A Correspondence (Short Literary Sci-Fi Story)

By Paul Victor Tims, After Mary Shelley and Robert Louis Stevenson

Early in 2024, a package of letters was discovered, exchanged between two eminent scientists of the 1800s, formerly thought to have been active nearly seven decades apart with no personal contact. Beyond suggesting a dating snafu in our literary historiography, these letters shed great light on the fates of two men thought to have died under similarly macabre circumstances.

Dear Victor,

I just saw your piece in the Journal of Medicine: The Use of Electrochemical Therapies in the Revivification of Necrotised Tissues. Bold of you, I must say! I thought you’d abandoned that line of research? Considering how things turned out last time, nobody would have blamed you for knocking it on the head. At the risk of broaching a rather delicate subject, that reminds me: how is your son? Still wandering the icy wastes, condemned to a gelid eternity of abominable solitude, I suppose?

Anyway, that’s not why I’m writing to you. I’ve been putting together another paper on the connection between dissociative neurological conditions – specifically, the psychopathic or ‘evil’ impulses often hived off to specific personas in Dissociative Identity Disorder – and blood chemistry. It occasioned quite a bit of original research, which Edward wasn’t happy about. You know how he despises change. The point is that, upon reading your recent piece, it occurred to me our areas of study might share a border: that obtaining the proper blood-chemistry might prevent the regrettable results you got when you attempted full-body revivification last time. Put bluntly, I’m not certain the normality or abnormality of the brain you used was the real problem. Meanwhile, your work on reversing necrotisation might be able to help me with a persistent problem with my own experiments: namely, the physical decay or ‘shrinkage’ associated with the original persona as a result of Induced Identity Dissociation. Dare I say the word ‘collaboration’? It’s something to think about, at any rate.

Regardless of what you decide, do drop in on me the next time you’re up in Edinburgh. I’m tired of the company of quacks and you’d be a breath of fresh air.

Your Friend in the North,

Henry.

*

Dear Henry,

Oh you are dramatic! ‘A gelid eternity of abominable solitude’ indeed! What orifice did you pull that out of? And no, the subject isn’t too delicate. As a matter of fact, my son’s ‘gelid eternity’ (no, I’ll never let you live that down) is rather less fraught with solitude than one might expect. The last I heard, he’d shacked up with some Inuit woman, name of Enid, with a thing for surgical scars. Quite disgusting, really, but I suppose beggars can’t be choosers.

I’m flattered to learn you’re still reading my work on those rare occasions I have time to publish. Dare away vis a vie the word ‘collaboration’. If our two research-spheres can compliment each-other in the way you’re suggesting, it would mean significant breakthroughs for both of us. Are you suggesting we put forth a joint proposal to secure funding from the Royal Society, or were you imagining a more self-funded and informal partnership? The former would be more prestigious, but the latter does offer the benefit of privacy. I’m open to persuasion on either. I’m based in London nowadays and I’d invite you down to thrash out the details, but I dread to think what mischief brother Eddie would get up to if you brought him to the capital. Perhaps your suggestion that I visit you in Edinburgh is sensible, eh?

Oh, on another note: do you recall that chap who turned himself invisible a few years back? If memory serves, he went off his rocker and turned to a life of crime, utterly freed from the consequences of his actions. Well, the point is that he turned visible again, quite spontaneously, naked in the middle of Oxford Street last week, at least according to the Strand. The forces of law and order are having a field day, of course. It’s dashed funny in a way, but considering how close we operate to the fringe of scientific acceptability, it gave me a chill. There but for blind chance go we, old friend.

Ah. I’ve just reread that last paragraph and I appear to be rambling on like the bitter old man I am. I’ll leave you before I start prating on about the price of coal or the scandalous quality of young women’s outfits nowadays. Let me know when I can join you amid the ginger barbarians of England’s sister-state. ‘Ciao’ (as the continentals say) for now.

Your Friend Among the Sassenachs,

Victor.

*

Dear Victor,

It was good to hear back from you so promptly. I confess, ‘ginger barbarians’ amused me rather more than might be considered decent. A visit might be a bit difficult at the moment, mind. Edward’s been more criminal than usual. The police are saying he trampled someone – a child, no less. I’ve got him on quarter-rations of our formula, just to run him a little, but I’m seriously considering cutting him off altogether. Blast it! Why does the monstrous bastard have to be so critical to my research?

Sorry. All that’s a bit grim for a collegiate missive, isn’t it? I actually wrote to boast of good news in the H.J. household. I’ve been chatting with this chap by the name of Stevenson, and I think he might be interested in writing a dramatised account of my scientific career: a novel, of sorts, that would bring the kind of cutting-edge research we do within grasp of the public’s understanding. One doesn’t like to get one’s hopes up where writers are concerned, of course, but I heard that someone’s writing about you in a similar fashion and I didn’t think it could hurt to jump on the bandwagon.

Right. I’ve got to go and ‘answer a few questions’ as they say in your Strand’s procedurals. I’ll let you know when the coast’s clear to come up and visit. In the meantime, any good cheer you can send from London would be greatly appreciated. ‘Eddie’, as you call him, has made things bloody sticky for me and Stevenson isn’t quite sufficient to lighten my mood.

Blast it! Now I’ve turned grim again!

Your Ally Amid the Ginger Barbarians,

Henry

*

Dear Henry,

Bloody sorry to hear about Edward’s latest mischief. The man’s a menace. I’d cut him off altogether for a few weeks; remind him who’s in charge. Never mind running him. He might be a mad dog, but he’s got a man’s skill for reasoning: if you lock him away in some dark corner awhile, he’ll learn not to play up again pretty sharpish.

What’s all this about someone writing about me? It’s the first I’m hearing about it!?

Got to dash now. That strange little American, Herbert, is knocking at my door, raving about ‘reanimation’ and begging for insights. I can’t decide whether to let him stay and stroke my ego or boot him out onto the street and tell him to come back when it’s daylight. Either way, I’d better go deal with him.

Alas, the work of a science communicator is never done.

Your Bemused Compatriot in the Big Smoke,

Victor.

*

Dear Victor,

Whatever you do, don’t go near a book shop for a few months! I assumed that book on you was being produced with your knowledge and consent, but having just perused a copy, I have to say I’m horrified. The bloody thing’s a hatchet-job! Is this legal? Can that Shelley woman do this? You ought to get a lawyer onto the matter. I bloody would. Actually, you can have mine if you like: the firm of Klein and Utterson. They’re pretty good, if a little nosier than one would like.

Things seem to have quietened down on the Edward front, for now at least. Look, if it comes to court, would you turn expert witness and tell them he’s a different person? I don’t want some idiot locking me up for his crimes. Sorry to ask it of you, but everyone else I know who might testify on the matter is either mad, bad or Transylvanian.

Oh, that’s right! I never told you about the Transylvanian bugger I met, did I? You were off in the arctic at the time. Interesting fellow: a Count, no less, from up in the Carpathians. His blood was invaluable to my research and was, frankly, in the most exotic condition I’ve ever seen. Alas, I had to terminate our acquaintance before I was quite done with him. To cut a long story very short, he tried to bite me. Right on the bloody neck! Anyway, the sequel of that little episode was a visit from a Dutchman carrying a tremendous number of wooden stakes and a bulb of garlic, who wanted me to tell him everything I could about the Count so he might pursue him. I gathered, from the stakes, that the neck-biting wasn’t new and that he meant to kill him before he ripped out someone’s jugular. Quite what the garlic was for, I have no idea. I hope never to find out.

Your Stalwart Wrangler of Scotch Eggs and Good Whiskey,

Henry

*

Dear Henry,

I’ve just finished reading the book you warned me away from. A ‘Modern Prometheus’ indeed! You’re not wrong that it’s a hatchet-job, though I can’t exactly fault the author’s less-than-generous depiction of my parenting skills. As a father, I make an excellent experimentalist. Shame the plebs who read this type of thing will now know me for the former instead of the latter. Honestly, though, I don’t see the need for legal action. The Eddie in you is overreacting, as usual. The author’s an adolescent girl, for crying out loud! Probably writing more against her own father than me. There is such a thing as being too heavy-handed in one’s response.

I’m less pleased with the morons in the press celebrating it as the dawn of a new genre: scientific fiction, one of them called it. Good grief, what I wouldn’t give to force these quasi-literates through a classical education! Aside from the small detail that my life is not a work of fiction, there are several texts with significant prior claims. With it’s themes of interplanetary travel, encounters with alien races and speculative biology, A True Story by Lucian of Samosata, written in the Second Century AD, does seem to have pipped Shelley to the post by a considerable margin.

Oh, hark at me, grumbling on when you have real problems. I’m relieved to hear things have settled down regarding Edward’s misdeeds, but I’m sure his behaviour must be a continued source of stress nonetheless. Maybe I can get up to you in the next few weeks? In the unlikely event things do escalate to the level of a trial, rest assured I shall turn witness for you. Actually, I’d like to make sure I’m as close by as possible for a bit, just in case. I’m not going to let your lesser half bugger up your whole career or deprive you of your freedom just because a few jury members find the concept of single-bodied consciousness dualism a little hard to comprehend. I’ll make sure I’m well-prepared to break it down for even the simplest haggis-quaffing Scots juror.

Sorry, was that one a bit much? You know I love your countrymen really.

Your Own Personal Prejudiced Englishman,

Victor

*

Dear Victor,

First of all, no. Your closing barb wasn’t a ‘bit much’, save that I nearly choked on my coffee when I read it. You accuse me of having odd turns of phrase, but I keep looking out the window at my neighbours, thinking ‘haggis-quaffing jurors’ and giggling like an idiot.

I’m afraid things have gone from tranquil to dire at this end. I’m not sure a good legal defence is going to cut it. There’s no easy way to say this. Edward’s killed a man. Not through accident or callousness, but in an act of cold-blooded murder this time. He’s also found some way to invert the physiological default. That is to say, our shared body looks like him rather than me unless we take active steps (i.e. ingestion of a new formula) to keep my mind in the driving seat and my phenotype on display. Since the stupid bastard’s a wanted man, I can’t imagine what he was thinking when he forcibly took over as our default persona, but now neither of us can reverse the effect. Perhaps he feared I’d never let him out of my darker psyche again after what he did. Perhaps I’ve been overestimating his ethical significance and he’s simply a complete bloody bampot.

Stevenson has quipped that our suicide would make a fine end to his book. The man’s humour is as black as Edward’s heart, but it has given me an idea. Death can be faked, after all, and faked especially well by those of a scientific bent. Victor, I’m becoming desperate. If I asked you to, would you send me samples of the chemicals you use in your revivification process? I have nobody else to turn to and no other means by which I might escape a hang-man’s noose. I am so, so sorry.

Your Friend in Need, Stranded Amid the Haggis-Quaffers,

Henry

*

Dear Henry,

Please find enclosed samples of the chemicals that will restore a dead body to life when coupled with an electric charge. I’ve also attached instructions on how to deploy them properly. If you mean to fake your death, you’ll have to find some way to trigger the chemicals in your own body post-mortem.

You’re surprised I’m helping you so willingly? After all, I turned my back on my own son when he committed terrible acts and you’ve allowed Edward to run amok, doing far worse, in your own body. I’ll be blunt. Shelley was quite right about me. Rereading that ghastly book, I see it all too clearly. Now, having lost my only truly meaningful, familial relation to hubris, judgementalism and inflexibility, I refuse to lose my friend to the same.

Speaking of my son, I’ve reached out to him. Prostrated myself in writing, actually. His response… let us just say he’s a better man than I. And I still know the captain who took me to the far north the first time. If you escape, come to London and call at my house. I realise that ‘I can get you into the care of a surgical abomination and a mad Inuit woman with a scar-fetish’ isn’t the most appealing invitation you’ll have received in your life, but… well. Anything beats the hang-man, doesn’t it?

Your friend, always (Sorry, no clever sign-offs this time),

Victor

*

Dear Victor,

Thank you. Thank you a thousand times.

By the time you get this, I’ll already be on route to London, racing my own mail.

Tell your son I’ll be forever in his debt. One monster to another.

Yours in Eternal Gratitude,

Henry

Here, the package of letters ends without any suggestion of missing material. We can only surmise that Victor Frankenstein and Henry Jekyll rendezvoused as planned and headed north to meet with the former’s ‘son’ (a gigantic monster made from the reanimated pieces of grave-robbed corpses) and his common-law wife, Enid.