#sofie lacroix

"As much as we might've hoped for the best," Emma Spring heard Marco Esposito expound, "it's time that we stopped delaying the inevitable." She clenched the form handed out to her with a solemn expression, hoping not to give away her true grief. "Once you sign these forms, the Adjudication of Disappearance will be set in stone for our children and make them legally dead." Her mind drifted back to Seria and the promise that she made. The promise she failed to keep.

"What a shame," Jed Walker sighed with his usual straight-forward tone, signing his form. "I had such hopes for my boy." He eyed Olive Raffaeli next to him, speaking in vague enough term. "Speak for yourself," she replied indignantly yet quietly, signing off her own paper. "Quitterie was just barely scraping by academically." The nurse put her paper out onto the center where it'd be collected, trying to ignore Mister Walker. "The transfer would've been far too obvious."

Rei Hoshijima scoffed at the bickering old couple to his left. "Then you should've kept a better look at her personal life," he claimed, signing his paper. "Wei Lu was smart enough to keep her's as an unknown nobody." He eyed the famous singer just across from him next to Emma. "And you put Kanata through the wringer from what I heard," Gert Zweig remarked next to him. "Not that I fault you for trying to play catch up but you might've risked drawing attention to us."

Just as Gert signed off on his form, he felt his phone beginning to vibrate... along with everybody else's eerily enough. On top of that, they all could've sworn they had switched the devices off. After sharing a glance of confusion between each other, each adult in the room pulled out their smartphones and found an totally unknown caller on their FaceTime. They glanced at each other's phones to find the same screen showing just the same. Soon enough, they all answered.

"Did you miss us?" Kanata Hoshijima quipped with a cocky rise of his eyebrow upon appear on each screen. A wave of confusion washed all over the adults simultaneously followed by a bigger wave of dread in tandem. All except for Emma and Sofie who were just plain confused. "Seriously?" a young male voice chimed in with a deadpan tone similar to Jed's. "That's your opening line?" The adult in question's formal facade shattered upon recognizing his son. "Zack?!"

Kanata rolled his eyes at his first mate's backchat. "I know it's cliche but it was right there," he retorted defensively. "S-son?" Rei managed to speak out. "You're alive?" Kanata turned back to their screen with a cheeky grin. "Quite the plot twist, huh?" his clone replied with a devil-may-care attitude. "One minute we were on our way to camp, the next we're on a space voyage back to Astra." Rei shared his confused dread with his fellow conspirators before Jed spoke up.

"What do you mean by... 'space voyage'?" Jed Walker inquired, sounding fascinated in spite of his fear. Sure enough, Zack's face switched out with Kanata on their screens. "Without getting into the details, a wormhole on Mcpa sent us approximately 5,000 light years into space," he spoke in his usual matter-of-fact manner. "Thankfully, there was an abandoned vessel nearby that provided a viable route back." He adjusted his glasses. "Quite the coincidence if you ask me."

Olive did her best to keep some semblance of composure. "Yes... whatever were the odds?" she glanced ever so slightly towards Jed with a glare in her eyes. They had been told of the true home-world of humanity by the Vixian Archives in their efforts to bury any leads. They knew that not all ships had cleared orbit before the meteor struck Earth. What they didn't know that one was apparently still operational. Nor that their clones would actually survive to use one period.

Jed could see the look in Olive's eyes. In fact, he felt everyone else in on the plan glaring at him, as if silently demanding to know what their plan B is. Problem was that there was never a plan be. Charce was suppose to have done he and his fellow clones in when he had the chance. Even with their Crust Suits activated, their oxygen was finite for it to just delay the inevitable. However, he gave them a reassuring glance to promise that they would adapt to this in time.

"Where's everybody else?" Emma desperately spoke up to break the silence. "Please tell me that Aeris made it." Zack genuinely smiled at her than he had before. "I can assure you that we all made it through, Ms. Spring." Both Emma and Sofie were the only ones to let out a sigh of relief. "They're all packing up their stuff for when we touch down on Astra." Neither woman had ever felt more relieved in the last year than they had now. "We're checking communications."

Marco Esposito finally spoke up after composing himself like the politician he was. "Well, I'm certain that I speak for everybody here when I say that this is nothing short of miraculous," he proclaimed with a proud smile hiding his own dread. "If I may suggest, I can personally call the Space Port to fly you in." The unscrupulous man shared his fake expression with everybody else as if to reassure his co-conspirators of a way out. "Just let us know when you're landing."

Each adult began to see where Marco was going with this as they gulped hopefully. If he could tip off the military as to a threat up in orbit, they could mistake the ship for a unidentified flying object. The destruction of the ship would incinerate each and everybody on board without even a trace of their DNA. None of the kids would suspect a thing until it was far too late. With any further luck, nobody would know that their children had actually commandeered a space-ship.

"Oh, we'll land this crate when we're good and ready," Kanata answered as the screens switched back to him. "Specifically once you're behind bars." A sudden chill came over the adults as their facades fully crumbled like cookies in milk before Zack appeared on Jed's phone primarily. "Between illegal genetic cloning as well as attempted premeditated murder of nine minors, I imagine you each face a life sentence." For the first time, his father's face displayed unmitigated horror.

"This... can't be..." Emma began to speak up, starting to put the pieces together. She looked around the room at the adult around her and found their expressions to match her distress but with a dash of pure dread. "You were all part of the king's plan?" the former servant exclaimed. Her mind soon realized how much of a family resemblance there was among the others and their children. The reactions of astonishment sent her way all but confirmed her revelation.

"Charce filled us in on the details but we managed to do most of the deduction ourselves," Aires spoke softly as her face appeared on Emma's phone. "I even have it all jotted down in my extensive diary." Just the sight of her little girl before her brought the former servant to tears. "We've been told about Princess Seria and the risks you took just for her clone." It was a relief to know that her highness didn't leave this world in vain that she didn't bother to wipe her face.

"Just what sort of prank are you trying to pull?" Olive declared at Zack, slamming her fist on the table. "Where did this 'cloning' come from?" As if on cue, Quitterie's scowl flash upon her phone specifically. "Zack analyzed my DNA along with Funicia and found an exact match," she declared with barely restrained anger. "We even lucked out with Yun-Hua and Ulgar to prove it beyond doubt." Her original found herself actually intimidated by her daughter, unable to speak.

"This was what Finn died for, wasn't it?" Ulgar spitefully spoke upon appearing on Gert's phone, his fury on full display. "He blew the lid clean off of your little scheme through Esposito and had to 'commit suicide' all just to save your own skins." The vice principal felt his palms perspire and his breath becoming sparse as his clone dressed him down thoroughly. "Your own son was a small enough price to pay for your sick attempt at immortality." His phone slipped from his grip.

"This isn't happening," Macro Esposito stammered, still in denial. "Charce should've finished you off, ship or no ship!" Sofie finally found her voice upon hearing her adoptive son's voice. "He was in on this too?!" she exclaimed, still wrapping her head around all of this before his face appeared on her phone. "As King Vix's vessel, I was aware of what I was," he began with a solemn look in his eye, "and what I was tasked with." His adoptive mother once again had no words.

"Thankfully, the power of friendship prevailed and helped him see the light," Luca cut in almost too casual, flashing upon his father's phone. "Some cheesy melodrama like that." His adoptive father was bewildered by how casual he was being about it, shrugging it off. "You had to be there." Said bewilderment morphed almost seamlessly into a panicked fit. "That's impossible," he stammered. "This is impossible." His breath became shortened. "You are impossible."

Yun-Hua Lu appeared on Wei Lu's phone, the celebrity only surprised by her daughter's makeover. "We felt the same when we put it all together," she began somberly, visibly restraining her true emotions. "Few of your were ever ideal parents but we had hope." Yun-Hua darted her eyes around in discomfort, barely able to stand looking at her original. "Hope that... you'd miss us and make amends as our family," she tried continued, "but you weren't even that, were you?"

A loud slam on the table made everybody jump before they turned straight at a livid Olive. "Of course we weren't," she viciously torn into them, staring directly at Quitterie with the utmost contempt. "You're all clones, doubles, knock-offs." All of her bottled up frustration just gusted out like an endless geyser. "Your job was being our second chance at life until that DNA Collection Process law." A concerned Jed tried to put his hand on her shoulder only for her to swat him away.

"That is all you are!" Olive pressed on, emphasizing every word with her anger. "That is all you will ever be!" She turned her head all around to address the entire crew of the Astra. "Nothing more than glorified meat suits to slip into once we were all past our prime!" A near lifetime of aggravation was finally being unloaded the more she spoke. "So go ahead and call the cops on us because it won't change who you are: a collection of cells fashioned into pale imitations!"

A long moment of stunned silence over Olive's tirade followed both in the room and among their clones while she finally relaxed into their chair. None of the originals dared to dispute her but hardly expected such frustration to boil over. "Better a knock-off than the real thing, toots!" a foul-mouthed male voice spoke up as a pouty Funicia appeared on her mother's phone, her Beego puppet doing the talking. "Coming from you, 'pale imitation' is a real compliment in my book."

The originals were all surprised when a pale faced woman appeared on their phones in place of their children. "These children are far more than just duplicates for your schemes," she spoke in a deep yet almost alien accent. "They went out of their way to save my life and are far more selfless than you'd even hope to be." After sharing his confusion with the others, Jed was the first to speak up in fascination. "And just who might you be?" he asked, sounding almost too calm.

"Paulina Levinskaya," she declared with a strong look in her eye, "the last true Earthling."

While the term itself left most confused, Macro did his best to compose himself by wiping his sweaty brow. "Now let's all be reasonable here," he said in an attempt to mask his crushing fear. "There's no need to do or say anything we might regret when a compromise is possible." He looked across at his fellow co-conspirators for any sign of support amongst their mix emotions. "Wow, a politician trying to bribe his way out of trouble," Luca snarked, "big friggin' surprise."

A slammed fist on the table got all eyes on an angered Emma Spring. "How can you suggest such a thing?" she demanded with sudden surge of emotion not unlike Olive's. "You all tried to dispose of your own children when they were too inconvenient for you." Her regal dialect was beginning to show in her choice of words. "You think you can just buy their silence?" Sofie chimed in with her own indignant scowl. "The minute they land, their DNA will be processed in any case."

Jed Walker smirked ever so slightly. "Not unless we were to report them as alien threats," he suggested with a scheming look in his eyes. "I'm sure Mr. Esposito has the connections to trigger a Def-Con Two if we're lucky." Emma shot him a look of disgust. "Have you all no shame?" she demanded rhetorically. "Those are your children." Jed shot back a look of confidence. "Children who've become 'too inconvenient' as you eloquently put it earlier," he smarmily quipped back at her.

"Destruction or leaving well enough alone," Marco Esposito spoke back with Jed's brand of confidence to Luca along with the rest of the crew. "Sounds like a stalemate if I've ever heard one." He could see the beads of sweat going down his adoptive son's head. "So what do you say?" the pitiful politician proclaimed to the Astra crew as a whole. "Do we have a deal or do we have a deal?" The room remained silent for a few seconds as the originals felt a touch more hopeful.

"Perhaps we should ask the good detective what he thinks first?" Kanata suggested with a sly smile, appearing on everyone's phone once more.

Right on cue, the meeting room's door flung open to unleash multiple police officers like water bursting from a dam. The originals barely had time to react even as they surrounded the table itself and allowed a smartly dressed man in a trench coat stroll in. "With the exceptions of Emma Spring and Sofie Lacroix," Detective Grace declared, pushing up his glasses, "every single one of you are under-arrest for illegal genetic science in conjunction with an attempt at filicide."

The full gravity of the adults' consequences came crashing down upon them like boulders as they realized that they'd been strung along. "The police'd found our story a bit hard to swallow without a vocal confession," Zack explained in his usual matter-of-fact manner. "So I hacked into your phones to meet their requirements." They all looked at their phones to find Jed's clone on all of their screen. "Not too bad for computers well past their sell-by date if you ask me."