{15 minutes into the future... }
Somewhere between the homonculous of alchemy, and the banned practice of human cloning, lies the Klein Bottle. I'm not sure of the wisdom in explaining how the process works, or how I came to inherit this knowledge, but for now I will only admit it's existence. It was not something I was eager to make use of though, for reasons that may become clear soon. However, my attitude changed, which leads me to the start of this story.
The idea came to mind at the end of my infatuation with Sarah K. I say 'end of' because, regardless of how I felt about her, she didn't feel that way about me. She was a fellow student, majoring in the computer sciences. I don't think it's easy to say exactly why she caught my attention as she did. She was soft spoken and kept mostly to herself. She was pretty, with a nice figure, if a little on the skinny side, with fair skin and glossy black hair. Behind those glasses of hers though, she had the most entrancing green eyes.
Perhaps she was too shy, or too wrapped up in her studies, but either way I wasn't making much of an impression on her. I suppose any normal or sane man would let the matter drop where it lay. Well, I didn't. In my particular way, I began to wish I could have Sarah all to myself -or, at least at version of her. It was when I found a strand of her glossy hair on her desk after lectures that the decision to use the Klein Bottle was made. I knew the process, but this would be my first real attempt at using this technology (or magic, or whatever one chooses to call it).
The first step was the easiest. Using the school's bio-chem lab, I took that hair to tease out a strand of intact DNA, which I then implanted inside the empty ovum of a mouse. Now, the controversial bit.
Taking out a pre-prepared vial of my own sperm, I added it to the test tube, having separated out a sample of my semen to include only X-chromosome sperm. It's difficult to admit that what I'd set out to create would in part be my own offspring, but while masturbating to provide this supply of sperm, I tried to think only of Sarah. Now, adding in the receptor chemical that would allow the animal egg cell to accept my seed, I stirred the mix and found under the micron microscope the implantation had indeed taken place.
Cleaning up the evidence of my potentially illegal work, I prepared a vial and smuggled my fertilized egg back home.
The Klein Bottle itself could be mistaken for an ordinary glass pitcher, at least at first glance. It was somewhat larger, rounder and more stylized. The real difference only became apparent on closer inspection. In mathematics, a 'klein botte' represents a single sided moebius strip, looping in on itself, forming a vessel that contains zero volume. In effect, the bottle's interior exists in a separate space-time, in isolation from our own. To say any more would be to give too much away.
Arriving at my dorm apartment, I cleared a wide space on my desk. Setting up my valued Klein Bottle, I also placed a portable heater and a few other alchemical items I'll gloss over mentioning. The difficult part involved the creation of the 'water of life', a sort of artificial embryonic fluid, with which I then filled the bottle. Finally, I placed inside the fertilized ovum.
By the time the final step had been completed, it was getting quite late. Before preparing for bed though, I opened up a new notebook and began a journal, which is one of those alchemical traditions I couldn't ignore. With the end of what I'd labelled Day 0, I made one final decision -the name of my new creation. She would be called Sara -'Sara' being a truncated version of 'Sarah', just as Sara herself would be.
* * *
The morning came, and with it the first signs of success. The previously invisible cell had become a vaguely pinkish sphere, almost a centimeter in diameter, floating in the middle of the Klein Bottle. Making a brief notation in my journal, I left for school, curious to see what sort of development would take place when I got back.
It was a little strange seeing Sarah again, but at the same time quite liberating to know I didn't have to worry about 'winning and wooing'; I already had her.
Returning home, I found that things seemed to be progressing quite smoothly. 'Sara' was now about 2 inches in length, curled up as one would expect of a developing fetus, her skin still somewhat translucent. Unlike a fetus though, she was forming with more adult proportions, with delicate slender limbs, and even the fuzz of dark hair appearing on her head.
Magnifying glass in hand, I jotted down all these observations in my journal, getting excited by the prospects of my success. Granted, most of the credit had to go to the un-real space of the Klein Bottle, but with so many variables that could have gone wrong, I felt proud of my efforts. By the end of the day, she'd grown yet another inch at least. At this rate, I knew it wouldn't be more than a couple of days before Sara would be ready to be 'born'.
* * *
On the third, and what would prove to be final day, I awoke to find Sara had grown nearly double in size. A perfect miniature of the real Sarah (if my own genes had made any changes, I couldn't see them), she floated weightless, knees drawn up to her chin, tiny eyes closed. Her hair had grown so that it was shoulder length, and her skin was no longer translucent. I could even make out her fingernails if I looked hard enough. She was such a darling little thing I spent several minutes just watching her before making my journal notations and getting ready for lectures.
* * *
My first bout of carelessness came near the end of the school day. I had run into my good friend Paul, and as we usually did, grabbed a slice of pizza and headed over to my place to check out my new DVDs. We would talk about classes, and he could complain about his mother, with whom he still lived. It was so matter of habit I didn't realize until we were marching up the stairs what a mistake I'd made. The Klein Bottle was left right out on my desk, and there wasn't going to be any easy explanation for what was floating inside it.
"What's the matter," Paul asked, noting my hesitation.
"Erm, no, nothing exactly," I mumbled, preparing myself for the worst. On entering my smallish apartment, it took Paul all of two seconds to discover my secret project.
"What in the hell..."
He leaned in close, peering at Sara. She'd now reached about 10" in overall length, and I realized with a sort of dull panic that I'd have to decant the bottle and extract her from it soon, probably as soon as tonight. Hopefully I could get rid of Paul before then.
"It's not really what it seems," I tried to explain.