(no subject)

Henry's old room was exactly as he left it. The desk under the window, the trousers slung over the back of the chair and the posters tacked up on the wall. Even the boy was the same, the ten year old lying on the bed with VR goggles over his eyes. The boy with the same hair, the same face, the same eyegrow that grew at an odd angle for no apparent reason.

The boy who was completely unaware of Henry standing in the doorway, parents hovering anxiously behind him.

Henry closed the door without a word, straightened his jacket with a flick honed over years of surprise inspections and returned his uniform hat to his head.

"I see," he said. "Thank you for your time."

From the boy's age, they hadn't wasted any time. He'd heard that Fleet offered clones to replace the children they enlisted in the service but he'd never dreamed his parents would have replaced him so fast, not when he'd clung to the mere memory of them through five years in training.

One last look around the suddenly small house and he left without looking back, touching his hat politely as he passed a pensioner in the street. There was nothing for him here.