I will leave some trigger warning, this story includes violent assault, unsettling mental images(gruesome/gory), and mentions of SH and Su1cid3
I’m and imtern at a large corporation (won’t say name for privacy reasons) that works with genetically modifying plants and pesticides along with selectively breeding animals. Recently I was offered a full time position if I assisted with a new test we were running. I agreed as I was in need of a job. For context I’m 19 and living with my parents, I have a car and license but have been struggling to find a job, I have an associates in STEM, I took dual credits in high-school. 8 months ago a large company based where I live reached out regarding an internship that may lead to a full time job. I hastily agreed as I am qualified, but was confused as to how they found me, and why they chose me. Well after I passed all the screening processes I was immediately accepted and started working. It’s been 8 months as I said and I’ve enjoyed working here but recently we did something that calling a crime against life itself would be an understatement. I had to tell someone but none of my friends or family will believe me, as this company is very reliable and has never done anything like this to theirs or my knowledge. After this project and once it’s completed I’ll have a full time job starting 400k a year, but I’m not sure if the money is worth what it did to me mentally.
So the whole basis of this project was on the premise of using cells from cows to create real steaks without killing an animal, this is already being worked on by other companies but our higher ups decided we should put our hand in the ring. The project started normally and we had multiple successful trials, we had officially made steaks from just cells, but our cfo was interested and taking this a step further. This is where my mental stated started taking a turn, he wanted to clone full animals. We started this and it was working, we had successfully clones small animals such as rats and other rodents, not even a day later he wanted to move the trials on to larger animals such as dogs and medium farm animals like pigs and goats. We kept doing this and it kept working, but after 3 weeks the subjects started showing signs of aggression then dying brutally. Sores would develop on the subjects and then upon them bursting the subject would bleed out. The cfo refused to believe this was an issue, and continued to allocate funds for the project.
This intern led to very rich people funding our research with special requests. One well known billionaire in particular requested we clone a person. Our entire team was against it and wanted to back out but the billionaire was promising millions to the company and millions to each member of the team individually. So we all caved and started on this cloning, we weren’t told who’s cells we were working with but all of our attempts were completely unsuccessful. Eventually we were able to get a fetus formed and it was fully responsive, it grew at an extremely accelerated rate and it clearly came clear what we were doing.
In a matter of 3 weeks it had developed from a fetus into a toddler that looked oddly similar to the man who had payed us. This really unnerved me and I took a week off of work. Promptly bought a house, furnished it, and moved in, I had totally isolated myself from any of my family and friends. The mental stress of learning that we were making what very well may end up being the next person to take over our company and mass produce clones. After my week off I had returned to work to find the clone in a stasis chamber covered in sores and very obviously heavily sedated. I also had received news that someone had acquired our company and had made this project our whole operation, he had halted everything else. No one ever told me it was the man who had payed us off to clone a person but I assumed it was based on what I had been told.
Soon we had 5 ongoing tests of this same subject, all at different stages, they all ended up becoming deformed or dying from the bloody sores they developed as side effects of the process. Soon the team was cut down from a large group of around 30 or 40 to just 5 of us. Anyone who disagreed at all was cut from the team and subsequently never heard from again, after some digging it seemed these people had been completely erased from existence. No names or identity profiles that matched their description, phones deactivated, all social media removed, and after some contacting of previous employers, phone providers, and even families of said people, I was always met with a single answer “who is that.” I became scared I would be cut next and kept quiet even among others in the company.
A day before writing this I was allowed to go home and I took one of the subjects. I’m not sure how I managed to sneak past security, or maybe they knew and wanted to see what would happen. Last night after I was home with it, he started asking questions, like “what is the meaning of life?” and “why am I alive?” This scared me a lot and I was worried he might start lashing out or try to end himself after I was unable to answer. I went to bed with him locked in a guest room with a mattress and pillows. I couldn’t sleep so I stayed up and watched my door with as much vigilance as I could. Eventually I heard a thump and crash, I quickly locked my door and armed myself with a bat I had in my room and waited. I soon heard screaming and it was hitting my door, he was abnormally strong and ended up breaking my door with a lamp I had in the living room. He charged at me with murderous intent, without thinking I blindly swung, I ended up hitting him in the head and he fell to the ground. It was a bloody mess, I checked and felt no pulse but I was so shaken up I could have been wrong.
I grabbed my keys and got in my car and drove to the courthouse, I bought a one way plane ticket to a different county (will not say what country in case anyone from the company finds this) as soon as the court house opened I went in and changed my name (again I will not mention this in case the company finds this) they said it would take weeks to process but I bribed them to get me all new documents immediately a long with a new SSN. It cost me a lot but I think I got away. I’m currently about to land and start my new life.