“We Can Remember It for You Wholesale” by Philip K. Dick is a story that plays with the idea of choosing to live with the memories of a life that you never had instead of living the one you live day by day. We learn that our main character, Douglas Quail, has big dreams of one day being able to visit Mars and he is willing to do anything to make that dream come true, even if it means having fake memories of a trip to Mars implanted into him, and that is what he does. However, during this process, we learn that Douglas actually has had a trip to Mars as a special agent, and two agents are waiting at Douglas’s place to kill him since he is remembering events he should not know about. This story is very weird and it is extremely coincidental in the fact that Douglas offers to have two fake memories implanted into his brain, only to find out he actually did live out those fake experiences before, he just forgot about them.
The story ends with Douglas and the people at Rekal learning that Douglas actually did stop an alien invasion when he was a child by showing the aliens kindness when they landed on Earth. With this knowledge, I would say that Douglas would take time to process not only everything that has just happened to him with the agents who were sent to kill him and the Rekal situation, but also to try his best to piece together his memory of meeting those aliens and his trip to Mars. However, before he could do any of that, he would have to find a way to get the Interplan agents off his tail because they did say that if the procedure to remove Douglas’s memory of his trip to Mars were to fail, they would kill him. On top of that, inside Douglas’s brain is a device that allows Interplan agents to, essentially, read his mind and know his every move before he makes it which would make his escape from the agents a lot more difficult.
However, with Douglas having been a special agent, he was trained to have great combat skills and evasive skills so evading the agents and finding ways to fake them out should be easy for him. While on the run, Douglas would try to make amends with his wife who left him because should could not stand his constant talk about having been to Mars. He would try his best to explain everything to her and find a way to start a new life with her, this time having learned his lesson and stop trying to chase a life he could never have and learn to appreciate the one he has now.
I like that you included Douglas’ previous special agent training in your version of the ending of the story. It would definitely make sense for him to utilize these skills to get rid of the agents.
Very clear reiteration on what occurred during the events of the story and I like your idea of Douglas trying to lean into his new alternative life with the idea of him cutting off loose ends with other characters first and before hand.
This is fun. You think through the consequences delightfully.