I Know Everything

8/3/2019 I Know Everything

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I KNOW EVERYTHING!A Short Fantasy

Dmitrii Emets

Translated from Russian

by

Jane H. Buckingham

Jane H. Buckingham 2011

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Doctor, please wake up! Yawning, Doctor Barannikov sat up on the couch. The tall

curly-haired orderly from Admissions was standing in front of him. They brought in a

new patient! he reported. So? Couldnt it wait till morning? This isnt quite the usual

ones. Seems to be some scientist. He demanded the head doctor to go to him. I said the

head doctor isnt here, and then he called for the one on duty. Doctor Barannikov

approached the mirror and, looking attentively at it, ran his hands along his face,

smoothing out the wrinkles. A regular paranoid, he said. Who is he? As I said, some

scientist. Either a lecturer or a prof. Last name Koptin. They caught him at the TV

station trying to force his way into the live broadcast studio. When they detained him,

he bit the cop and someone else there, said the orderly.

The large luminous clock in Admissions showed five to three. The delivered patient,

a small, dishevelled person with a bruise on his right cheek, was sitting in a chair. He

was in a straight jacket. The young policeman next to him examined its tied sleeves with

interest.

On seeing Doctor Barannikov, the patient jumped up impatiently. Youre the on-

duty doctor? At long last! Im completely normal! Order them to untie me! he shouted.

Were all normal. Please sit down on the chair! Lets sort everything out! Im Koptin,

a scientist! You dont have the right to hold me here! Ill complain! Im completely

healthy! Barannikov frowned. All mental patients consider themselves healthy. For this

very reason, grilles and unbreakable glass are installed in psychiatric hospitals. May I

go? asked the policeman. Sign here, please! After taking the paper, the policeman

took off.

The man in the straight jacket watched him leave. Well, what next? he asked

tiredly. Without answering, Barannikov sat down at the table and glanced through the

copy of detention report attached to the referral for psychiatric examination. Why didyou have to go into the live broadcast studio? Were you aware what this would lead to

and where youd find yourself? he asked. The patient moved uncomfortably in the

straight jacket. I knew what risk I was taking, but I wanted to warn as many people as

possible. Two days ago, I asked them to give me airtime, but these fools refused!

Blockheads, soon theyll be sorry for everything!

Did you threaten someone specifically? the doctor asked quickly, throwing a

penetrating look at the patient over the papers. Koptin shook his head in negation.

Where did you get that? Im a scientist. I dont resort to violence at all. But from the

accompanying report it says that you do. During detention you bit Senior Sergeant V.

Mordenkos hand and insulted by action assistant directoreh-ehname illegible.What assistant director? Probably that fellow whose button I tore off the collar. Indeed

I didnt know its considered insult by action, the patient was surprised. See, you

yourself confess! the doctor said with authority. Think of it, I tore off a button. I hope

its not a secret how they detained me? With a baton on the neck, a pistol on the cheek.

Naturally, I was outraged and I started to resist. But it doesnt mean that Im

dangerous.




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Having read through the report, Barannikov put it down. Youre a scientist? he

asked. Doctor of biological sciences. Senior researcher at Michurin1 Institute of Plant

Industry, Koptin said with pride. And you were workingeh-ehuntil recently?

Koptins face became insolent. To the doctor this was the sign of a hothead a small

full-blooded man, nervous, flies quickly into a rage, and, by and large, more prone to

mental disorders. What? Are you hinting that they could throw me out because Im

bonkers? Im hinting at nothing. Im simply asking. Its you jumping to conclusions.

Youre asking? the scientist flew into a rage. Would you only listen to yourself! Youre

used to dealing with psychos, but not with normal people! It wont work! And do you

know what you are? An idiot! A nitwit! A blockhead! And Koptin burst into a stream of

swearing. The doctor patiently waited until he ran out of steam. Finally, the patient

stopped exhausted. Okay, ask your questions and lets end this, he said.

Barannikov turned to the entry form. You dont drink? No? Are you registered at

an addiction or psychiatric clinic? Any of your family prone to alcoholism? Insanity?

Koptin again began to redden, but kept himself under control. No, he said. Take this

into account, its useless to hide, inquiries will be made all the same, the doctor warned.

The man sitting opposite unexpectedly snorted, and on his face was reflected a kind of

malicious joy. Make any inquiries you want. All the same you wont get any answers,

he said. Why? the doctor was astonished. Because, if nothing is done, humanity has

exactly a week left. And then thats it! Curtains!

If we put down maniacal delirium, no one will dispute this diagnosis,

Barannnikov thought in a business-like manner. Couldnt you describe everything in

more detail? he asked. The patient smiled distrustfully. Are you sure that youll be able

to grasp what I tell you? Or is all this only necessary in order to put me in the funny

farm? We dont have a procedure with respect to psychiatric patients. If you convinceme that youre healthy, I wont keep you here, promised Barannikov.

The patient looked searchingly at him and obviously decided. Fine, Ill tell you! I

consider it my duty to. But if you dont believe me, then you only have yourself to blame.

Im not scared of finding myself in a loony bin, because soon there will be neither loony

bins nor cities nor people, nothing at all. And what awaits our Earth? An alien

invasion? Barannikov asked ironically. Alien invasion? No, I dont think so. At least

not in the near future. Our enemy is much closer. In another word, it has always been

with us. I know that theyll take over our planet, and this will happen in a week. Possibly

give or take a day, although I dont think that theyll change their plans. And wholl

take over? The Americans? No, The Americans will suffer together with us, Koptinshook his head and, after lowering his voice, whispered, Vegetables and fruits will take

over!

Out of surprise Barannikov drew forward and then burst out laughing. Are you

serious? Fruits and vegetables? But why not insects? The patient looked at him almost

1 Ivan Vladimirovich Michurin (1855-1935), Russian botanist, one of the founding fathers of scientific

agricultural selection, also made a major contribution in genetics, in the field of pomology.




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with hatred and the doctor immediately stopped laughing. I beg your pardon, I didnt

mean to, he apologized. Doesnt matter. Youre not the first. They also laughed.

Whore they? The Defence Ministry, the FSB,2 the Ministry of Extraordinary

Situations, and other similar departments. Blockheads! They laughed, didnt even listen

to me, and showed me the door. No one even looked at my calculations.

Barannikov looked up at him. Whats this? You even have calculations? An entire

notebook. They took it away at the police station. I beg you, please phone them, get

them to give it back to me. Its the only copy. Everybody is asleep there now. Ill phone

in the morning, promised the doctor. And for the time being lets do it this way,

without the calculations. Koptin looked sullenly at him. I hope youll understand.

These arent the ravings of a lunatic, these are facts. I really hope that youll believe me.

Understanding that the story would be long, Barannikov with a gesture sent the bored

orderly away.

Before the patient started talking, he looked around Admissions. What do you have

in the fridge? he asked suspiciously. Medicines. Phials, not surprised, the doctor

answered. Thats all? Koptin asked with special persistence. I dont know. Probably.

No fruits or vegetables? Maybe. Sometimes the relatives bring them for the care

packages. The patients eyes lit up with a special fire. Open the fridge! he demanded,

leaping up.

Understanding that it was useless to argue, Barannikov went to the refrigerator and

opened it. Koptin looked cautiously over all the shelves. Here are apples and bananas.

Can leave the bananas. Theyre rather stupid and will understand nothing, but please cut

open the apples and crush all the seeds! Come on! Either do this yourself or untie my

hands. After delaying a little, the doctor cut open the apples one by one and, having

cleaned out all the seeds from the middle, crushed them on his table. The patientwatched him intently.

Very good! he said. You did this very decisively, now they wont eavesdrop. The

seeds are their sensory organs; without them, they neither hear nor sense anything

You would never think that the structure of fruits and tubers resemble a human brain?

Please take a look at the apple and youll discover two hemispheres, a core, and the

central column of the nervous system. Ive long studied this resemblance and came to

the conclusion that the entire matter here is in the original genetic program of a cell. If

we delve deeper into the beginning of history, then itll become clear that fruits and

vegetables are our evolutionary brothers who hate us as strongly as Cain hated Abel.

And their hatred can be understood, since, using fruits and tubers as food, we devourthe thinking cellular essences just barely inferior to us!

Really barely inferior! not able to hold back, the doctor interrupted. I assure you

that it is so! Possibly, in some ways they even surpass us, especially if we take into

account that their life is considerably more transient. Im sure if an apple or a pear were

2 FSB is the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, the main successor agency of the KGB.




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to live not three or four months but ten to fifteen years, it would put any earthly genius

to shame!

The doctor picked up a pen to write something down on the form but did not write

anything down; instead, he only started to draw something mechanically in the margins.

Must admit that the hypothesis advanced by you is quite unusual. Frankly, I just didnt

have to hear anything but the absurd assertion that plants can think Not plants in

general, namely vegetables and fruits! the patient corrected him. Deciduous trees not

bearing fruits, algae, and grass dont count. They arent given a personality, and their

seeds dont emit microwaves. And whats this about microwaves? Barannikov asked

with an easy smile. Variable thermal and infrared waves of weak intensity. With their

help, the fruits communicate with each other and weave their conspiracies, their vile

intrigues! The waves serve them as speech just like the vibration of air for us.

Koptin became silent and swallowed. The doctor looked politely at him, waiting for

him to continue. You probably want to find out how I came to all this? continued the

crazy one. It was simple. Many scientists have observed these infrared waves, but they

considered them radiation, which any material body emits. Well, the processes of

cellular metabolism, splitting, light reflection and all such things. I first assumed that

these waves are in reality the speech of plants and deciphered them.

Bold enough. And how did this assumption come to you? By chance. I

immediately ran a test on several apples, putting them in a lab dish. I was surprised that

the apples emitted microwaves in turn, i.e., as if they were exchanging words between

themselves. While one apple was emitting, the rest paused the infrared waves. Youll

agree, this in itself is improbable. Im a dreary and persistent person and I dont

appreciate unsolved riddles. I began to study this whole problem, did experiment after

experiment, and soon I managed to isolate the specific combinations of frequencies Ibegan to dig further, uploaded the frequencies into the computer, made several bold

assumptions, and in half a year I know, its hard to believe this I was already able to

understand the speech of apples. Furthermore, it turned out that not only apples have

intelligence but also almost all fruits: bananas, pears, plums, figs, peaches. Their

languages differ, but not as much as human speech. Knowing one language, one can

master the others very quickly. After fruits, I tackled vegetables and also discovered that

they have reason, although on a much lower stage of evolution

The curly orderly looked in at the door, but Barannikov waved at him with

annoyance, and the orderlys head disappeared. Koptin looked around interrogatively

and was interrupted. Eh? What is it? he asked absent-mindedly. Please ignore it. Youcompared vegetables and fruits and said that youve mastered their language the

doctor patiently reminded him. Yes, so that was all. I bought fruits and vegetables,

increased the memory in the computer, sat down in the lab by myself, fortunately, no

one disturbed me, and for several months running listened attentively to their

conversations.




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Did you share the results of your studies with anyone? Colleagues, friends? Koptin

looked downcast. The first time I did, but then I gave up. Useless. I said that

deciphering the pulses, I made several bold assumptions almost insights, which could

in no way be confirmed scientifically, neither logic nor formulas. But then to science

what cannot be confirmed by formulas is only a hypothesis. And the record of your

interceptions did not produce any impression on them? Koptin made a face. Alas!

There was nothing remarkable in the conversations intercepted by me. In essence, these

were squabbles, petty gossips, or empty chatter about which was watching the rind,

which pistil was touched by which stamen, which was eaten, and which was drilled by a

worm. Though I understood that with random castings, its hard to come across

something interesting, after all, people dont always talk about scientific discoveries,

religion, or art, more often they chat about all kinds of nonsense.

The phone rang. Doctor Barannikov let it ring once or twice, then picked up the

handset and put it back down. Everything youve said is very interesting, but I dont

understand, how does it follow from this that destruction threatens humanity? he

asked. The insane one leaned towards him and whispered, I found out about this by

chance. Five days ago, I overheard the conversation of two oranges. They were

discussing the preparation of plan A and were very excited. The doctor raised his

eyebrows. What plan A? Plan A is the plan of annihilation of all biological forms on

Earth and the arrival of botanical forms to replace them.

The doctor whistled slightly. Well, some scope you have, my friend! For what

reason will the fruits do this? As I understood it, the matter here is living space. Plants

need soil to let the roots spread, they need oxygen and a regular, predictable climate.

They hate us, people, hate us fiercely, even at the level of ordinary consciousness. Not

enough that we take away their soil, but we also went in for selective breeding, in otherwords, we make freaks out of them, which we then devour. This alone is already enough

for them, once and for all, without experiencing pangs of the conscience (especially since

they dont and cant have the conscience of our understanding), free the planet from us.

Feeling that he had involuntarily been caught up in the lunatics confidence,

Barannikov shook his head. What, do you think that vegetables and fruits are actually

capable of having the upper hand? he asked. I fear so. Vegetables and fruits have a

strict hierarchy. There are clans and castes with rigid boundaries, which can never be

crossed. The highest caste has tomatoes, apples, and pears. This is the aristocracy. They

are the think tanks, the scientists, diplomats, officers. They manage everything.

Oranges, mandarins, lemons, and some other citrus fruits is the middle tier. These arethe bureaucrats, sergeant majors, managers, junior officers, judges, police. Of course, I

name the professions with analogy to human ones, theirs are all somewhat different.

The last link of the chain is the vegetables: carrot, potato, cabbage, radish, and others.

Vegetables are the model executors: fighters, soldiers, unskilled workers, in short, the

bottom of the pyramid. Their intellect is not developed beyond a certain level, but their

main virtue is the ability to carry out orders without question. As for the grass, broad-




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leaved trees, and other irrational plants, in the opinion of the highest castes, theyre

needed only to fertilize the soil.

After propping up his head with a hand, the doctor snorted. But what infallible

logic you have! How do the plants think of annihilating people? Perhaps they charge

with bayonets in an attack? Koptin excitedly moved his hands under the straight jacket.

Bayonets? Of course not! The ability of plants for motion is limited, but they wont be

required to move, he said. All important officials, members of governments, defence

ministers, even presidents have already been infected with slow poisons, which the fresh

raw fruits they eat secrete. These poisons arent tested and dont let themselves be

detected, but theyll enter the blood stream hour after hour regularly in a week. Before

the people come to their senses, there wont be a significant number left alive. This will

lead to chaos: shut off electricity, gas, TV, and chaos will start. And then, in the flame of

anarchy, the fighters potato, onion, cabbage, and others will be put to use. Theyll

sacrifice their life, and every gram of them will be saturated with poison. Fungi and

flagellate will be up in arms. The start of an epidemic. The theory of parasitism? the

doctor recalled. Precisely. Biological forms, in essence, parasitize on the botanical, eat

them, at the same time getting energy from the basic components: trace elements,

water, and light. Biological forms cant exist without the botanical.

Barannikov touched his cheek in a preoccupied manner. And in your opinion,

plants knew how to keep their plot a secret from people? Till now, not a single one of

them let the secret out, well, besides these oranges, of course? Koptin frowned. Are

you joking, Doctor, how? In order to understand their speech, one needs the cipher

code, which only I have. Besides, theyre a united front. Their personalities are uniform,

and desires similar. There cant be traitors among them. They differ from us, people, in

this.Extremely interesting! said the doctor. What do you propose to do? How to fight

thiseh-ehthreat? The patients eyes began to sparkle. I do have a plan. As the first

order of business, we have to create immediately a united world commission to fight this

disease. Of course, the present governments already cant be saved theyve been

poisoned, but we can still create reserve structures! Next, we must urgently withdraw all

raw vegetables and fruits from use. We must not eat even one raw fruit! The third step is

to destroy all major green grocers and warehouses, especially those that store fruits.

Why fruits? I already said, precisely they run the show. Without fruits, the vegetables

are incapable of independent action. Theyre too stupid and undeveloped. Have to set

them apart, to make it as less dangerous as can be. If some warehouses arent destroyed,must fence them off from each other by at least a thin layer of foil. Ive already checked,

they cant communicate through foil. At worst, hot canning will help. I carried out

analyses, cooked fruits are harmless as food. In addition, must start work right away on

the selection to degrade vegetables and fruits.

Suddenly the face of the deranged acquired a conspiratorial expression and he

leaned towards the table so that his face almost touched the doctors face. Only one




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thing I still didnt understand! Perhaps the most important! Koptin whispered. Whats

that? As I said, fruits and vegetables have a strict hierarchy, based on unconditional

subordination. The bottom of the pyramid is known to me, the middle also, but here

whats at the very top? Till now I was certain its apple, but now Im thinking, what if it

isnt? What if its some other form, devilishly smart, even brilliant, which planned all

this? What is it? What heads everything? Hmm And you, of course, have hunches

what this can be? the doctor asked with a smile. The whole point is that I dont. My

research is still not complete!

Barannikov got up and stretched. Everything that he needed to formulate the

diagnosis, he had already found out. Typical schizophrenia aggravated by maniacal

delirium. Very sorry, my dear, very sorry. This is what I think: perhaps you go into the

ward for the time being and rest a bit? At the same time think over this riddle, he said

in a friendly way and stretched his hand to the button for summoning an orderly.

The patients face turned pale. He understood everything. No! he yelled. I beg

you! Im not crazy! Lets agree: I admit that everything I said is complete nonsense, a

bad joke, fiction. I dont believe in any of this! In that case, will you let me go?

Barannikov shook his head. Cant. I dont have the right to do so, if only you were

actually normal. Well observe the process ofeh-ehyour recovery, carry out a course

of treatment, and, if everything goes without complication, youll be released. When?

Koptin almost groaned. The doctor looked searchingly at him. Well, perhaps in a

month or two. Even with very favourable prognosis I wont be able to do anything for

you sooner than five weeks. Idiot! You dont understand what youre doing! Youll

destroy humanity!

With a loud scream, the patient jumped up and rushed at the doctor, trying to

extricate himself from the straight jacket. Barannikov pressed the button. The curlyorderly ran in with another one, rather bald, with a neck of a former classic boxer. They

picked up the wriggling Koptin and carried him from Admissions to Treatment,

separated by an iron door. Sedation! In a private room and set up regular watch! the

doctor ordered, pensively tapping his fingers on the table.

Having been left alone, Doctor Barannikov behaved quite strangely. He set off to his

own office and locked himself in, leaving the key in the door. Then he approached the

mirror, anxiously touched his face, and with one energetic jerk pulled it off. The face

turned out to be a mask, under which was a medium-sized watermelon.



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I Know Everything