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 to cognac."
     That was our usual warm-up before a good talk.
     They  brought  cognac and wine for the lady.  We  drank, satisfied  our
first  hunger  with  sturgeon  in  aspic  and  then  stared  at  each  other
expectantly  again. There  were  parties  going  on  around  us. A tubby man
standing at two joined  tables  was  toasting "mother  science."  (They were
drinking to a  completed  dissertation.) A  tipsy  fellow  all  alone  at  a
neighboring table was threatening a carafe of vodka, muttering:
     "I'm quiet... I'm quiet!" He was bursting to tell some secret.
     "Listen, Val!"
     "Listen, Valery!"
     We looked at each other.
     "Well, you go first." I nodded.
     "Listen, Val," his eyes glistening invitingly behind his glasses, "drop
your  systemology  and come  over to  us. I'll arrange  your transfer. We're
working  on such  an interesting  project now!  A microelectric  complex,  a
machine that makes machines. Do you get it?"
     "Solid-state circuits?"
     "Ah, what  are solid-state circuits-obsolete now. Electronic and plasma
rays plus  electrophotography plus cathode  spraying  of film plus...  in  a
word, here's  the idea.  The  circuit  of  an electronic machine evolves  in
bundles of ions and electrons,  like the image on a TV screen-and that's it.
It's finished; it can work. A density of elements as in the human brain. See
that?"
     "And does that exist now?"
     "Well, you see, ..." he raised his eyebrows. "If it did, then why would
I call on you? We'll do it in the time allotted."
     (Well, of  course,  I  had to drop systemology and follow  him! Not him
follow me; oh, no ... of course not! That's the way it always was.)
     "What about the Americans?"
     "They're trying, too. The question is who'll be first. We're working at
full blast. I've already made a dozen depositions. Do you get it?"
     "Well, what's the goal?"
     "Very simple:  to make computers as  easily  mass produced and cheap as
newspapers. Do you know the code name I gave to the  project? 'Poem.' And it
really is a technological poem!"  The  booze made Valery's nose glow. He was
putting in a  big effort and was probably sure of success. I was always easy
to  talk into  things. "A computer factory no bigger than a TV  set, can you
imagine that? A factory that's a machine! It receives a technical assignment
by teletype  for  new  computers, recalculates the assignment into circuits,
encodes the result into electric impulses, which run the beams on the screen
and print  out the circuit.  Twenty seconds-and the computer  is finished. A
thin plate that  contains  the  same circuitry it now takes a whole room  to
house, understand? They send the thin plate in an envelope to the buyer, and
he installs it in the unit. The command  panel of a chemcial plant, a system
for controlling traffic lights in  a city, a car-wherever-everything that in
the past had been done slowly, clumsily, and with mistakes by man can now be
done with electronic precision by the wise microelectronic plate! So you see
what I mean?"
     Lena  was watching Valery  rapturously. Really,  the picture he painted
was so marvelous that I didn't realize right  away that he was talking about
the same film circuits that I created in the tank  of the  computer-womb. Of
course, they were simpler ones, but in principle, more complex ones could be
made, too.
     "But why the vacuum and  various rays? Why not chemistry? Probably, you
could do it that way, too."
     "Chemistry.  Personally,  ever  since Professor  Varfolomeyev  used  to
lecture us, I haven't been too hot on chemistry. [Lena  giggled.] But if you
have  some  ideas on chemical microelectronics-let's have them.  I'm for it.
You can handle that end of it. In the long run, it's not important how we do
it,  as long as  it gets done. And then... and then we'll  be  able to do so
much...."  He  leaned  back  dreamily.  "Judge for yourself. Why should  the
computer-factory be assigned to create circuits? That's extra work.  All  it
has to  do  is  receive  information  on the  problems.  After all, we  have
computers working in production, in services, in transport,  in defense. Why
translate their impulses  into  human speech if  they will only  have to  be
retranslated  back into  impulses! Imagine: the  computer-factories  receive
radioed  information   about  other   computers  from  industry,   planning,
production,  shipping  .. . from everywhere, even on the weather, the crops,
the needs of  people. They work it out into the necessary circuits  and send
them out."
     "Microelectrical recommendations?"
     "Directives, my good fellow! What recommendations? Mathematically based
electronic circuits  are the  reflexes  of  production. You don't argue with
mathematics."
     We drank.
     "Valery," I  said,  "if you do  this, you'll be so  famous that they'll
even print your picture on bathroom paper!"
     "Yours, too," he added generously. "We'll be famous together."
     "But, Valery," Lena said, "in your complex there's no room for  people.
How can that be?"
     "Lena,  you're an engineer." Ivanov condescended.  "Let's  look at this
subject, man I mean, from an  engineering point of view. Why should there be
room for him?  Can  a man  receive radiosignals,  ultra  and infrared, heat,
ultraviolet rays  and X-rays,  radiation? Can he  withstand  a  vacuum,  gas
pressure at  hundreds  of  Gs,  vibrations,  thermal  shocks  from minus 120
degrees  Celsius  to plus 120 with  hourly frequency  or  the temperature of
liquid  helium? Can he  fly with the speed of a jet, submerge  to  the ocean
floor or plunge  into molten metal?  Can  he figure  out  a problem with ten
factors-only ten-in a fraction of a second? No."
     "He can with the help of machines," Lena said, supporting humanity.
     "Yes, but machines can  do it without his help! So all that's left  him
in our harsh electronic  and  atomic age  is to push buttons. But that's the
easiest operation to automate. You  know, in  modern technology, man is  the
least  dependable  element.  That's why  there are all  those  breakers  and
buffers and other defenses against fools."
     "I'm not saying nothing," the drunk growled.
     "But man could be perfected," I muttered.
     "Perfected?  Don't  make  me  laugh!  That's  like   perfecting   steam
engines-instead of replacing them with diesels or electric engines. The flaw
is in the physical principles of man, the ion reactions and metabolism. Look
around," he said, waving his arm around the room.
     "That damn process is draining all of man's strength."
     I  looked  around. At the joined  tables the revelers were  kissing the
brand-new candidate, a bald youth, worn out by work and tension. Next to him
was his  wife. At  a nearby table twelve  tourists were  feeding decorously.
There  were smoke and  noise over every table. On  the stage, a saxophonist,
leaning over to the side and jutting out his belly, was wailing  a solo with
variations; the brass section was busy syncopating and the  drummer was in a
frenzy. The band was  doing  a rock  version of an old  folk song. Near  the
stage, without moving their  feet, couples agitated  all the parts of  their
bodies.
     "I'm  not saying  nothing!" our neighbor  announced, staring  into  the
empty carafe.
     "Actually, man's  only  redeeming feature is  his universality," Ivanov
noted. "Even though he does it badly, he can do a lot. But universality is a
product of complexity,  and  complexity  is a quantitative  factor.  When we
learn to make computers tens of billions of times more complex with  the use
of electro-ion beams, it'll be all over. Man's song will be sung."
     "What do you mean?" Lena demanded.
     "Nothing  terrible will  happen, don't worry.  Simply a  situation will
come  about  quietly, with  dignity, in which machines will  be  able  to do
without  man.  Of  course,  the  computers,  respecting the memory  of their
creators, will be kind to all the rest. They'll satisfy  their simple-minded
needs in  terms of metabolism and such. The majority  of people will be very
pleased with the  situation. In their  unflappable  conceit  they  will even
imagine that the machines are serving them. And for the computers it will be
like a  secondary unconditioned reflex,  an inherited  habit. And maybe  the
computers won't have habits like that. After all, the basis of a computer is
rationality. What would they need habit for?"
     "By  the  way,  those  rational  machines are  serving  us  now,"  Lena
interrupted hotly. "They satisfy our needs, no?"
     I said nothing. Valery laughed.
     "That depends on how you look at it, Lenochka! The computers have every
reason  to think that  we satisfy  their  needs. If I were, say, a  Ural-4 I
wouldn't   have  any   grudges  against  people:   you  live  in  a   bright
air-conditioned  room  with  a  steady  supply  of  alternating  current-the
equivalent of hot and cold water.  A  servant in  a  white lab coat scurries
about, fulfilling your every whim, and they write about you  in the  papers.
And the work  is clean:  switch those currents  and transmit those impulses.
What a life!"
     "I'm  not saying nothing!"  our neighbor announced for  the last  time,
then stood up and shouted an obscenity at the room.
     The maitre d' and company ran over to him.
     "So what if I'm drunk," the man yelled, as  he was  assisted out of the
restaurant.  "I'm drinking on my own money-money I earned. Robbery is a job,
too, you know."
     "There he is,  the object  of your concern, in  all his glory!"  Valery
compressed  his thin lips. "A worthy descendant  of the parasite who shouted
'Man-that  has a proud ring!' Not  any more. Well,  how about it,  Val?"  he
turned to me. "Come on over. Get in on the  project. This way you and I will
leave  something for the  future.  Thinking computer-factories,  active  and
omnipotent electronic brains-and  in them your ideas, your work, the best of
us all. What do you think? Man the creator-that still  sounds  good. And the
best will stay  on and  develop even  when that  semiliterate broad, Nature,
will finally uncrown her homo sapiens!"
     "But  that's  terrible,  what  you're   saying!"  Lena   was  incensed.
"You're... a robot! You just don't like people!"
     Ivanov gave her a gentle, condescending look:
     "We're not arguing, Lena. I'm just explaining what's what."
     That was the limit.  Lena clicked off and said  nothing. I didn't reply
either. The silence was getting uncomfortable. I called the waiter and paid.
We  went  out  on  Marx  Prospect,  on  the  "Broadway  of  Dneprovsk."  The
pedestrians defiled it.
     Suddenly Valery grabbed me by the hand.
     "Val, do you hear? Do you see?"
     At first I didn't know what I was supposed to see or hear.
     A  teenage  couple walked past,  both in thick  sweaters and  the  same
hairdo. The boy had a transistor radio around his neck in a yellow pearlized
shell with a  rocket  on it. The pure sounds of the  saxophone and the clear
syncopations of the brass resounded  on the street.  I would have recognized
the sound of that radio  among a hundred brands like a mother recognizes the
voice of her child in the  din of a  kindergarten. The low-noise,  wide-band
amplifier that was in it was one of the things Valery and I had invented.
     "That means they've started production on it," I concluded. "We can ask
for our royalties. Hey, fella, how much did you pay for the radio?"
     "Fifty dollars," the punk announced proudly.
     "There  you  see,  fifty  dollars,  that  equals  forty-five  Mongolian
tugriks. A clear markup for quality. You should be pleased!"
     "Pleased? You be pleased! You said it was terrible  [actually  that was
Lena, not me]. Better terrible, than that!"
     Once upon  a time, we had delved into  quantum physics,  were amazed by
the duality  of the  particle  wave  of the electron, studied the theory and
technology  of  semiconductors, mastered  the  most refined  lab  equipment.
Semiconducting equipment  was the future of electronics  in  those days. Pop
science writers  praised them and engineers dreamed about them.  There was a
lot in  those dreams.  Some came true-the  rest was discarded by technology.
But  we  had  never  dreamed  that  transistors  would   figure   among  the
accoutrements of pimply punks on the prospect.
     And how Valery and I had struggled with  the noise problem! The problem
was  that  electrons distribute themselves in a  semiconducting crystal like
particles of color in water-the same old chaotic Brownian motion. That's why
there's  noise  in earphones,  sounding like the hiss of a phonograph needle
and the distant murmur of the surf. It's an involved  story. I had the first
invention, and the official phraseology of  the application to the Committee
on Inventions of the USSR was music to  my ears: "Submitting with  this  the
above-mentioned  documents, we request an  inventor's  certificate  for  the
invention called...."
     So, all right; someone lived through the  joy  of learning,  ignited in
creative search, experienced engineering  triumphs,  but what does that poor
punk care? He didn't get anything from all  that joy. So there  it is:  turn
over the bloody  tugriks, push the button, turn  the handle... and go around
like a jerk with a clean neck.
     We walked Valery back to his hotel.
     "So?" he asked as we shook hands.
     "I have to think about it, Valery."
     "Think!" Lena gave me a hostile look. "You're going to think about it?"
     She really has no self-control. She could have held her tongue.
     The funny part was that Valery didn't even ask what I was doing. It was
obvious to him that there could be  nothing  good going on at  the institute
and that I had to come over to work with him.
     I'll think about it.

     October 2 7.
     Ivanov called:
     "Have you thought about it?"
     "Not yet."
     "Ah, those women! I understand you,  of course. Decide, Val. We'll work
together. I'll call you tomorrow before I leave, all right?"
     If back then,  in March, when my complex was only beginning to plan and
build itself, I had  stopped  the experiment and analyzed the possible paths
of  development,   everything  would  have  turned   to   the  synthesis  of
microelectronic units. Because that was something  I understood. And  now  I
would be  way ahead  of Valery.  The work  would  have  gone  down different
channels, and it would never have occurred to me or  to anyone else that  we
had overlooked a method of synthesizing living organisms.
     But I didn't overlook it.
     How  pleasant it  had been using my engineering thought to create those
plates with microcircuits in the tank: flip-flops, inverters, decoders! That
'Poem' of his, if you added my computer-womb to  it, would be  a sure thing.
In fact, it  would  be his computer-factory.  I was on top of things in that
area. It's not too late to turn around ....
     And work like that  really could lead to a world or society of machines
totally  independent of man-not robots, but  machines  that  complement  one
another. Perhaps that is the  natural evolution of things? If you look at it
objectively,  there's nothing so terrible about it. Well, there were protein
(ion-chemical)  systems  on earth, and on  the  basis  of  their information
electron crystal systems developed. Evolution continues.
     Yes, but  if you look at things objectively, nothing so  horrible would
happen if there was a thermonuclear catastrophe,  either. Well, so something
exploded, and the radioactive foundation of the atmosphere increased. But is
the earth  still spinning on  its  axis? Yes. And  around the sun? Yes. That
means the stability of the solar  system has not been harmed, and everything
is all right.
     "You don't like people!" Lena  had  said to Ivanov.  What's so  is  so.
Hilobok's  stink,   quitting  the  institute,  bumping  into  our  invention
yesterday-they were all steps on the stairway to misanthropy. And there  are
plenty of such steps in the life of every active person. If you compare life
experience  with  engineering  experience  you  could  really  come  to  the
conclusion that  it's  easier  to develop machines in  which  everything  is
rational and clear.
     But, all right; but do I like people? It  will all depend on that, what
I continue working on.
     I had never thought about it.... Well, I love me, however terrible that
may be. I loved my father. I love (let's say) Lena. If I ever have children,
I guess I'll love them. I don't exactly love Valery, but I  respect him. But
as  for all the people that walk around on the street,  that I run across in
my work, in  public places,  that I  read about in  the newspapers and  hear
about-what are they to me? And who am I to  them? I like good-looking women,
smart,  cheerful men,  but  I  despise  fools and  drunks, can't  stand auto
inspectors,  and am cool  toward  old people. And in the morning rush hour I
sometimes  get the  TBB-the  trolley  and  bus bananas-when I want  to smash
everyone on  the head and jump out the  window.  In a word,  I have the most
varied feelings about people.
     Aha, that's  the point.  We feel respect, love, contempt,  shame, fear,
pride,  sympathy, and  so on about  people. And  about machines?  Well, they
elicit  emotions, too. It's pleasant to work  with  a good machine, and  you
feel sorry if you've ruined a machine or piece of equipment. You might curse
yourself before you find the  trouble .. . but that's completely  different.
These are feelings not  about the machines, but the people who made them and
used them. Or  could use them. Even  the fear of the atom bomb is merely the
reflection of our  fear of the people  who  made it and plan to put it  into
use. And the  plans of people who build machines that will push man into the
background also elicit fear.
     I love life. I love  feeling everything-that's for sure.  And what kind
of life could there be without people? That's ridiculous. Naturally,  if you
juxtapose Ivanov's computer-factory to my computer-womb....
     It's clear. I choose people!
     And the  wise and strong Valery  is even weaker  than I  am. He doesn't
pick his work; his work picks him.
     (Come on, be honest-deep-down honest, Krivoshein. If  you didn't have a
method for creating man on  your  hands,  wouldn't you espouse  the point of
view in favor  of computers? Every one of us specialists is always trying to
give  our work an ideological base. You can't simply admit that you're doing
the  work only because you don't  know how to do anything else! A confession
like that for a creative worker is tantamount to bankruptcy.
     By the way, do I know how to do what I'm planning to do? ...)
     Enough! Of  course, all this  is very  intellectual  and nice:  putting
myself  down,  bemoaning  my  imperfections,  worrying about the discrepancy
between my dreams and actions. But where is that knight of the spirit with a
higher education  and experience in the field to whom I could  turn over the
project with a clear conscience? Ivanov? No. Azarov? I never got a chance to
find out. And the work is waiting.
     So whatever I may be, my finger will rest on the button for now.
     October 28, A phone call at the lab.
     "Well, Val, have you decided to do it?"
     "No, Valery."
     "Too bad. We would  have done some fine  work.  But, I understand. Give
her my regards. She's a nice woman; I'm happy for you."
     "Thanks. I'll tell her."
     "Well, so long. Drop in when you're in Leningrad."
     "Without fail! Have a good flight, Valery."
     You don't understand a damn thing, Valery. The hell with it. It's over!
I think I've gotten my itch to work back. Thanks for that, Valery,  at least
for that!



        Chapter 18


     You  never know  what's good  and  what's bad. Stenography  came  about
because of  poor penmanship and the theory of reliability from breakdowns in
machines.
     -K. Prutkov-enzhener, Thought 100

     November 1. And so, without wanting to, I've proven that in controlling
synthesis,  you  can  create a  psychopath  and  a  slave on  the  basis  of
information on, say, an average person. It happened because the introduction
of auxiliary information was done through  crude violence  (oh, I just can't
couch this "result"  in academic  phrases!). Now as a minimum  goal, I  must
prove the opposite possibility.
     The positive  aspect of the experiment with Adam was that  he came  out
physically unharmed. And he looked the way I wanted him to  look. Now I have
experience in transforming the form of the human body. The negative aspects?
The  "convenient" method of many  transformations  and dissolutions is ruled
out categorically; everything has to be done in one session. And the "it-not
it" method of  correction must only be used  in those situations when I know
for sure what "it" is and can  control the changes, simply, by changing only
minor external flaws.
     In a word, I have to start from scratch yet a third time.
     I  want to create an improved version of myself, handsomer and smarter.
The only  possible way is to  record my wishes along with my information  in
the computer. It can either react to them or not.  The worst that can happen
is  there'll be  another  exact copy of Krivoshein-and that's it. As long as
he's not worse.
     The physical part seems rather simple. I'll put on Monomakh's Crown and
picture myself to  the point  of  hallucinations  in  a better  form-without
facial defects (get rid of  the freckles and the scar  over  my eyebrow, fix
the nose, reduce the jaw, etc.) and body flaws (get rid of the fat,  fix the
knee). And the hair should be darker.
     But  as for increasing his  mental capacity. How? Just wish that my new
double be smarter  than me? The computer-womb won't register  that. It deals
only with constructive information. I have to think about it.
     November 2. I  have an idea. It's primitive, but it's an  idea. I'm not
equally  bright  at  different  times of  the  day.  You  get  dull  after a
meal-there is even a biological reason for it (the blood is drained from the
brain). Therefore, I'll record information  on me when I've not eaten  for a
while. Or smoked.
     And here's one more aspect of my  mental ability to take  into account:
the  closer it is  to  night, the more my  sober  and rational  thoughts are
crowded out by dreams, imagination, and feelings. That can be gotten rid of,
too. My dreaming has already gotten me into enough  hot water. Therefore, as
soon  as  evening  comes  on-out  of the  chamber.  Let  my  new  double  be
somber-minded, reasonable, and well-balanced!
     November  17.  It's  been  three  weeks  that  I've  been  getting  the
computer-womb to perfect  me.  I keep wanting to  say "You may!" through the
crown,  to  see what  will happen. But no, there's a  man in there! Let  the
computer absorb my thoughts, ideas, and desires some more. Let it understand
what I want.
     November  25,  evening.  The snow is falling  on the  white  lamp post,
falling  and falling, as if it's determined to  overfulfill the  plan. There
goes that girl on  crutches past our house again, coming home  from  school.
She probably had polio and lost the use of her legs.
     Everytime that  I  see her-with  a big knapsack on her sharp shoulders,
limping uncomfortably with  the crutches, her body  hanging  loosely between
them-I  feel ashamed. Ashamed that I'm healthy as a horse; ashamed that I, a
smart  and educated man, can't help  her. Ashamed  by a feeling of  a  great
impotence that exists in life.
     Children should not be on crutches. What's the point of all the science
and technology in the world, if children use crutches!
     Could  it be  that  I'm still doing  something  wrong? Not  what people
really need? This method of mine won't help the girl in any way.
     It'll soon be a month that I've been planning what I'll think about and
entering the  information chamber, affixing  the sensors to my body, putting
on  Monomakh's  Crown, and thinking aloud. Sometimes I'm gripped  by doubts.
What  if  the  computer-womb  is doing something  wrong  again?  There's  no
control, Goddamn it!  And I get scared, so  scared that I'm  afraid it might
have an effect on the personality of the future double.


     The next entry was made in pencil.
     December 4 Well... in principle, I should be exulting. It worked. But I
don't have the strength, the energy, the  thoughts, the emotions for it. I'm
tired. Oh, how tired I am! I'm too tired to look for my pen.
     The computer took all my desires into account in the physical aspect. I
fixed a few things up in the synthesis process. As the double was appearing,
I didn't have to measure or guess-my  practiced eye immediately picked up on
the  "not  its"  in his  construction  and  controlled the  computer  as  it
corrected them.
     I set  up a ladder in the tank and helped him get out.  He stood before
me,  naked, well-built,  muscular, handsome, dark-haired-still resembling me
but not resembling me. Puddles of the liquid spread at his feet.
     "Well?" I asked, my voice hoarse.
     "Everything's in order," he smiled.
     And  then... then my lips trembled. My face trembled. My hands shook. I
couldn't even light a cigarette. He lit one for me, poured  me some alcohol,
muttering:  "It's all right, everything's  fine, don't...." He comforted me.
That was funny.
     I'm going to try to sleep now.
     December 5. Today I tested the logical capabilities of double number 3.
     First round (playing crosswits): 5-3 in his favor. Round  two  (playing
words):  in  ten  minutes  he  built  eight  more  words  than  I  did  from
"abbreviation" and twelve more than me from "retrogression." Round three: we
solved logic puzzles from  the college text by Azarov, beginning with number
223. I only reached number 235 in two hours of work; he got up to 240.
     I wasn't faking-I was really caught up in the contest. That  means that
he thinks 25-30  percent  faster than  I do-and that's  from a simple-minded
clumsy  attempt  at  improvement.  Just  think  what  could have  been  done
scientifically!
     We'll see how he is at work.
     December  7. Our work so far isn't intellectual. We're cleaning  up the
lab.  And  not only because of the intertwined wires and living hoses. We're
dusting  and vacuuming  and removing  mildew from flasks, and  equipment and
panels.
     "Tell me, how do you feel about biology?"
     "Biology?"  he  looked at me in surprise, then  remembered.  "Oh, I see
where you're  leading. You  know,  I don't understand him either. I think it
was some kind of fixation coming from trying to prove himself."


     "Wow!"  said student  Krivoshein  and even bounced on  his chair.  "Now
that's something!"
     But how... after all, double number  3 was also  a  continuation of the
computer-womb! That meant... that meant that the computer had learned how to
construct the human organism?  Well, of course. He was the first. That's why
all that  complex searching and retrieval  had been  necessary. And now  the
computer remembered all the attempts and picked  from among  them those that
led directly to the goal, constructing a program for synthesizing man.
     That  meant that his  discovery  of  inner  transformations  was  truly
unique. It  had to be saved. The best thing would be to re-record himself in
the computer-womb, not  with  a vague memory of the search, but with precise
and proven knowledge on transforming himself. But why?
     "Ah, how much can you think about  that!" He frowned and went  back  to
the diary.
     December  18. I  don't remember.  Are  these  frosts  the  ones  called
Epiphany frosts or the ones in January?  The northeast wind had brought us a
real Siberian winter and the steam heat can barely hold its own. The grounds
are all white and the lab is brighter.
     I don't know if all the biblical rules were followed but the new double
has been christened. And the godfather was none other than Harry Hilobok.
     This is how it happened. Students from  Kharkov U. came for  their year
of probation  work. The day before yesterday I  dropped by the dorms for the
young specialists and borrowed "for psychological experimentation" a student
card  and a  directive to work here.  The students gaped at me with  awe and
their  eyes  were aglow with  a readiness  to give not  only their cards but
their shoes  for  the good  of  science.  I  borrowed a passport  from Pasha
Fartkin.
     Then we familiarized the computer-womb with the appearance and contents
of the documents.  We  manipulated them in front of  the objectives, rustled
the pages.... When the  passport, the student card, and the form appeared in
the tank, I put on the crown and  with the "it-not it" method  corrected all
the information.
     Double  number  3  is  now called  Victor  Vitalyevich  Kravets.  He is
twenty-three, Russian,  subject to military service, a fifth-year student in
the physics department at Kharkov State U, lives in  Kharkov,  17 Kholodnaya
Gora. Pleased to meet you.
     Am I?  During the operation  the  newly hatched Kravets and I talked in
whispers  and felt  like counterfeiters who  were  about to  be  caught. The
engrained respect for the law in intellectuals showed itself again.
     We also felt strange the next day when we went to see Hilobok: Kravets,
to report in, and me, to ask that he be assigned to my lab. My biggest worry
was that Hilobok would assign him  to another lab. But it worked  out. There
were  more students that  year than snow.  When Hilobok  heard that  I would
guarantee the material needed for student Kravets's diploma thesis, he tried
to foist another two on me.
     Harry, naturally, noted the resemblance between us.
     "He's not a relative of yours, is he, Valentin Vasilyevich?"
     "Well, sort of. A nephew three times removed."
     "Well,  then it's understandable! Of  course, of  course....." His face
expressed understanding of my familial  feelings  and his tolerance of them.
"And will be be living with you?"
     "No, why? Let him stay in the dorms."
     "Oh,  of course." Harry's face made it clear that  my relationship with
Lena  was no secret to him either. "I  understand you, Valentin Vasileyvich.
Oh, how I understand!"
     God, how disgusting it is when Hilobok "oh, understands" you.
     "And   how   are  things   with  your   doctoral   dissertation,  Harry
Har-itonovich?" I asked, to change the subject.
     "The doctoral?" He looked at me very carefully. "It's all right. Why do
you  ask,  Valentin  Vasilyevich?  You're   in  discrete  phenomena;  analog
electronics isn't in your field."
     "Right  now  I don't  know  what's  in my field  and what  isn't, Harry
Haritonovich," I replied honestly.
     "Ah,  so? Well, that's laudable. But I won't be up for  a defense for a
while. My work keeps pulling me away. Current events don't give  me time for
creative work. You'll  do  your defense  before I do, Valentin  Vasilyevich,
both your candidate and doctoral dissertations, he-he...."
     We walked back to the lab in lousy humor. There was a creepy duality in
our work: in the lab we were gods, but when we had to come into contact with
the  environment,  we  had  to  politic,  sneak,   wheedle.  What  was  it-a
characteristic of research? Or of reality? Or, perhaps, of our personality?
     "After all, it wasn't I who invented  a  system of ticketing  humanity:
passports,  passes, requisitions,  reports,  and so on,"  I  said.  "Without
papers you're a gnat; with papers you're a man."
     Victor Kravets said nothing.
     December 20. Well, our work together is beginning!
     "Don't you think that we went overboard with our vow?"
     "?!"
     "Well, not the whole vow, but that sacred part."
     "To  use  the  discovery  for  the benefit  of  mankind  with  absolute
dependability?"
     "Precisely. We've realized four methods: synthesis of information about
man into man; synthesis of rabbits  with improvements and without; synthesis
of electronic circuits; and synthesis  of  man with improvements.  Does even
one of them have an absolute guarantee of benefits?"
     "Hmmmm. No. But the last method at least in principle-"
     "-can create 'knights without fear or flaw,' cavaliers of Saint George,
and fiery warriors?"
     "Let's just say good people. Any objections?"
     "We're not voting  yet. We're discussing. And I think that that idea is
based-please forgive me-on very jejune ideas of so-called good people. There
are no abstractly good and bad people.  Every man is good for  some  and bad
for  others. That's  why  the  real knights without fear and  flaw  had more
enemies than anyone  else.  The only one who's good for everyone  is a smart
and sneaky egotist, who tries to get along with everyone in order to achieve
his ends. There is, however, a quasi-objective criterion: he  is good who is
supported  by  the  majority. Are you willing to  use that criterion as  the
basis for this method?"
     "Hmm... let me think."
     "What  for? If I've already thought about it, after all, you'll come to
the  same  conclusion-that  the  criterion  is  no good.  The  majority  has
supported  God knows who since  time  immemorial. But  there  are  two other
criteria: good is what I think is good (or who I think is good)  and good is
what is  good for me. Like  all  people  who  care professionally about  the
welfare of mankind, we operated on  the basis of both-only in our simplicity
we thought  that  we were  only  using the  first  one,  and  considered  it
objective at that."
     "Now you're exaggerating!"
     "Not  a bit! I won't remind you about poor Adam, but even when you were
synthesizing me you were worried that it should be good for me (rather, what
you thought was good)  and that  it should be good for you, too.  Right? But
that's a subjective criterion and other people-"
     "-with this method could do what they thought was good for them?"
     "Precisely."
     "Hmmm. All right, let's  say  you're right. Then  we  have to  look for
another method of synthesizing and transforming information in man."
     "Like what?"
     "I don't know."
     "I'll  tell  you  what  method  is  needed.  We  have  to  convert  our
computer-womb  into  an  apparatus that  continually turns out 'good' at the
rate of... say, a  million and a half good  deeds a second.  And at the same
time, it should do away with bad deeds at the same rate. Actually, a million
and a half-that's  just a drop  in  the  ocean.  There are three and  a half
billion people on earth and every one of them performs several dozen acts  a
day that can never be construed as neutral. And we still have to  figure out
a method of equal distribution  of this production across the surface of the
earth. In  a  word, it  had  to  be  something  like  an ensilage  harrow on
magnetrons of unfired brick."
     "You're mocking me, right?"
     "Yes. I'm trampling your dream-otherwise it will lead us into God knows
where."
     "You think that I...?"
     "No.  I  don't think that  you  were working  wrong. It  would  be very
strange  if  I  thought  so.  But understand: subjectively  you  dreamed and
thought,  but  objectively  you  did  only  what the  possibilities  of  the
discovery permitted you to do. And that's the point!  You have to coordinate
your  plans with the possibilities  of  the work.  And you  were  hoping  to
counterbalance a  hundred billion varied acts  of humanity a day  with  your
little machine. And it's those hundred billion, plus uncounted past actions,
that determine  the social processes  on earth, their goodness and evil. All
of  science  is incapable of counterbalancing  those mighty  processes, that
avalanche of acts and deeds, first of all because  science makes up  a small
part of  life  on earth, and  secondly  because that is  not its  specialty.
Science doesn't develop good or  evil-it  develops new information and gives
new  opportunities. And that's all. Now  the application of that information
and  the  use  of  the opportunities  determine the  above-mentioned  social
processes  and  powers.   We  will  give  people   nothing   more  than  new
opportunities to produce  people in their own image, and it's  up to them to
use these opportunities to their benefit or harm or not at all."
     "You mean we  should publish the discovery  and wash  our hands  of it?
Well, I never! If we don't give a damn what  happens to it, certainly no one
else will!"
     "Don't be  angry. I don't think we should publish and wash our hands of
it. We have  to go on  working, studying the  possibilities the way everyone
does. But in the research, and the ideas, even in the dreams on project 154,
you must keep in mind that what happens to this project in real life depends
primarily on  life itself, or  to put it  in  a  more cultured way,  on  the
socio-political situation in the world. If the situation develops in a safe,
good  direction, then  we can  publish.  If not-we'll have  to  hold off  or
destroy the project, as foreseen by the vow. It's not in  our  power to save
humanity, but it is in our power not to inflict any harm on it."
     "Hm  . .  .  that's very  modest.  I  think you're  underestimating the
possibilities  of  modern  science. We now have the capability of destroying
humanity by pushing a  button-or several buttons. Why shouldn't there  be an
alternative method to save or at least protect humanity by pushing a button?
And why, damn it, shouldn't that method be in our field of research?"
     "It doesn't lie there. Our direction  is  constructive. It's much, much
harder to build a bridge than to blow it up."
     "I agree. But they do build bridges."
     "But no one's built a bridge that can't be blown up."
     We found ourselves at a dead end.
     But  he's  okay. He  essentially  laid out all  my  vague doubts  in  a
clear-cut fashion; they had been  bothering me for a long time. I don't know
whether to be happy or sad.
     December 28.  So, it's been  a year  since  I sat in the  new lab on an
unpacked impulse  generator and thought about an indefinite experiment. Just
a year? No, time is measured by events and not by the rotation of the earth.
I think at least a  decade has  passed. And  not  only because  so  much was
done-there was so much experienced. I've  started thinking about  life more,
understanding myself and others better, I've even changed a little-pray God,
for the better.
     And  still there  is a dissatisfaction-too much  dreaming,  I  suppose.
Everything  that I've  thought of  has happened, but the wrong way  somehow:
with difficulties, with horrible complications, with disillusionment. That's
the way it is in life. Man  never dreams  about  where he could fall flat on
his face or find disillusionment; that happens on its own. I understand that
perfectly well with my mind, but I still can't resign myself to it.
     When I  was  synthesizing double number 3 (Kravets in civilian life), I
hoped vaguely  that  something would click in  the computer-womb and I would
get  a knight  without fear or flaw! Nothing clicked. He's fine, can't argue
with that, but he's  no knight.  He's sober-minded, reasonable, and careful.
And where was the knight supposed to come from-me?
     Jerk, dreamy jerk! You  keep hoping  that nature will find and hand you
the  absolutely dependable  method-it  never  will.  It  doesn't  have  that
information.
     Damn,  is  it really impossible?  Is the  perfected  Krivoshein-Kravets
really right?
     There is one method of saving  the world by pushing a button; it can be
used in case of thermonuclear war. You hide several computer-wombs that have
been fed information on people (men and  women) deep in a mine shaft  with a
large supply  of reagents. And  if there are no people left in the ashes  of
the earth, the  computers will save and  resurrect humanity. That's one  way
out of the situation.
     But even then it won't work like that.  If  you give the world a method
like that, it will destroy the balance that exists and  push the world  into
nuclear  war.  "People will still live. Atom bombs aren't so  terrible-let's
set them  off!" some idiot politician will think. "The problem of  the  Near
East? There is no Near East! The Vietnam problem? What Vietnam? Buy personal
bomb shelters for your soul!"
     Then that's "not it" either. What is "it?" Is there an "it?"


        PART THREE * AWAKENING



        Chapter 19


     Sleep is the best weapon against sleepiness. -K. Prutkov-enzhener
     A Sketch for an Encyclopedia

     A quick-flowing June night: the purple sunset had gone out  in the west
a short  time ago and now in the southeast, beyond the  Dneiper, the sky was
growing light again.  But even a short night is  a night;  it has  the  same
effect on people.  The inhabitants of the shaded parts  of the planet sleep.
The  citizens of Dneprovsk were sleeping.  Many of the  participants in  the
described events were sleeping.
     Matvei Apollonovich Onisimov  was sleeping  fitfully. He had a  lot  of
trouble falling asleep: he smoked,  tossed and turned, and bothered his wife
while  he  thought about  what  had  happened.  When  he  did  fall  asleep,
exhausted, his overstimulated mind offered a terrible dream. It seemed three
bodies  killed by  fire throwers  were found  in three  city parks.  Medical
Examiner Zubato, too lazy  to  examine  all  three bodies, came up  with the
theory that  all  three were killed with  one shot. To probe the veracity of
his theory,  he sat the bodies down on a marble  bench in  the autopsy room,
arms around one another; their wounds matched up.
     Matvei Apollonovich, who usually had black and murky dreams that looked
as  if  they were an old, used film, experienced this  picture in  3-D, with
color  and  smell; there were three Krivosheins in a  row-huge,  naked, pink
ones smelling of meat-and they were staring  at him with photogenic  smiles.
Onisimov  woke  up  in  protest.  But (the  dream  had helped)  he  had  the
beginnings  of a good theory when he woke up: they were boiling the murdered
Krivoshein's body in that  lab! After all-a body is the most important  clue
and it's risky  to hide  it or bury it;  it could be found. And so they were
boiling or disintegrating  the body  in  a special  liquid,  and  since this
wasn't an easy matter,  they  miscalculated and  the  tank turned over.  And
that's why the body seemed  warm when Prakhov the technician found it in the
tank!  That's  why it  melted so fast, soaked as it was  in their chemicals,
leaving only a skeleton. The lab assistant had been knocked out by the tank,
and the other conspirator-the  one who was pulling all those tricks in front
of  him  yesterday-ran off.  (It  was  clear  that the mystifier  or  circus
performer was  either using masks or else was well trained in mimicry.)  And
then  he arranged for an  alibi-he could  have  fooled that Moscow professor
with his masks and mime. And his papers were just very good fakes.
     Matvei Apollonovich lit another cigarette. And still this was no simple
crime. If the perpetrators were working both  here  and in  Moscow and there
was  no motive  of greed,  personal  vendetta,  or sex, then . . .  probably
Krivoshein had  made a serious invention or discovery. No, tomorrow he would
insist  to  his chief that they bring in  the security  organs on this case!
(Although Onisimov will never know what happened, we must give credit to his
detective  ability. Really: not  knowing  anything about  the essence of the
case and  using only the external  accidental facts, he managed to  build  a
logical, consistent theory-not everyone can do that!)
     Having made the decision, Matvei Apollonovich slept soundly. Now he was
having pleasant dreams: he'd been promoted for solving the case.  But dreams
are even less subject  to our  control  than  reality, and  the investigator
began  groaning  and tossing.  His awakened wife asked:  "Matvei, what's the
matter?"  Onisimov had dreamed that there  was a fire in the  department and
the new promotion list had been destroyed.


     Arkady Arkadievich  Azarov had  just fallen  asleep, and  only with the
help   of   two  sleeping  pills.  (He'll  wake  up  in  the  morning   with
neurasthenia.)  He was also tormented by thoughts of  the  events in the New
Systems  Lab.  He  had  already  gotten a  phone  call from the  Party  City
Committee:  "Another accident, Arkady Arkadievich?  With  a  loss  of  human
life?"  How do  they  find  out  so fast? Now  it  would all begin: reports,
commissions, explanations.... But that's why he was a director and got a fat
salary, so that he could be  driven crazy! These are  the things,  for which
he's  not  responsible  and couldn't  possibly  be  responsible,  that  cast
aspersions on his honest, productive, positive work! Arkady Arkadievich felt
alone and miserable.
     "I  should never have  set up that lab of 'random retrieval.'  I didn't
listen  to myself. I  mean the  whole  idea  of random  test  and  free-form
combinations  being a  path that would bring truth and correct  solutions to
science went deep  against my own  grain. And it still does. The Monte Carlo
Method-just  look at  the name!  Belief in  chance-what  could be worse in a
researcher?  Instead of analyzing  the problem logically and confidently and
slowly  reaching its  solution, you try your luck,  even with the aid of lab
equipment and computers! Of  course, you  can build pseudoscientific systems
and algorithms that way, but don't they resemble the 'systems' gamblers have
for beating  the bank and  which always make them bankrupt? Big deal, so you
changed the  name  of the  lab.  But  the  essence was the same. You let  it
develop, because there is  this tendency in world systemology. And so let it
develop in our institute, too. It's developed all right!"
     Arkady Arkadievich hadn't  expressed his misgivings  to Krivoshein back
then, because he didn't  want  to dampen  his enthusiasm.  He  merely asked:
"What  are you planning to achieve... through  random retrieval?" "First and
foremost  to master the methodology,"  Krivoshein had answered, and that had
pleased Azarov more than if he had spewed out hundreds of ideas.
     "But  he  wasn't  just  mastering  the  methodology/'Arkady Arkadievich
remembered  the  laboratory,  the setup  that  looked like  an octopus,  the
expensive  collection of test tubes  and  flasks. "He  was doing  some  vast
experiment. Could he have really been doing what he had  reported  on at the
scientific council? But it ended up with a corpse. A corpse that turned into
a  skeleton!" Azarov  felt revulsion and  anger.  "I  have to put an end  to
experimentation;  something  always   goes  wrong!  Always!  Systemology  is
essentially a cerebral science. The  analysis  and synthesis  of  any system
must  be promoted! And if you want to work with computers-please do, program
your  tasks and go  into the  computer  room. And  basically with  all these
experiments," the academician laughed lightly, calming down, "you never know
what you've got: a hugh mistake or a discovery!"
     Arkady Arkadievich  had a  long-time score to  settle with experimental
science, and his opinions on it were  firm  and definite.  Some thirty years
ago the  young  physicist  Azarov was  studying  the  process of  liquifying
helium. Once  he  stuck two glass  stirrers into his  Dewar  flask, and  the
liquid, cooled down  to 2œ on the  absolute scale,  evaporated very quickly.
Two  liters of then  precious helium  disappeared  and  the  experiment  was
ruined! Arkady  accused  the lab's glass  man of sticking him with a  faulty
Dewar flask. He had  been penalized ... and two years later a  classmate  of
Azarov's  at  the  university, Pyotr Kapitsa,  in  an  analogous  experiment
(lowering capillary stirrers into a vessel) discovered the superfluidity  of
helium!
     Arkady Arkadievich grew  disillusioned in experimental physics and came
to love the  dependable and strict  world  of  mathematics. It was math that
elevated him-the mathematical  approach to the  solution of  nonmathematical
problems. In  the  thirties he applied his methods  to the  problems  of the
general  theory of relativity, which had all science  enthralled;  later his
research helped solve important problems in the theory of chain reactions in
uranium  and  plutonium.  Then he applied his  methods  to  the  problems of
chemical catalysis of polymers; and  now he was head of the discrete systems
direction in systemology.
     "Eh, I'm still  thinking  about the  wrong  thing!" Azarov  complained.
"What did happen in Krivoshein's lab?  I remember last autumn he came to me,
wanted to talk about something. What? Work, naturally. And  I waved him off.
I was too busy. Somehow you  always consider things that can't be put off as
the most important. I should have talked to him; I'd know now what happened.
Krivoshein never approached  me again. Of course, people like that are proud
and  shy. Wait-what kind of people? What's Krivoshein like? What  do  I know
about  him?  A few lectures at  seminars, an  appearance  at the  scientific
council, several exchanges with other lecturers, and a nodding acquaintance.
     Can I base a  judgement on that? Yes, I can.  I'm not so bad at judging
people. He was an active and creative person. You recognize people like that
by their  questions and by their answers. You can  see  the constant thought
flow-not  everyone can see it, but I'm the same way; I  can  recognize it. A
man eats, goes to work,  greets friends, goes to the movies, argues with his
co-workers, lends money, tans at the beach-he does it all wholeheartedly-and
yet all the time he's thinking. On one  subject. The idea has no relation to
his actions or daily cares, but there is nothing that will distract him from
that idea. It's the most important part of him: new things are born from it.
And Krivoshein was like that. And it's too bad that's in the past tense-life
loses something  very necessary with the death  of a man like that. And  you
feel even more  alone.... Well,  enough, what am I going  on about?"  Arkady
Arkadievich looked at the time. "I must sleep."


     Harry  Haritonovich Hilobok couldn't fall asleep that  night either. He
kept looking at  the lighted window across the way in Krivoshein's apartment
and tried to  guess who was that in there. Lena Kolomiets left rapidly after
ten  (Harry  Haritonvich  recognized  her figure  and walk,  and thought: "I
should get to know her better.  There's a lot to her"), but the light stayed
on.  Hilobok turned out his lights, and  seated himself at the window with a
pair  of binoculars, but the  angle was wrong-he could only see part  of the
book shelf and the Olympic-ring logo on the wall. "Did she forget to put out
the  light? Or is there someone else in there? Should I call the police? Ah,
the hell  with  them. Let them  figure  it  out."  Harry Haritonovich yawned
deliciously. "Maybe it's the police in there investigating...."
     He went back into  his room and lit the night-light, a naked woman made
out  of fake  marble with a light  bulb inside. The soft  light fell  on the
bearskin rug on the floor, the walls covered with blue wallpaper with golden
storks, the polished grain of  the desk,  the bookshelves,  the closet,  the
television set, the quilted pink couch, the  dark red carpet with a scene of
ancient feasting-everything was meant to be conducive to sensuousness. Harry
Haritonovich undressed and went to look  at himself in the mirror.  He liked
his face: the straight large nose; the smooth, but not fat, cheeks; the dark
mustache-there was something of Guy  de Maupassant about  him. Very recently
he had  been trying  on his doctor-of-technical-sciences  look.  "Why did he
have to do that, that Krivoshein?" Harry Haritonovich felt his heart beating
madly. "What had I ever done to him? I even voted for his project and helped
his relative get a  job at the lab.  He doesn't have  a  dissertation and he
envies the rest! Or was it because I didn't fill his request for the  SES-2?
Well, it doesn't matter-there is no more  Krivoshein.  He's gone. That's the
way it  is. The winner in life  is gone. That's the way it is. The winner in
life is the one who outlives his adversary."
     Hilobok was  pleased  with  the  humor  of  his  thought  and wanted to
remember it. It should be noted that Harry Haritonovich was not as stupid as
one might assume from his behavior. It's just that he based his formula  for
success on the following: they expect less from a fool. No one ever expected
great ideas or  knowledge  from  him; thus on  those rare  occasions when he
would display some knowledge or the tiniest idea, it came as such a pleasant
surprise  that   his  colleagues   would  think:  "We   underestimate  Harry
Haritonovich,"  and  try  to   compensate   for  that  evaluation  in  their
disposition toward him.  And that's  how his articles got into the anthology
Questions of Systemology-the editors, naturally expecting nothing very good,
were  bowled  over by the few grains of  reason  in them. Harry Haritonovich
turned  in  work to  people who  were  already demoralized  by his talk  and
behavior. But something went wrong with his dissertation... but, never mind,
he would get his!
     Harry  Haritonovich was lulled  by  pleasant thoughts and  rain-bowlike
hopes. He was sleeping soundly and without  dreams,  the way they  must have
slept in the Stone Age.


     Officer Gayevoy was sleeping  and smiling, just returned from his night
shift.


     After a good cry about Krivoshein and herself, Lena fell asleep.


     But not everyone was  asleep. The police guard Golovorezov was fighting
off sleepiness at his post watching the New Systems Lab; he  was sitting  on
the steps of  the lodge, smoking, and  looking at the stars over the  trees.
Something rustled in the  grass  not far away.  He shined  his flashlight: a
red-eyed albino rabbit looked at him from the  bushes.  The guard shooed him
away. Golovorezov had no idea just what kind of a rabbit it was.


     Victor Kravets tossed and turned on the hard cot under a cloth  blanket
that smelled of disinfectant in the solitary confinement cell of the prison.
He was in that state of nervous agitation when sleep is impossible.
     "What  will  happen  now?  What   will  happen?  Did  graduate  student
Krivoshein get  out of  it,  or will the laboratory and the  project perish?
What  else  can I  do  to  help?  Fight  back?  Confess?  To  what?  Citizen
investigator, I'm guilty of good intentions-good intentions that didn't help
anything. I guess  that's  a  heavy guilt, if that's how it's worked out. We
kept  rushing-hurry! hurry!-to master the  discovery, to reach  that  method
'with absolute dependability.' And even  though I didn't admit it to myself,
I expected us to come up with it too. Evolution brought new information into
man gradually, by  the  method of small trials and small errors, testing its
benefit with innumerable experiments. And we-we  tried to do  it  all in one
experiment!
     "We should have dropped the idea of possible social repercussions right
off the bat and worked  openly and  calmly like everyone  else. In the  long
run,  people aren't children. They must understand what's what on their own.
We  figured  out  everything:   that   man  is  a  super   complex,  protein
quantal-molecular system, that  he is the product of natural evolution, that
he is information recorded  in the liquid.  The one thing we missed was that
man is man.  A  free creature. The master of his fate and  his  actions. And
that freedom began  long before  all the rebellions and revolutions, on that
distant day when a humanlike ape thought: 'I  can climb up the  tree  to get
the  fruit but I can also knock it down with the stick  in my hand. Which is
better?' It wasn't just thinking, that ape-it  had seen storms make branches
knock down fruit.  Freedom  was  the opportunity  to  choose  a  variant  of
behavior based on  knowledge. From that day every discovery, every invention
has given people new opportunities, made them even freer.
     "Of  course, there have  been discoveries (not many) that  told people:
don't! You  can't build perpetual motion machines;  you can't pass the speed
of light; you can't accurately measure the speed and position of an electron
simultaneously.  But  our  discovery  forbids  nothing  and  doesn't  change
anything. It says: go ahead!
     "Freedom. It's  not  easy  to recognize  your  freedom  in  our  modern
society, and pick variations of  your behavior wisely and well.  Millions of
years of the past hang over man when biological laws determined the behavior
of  his  ancestors and everything was simple. And now he  is still trying to
lay the blame for his mistakes on circumstances, on cruel fate, and to place
hopes in  God, on  a strong personality, on  luck-just so  it's not him. And
when the hopes shatter, man looks and finds a scapegoat: the people  who had
raised the hopes are  free of guilt. In essence, people who take the path of
least resistance do not know freedom."
     The peephole in  the  door opened,  letting  in a ray  of light; it was
blocked by  the  guard's face. They  were probably checking to see if he was
planning another break. Victor Kravets laughed silently: naturally the clink
was  the best place to meditate  on freedom!  He acknowledged  with pleasure
that despite all the recent hassles he hadn't lost his sense of humor.


     Double Adam-Hercules was sitting and  reminiscing on a bench at the bus
stop  on an empty  street. Yesterday,  as he was  coming  from the  railroad
station,  thinking about  the three currents of information (science,  life,
art) that affect man,  he had the beginnings of a vague, but very  important
idea.  He was interrupted by  the  three men  with the  demand  to show  his
papers, those  so and so's.... He was left with the feeling that he had been
close  to  a valuable guess. He  would have been better off without it, that
feeling. Now he wouldn't get any sleep!
     "Let's try it again. I was thinking about what information can be used,
and  how,  to ennoble man? Krivoshein had  the idea of synthesizing a knight
'without  fear or flaw.' And now I've got it and I  can't reject it. I ruled
out information  from  the  environment  and  from  science,  because  their
influence on man can  be equally good  or bad.  There is only  the method of
awakening good thoughts with a lyre-art.
     True, it  does awaken them,  but the  lyre is an imperfect  instrument;
while it's being plinked,  man  is ennobled, but  when it stops, so does the
effect. There is something left, of course, but not much, just a superficial
memory of  seeing a  play or reading  a  book. Well,  all right, what  if we
introduce this information into the  computer-womb during  the  synthesis of
man. What if we record the  contents of  many books, show  several excellent
movies? It would  be the  same thing:  it  would  remain in the  superficial
memory-and that's all. After all, the book's not about him!
     "Aha, that's  what  I was  thinking about: there is a  transparent wall
between the source  of  art information and  its receptor-a  concrete  human
being. What is that wall? Damn  it, will life experience always be  the main
factor in the formation of the personality? Do you have to  suffer yourself,
to understand the suffering of others? Make mistakes to learn the right way?
Like a child  who has to burn himself to keep  from sticking his hand in the
fire. But that's a hard way to learn,  life experience, and not everyone can
master it. Life can ennoble you but it can also make you bitter and stupid."
     He lit a cigarette and paced back and forth in front of the bench.
     "Information from art is not processed thoroughly enough by man so that
he  can use it to solve his  own problems in life. Wait! The information  is
not processed to the point  of problem  solving....  I've heard that before!
When? In the beginning of the  experiment: the early complex sensors-crystal
unit-TsVMN-12  did not absorb my  information-Krivoshein's  information-it's
the same thing! And then I used feedback!"
     Adam was no longer pacing; he was running  on the spit-covered pavement
from the wastebasket to the lamp post.
     "Feedback,   that's  what  I  want!   Feedback,  which  increases   the
effectiveness of information systems a  thousand times. That's why there's a
wall. That's  why  the effect  of  art  information  is  so low-there  is no
feedback between the  source and  the receptor.  There  is some,  of course:
reviews, readers' conferences, critical magazines, and so on, but that's not
it. There has to be direct, technical feedback, so that the information from
art that is  being  introduced into a  person  can be changed  to  suit  his
individuality, character,  memory, abilities, even appearance and biography.
In  that way his own  behavior in  critical situations can be played for him
during  synthesis (let  him  make his mistakes,  learn