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тнen & now (parт ιι)
TheIrishDevil posted a photo:
Then & Now, Part II
For whatever reason, the clones woke up. Like a cascade failure, countless meditech-filled warehouses had gone from quiet and spotlessly clean locations full of the unwaking living, to chaotic spaces full of wailing, frightened souls.
Souls. Lab-grown though their bodies may have been, every single one of the clones that woke up had shown self-awareness. They had shown genuine feeling and terror and confusion.
What had been a perfectly sustainable business model for the corporations, had become impossible to maintain overnight. And for that sin, that simple sin of being real and whole, over 50% of those newborn souls had been immediately liquidated by the order of lab directors. The surviving, fully-aware clones were still considered property according to international laws. Some of the larger corporations, in an attempt to save face with the greater public, began offering their clients another option besides asset liquidation. If a client wished, they could take on responsibility for their clone, accepting all liability. From then on, the clone would be the client’s problem, and theirs to do with as they pleased.
But property they remained. Laws and regulations were quickly put in place that ensured clones were tagged and numbered, with barcodes and identification implants soon made compulsory. The clones could be used as free labor. Used for spare parts. Trained or molded into whatever was desired out of them. Their rights were severely limited, having no more say in the direction of their own lives than robots equipped with advanced AI.
An uprising had been inevitable. Starting in dirty sublevel alleys of the megacities, like so many failed causes before it, no one fully expected the ferocity with which the clones would fight for their personhood. Fewer still expected that they would organize well enough to plant the seeds of a true movement.
But they did.
Even after all this time, some sixteen years on, no one seems to be able to put a finger on exactly what happened to grant the clones self-awareness en masse, forever marking that tumultuous span of history as The Awakening. And the fight is far from over. Illegal ident scrubbing rackets are booming as more and more clones attempt to pass as free humans, tired of waiting for meaningful change. Many clones have found refuge in the few megacities that show more leniency towards their kind. Among them are some of the few remaining vanguard of the uprising, grown tired of the violence and looking for other ways to further their cause.
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