The Replicated Man

 is a Fallout 3 quest. It is also an Xbox 360 and PC achievement.

Objectives and walkthrough
The quest is given to you by Dr. Zimmer in Rivet City, who asks you to track down an android that has escaped. The android has gone sentient and independent and does not wish to return.

This quest can also be started by finding a tape recording in one of the following locations: Red's Clinic in Big Town, Eulogy's Pad in Paradise Falls, Craterside Supply in Megaton, Nathan and Manya's house in Megaton, Underworld Outfitters in Underworld, The Chop Shop in Underworld or in Tenpenny Tower's Clinic.

At any time during this quest, you may be approached by a woman named Victoria Watts of The Railroad, an organization dedicated to helping androids gain their independence (Herbert Dashwood and Manya are also members of the railroad). She asks you to tell Dr. Zimmer that the android is dead, and gives you a piece of his body to support your claim. You can also find Watts by breaking into Dr. Zimmer's room in Rivet City.

To start tracking down the android, Dr. Zimmer asks you to talk to Dr. Preston in Rivet City. Preston gives you one of the android's recordings and tells you that similar tapes were sent to almost every scientist in the Wastelands. Accordingly, you can now find these holotapes in various locations, mostly in clinics. You can also get one from Seagrave Holmes in Rivet City's Marketplace. You need 2-3 of these tapes until your quest is updated. Additionally, instead of receiving holotapes from clinics, you can go back to Megaton and speak with Moira in the Craterside Supplies. You will have a conversation option asking her about the android, if you succeed, the quest will be updated. You will then need to find Pinkerton in Rivet City. After asking around in Rivet City, you will find that he lives in the broken-off bow section at the front of the ship.

Since he's rather hard to get to, you may want to use this opportunity to finish one of the sub-goals of The Wasteland Survival Guide, which also requires you to talk to Pinkerton.

There are two ways to enter the bow section, either by picking a locked door (100 lockpicking skill required) on the starboard side or by entering an underwater door where the bow sections has broken off. The latter requires you to swim pretty far through radiated water. Upon entering, you will also be attacked by several mirelurks and may come across several traps and mines.

When you speak to Pinkerton, he will tell you that the android's name is Harkness and that he (Pinkerton) performed the facial reconstructive surgery and the memory wipe. He will also tell you that his mind was not actually wiped, rather that his old identity had been buried deep and that it can be reactivated by speaking a certain code to Harkness. He now works as the security chief in Rivet City, and was actually the person who greeted you when you first entered Rivet City. Pinkerton also has an option to perform facial surgery on you, at the end of the conversation.

You now have several options to finish with the quest:
 * You talk to Harkness and convince him that he's an android. You will receive his A3-21's Plasma Rifle and +200 karma as a reward. You can then follow Harkness into the Science Lab, where he talks with Zimmer, and then kills him and his android bodyguard.
 * You show Dr. Zimmer the android part and tell him that he's dead. You will receive 50 caps and good karma.
 * You tell Dr. Zimmer the android's human name and the code to uncover his memories. You will receive the Wired Reflexes perk and -200 karma. Dr. Zimmer will then walk to Harkness' location and claim him as his property.  Harkness will initially resist until Dr. Zimmer uses an override code to reset Harkness to factory defaults.  Dr. Zimmer and Armitage will then leave Rivet City with Harkness in tow.

There are a couple of ways to receive both A3-21's Plasma Rifle and the Wired Reflexes perk. One is by first convincing Harkness he is an android, telling him you'll keep his secret, and then selling him out to Dr. Zimmer anyway by revealing his identity. If you now try to kill Dr. Zimmer and his bodyguard after receiving that reward, they are rendered temporarily unconscious, and the guards will attack. Dr. Zimmer will go collect Harkness with the override code. On the 360 version, you can still kill Zimmer and his android after receiving the perk. Guards will not attack you.

A slightly different way is by first talking to Harkness using the override code and gain good Karma, ask him what he will do, then ask him to allow you to kill Zimmer, he then gives you his trusted rifle (A3-21's Plasma Rifle) and will approve an attack on Zimmer and his bodyguard, but no one else, within the confines of Rivet City. Now talk to Zimmer, tell him the android is Harkness, you receive bad Karma (for an end result of no net change to Karma) and the Wired Reflexes Perk. End the conversation and attack them. They will now die. Report back to Harkness who will acknowledge Zimmer's end by your hands. For an evil alternative, after receiving Harkness' rifle and then selling him out to Zimmer, you can instead wait and allow Zimmer to confront Harkness. After Zimmer wipes Harkness' mind, you can kill Zimmer and his bodyguard with no reaction from the city guards. For the rest of the game, Harkness will now stand wherever he was when his memory was wiped, only repeating his 'A3-21 waiting for input' phrase over and over.

Also, if you have a high speech skill you can persuade Harkness to go with Dr. Zimmer and receive both A3-21's Plasma Rifle and the Wired Reflexes perk from Harkness and Dr. Zimmer respectively.

Trivia
Harkness is an android but every major player in this quest is also possibly actually an android. Armitage, Dr. Zimmer, Pinkerton, and Victoria Watts all have Android Components on their bodies if killed (some of these people cannot be killed until all their quests are completed. An alternative explanation for Dr. Zimmer, Pinkerton, and Victoria Watts to have Android Components on them as that they all work or have worked with androids in one way or another.

The quest is very reminiscent of the story "Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep" by Philip K. Dick, which was adapted into the film "Blade Runner". It takes place in a post nuclear war society, where as people are emigrating to off-world colonies, they build androids to do the hard dangerous labor. Due their likeness they're banned from being on Earth. The main character is a special police officer who goes out and 'retires' these androids. In the course of his investigation of a group of them, he begins to wonder if he is in fact an android, and also endures this crisis of identity with another officer who retires androids. In fact, when you reveal the truth of his past to Harkness, he specifically mentions "Runners" in his recollections, however in the context of it, "Runners" refers to the Androids that he had hunted down were called 'runners'. More like Logan's Run than Blade Runner.

The questname is a reference to the Ray Bradbury book The Illustrated Man. It could also be a further reference to the movie "Blade Runner", in which the androids where called Replicants; or also Isaac Asimov's story (made into a movie) "The Bicentennial Man", which was about a robot who had bioaesthetic surgery on himself to appear more human and to become accepted into human society.