May Day

May Day
by
Raman Jalota

    Sasha watched the hologram intently. He rubbed his lower lip with his right forefinger. Natasha Prozotskova had just assumed the command of the factory. She was the commander and the CIO, “I intend to retain my position of ‘Chief Imprint Officer’ as it is the single most critical position in the entire organization. I’ll pass on some of my functions to other technicians and administrators, but I intend to be the only imprinter in the organization. That is where the source of all power is.” She smiled her crooked smile.
    Sasha found that sexy but would never admit to that in public. What a woman! The steady rise to power in the last twenty years. She must have somehow manipulated her ownership of the imprinting technique to gain control of the Army block factory. This won’t be the last step in her rise to fame and power. What was next for her?
    “I am promoting Sasha Rurik to chief testing technician. He would assume most of my current functions. I’ll be moving to the command center on the fourth floor. I expect things to run smoother than ever before.”
    Chief testing technician. Yes! At long last I’ll have access to the technique. The past five years are finally paying off. I may have a chance to stop her. His face hardened as he controlled his tears.
    Victor patted him on the shoulder, “Looks like you are moving up young man. No more nutrient nurseries for you. It’s the voice lab and ultimate power for our young star.”

.....

    His thoughts were tumbling. He stopped by the Vodka dispenser and inserted his card for a liter bottle. Those old communists were right. Russians will never give up Vodka. Two hundred years after the nuclear catastrophe of 2020 and yet Vodka had kept the Russian spirit alive during its darkest days and to today it was his drink of choice in good times and bad.
    He poured a generous shot and turned to his antique cd player. He was in one of those moods. He listened and tried to sing the words, “Yeh dil, kahan teri manzil* ...”
    The door chimed and he heard a familiar voice on the doorcom. He hurried to release the door and held Natasha’s hands as she kissed him on the cheek.
    “I hope I am not disturbing you. Oh! Vodka! You drink this shit? Well I’ll take a shot this evening. It is a special occasion.”
    Sasha went to the kitchen to pour a drink for her, “I didn’t expect to see you. What ...”
    “Oh, I feel so great today. I didn’t have time to speak to you at all and felt I must see you before I go see commander Dmitri. He has a new contract for us. And this time it’s big. Not the little stuff for 2,500 men. This could be for 100,000 or more. You must come to my office tomorrow morning and discuss your new role.”
    She sipped the drink and wrinkled her nose. “What’s that music?”
    “Oh! It’s some ancient Indian music. I like the lively tunes they had.”
    “Too bad, the three and a half billion people of lower Asia would never hear a note of music again. We Russians were lucky to survive. Do you know that the North American continent was the most powerful continent in the world just a few hundred years ago?”
    Sasha nodded his head. He didn’t want another talk about history from Natasha. But once she started she would never shut up.
    “Actually, my great grandfather had visited north America. And now it’s all under water. Nine tenth of the world covered by the poisonous radioactive sea. We are the survivors. We were the chosen ones. Sasha, you and I are the chosen ones. We have the same destiny.”
    “And what’s that?” He bit his tongue. I shouldn’t have said that.
   “To rule the world, of course.” She smiled her crooked smile.
He took a sip and admired her voluptuous body trying to break out of her blood red dress. Dmitri, the old fart would definitely be tempted by her. And what about her? She probably loves to use her body for gaining an advantage when she can.

.....

    Natasha walked into the reception hall like a clone walking in an area imprinted in its brain. One of the attendants showed her to the formal living room where the middle-aged Boris Dmitri sat on a long sofa sipping a drink. His face lit up as his eyes feasted on the top of Natasha’s breasts, exposed for just this purpose.
    “Come on in Natasha. It’s so nice to see you. Would you like a glass of wine? I am stuck to my taste for Vodka. We shouldn’t have to wait too long for General Pushkin.”
    Natasha nodded her head and sat on a chair facing him taking care to let her breasts face him squarely,     “It’s so nice of you to see me. I would like a white Vladistin.”
    The General and the wine arrived shortly, “To your health, commander.”
    “Natasha, as you well know, we have used the Army block clones before .... but for minor missions. General Pushkin has told me that he likes the uniqueness of the clones specifically manufactured for a specialized purpose with a designated life span. They have worked well on expeditions to dangerous areas and in putting down riots in some of the provinces. And he likes not having to provide any supplies for them.”
    “Oh yes! That’s one of our specialities. We call it Delayed Nutrient Release. The clones are manufactured with enough nutrients to last another thirty days using the DNR system.”
    General Pushkin nodded his head, “That’s so excellent. What we want to do next is to use an army of clones to capture a targeted area. Do you suppose Army block could produce what we need?”
    “You have used our soldiers before. You must have noticed they are top fighting grade soldiers. We have unused production capacity that we can convert immediately and we can delay our current contracts for national needs. How many are you thinking of?”
    Boris looked at her breasts and licked his lips, “We would like to use an army for capturing the neighboring state of Parsinia. You know that it has always been Russian territory and rightfully belongs to us.”
    “Of course, commander. Parsinia has a strong army of almost seventy thousand, mostly clones of a high caliber, but not a match for my soldiers. How many did you have in mind?”
   General Pushkin gulped down the last of the Vodka, “I think two sets of forty or forty-five thousand clones would be able to accomplish the task. We have already started the weapon manufacturing. We want to use these exclusively for one purpose and one purpose alone.”
    Boris’s eyes were bright, “To capture Parsinia, to eliminate or convert their army and then to die.”
Natasha smiled. Without divulging the calculations her mind was doing, she asked, “When do you need them; how long a life span; and whose voice do you want to imprint on them?”

.....

    Parsinia fell in three days. The 90,000 strong Army block clones performed exceptionally well, and General Pushkin, despite his age, commanded the army. He stood next to commander Dmitri at the victory parade. Natasha was in the first row of the dignitaries. General Pushkin addressed the crowd, “This is the finest army I have ever commanded. I think a large part of the victory is owed to the efforts of Natasha Prozotskova and her Army block clones.”
    As the cheers subsided, she moved near him.
    “Thank you, General Pushkin. That’s very kind of you to say that.”
    “Natasha, I have never worked with a group of men so dedicated and motivated to achieve their commander’s goals. I felt as if I had worked with them for twenty years!”
    “Well General, they were imprinted with your voice and would have cut off their heads if you had asked them to do so. My imprinting technique guarantees absolute dedication to the voice they are imprinted with. Even higher loyalty than that of a mother to her child, or vice versa.”
    “How did you ever come up with such a technique?”
    “General, what’s more important is how well we can utilize my technique for meeting the future goals we set for Russia.”

.....

    She picked up the disk and inserted it into the scrambler, “The first step in imprinting is to scramble the voice. The scrambled digitized data is then processed through the concentrator and encoded. The last step is imprinting.”
    Sasha stared intently at Natasha’s fingers deftly manipulating enhancers, decoders and flatliners to achieve the highest peak of imprinting. The clones were being pumped with steroids and nutrient Z-4 as the imprinting started.
    “So we do the same for each chamber?”
    “We used to do that Sasha, but for large orders we have to use the delta accelerator to cut down the time of imprinting from twenty hours to ten minutes. Anytime we have an order for a large group like the last set of ‘A’ Army clones, we switch to the accelerator routine.”
    He looked at the imprinting area with awe. It occupied almost 10,000 square meters, twice the size of the nutrient nursery that he had last worked in. It was ten times more complex than what he had imagined it to be. A total of two hundred clones were being readied at a time. I must understand everything here. This is the key to stopping her.
    “And so this group will be ready very shortly. Two more sets and the six hundred can be shipped by this afternoon. Do you think you can do the next two sets?”
    Natasha watched as Sasha imprinted the next two sets with a measured manner that conveyed complete understanding of the process. Natasha kissed him lightly, “This is wonderful. I can now leave this secret in your capable hands.”

.....

    Natasha walked into the bathroom. She adjusted her make-up and scraped Boris’s hair from his brush into her purse. She unbuttoned her dress and walked back into the bedroom. Boris reached for her breasts. She smiled her crooked smile and kissed him on the mouth. Just a few more nights. This is all I have to do. Get enough hair for DNA generation.

.....

    Natasha walked to the Royal Palace unannounced, “Tell Dmitri, Natasha Prozotskova is here. He knows why I am here.”
    Dmitri’s face brightened, “Natasha, of course. Never restrict her from coming to the palace.”
    Natasha walked in to his private chambers and kissed him on the cheek. She whispered in her deep voice, “Listen Dmitri, you need to retire General Pushkin and replace him with Natasha Prozotskova. That will allow me to be near you all the time.”
    He smiled, “Yes, of course. I want you here with me, always. I have missed you terribly the last week.”
    “That couldn’t be helped. But now, we will be able to see each other regularly.” She kissed him on the cheek again. You have three more weeks left in your life. I am glad I made you completely dependent on me and sexless. I couldn’t stand that nasty old beast anymore.

.....

    The Army marched by the podium. Red square was filled with dignitaries and ordinary workers. Natasha looked radiant. Fit to be the Queen! Sasha watched the proceedings deep in thought. He rubbed his lower lip. Supreme Commander of Russia! She has done it again. And what can I do to reverse it? When will I get a chance?
    Victor nudged him, “I suppose you will be moving up too.”
    “Victor, I have very little contact with her. She has me ... she has us where she wants us. We are to be used just like everyone else she has managed to use.”
    “Yeah, but Dmitri did die suddenly. She was in the right place at the right time.”
    “I think she had a hand in all of this. Remember when she locked out everyone from the research wing for three weeks? What did she do in the lab?”
    “You are too damn suspicious Sasha. That was two months ago. Dmitri did die suddenly, but because of a bad heart. She had no hand in it.”
    She had no hand in it! That’s what everyone thought when my family was wiped out. She had everything to do with it! She was responsible through and through. It was her army. It was her plan. It was her doing.
    “She could have created a clone. She could have generated a means of shortening his life. She could have done anything.”
    “She could also have just been perfecting another technique to improve the Army block clones. Like her imprinting technique. Only you and she know how to perform it.”
    “Yes, but she controls the whole process. I have very little to do with it.”

.....

    The first order of 100, 000 ‘A’ soldiers to capture Byelarus came and went without mishap. The surviving soldiers from the first war were combined with a new batch of 150,000 ‘A’ soldiers to take back Ukraine. As the last soldiers were loaded onto trucks and trains leaving the Army block, Sasha needed to get drunk. This is horrible. Everyday I am helping kill thousands of other families by creating these soldiers. And for what? To glorify Natasha’s kingdom? This is not my Russia. I can’t take it anymore.
    With the capture of the last soldiers in Ukraine in April, Natasha paid a rare visit to the Army block factory.
    “Sasha, I need a special order of soldiers to march in the Red square for the May Day parade. This will be the finest parade in history. The best marching soldiers you can find in the lab with the hardiest stamina you can create in the lab. I want a show that the Russian people will never forget. A show that will imprint my name in their memories forever.”

.....

    Victor opened his door, “Sasha! What are you doing here?”
    “Let me in. Here, open this bottle.” Sasha walked in and took a hurried look around the housing unit.
Victor walked back from the kitchen, two glasses in hand, “What’s going on? You look terrified.”
    “I need your help. I need to alter the voice imprint mix for this new order.”
    Victor whispered, “You mean ...”
    “Victor, how long have you known me?”
    “Since school days. What fifteen, maybe twenty years. Why?”
    “What I am going to tell you is my life’s secret. I am not Sasha Rurik. I am Mikhail Fyodor.”
    “But the Fyodor family was ...”
    “Yes, you are right. The Fyodor family was wiped out in the purge of 2200. I was saved and raised by a friend of the family. The Rurik’s hid me and brought me up as their own. And I have lived my life dedicated to one thing and one thing alone.”
    Victor stared at him unbelievingly, “And what’s that?”
    “To put an end to Natasha Prozotskova and her plans. She was responsible for the end of the Fyodors. She and her clones.”
    Victor poured two more drinks, “How would you do this? This end to Natasha and her plans?”
    “I intend to change the imprint mix for the latest order of soldiers.”
    “The order we are working on now, for the May day parade?”
    “Don’t you see? This may be my only chance ... This may be Russia’s only chance. Natasha is completely in control of our country. Her victories and expansions have consolidated her position. She intends to seal her control with a big parade that will imprint her status in the mind of the Russian people forever.”
    “But there are people still starving in the streets of Moscow. No matter what she may proclaim. We are not living in prosperity. There’s a lot of poverty and deprivation that we have yet to overcome.”
    He put his hand on Victor’s shoulder, “I knew you saw through her bullshit. She’s just another dictator replacing Dmitri. No better than him ... definitely much more dangerous than him. We need to put the power in the hands of the people. Back where it belongs. But more than that, I need to avenge my family. Will you help me alter the voice mix?”

.....

    Victor fed the two digitized voice prints. He enhanced Mikhail’s recording as Mikhail flattened Natasha’s while keeping General Kasparov’s at mid-range. They had to repeat it several times till the final testing hologram was smooth and appeared normal even to trained eyes. This accomplished, they had to create the trigger.
    “What do you want to use as the trigger?” Victor whispered, even though there was no one else in the lab.
    “Use ‘Great’ twice. The repetition of great by the General will be the trigger.”

.....

    The morning sun was cold but the clouds soon drifted and the breeze died. It was a perfect day. The surviving soldiers of the Ukraine army marched past the podium saluting smartly. Natasha stood on the podium. General Kasparov two steps behind her. She in her red dress, he in his army tunic. Victor and Mikhail watched from the stands.
    The Ukraine army finally marched out of the Red square. Mikhail rubbed his lower lip with his forefinger. Now. Time for the special brigade and General Kasparov’s speech.
    General Kasparov waited till the sound corder self-adjusted for him. He waved his hand at the huge gathering, “Dear citizens, this is a fantastic day. A day of tradition. May Day. Our May Day. For three hundred and thirty glorious years, our great tradition of proclaiming this day continues. Each brighter than the previous.”
    The Army block clones dressed in red and black had just entered the square. The five thousand soldiers marching in four flights were moving like a welloiled snake, slowly slithering its way to the prey.
“Our great leader Natasha Prozotskova ....”
    The five thousand soldiers broke into two lines of twenty five hundred. Their weapons drawn, they converged expertly to the podium. The small security force was easily eliminated.
    Natasha seized the sound corder, “All soldiers, hear my voice. Remember my voice. This is your creator. Stop! Remember the voice from the womb. Stop! Stop now!”
    Three soldiers emerged near the podium, covering it. One on the left, one on the right and one in the middle with their lasers locked on Natasha. There were three bursts instantaneously like lightning bolts striking from the heavens. A pile of burnt red dress and charred bones lay at the foot of the podium.
One of the soldiers produced a sound corder from his pack. His voice boomed over Red square, “This is the beginning. Power to the people. This is May Day!”

The End    3148 words

Copyright © 2004 Raman Jalota. All rights reserved. No part of this electronic publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the author.

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