Self-discovery

A man was walking toward me on the paved path. I could see the green trees and white columns of the old institute building behind him. I was headed for the accounting office. Everything was normal in the grounds. The man had a slightly rolling gait, swinging his arms, and he didn't quite limp, but stepped more carefully with his right foot than with his left. I noticed that particularly. The wind made his raincoat flap and ruffled his red hair.

My first thought: “Where have I seen this guy?”

The closer we got to each other, the more I saw of him: his sloping forehead with a widow's peak and steep ridges over the eyes, flat cheeks with a reddish, week — old stubble, haughtily pursed lips, and bored, squinting eyes. No, we had definitely met before. It was impossible to forget an obnoxious face like that. And that jaw — my God! — it should be worn only in the closet.

My second thought: “Should I say hello or walk by indifferently?”

And then everything around me no longer existed. I tripped on the flat pavement and stood stock still. The person coming toward me was me.

My third thought (edited): “What the….”

The man stopped in front of me.

“Hello.”

“H — h — hello….” A thought sprang up from the chaos that ruled in my brain. “Hey, are you from the film studio?”

“The film studio? I recognize my independence!” My double smiled. “No, Val, the studios aren't planning a movie about us yet. Though now, who knows.”

“Listen here, I'm not Val to you, but Valentin Vasilyevich Krivo — shein! Some pushy guy like you….”

The man smiled, obviously enjoying my anger. I could tell that he was much more prepared for our meeting and was relishing his upper hand.

“And… be so kind as to explain: who you are, how you come to be on institute grounds, and why you are wearing that makeup and outfit to look like me?”

“Sure,” he said. “Valentin Vasilyevich Krivoshein, head of the New Systems Lab. Here's my pass, if you like.” He displayed my worn, used pass. “And I came here from the lab, naturally.”

“Ah, so that's it?” It's important not to lose your sense of humor in situations like this. “Very nice to meet you. Valentin Vasilyevich, you say? From the lab? I see… uh — huh.”

And then I realized that I believed him. Not because of the pass, of course. You could fool anyone with a pass. Either it was the realization that the scar over my eyebrow and the brown birthmark on my cheek, which I always saw in the mirror on my left, actually were supposed to be on the right side of the face. Or it was something in his behavior that absolutely ruled out the possibility of a practical joke. I was scared. Had I really gone mad during the experiments and run into my split personality? “I hope no one sees us. I wonder, to anyone else, am I here alone or are there two of us?” I thought.

“So — from the lab, you say?” I tried tricking him. “Then why are you coming from the old building?”

“I was in accounting. Today's the twenty — second.” He took out a roll of five — ruble notes and counted off part of it. “Here's your cut.”

I took the money and counted it. Then:

“Why only half?

“Oh, God!” my double sighed expressively. “There are two of us now, you know.”

(That exaggerated, expressive sigh — I'll never sigh like that. I didn't know you could demean someone with a sigh. And his diction — if you can call the absolute absence of diction diction! — do I really spit out words like that?)

“I took the money from him, and that means he really exists,” I thought. “Or are my senses tricking me? Damn it, I'm a researcher, and I couldn't care less about senses until I know what's going on here!”

“So you maintain that… you've come out of a locked and sealed lab?”

“Uh — hum. Definitely from the lab. From the tank.”

“From the tank, my, oh…. What do you mean, from the tank?”

“Just that, from the tank. You could have set up some handles. I barely managed to get out.”

“Listen, drop this! You don't think you could really convince me that you were. that I was. no, that you were made by the computer?”

The double sighed once more in the most demeaning manner possible.

“I have the feeling it's going to take you a long time to get used to the idea that this has happened. I should have known. After all, you saw that there was living matter in the flasks?”

“Big deal. I've seen mold, too, growing in damp places. But that didn't mean that I was present at the conception of life. All right, let's assume that something living did arise in the flasks. I don't know. I'm no biologist. But what do you have to do with it?”

“What do you mean?” Now it was his turn to get angry. “And what did you think it would create: an earthworm? a horse? an octopus? The computer was collecting and processing information about you. It saw you. It heard, smelled, and observed you. It counted the biowaves of your brain! You were around so much you callused its eyes! There you are. If you have motorcycle parts you can only make a motorcycle, not a vacuum cleaner.”