The Discovery

The clearing was almost silent; the only sounds Gilligan could hear were those of the island birds and the trickling of the stream that flowed at his feet. He sat alone, on a mound of earth, peeling a ripe yellow banana.

So focused on his task, Gilligan didn't hear a man walk up behind him, and, when the man put his hand on Gilligan's shoulder, the boy jumped up off the earth mound, the banana flying out of his hand. He turned to see who it was, and behind him stood a big man in a sleeveless blue rugby shirt and khaki jeans with blue shoes to match. The banana had flown up and landed on the navy blue cap covering his white hair. The man had a look of utter annoyance on his face.

"Oh! It's you, Skipper!" Gilligan exclaimed breathlessly.

"Of course it's me, Gilligan!" the Skipper shouted angrily, pulling the half peeled banana off of his hat and throwing it to the ground.

"Well, sorry, Skipper," Gilligan apologized, both hurt and afraid by Skipper's rage.

"Just go get some coconuts!" the Skipper ordered, pointing a finger out into the jungle. "But I already-" Gilligan started, only to see the look on the Skipper's face. "Was going to get the coconuts!" he finished nervously, slowly walking away, then breaking into a run as he got to the edge of the forest.

He only ran a few feet before he realized something. The Skipper let out a long sigh of exasperation as he saw Gilligan's white cap and red shirt running back to him.

"How many do you want, Skipper?" Gilligan asked, panting.

"Just go!" The Skipper bellowed, and Gilligan was quick to listen.

As he ran through the foliage, Gilligan began to get the strange notion that he was being followed. He stopped and listened, but heard nothing, though this did little to alleviate his anxiety. Slowing to a walk, Gilligan continued on his way.

Gilligan looked around, searching the forest floor for coconuts as well as whatever he thought was tailing him. Before he knew it, he had collected nine coconuts in his arms and was heading back.

As he was walking, his pale pants leg got snagged on something, and he fell with a thud onto the sandy ground. All the coconuts he had collected flew in every direction. Dazed, Gilligan got up, his face covered in earth. Wearily, he turned around so that he could see what was caught on his jeans, his eyes widening as he saw the shiny gold fork, partly covered by a large bush. Bending over, Gilligan pulled it from the fabric of his pants. When it was free, he found that when he pulled it, it pulled back! Must be caught, Gilligan thought, giving the utensil one more tug.

The fork flew out of the bush along with the one who was holding it. Gilligan could only stare at the man who lay before him on the ground. As the man picked himself up, Gilligan's suspicions were confirmed.

The man who Gilligan had found was his double.


Agent 222 stared back at the one who he was imitating. The boy's face showed much confusion, as if he didn't think any other spies would come to the forsaken island. "Vhat is your mission?" 222 asked in his deep, Russian voice.

"Mission?" Gilligan asked. "What mission?"

The spy rolled his eyes at the, what he believed to be, fake innocence. "Like you do not know, da?"

Gilligan stared blankly for a moment, then asked, "What does da mean?"

222 let out a long sigh, then proceeded to asked again: "Vhat is your mission on this island?" He is idiot, so he vill answer, he thought. Now I can have mission completed, and get promotion!

Instead, Gilligan answered, "We don't have a mission! We're shipwrecked!"

To this, 222 let out a "Ha!"

"Well it's true!" the boy persisted.

"Look, if you don't give me answer, I get angry," 222 explained almost matter-of-factly. "Vhen I get angry, I feel like I am vanting to kill someone."

Gilligan's eyes widened in fear and he began to back away from his double.

"There is no mission!" he cried as he fled into the jungle. "There is no mission! There is no mission!" he repeated until he was out of hearing range.

222 shrugged, put his pocket knife next to his mouth and began to talk.

"You heard?" he asked.

"I heard," came the disapproving voice of the Commandant.

"I know, I know!" the agent whined, "I do horrible!"

"I agree," the Commandant purred. "You do tings de stupid way! You need to do better, not fail miserably."

"Da, Commandant. You have to admit, that vas a good try, no?" asked 222 hopefully. "No!" boomed the Commandant. "Dat was terrible try! Vhen you take Gilligan's place, actually act like him dis time."

"Da, Commandant." 222 grinned. "I shall take his place."

"Good," the Commandant murmured.

After a long pause, 222 asked, "Vhat if my new pocket knife does not vork?"

What sounded like static to the agent was the Commandant sighing in exasperation.

"You have laser-beam?" he asked.

"Check!" 222 confirmed.

"Tape recorder?"

"Check!"

"Death-ray?"

"Check!" Agent 222 felt pleased with himself. He hadn't broken anything on his new knife!

"Most spies vould be just fine if dose vorked," the Commandant commented, "But you are not most spies. Take Gilligan's place and get de information! Signing off."

Agent 222 stuck his tongue out at the transmitter spoon as if the Commandant could see him before slamming the knife shut.

"I should have listened to my mother," he told himself as he returned his knife to his back pocket. "I'd be a doctor now, or maybe practitioner or veterinarian." He looked to where Gilligan had run off frantically into the jungle, then turned the opposite way. "I'll get the information after lunch," he decided as he raced off into the forest.


The last thing the Skipper heard before he hit the ground was Gilligan's high pitched yell- "There is no mission! There is no mission!"- before he found his face full of sand with Gilligan on top of him.

"There is no mission..."

"Gilligan!" the Skipper yelled, furious. "Get off me!"

Flustered, Gilligan quickly jumped to his feet and helped the Skipper up, who was still spitting out sand.

When he was standing, the Skipper grabbed at his hat, but then relaxed when he saw the terrified expression on his little buddy's face.

"What happened, Skipper?" the Professor shouted as he came running up into the clearing, almost not seeing the small stream or the rock that sat beside it. He quickly avoided it and came to stand by Gilligan's side.

"Gilligan came running up crying 'There is no mission!' over and over again!" the Skipper told him, feeling sorry for his friend. "Gilligan, what happened?"

"Well," Gilligan started, his voice wavering, "I w-was going to g-g-get the co-coconuts you asked for Skipper, then I tripped over something."

The Skipper couldn't help but smile at Gilligan's imitation of tripping.

"Then I saw a shiny gold fork stuck to the bottom of my pants and tried to pull it out, and someone was holding it on the other end!"

The Skipper's eyes grew wide and he asked, "Who was it? Will he get us rescued?"

"No," Gilligan replied, shaking his head. Suddenly, his voice grew quiet. "He said if we didn't tell him what our mission is on this island, 'I get angry. And vhen I get angry, I feel like I am vanting to kill someone'," Gilligan said, imitating the accent. "He's gonna kill us, Skipper!"

The Skipper look sympathetically at the boy, putting his hand on his shoulder and murmuring, "There, there, little buddy."

Gilligan seemed calmed by this, but he wasn't totally.

The Professor seemed unaware of Gilligan's fear and asked, "Did you say a gold fork?" "Yeah," a weary Gilligan replied. "It was part of a pocket knife with all sorts of attachments, like a spoon and a screwdriver." He made motions with his hands as if to act out his words.

"A gold pocket knife..." The Professor pondered over this for a moment, then it suddenly dawned on him. "Didn't your 'double' have a shiny gold pocket knife?"

"Yeah, and that's just who I saw!"

The Skipper's sympathy went away and turned into annoyance. "Gilligan, are you saying you stopped collecting coconuts because you saw your reflection?"

"No!" Gilligan protested. "I stopped because I saw another me!"

"Gilligan," the Professor started softly, "what you saw was a perception in a conscious state in the absence of external stimuli which has qualities of real perception. In other words, it was a hallucination."

"Oh!" Gilligan exclaimed, smiling. "I thought you were going to say I was just seeing things!"

The Skipper rolled his eyes and the Professor gave his 'this guy's hopeless' look.

"Gilligan, that's what hallucination means!" the Skipper explained softly, but the annoyance in his voice was all too evident.

"You mean you don't believe me?!" the boy cried, almost in tears.

"Well, er-" Skipper stammered, trying to find the right words. Failing, he sighed and said, "No, we don't."