Pride Walk Amsterdam 2019

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Copyright 2019 © Bob Thomas

тнen & now (parт ιι)

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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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Photo by Rex

Michael Mahler posted a photo:

тнen & now (parт ι)

TheIrishDevil posted a photo:

♫

The A-class clones were never meant to have a soul of their own. They were grown in maturation vats, often accelerated but not always, their genomes perfectly sequenced and customized to the client’s specifications. Once mature they would be transferred to longterm stasis pods, and there they’d stay until such time as the commissioning client had use for them. Sometimes just for parts. But the A-Class were made to be kept whole. Pristine. Replacement bodies, full grown and ready for immediate occupancy by a client’s transplanted consciousness.

Until that time, they were to be kept and cared for, carefully tube-fed perfected blends of vital nutrients and calories. Their minds were pre-programmed with only the basic concepts of speech, motor control, and other things that even toddlers take for granted. Perfect blank slates.

They were never meant to be self-aware. They were never meant to wake up. Not as themselves.

But they did wake up. And they were self-aware.

The lucky ones escaped liquidation at the hands of panicked corporate directors and irate clients. The lucky ones weren’t sold off in droves as slave labor to mining colonies.

The lucky ones were taken in by the more merciful (or maybe just more guilt-ridden) clients of the genetics and cloning corps.
The very people who had commissioned replacement bodies for themselves, now found themselves the legal owners of their fully adult copies. Copies with souls. Copies that could learn. That could feel. That looked at the world with fear and awe and curiosity. Their skin never touched by sunlight, their pigment-free hair, their faces full of fear and wonder…

…and with eyes like widows that looked into one’s own soul.

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In White

Owen J Fitzpatrick posted a photo:

The city centre during Dublin Pride 2019

O’Connell Street – Dublin – Ireland