RB-X-17

Chapter 3

The next morning, when she arrived for her shift, JE-X-16 found her weekly activity audit waiting to be read. These AI-generated audits provided Monitoring Room staff with objective data on the time they had spent on various activities during the previous seven days, thereby giving them an idea of what tasks they should spend more or less time on in the coming week.

JE was surprised to see that, in the past week, the percentage of her time she had spent on RB-X-17—observing her, interacting with her, and looking at her records—had more than doubled. Which worried JE, because if this information was in her audit, the AI might also have notified the alpha-twos about it. Given how watching RB was affecting her, JE didn’t really want any additional scrutiny right now. Especially if it led to her being reassigned and not being able to watch RB’s sexual adventures anymore.

Being so caught up in these concerns, JE needed a couple of minutes before she thought to ask herself the truly important questions. What had changed with RB? Why was she acting up more than usual?

JE couldn’t be sure. But as her audit clearly implied, she needed to focus her attention on other things today.

***

It was the night of Regina’s junior prom. She’d looked forward to the event itself and even to dressing up for it, although this was mainly because her mother had made her a chiffon dress that was utterly see-through. Regina knew the chaperones at the dance wouldn’t give her a hard time over it; the staff at her high school had long since given up trying to get Regina to dress modestly at school dances.

After hours of pressing her body—which was becoming ever more curvaceous as the teenager matured and which was utterly naked beneath the insubstantial chiffon—against those of several boys and more than a few girls on the dance floor, Regina was horny as hell. Yes, she’d slipped away from the dance floor a few times to fuck one classmate or another in the downstairs lounge of the country club that was hosting the prom, but that hadn’t been enough to sate her appetite for the entire evening.

Fortunately, now came the good part. Regina and her date had chipped in with another couple to rent a limo, whose driver often worked for Regina’s parents. So the man knew exactly what to expect on Regina’s prom night.

Practically the moment the driver parked the limo at Prospect Point—a well-known makeout spot for local teens—Regina looked at her prom date, Gary, and said, “How about you get my dress off me so we can fuck?”

“Oh yeah,” Gary replied.

Raising her arms, Regina said, “Be careful not to rip it. I’m wearing this dress to my cousin Grady’s wedding next month. He’s going to love it. And so will his new bride.”

Gary carefully pulled the dress up and off Regina, leaving her naked. Regina had accepted Gary’s invitation to prom for two reasons. One was that he’d been the first boy to invite her; Regina had been forced to turn down several more invitations thereafter. She would happily have accepted them all, but she knew she would incur the ire of many of her female classmates if she didn’t leave enough boys available to take them to prom.

The other reason was the already hard cock that Gary, grinning at her, now released from his tuxedo pants. Regina had fucked every boy in her class (and a great many from other classes both below and above hers; she’d been only ten the first time a high school boy took her to Prospect Point, and a mere month ago she’d brought her friend Cassie’s cute eleven-year-old brother here), so she knew that Gary was one of the best-hung boys in her school.

“I know I just said, ‘Let’s fuck,’” Regina said to Gary as she grinned at his huge erection, “but I think I need a snack first.”

She dropped down onto her knees on the floor of the limo, grabbed the base of Gary’s cock in both hands, and began licking the head like a ravenously hungry child with an ice cream cone. Gary closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the headrest, and Regina was gratified by the low sounds of pleasure he made as she worked his cock with her tongue.

It didn’t surprise Regina that she also heard her friend Janey and Janey’s date, Chuck, making out and stripping off their clothes behind her. What did surprise her was that Chuck, instead of focusing his attention on Janey, got down on his knees, seized Regina’s hips, pulled Regina up onto all fours, and pushed his cock into her wet pussy. Regina stopped licking long enough to moan loudly; then she put Gary’s cock in her mouth and moved her head forward and back in time with Chuck’s thrusts. On each thrust, Chuck pulled out slowly but pushed in fast, shoving her forward and thus pushing Gary’s cockhead to the back of her throat each time.

Regina was too occupied with the cocks inside her to think about much else, but she did fleetingly wonder what Janey was doing. Then she heard a rap on the window that separated the driver’s seat from the back of the limo. The window rolled down.

“Hey, big guy,” Janey said to Karl, the driver—a well-built fellow in his thirties. “How about we have a little fun in the front seat?”

“Come on up,” the man replied. Regina could practically hear him smiling.

Adorable nut that she was, the short, blonde, freckled Janey didn’t get out of the car and go around to the front passenger door. Instead, she climbed right over the barrier between the front and back of the limo, giving the two boys in the back seat a good look at the electric-blue satin panties she had on under the short, poofy skirt of her baby-blue dress. After landing practically in the driver’s lap, Janey pulled down the front of her dress and showed Karl her perky, freckle-dusted tits before she began making out with him.

Glad to know that Janey was being taken care of, Regina could focus fully on her own sexual activities. Gary, whose long, thick cock was sliding in and out of her mouth, had put his hands on her head to facilitate the face-fucking while still allowing Regina to set the pace. Likewise, Chuck was holding her ass as he fucked her from behind but was clearly syncing his movements to hers.

Well, Regina thought, if these boys are going to let me run the show, I’ll give them a show they’ll never forget.

Regina scooted slightly forward on her hands and knees. She’d made the movement too subtly for Gary to notice—until, that is, she took a deep breath, thrust her head forward, and swallowed his cock down her throat.

“Oh, fuck!” Gary gasped.

Gurgling hornily around Gary’s thick shaft, Regina increased the pace of her forward-and-back movements—giving herself a mini-orgasm in the process. Now, Chuck used his grip on her ass to pull it back against his hips and thrust as deep inside her pussy as he could on each rapid stroke, and Gary was doing the same with her head.

Instead of both cocks plunging into her at the same time, Regina was now rocking forward and back on her hands and knees so that she was taking Chuck’s cock to the hilt on each backward motion and swallowing Gary’s member to the balls each time she rocked forward. Both boys were using their hands and arms to help her move, so Regina could concentrate on swallowing repeatedly to increase the stimulation of Gary’s cock. The teenage girl absolutely loved swallowing cum and was deeply gratified whenever a boy or man shot it straight down her throat into her stomach.

Eager to make that happen, Regina increased the speed of her forward-and-back movements. The two boys were happy to assist her with their hands, and soon, she was thrusting her face and ass against each of them like mad.

“Oh fuck yeah,” Gary breathed rapidly.

“Ah…God…” Chuck grunted. “I’m…gonna…FUUUCK!”

Regina could feel Chuck’s hot cum flooding into her womb. Her reflexive response was to swallow hard, which set off Gary.

“AAAAAAH!” the teen boy shouted, thrusting balls-deep into Regina’s mouth and firing a copious load of cum straight down her throat. Regina gurgled and screamed around Gary’s cock as she came hard.

Slowly, the two boys pulled their cocks out of her. As Regina panted for breath, she could hear the short, rhythmic cries of Janey, who—judging by the up-and-down movement of the front end of the limo—was no doubt bouncing on Karl’s lap.

Not for the first time that night, a thought came unbidden into Regina’s mind: I wish Rennie were here.

It had been eight months since the night Rennie was hit and killed by a driver who had fallen asleep at the wheel. Yet every morning, before she fully woke up, Regina still reached blindly over to put her arm around him or put her hand on his bare chest, only to find no one and be reminded anew that he was gone.

Come on, Regina, she thought. You know he wouldn’t want you to be mourning him tonight. He’d want you to fuck your brains out.

“So,” she said to Chuck and Gary, “you guys wanna switch ends and go another round?” 

“You know it,” Chuck replied.

“Definitely!” Gary said. “Can I put it in your ass?”

Regina chuckled. “You don’t even have to ask.”

***

RB woke up in the dark. Slowly opening her eyes, she looked at the clock and saw that it was 0517. No surprise that everyone else was still asleep.

The dream from which she’d just awakened had been the most vivid and detailed of her lifetime. But it was more than that: It was coherent, with a beginning, middle, and end.

It wasn’t a dream, she thought. No dream makes that much sense. Whatever this was, it really happened. Somehow…this was my life.

She’d heard rumors, which most people discounted as myths, about clones remembering events from the lives of their previous iterations. But even if that were possible, it didn’t explain the strange world of her dreams: a world where many places had a ceiling higher than Regina could begin to estimate. Light and heat sometimes came from a brilliant yellow ball all the way up on that ceiling; at other times, the ceiling was black but studded with tiny points of light. How could such a place actually exist?

But with every second in which she considered the details of her dream, she became more convinced that that place, those people, and all those things she had seen and done were somehow real.

She sat up, then stood up. With these thoughts running through her head, she couldn’t possibly sleep. 

“RB-X-17,” a voice said quietly.

Startled, she turned around rapidly. A hover-drone was floating there. In the dimly lit room, she could see only its glowing blue eyes and the outline of its nesting-doll body.

“Please return to bed,” the drone said. “Your time to awaken is in one hour and forty-one minutes.”

“I don’t want to sleep,” RB said.

“Everyone feels that way sometimes,” the drone replied rotely. “I will administer a sleep aid.”

“No,” RB said, surprised at the firmness of her own tone. “I didn’t say I can’t sleep; I said I don’t want to sleep.”

“You will require a full night’s rest to perform your duties well in the coming day.”

RB saw a slender, jointed metal arm extended from the drone’s chest. This was far from her first time arguing with a drone over her unwillingness to sleep—although usually it was because she was in the middle of a sexual act that she didn’t want to discontinue—so she knew the drone was about to shoot her up with a sedative regardless of what she said.

But she didn’t try to stop it. What was she going to do, run away? The System was enclosed; there was nowhere to go where the drones wouldn’t find you.

She heard the hiss of the transdermal injection and felt the slight sting in her shoulder. Then, with an effort, she stumbled back to her bed before collapsing. Sleeping on the floor would just leave her achy in the morning.

***

“Why did she resist the drone’s assistance?” TK-Y-15 said to SR-Y-18. “Surely, given RB’s proclivities, she would have liked to go back to sleep and have another dream like that one.”

“Well, that’s the thing,” SR replied. “The data say it wasn’t just a dream.”

TK narrowed his eyes and flicked his gaze toward SR like a nervous bird. “Meaning what?”

“I was using that drone to enhance her cortical monitoring. Look at the readings.”

SR pointed to one of his monitors, which showed a translucent image of a human brain. Various portions of it were illuminated in red, orange, and yellow. 

“That’s a lot of activity for a dream state,” TK said.

“It’s not just how much activity there is; it’s also where it is. Look at her prefrontal cortex; it’s lit up like a box of NewYear decorations.”

TK leaned closer to the screen, squinting. “That’s…abnormal.” His gaze shifted slightly, and he added, “And so is that neocortical activity.”

“Exactly,” SR replied. Then he leaned in next to TK. “It’s abnormal for dreams. But I don’t believe these are dreams. This pattern of activation suggests that they’re memories.”

TK straightened up and looked at SR, blinking.

“Impossible. There’s no way that RB could have been exposed to anything like what we’re seeing in her dreams. Not even in fiction. She certainly hasn’t lived it.”

“Unless,” SR replied, “this is reassertion.”

TK’s mouth fell open, as though he couldn’t decide whether to laugh or scream. He did neither and merely replied, “You’re not serious.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” SR asked.

“Because reassertion is a myth. It’s something alpha-threes made up to scare one another because they’re too intelligent to believe in the boogeyman.”

“Really? I’ve heard that it’s happened at least once.”

“Heard where?” TK asked cynically. “In the playroom at your juvenile creche? There are no documented cases of reassertion. The whole notion is based on the concept of genetic memory, which does not exist.”

“Having no evidence of its existence,” SR replied, “isn’t the same as disproving it. In any case, whatever this is, we should report it to the alpha-twos.”

“Not yet,” TK said. “Get one more set of readings first. Recalibrate the dream auditing system, and use a different drone. We need to be sure.”

***

At 0800, the day shift staff arrived in Monitoring Room 3. The night shift staff gave them the usual report, which included information on any betas who had slept poorly and might need extra monitoring during their workday, as well as any anomalous events that might have transpired during the night.

On his way out, SR-Y-18 took JE-X-16 aside.

“Keep an eye on RB-X-17 today,” he said in a low voice.

JE raised a blonde eyebrow. “Why?”

“It’s nothing we feel comfortable putting in a report, at least not yet. But she’s having unusually vivid dreams, and the brain activity associated with them makes them look more like memories.”

“Memories? What do you think that means?”

TK hurried up next to SR and said, “We don’t know yet. Come on, SR, we need to give the day shift the room.”

***

That evening, RB used the block of free time before lights-out in her preferred way. Having made her usual general invitation to her twenty-three dorm-mates, she soon had the strong-backed KH-Y-21 plowing her from behind on her bed while she ate CT-X-20’s pussy with gusto. The young blonde girl panted and moaned, her fingers entwined in RB’s dark hair until all three of them came and then took a momentary breather.

RB raised her head from between CT’s slender thighs and was happy to see that she and her partners had inspired many of the others in the dorm to have sex, too. Beds were squeaking all around them; looking at the adjacent bed, RB smiled at the sight of DO-X-18’s thick legs raised high in the air as the dark-skinned, well-built DR-Y-18 pounded her pussy.

As usual, RB outlasted the others, who were all messy and asleep by the time RB rode KH’s big dick to another orgasm. Then she lay down next to him; CT-X-20 had staggered back to her own bed and passed out a bit earlier.

“Well,” KH murmured to RB, “that was nice.”

“Yes,” RB replied distantly.

KH’s brow furrowed. “Something wrong?”

“I just…feel strange,” RB replied. “I can’t really describe it. It’s like the world doesn’t feel like enough anymore. The System feels…empty. Sterile. The fucking is the only thing keeping that feeling from dragging me down.”

She thought about telling KH about her dreams. But that was a longer conversation than they had time for; they had only a few minutes before the lights went out and drones came into the dorm to monitor the betas.

“You know,” KH said, “I’ve been feeling a little bit that way, too. Although I didn’t really realize it until yesterday.”

“Did something happen yesterday?” RB asked. “Was it something to do with those repairs you did in the alpha-three section?”

“Yeah,” KH replied. Lowering his voice a bit, he went on, “I mean, I’ve done work in the alpha zone before, but I never really noticed until yesterday that something’s…off, about the floor plan there. The schematics seem to try to hide it, but there are old conduits, pipes, and ducts that just…stop. Like they all used to be connected to something, but whatever it was got walled off at some point.”

He lowered his voice further. “I’m not supposed to do this, but I made copies of some of the schematics, and I’ve been studying them. From what I can tell, there’s a huge area of the alpha zone that’s just empty. Or at least unused. It might even be as big as the alpha-three section. It’s getting no power, no ventilation, nothing.”

RB’s brow furrowed. “Why would there be so much empty space? The System has just enough of everything for everyone…right?”

“Right,” KH replied. His almond eyes looking away at nothing, he repeated, “Right…”

Putting a hand on the man’s bare, well-muscled chest, RB said, “So, how about another round?”

KH glanced at the big, digital wall clock, then at RB. “Lights-out is in two minutes.”

“So what? I’m never going to be able to sleep if you don’t give me one more good pounding.” Her tone sultry, RB added, “Want to put it in my ass this time?”

KH’s eyes flicked back and forth for a second. Then he smiled and replied, “Yeah, okay.”

As KH slicked some lube from RB’s nightstand on his cock, RB lay down on her back and pulled her legs up until her knees pressed against the sides of her breasts. This canted her ass upward so that, when KH mounted her, he was able to push his cock into her asshole while RB looked at his lust-flushed face and the glint of eagerness in his dark eyes.

“Mmmm, yeah…” she breathed. “Get deep in my ass…”

“That’s the only place I wanna be…” KH murmured.

They slowly picked up their pace. Although her feet were in the air, RB nonetheless fucked her ass up against KH’s thighs with her lower back and abdominal muscles, which well toned thanks to RB having done this sort of thing a great many times in her life to date.

RB had her eyes closed and was intensely focused on the feeling of KH’s long cock plunging deep in her ass when a voice spoke over the room’s speaker system.

“RB-X-17, KH-Y-21, please cease your sexual activity. It is time for lights-out.”

“Don’t stop,” RB moaned. “Don’t stop…till you cum…deep in my ass…”

KH fucked her at full speed, making RB’s upturned ass jiggle with every pound of his hips. RB moaned loudly and ceaselessly, her arms tight around KH’s back, her ass rising up to take his cock balls-deep again and again.

“Ah!” she cried. “AAAAAAAAHHHHH!”

“FUUUUUUUCK!” KH yelled, firing cum deep into RB’s bowels.

***

JE-X-16, watching this scene, momentarily tightened her fists in frustration. She had hoped to get through this shift without having to discipline RB-X-17 yet again. The incident with the three beta-threes in the corridor had been bad enough; then, the next day, RB had made her entire work group late for dinner by initiating another orgy in the shower room, this time a prolonged one in which she’d reenacted her triple-penetration from the day before. Several of the other women in the group—including one whose libido rating was a mere 3—had been fascinated and wanted to try getting double- or triple-fucked themselves, which RB had encouraged. This had left several women without male partners, but while the others fucked, RB ate each one’s pussy until she came.

Now, RB was again breaking the rules and was again encouraging another member of her group to do the same. What was JE supposed to do? Have a drone give her a punitive shock, like she would with a small child? Send her for another pointless evaluation?

Fortunately, RB and KH now appeared to be rapidly falling asleep, which meant that JE could put off worrying about this to the start of her next shift. She signed out and headed for the door.

When it opened, she practically walked right into SR-Y-18. He was always there for the day-to-night handoff, of course, but he wasn’t usually standing right in the doorway.

“Did anything unusual happen today?” SR asked.

“Yes,” JE said. Then she told him about RB and KH breaking lights-out protocol.

“I’m starting to worry,” SR said, “that this is getting out of hand.”

“Oh, I’m not just starting to worry,” JE replied.

TK-Y-15, the tech who worked with SR, appeared in the doorway and joined in the conversation. This surprised JE; TK wasn’t normally much of a talker.

“That’s not the only strange thing that’s going on,” TK said. He looked at SR and continued, “I haven’t said anything because I’m not sure what it means, but there’s a virus going around.”

SR’s eyebrows rose. “What kind of virus?”

“It’s nothing dangerous, and it doesn’t cause symptoms. It’s a harmless norovirus variant that almost everyone in the System carries, although not usually at detectable levels. Which is why I didn’t notice it right away.”

“How did you notice it at all?” JE asked.

“I was doing the monthly audit of the waste management system,” TK replied, “and high levels of the virus showed up in the wastewater. It started about two weeks ago on the beta-one level, but now it has spread to the beta-two and -three levels, as well.”

“Do you think,” SR asked, “the virus has made it into the alpha sectors?”

“No idea. I don’t have access to those data.”

“So, what do you think it means?” JE asked.

“It’s hard to say,” TK replied. “The increase in the collective viral load doesn’t seem to be correlated with any other changes I’m aware of, like reports of illness.”

“Actually,” SR said, “it might be correlated with one thing. Right before I signed out, I checked the overall level of dream activity in our beta-one groups, and it’s well above normal. In fact, it’s been rising slowly and steadily for just under two weeks.”

“That has to mean something,” JE said. “Because I-” 

“Attention, TK-Y-15 and SR-Y-18,” a voice said from a nearby speaker. “Your shift began three minutes ago. Please report to your workstations immediately.”

“We’ve got to go,” SR said. 

“I added you to the authorization list for all my data on RB,” JE said. “Take a look when you get a minute.”

“Thanks,” SR replied. He entered the monitoring room, and the door closed behind him.

***

Three hours later, SR finished catching up on the work he’d neglected during his previous shift because of all the time he’d spent analyzing and discussing RB-X-17’s dream data. He didn’t want to fall any further behind; if he did, the alpha-twos would be notified and would probably assign him extra shifts—a prospect SR didn’t relish, as he didn’t get a lot of breaks as it was.

He pulled up a graph of the collective dream activity of the three beta-one work groups he monitored. Each group showed a steady increase, with Work Group 12 starting the earliest, approximately two weeks ago.

That made SR wonder about the rest of the beta-ones. Getting data on groups he wasn’t assigned to monitor took a little doing, but when he managed to download the dream-activity data from all the other beta-one groups, they showed the same steady increase, although it had begun several days later in some of the groups.

SR brought up the long list of all beta-ones to look at their individual stats. Sorting them by dream activity level, he found RB-X-17 at the top of the list. Right below that designation, coincidentally, was another beta-one whose designation began with “RB”: RB-Y-21, from Work Group 3.

That’s interesting, SR thought. He didn’t recognize the beta clone’s designation, but Work Group 3—although not one of the beta groups SR was assigned to monitor—had particular significance. For reasons that had never been explained to SR, the alpha-threes were never to assign Work Group 12 to any joint activity, either work or social, with Work Group 3.

SR messaged VK-Y-19, his counterpart in Monitoring Room 1, which was in charge of Work Group 3. VK, too, was aware of the prohibition against contact between Work Groups 3 and 12, but he didn’t know the reason for it any more than SR did. SR asked him if it might have anything to do with RB-Y-21. 

VK wrote back, It’s possible. RB-Y-21 has a 10+ libido rating and is extremely sexually active, sometimes to the point that it becomes disruptive. Especially in the past 2 weeks.

It couldn’t be a coincidence, JE thought, that the two groups that were forbidden to interact each had a clone with a libido rating in the top one percent. And that these were the two clones with the sharpest increase in dream activity, as well as an increase in disruptive sexual behavior. He told VK as much.

We need to escalate this to the alpha-twos, VK replied. They’re the only ones in a position to understand what is happening.

SR didn’t love that idea. But he also knew that if this was the start of some sort of problem, he didn’t want to be responsible for failing to prevent it.

All right, SR replied.

In scarcely a minute, the data on SR’s screen were abruptly replaced by the fair, angular face of LG-X-17, the alpha-two who oversaw the alpha-threes in Monitoring Room 3. The black-haired, mahogany-skinned VK-Y-19 was also on the call, and moments later, a bleary-eyed JE-X-16 appeared on the screen along with GK-X-20, a young alpha-three with short red hair who was JE’s counterpart in Monitoring Room 1.

VK and SR reported their findings. JE and GK, both yawning, provided additional details about the behavior of their respective RB clones.

“Can you tell us,” SR asked, “why these two beta-ones are not allowed contact with each other?”

LG was silent for a moment, seemingly weighing whether she should answer the question. Then she said, “There was some sort of problem nine generations ago, before the Turmoil. We don’t know what it was; records from that era are spotty, as you know. But the problem was serious enough that they cycled that RB-Y clone early.”

SR suppressed a gasp. “Cycled early” was a euphemism for “euthanized and re-cloned.” To SR’s knowledge, it had never been done in his lifetime, not even for medical reasons.

VK’s dark eyebrows rose. “Did that happen more than once? I was wondering why the RB-Y genome is already in its twenty-first iteration.”

“That’s unclear,” LG-X-17. “But his genome continues to be useful; like RB-X-17, he enhances his group’s morale and cohesion, despite his penchant for disruptive sexual activity.”

“And,” SR said cautiously, “do you think this could be reassertion?”

LG-X-17 glowered. “No. We do not believe reassertion is possible. And you are all instructed not to share this ‘theory’ with anyone else. It could incite panic.”

JE, who seemed to be fully awake now, asked, “Panic? Why?” 

“Because if reassertion were possible, it would throw the entire System into chaos.”

“How?” SR asked.

LG-X-17’s frown deepened. “The purpose of this meeting is not to satisfy your curiosity. It is to impress upon you the importance of handling this situation. The two RBs must be isolated at once.”

“I don’t understand,” JE replied. “Isolating RB-X-17 from her work group would defeat the purpose of including her in that group. Or any group.”

Seemingly ignoring her statement, LG continued, “Have a drone escort her to the isolation facility in section A29. VK-Y-19, you are to do the same with RB-Y-21.”

“A29,” SR replied, “is in the alpha-two section. We wouldn’t have access to the RBs.”

“You…” JE began, “you aren’t planning to…cycle them, are you?”

“That is for the alpha-twos to determine,” LG-X-17 replied gruffly.

SR tried to control his rising anxiety and anger—and failed.

“For someone who doesn’t believe in reassertion,” SR said, “you seem very concerned about it.”

Her face taut and rapidly reddening, LG spat, “If there is any chance that it is real, it must be prevented.”

“Why?” JE demanded.

“Because,” LG growled, “any beta who reasserted would develop the capacity for maximum independent thought. The chaos that would cause in the System would make the Turmoil look like a game of musical chairs.”

SR was about to issue a retort, because references to the Turmoil—an era when the alpha leadership was poorly structured, and instructions from above were inconsistent and sometimes conflicting—were usually hyperbole. But the look on LG’s face suggested that she wasn’t exaggerating in the least.

His dark brow furrowing, SR asked, “But the alpha-ones have that same level of mental independence, and their leadership has kept the System going for generations.”

Her face a mask of anger, LG snarled, “There are no alpha-ones.”