We

I feel my cheeks are burning as I write this. To integrate the colossal, universal equation! To unbend the wild curve, to straighten it out to a tangent⁠—to a straight line! For the United State is a straight line, a great, divine, precise, wise line, the wisest of lines!

I, D-503, the builder of the Integral, I am only one of the many mathematicians of the United State. My pen, which is accustomed to figures, is unable to express the march and rhythm of consonance; therefore I shall try to record only the things I see, the things I think, or to be more exact, the things we think. Yes, we; that is exactly what I mean, and “We” shall, therefore, be the title of my records. But this will only be a derivative of our life⁠—of our mathematical, perfect life in the United State. If this be so, will not this derivative be a poem in itself, despite my limitations? It will. I believe, I know it.

I feel my cheeks are burning as I write this. I feel something similar to what a woman probably feels when for the first time she senses within herself the pulse of a tiny, blind, human being. It is I, and at the same time it is not I. And for many long months it will be necessary to feed it with my life, with my blood, and then with a pain at my heart, to tear it from myself and lay it at the feet of the United State.

Yet I am ready, as everyone, or nearly every one of us, is. I am ready.

It seemed to me so incredible, so absurd, that I lost control of myself and laughed aloud. A laugh, as if an echo of mine, reached my ear from the right. I turned. I saw white, very white, sharp teeth, and an unfamiliar female face.

“I beg your pardon,” she said, “but you looked about you like an inspired mythological god on the seventh day of creation. You look as though you are sure that I, too, was created by you, by no one but you. It is very flattering.”

All this without a smile, even with a certain degree of respect⁠—(she may know that I am the builder of the Integral). In her eyes nevertheless, in her brows, there was a strange irritating X, and I was unable to grasp it, to find an arithmetical expression for it. Somehow I was confused; with a somewhat hazy mind, I tried logically to motivate my laughter.

“It was absolutely clear that this contrast, this impassable abyss, between the things of today and of years ago⁠—”

“But why impassable?” (What bright, sharp teeth!) “One might throw a bridge over that abyss. Please imagine: a drum battalion, rows⁠—all this existed before and consequently⁠—”

“Oh, yes, it is clear,” I exclaimed.

It was a remarkable intersection of thoughts. She said almost in the same words the things I wrote down before the walk! Do you understand? Even the thoughts! It is because nobody is one, but one of. We are all so much alike⁠—

And I heard, saw, how she, behind me hesitated for a second, thinking. The door of the closet.⁠ ⁠… It slammed; again silk⁠ ⁠… silk.⁠ ⁠…

“Well, all right.”

I turned around. She was dressed in a saffron-yellow dress of an ancient style. This was a thousand times worse than if she had not been dressed at all. Two sharp points, through the thin tissue glowing with rosiness, two burning embers piercing through ashes; two tender, round knees.⁠ ⁠…

She was sitting in a low armchair. In front of her on a small square table, I noticed a bottle filled with something poisonously green and two small glasses on thin legs. In the corner of her mouth she had a very thin paper tube; she was ejecting smoke formed by the burning of that ancient smoking substance whose name I do not now remember.

The membrane was still vibrating. Within the sledgehammer was pounding the red-hot iron bars of my chest. I heard distinctly every blow of the hammer, and⁠ ⁠… what if she too heard it?

But she continued to produce smoke very calmly; calmly she looked at me; and nonchalantly she flicked ashes on the pink check!

With as much self-control as possible I asked, “If you still feel that way, why did you have me assigned to you? And why did you make me come here?”

Inside there were two of them, one a short specimen with heavy legs, his eyes like the horns of a bull tossing the patients up, the other extremely thin with lips like sparkling scissors, a nose like a blade⁠—it was the same man who⁠ ⁠… I ran to him as to a dear friend, straight over close to the blade, and muttered something about insomnia, dreams, shadows, yellow sand. The scissors-lips sparkled and smiled.

“Yes, it is too bad. Apparently a soul has formed in you.”

A soul?⁠—that strange ancient word that was forgotten long ago.⁠ ⁠…

“Is it⁠ ⁠… v-very dangerous?” I stuttered.

“Incurable,” was the cut of the scissors.

“But more specifically, what is it? Somehow I cannot imagine⁠—”

“You see⁠ ⁠… how shall I put it? Are you a mathematician?”

“Yes.”

“Then you see⁠ ⁠… imagine a plane, let us say this mirror. You and I are on its surface.

And then, if it proves inevitable, we may direct the tubes of the motors downward and by their work alone.⁠ ⁠…”

I jumped up.

“It is inconceivable! It is absurd! Is it not clear to you that what you are contriving is a revolution?”

“Yes, a revolution. Why is it absurd?”

“Absurd? because a revolution is impossible! Because our (I speak for myself and for you), our revolution was the last one. No other revolutions may occur. Everybody knows that.”

A mocking, sharp triangle of brows.

“My dear, you are a mathematician, are you not? More than that, a philosopher-mathematician? Well then, name the last number!”

“What is⁠ ⁠… I⁠ ⁠… I cannot understand, which last?”

“The last one, the highest, the largest.”

“But I-330, it is absurd! Since the number of numbers is infinite, how can there be a last one?”

“And why then do you think there is a last revolution? There is no last revolution, their number is infinite.⁠ ⁠… The ‘last one’ is a children’s story. Children are afraid of the infinite, and it is necessary that children should not be frightened, so that they may sleep through the night.”