From Are You Me?
*
[Southern 36th Level]
“Are you me?” She slumped to the floor as the recurring head made her faint, staring across her prison to the girl standing on the other side.
Silently observant, the girl smiled, eyes flashing to see weakness.
“You look a lot like me,” she said, “the way I used to be, anyway.” Raising a bandaged hand, Aethel gestured as she continued, “Pinned up hair, cocktail dress. You even speak the same.”
The twin laughed, sound vibrating against the glass, hands behind her back, as she walked the length of Aethel’s confinement. “We may look alike, but I’m perfect.” She displayed a set of gleaming white teeth. “You’re plump.”
“You noticed?”
“What if I’m real and you’re not? The life you’ve had is just a dream, my dreams and my thoughts.”
“No.” Aethel closed her eyes to the blinding lights, the artificial girl that looked, and sounded, so much like her. She needed to think but her head seemed to be all over the place, and the bruise, no doubt, was still dark, still visible.
Her counterpart squatted behind her, putting a hand to the glass as if to stroke Aethel’s stringy hair through the very material that separated them.
The girl laughed again. “Are you me?”
