Unmistakable
You didn’t do it. You saw the footage on the news just like everyone else, as the person who looked exactly like you murdered twelve people at the 7-11. It wasn’t you, but security cameras can’t lie. What could have been your own hand gripped the knife as it sliced open the stomach of the cashier. The young man fell to the ground, clutching his intestines, and the face that looked like yours grinned as it was splashed with steaming blood. Someone tried to tackle your twin from behind, but your twin was too fast, turning around and bringing the blade across the man’s throat. When the carnage was over, the store was a slaughterhouse. The young mother slumped across the corpses of her son and her daughter. And your twin just stood there, coated from head to toe in gore, and laughed in a voice that sounded just like your own, slipping away only moments before the police arrived.
At the trial, you have no alibi. You try to explain that it was your twin, your clone, your doppelganger. You were at home, alone, but no one believes you. The jury sees your face in the video, and fingerprints identical to yours were all over the murder weapon. There is no hope for you. The sentence is death.
Weeks later, in prison, you look up to see the judge who condemned you, watching you through the bars of your cell. You plead with him again, still insisting upon your innocence. The judge furrows his brow, and he speaks.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “There’s nothing I can do for you. After all, it wasn’t me who issued that sentence.”
You look puzzled, and the judge smiles.
“It was my evil twin.”
And the judge’s laughter mingles with the echoes of his footsteps as he walks away, leaving you alone in your cell to face your fate.
