Arc 8 | Chapter 275: Normal for Them

✮ ✮ ✮ Some Four Decades Ago ✮ ✮ ✮

“Emmie,” a trio of voices echoed out to her, although it was nearly impossible to tell more than one person was speaking.

Still, Emilia didn’t have to glance up to recognize the three voices calling for her, their cadence so identical when they wanted that even she, known throughout The Penns as the only person able to differentiate one clone from another, couldn’t tell which of the triplets was speaking by voice alone.

The clones being interchangeable was considered one of their greatest selling points, each an agent for The Black Knot, able to slip in and out of their assignments as needed. Sure, some of them had scars from their decades in the field, and when they weren’t working, they had different interests and personalities, but when they were working, when their bodies were perfect and flawless? Then, no one could tell them apart—at least, not under normal circumstances. Perhaps, way back when she’d been a child, able to easily tell each of the clones apart after only meeting them once, this should have been taken as a clue that she was not

normal.

“What’s up?” she asked, continuing glaring into the abyss of the legal documents Olivier would be covering in his class that afternoon.

She’d had to hack into another student’s Censor—which they had stupidly installed a glitchy hack into, and she’d been forced to report to The Black Knot, so they’d issue a warning about vulnerabilities in the hack… although, only after she’d taken the files for the class—in order to get the reading, Olivier having apparently told his students to stop cooperating with her unofficial auditing of his class while attempting to annoy him into taking her case.

It was really unfortunate for him that she knew Harvey Vickers, dean of Yurndale University, and while Olivier could kick her out of his class every time she showed—which was currently every class he taught, as she was growing increasingly desperate—he couldn’t get her outright banned from either campus or his classroom. Instead, he could only kick her out when she was actively causing problems, which happened somewhat regularly because she was, well, herself. The fact that he already had a reputation for being moody and unreasonable was working for her at the moment, as even he wouldn’t risk the scandal of quitting because a little silverstrain girl was bothering him.

“We have a job for you!” one of the triplets said, plopping down across from her. He swung one long leg over the other, a smile tugging at his lips—Baylor, then.

Bright, appreciative green eyes roamed over her, set against the deep tan from their summer of fun and a bridge of freckles over his nose. The black hair nearly all the clones were currently keeping in the short and artfully same messy cut—the result of a poll earlier that year—was, somehow, even more dishevelled than usual.

“The last time you tried to give me a job, Baylie, I didn’t even get to do it because your daddy”—Baylor made a face, everyone but Loren hating it when she referred to the triplet’s guardian as their

daddy

—“found out about it and grounded me.”

The fact that her parents had allowed Loren to

ground

her, despite him not being her daddy—and this had been a few years ago, so she hadn’t even yet had the chance to call him that within the context of sex—

and

her being an almost adult

and

her not actually having done anything, was beyond her. Regardless, it and the boring paperwork he’d made her help with had made an impression, and considering she was currently looking down the barrel of spending the next few decades in prison for manslaughter, Emilia would prefer to not spend her last few months of freedom grounded.

Then again… perhaps she could convince Loren to let her spend it actually on the ground? The carpet in his office was scratchy on the knees, though, so she’d need to do something about that beforehand…

“It isn’t that sort of job,” Taelor said, stepping up behind his brother, his face the solemn line of severity it always was, unless he was pretending to be one of his more cheerful siblings. His own hair was, unsurprisingly, perfect—messy, but purposefully so.

The other one, Valor, had wandered away and was now staring listlessly out the window, watching the students of the school wander by—Emilia had hunkered down in the library to read the class materials before Olivier’s class. Valor wasn’t looking their way, but Emilia still knew what would be on his face: longing.

Being a Hyrat clone—or a member of any of the families that effectively ran The Black Knot—came not just with responsibilities, but stigma. Everyone knew the faces of the Laprise boys and the Hyrat clones, their lives all the more difficult for it. It had been one thing in The Penns, where they had still faced prejudice and fear, only the reality that they had friends and people who loved them—as well as a few who just didn’t fear them, like Halen, perhaps one of his only

good

qualities—able to lessen the sting of reality.

Now, though, their childhoods were coming to an end.

With the exception of the few friends they’d made who were a year or two younger, everyone in their friend group had graduated. Most of them were moving into their gap decade—somewhere Emilia hoped to end up, if not in prison—the triplets were struggling with their place in the world. It wasn’t like they could wander Baalphoria, enjoying one last burst of freedom—not with the same abandon the rest of them could, anyways.

Even in comparison to Rafe and Andre, their faces already well known as future leaders within The Black Knot—not that Rafe had any desire to go that route in life, and Andre’s lack of a black knot complicated his own position as well—the clones could never escape the legacy of their face and genetics.

Everyone knew the clones. Everyone feared the clones. While they could change their appearance, Emilia knew that took a toll on them. Changing their appearance was, in the end, something no clone did for anything by work, regardless of how it might allow them to live a slightly more normal life.

Around them, the few students who came near them, seeking a table to study at, quickly aborted their mission when they caught sight of the triplets, fear flashing in their eyes before they bolted off. A librarian poked her head around the corner after the third person ran off in less than a minute, probably thinking someone was fucking in one of the less frequented sections of the library, only to blanch when she realized who was there and scurry away.

It really wasn’t fair; the clones already faced the reality that escaping their destiny as Black Knot agents was impossible. The least they could have was a normal childhood, a normal transition into the rest of their life. They couldn’t, just like they couldn’t find love or create normal families—although,

technically,

there was no rule against that, it was just that none of the clones had ever engaged in anything beyond friends-with-benefits, although she had her suspicions that something

more

was happening between Halen’s little cousin, Alaric Mhrina, and Cyan Hyrat.

Currently, Emilia was many of the clones’ most frequent friend-with-benefits, something she’d been for their younger members since her weird, not-quite friends-with-benefits, not-quite boyfriend-and-girlfriend relationship with Rafe had collapsed into barely being friends. The clones had other friend-with-benefits… probably. Emilia knew there used to be, after accidentally walking in on a number of the clones fucking another Black Knot agent when she was in her late teens. That agent might have died, though? Had they replaced them with someone else? Did they keep multiple friends-with-benefits around?

Really, she probably should have asked more questions about the arrangement. The answers wouldn’t have made a difference in her decision to start up this odd sexual relationship with them, but she was curious, and bringing it up now just seemed awkward. Plus, she had other things to worry about: namely, getting one prissy fucking lawyer to take her case!

Still, just because her life was on the verge of falling apart didn’t mean she should ignore her friends.

“What sort of job is it, then?” she asked, letting her feet tangle with Baylor’s under the table. The smile he gave her promised that, if she wanted, he would be very into whatever she was offering. The fact that she was pretty much always offering, especially now that her days may be numbered, made his enthusiasm cute, if unnecessary.

A bubble of privacy shimmered out around them, courtesy of Valor, paying attention to them despite still staring out the window. He had angled himself towards them more, though, his lips quirking slightly as he watched students doing something outside. So much longing. All he wanted was to be normal, if only for a speck of time, but that wasn’t something he could achieve—not outside the games he sometimes played, anyways. Inside games, he and his siblings—the handful of other clones who played, as well—could be anyone they wanted. Games, however, would never quite compare to reality.

“The function the organization uses for communication isn’t enough for us,” Taelor replied, taking control of the conversation, just as aware of what was happening with his younger brothers as always.

Baylor could talk if he wanted to—if he needed to. With Taelor there, he didn’t need to. He could mess around and let his brother take the lead, one of his feet reaching up to rub over the inside of Emilia’s bare thigh, her legs automatically parting for him. As if on cue, Valor’s privacy skill shifted from simply hiding their conversation to blurring their physical bodies as well.

“It’s no fun if it’s in public but also not,”

she signed at him, teasing, when he glanced over at them, interest written over his expression just as plainly as it was Baylor’s.

The youngest of the triplets’ eyes crinkled before they flickered lower, her and Baylor’s position at the end of the table giving him a perfectly acceptable view of what was happening.

“Yes, but you’re already facing charges for one thing. I don’t think public indecency charges will help your case, or encourage that lawyer to take your case.”

Valor was, unfortunately, correct. Her previous lawyer, shitty as he had been, had at least explained to her the importance of keeping her nose clean until the manslaughter case was settled. Apparently, if she was even questioned by SecOps for witnessing a crime it would look bad for her, which, seriously? How did that just not encourage witnesses to not come forward, fearing for ridiculous consequences for simply being in the wrong place!? The more she learned about the legal system, the more she hated it.

As much as she was mostly not-so-officially auditing Olivier’s class to try and coerce him into taking her case—seriously, if she couldn’t convince him with money, sex, or being an annoying brat, she was at least going to make her last year of freedom his most miserable—she was learning a lot in it. Most of what she learned sucked, and the fact that the non-dev lawyer also seemed aware of that fact, even if he rarely said it so blatantly, just made her want him more.

Want him as her lawyer… want him between her legs—seriously, the man was beautiful, even if he was an asshole who wouldn’t even discuss her case with her.

“You were saying?” Emilia sighed, looking back to Taelor, who had fallen silent, waiting for her to restart the conversation. Being friends with the triplets so long meant they knew her quirks, and being distracted by her wandering thoughts was a core personality trait—one that either endeared her to people or pissed them off to no end. “Something about The Black Knot’s messaging function not suiting you? The three of you, or the organization in general?”

“A bit of both,” Taelor replied, his knuckles brushing over his younger brother’s neck and jaw and earning him a shudder that vibrated through Baylor’s whole body and into Emilia’s, the middle triplet’s foot pressing idly at her pussy, nothing more than an intention to make her visit their room later at the movement.

The clones in general were odd—even Emilia could admit that, and she loved virtually every one she’d had the joy of meeting. They were the same person, and yet not. They were related, and yet not. There were so many of them—over a thousand, even Emilia not knowing the true number—that most would never meet each other more than in passing, if at all. They had clones who raised them, but despite Emilia’s teasing, they really weren’t parent and child, nor were most of the children they raised in pods true siblings; rather, they were usually clones born within a few months of one another, raised more like the Black Knot unit they would eventually become—assuming nothing went wrong—rather than as siblings.

For the few

sibling groups

that existed, like the triplets, they weren’t a true separation of a single egg in utero, but rather a case where multiple implanted embryos had stuck. That sharing of the same genetics, the same birth mother, the same guardian, complicated their relationship impossibly further.

Emilia knew that most people, even their extended family of the Laprise and Baxters—save perhaps Malcolm, who had proven to be far kinkier than she would have thought in the last few years—didn’t like to put too much thought into the clones complicated existence and love for one another, something that from all she herself knew was even more intense within at least a few of the siblings groups.

For her, the clones loving each other as more than family, but less than lovers, was just normal for them.

For her, the clones being open with each other in a way that would scandalize most people was just how they were meant to be.

For her, the triplets slipping into something else entirely—something so entwined she doubted they would be able to function if broken apart—was perfect for them.

Emilia didn’t think anything

normal

could possibly fit a family comprised of clones who were their own people, despite all attempts to force them to be a collective entity, even if just while working. They were different in a way no one outside their genetic code could ever truly understand, and it didn’t feel right to judge them for the ways they dealt with that, for the love and affection they managed to carve out where they could.

“Mostly, for the three of us,” Taelor continued, forwarding her a file for an upcoming assignment.

Emilia still didn’t agree with their decision to just go straight into working for The Black Knot—not that they hadn’t done the occasional job that required a younger agent while still in school. Despite how complicated their gap decade would be—despite how it wouldn't quite be the same for them as for the rest of their friend group—Emilia still wished they’d tried to have a decade more of even broken freedom. So had Loren, she knew, who had fought against the common practice of clones going straight into full-time work after their compulsory schooling ended.

The triplets had refused, though. Emilia still hoped to talk them into taking the offer for a gap decade up—she was an optimist, okay!? If she wasn’t, she’d have given up on winning her legal case long ago and fucked off to Dion or Norvel. Did a certain snotty Norvellian prince currently have an order out to have her dumped into the Dread Coliseum on sight so he could watch her die? Yes, but she was confident in her ability to survive… mostly.

Looking over the file Taelor had sent her, her hips shifting more and more against Baylor’s foot so that even Valor’s skill wasn’t going to be hiding what they were doing soon, Emilia felt a dread grow inside her.

What the fuck had the triplets—had the entire organization—gotten themselves into.