✅ Project SETI Trilogy

Chapter Two - Part XI: Ill Intent

          "All the required data—organic and digital—has been loaded. All systems are ready," a male Daxut named Mikren reported as he finished priming the titanic cloning unit that took up the vast majority of the sizable room. There were many large cables neatly bundled together and plugged into various ports on the right side of the floor-to-ceiling structure, and it had sleek navy blue metal casing that conformed to the shape of the impossibly advanced circuitry within. In the middle of it was a transparent cylindrical tube that was surrounded on most sides by many smooth, flat panels that were covered in hexagonal transmitters of some kind. The front of it had a door that slid open to the side, which was currently in the closed position. To the left of the tube was the control console, which had two stacked screens, a touch interface, and a few analogue controls.

          "Begin the print," Jarah ordered from across the room. She turned to face Sudala, a younger Daxut that she had taken on as an apprentice. "Are you done preparing the microprocessors?"

          "Testing the last one now," Sudala replied. She was a bit short for their kind at just six feet, and her crown was a vivid electric red. She inserted a tiny piece of organic-looking circuitry into a tablet-like device mounted on the counter, and the screen flashed an affirmative shade of blue a few seconds later. "All five are coming up complete and operational."

          "Initiating the print process for five clones," Mikren said as he punched in the quantity. The computer verified that there were just enough physical resources to fulfill the request, and confirmed for a final time that all the data needed was available. He pressed a button on the touchscreen, flipped a switch, and the unit loudly whirred to life.

          Sudala quickly loaded the five microprocessors into small applicators with sharps on them. When she was done, she neatly laid them out on the counter, and Jarah took one and went over to the towering piece of equipment on the other side of the room. In the cylindrical chamber, a blue humanoid wireframe had appeared. The hexagonal transmitters along the bottom of it began to emit microscopic pieces of colourless matter and set them in place at the wireframe's feet, and at the same time, the transmitters directly above the active ones began to glow as they prepared to discharge. This continued in turn as the clone was constructed from the bottom up.

          "Thirty-six percent completed," Mikren said a short time later. "It's proceeding as it should."

          Something began to click incessantly on Jarah's utility apron. She produced a small flat device from a pocket, clicked a button on its side and held it up to her beak. "Yes?"

          "Serrh here. If you're not busy at the moment, we need you to review the holograph message before it's sent," a masculine voice said.

          "I'll be up there in about five minutes," she replied. "I'm overseeing the first of the clones to be printed to make sure the ones that follow will proceed with no complications."

          "Understood."

          She dropped the small communicator back into her pocket and continued to observe the cloning process. When the wireframe was completely full, the blue lines disappeared, which left a white, featureless silhouette of the human being cloned. The screen in front of Mikren flashed that it had reached eighty percent completion and to press a button on the interface to initiate the second phase of the procedure. He pressed it as prompted, and the machine let out a brief low-pitched beep to signal that it was starting.

          All of the hexagonal transmitters flashed to life at the same time, and the chamber within filled with a reddish translucent substance that rapidly bubbled and boiled until it evaporated into a thick opaque vapor that completely enveloped the blank humanoid within. The status bar on-screen lit up in an affirmative shade of blue and beeped briefly when it reached one hundred percent completion just a minute later, and the excess vapor was drawn into the floor to be reused on the next cycle. What was now in the cylindrical tube was a perfect copy of Nova as he existed at the time of upload. He was yet unconscious and not quite alive, but Mikren and Jarah were already moving to remedy that.