But I’m you. The man you should have been. The man you wanted to be.
That’s the only reason for my existence, isn’t it?
Well. Be careful what you wish for.
Because I exist now, Dr. Henry Jekyll - your equal, your alter ego. Here, in this sublime, fascinating, delightful world.
What a strange way to enter it, though. Born of vice. In a laboratory - your laboratory, and mine. I had no parents, no mother to give me life. That first gasp of air through another man’s lungs.
The first sensation was a cold liquid, gliding down my throat, creeping through my limbs, shifting something deep within me.
Something like soul.
Then came the pain - hard, racking pain, and we writhed and screamed, and in this fashion, I came into the world.
Fitting.
Slowly, leisurely, the agony faded away. My fingers twitched.
An unfamiliar thought crept into my mind - lighter, brighter, sickeningly conscientious. Not my thought, certainly not.
The potion? Had it worked?
Mirror. I needed a mirror. But who keeps a mirror in a laboratory?
What a strange process it was, at first. Two thoughts, two minds, in one body. While that first mind flashed with panic and tension, electrifying delight, mine slowly skimmed over the situation. The bright lights and glistening minerals of a scientific workstation blanketed us. Night crept through the windows. Shattered crystals of glass, bright, bubbling liquids, fell across every surface, no doubt smashed in our torture. Silence fell, broken only by our frenzied breaths as we dashed through a courtyard, down several sets of dark halls, and, finally, into a large room I took to be the other’s bedchamber.
By “the other” I mean you, Dr. Henry Jekyll. That high-pitched, irritating voice in my mind, always wondering, always bothering me in my moments of fun - so horribly selfish. At first you were agreeable enough, but now…. It does not matter now. Soon, you will be gone, and your anxious voice will bother me no more.
Now, on with the tale.
Through the dark room we stumbled, until, finally, our shaking hands (your hands; mine would not have quivered like a child’s), lit a lamp, and then slowly, wondrously, approached the mirror.
Two minds burst into fiery life.
Shock swallowed yours - wondering, freed - your experiment had worked! You had become an altogether new person.
Me.