“Screw it,” he said to his own face. “I’m growing a beard.”
Chapter 8
Day 56
When Charles Scott came to the lab apartment periodically to “chat,” it never felt like anything quite so casual and spontaneous to Jeremiah. More often, in fact, he was left thinking he’d somehow managed to do something wrong. Scott had a way of making everyone around him feel like they weren’t quite living up to his lofty expectations.
On a Tuesday morning, however, when Scott came in through the front door without knocking, Jeremiah was glad for the chance to talk to him. He had a growing list of questions of his own.
He poured them each a coffee, and they settled in on the leather couches where Jeremiah answered Scott’s standard interrogation without discussion: Yes, he was still convinced that the clone was a perfect replica of himself; No, he hadn’t been surprised by any of the clone’s actions in recent viewings; He was, indeed, getting enough exercise; Sure, he and Brent were getting along fine, no problems there.
Before Scott could make a hasty exit, as he typically did once he was satisfied with these meetings, Jeremiah turned the conversation to his own concerns.
“You know, Dr. Scott, it’s occurred to me that we never really discussed what happens at the end of this, once our contract expires.”
“At the conclusion of the experiment you will be returned to your own life, Mr. Adams, just as we’ve agreed. There’s nothing to discuss.”
“I mean the details,” Jeremiah said. “We never talked about how that is going to happen. When this year is over, what do you do with the clone?”
“Do with him?”
“What happens to him? Do you just get rid of him?”
“If you’re asking, Mr. Adams, do we kill him, the answer is no. I assume you’d agree that wouldn’t be the right thing to do.”
Jeremiah was glad to hear it. Despite everything, the notion had bothered him. The clone, after all, was blameless in all of this, and in the clone’s own mind, he was fully human. True or not, that belief had to mean something. He was Jeremiah, for all intents and purposes. It seemed unnecessarily callous to just discard him.
“But there can’t be two of us. How is it done, then?”
Scott took a measured sip of his coffee before he answered. “They say everyone has a doppelganger somewhere in the world, Mr. Adams. This will be yours. We will input a new memory file into the clone, an entirely new identity, and send him on his way. It’s easily arranged.”
The idea of his clone walking around freely somewhere in the world was troubling.
“You just give him a new life?”
“Essentially, yes.”
“Don’t you think that’s risky? What if he comes back? What if we run into each other at the gas pump or something?”
“We have ways around that with the Meld. Stop worrying.”
“I just want to be certain you’ve thought this through,” Jeremiah told him. “He has my DNA, you know. He’ll be walking around with my DNA. That’s a problem.”
“Why?”
“What if he decides to rob a bank? What if he kills someone?”
“He won’t. We can see to that with Meld, as well. He won’t have the inclination to do anything like that, or the capacity. We’ll take care of it.”
“What if he starts a family?” Jeremiah asked. “What if he has kids?” The idea, which had only just entered his mind, was positively frightening to him. Those would be his children, he realized. His own flesh and blood, essentially. Children who shouldn’t be born.
Charles Scott dismissed the issue with a shake of his head.
“Sterilization,” he said, “is a straightforward procedure.”
“And what about me?” Jeremiah asked after a moment. “I’m just supposed to slip back into my old life with $10 million in my pocket? How do I explain that to my family?”
“You do like to dwell on the mundane, don’t you? The winning lottery ticket has already been printed. Calm down, Mr. Adams.”
Before Jeremiah could protest that he’d never purchased a lottery ticket in his life, Brent came in through the front door and Scott stood up to face him.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Dr. Scott,” Brent said. “I wasn’t aware you’d be here. I can come back.”
“No need, Mr. Higgins,” Scott told him. “We’re done here. You have work to do.”
As he moved toward the door to leave, though, Charles Scott’s half-filled coffee cup dropped from his hand as though the man had simply let it go without a second thought. Coffee saturated the carpet, a dark spot expanding rapidly, and all three of them went momentarily still in sudden surprise.
It was Brent who moved first, rushing over and picking up the toppled cup, while Jeremiah went to the kitchen to grab a roll of paper towels. Charles Scott, after a noticeable hesitation, bent down and began mopping at the spill with his own handkerchief.
“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Adams,” he said. The sincerity of the words sounded foreign coming from him. Scott wasn’t prone to apologies. Jeremiah thought he seemed unnecessarily rattled over the accident.
“Don’t worry,” Jeremiah told him, pressing a thick wad of towels into the rug. “It’s not my carpet.”
Scott stood up and folded his soiled handkerchief into his fist. “I’m sure I don’t know how that happened,” he said. “I’ll send someone to clean it right away.”
His composure somewhat restored, Scott turned on his heels and left the room in a hurry, the front door closing behind him.
Brent looked down at Jeremiah and smiled. “That was strange,” he said. “You think I make him nervous?”
“You aren’t nearly as threatening as you think you are,” Jeremiah said.
A half hour later, they were settled in front of the monitor watching the clone’s uneventful morning at
