Robert Silverberg - In the Clone Zone

“Dead? Who? What do you mean?” the Alvarado clone said calmly. “This clone was gravely injured in an attempt on my life and has hovered close to death for many weeks, despite the finest care we could give him. Now that he has begun to recover he is exhibiting delusional behavior. He insists that he is the true Maximum Leader and I am nothing but an artificial genetic duplicate. I ask you to test the authenticity of his claim, Senor Doctor.”

“ Mondschein! Rafael Mondschein!” the ragged Alvarado cried. A convulsive quiver of amazement ran through his shoulders and chest. “You here? They’ve brought you back?”

Mondschein said nothing. He stared at the ragged man.

The prisoner’s eyes gleamed. “All right, go on! Test me, Rafael. Do your mumbo-jumbo and tell this fraud who I am! And then we’ll see if he dares keep up the masquerade. Go on, Rafael! Plug in your damned machine! Stick the electrodes on me!”

“Go ahead, Senor Doctor,” the Alvarado clone said.

Mondschein stepped forward and began the preparations for the test, wondering whether he would remember the procedure after so many years.

The prisoner looked toward the Alvarado clone and said, “He’ll prove that I am who I say I am. And you won’t have the guts to carry the pretense any further, will you, you test-tube fraud? Because half the staff in the hospital knows the real story already, and somehow the truth will get out. Somehow, no matter how you try to suppress it. And it’ll bring you down. Once the country finds out that you’re a fake, that you simply seized power when the motorcade bomb went off. Once word gets around that I didn’t die, that you’ve had me hidden away in the hospital all this time with people thinking I was you and you were me, what do you think will happen to your regime? Will anyone want to take orders from a clone?”

“You mustn’t speak now,” Mondschein told him. “It’ll distort the test results.”

“All right. Yes. Listen, Rafael, no matter what you tell him he’ll say that you identified me as a clone, but you know that it’s a lie. When you get back outside, you tell people the true story. You hear me? And afterward I’ll see to it that you get whatever you want. Anything. No reward would be too great. Money, women, country estates, your own laboratory, whatever.”

“Please,” Mondschein said. “I ask you not to speak.”

He attached the electrodes to himself. He touched the dials.

He remembered, now. The whole technique. He had written these personality-organization algorithms himself. He closed his eyes and felt the data come flooding in. The prisoner’s brain waves met his own—collided—clashed—clashed violently—

To the Alvarado clone Mondschein said, “The alpha match is perfect, Senor Presidente. What we have here is a clone.”

“No, Rafael!” the prisoner roared. “You filthy lying bastard, no! You know it isn’t so!”

“Take him away,” the Alvarado clone said.

“No. You won’t do anything to me. I’m the only legitimate President of Tierra Alvarado.”

“You are nothing,” the clone told him. “You are a mere creature. We have scientific proof that you are simply one of the artificial brothers. Dr. Mondschein has just demonstrated that.”

“Balls,” the prisoner said. “Listen, Mondschein, I know he has you intimidated. But when you get out of here, spread the word. Tell everyone what your real reading was. That there’s a usurper in the presidential palace, that he must be overthrown. You’ll be a national hero, you’ll be rewarded beyond your wildest dreams—”

Mondschein smiled. “Ah, but I already have everything that I want.”

He looked toward the Alvarado clone. “I’ll prepare a formal report and sign it, Senor Presidente. And I will be willing to attest to it at the public trial.”

“This has been the trial, doctor,” the clone said smoothly, indicating an opening in the ceiling of the cell, where Mondschein now saw an opening through which the snout of a television camera protruded. “All the information that we need has been recorded. But I am grateful for your offer. You have been extremely helpful. Extremely helpful, Senor Doctor.”

That night, in the safety and comfort of his beloved villa, Mondschein slept soundly for the first time since his return to Tierra Alvarado—more soundly than he had slept in years.