General Information

Physical:  Middle-aged, closely cropped flaxen-hair, lean build, on the short side (around 170cm or 5’7’’), pretty fit

Personality:  Slightly neurotic, narcissistic, over analyses thing, finds it difficult to make decisions

His virtual twin.  He’s an exact copy of his personality and memories.

Setting and World

On Earth, a Western society.  Most probably an urban setting.

In this world you can download a copy of people’s consciousnesses into a computing environment.  In a special transparent chamber, you can see a smaller 3D image of yourself to have entire conversations with your copy.  It’s not cheap though and it’s not that readily accepted in society.  The original idea behind it was for people to preserve their loved ones before they pass on.

Plot

Felix takes advantage of this technology and decides to make a copy of himself.  Right now.  After all, he talks so much to himself anyway.  He scrapes up the money to make it happen, but he keeps his 3D ‘twin’ a secret.

In the beginning it’s great.  His 3D ‘twin’ agrees and sympathises with everything.  He’s the perfect best friend.  But then things start to get weird.  They start to have arguments.  His twin wants to see more of the ‘world’ (right now he’s held offline so he cannot travel in cyberspace.)

Note, it’s not meant to be a comedy.

Questions

StuckOnMyStory Feedback

For one thing, he’s going to be stressed out.  So this needs to show in his daily life.  Maybe friends, colleagues, even strangers he is forced to interact with (in a shop, say).

So what are some ways Felix could handle this?

* After the arguments and threats get out of hand, in a fit of rage he ends up killing his virtual twin.  Destroys the computing chamber where the twin resides and deletes all the software.  But then the guilt…. In a way, he killed himself, didn’t he?  What would his twin say while this is happening?  What would he say to himself (the real self)?  Would he feel so guilty he ends up resurrecting him?  Would he hold some type of private funeral?  How would he continue with life afterwards?  Would his psychological problems worsen?
 
* He works hard to find a psychologist who will take on his twin as a patient.  Or maybe it’s a relationship therapist who takes them both on.  And then it could be that his twin is completely psychotic and then needs to be destroyed or he is cured and they end up living happily ever after.

* He keeps his twin and the situation worsens until finally it drives him mad and he ends up killing himself.

* He gives into his twin’s request and connects him to the rest of cyberspace.  This opens up many other possibilities like: 
- his twin ends up falling in love and deserting Felix altogether
- ends up forming a group with others like him and they create havoc on networks (or do good?)
- convinces Felix to join him (kill his living body) in cyberspace
- Felix is able to use his twin to do illegal things on the network, together they get rich (and eventually go to jail?)

I think I like the idea of the relationship therapists.  Could get some really great dialogues in there.