The elevator shaft was long and rectangular, extending far up beyond their vision. Red lights set with numbers glowed dimly in the oppressive dark, highlighting a steel-rung ladder which was set into the shaft a safe distance from the lift’s passage. The three surviving clones climbed in silence up the vertical face. What would they have to talk about anyway? Connor found it interesting that they could disagree with each other, as the first clone he had met did. What would happen the longer they stayed apart? Would they still act and think the same? Or would they become true individuals, connected only by common name and genetic profile.

“It’s so dark I can barely see,” said one.

Connor grunted in agreement as he shifted his weight and struck out for another rung of the ladder.

“Check your memories,” said the other. “I recall growing lenses that could filter out light more efficiently. I’m adapting my eyes as we speak.”

“I don’t remember that,” replied the first clone after a pause. “It’s possible we all had different functions. Maybe some of us grew new organs. Some of us were just tested on.”

“But we were connected. Did you not feel that? Could you not feel everything? If I close my eyes, I can feel it. The pain and agony shared over the bond. I can feel the saws and scalpels of a dozen operations cutting me open. Was that real or did I imagine it?”

One of the clones laughed. “Our minds were tampered with. It was that bald kid. He did something to our brain. I saw him in my dreams. I wouldn’t be surprised if we are all a little fucked up. All different with our own quirks and ticks.”

“Are neither of you bothered by this?” asked Connor.

“By what?” asked the other two simultaneously.

“That this has happened to me. To us. I shouldn’t be having a conversation with myself, and yet here I am, trying sort out which sordid memories were real to me, and which were real to you,” said Connor.

“They are real to all of us,” replied one softly. “We were all connected. Like a hive mind.”

“But separate,” disagreed the other. “I wanted to kill everyone back there. To rip them apart, limb from limb. I wanted justice and vengeance. I was pissed the others didn’t.”

Connor nodded to himself in the dark. “We are all different versions of the same person. Perhaps some have more of the good than the bad. Maybe it’s the opposite for some of us.”

“Are you saying I’m evil?” asked the clone, his voice growing taut.

Connor shook his head, a useless gesture in the darkness. “No. I’m saying we are not the same person. The only one who is, is that one in the tank. That one in the middle. We are different versions of him.”

“Then we should free him.”

“Agreed. But first we need to escape. To find help. We will return and free ourselves,” said Connor.

The other’s silence filled the shaft.

“Do you think we could be whole… like together again? It feels weird not being connected…”

“I don’t want to lose who I am. I’d rather be me than another version of me,” said one of the clones after a pause.

“You do you,” shrugged Connor. “I’ll do me.”

A slab of darkness filled the shaft. Connor realised it was the elevator. They must be close.

“Let’s climb on top. Hopefully we can open a hatch or something.”

The others followed. Connor squeezed himself past the small gap between the ladder and the lift. Above the lift, he turned and stepped onto its roof. He dropped to his knees and felt blindly for an opening, pulling on any surface or ledge he could form a grip on.

“I’ve got it,” said a clone, stepping onto the lift.

There came a creaking sound as he lifted the roof hatch open. Bright light spilled from a small square, filling the tunnel with its warmth. The clones slithered into the open hatch. Connor followed last, dropping onto the elevator floor, his bare feet slapping the hard surface. The clones shared a glance at each other. Blood clung to them in varying degrees. Each had a different length of hair, possibly denoting their respective ages in relation to each other. “What do we do now?” asked Connor.

“There will be more armed guards, I’m sure of it.”

“I can’t believe they shot at us,” replied another morosely. “Like we were savage animals.”

Connor nodded at the recent memory. “What would they care? They can simply grow more of us. We are animals to them. Livestock.”

One of the clones cracked his knuckles. His jawline was taut as his eyes focused on something in the near distance. The vicious justice he wanted to deliver, thought Connor. He wanted it too but delivered through the legal arm of the law. He had had his fill of murder. It was time to stop running, to stop hiding from his responsibilities and go to the authorities. Vigilante justice could only get him so far. He wanted the giant fist of the federal government to punish the fuckers who had tortured him for five long years.

Something in the brooding clone snapped. He raised his arms above his head and howled a primal cry of pain and anger. He stood, screaming and shaking under extreme tension until the skin near his wrists split, exposing two sharpened daggers of bloody bone.

“Yo, what the fuck?” asked the other clone as he shied away into the corner.

Connor reached for the enraged clone in a vain attempt to calm him down. The clone battered his hands away and sprang for the elevator doors, sliding his blood slick hands in between the soft plastic seal and pushing. An alarm dinged and the door slid open. The clone pushed his way out of the sliding doors, slamming his bone weapons into the first thing he saw, the neck of a security guard. Four other guards stood around in a disarrayed cluster, caught off guard by the clone’s sudden appearance. The enraged clone moved amongst them, bone knives swinging. Connor ducked into the corner of the elevator to hide as the first bursts of submachine opened up. The wordless screams and curses of battle filled the pauses between the piercing gunfire. Connor pressed himself hard into the crevice, trying to make himself as small a target as possible. After what felt like minutes of waiting, the corridor fell silent.

“It’s over,” said the other clone.

Connor extracted himself from his defensive huddle and stood up. He poked his head around the corner of the door. His eyes tracked over the twitching, blood splattered bodies dressed in tactical clothing. The clone stood a few paces away in the centre of the mutilated corpses, his eyes closed, chest heaving in and out as he breathed deeply, as if composing himself after the violence. A dozen raw wounds covered his chest and arms, exposing the soft tissue and bone beneath, bloody yet not bleeding. As Connor found the courage needed to step out into the hall properly, he watched the clone heal himself. Thin tendrils extended from his hands to the bodies at his feet, lapping at the spilled blood and delving into the warm cadavers for material. The visible blood congealed, turning darker as skin crept over the wounds. Connor turned away, sickened at the sight.

“God, that is awful,” he muttered to himself.

The clone scoffed. “You better get used to it, cupcake. This is what we are now.”

“Yes,” agreed Connor, after recalling his memories of the hospital and his battle with the Khalists. “I don’t have to like it though.”

The clone exhaled sharply, dismissing Connor’s comment. “Make yourself useful and grab some guns. We’re going to have to fight our way out of here.”

A dead guard stared at Connor from behind the lenses of his bio-mask. “These men probably have families. They’re just doing their job,” said Connor.

“These men shot first, asshole!” growled the clone, now inches away from Connor’s face. “Wake up! Its kill or be killed. Pick up a weapon or stay the fuck out of my way. I will not go back under the knife. I will not be dissected or vivisected or pumped full of deadly viruses for a second longer. I’m getting out of here alive. I’ll put anybody who crosses me down, even you, you holier than thou, prick!”

Connor didn’t say anything. He bent over to pick up a discarded submachine gun and a spare magazine from the copse’s tactical vest. He reloaded the gun in silence, flicked the safety on and waited.

“Good, boy,” said the clone, bending over to retrieve a fallen sidearm. The last hole in his back winked close.

“Hey. I have an idea,” said the other clone from the elevator. “What if we dressed in their uniforms? We could just sneak out that way.”

Connor shrugged his shoulders. “They could send reinforcements at any second. Do you want to be caught with your literal pants down while they surround us?”

“It’s better than having to fight our way out,” he replied as he bent down to remove the boots from a fallen guard. “We’ve got no idea how many armed goons there could be. They may have an entire army.”

“I’m not hiding,” said the other, slinging a gun over his shoulder by its strap. “I’m going balls out. Fuck these assholes. You with me?” he asked Connor.

Connor looked from one clone to the other as he weighed his options. Both were bad in his opinion. He’d rather not get any more blood on his hands if he could help it.

“I’ll stay and help this guy get changed. You go ahead. We’ll catch up,” said Connor.

The clone shook his head as he gave Connor a look of disgust. “Right…” he said as he picked up a handgun and checked the chamber. “Let me do all the work again.” He strode several steps down the corridor before stopping. “They won’t let us leave this place alive. It’s in their best interests to kill us. Just think of that when they surround you. It’s us or them.” He walked away without looking back.

Connor looked at the other clone who had stopped struggling with the boot and was now staring at his hands. “Are you still going through with this?”

“I don’t know…” he replied with a long sigh. “It seems so ghoulish… and by the time I undress this guy they’ll probably have us surrounded.”

Connor jumped at the sounds of gunshots echoing toward them. He cast about, searching for his next step. “Look, we need to keep moving. I think you’re partially right, but we should find something that is easier to put on and something a little less noticeable.”

“Ok,” replied the clone.

They moved down the corridor, eyes alert for the other clone or more guards.

The corridor they were in ran ahead for twenty metres before joining a larger room. The walls were a mixture of glass and expensive looking wood panelling of a rich red colour. Beyond the glass he saw laboratories filled with glass vials, fridges and large scientific looking machines, pumping, heating, spinning, analysing the various chemicals he and his fellow clones had created or been forced to endure. He felt something stir inside of him. A desire for petty revenge. Before he knew what was happening, the safety of the submachine gun was off, and bullets were flying. He shot from the hip, without style or control, spraying steel-alloy in a wide arc of destruction. Glass shattered. Papers flew. Lights went dim. Liquids and samples splattered across the floor, desks and walls. The gun clicked. Connor felt a stab of anger. He wanted more damage. More destruction. He should go back and find some more ammunition. A hand grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around.

“What are you doing?!” asked the clone. “Are you trying to draw their attention?”

Connor pushed himself away. “I couldn’t help it. I wanted to get back at these people. Even just a little bit.”

The clone scoffed at him. “We are all fucked, aren’t we? I don’t remember being this much of an asshole.”

Connor stared at the floor as he thought about his past and his abrupt change after the terror attack in Boise. “You are probably right.” He threw the gun on the ground, sending it clattering into the wall. He looked at the damage he had done in his moment of rage, his eyes flickering over the torn-up equipment to the corner of the room where some hazmat suits were hung.

“I’ve found our disguise.”