learn all the joys of
communal  living with  this  one: arguments over Lena, worries that we'll be
caught, the problems of the bed versus the  cot.... And most important: this
is not  what  I had expected  from the new experiment.  The  experiment is a
success. The computer is re-creating me. But I have to move beyond that.
     And  if  I dissolve him with the  command "No!"-isn't that  death? But,
forgive me,  whose  death is  it? Mine? No, I'm still alive. The double's in
the vat? But he doesn't exist yet.
     Is this all subject to the rule of law-my experiments? And on the other
hand, is this abuse of my work? My double was right: there is really strange
work.
     And it all  stems, I guess, from faintheartedness. In  our modern world
people in the name of ideals and political goals go forth and send others to
kill and die.  There are ideas and goals that justify it. And I have a great
idea  and a  great  goal:  to  create a method that improves  man  and human
society. I won't spare myself, if need be.  Then why am I afraid to give the
command "No!"  for  the sake  of  my work?  I  have  to  be firmer,  if  I'm
undertaking this work.
     Especially  since  this  isn't  death.  Death  is  the disappearance of
information   about  a  man,  but  the  information  is  not  lost   in  the
computer-womb;  it  merely  changes  form,  from  electrical  impulses   and
potentials  to  man. And  I  can always  give  them another  double if  they
want....
     I  pondered  until   the  hoses  leaving  the  tank  began  contracting
rhythmically, emptying out the excess liquid. Then I put  on  the Crown  and
gave the command.
     It's  not a pleasant sight:  there was a  man-and he dissolved. I still
feel bad....  All right,  pal,  don't rush. I'll make you fine and dandy. Of
course, I can't give you more brains than what I've got myself, but at least
I'll give you looks that will  make you  reel.  After all,  you have lots of
flaws,  as  I do: slightly  bowed  legs,  hips  too  wide and  fat,  rounded
shoulders,  a  stumpy torso, masses of excess hair on the legs,  chest,  and
back.  And protruding  ears,  and  a  jaw that makes me look like a complete
dolt. And my forehead, and my nose . . . no, let's be self-critical. It just
won't do!
     August 6.  Experiment number 2-things get harder by  the hour! Today  I
decided to improve on the looks of a new double and  got so messed up that I
don't even want to think about it.
     I began knowing exactly what was "not it" in my  looks. (Actually, it's
all "not  it," if  it can be changed.)  But what was "it?" In my experiments
with the rabbits the criterion for "it"  was whatever I felt like. But a man
is no rabbit;  even though they say one head is good, and two are better, no
one ever thought that in a biological sense.
     After my command of "You may!" the image of the new double appeared and
the semitransparent lilac muscles of the  stomach  had  started disappearing
under  a  layer  of yellow  fat,  I gave  the  signal  "That's not  it!" The
computer, obeying my imagination, dissolved the fat tissue where  I  saw it:
on the stomach and near the neck, leaving it on the back and sides.
     I  hadn't noticed  that right  away, because I was working on the face.
Mentally I gave the double a noble brow, but when I looked at the profile, I
was  aghast:  the skull  had  been flattened!  And  the  shape of  the  brow
contradicted the rest of the face.
     In a word, I was lost. The computer took that for a total  "not it" and
dissolved the double.
     I was  at  dead-end. "It was obviously  the beauty of the  human  body.
There  are  classical  examples of it.  But...  turning  my  double  into  a
pleasant-looking  man with classic features in  the  course of two hours  of
synthesis was something that was  beyond the  powers of not only me,  but of
the  most qualified member  of the Artists' Union of the USSR! My  only hope
was that the computer was remembering all the changes made on the double.
     Then I  gave the order "You may!" once  more.  Yes,  the  computer-womb
remembered everything: the double retained all my  clumsy changes.  That was
better, I could work as many sessions as was necessary.
     In that session I got rid of the excess fat from the double's body. His
pot belly disappeared.  You  could even  see his waist. And his neck took on
definite outline. That was enough for  a start. "No!" Everything disappeared
and I ran over to the city library.
     I'm leafing through Professor G. Gicescusy Atlas of  Plastic Anatomy (I
also have four richly illustrated books on Renaissance art),  learning about
the proportions  of the human body, picking  out the double's  looks  like a
suit  off  the  rack.  The  canons  of  Leonardo  da Vinci,  of  Durer,  the
proportions of Schmidt-Friech.... It seems  that in a  proportionate man the
buttocks are exactly at mid-height. Who would have thought!
     God, what a poor engineer had to learn!
     I'm taking Hercules as my basis since he is shown from all angles.
     August 74. The  twelfth  experiment-and  it's still  not  right.  Still
lopsided and  vulgar. First one leg is shorter than the other, then the arms
don't match. Now I'm going to try the proportions of Durer's Adam.
     August 20. The proportions are right. But the face ... an eyeless, dead
copy with Krivoshein's features. Large rust-colored marble curlicues instead
of hair. In a word, today was the twenty-first "No!"
     Someone careful and suspicious inside me keeps asking  "Is this it? The
method you're developing now, is this the method?"
     I think so, yes. Anyway, it's  a step in  the right direction. For now,
in order  to  synthesize  a  man, I introduce only high-quality  information
about his body. But in the same manner we could  (and in time we'll work out
how  to  do  it)  introduce  any information gathered  by humanity  into the
computer-womb on the best human  qualities,  and create  not only externally
beautiful  and physically  strong people,  but ones  who  are beautiful  and
strong in mental and spiritual qualities as well. Usually  the good is mixed
with  the bad  in people: he's smart  but  weak in spirit; he's got a strong
will but  applies it  to  trifles  either through stupidity or ignorance, or
he's firm, and kind,  and smart, but sickly . .  . and with this  method  we
could get rid of all  the bad and synthesize only the best qualities into  a
person.
     "A synthetic knight without fear or flaw"-that must sound terrible. But
what's the difference in  the end: whether they're synthetic  or natural? As
long as  there are plenty  of them. There  are so few "knights"-personally I
only know them from movies  and books. And yet we need  them so much in real
life. There'll  be room and work for all of  them. And each will be able  to
influence the world to be a better place.
     August 28. It's working! Pathetic daubers with their brushes who try to
capture the beauty and power of living person in a dead medium. Here  it is,
my "brush," an electrochemical machine, a continuation of my  brain. And I'm
an engineer, not  an artist. Without using my hands, through the power of my
mind, I am creating beauty in life with life.
     The delicate and precise  proportions of Durer's Adam with the rippling
muscles of Hercules. And the face is  handsome. Two  or three more tries ...
and I'm done.
     September 1. The first day on the calendar! I'm on my way to the lab. I
have  pants, shirt, and shoes  for him.  Into the suitcase. And don't forget
the movie camera-I'm going to film the appearance of the magnificent double.
I'm anticipating  what an effect  that home  movie  will have someday when I
show it!
     I'm going over  there, put  on Monomakh's Crown, and mentally I'll give
the order . . . no, I'll say it out loud, damn it, in a strong and beautiful
voice, the way the Lord had spoken in a similar situation:
     "You may! Appear into this world, double Adam-Hercules-Krivoshein!"
     "And the Lord saw that it was good...."
     Of course, I'm not  God. I spent a month creating a man, and He managed
on a shortened workday, Saturday. But was that work?



        Chapter 16


     Man  has  always  considered himself smart-even when he  walked on  all
fours and curled his tail like  a handle on a lea-kettle. In order to become
smart, he'll have to feel that he is stupid at least once.
     -K. Prutkov-enzhener, Thought 59

     The next entry in the diary shocked student Krivoshein with its uneven,
changed handwriting.
     September 6.  But I didn't want... I didn't  want  something like this!
All I can do is shout to the sky: I didn't want  it! I  tried to make things
come out well... without any  mistakes. I  didn't  even sleep nights. I just
lay there with  my  eyes shut, picturing  all the details of Hercules' body,
and then Adam's, noting which features should be added to my double.
     I couldn't do it all in one session. No way-that's why I dissolved him.
I couldn't  let out a cripple with arms  and legs of different length. And I
couldn't possibly  have  known that each time I dissolved  him I killed him.
How could I have known?
     As  soon  as the liquid cleared  his  head and  shoulders,  the  double
grabbed the edge of the tank with his powerful hands and jumped  out.  I was
running the movie camera,  capturing the historic moment  of a man appearing
from a machine. He  fell  on the  linoleum before me, sobbing with a hoarse,
howling cry. I ran to him:
     "What's the matter?"
     He was hugging my leg  with  his sticky hands, rubbing his head against
them, kissing my hands as I tried to lift him.
     "Don't kill  me, don't  kill  me! Don't  kill  me any more! Why do  you
torture me, aaah!  Don't! Twenty-five  times you've  killed  me, twenty-five
times. Aaah!"
     But I hadn't known. I couldn't know that his consciousness revived with
every experiment! He understood that I was reshaping his  body, doing what I
wanted with him, and he couldn't do a thing about it. My command "No!" first
dissolved  his  body, and then  his  consciousness  dimmed. Why didn't  that
artificial  idiot tell me that  the consciousness begins functioning  before
the body?


     "Damn it!"  the student muttered. "Really-the brain  must  be unplugged
last. When was that?"  He turned the pages and sighed with a certain relief.
No, it  wasn't his fault. In August and September he couldn't have told him,
he didn't know it himself. If  he were running the experiment, he would have
made the same mistake.


     And so I got a man  with  a classic  physique, a pleasant look, and the
broken spirit of a slave. "A knight without fear or flaw."


     Go ahead, look for a scapegoat, you  louse. You didn't know; you tried!
But did you!? Wasn't it conceit, self-love? Didn't you feel like God sitting
up in  the  clouds  in  a labeled leather  armchair?  A  god, on whose whims
depended the appearance and disappearance of a man,  whether he would  be or
not be.  Didn't  you  experience an intellectual passion when  you gave  the
computer-womb the orders over and over: "You may!" and "Not it!" and "No!"?


     He tried to escape from the  lab immediately. I barely talked  him into
washing up and dressing. He was trembling. There could be no question of his
working alongside me in the lab.
     He spent  five  days with me^  five horrible days. I  kept hoping  he'd
relax,  get  better.  No way! No, he was healthy  in body, knew  everything,
remembered everything-the computer-womb  recorded all my information in him,
my  knowledge, my memory-but the  terror of his  experience was overwhelming
and  could not be controlled by  his will or thoughts.  His hair turned gray
the first day from the memories.
     He was terrified of me. When  I  would come home,  he would jump up and
get into a position  of submission: his gladiator's back would hunch and his
arms, bulging with rippling muscles, would hang limp. He was trying  to look
smaller. And his eyes-oh, God, those eyes! They looked at  me with a prayer,
entreaty, with a  panic-stricken readiness to do anything  to mollify  me. I
felt terrified and guilty. I've never seen a man look that way.
     And tonight,  sometime after three... I don't know why I woke up. There
was a dead  gray light from the streetlights on the ceiling. Adam the double
was standing  over my bed with a raised dumbbell. I could see his muscles in
his right arm tense for the blow. We stared at each other for a few seconds.
Then he  giggled nervously and moved  away, his bare feet scuffling  on  the
wood floor.
     I sat up on the bed and turned on the overhead  light. He was crouching
on  the floor by  the closet, his  head on his knees. His  shoulders and the
dumbbell in his hand were shaking.
     "What's the matter?" I  asked.  "You should  strike, once you've aimed.
You would have felt better."
     "I can't  forget,"  he muttered in a hollow baritone through the  sobs.
"You see, I can't forget how you used to kill me... twenty-five times!"
     I opened the desk, took out my passport, engineering degree, what money
there was, and shook  him  by the  shoulder. "Get up! Get dressed and go. Go
off somewhere, make a life for yourself, work, live. We won't be  able to do
anything  together. No rest for you or me. It's not my fault! Damn it, can't
you understand that I didn't know? I was doing something that had never been
done. Surely  there were  things I couldn't have known. A man  can be born a
monster or mentally  ill, or become that  way after an illness or  accident,
but then it's  nobody's  fault, nobody  to bash with a dumbbell.  If you had
been in my place, the  same  thing would have happened,  because you are me!
Understand?"
     He was backing toward the wall, shaking. That sobered me up.
     "I'm sorry. Take my papers.  I'll manage here somehow.  Here,"  I said,
opening the passport, "you look  more like me on the picture than  I do. The
photographer  must have tried to perfect my features, too. Take the money, a
suitcase, clothes-and go  where you  want.  You'll live on your  own, work a
bit, and maybe things will be easier for you."
     Two hours  later he  was gone. We agreed that he would write to me from
wherever he settled. He won't write....
     It's a good sign that he tried to kill me. That means he's no slave. He
feels hurt and insulted. Maybe things will work out for him?
     And I'm sitting here  without  a  thought  in my head.  I have to start
over. Oh, nature, what a bitch you are! How you enjoy laughing at our ideas!
You seduce us, and then....
     Drop it! Stop  looking for someone to blame. Nature  has nothing to  do
with it, it  is  part of your work only on an elementary level. And the rest
is all you. Don't try to get out of it.
     The alarm went off: 7:15. Time to get up, shave, wash,  and go to work.
A murky sun over  the buildings,  the sky full of  smoke, dirty, like an old
curtain.  The wind  raised  dust, whipping  the trees, blowing  through  the
balcony door. Downstairs  a bus licks people  off the street  at  the stops.
They gather again,  and they  all have the  same expression on  their faces:
can't be late for work!
     And  I have to  get to work  too.  I'll get to  the lab,  jot down  the
results of  my  unsatisfactory  experiment,  and  console  myself  with  the
bromides:  "You learn from  your mistakes;" "There  are  no  beaten paths in
science;" and so on. And I'll  start the next experiment. And I'll make more
mistakes and destroy not guinea pigs, but... people? You conceited, dreaming
cretin, armed with the latest technology!
     The wind whips  the trees. It was all in the past: the days of research
and  discovery, the evenings of meditation, the nights of dreaming. And here
you are, the cold, clear morn, wiser than the night. Merciless morning! It's
probably in this sober time that women who had dreamed all night of having a
child go for an abortion. And  I  had  an abortion.  I dreamed. I wanted  to
bring happiness to the world, and I've created two miserable people already.
I'll never master this work. I'm weak, unneeded, and  stupid. I must take up
something mediocre, that  I can handle-for an article, for  a  dissertation.
And then everything will be fine.
     The wind whips the trees. The wind whips the trees....
     On the next balcony there's a recording of Mozart's Requiem playing. My
neighbor, associate professor Prishchepa, wants  to  get into a mathematical
mood first thing  in the morning. "Requi . .  .  requiem...." The voices are
bidding farewell to someone clearly and simply.  This is good music to shoot
oneself by. Nobody would notice the shot.
     The wind whips the trees.
     What have I  done?  And yet  I  had doubts,  and then  not  doubts  but
knowledge. I  knew  that  any change  I  made  stayed  with  him,  that  the
computer-womb remembered everything. I didn't pay attention. Why?
     I had a thought, not expressed in words, so that I wouldn't be ashamed,
or  a feeling of well-being  and safety, I  guess: "after all, it's not  me.
It's  not happening to  me...." And also a feeling of  impunity: "Whatever I
want, I'll do. Nothing will happen to me...."
     You  won't  shoot  yourself,  you  animal!  You won't  do  anything  to
yourself-you'll live to  a  ripe  old  age and even  set  yourself up as  an
example to others.
     The wind whips the trees. The bus licks people off the stops.
     I don't want to go to work.
     September  20. Gray  asphalt. Gray clouds. The  motorcycle swallows  up
miles  like  noodles.  A  kid  stops  by the road,  and I can tell  from his
position that he's decided to be a motorcyclist on a red bike  when he grows
up. Be a motorcyclist, kid; just don't become a researcher.
     I keep accelerating.  The speedometer  says over ninety.  The  wind  is
lashing my  face. Here  comes  a dump truck,  hogging  most of the  road, of
course.  Those  bastard truckdrivers, they don't  take  bikers  for  people.
Always trying to ride us off the road. Well, I'm not yielding to this one!
     No, there was no crash. I'm alive. I'm writing  down how I  tore around
glassy-eyed today. I have to write about  something. The truck veered to the
right at the last second.  I watched in the rear view mirror as  the  driver
pulled over and ran into the road, waving his fists at me.
     Actually, if I had  crashed, what difference would it  make?  There's a
spare Krivoshein in  Moscow.  I can't describe my  repulsion and disgust for
everything right now. Including me.
     How he shook, how he hugged my feet-the strong, handsome "not me."  And
I could have foreseen it and spared him. I could have! But I thought: "It'll
work like this. What the hell! After all, he's not me."
     And  it was so  interesting, good,  beautiful.  We dreamed and  talked,
worried about the good of mankind, swore a vow. What shame! And in the work,
I  overlooked  the  fact  that  I  was  creating  a  man.  I  thought  about
everything-exquisite forms,  intellectual content-but that  it might hurt or
scare him  never  entered  my  mind.  I  just  decided  that  there  was  no
informational  death in the experiment-and  fine.  But death was a  violence
that I performed on him over and over.
     How did it happen? How?
     The   white  posts  along   the  highway  reflect   the  motor's   hum:
but-but-but-but how  did  it happen? But-but-but-but  how?  The  speedometer
reads  110, the gray stripes of earth and trees whiz  by.  At  this  speed I
could escape  from pursuers or  save someone, getting there  in  time! But I
have no one to run away from and no one to save. I did have someone to save,
but I had to do some honest thinking there ... and I didn't.
     I can master heights, elements, with my brain and brawn. It's easy with
the elements. They can be mastered. But how do you master yourself?
     I  just  went  over  the  diary-and  I'm  frightened  by  how  low  and
self-serving  my thoughts  are! Here  I am  discussing how  troubles  befall
people because they are unprincipled, that they think  they can  live off to
the side, not get involved, and a few  pages later I  cleverly make sure I'm
off to the side: don't get mixed up with Harry Hilobok, let him get his damn
doctoral  dissertation ....  Here I'm  thinking  about how to derive benefit
from my discovery, and here I call myself to do cruel acts with reference to
wars  and murders  in the world.  Here I (or  me and the  double, it doesn't
matter) lower myself to the level of  an ordinary engineer, who can't handle
such difficult work-a  moral insurance in case  it doesn't work; and when it
does work,  I compare myself  to the gods. And I wrote  all this  sincerely,
without noticing any contradictions.
     Without noticing? I didn't want to  notice them! It was so pleasant and
convenient  that way: preen, lie to  myself with an open heart, adjust ideas
and facts  to fit  my moral comfort. So  it  turns  out I thought more about
myself than about humanity?  It  turns  out that this work, if evaluated not
from a scientific but a moral  position, was nothing more  than showing off?
Of course, where would I find the time to worry about my guinea pigs!
     What kind of a man are you, Krivoshein?
     September 22. I'm not working. I can't work now. Today I  rode down  to
Berdichev for some reason and by the way, I understood the hidden meaning of
the mysterious  phrase that was  printed out  one day. Twenty-six  kopeks is
what it costs  to fuel up to get from Berdichev to Dneprovsk: five liters of
gas, two hundred grams of oil. I've unearthed another discovery!
     Where is Adam now? Where did he go?
     And  that creature that  the  machine  tried  to create after the first
double: half-Lena, half-me. It, too, must have suffered the horrors of death
when we ordered the computer to dissolve it? And my father.  Oh damn! Why am
I thinking about that?
     My  father...  the last  cossack in the Krivoshein  line. According  to
family tradition,  my forefathers come from the Zaporozhian cossacks.  There
was  a brave cossack whose neck was damaged in battle-and there you  get the
Krivoshein line. When  Empress  Catherine broke them  up, they moved to this
side  of the Volga. My grandfather Karp Vasilyevich  beat up  the priest and
the head of  the village when  they decided to get rid of the village school
and set up a church school. I haven't the slightest idea what the difference
was between them, but my grandfather died at hard labor.
     Father  took part in all the revolutions, and served under  Chapayev in
the Civil War.
     He fought in the last war as an old man, and  only the first two years.
They were retreating  in the Ukraine  and  he led his  battalion out from an
ambush in Kharkov. Then because of wounds and age,  they  transferred him to
the rear, as a commander on the other side of the Urals. There, in the camp,
a soldier and peasant, he taught me how to ride, how to take care of a horse
and saddle it,  how to plow, mow, shoot from a rifle and a  pistol, dig  the
earth, and chop brambles  with a machette. He also made me kill chickens and
pigs by stabbing  them  under the  right  shoulder  blade with a  small flat
knife, so that I wouldn't fear blood. "It'll come in handy in life, sonny!"
     Shortly before  his  death  he and  I  went down  to  his  homeland  in
Mironovka, to see  his cousin Egor  Stepanovich  Krivoshein.  While we  were
sitting in his cottage drinking, Egor's grandson rushed over:
     "Cramps,  they  dug out a body from  the  clay  in Sheep's Gully  where
they're digging the dam!"
     "In  Sheep's Gully?"  my father asked. The old men  exchanged  a  look.
"Let's go see."
     The  crowd of workmen and onlookers made way  for the two  old men. The
gray, chalky  bones were piled up in one spot. Father poked the skull with a
stick, and it turned over, revealing a hole over the right temple.
     "Mine!" father said looking at Egor Stepanovich triumphantly.  "And you
missed. Your hand shook, huh!"
     "How do you know it's  yours?"  the other demanded  sticking his  beard
into the air.
     "Have you forgotten? He was coming back  to the village. I was right on
the side of the road, you were on the left,..." and father drew a picture in
the clay to prove his point.
     "Whose remains are these,  old  men?" a young  foreman in a fancy shirt
demanded.
     "The  captain," father explained,  squinting. "In the first  revolution
the Ural  cossacks were  quartered here, and this  here  was their  captain.
Don't bother the police with it, sonny. It's been over a long time."
     How  marvelous it  was to lie  in  wait in  the steppe  at  night  with
father's  gun, waiting for the captain-both for the  principle  and the fact
that the  bastard ripped up men with his bayonet and raped girls! Or to  fly
on horseback, feeling the weight of your saber in your hand, taking measure:
I'll  chop that one over there, with beard, from  his  epaulets all  the way
through!
     The last time I fought was eighteen years ago, and it wasn't a fight to
the death, only to the school bell. I never galloped in the days of old. All
my bravado comes on a bike facing down a truck.
     And I'm not afraid, father, of  blood or death. But your simple lessons
never did come in  handy. The revolution continues through different  means,
with discoveries  and inventions-weapons more dangerous than sabers. And I'm
afraid, father, of making mistakes.
     Liar!   Liar!  You're  preening  again,  you  low-life!  You   have  an
ineradicable streak  of  showing  off.  Oh, it's so pretty: "I'm  scared  of
making mistakes, father," and all about the revolution. Don't you dare!
     You  wanted  to  synthesize  in  people  (yes, people,  not  artificial
doubles!)  the nobility  of  spirit that you lack, the beauty that you don't
have, the determination  you'll never have, and  the  selflessness you can't
even dream of.
     You come from  a good family. Your forefathers knew  how to work and to
leave good work behind them, and to beat the bastards with fist or gun. They
didn't let up. And what are you? Have you fought  for justice? Oh, you never
had an opportunity? Maybe you've cleverly managed to avoid them? What, don't
feel like remembering?
     That's the problem. I'm afraid of everything: life, people. I even love
Lena in a cowardly way: I'm afraid to bring her close and I'm afraid to lose
her. And God forbid, no children. Children complicate things.
     And the fact that I'm hiding my discovery-isn't that also a fear that I
won't be able to develop  it properly? And I probably won't. I'm a weakling.
One of those smart  weaklings  who  are better off not being  smart. Because
their brain is only given them so that they can appreciate their lowness and
impotence.


     Graduate  student Krivoshein  lit  up a  cigarette  and paced  the room
nervously. It was painful reading the notes-it was about him, too. He sighed
and returned to the desk.
     Easy, Krivoshein, easy. You can talk yourself into something hysterical
this way. You still  have the responsibility  for the work... and everything
isn't lost yet. You're not  such a son of  a bitch that you should drop dead
immediately.
     I  can  even make  you look  good.  I haven't  used  the discovery  for
personal gain, and I won't.  I worked at peak capacity,  and I didn't cheat.
Now I'm trying to figure things out. So I'm not worse  than others. I made a
mistake. And who doesn't?
     Yes, but in  this work  comparisons on a relative  scale-who's  better,
who's worse-don't apply. Others study  crystals  or  develop machines;  they
know their work,  and that's enough. Their character  flaws only  harm them,
their  co-workers  at the lab, and their  relatives. But  I'm  different. In
order to create Man, it's not enough to know, to have a scientific handle on
the  thing-you have to be a  real Man yourself,  not  better  or  worse than
others, but in the absolute sense a knight without fear  or flaw. I wouldn't
mind  that at  all, but I don't know how to go about  it. I  don't  have the
information.
     Does that mean that I can't handle this work?
     October 8. The yellow and red autumn is in the institute grounds, and I
can't work. It's full of dry leaves, the lightest rain makes a lot of  noise
on them,  and then there's  a coffee aroma  of  rotten leaves. And  I  can't
work....
     Maybe I  shouldn't, it's not needed? A good generic  stock,  a  quality
education, a hygienic  life-style.... Let smart people re-create themselves,
have lots of children with good stock. They'll be able to feed  them,  their
salaries  will stretch; after all, they're smart people. And they'll be able
to bring them up. They're smart people. No computers will be necessary.
     Harry Hilobok called  today. They're organizing a permanent exhibit  at
the institute: "The Achievements of Soviet Systemology," and naturally, he's
the organizer.
     "Won't you contribute something, Valentin Vasilyevich?"
     "No."
     "Why  are  you  like  that? Now  Ippolit  Illarionovich  Voltampernov's
department is  giving three exhibits and  other  departments  and  labs  are
contributing.  We should have at least one exhibit  on your topic. Don't you
have anything yet?"
     "No. How's the biosensor system moving, Harry Haritonovich?"
     "Eh,  Valentin  Vasilyevich,  what's  one  system compared  to  all  of
systemology, heh-heh! We're working on it, but meanwhile you see, everyone's
demanding exhibit stands,  mock-ups, tableaux, signs in three languages, and
our heads  are spinning. The lab  and the workshops are full up,  but if you
should have  anything  for  the show, we'll manage. Things  are  going  fast
around here."
     I almost said that it was the system that I  needed to come up  with an
exhibit for your stupid show  but I controlled myself. (Let him make it  and
then we'll see.) Always being sneaky, Krivoshein!
     My  exhibits were all over the world. One was in Moscow struggling with
biology.  The others were munching grass and cabbage in gardens. And another
just ran off to who knows where.
     Should I exhibit  the computer-womb to shock the academic world? Create
two-headed and six-footed  rabbits as part of the demonstration, at the rate
of two an hour? That would create a stir.
     No,  brother. This  machine  makes man. And there's no  way of  getting
around that.



        Chapter 17


     Every  action carries  obligations.  Inaction  doesn't  oblige  you  to
anything.
     -K. Prutkov-enzhener

     October  11. I'm repeating the experiments in  controlled synthesis  of
rabbits-just  so  that  the  mechanism  doesn't  sit around for nothing. I'm
filming  it   all.  I'll   have  a  documentary.  "Citizens,   present  your
documentaries!"
     October 13. I've invented a method of destroying biological information
in  the computer-womb quickly  and dependably.  You can call it an "electric
eraser." I  use tension from  the  noise generator as  input for the crystal
unit and TsVM-12  and 15-20 minutes  later  the computer  forgets everything
about  the rabbits. If I  had had this method  earlier instead  of the order
"No!" I would have destroyed Adam each time irreversibly and fundamentally.
     I just don't know if he would have liked that any better.
     Time is making the leaves fall and the sky grow cold. And my work isn't
moving. I can't undertake serious work now. I don't have the stomach for it.
I'm lost.
     Here, Krivoshein! You can now take it as conclusively demonstrated that
you are neither God  nor the hub of  the earth.  Thus, you should seek  help
from others. You must go to Arkady Arkadievich....
     "Aha," graduate student Krivoshein exclaimed.
     I must  follow procedure; he  is my superior.  Actually, that's not the
point.   He's   smart,   knowledgeable,   influential,   and   a   marvelous
methodologist.  He knows how  to formulate any  problem. And, "A  formulated
problem," as it says in his Introduction to Systemology, "is the solution to
the  problem written in  hidden  form." And that's just  what I need. And he
supported my  topic  at the  scientific  council.  Of  course,  he's  overly
officious and conceited,  but we'll manage.  He's a  smart man,  after  all.
He'll understand that glory is not the point of this work.
     Wait! Good intentions are one thing, but reasonable care can't hurt. To
let Azarov in on the deep, dark secret that the computer-womb can synthesize
live  systems-no,  that can't  be allowed. I have  to  start  with something
simpler, and then we'll see, as he likes to say.
     I have to synthesize electronic circuits in the computer. That was what
old Voltampernov had attacked, and by the way,  that's my official topic for
the next year and half.
     "You must, Valentin Vasilyevich, you must!"
     Here's the plan. We place  six wires into the liquid: two  are feeders;
two, the control oscillograph; and  two, the impulse  generator. I give  the
computer the parameters of  the circuits  and the  approximate sizes through
Monomakh's  Crown. I definitely know  what's "it"  and "not it" in this-it's
familiar ground.
     October 15. Rounded brown squares  are appearing in the tank. They look
like laminated insulation. Metal lines of the circuits settle  on top of the
squares,  then  layers of insulation,  condensers, strips  of resistors, and
diodes and  transistors .... It  looks a lot like film  technology, which is
being developed in  microelectronics,  but  without  the vacuum,  electrical
discharge, and other pyrotechnics.
     And how pleasant it is after  all the headaches and nightmares to click
the  switches, adjust  the  brightness and  contrast  of  the  beam  on  the
oscilloscope,  and count off the microsecond impulses! Everything is  clear,
precise,  understandable.  It's  like coming  home from distant  shores. The
devil lured me onto those shores, into the dark jungles called "man" without
a guide or compass. But who is a guide and what's a compass?
     All right.  The parameters of the circuits agree,  project 154  is half
done. Won't Ippolit Illarionovich be glad!
     I'll go to see  Azarov. I'll show him the samples, explain a few things
and hint at future prospects. I'll go there tomorrow and say:
     "Arkady Arkadievich, I come to you as one smart man to another...."
     October 16. I went... flying into open arms.
     So, in the morning I  thought through our conversation, took  along the
samples, and headed  for  the old building. The autumn sun shed light on the
ornate walls, granite steps, and me, walking up them.
     My   depression   began   at  the  front   door.   Those   governmental
three-meter-wide doors made out of carved oak, with curved handles and tight
pneumatic springs! They  seem  to  be  created  especially  for  beefy young
bureaucrats with hands as big as skillets for a  dozen eggs. The young bucks
open the doors with a light tug and go handle important papers. Once through
the doors I began thinking that a conversation with Azarov should not  begin
with a shocking  opening  ("I come to you as one smart man to another....");
instead I should kowtow-he's an academician and I'm an engineer.
     And as I  walked  up  the  marble staircase covered  with  thick carpet
attached by chrome tacks, with  bannisters too broad to grasp completely, my
soul reached a respectful readiness to  agree with anything the  academician
might say  or recommend.  In a word, if it was Krivoshein the discoverer who
went up the stairs  with a spring step, it was Krivoshein the supplicant who
entered the director's waiting room, shuffling his feet, with a hunched back
and a guilty face.
     His secretary Ninochka cut  me off with a fervor  that Lev Yashin,  the
goalie, would envy.
     "No, no, no, comrade Krivoshein, you can't. Arkady Arkadievich is going
to a congress in New Zealand. You know how much trouble  I get into if I let
people in! He's not seeing anyone, see?"
     There were  quite a few people sitting  in the  waiting room. They  all
gave me a  dirty look. I sat down to wait, without any particular  hope  for
success, simply because the  others were  waiting,  and I would,  too. To be
part of the collective. A dead-end situation.
     More people arrived.  They  were  all grim  and ugly. No one  spoke  to
anyone.
     The more people there  were in the waiting  room, the less important my
business  seemed.  It  occurred to  me  that my samples  were  measured, not
tested,  and  that  Azarov  would try  to prove that  technological  work in
electronics wasn't for us. "And why am I bothering him?  I've still got over
a year to finish the project. So that Hilobok can  crack jokes about my work
habits again?"
     Speak of the devil, Hilobok appeared in the doorway with a rushed look;
I took up a good position and slipped in after him.
     "Arkady Arkadievich, I'd like...."
     "No,  no,  Valentin  ...  eh  ...  Vasilyevich."  Azarov frowned  in my
direction,  accepting some  papers from Harry. "I  can't!  I  simply  can't.
There's a holdup with my visa. I have to  go  over the typed lecture. Please
address your  questions to Ippolit Illarionovich.  He'll be  my  replacement
this month,  or to Harry Haritonovich. I'm not  the only person in the whole
world, for pity's sake!"
     So,  the  man  is going  to New Zealand.  Why  am I bothering him? To a
congress and to familiarize himself. And why did I ever think to grab him by
the coattail? It's silly. Just go on and work, until they want a report.
     Some day they'll interrupt  government  meetings for this project. Yes,
but why that does that have to be some day?
     They  won't interrupt meetings,  don't  worry.  I'll  be  dealing  with
second-level clerks, who will never  take  it upon  themselves to  take  any
action or responsibility-weaklings, just like me.
     Weakling. A weakling and  nothing  more! You should have talked to him,
if you had decided to. You couldn't. You apologized in a repulsive voice and
left  his  office.  Getting  an  Azarov  who  is hurrying  across  the  seas
interested in your work is a lot harder than commanding the computer-womb.
     But there's still something wrong.
     October 25. And this is right, I think! Our  fair city is being visited
by a major specialist in microelectronics, a technical sciences candidate, a
future doctor in the field, Valery Ivanov. He called me today. We're meeting
tomorrow  at eight  at the Dynamo  Restaurant. Dress accordingly. Ladies not
excluded.
     Valery Ivanov,  with whom I used to cut  classes  so that we could play
cards, my roommate,  the guy I did my  probation work and went to parties at
the library institute with. Valery Ivanov, my former boss and co-inventor of
two projects, a good arguer and a man of great ideas! Valery Ivanov, the man
I worked with like this for five years. I'm happy.
     "Listen, Valery," I'll say to him, "give up your microelectronics,  and
come back here. I've got a great project."
     He  can  even head  the lab, since he's got the degree. I'm willing. He
knows how to work.
     Well, let's see how he's changed over the last year.
     October 26, night. Nothing happens in life for nothing.
     From  my  first look  at  him, I  knew that  we  wouldn't  have the old
rapport.  And  it  wasn't  a  question  of  a  year's  separation.  The  old
Harry-esque vileness had come  between us. It's not  his fault or mine,  but
we've ended up on opposite sides.  He, who had proudly  quit and slammed the
door,  was  somehow  more in the right  than I, who stayed behind and didn't
share his bitter lot. That's why there was  a slight unpleasantness  between
us all evening, a bitterness that we couldn't  overcome. We somehow  trusted
each  other less now. It  was good that  I took Lena  with me; at least  she
decorated our meeting.
     Actually the conversation was interesting. It's worth relating.
     The meeting  began  at  8:00  P.M.  A Petersburgian  sat before  me. An
imported  suit in a discreet  gray  check, without lapels, a white, starched
shirt, hexagonal glasses on  an aquiline nose, a proper black crew cut. Even
the drawn cheeks reminded me of the blockade.
     Lena  was no slouch,  either.  As we  walked across the  room, everyone
looked  at her. I was the  only  slob  in  the  group: a  checked shirt  and
not-too-rumpled gray pants. Two doubles had depleted my wardrobe severely.
     Waiting for our order, we enjoyed looking at each other.
     "Well,"  Petersburgian Ivanov  broke the silence, "Oink something,  you
old pig."
     "I see your mug is assymetrical."
     "Assymetry  is a sign of the times. That's my  teeth. I got  a chill in
the train," he said touching his cheek.
     "Let me give you a punch-it'll pass."
     "Thanks. I think I'll stick