Free The Trilisk Revolution (Parker Interstellar Travels) by Michael McCloskey

sighted the weapon’s targeting sensors onto the newcomer.
    Imanol
stared aghast. He froze.
    It’s
not possible. That’s me!!!
    Imanol
was paralyzed by confusion for another moment, then he understood.
    It’s
a duplicate of me. From a Trilisk column.
    “Damn
it Telisa, you should have told me! This is idiotic!”
    Imanol’s
duplicate ran up to the back of the house. The copy was wearing a Veer suit and
carrying a weapon. Imanol watched through the weapon sensor. The others inside
suddenly turned toward the back. The sitting one rose. They were alarmed. The
duplicate paused, then entered the house. Imanol felt sure he had just broken
in. One of the Trilisks grabbed a pistol from a drawer. Another grabbed a
knife.
    Trilisks
fighting with pistols and knives?
    The
windows of the house shattered open. Half a second later, Imanol heard the
retort of an explosion. But there was no smoke or fire.
    “Blood
and souls!” he exclaimed aloud.
    Was
that a grenade? Maybe just a frag grenade. Not incendiary, obviously.
    His
duplicate was off the scanner. Imanol sent an attendant sphere in closer.
    Did
they blow him up with a thought? Did he have an accident with a grenade? What
the hell is going on?
    Imanol
felt acutely vulnerable again. He glanced around behind his position, but saw
no danger. Then he flipped back to the rocket launcher view.
    Inside
the house, the two Trilisks were in distress. They fell to their knees.
    Something
has… poisoned them? Of course… Maxsym’s gas!
    “A
gas grenade?” he wondered aloud. “Where did I go? Why did you guys leave me in
the dark about this?”
    It
seemed ridiculous to think that Imanol’s duplicate had blown himself to bits
with a gas grenade. It just did not track.
    Wait.
Duplicates can be controlled by Trilisks! They must have taken control of him,
had him blow himself up with the grenade. But they did not know it was
poisoned.
    The
forms inside were still on the floor in the house.
    “This
is for me,” Imanol said. The grim humor of his statement curled the ends of his
lips up a fraction, despite the anger he still felt at being duplicated again
without his permission.
    Imanol
launched his rocket just over the ridge with the launcher locked onto the
house.
    Fooooom… Kablam!
    It
slammed into the big house. Debris erupted from the open windows. Then the
house started to burn. The bodies inside remained still.
    “Insanity,”
Imanol muttered.
    That
was so easy. I was sure the Trilisks would just kill me in an instant. That one
picked up a knife! Siobhan is breaking into a massive fortress and I get a
duplicate and a Trilisk with a Ginsu.
    Imanol
took a deep breath. It was hard to believe all this was even happening. He had
never experienced such major confusion in any of the drills. He admitted that
was a shortfall of their training. They had dealt with reasonable
contingencies, but never anything like this.
    Suddenly
Imanol had a dark thought.
    An
army of duplicates, sent to kill the Trilisks? What if I’m a duplicate, too?
What if the others are experiencing the same thing? Are there several PIT teams
out there and we don’t even know it?
    “Dammit
why does everything always get so screwed up?”
    Imanol
discarded the spent missile cannister and unslung the other from his back. His
forward attendant did not see any Terran shapes. It paused to observe a rodent
fleeing the burning house. Imanol had half a mind to shoot the next rocket at
it just in case it held a Trilisk. The attendants did not report it to him as a
target.
    Imanol
made it down his hill and walked through some tall grasses toward the house. He
saw something built of stone ahead, nestled against the softer hillside. It was
an old archway with rotting doors. Beyond, Imanol saw the entrance had been
blocked with a stone wall.
    An
old root cellar? Or an escape route.
    Imanol
told an attendant sphere to watch the old entrance. He moved around it toward
the house. As he approached the smoldering porch, he drew his