This one came a bit easier than the first. The changes here weren't as much fun though. I like creating passives. Next chapter will be ready as soon as it’s edited, and then things get really interesting.

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Chapter 2: Stupid Children

Day 31

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I wasn’t as clever as I thought. Today I woke up and noticed the veins on my legs and arms are more pronounced. The increase in myoglobin has darkened my blood, making them stand out on my pale skin that’s never seen the sun. I can only hope our surveillance doesn’t pick it up. Harper hums along innocently next to me. He hasn’t noticed. Stretch is more savvy. I can tell he knows something has changed, but he’s smart enough not to voice his thoughts where they could be overheard.

I’ve been working on what to use the remaining dust on. I know it has to be a weapon, and I need it to be something completely unexpected. As much as it pains me to admit, our maker and genetic double has years of experience and likely far more dust at his disposal. If it comes to a fight, he’ll have strengthened and altered his body in too many ways to count. My only shot, if I ever get the chance, is to use something subtle that will bypass any defensive measures he’s taken. I considered stealth, but we have no idea where we are, and even if I escape with him behind me I’ll never save my brothers. I need to take him out if I get the chance.

Assuming he’s alone. Assuming he’ll appear in person. Too many assumptions. I’ve yet to have a recent memory of him. I suspect the memories he transferred are incomplete. Perhaps saved from when he was younger. It would explain why he is so sure of himself. You’d have to be mad to make ten copies of yourself with all of your memories and skills. If our memories are incomplete, we have no way of knowing how far he’s come in the intervening years.

One of the others, a quiet one I haven’t named, doubled over groaning earlier. He stopped shortly. Harper looked concerned, but didn’t move. What could we do? At least it didn’t look serious. I need to name the others. I need to remember them. It would be a miracle if we all survive the next few days, and I’ve seen no reason to believe in miracles.

Day 33

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Time to dive once again. I had an idea for my next change. I had no idea if it would work, but without knowing more about him there’s nothing I could do. I visualized the dust once more, and noticed that a few grains that were previously dark are bright once more. Dust can be reused! This is a huge find. My memories had nothing on this. It explains a lot, but causes even more problems. If we assume the enemy has years on us, and we know he has, how much might he have done? With all the dust at his disposal he could be practically indestructible by now. True, the being in our memories looked fairly human, but who knows how long ago that was?

I had no time to question myself. One of us could be snatched any moment. I began to visualize my concept. This would be much more complicated than last time by far.

I started by imagining a sack in my little finger on my left hand. Very small. I raised the fingernail slightly, created a second nail underneath, and created a small sack between them. In this sack I generated a toxin. Batrachotoxin. A natural poison. Extremely deadly, even in very small doses. Of course it was possible he might have created an immunity, but nothing was for certain and a choice had to be made. batrachotoxin works by binding open sodium channels in nerve cells permanently, causing paralysis as signals cannot be received to move the muscles. I was betting that he hadn’t found a way to completely rewire his entire peripheral nervous system. I also added a second small sack of oily fluid behind the fingernail and allowed it to flow through channels to the pores around my fingertip. The sack would coat my finger in an oily substance, hopefully blocking the effect of my poison on my own skin upon release. Chances must be taken to kill a monster. If even a little of the poison touched unprotected skin, I would die. Simple as that. I added some nerves to allow for control of the process, and tweaked the muscles in my pinky to squeeze the two sacks. I spent nearly an hour going over the changes before committing. If my control wasn’t perfect I’d poison myself or my friends as easily as my target.

The pain was much worse this time. I think I was still recovering from the first time. I couldn’t hide it completely, and I gnashed my teeth and moaned as Harper watched on in sympathy. If that eye in the sky saw any of this all of our lives could be forfeit. Or at least mine. Through it all I allowed myself a breath only every fifteen minutes, just in case.

At some point in the process I fell asleep.

Day 34

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I woke up to Harper shaking me, fear on his face. Stretch was taken while I was out. All the planning, all the work, and I’m sleeping when my brother needed me. I know my sleep was natural, a result of my overexertion from the change. I was so careful. I growl and hit the ground, no tears in my eyes. The anger would burn them away. I need to get out of here. I need to force the issue before Stretch is killed or worse. I raged impotently for a few minutes, clawing at the walls and breathing heavily. After I exhausted myself I sat down next to Harper. He put an arm around my shoulder and hums one of his military tunes, steel in his eyes. Clarity finally returned and I thought harder than I ever had in my short life.

What can I use? The room is simple and white. Empty but for my brothers and the food and water fixtures. My brothers, Each with a reservoir of mist to match my own. But only I had the knowledge to use it safely, and as far as I know it’s impossible to use the mist of another. No, two assumptions there. How hadn’t I noticed them before? My eyes flew wide and I turned to Harper.

“He has to be able to use it!” Harper looked at me questioningly, interrupting his march. The others looked my way. At this point the whole room was staring at me. I was risking the ire of the eye ball that took Stick, but at this point there wasn’t any time. If our evil genetic stock wanted to force transformations on us for research, as I was almost sure he did, he would need a way to direct the change externally without our permission. Yet another reason to use clones. The mist was inside us, ours. However he was doing it, it probably worked much better when you shared the same blood. Which bought me to my second ridiculous assumption. Why did I assume that I was the only one with solid medical knowledge? Sure, we were all different in temperament. Sure, we all made sense of the memories we’d been given at varying rates and with different focuses. Why should that mean that my brothers had nothing to give? We were clones. Hell, I’d barely spoken to most of them. Most of us were naturally quiet, taciturn. Outside of Harper and Stretch I knew almost nothing about them. I burned at my lack of awareness. This situation had been entirely avoidable. I thought I was making all the right moves, when I hadn’t even used the human resources around me. Seven men, with my face, my brain mass, and hopefully my creativity.

Turning to take in Harper and the crowding doubles I showed my teeth. “Who here remembers the bones?” Six hands, even Harper. “The muscles?” Five hands stay up. I breathe in, though I know it’s not necessary. This next question could very well determine whether we had any chance at all. “Who has seen the dust inside them.” One hand stays up, and a second man nods confirmation. The Brother who kept his hand up turns it towards me, a feral grin on his face. I mirror it, and to my surprise he unsheathes claws on four fingers of his left hand. “Wolf”, he says. “Doc” I say gripping his hand and showing off the dark veins in my forearm. He looks puzzled at my choice of modifications. I turn to the man who nodded.

The final man with the knowledge we needed looked almost sheepish, a shyness that was absent in the rest of us. “Have you used it?” He shook his head and looked a little ashamed. “Even better, now we have options.” Wolf was right. Sure, my skill might help if we were knocked out, and his claws looked like they could handle a lot, but we had no way out of the room.

By now I was fairly sure that we were not constantly observed. Still, we needed to act quickly before the eye returned. We shooed the others away and took a corner to discuss our options. I now knew the value in the opinions of my brothers, but right now we needed medical knowledge and decisive action. “Do you have a name?” He looks down. I look at Wolf, then back at our new friend. “Rabbit” Wolf says definitively. Despite the situation, Rabbit looks like he’s been given the world. He looks so much younger than us and I feel awful about the risks we’re about to push on him.

“We need a way out of the room don’t we?” he looked at Rabbit as he spoke. I nodded. “You need to change my body.” I nodded again, looking apologetic. This is crazy and dangerous every time, and we all know it. We have no formal training, just the mangled memories of a madman to go on. Rabbit looks at Wolf and nods. “Okay, what do I do?”

I entered meditation. Wolf paused, looking at the wall.

“Camouflage, then escape when they come to check on us?” Wolf is the first up.

“We can’t, if they come to check they’d knock us out. I might be fine, but you two would be out.” My voice is already scratchy. This is more than I’ve spoken at one time in my life.

“How about the waste grate? We could strengthen his muscles and bones.” Wolf seemed to like the idea, but after a moment he shook his head.

“No way to be sure he could break it. We need absolutes. We only have this one chance.” I nodded and we fell silent again. We stayed like that for longer this time. The rest of our brothers were gathered across the room, waiting anxiously. Harper hummed and fidgeted. Hope for our Friend and brother seemed further and further away with each passing moment.

“Acid?” Rabbit says every word like a kid talking out of turn. I thought it could work. Wolf grabbed him in a one arm hug and we started working out the details excitedly. We’d need to raise the acidity of his stomach radically, and protect his stomach lining, throat and teeth. It will use up everything that he has. I could only hope that it would be enough. We explained what we know of dust usage to him, and he began the process. I paced, and Rabbit looked like he was about ready to scream. Shortly Rabbit started trembling and we all gathered around, Wolf on my right, Harper to my left.

After nearly an hour of worry Rabbit came out of it. Wolf asked how he was, but he just waved him off and stormed towards the grate, wobbling a little on unsteady feet. He emptied the contents of his stomach over as much of the grate as possible and fell over next to it panting. We all gathered around to see whether it would be enough. Soon there was vapor rising from the soaked metal and in five short minutes a finger wide section of bar fell through.

Suddenly the red light returned, and a high pitched noise came to my ears. No more time. Wolf and Harper struggled to bring Rabbit to his feet, the change and his empty stomach had left him barely able to open his eyes. We had meant to douse the remaining acid in water from the trough to lessen the effects on our bare skin, but it would take too long. Grimacing at the pain to come I jumped on the weakened grate with all my weight, shouting as I fell. The drop was only four or five feet. I rolled to the side to allow the others to land. The acid was already beginning to burn and I rubbed sewage on myself quickly in an effort to get some of it off. Harper fell next, and Wolf lowered Rabbit down as well as he could. He followed, and another brother came next. The noise was getting louder, and no more of the group followed. With tears and screams we broke away from beneath the grate and ran blindly through the dark.

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Poor Stretch. For those of you wondering, Doc and his brothers are physically in their early thirties. They were just created, so most of them have one or more attributes of a child where the memories haven’t really connected yet. Harper is overly kind and attached, and fascinated with his voice, Wolf is interested in weapons and fighting, and Rabbit is just overall mentally young. He’s already treating the others like big brothers instead of equals and they’ve only shared one real conversation.