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With a sigh, Quelgrum thumbed an illuminated stud. Send in the Professor,
please."
A few moments passed, as silence reigned in the small chamber until the door
opened. The General smiled. I'd like to introduce you to a good friend of
mine."
A white-coated man of middle years entered the room. Grimm's jaw dropped as
he registered a familiar countenance. It was a face he had never expected to
see again: the face of Armitage.
Chapter 26
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Attack!
Grimm gaped for a moment at the white-coated apparition before him. The last
time he had seen Armitage, a mere three days before, the man had been lying in
a spreading pool of his own blood, thanks to one of Crest's throwing knives.
This could not possibly be the same man. Looking closer, Grimm saw that this
man sported a pale, long-healed scar on his right cheek, where Armitage had
had none. His hair was longer than could be accounted for by three days
growth. The man had more and deeper lines on his forehead, and he had a
pronounced stoop that gave him an almost hunchbacked appearance. Grimm's
rejected his first thought; that Armitage must have an identical twin. This
man, although bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Administrator, was too old
to be the Haven chief's twin brother.
On the other hand, he seemed also too similar to that man to be even his
father.
The Haven pilot, Foster, broke the silence.
"Administrator! he cried, bounding to his feet. What brings you...?"
Foster's voice tailed off; the same confusion Grimm had felt must have seized
him.
The white-coated figure turned to General Quelgrum, who wore an expression of
cool amusement at the baffled looks on the faces of the young Questor and his
companions.
"Am I right that these people have met the new Administrator, Sir? the older
Armitage asked.
Quelgrum nodded. They've just come from Haven, so I'd guess they're feeling
a little puzzled right now, he drawled. Why don't you enlighten them,
Professor?"
"My name is Robert Armitage, the Professor said, in an exact replica of his
near-doppelganger's voice. My kinship with the Administrator is, as you have
guessed, very close: as close as possible, in fact. We are as one in our
heredity."
"You are too old to be a twin of Armitage, Tordun declared. You must be
twenty years his senior."
The older Armitage smiled. I'll take that as a compliment, he said. The
actual figure is more like forty years, but certain drugs can do wonders for a
man."
Grimm suppressed a shiver at the word drugs', remembering his own recent
addiction to the herbs Trina and Virion, but he said nothing. Further
revelations must be forthcoming.
"The original Administrator of the Haven Correctional Facility was George
Armitage, the Professor said. When I say original', I mean that he was the
Administrator before the Final War.
"As I understand it, he was a fine, pragmatic scientist of the first order; a
capable, dedicated man, who inspired all around him to give their utmost in
the struggle to uncover the essential inmost workings of the human mind. Haven
had a fine team of people working for him, with a number of scientific
disciplines at their disposal. One of these was genetic engineering."
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Grimm's brows furrowed. He had read these last two words once before in an
ancient book in the Arnor Scholasticate Library, but they had meant nothing to
him.
"Is any of you familiar with the word clone'? Robert Armitage asked.
During his long, lonely hours in the Library, Grimm had cultivated an
interest in the study of horticulture, which had stood him in good stead in
his basic training in Herbalism.
"That is when a plant is grown from a cutting, so as to preserve the unique
properties of an interesting or rare mutant, he said, not understanding the
bearing that this might have on the issue.
Armitage clapped his hands. That's almost a textbook answer, my young
friend. Do you know anything of genetics?"
Grimm nodded. A little; genetics is the study of heredity, allowing desired
traits of animals and plants to be selectively bred and enhanced, with a
known, statistical chance of success."
"You are correct, as far as your definition goes, the scientist said.
However, in the decades before the Last War, the science became almost an
art. We learned the very mechanisms of genetic transference and became able to
manipulate them, almost at will. Each living thing contains within each of its
cells the information required to build that man; that tree; that fish;
thatfungus .
"During sexual reproduction, the parents units of genetic information,
thegenes , become mixed and shuffled before being passed on to the offspring,
ensuring a unique genetic identity for each child, with the exception of
identical twins, who are split from a single fertilised egg. The complete
genetic information of an individual is called agenome. "
The man's bearing was that of a teacher lecturing a group of rapt students.
Indeed, he had a captive audience, since Grimm and his companions were
surrounded by armed guards, with belligerent expressions which quelled any
thought of rebellion.
Nonetheless, Grimm found himself engrossed by this new old Armitage's
monologue, and he leaned forward, ignoring a sour look from Xylox.
"At the peak of human scientific achievement, we became capable of separating
an individual's unique genetic information from almost any cell of his, her or
its body, placing it into an evacuated egg cell and stimulating it to act as
if newly fertilised. At first, the success rate was low, and individuals so
produced died young, since they had been born from a genome that was already
old. However, it became possible to rejuvenate the genome, to reset the clock,
so to speak, and it became feasible to recreate a human being who was an exact
copy of his genetic donor."
Armitage's gaze locked upon each of his students in turn, as if the force
of his will alone could lock his arcane learning into their brains. Grimm
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