Self-discovery

By this time he had a clear understanding of the binary arithmetic of sensation: painful — pleasant. And it occurred to him that the simplest way of subjugating the cellular processes to his consciousness was to make them hurt. It was quite possible that the incident with the icicle prompted this discovery; the idea came to him right after it.

Of course, the cells that were deteriorating and dying from various causes let themselves be known very palpably. The organism itself, without any orders from “above” sent leucocytes, feverish tissue, enzymes, and hormones to help. All he had to do was either speed up or slow down these microscopic struggles for life.

He injected and cut muscles everywhere he could reach with a needle or a scalpel. He injected fatal doses of typhus and cholera bacteria cultures. He inhaled mercury vapor, drank mixtures of corrosive sublimate and wood alcohol. (He didn't have the nerve to try faster — acting poisons, however.) And the more he tried the better his organism handled all the dangers he was aware of.

And then he caused cancer in himself. Cause cancer! Any doctor would spit in his eye for an announcement like that. To cause cancer you have to know what causes cancer. To be perfectly honest, he wouldn't maintain that he knew the causes of cancer, but this was simply because he couldn't translate into words all the feelings that accompanied the changes in the skin on his right side. He began with questioning the patients who were undertaking gamma therapy at the lab. What did they feel? This was not kind — asking terrified, exhausted people, contorted by pain, about their experiences and not promising anything in return — but that was how he understood the image of a cancer patient.

The growth was getting bigger and harder. Smaller growths began branching off from it — strange greenish purple ones, like cauliflower. Pain chewed up his side and shoulder. At the university clinic, where he went for a diagnosis, they suggested an immediate operation, without even letting him leave the place. He got out of it by lying and saying that he wanted to undergo radiation therapy first.

Graduate student Krivoshein, crumpling a cigarette, stepped out onto the balcony. It was a warm night. A car, waving its headlights, raced down a side road. Two little lights, a red one and a green one, traveled from Cygnus to Lyra. Behind them followed the roar of a jet engine. Like a match across a cover, a meteor struck the sky.

Back in his room, standing in front of the mirror, he concentrated his will and feelings, and the growth melted away in fifteen minutes. Twenty minutes later there was nothing but a purple spot the size of a saucer. Another ten minutes later there was just his usual skin, in goose bumps — it was chilly in the room.

But he couldn't express his knowledge about stopping cancer in either prescriptions or medical advice. What he could describe in words wouldn't heal anyone, except maybe other doubles like himself. So all his knowledge applied only to them.

With time, probably, he would learn to overcome the barrier between the doubles of the computer — womb and regular people. After all, biologically they were not too different. And the knowledge was there. Even if he couldn't express it verbally, they could record the fluctuations of his biopotentials, graph his temperatures, develop numbers of analysis in computers — medicine was a precise science now. And finally they would come around to recording and transmitting precise sensations. Words were not necessary. The important thing for a sick person was to get well, and not to write a dissertation on his recovery. That wasn't the point.

The student's attention was riveted by a light exploding below. He looked closely: leaning against a lamp post, the fellow in the cape from yesterday, the detective, was lighting a cigarette. He tossed the match and walked away slowly.

“So he found me, the damn creep! He's stuck on me like a burr!” Krivoshein's mood was ruined. He went back inside and sat down to read the diary.

Chapter 14

Life is short. There is barely enough time to make an adequate

number of mistakes. Repeating them, that's an unforgivable

luxury.

— K. Prutkov — engineer, Thought 22

Now the student was reading the notations with envious curiosity. Well, what had he achieved, when all he wanted was to twirl knobs?

June I. Phew… finished! The information chamber is ready. I begin the experiments with the rabbits tomorrow. If I follow tradition, I should begin with frogs. but I would never pick the disgusting things up! No, let my double play with toads. He's a brilliant student, quite industrious.

I wonder how he's doing.

June 2.1 equipped the rabbits with electrodes and sensors and put them all in the chamber. Let them overload it with information.