"Hey—um, do you have a name except Agent 222?"

A half shrug. "Of course. Nikolai, Ivan, Sasha, Boris, Pavel… I have had many names. Which do you prefer?"

"Sounds like you prefer 222, huh?"

"It does well enough. Easy to remember, no?"

"I guess so. Nobody uses my whole name, either. But can I ask you something?"

"You just did. Three different somethings," 222 pointed out. "Ask."

"Well… it's kind of stupid. But I was just curious." He took a deep breath, then, very fast, asked, "Did they… I mean, did my friends ever notice that we'd switched places and you were me?"

A rueful smile licked at the corners of 222's mouth. He half shrugged again. "Da. First day, I was locked in bamboo cage by lunchtime, while castaways took turns shouting and threatening dire fates if you were not returned."

He sighed, just a bit, relieved. "Oh. Good. I mean, not 'good that you got thrown in jail,' but I was… well, I was kind of afraid that no one would have noticed. Or that you'd be a better me than I am."

222 shook his head. "Hardly, my friend. To hear others tell it, you would not need boat to go back to mainland—could just walk on water the whole way."

The tips of Gilligan's ears went a bit pink. "Aw, that's just because everyone's always nicer when you're dead."

"Wait." That had to be some sort of American slang he was misunderstanding. "People are… 'always' nice when you are dead? Does this happen often?"

Gilligan grinned. "I guess that does sound a little crazy, huh? But, well, yeah; it kind of does. Like, there was this time a year or so back…"

OoOoOoO

"… So I am naked, hiding under bed when her husband comes in. He undresses, gets into the bed, and goes right to sleep; you can understand why his wife was so lonely, no? As soon as I hear him snoring, I take first clothing I can find, scarcely looking at what I am wearing, and sneak out of apartment in undershirt, with his trousers which are eight sizes too big and fastened with belt that was longer than I am tall, and run back to safehouse in her bunny slippers."

Gilligan laughed aloud. "Oh, no! Did you get in trouble?"

"Ha! Trouble?" 222 looked smug. "Comrade, I got promotion. Husband was high-ranking diplomat… and hidden in belt buckle was microfiche of top-secret documents!"

"Wow… that was smart."

He shrugged whimsically. "Well, yes, and then again, no. It would have been very smart of me… if I had known any of this ahead of time. But lucky for me, I was able to make Commandant believe I had."

Gilligan shuddered. "Yeah, that's pretty lucky, all right. Your Commandant is a really mean guy. I didn't like him at all."

"No, I am sure you did not," 222 said, sobering. "Was it… very bad?"

222 knew quite well what the Commandant was capable of, and he knew what the other man must have suffered during his incarceration. But Gilligan knew that when he fouled up, he could look forward to a chewing out, and maybe, at most, a quick swat that couldn't hurt a fly, but always with the bone-deep certainty that the Skipper would never, ever, go beyond that, or, more importantly, let anyone else do so, either. That certainty wasn't a luxury 222 had ever had, from the sounds of it. Why hurt him with the truth? "Nah," he said casually. "Nothing much. The food was crummy, and he asked a whole lot of dumb questions, and, yeah, they roughed me up a little, but I gotta be honest; you belted me worse than he did, most of the time."

"Yes. I did. And I am sorry, tovarisch," 222 said, not believing a word of it, but deeply impressed nonetheless. This man truly should have been Russian. "I am sorry for everything."

He sounded sincere. Of course, as the old saying had it, 'once you could fake sincerity, you had it made,' and they were probably taught how to do that on the first day of spy school. But… there was something in his voice, something in his eyes, that rang true, and Gilligan believed him.

"It's okay," Gilligan said, and he meant it. "Just don't do it again, all right?"

222 blinked. That, so far as Gilligan seemed concerned, was that; their fences were duly mended and the subject therefore closed. It's okay? Don't do it again? That was how one responded if a housemate took your last pair of clean socks, or if a child spilled his milk on the tablecloth! Not after betrayal, and certainly not after weeks of what 222 was perfectly well aware must have been hell on earth. "I shall not; you have my word on it," he said solemnly. "If I may now ask question, though?"

"Why not? Everyone else has. Go ahead."

"I am not unfamiliar with the questioning techniques my Commandant favors," 222 said carefully. "I must know—how did you survive? How did you not break?"

Gilligan looked away, and picked up with a length of bamboo. He played with it for a moment, not meeting 222's gaze, looking for the words. "…I don't know, exactly. Maybe it's just that… it wouldn't have helped."

"I do not understand."

The crack of the snapping branch was very loud in the quiet jungle; 222 jumped. Gilligan tossed the shorter part of the cane away. "He said he wanted the truth about us, why we were all here on this island. So I told him the truth. He didn't believe a word of it, and so it just made him mad. He thought there had to be some big secret plot going on, like in a comic book." He broke off another piece, the report sounding almost like a pistol shot, and again threw the shorter segment into the underbrush. "So I told him all the nutty plots I could imagine. Rockets and secret codes and mind control rays. He didn't believe any of those, of course, and he got even madder." Crack. Another section gone. "I tried going back to just repeating my name, rank, and serial number. That didn't go over so good, either." Crack. "So I stopped talking altogether." He snapped the remaining few inches of stick in two, and looked at them for a moment, then tossed both of them aside. "That's it, really. I didn't actually do anything special. And I… I think I did break. I think they broke me over and over and over. He just didn't believe it when he saw it, or maybe he just didn't like what he got when he did, so he had to keep trying. Which meant that I had to keep trying."

222 nodded slowly. He looked at his double; he had not been lying about his familiarity with the Commandant's preferred techniques, especially the ones that left no outward marks. He had seen them performed. He had used them. He had even experienced some of them, in the course of his training. And he didn't believe for one minute that surviving any of it with wits intact could be considered as 'not actually doing anything special.'

Gilligan looked away for a moment, then, visibly, switched gears, putting the dark thoughts far away. "Anyway, that's all over now. Let's get back to camp, all right? I really want to see my friends, and make sure that they're okay."

You mean, you really want to see your friends and make sure that I didn't hurt them, 222 thought. "Da. They will be glad to see that you are okay."

OoOoOoOoOoO

As they walked through the jungle, 222 fell back a pace or two, watched Gilligan. When no one else was around, the other man maneuvered through the trees with a sort of unthinking grace that was completely at odds with his usual demeanor. He fit here, somehow, in a way that he, 222, would have never been able to duplicate.

As they drew nearer to the camp, he unconsciously began picking up speed, eager as a puppy, and as he caught sight of the Skipper, he lit up like a searchlight. "Skipper! Hey, Skipper! It's me!"

The Skipper scowled. "What do you want?"

Gilligan blinked. "Well, gosh, Skipper… it's been a long time, you know. It's good to see you…?"

"Not long enough," the Skipper said shortly. "What do you want?"

"…Skipper? It's me, your little buddy. Don't you recognize me?"

"We're back to this sick little game? Get lost, 222. If you're looking for a job to do, I'll find you one. If you're not, get out of here!"

Biting his lip, Gilligan tried to think. "But Skipper—"

"Move it!"

"But Skipper… I'm me!" He flung an arm to where 222 was just emerging from the underbrush. "He's 222!"

The Skipper stared from one man to the other. In shock, he whispered, "Gilli—" His face hardened. "This is a trick. Another spy? Who are you? Agent 223? 224?"

222 glanced at Gilligan's crestfallen face, then back at the Skipper. "I assure you, sir; he is not spy. This truly is your Gilligan."

"Yeah, Skipper! It's me, honest!"

"I'm stumped," the Skipper said. "One of you I know for sure isn't my little buddy; the other one could just as easily be another spy doing a better job of faking it. I don't want to make any mistakes here!"

Gilligan looked incredibly guilty. "Well… there is one way you can know for sure," he said slowly. "But you've got to promise not to get mad, okay?"

The Skipper examined the two men before him—both looking nervous and uncomfortable, both wearing Gilligan's face—and looked to heaven. "Why me?" He shook his head. "Okay, I'll bite. How can I know for sure?"

"Read our minds," said Gilligan.

The Skipper started. "How? You burned the bush with the magic seeds, didn't you?"

"Well, yeah," Gilligan said, and he managed to sound even guiltier than before. "That one. There are, um… a few others. I can show you where to find one of them."

The Skipper scowled, and forgot to be suspicious for a moment. "So all this time, you've been reading our minds without telling us?"

"Heck, no," Gilligan shuddered. "Once was enough. I just happened to notice a few other bushes, here and there, and Ethel really likes them. So I just left them alone, and they left me alone, and I forgot about them."

"Who in blazes is Ethel?"

"A bird. She's really pretty, all bright red. She's got her nest right next to one of the bushes, and she and her husband are always eating the seeds. That was actually why I figured it was safe to try eating them in the first place. I guess birds don't mind having their minds read."

Magic seeds? Mind reading? Was that what the Americans were doing out here? Then why is the Skipper surprised? 222 set his jaw. Whether or not Gilligan was playing some sort of double game on his comrades, if there really was something mysterious to be found on this island, something as potentially earthshattering as a reliable method of inducing telepathic communication, getting hold of it had just become his first priority. Well, make that his second priority. Not getting shot was still the top of the list.

"Oh, now wait just a minute," the Skipper said. "If you are another spy, you could as easily be feeding me poison. You've had plenty of time to get the story about our little mind-reading fiasco and all these other details out of my little buddy."

Gilligan threw up his hands. "Then what are we going to do? Anything I tell you to try and prove that I'm me would be the same problem! Anything I say, you can just argue that the real me, if I am me, must have told it to the other me, if I am him, and that's the only reason I could know it, whether I'm me or not. Skipper, those stupid seeds are my only chance!"

"We'll just see about that," the Skipper said. "I'm not going to eat anything that I haven't already seen both of you eat first."

Gilligan nodded; that seemed fair. He led them back through the jungle, following paths only he could see, until they came to a patch of scrub that looked pretty much like all the others. This one, however, contained a sprout, perhaps eight or nine inches tall, with a few straggly leaves and a single seed pod. He pulled the plant up by the roots, tossing the denuded stem into the bushes before either of the others could get too close a look at the leaves. With a thumbnail, he split the pod, and shook a single seed into the Skipper's hand, then into 222's, before popping one into his own mouth and shoving the rest into a pocket.

A bright scarlet bird swooped towards him, landing on his shoulder, before launching into a medley of chirps and twitters that sounded for all the world like conversation.

And he responded. "Oh, hiya, Ethel! Yeah, long time, no see," he said casually, and, digging into his pocket again, offered her a seed, too. She took it daintily, then trilled a reply.

222 stared at the bird, and at the man chatting with her; 'Ethel,' it seemed, had no intention of biting his ear. He shook his head, bemused, and ate the seed.

The Skipper's whole face lit up. "Yeah, forget the seeds—you're my little buddy, all right!" True to his word, he flicked the seed into the bushes. "And what in blazes were you thinking, you idiot? Running off and getting yourself captured? Of all the dumb things I've ever seen you do, that takes the cake!"

And that would have been that, if 222 had not heard the thoughts behind the shouting; I'm glad you're back. I missed you. Thank God you're safe.

And Gilligan just smirked at his captain. "Aw, come on, Skipper—it wasn't my fault! Besides, it was pretty nice having a room to myself again, with no one snoring all night." I missed you too. It's good to be home.

And the Skipper, grinning fit to split his face clear in two, swept off his cap and—gently—tapped him with it. Very gently. It was a joke, a nonverbal exclamation point. It was a substitute action meant to convey the sense of a hug, a friendly punch in the arm. And it was, in every sense of the word, a mistake.

Because Gilligan didn't react, exactly. No flinching, no cringing, no resigned sighs.

It was worse than that. He just froze dead in his tracks, standing stock still, his face going wooden and his eyes glassy. This has happened before, that expression said. It will happen again. I can't stop it and I can't escape it. But I don't have to watch while you do whatever it is you're going to do to me.

The Skipper looked at his crewman, then at the hat in his hand, appalled, and suddenly grateful that he was not currently capable of mind-reading. Shoving the cap back on his head, he nudged the younger man, very, very gently. "Hey, look alive," he ordered, trying to sound normal. Trying not to picture what must have happened to make such a reaction into habit. Trying not to notice the irony in the phrase. "Get the lead out. We have a lot to do and not much time to do it in!"

Gilligan blinked, some animation coming back into his face. "Aye aye, sir," he said, and managed an apologetic lip twitch that might almost have qualified as a smile. "Yeah. Let's get moving, right, 222?"

OoOoOoOoOoO

Author's note: The mind-reading seeds are, of course, from the episode 'Seer Gilligan.' The idea that there might have been other bushes on the island is my own, because the idea of destroying the last specimen of a nearly extinct species makes me sad. And yes, Ethel is the bird that bit 222 a few chapters back; I don't know if the seeds induce telepathic abilities in birds or not, or if she was under the influence thereof at the time. It's possible that she just didn't like him.