Kleptopolis
Two Clones were on a boat, fishing off the coast of the island.
"Alright Jeff, did you bring the bait?" the first Clone asked.
The other Clone didn't say anything. Instead, he held up a stick of dynamite, much to the first Clone's confusion.
"Uh, Jeff? You know that's not bait, right?" the first Clone questioned.
"No, Mark, it's better," Jeff explained, lighting the stick before dropping it in the water. "Ever heard of blast fishing?"
"I've heard of it, but I don't know what it is," Mark admitted.
"I looked it up. Instead of catching fish one at a time, we can just blow them out of the water!" Jeff explained.
"And… there aren't any drawbacks, right?" Mark questioned further.
"Well, the website I used said it was dangerous, illegal, and hurts the ecosystem… But hey, easy fish!" Jeff reasoned.
Mark, on the other hand, weighed the pros and cons on his fingers before shrugging it off. "Eh, what's the worst that could happen?"
Right after saying that, the boat they were on exploded, and they were sent straight into the air before splashing into the cold water.
"Mark!" Jeff screamed. "This is your fault!"
"My fault?!" Mark screamed back.
"Why didn't you tell me this was a bad idea?! You should've stopped me and now the boat's destroyed!"
"Are you saying you didn't realize it sooner? This is your fault!" Mark snapped back.
"Don't blame me! All I wanted to do today was go fishing with my friend!"
"I had all of our equipment! All you had to do was bring some bait! No one in their right mind uses dynamite as bait!"
While the two continued to argue, they were being watched by Zetal through a pair of binoculars.
"Such idiots…" he sighed. "I don't understand how the cloning machine makes Clones as dense as them. I'm just grateful there are some out there that aren't as dumb."
He took an elevator to the bottom of the tower, where after reaching ground level and passing a hall, he entered a room where the members of the Clone Tier usually gather.
"Case in point," he said to himself. "Alright, not-so-gentlemen, what's the latest? What improvements have you made for the island?"
A two-headed Clone is first to step up and respond. "Sir, me and Bikran-B have come up with the perfect solution to reduce the city's electricity usage," one of the heads announced.
"I don't know why I have to be called Bikran-B, I was created first…" the other head grumbled. "And by the way, I had nothing to do with it. Bikran-A's brilliant idea was to overload the city's power grid and cause a blackout."
"It is brilliant! It's effective, it's direct, and above everything, it solves the problem!" Bikran-A protested.
"How in the world is causing a blackout a good solution?"
"It is if you want people to stop using electricity. Wait for someone to fix the power grid, then overload it again!"
"Of course Bikran-A would think cutting the electricity like that would be a good idea. What a shocker!" a Clone with a hard hat and gigantic drills on his wrists quipped.
"Stay out of this, Handidrill!" the two heads shouted.
Handidrill simply smirked and shrugged at them in response.
"All I'm saying is that there are more practical ways to stop everyone from using so much electricity," Bikran-B reasoned.
"Wrong!" Bikran-A shouted. "I'll say it again– it's effective, it's direct, and it overshadows every other complaint anyone else may have!"
"With all due disrespect, I'll give you something to complain about!"
With that, Bikran-B slapped his other half and started a full-fledged fight, a fight where both heads could feel every blow to their body.
"That's enough!" Zetal shouted, tired of their bickering. "You both were created at the same time, and I know this because I was there. What I don't know is how the cloning machine managed to put two heads on one body. Aside from that, does anyone else have something they'd like to share?" he asked.
Bilehazzard tried to speak, but his words came out as a series of gurgles.
"Does anyone else have something meaningful they'd like to share?"
"If it's of any meaning to you," Handidrill said, "production in the salt mine has gone up dramatically! Drissile can confirm that, right, compadre?"
A Clone, also wearing a hard hat and carrying what looked like a mix between a rocket and a drill on his back nodded in response. "Affirmative. It's amazing how much salt you can make with a computer and an angry gamer."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Zetal asked.
In the salt mine, a Clone was searching for a spot to start mining when he heard angry shouting from behind a door. The Clone didn't recall a door being there, and even if that door was always there, there was no door frame attached to it.
Curious, the Clone walked over to the door, opened it, and was immediately met with a wave of salt.
"Are you serious?! That character is so overpowered!" the voice screamed.
"Louis!" the head of the mining operations exclaimed. "Didn't anyone tell you not to disturb our new employee?!"
Louis looked into the room to find another Clone playing a video game on a computer, salt all around them.
"This is so stupid! I dodged that!" The angry Clone screamed at his monitor before slamming his fists on the keyboard.
Louis looked at his boss and asked, "Sir, not only is having a computer in the mine impractical, what's powering it? It doesn't make sense!"
"Believe me, I thought the same thing, but Handidrill insisted," his boss sighed. "He said set up a computer down here and let your angriest worker use it to play video games. I questioned his logic, and he said it was either this or find some pirates to trade with, whatever that means."
The two looked over at the hills of salt.
"Looks like we have more salt than we know what to do with!" Louis's boss chuckled.
"That's great! So… can I go home early?" Louis asked.
"Nope! Now get to work."
Before anyone could do anything else, the Clone at the computer let out a shriek of fury.
"Come on, man! There was nothing I could do!" the angry Clone shouted, ripping off his headphones and snapping them in two in his fit of rage.
"...On second thought, go get this guy some new headphones," Louis's boss ordered.
Back at the tower, Zetal was still trying to figure out what Handidrill and Drissile meant when they said those words. "I guess I'll trust your judgement on that," he sighed. "Anyone else?"
"Big Boom learned new word!" Big Boom exclaimed, raising his hand.
"Oh, really?" Zetal asked. "What word did you learn?"
"Brains," Big Boom answered, smiling.
In response, Zetal groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Big Boom, this is the ninth time this month you've said you've 'learned' that word… and I sincerely wonder if you have any," he added under his breath. "Let me give you something to do for the day: go to the library, grab a book, and expand your vocabulary."
"Yes sir! Big Boom will make Larry's cab bigger!" Big Boom yelled, running off.
"Wha– no! I said vocabulary, not–"
But it was too late. Big Boom ran off, not bothering to open the door and opting to break it down instead, much to Zetal's dismay.
"The things I have to deal with…" he sighed. "Do you have anything to say, Meticopy?"
Meticopy, a Clone with no distinguishable features, save for the gear-shaped belt around his waist, shrugged and shook his head. "Nothing meaningful or new, I'll admit."
"Gotta say, I'm glad you're putting my Mini-Cloner to good use, but do you have to nitpick everything wrong about the Clones you make?" Zetal asked.
"If I don't, who will?" Meticopy joked as he used his belt to create another Clone from scratch. The process was similar to 3D-printing, with the Clone taking form from the legs up.
"Hmm… Nope! This Clone's shoes are too big! Restart!" he shouted, his creation disappearing instantly with the press of a button on his belt.
"Are you for real, Meticopy? That Clone could've come out just fine!" Zetal complained.
"If there's one thing I've learned in life, it's you can do it right, or you can do it badly," Meticopy fired back, erasing his next creation from the shoes alone.
"You don't even know what he would've looked like!"
"Their shoes weren't the right shade of black," Meticopy said.
"Can't you leave your perfectionism by the door when creating Clones?" Zetal requested.
"No can do, sir! Clones are the backbone of Kleptopolis, and without some semblance of perfection, how are we going to look when they inevitably put us on the map?" Meticopy reasoned.
"Inevitably? We've been trying to get Kleptopolis noticed for months now!" Zetal exclaimed. "Either our people keep scaring off the cartographers who pass by here, or someone out there is deliberately ignoring us! What's a guy gotta do to get their city noticed?"
He looked over at the remaining members of the Clone Tier and sighed. "The rest of you are dismissed. Go do the rest of your duties or whatever. I've got a phone call to make… as soon as I figure out what his number is."
As they watched Zetal type a set of numbers on his phone, Bikran, Bilehazzard, Handidrill and Drissile went their separate ways, leaving the room and heading to various areas of the city while Meticopy stayed at the other end of the room opposite to Zetal.
Back underground, Handidrill and Drissile were walking across the salt-covered floor, passing hills of salt, some of which were so high, they touched the underground ceiling!
"Nice to know that computer idea worked," Handidrill said, "because I don't know where we'd find pirates."
The two walked to a higher area in the mine, one that had less… salt. In this area, various veins of ore lined the walls, giving anyone who mined here the choice to dig up whatever they wanted.
"Hard to believe this area has so many precious metals just waiting to be dug up," Drissile said.
"I'm not impressed," Handidrill sighed. "We could find these any other day. Emeralds, diamonds… drillalldayanite, which I just made up– It's too easy to find now!"
After that small complaint, he began punching the wall with his drills. Chunks of rock flew out of the hole, some hitting Drissile but remaining unfazed.
After a while, Handidrill stopped drilling and stepped back to admire the fruits of his labor. Well, gems would be more accurate, as he found a glowing green ore.
"Well, hello! And what might you be?" he whispered to himself, reaching out to touch the ore. Before he could, he received a bonk on the head from Drissile's drill.
"Hold on," Drissile warned. "Isn't that the same ore that mutated who we now know as Bilehazzard?"
"Maybe? I only know that guy was sick at the time, but I doubt the same thing will happen to me, 'cause I ain't sick!" Handidrill responded, reaching out again, resulting in another bonk.
"Quarantine the area and report this discovery to our subordinates," Drissile advised. "We don't need any more inconveniences."
"Alright, alright," Handidrill groaned. "I'll let them know that they should take precautions when digging around here."
As he stumbled off, Drissile resumed drilling where his acquaintance had left off. As it turned out, there was more of this mysterious ore than what he had expected.
"I can't let him find out there's more of this stuff," he muttered to himself.
Immediately, he started drilling around the ore, trying to dispose of the evidence. While drilling, the cluster of ore fell into a hole, taking Drissile into another section of the mine that had more of the same ore. Amazingly, none of the ore had touched him.
"That was not what I meant to do, but if it means he doesn't see it, that's fine by me," he stated before using his drill to burrow into the side of the wall and tunnel back up to where he fell.
When Drissile got back to the grounds he fell from, Handidrill was standing in front of him.
"All good, compadre?" he asked.
"I'm fine. Small collapse in the mine is all," Drissile hastily replied, faking a cough. "What's next on the agenda?"
"Next, we figure out how to increase iron production," Handidrill replied. "I have an idea, and I'll need 17,000 boxes of cereal. Let's go!"
Meanwhile, Bilehazzard was in the forest far from the tower. Despite the island being a megalopolis, there was a very small area full of trees. These trees would be cut down and used for fuel, lumber, and the occasional giant log-throwing competition.
As Bilehazzard walked through the forest, he heard the sound of a tree falling but couldn't tell from where… until it was too late.
Two Clones holding axes walked over to the tree, one shaking their head. "Mike, you really have to warn others when a tree is about to fall. You never know who could be out here," the second Clone sighed.
"You worry too much, Richard," Mike chuckled. "It's just us and the other guys out here. Besides, trees make noise, and that should be enough of a warning to get out of the way."
"Trees only make noise after they fall, you–" Richard groaned in frustration. "Whatever, let's take a look at what we got here."
They took a look around the tree until they noticed a green puddle on the ground.
"What kind of sap is this?" Mike wondered, swiping his fingers against the puddle to taste it.
"Mike, I'm almost certain that's not sap…" Richard said.
"What makes you say that?" Mike asked.
"Because this stuff just started moving."
To Mike's ignorance, the puddle under the tree began shifting until it reshaped back into Bilehazzard's form. He began to shout, but as usual, it came out as a series of gurgles.
"I'm sorry, I thought it was sap!" Mike exclaimed.
"Wait, you can understand what he's saying?" Richard asked.
"You can't?" Mike asked back.
Bilehazzard gurgled something else before bursting into tears of joy. At least, he would be if those tears weren't immediately absorbed back into his skin.
"What's he saying now?" Richard asked.
"He's saying, and I quote: 'I'm so glad someone can finally understand me after so long! You have no clue of how much pain I had to suffer, the loneliness I had to face, the many, many pointless conversations I had to sit through because I couldn't interrupt them… but now, you understand me,'" Mike said.
Bilehazzard continued trying to speak, with Mike translating his words for Richard. Eventually, Bilehazzard gurgled something that caught Mike's interest.
"Would I like to join the Clone Tier?" Mike asked. "What sort of question is that?! Working alongside some of the most elite Clones on the island?! Yes!"
"I'm kinda proud of you, Mike," Richard said with a smile. "From being an ordinary glumberjack to one of Zetal's subordinates, you're really moving up in the food chain."
As Bilehazzard picked Mike up and carried him away in his hand, Richard waved goodbye to the two. "Later, Mike! Do all of us glumberjacks proud… because we all hate our jobs."
In the city, Bikran was still arguing with each other, shifting from figuring out how to reduce the city's electricity usage to agreeing to focus on smaller problems.
"Look at this!" Bikran-A exclaimed. "Some litterbug left an empty can on the ground!"
"Ironic how a piece of garbage left a piece of garbage sitting here," Bikran-B replied. "But since it's here, we should do something about it."
"You're right, we should!" Bikran-A agreed. "Let's hunt down whoever left this can here, shove the can down their throats, and stuff them in the trash! That ought to teach them a lesson!"
"Uh, why don't we just throw the piece of garbage away? Look, there's a trashcan right there," Bikran-B suggested, pointing to a trashcan on the opposite side of the street.
"Exactly! Stuff the no-good litterbug in the trashcan! You're speaking my language for once!"
"NO! I meant the can, not the Clone!"
"I know– We 'can' stuff the Clone in the trash and show him a lesson he'll never forget!"
"Are we seriously doing this again?" Bikran-B questioned. "If you're going to be like this, I'll do it myself!"
With that, Bikran-B picked up the can and headed straight to the trashcan without any resistance from his conjoined twin. As he was about to throw it away, his head was shoved into the trashcan.
"What have we learned today? Besides you are what you throw away?" Bikran-A asked.
"Oh, I'm not letting this slide! Come here!" Bikran-B shouted.
What followed after was another altercation that ended up with both of them in the trashcan. Fortunately for them, they saw who was likely the same Clone dropping a paper box on the ground.
The two heads looked at each other, and an evin grin formed on Bikran-A's face.
"A, don't even," Bikran-B warned.
"Tough toenails, B! We're doing things my way now!" Bikran-A replied, jumping out of the trashcan and chasing after the littering Clone.
Several Hours Later
Zetal and Meticopy were still in the same room in the tower. Zetal was still calling random numbers on his phone until he reached the line of one specific person.
"Hello?" the voice on the other end asked.
"Is this Bro's number? This is Zetal," he said.
Immediately, he heard a disconnect tone, so he had to redial.
"Pardon me, call dropped," Bro joked. "What do you want?"
"I was wondering if you knew any cartographers, or the mayor, or someone who could get Kleptopolis recognized," Zetal requested.
"I mean, we have cartographers everywhere. Your minions probably scared the ones who pass by your area," he taunted. "And I don't know the mayor either."
"Well, can't you do something? I've been trying to get this place on the map for months now!"
"I don't know what you're expecting me to do, in that case," Bro admitted.
"Something! Anything! I'm desperate here!" Zetal pleaded.
The line went silent for a moment before Bro spoke up.
"Fine, I'll see what I can do," he answered.
"Thank you," Zetal sighed in relief before hanging up on Bro. "Finally, Kleptopolis is gonna be on the map!"
Bro, who was now on the receiving end of the disconnect tone, hung up his side before blocking Zetal. "Not happening, ever," he muttered to himself. "Hey guys, you'll never believe who just called me…"
Meticopy easily noticed the cheery smile on Zetal's face. "I assume the call went well?"
"Very," he answered. "I'm sure Kleptopolis will get the recognition it deserves soon enough. In the meantime, how's that copy coming along?"
"It was very tedious, but I finally got everything down perfectly!" Meticopy said, dusting his hands.
Before the copy could do anything, it was crushed by Big Boom, who had made a hole in the wall.
"NOOOO! My copy!" Meticopy screamed. "The humanity!"
"Big Boom made Larry's cab bigger!" he announced with no regard to the Clone he was standing on.
"Who's Larry?" Handidrill groaned, clutching his stomach. "Doesn't matter, I guess. What matters is that me and Drissile found a strange ore in the mine. After that, we spent the rest of our day eating cereal to try to increase iron production."
"And just so it's clear, it didn't work out well for us," Drissile hiccuped.
"You know what did work out for us?" Bikran-A asked. "Our new trash removal system!"
"Which I absolutely hate, by the way," Bikran-B said. "Turning the civilians into Clone trashcans is not how you solve a littering problem!"
"It worked on the past three litterbugs. Who's to say it won't work on anyone else?" Bikran-A reasoned.
By now, everyone was focusing on Zetal, who looked like he was daydreaming.
"What's got the big boss in a good mood?" Drissile asked.
"He just got off the phone with someone and said the island will be on the map soon," Meticopy replied.
"Not just anyone," Zetal corrected. "My worst enemy is willing to pull some strings to get Kleptopolis on the map for me."
Everyone looked at each other, unconvinced.
"You are aware of what you just said, right?" Bikran-B asked. "Your worst enemy is willing to help you. Does that sound right to you?"
After realizing the island was not going to be on the map, Zetal immediately began calling Bro several times, all of which resulted in failure.
"I should've seen that coming," he said.
By now, Bilehazzard finally joined the others, a Clone on his shoulder.
"Well, look what the pile of sludge dragged in," Handidrill joked.
Bilehazzard gurgled something, and the Clone said, "Come up with something more clever than mocking my features, mole-man!"
"Excuse me?!"
"If you must know, my name is Mike. I was given the ability to understand Bilehazzard, and with it, I was invited by him to join the Clone Tier as his translator," Mike explained.
"Z-Zetal! You're not just going to stand here and accept this nonsense, are you?!" Handidrill stammered.
Zetal, who was already irritated, didn't say anything at first, but when he did, he started his complaints with a sigh. "Listen, my day was ruined when I realized we aren't going anywhere with this map thing. Just do whatever you want at this point. Mike, I'll have someone prepare a room for you. I'm going to bed."
While walking out of the room and overhearing the sounds of Mike's squeals of excitement and Handidrill's protests, Zetal could only mutter one thing to himself.
"The things I have to deal with…"