Someday they'll want us.

James Wynn · 24 Jun 2010, 14:13 · from 2010-June.txt.gz

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From: crushtv at gmail.com (James Wynn)
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 2010 09:13:32 -0500
Subject: (urth) Someday they'll want us.
In-Reply-To: <A38FCFDF3C434CB3A9E2D261F8BF9F79@jill>
References: <A38FCFDF3C434CB3A9E2D261F8BF9F79@jill>
Message-ID: <4C23680C.7070107 at gmail.com>


>
> "Someday they'll want us" is the last line of _The Fifth Head of 
> Cerberus_, written three years after the narrator's release from 
> prison.  The subject, clearly, is Phaedria and her child.  Who are the 
> "us" of the example? I have sometimes heard the phrase used where "us" 
> means the singular "me", but I do not think it fits the narrator's 
> education and speech patterns. The narrator's known family at this 
> time consists of only Mr. Million, and David, who lives in another 
> city.  Are we to infer that he has already created a 'Number 6' clone?
>
I am pretty certain that "the child" with Phaedra is Number 6. Phaedra 
*works* at Cave Canem and we know the jobs available there. "Us" is Mr. 
Million and all the clones before and after Number 5. As "Dr. Marsch" 
has explained, "us" and "me" are equivalent in their case.

> A little earlier comes the sentence "I have written to disclose myself 
> to myself, and I am writing now because I will, I know, sometime read 
> what I am now qwriting and wonder".  This can be read in two ways; one 
> in which "myself" and "I" may refer to a clone, and another which 
> suggests that in writing the narrator has found a better means of 
> self-examination.
>
I think it is the former. He knows that he will pass on this position to 
another at one point. He must know on some analytical level that Number 
6 will murder him one day.
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