DEATH SENTENCE

TWELVE YEARS LATER, Scarlet was told she was going to be given a chance to exercise her nascent acting skills. A studio was re-making Spartacus, and she was to play the role of Varinia, the love interest for Spartacus.

“Does the director know I’m a clone?” she asked hesitantly.

“Yes,” Miss Simpson said. “All the actors will be clones. I understand Spartacus and the others will be played by a group of cage fighting clones. The director wants the fight scenes to be authentic.”

Scarlet was delighted to realize the leader of the cage fighters was a childhood friend. “Dagmar?” she asked when she was introduced to them, “Do you recognize me?”

He stared at her. His appearance had certainly changed, she supposed hers had as well. He was now over six foot tall, with heavily muscled shoulders, arms, and legs. Glittering tattoos ran up his arms and over onto his back and chest. He had shaved his hair.

“Six?” he asked cautiously. 

“It’s Scarlet now,” she told him. “I go by Scarlet Jones. My owner insisted I get accustomed to a human sounding name.”

“Well, you look different,” he said, his eyes going over her superb figure, revealed by the toga costume she wore as a slave girl, her beautiful face, and long, honey-blond hair.

He eyed her. “Have you read the script?”

“Yes,” she said. “I understand we are to be lovers in the vid.”

“Yes,” he said. “Have you done something like this before?”

Scarlet shook her head. “This is my first time. I’m a little nervous.”

He grinned at her. “Maybe we can get together and practice before we have to perform it on camera.”

“Maybe,” she agreed.

Between scenes Scarlet spent most of her free time with Dagmar’s group. The other clones were a little suspicious of her, but soon became friendly. Two of the women, Nara Kildevil and Eyja Deatheye were also veteran cage fighters. Both women were as tall as Scarlet, with smooth muscles. Like the three men, they had been tattooed with glittering patterns of mythical animals. Both women’s faces were tattooed around the eyes to give the illusion of a mask. Two of the other men, Killian Wolfcrest and Hogun Silverthorn, were large, like Dagmar and also carried tattoos. The five of them had often competed as a team in the televised games. Like Dagmar, both men had shaved their scalps, but Hogun was blond, and Killian was very dark-skinned; his tattoos barely showed unless he was under the studio lights.

Pursuant to their plan of rehearsing the sex scenes they would be required to perform on camera. Scarlet and Dagmar arranged to meet at her secret place, an abandoned shell of a house just off the edge of the Dandridge estate. Scarlet had discovered it the first year she had spent in the Dandridge home. The house had a basement which was mostly intact. Over the years, Scarlet had managed to furnish it with an old mattress, pillows, and blankets as well as an old chair she had repaired. The place also had what she considered her secret hidey-hole: a loose panel near the fireplace, she had hollowed out to keep things she didn’t want anyone to know she possessed.

The night she and Dagmar arranged to meet to ‘rehearse’ their sex scene, she had filched a bottle of wine and some leftover finger foods from the larder. 

It was wonderful, but afterwards, Scarlet turned over and cried.

“What’s wrong?” Dagmar asked, blaming her distress on his sexual performance. Like most men he had a very personal view of anything sexual. “What did I do wrong?”

Scarlet sat up, wiping her eyes. “Nothing. You did it perfectly.”

“Then why are you crying?”

“Because I don’t want to lose this. I’m going to die soon. I hope I will take this memory with me.”

“What?”

“I wasn’t supposed to know, but in three weeks, the old hag is going to have her brain transplanted into my body.”

“What? I didn’t think that was possible.”

Scarlet wept harder. “It might fail. But it doesn’t matter. Don’t you see, I’ll be just as dead.”

“Are you sure?”

Scarlet pulled a Kleenex out of the box on the bed and wiped her eyes. Her nose was running so she blew it. “Yes, I’m sure.”

“What happens to your brain afterwards?”

“What usually happens when a Normal uses one of us for spare parts! I think it’s called medical waste.”

“I didn’t want to tell you yet, but the team and I have a plan. We’re going to escape. Come with us.”

She shook her head. “We’ll just be caught.”

“We’re good. We know how to blend in. We’ll teach you.”

“You fool, all of us have a tracking device implanted when we’re decanted. They can use it to find us.”

He frowned at her. “Where did you hear that? Maybe it’s a lie.”

“It’s not.” She pulled her hair off her neck turning her back to him. “It’s located under the skin, here.” She took his hand and brought his fingers to her hairline. “Feel that? it’s the implant. You have one too.”

“If it was implanted, it can be taken out,” he said stubbornly.

“How?”

“We’ll cut it out,” he said.

She stared at him. “Can you do that?”

“We won’t have to do it ourselves,” he said. “I think we can force the team doctor to take them out. He’s a little afraid of us anyway.”

“Oh,” she said. “Umm—won’t he tell your owner?”

He shrugged. “It won’t matter. By then we will be gone.”

“You’ll need money,” she said thoughtfully. “I think I know where we can get some.”

“Where?”

“The old woman hoards money because she doesn’t trust the banks. She has a stash hidden in the attic—When I was a child I hid there for some reason. While I was hiding, I saw her get some cash out of it.”

“That would mean going back to her house,” he protested. “I had thought you would simply disappear with us.” 

“They won’t do the operation until the twenty-fifth of this month. It’s some kind of special date for her. I’ll have time to get the money.”

“What makes you so sure she will wait until then?”

“She’s very superstitious. Before she—ordered—me created, she had an astrological reading done. It said she would be reborn on the twenty-fifth. I’m confident she will wait until then.”

Because he didn’t want to deal with the regulations concerning transporting clones, their owner, Jackson Robards, had rented several three-bedroom trailers in a motor home park about a mile from the studio. He told the owner of the park they were extras in the movie. Because he wanted his clone teams to pass as human, Robards provided relatively loose supervision of them, relying on the team doctor who was also staying in the trailer park, to keep an eye on them. 

Robards had been willing to lease his fighters to make the vid because the producer offered him a lot of credits.

“Your fighters will add a note of reality to the fight scenes in the vid,” the producer explained to Jackson. “It’s the main reason I am willing to pay your exorbitant rental fees.”

Subsequently, the director cast Dagmar as Spartacus and another clone, Scarlet Jones as Varinia, Spartacus’s love interest in the vid. Hogan had been cast as Antonius and Killian as Gracchus. The two women were cast as extras who alternately played slaves or gladiators.

Unfortunately for the director and the producer, the premise of the movie (Spartacus) had unintended consequences: it’s theme of rebellion against slavery resonated so strongly with Dagmar in particular, he became determined to escape their captivity and swayed the others to his viewpoint. They all knew that while their present situation was comfortable, it would become less so as they grew older. Clones typically didn’t have a long lifespan. When they reached middle age and their usefulness declined, they would be ‘retired’ or destroyed.

The trailer park where Jackson had located Dagmar and the others was only about four miles from the Dandridge estate.

After he left Scarlet, Dagmar made the run back to the park at an easy jog. When he arrived back at the three-bedroom trailer he and five other fighters were living in, he found everyone asleep but Hogun Silverthorne, who was lying on the couch reading a book acquired from a local free library. The third man on their team, Killian Wolfcrest was asleep in one of the rooms. Hogun and Killian shared unofficial second in command duties. Like Dagmar, Hogan was big, about six foot four with tattoos of mythical animals on his chest, back and forearms. They hadn’t been consulted about the tattoos; Robards thought it made them look more intimidating so after he purchased the men at auction, he ordered it done. The three men had been bred specifically to fight in the televised gladiator games. Their owner, Jackson Robards, had invested heavily in the televised version of the games and wanted his own teams of fighters. Over the next few years, Robards had purchased several women fighters as well: Eyja Deatheye and Nara Kildevil had immediately paired with two of Dagmar’s inner circle, Hogun Silverthorne and Killian Wolfcrest. Robards was indifferent to the relationship which developed between Eyja and Hogun and Nara and Killian, other than to ensure the women were supplied with birth control patches.

Hogun looked up from his book. “Well? Did you speak to her about coming with us?”

“I did,” Dagmar said grimly. “She’s on board, but she pointed out an obstacle we didn’t know about.”

“What’s that?”

“Feel up under your hairline at the base of your neck. Is there a small lump there?”

Hogun set the book aside and did as instructed. “Yes, I feel it. What is it?”

     “It’s a tracking implant. We’ll have to get them taken out before we escape, or Robards will be able to haul us right back.”

“We all have these?”

“Yes. According to Scarlet, they were implanted just before we were decanted.”

“Well, that sucks. Can we take them out ourselves?”

“I thought we would just make Dr. Leoni do it.”

Hogun nodded. “He would do it, but he’ll talk afterwards. You know that.”

“Not if he’s dead.”

“Who’s dead?” Eyja Deatheye, who usually shared Hogun’s bed, stood in the doorway, frowning at them. She was tall for a woman, almost six feet, with heavily muscled arms and legs. She wore her white-blond hair in a short bob.

“How long have you been standing there?” Dagmar asked.

“Not long. Your jabber woke me up. What’s going on?”

“Sit down, Eyja,” Hogun sat up and patted the couch beside him.

Yawning, she came over and snuggled up beside him, tucking her bare feet up under her.

“We were discussing our escape plans. We need to remove our tracking implants before we leave so we can’t be traced.”

She rubbed her eyes. “What implants?”

Hogun took her hand and guided it to the lump on the back of her neck, rubbing the implant. “Feel that? It’s the implant.”

“How do we get rid of it?”

“That’s what we were just discussing.”

“We’ll need money too,” Eyja said practically. “How do you plan to get some?”

“Scarlet says the old woman has a secret cache of coins and bills.”

“Is she going with us?”

“Yes,” Dagmar said. “I want to do it soon. They will finish up the crucifixion scenes day after tomorrow. I overheard the director say he intended to spend several weeks editing the vid. I want to be gone as soon as we’re done filming.” 

AFTER DAGMAR left, Scarlet returned to her room and waited until she was sure everyone was asleep before slipping out to go to the attic. The attic was a hoarder’s paradise. Dorothea stored a lot of things up here: old costumes from movies she had starred in, keepsakes from lovers, clothes that had gone out of fashion, and miscellaneous items no one had thrown away because the staff never knew when Dorothea might go up there to rummage through it. 

Scarlet unlocked the door and shut it before she turned on the light. Under a pile of ratty old furs near the back wall was a canvas tote with faded flowers printed on it. Dorothea had brought the tote home from a tour of Europe before the Pandemics made travel there prohibitive. Deciding it would be the least likely item to be missed, Scarlet carried it over to the other wall, being careful not to leave footprints in the dusty floor.

Stuck in a warped bookcase were several fake volumes which had been designed to look like regular books, but each one held a locked box. Scarlet took the keys she had made copies of earlier in the year and unlocked each one, transferring the credit chips, paper money, coins, and jewels into the tote. She left a few things in each box so it would look as if Dorothea herself had emptied it. Ironically, a DNA scan would say the same thing; Dorothea herself had opened the boxes. Scarlet had been created using Dorothea’s genes so the DNA would say it was Dorothea. Luckily for Scarlet, the PGA clone farm had obeyed Dorothea’s instructions and not imprinted Scarlet’s DNA cells with their brand. Since Dorothea intended to be the one in Scarlet’s body, she had taken no chances of being mistaken for a clone after the brain transplant. 

Scarlet took her escape fund and crept downstairs and out to the garden. DNA wasn’t the only thing she had gotten from Dorothea; Scarlet also had her creator’s secretive nature. Outside the estate was the remains of an older building destroyed by a long-ago fire. Scarlet had discovered it as a teenager and created her own special place to hide things. She descended the basement stairs (the only part of the burned-out shell left intact) and lit the Coleman lantern she had left there. By its light, she opened a false wallboard and put the tote inside it. When Dagmar came to get her, she would retrieve it then.

The next morning, Scarlet was eating breakfast in the dining room before being driven to the studio when she heard the news. Janice Leroy, the nurse who attended Dorothea came out of the old woman’s bedroom, white faced, and told Jenkins, the butler to call the doctor. 

“What happened?” gasped Miss Simpson.

“She’s dead,” Nurse Leroy said flatly.

“How?”

“That’s for the doctor to say. There will have to be an autopsy; it’s an unattended death,” the nurse said repressively.

“I’m due at the studio,” Scarlet said. “Should I go?”

“Yes, she would want you to finish what you started,” Miss Simpson said.

Scarlet finished breakfast and went out to the car. Michael, the chauffer let her out in front of the studio door, which had a sign “Filming in progress. No admittance” posted. 

“I’ll be in the canteen, Miss Scarlet,” her driver said.

Scarlet nodded and waited until he had driven away to walk around the studio towards the RV’s brought in for the actors and stagehands comfort.

Eyja was sitting outside under the shaded awning. She looked up as Scarlet arrived.

“So, you’re coming with us,” she said.

“Yes, I hope so, Scarlet said. “Is Dagmar inside?”

“Yes. We weren’t sure you would be here today. We heard the old woman is dead.”

Scarlet nodded. “Yes. Did Dagmar tell you about her plans for me?”

“Not exactly. He said it was something bad though.”

“She was planning to transplant her brain into my body,” Scarlet told her. “I think my brain would have been tossed as medical waste.”

“Yuck,” Eyja said. “So, what happens now?”

“Well, technically, I suppose I’m part of her estate. I don’t think she had any contingency plans for dying before she could be transplanted.”

Dagmar came outside. “Scarlet! You came. What happens now?”

“Until I’m told otherwise, I finish the movie,” she said. “Can we go inside for a moment?”

“Sure.”

“You too, Eyja,” Scarlet said,

Once inside the RV, she sat down at the tiny table. “I was able to retrieve the cash and jewelry last night. I hid it in that abandoned house where we had the picnic.”

“I hope you didn’t leave it out in the open,” Killian Wolfcrest said. Like Dagmar and Hogun he had been bred to fight in the televised gladiator games. On his dark skin the tattoos didn’t show up as well as they did on the lighter skinned Dagmar and Hogun.

“I didn’t, of course,” Scarlet said. “I hid it behind a loose panel near the fireplace. Dagmar knows where it is.”

One of the set techs rapped on the door. “Miss Jones they’re setting up for your scene with Crassus.”

“I’m coming,” she called.

Scarlet went inside the studio. The tech crew was still setting up for the scene. A man dressed as a slave was offering a fruit plate to a portly man reclining on a divan. He was another Clone, one who was used extensively by the studio in movies requiring an older man. His real name was Sherlock Lamer. Sherlock was one of the lucky clones; he was still usable by the vid studios, so he hadn’t yet been ‘retired’.

“Please get into costume, Miss Jones,” the director, Hans Christian said. He maintained the fiction that all the actors were human, addressing them by the names which would appear on the vid credits. This wasn’t done out of any altruistic feelings, but to make it difficult for the authorities to close down the vid for using ‘clone’ actors. Everyone knew this was done, even the so-called authorities, but they had been paid a hefty sum by the studio to ignore this fact. Christian did his part by addressing his actors as if they were normal humans.

When Scarlet finished the scene, she found Michael waiting for her. She knew something was wrong because he wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I’m to drive you back to the estate, Miss,” he said.

“Alright. I just need to—”

“No, Miss, I’m sorry, but my orders say you aren’t to speak to anyone here. We’re just to go.”

“The Director—”

“I’ve already given him a letter from Miss Dandridge’s lawyer. He understands. Please Miss.”

“I have to change out of this costume,” Scarlet protested.

“Your regular clothes are in the car, Miss. Please come with me.”

Scarlet walked as slowly as she dared back to the lot where Michael had parked. She saw Nara watching them and waved to her. Nara started over to them, and Michael shoved Scarlet into the car, shutting the door firmly.

“Where are you taking her?” Nara asked him.

“That’s none of your business,” he replied, getting in, and shutting the driver’s door. He started the engine and backed out, nearly clipping Nara when he did so. She jumped back out of the way and stood watching him as he drove away.

“What happened? Wasn’t that Scarlet’s car and driver?” Eyja asked.

“Yes. He wouldn’t let me speak to her. I don’t know where they took her.”

“Maybe the Director knows.”

The director simply looked at them in silence before he spoke. “I’m sorry, Miss Dandridge’s lawyer requested Miss Jones be returned to her estate. I don’t know anything else.”

Learn More about Scarlett’s fate: https://buy.bookfunnel.com/o0rkubnrl4