/lit/ - Literature

“Oh don’t worry, I know what it does”.

The distinguished looking fellow in the top hat and black winter coat seemed at once incredulous, and subtly threatened. “I doubt very much that you do. It’s a genuine breakthrough. Unlike anything anybody else has ever invented, of the utmost importance-”

I interrupted him, only worsening his mood. “Utmost importance to the future, blah blah, yes I know. That’s what they all say. It’s a machine that makes copies of itself, isn’t it?”

Where before he looked ready to lay into me, he now appeared to me as a deer caught in the headlamps of a motor carriage. “Do...you mean to imply there have been inventors before me, who came to file a patent on a similar device?”

I retrieved a folder full of them from the back room. Such wonderfully detailed, intricate drawings. What a shame all that intelligence is put to such a terrible purpose.

“I don’t understand” he gasped. “Then why haven’t I heard of it? Why is such machinery not in common use?” I sighed, tucking the drawings back into the folder and laying it flat before meeting his gaze.

“You think you’re special, don’t you. There are scores of inventors like you, children of machinery. All you think about is cogs and pistons, gears and drive belts day in, day out. I would ask if you’re married but I’m sure I already know the answer.”

He sputtered, but did not contradict my assumption, so I continued. “It’s always the ones like you. Are there not enough pleasures in life to distract you from these….these machinations?” I swept his drawings off the desk. He hurriedly scooped them up, then held them defensively to his chest.

“You don’t understand!” he snapped. “This invention will change the world!” Of course I knew too well he was right. That’s why I pressed a concealed switch, locking the door he’d come in through as soon as I saw what device his patent application was for.

“We’ll see in a minute which one of us lacks in understanding. What do you know of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution?” Still eyeballing me warily, he recalled the basics of it admirably well. “And how did it all start? For evolution to occur there had to be some initial creature to begin evolving. The simplest possible form of life.”

I had his interest now, though he would not yet loosen his grip on those drawings. Not that it would make any difference. “What you’re describing is just a chemical reaction that makes copies of itself. No eyes, no mouth even, just the bare minimum needed for natural selection to act upon it. A chemical mechanism which self-replicates.”