survived more than 87 days. Érica wasn’t too
disappointed. She hadn’t expected it to be easy, scientific
research seldom shows overnight success; she was certain that any
problems would be resolved in the not too distant future and The
Order would make billions of dollars, pounds, or whatever currency
you like, from the sale of the service to wealthy
clients.

The group arrived at the
door of the Pindar’s office and an officer of the elite guard
rapped on the door, which opened silently. Érica and half a dozen
of her escort walked into the room where a figure was sitting with
his back to the group. The clock on the wall struck midday. She
could see a figure of a man sitting, facing away from her, staring
at a painting of Adam Weishaupt. Érica spoke confidently, having
been through this process many times before, using the same formal
procedural language.

“Good afternoon Thomas
McCann. I hereby give you notice, as stated previously in January
2051 that, as of now, I, Érica Maria Santos, formally known as
Nathan Robert Smith, assume the office of Pindar of the
organisation known as the Illuminati, also known as the Order of
New Perfectibilists, also known as The Order. As from this day
forth I shall exercise my power fairly and justly and will always
put the benefit of The Order above that of myself.”

The figure rose from his
seat and turned to face Érica.

“Do you now? Well, I’m sorry
but I beg to differ.”

Érica was shocked. She
looked at the very healthy and very young man that stood before
her; instead of an elderly and sophisticated black man she was
looking at a white man with golden hair, blue eyes and a disturbing
amount of arrogance. Marcus smiled.

“Cat got your tongue, has
it?”

“How can this be? Who are
you? Where’s Thomas?”

“Thomas? Oh he’s dead my
dear. Passed away two years ago. Almost to the day,
actually.”

“How did you become Acting
Pindar? There are protocols to address the event of an Acting
Pindar dying whilst in office, and none of them include promoting
somebody that I do not know of.”

“Ah, Érica. Or maybe I
should call you Nathan. No, you look more like an Érica. You are a
very pretty little thing, aren’t you? I wouldn’t mind spending some
recreational time getting to know you properly.”

Marcus took time to ogle
Érica before continuing.

“But I digress. And I’ve
been very rude. I haven’t introduced myself. My name is Marcus
Gallagher.”

“I can’t say I’m pleased to
meet you, Mr. Gallagher, but I’m back now and I’m going to take my
rightful position as Pindar.”

“I can’t let you do that
young lady.”

“You have no right to stop
me from doing so. Guards, arrest this imposter.”

The guards stayed still,
making no attempt to follow her orders.

“I don’t think they heard
you Érica. Try again.”

Érica repeated the order,
and the guards stood still, one of them allowing himself a little
smirk. Marcus’s tone was mocking.

“Nope, they definitely
didn’t hear you. Or perhaps they don’t want to arrest
me.”

“These are the Elite Guard.
They are loyal to me!”

“Doesn’t look like it, does
it? Guards.”

Two guards stepped forward
and gripped Érica’s arms tightly. She shouted again.

“They were loyal to me.
They’ve always been loyal to me.”

“Loyalty can be bought,
Érica. And I have offered them the next best thing to immortality.
I have promised them that their souls – at a time of their choosing
– will be transferred into a young healthy clone so that they can
continue their lives in the luxury that they will be accustomed to.
Strange to say, they jumped at the chance. It’s really a pleasant
feeling knowing that, upon dying, you can keep your standard of
living and all the things that you’ve accumulated during your life,
instead of being reincarnated into a random body that could be born
into some hellhole on the other side of the world. Contrary to
popular belief you can take it with you.”

“But my sources told me that
the cloning process hadn’t been perfected, yet.”

“Yes. Sorry about that. I
told them to tell you that. It’s called disinformation. But the
cloning process is a great success. I mean, look at me. Am I not a
beautiful specimen?”

Marcus pirouetted once, to
give Érica the full view of his body. He glared at
Érica.

“Yes Érica. I’m a clone. It
was a great idea you had, this project to transfer our souls, to
decide where they would end up after our bodies wore out. An even
better idea to transfer our souls into clones, so we don’t have to
hang around twenty years or so to mature, like you just had to.
This whole process took only twenty minutes or so. Maybe less. When
this clone body wears out – or when I feel like a change – I can
simply exchange it for a new one. No waiting.”

“So… what are you going to
do? If you’re going to kill me, then just get it over
with.”

“Kill you? Why should I want
to do that? If I kill you, you’ll be back here in twenty years or
so, like an annoying mosquito. No, Érica. I’m not going to kill
you, per se. We both know that you’d reincarnate and I simply
cannot be bothered to go through this rigmarole every couple of
decades. Érica, you’re going to stay here, with us for a while, a
very long while. For ever actually”

Érica was about to see the
fruits of her ambition first hand, although she had always imagined
it would be from a different vantage point. She was being wheeled
along the corridor, strapped to the very same trolley that had
delivered countless other men and women to their death, including
the anonymous first victim who had provided the first baby to
undergo experimentation, the advertising executive Ami Durand and
Professor Ingram.

She had been the instigator
of research into soul transference and clone creation but had never
envisaged that it would be her undoing. In all her incarnations she
had never misjudged anybody as badly as she had misjudged Thomas.
How could she have been so stupid?

The sliding doors of the
laboratory opened just before the trolley was about to hit them.
Érica looked around her and saw the transference equipment, which
had undergone a small modification only two hours earlier. Marcus
was already in the room, standing tall, looking forward to dealing
with the threat that Érica thought she had brought with
her.

“Good afternoon Érica. Let
me introduce you to our wonderful apparatus here. This beast
directs the soul from a dead person into a new recipient body. Your
original idea of course, and for that I thank you. Now, this
recipient can be a human or, it can be like me, a clone. You did
realise that didn’t you, Érica? I’m not just any old clone who took
control of the organisation. No, no, no… I’m Ruth, the plantation
slave who was raped in front of her daughter. I’m Simon, the ten
year old murderer and suicide, I’m Jake, the member of the team
that helped bring about the Revelation. I’m Thomas, the man who you
put in charge of the Organisation whilst you were busy growing up
in Brazil. And now… Well, as you can see, I’m Marcus – a.k.a. your
worst nightmare.

“I’ll tell you what’s going
to happen, my dear. Normally, we would take a soul and direct it to
a new host. Then the new host wakes up, and hey presto! Everybody’s
happy. But you, Érica, you will not be entering a new host. Your
soul will only make half the journey because instead of a receiver
chamber, a sealed capsule has been attached. Your soul will be
spending eternity locked inside that capsule, in a secure vault,
where you can do no harm. I believe that this will be the perfect
example of what romantics like to call ‘a fate worse than death’.
You’ll be my very own genie in a bottle.”

Érica suddenly felt very
helpless and very angry. She had been betrayed by those she had
trusted with her life. She saw no way out. There was no escape. She
knew that only her body would die, but for her soul to be locked
inside that capsule forever – that was unimaginable.

The laboratory staff
unceremoniously stripped her naked, adding insult to injury. Marcus
took a good look at her.

“Sorry about that, my dear,
but clothing upsets the calibration of the apparatus. I’m sure you
understand. ”

Two assistants manhandled
her roughly into the donor chamber. Before the transparent lid was
closed, Marcus bent over her.

“I would have liked to have
cut your throat myself, but that would have meant releasing your
soul to the four winds, and I can’t allow that. So you’ll just have
to suffer the delights of finding yourself in a vacuum. I know I’ll
enjoy watching.”

A lab technician turned on
the machine.

Érica looked down at her skin
as best she could, given that she was still physically restrained.
It
began to swell and turn blue as the air
was sucked out of her body. She fought for her breath and started
to feel very hot as her blood temperature began to increase. Marcus
was feeling very pleased with himself.

“I’m impressed Érica. You’re still awake. Nobody normally
lasts this long. Oh, did I speak too soon? I think your lungs are
about to give up on you… come on…come on…and…there we go! No more
lungs!”

The monitoring technician called out.

“Sir, the soul is leaving the donor body.”

Érica’s soul left her corpse and set off in search of a new
host. But this time there was no recipient body to receive
it.

“Sir, it’s in the airlock.”

The airlock door was quickly closed, and air was pumped into
the small tube that linked the two incubators in order to seduce
the soul towards where a recipient body would normally be
waiting

Inside the apparatus, Érica’s soul was darting to and fro in
an effort to find a body. An airlock opened and the soul sensed
that there was another possible escape route. It hurled itself
through an opening that it thought would give it freedom, but
instead found itself inside a lead-lined cylinder.

Another button was pushed and within milliseconds a lid
clamped shut on the container. Marcus walked over to the equipment
and removed the container, itself the size of a small thermos
flask, from its cradle.

“Excellent job gentlemen. And, of course, ladies.”

He made his way along the network of corridors, casually
tossing the container from hand to hand, until he arrived at a
large red door. He wasn’t worried about dropping it; there was no
way that the container would break, releasing its prisoner. He
passed his hand over an optical reader and the door opened. Inside
was a heavy steel door with a forty-eight number combination lock.
He had deliberately used the same locking technology to that which
had been employed to secure the safe at Maidenhead Thicket in 1990.
It was a good memory and he saw it as a bit of an homage to the
beginning of his journey towards possessing the power that he now
held.

Marcus deftly entered the correct combination sequence and the
door swung open. Inside was another smaller safe, more
technologically up to date. Marcus placed his palm onto the
identification plate. There was a click, and the door
opened.

Marcus took one final look at the vessel imprisoning Érica’s
soul.

“Goodbye Érica or should I say, Nathan. This will be your home
for the next - well, forever actually. May we never meet
again.”

He placed the cylinder inside the safe and closed the door.
Then he turned around and left the vault, pushing the door shut
with his foot, and scrambled the combination. Finally, just before
leaving by the red door, he armed the intruder detect and destroy
system. He stepped through the red door and watched as it
automatically closed behind him.

Caitlin settled herself on
her chair at the rather cheesily named Ye Olde Coffee Shoppe in
Covent Garden. The coffee it sold wasn’t any different to Starbucks
or Costa, in fact it was probably sourced from the same suppliers,
but the décor and the frontage of the place was like something out
of Dickens’s London. The staff were dressed in Victorian dresses
and everything about it did its best to whisk its customers away
into a world that had existed two hundred years earlier. It was
escapist coffee.