Clone

Rine's Personal Struggles

Rine's insecurities start to affect her work with the rebellion. She becomes increasingly distant and withdrawn, and she starts to doubt her own abilities and worth. She isolates herself from her comrades, and she starts to question whether she is truly fit to lead the rebellion.

Her comrades and the rebels, who are aware of her struggles and her condition, try to reach out to her and support her. Her closest friend, Ava, tries to talk to her, encouraging her to open up and express her feelings. Ava tells her that it's normal to feel this way, but she shouldn't let it consume her. Ava also reminds her of her importance in the rebellion and the cause.

Rine's fears grow more and more until she can no longer handle the stress of leadership. She decides to leave the rebels and go home, but the rebellion wants her return. They send out a distress signal to all major cities of the galaxy in hopes that someone can come and help them. Unfortunately, Rine doesn't make it home in time to see the response to the distress signal, and soon she finds herself captured and imprisoned by the Cyber Rebels. She spends a week locked away in a dark underground cell before they release her.

"I've got no choice," Rine thinks, "They're not going to give me another chance."

When she comes home, she immediately begins to put her plan into action. She makes sure to contact General Lane, requesting that he help her find a way to free herself. He agrees to help her because he knows it will take too long to break down and liberate her from her confinement. He assigns her a team consisting of herself and General Lane to track down the remaining clones that were released into space during the evacuation of Eden.

"If you can't capture the remaining clones," General Lane states, "you must locate the last piece of Eden."

As far as I know, only one clone remains: The one we believe is a clone of Eden itself. If we were able to catch the rest, then there would be no need for the clones to be brought back to Earth at all. As far as I know, it's possible, however, that if they find the last piece of Eden itself, then it won't be destroyed, and the clones may be allowed to return to earth instead."

Once Rine finds out that the piece of Eden that remained in the sky was once an entire planet, she is ecstatic and she plans her escape.

One day, as she is running away, she is surprised when she sees that she isn't alone. Standing just a few feet away from her is Ava, looking exactly as she remembers her. Rine is horrified by her appearance. She remembers how beautiful and radiant Ava was in her youth. Now she is emaciated and broken, looking like nothing more than a pile of bones covered in scars. Her skin is pale and thin, making the bruises look even more painful and grotesque, and she looks like a living skeleton, but she holds her head high.

"You!" Rine cries, "What are you doing here?"

"We found out about what the Cyber Rebels had done to you," Ava says, "And I couldn't bear the thought of losing you to them again."

"So you followed me?" Rine asks, "How could you?"

"I wasn't given a lot of choices," Ava replies, "It seemed easier to do the only thing I had left that made any kind of sense to do and risk everything."

"But you were never my friend," Rine argues, "Why did you do anything? Why didn't you just leave me to die?!"

"Because I care about you," Ava replies, "I love you, Rine."

Rine can feel tears forming in her eyes. She quickly wipes them away.

"I'm sorry you had to hear all that," she says, "But this isn't the place to discuss our feelings right now."

Rine continues walking past Ava, who grabs hold of her arm to stop her.

"Listen to me," Ava insists, "This isn't the place to end things, you and I. Don't you understand? We can find a way together."