AN: Most longer phrases in italics are taken from in-game transcribes and emails.
The title is taken from the game achievement of the same name, so you know where this story is going.
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
It's all so elaborately set up—the simulation lab, the fake helicopter. The bottle of wine and the game controllers. The little things that make this imaginary world so real. It hadn't been easy to obtain both permission and resources, but having parents on the Board of Directors who trusted his ability to get results had certainly helped the process.
So the simulation is perfect. Everything is ready. Morgan has made sure of it.
…
"One last safety measure. Let me introduce October. Say hello—"
— trusting you with my brain. You do good work, so hopefully that continues ;) Listen, if the tests don't go well, if something happens, let Alex know that I know it wasn't his fault. I signed up for this—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
The tests are usually the same, once they have determined the ones that prompt the best responses. Sometimes they change what they ask him to do, occasionally they swap in an entirely new set of tasks, but overall they try to keep the central components constant—the boxes, the button, and hide-and-seek. Like he's a child they're testing for milestones, and perhaps he is, in this. Still just getting his grip on the unseen.
He gets to see his own results in the briefing afterwards, once he's been brought back up to speed and the shock has worn off. He gets to marvel with the rest of them at telepathy and shapeshifting, and brainstorm on what had gone wrong, even though he's coming at the problem with a disadvantage of memory and knowledge.
"It's still amazing progress, Morgan." Bellamy reassures him whenever he fails a test—or even when he occasionally fails all three. And it is truly amazing, learning what he can do with the aid of these Neuromods. But he doesn't want just plain amazing. He wants perfection.
They look over the tests and they adjust the Neuromods and Morgan takes care of what few responsibilities he's been left with aboard the station, the ones he can handle without actual memory of their intricate details.
Then the next batch is ready and they do it all over again.
…
—wanted Morgan's mind pristine to receive the prototype Neuromods. That means going waaaay the hell back. Hence the apartment sim. Yus are dedicated to their science is all I can say—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
"Are you sure you're all right, Morgan?" Alex asks him.
He seems to be getting this question all too often. From his brother, from the scientists he works with, in his mandatory sessions with Dr. Kohl. Even his secretary asks him sometimes, watching him with open concern whenever he passes by.
Hell, he's getting it from people he doesn't even know—no, scratch that. People he probably did know, but doesn't anymore. Maybe he'd been more well-liked than he'd realized. From chief officers to low-level technicians, there always seems to be somebody trying to catch his attention.
He mostly ignores them at this point. He doesn't know what they expect of him, doesn't know their past relationships and he doesn't want to make conversation when he's always on the back foot and one blunder could reveal things they're not supposed to know about.
Besides. He'll just forget them all again next time, anyway.
And sure, he looks a bit too tired in the mirror. Perhaps he's lost a bit of weight. Sometimes his hands shake and he can't make them stop, or he wakes up in a hallway with no memory of how he got there and, worse, no memory of how to get back—
But those are the normal side effects of what he's doing. He relearns this every time he rereads the debrief, so he knows what to expect. And Alex certainly knows this, so why the questions?
He's fine.
…
—It's unusual. Last time he asked, I was right there – so I told him the code and he gave me a blank look – a code we'd set less than a week ago—
— you passed me in the hall today and you looked through me. If you're angry at something I did—
—their lack of personality is contagious – even Morgan's got glassy eyes now, hasn't smiled or made a joke in, what, a month?
A year?
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
Morgan hears the bathroom door open behind him, but he doesn't look up from the sink. He knows the sounds of his brother's footsteps, even with everything else he's apparently forgotten .
"Morgan…"
"I don't want to talk about it."
"I think you should."
"I don't care." He hisses, but that's what got him in trouble in the first place. Anger.
Alex sighs. Morgan looks up into the mirror to see him rubbing at his eyes beneath his glasses. His brother has gained weight, he thinks, and he wonders when it happened.
"I know it's frustrating." Alex says. "But it's normal to have setbacks in any experiment. You know that."
He does know. Of course he does. But this is the first time that he is the experiment and that makes it personal. Makes every failure his own.
"We have to get this right, Alex." He says to his reflection. He sounds rather more plaintive than he would like. " I have to get this right."
"We will." Alex's hand comes to rest on his shoulder, large and warm and familiar, and Morgan slumps just a bit, lets go of some of the pent-up tension that feels like it's been building up for months. "We are, Morgan. But good things take time. You're going to have to be patient."
Yes, well. He's never been good at patience.
"For now, I think you should have a few more regular sessions with Dr. Kohl." Alex suggests, in that way that isn't really a suggestion. And what can Morgan do besides bow his head and nod? Anything else might get him pulled from the tests and he can't have that. He just can't.
He can't have it all be for nothing.
…
—all orders go through him after Morgan's outburst at the debrief. Pending a psych evaluation—
—but the aggressive response to the same set of testing criteria was clearly a departure. My recommendation is we need to start charting personality drift—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
The briefing doesn't make sense.
Well, it does, in a rather literal way. He hasn't lost his ability to read. But he cannot fathom what his past self must have been thinking.
Aliens. Experimental testing. Cyclical Neuromod removal, leaving his memory shot to pieces and his brother with complete control over all of it. Oh, it's exciting, of course—he can see the all the potential in just one glance and no doubt his past self had had an even better idea of the advances in science they were making.
But what happened if it all went wrong?
There are no contingency plans in place—at least none that he can see in the briefing, and surely his past self would have included something like that to soothe these very doubts. No plans in place should the Typhon escape and take over the station. No plans in place to protect Earth from any invasion.
No plan in place if his brother simply decides to keep him in the simulation, living the same day over and over as a nice, malleable test subject.
And maybe it says something about him, that he doesn't trust his own brother. But he'd rather be safe than sorry. Rather have a safety net to fall back on and never need to use it rather than run the risk of being without when he—when they—need it most.
"Back up to speed, Morgan?" The doctor, Bellamy, asks, and Morgan smiles tightly. Nods. Yes, he is. And now he knows that he has plans to make.
Only, he already has, he learns.
He finds it when he makes it to his cabin. Code and materials for an operator, along with a briefing that he wrote himself, not the one the scientists pressed on him. So there it is: his back-up plan. Someone—or something—to tell him all the things he doesn't know, if he needs it, and with directives to help him do what needs to be done, should the worst happen. All it needs is a little more tinkering and it'll be ready.
It's…disturbing.
(How many times has he done his? How many plans has he made? Does he just keep running this cycle of panic and planning, hiding operators and fail safes and then forgetting he's made them at all? What has he been doing—)
But it's also comforting—his past self hadn't been completely complacent. Even if he doesn't know which past self it was.
He stands in the middle of his opulent cabin and feels faintly, inexplicably miserable.
He has his plan, though. He has his safety net. So…it couldn't be too bad, could it, to continue the tests? All this time and energy and memory put into it all, all the advances they've already made. All the new discoveries still just waiting. It would be a shame to throw it all aside, especially since Alex has kept things under control so far.
He can continue then, he decides. As long as he has his backup plan together. Just in case.
…
—no offense, but Morgan's requisitioned enough to repair any operator in the station five times over now, and we have other—
—an operator follows an owner's commands to the letter. Morgan may have built an unlicensed model, and if so, it would have access to station protocols. I'll take the matter to the board if I have to—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
Morgan knows his brother.
Alex is allergic to failure. It helps him, sometimes, drives him on to bigger and better things, but it also makes him impossible to reason with when he thinks his work is under attack. So Alex doesn't have a clear, written out plan of what he's going to do if containment fails. Morgan isn't surprised to find the briefing lacking.
But his brother has never been the sort to go down with the ship either. He'll have a last resort.
It takes a bit of hacking, a bit of snooping around, but he finds the escape pod that Alex has stashed away in the Arboretum. At least it shows Alex has some sense, he supposes.
The thing is—the thing is he doesn't know if he can trust Alex. Trust his brother not to lock him up in a memory loop, to clean up his own mess if the Typhon escape, or to actually warn Earth if it seems like it needs to be done. Alex will protect himself and the company, and possibly Morgan as well, but that's not enough. Morgan needs to be sure.
He has been making his own plan anyway; Alex's only ties it all together. Maybe it's pessimistic, but…it's only so long before it all goes wrong.
…
—need your help tracking down a missing keycard. This should be one of your highest priorities. It's labeled EP101—
—I'd say someone was trying to hide it, along with what looks like a bug out bag. Should I be concerned about anything—
"—I keep having this...dream. I'm just staring into the black between the stars. There's something there. I know there is. I just can't see it...but it sees me. I can feel it...hate us. I know you know what I'm talking about. Or you will soon."
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
(Lift the boxes. Hide with the chair. Press the button.)
(Box. Chair. Button.)
The videos he watches are indescribable—watching himself employ non-human powers with quick precision is a thrill when he sees it. (But of course it is. It's always his first time seeing it.) Even the scientists, who have been doing this since the beginning and remember every minute of it, always look delighted whenever he perfects a new skill.
It's advancement. It's wonderful. So why is it that he can only sit there and wonder why he can't find the energy to smile? The energy to think?
(Box. Chair. Button. Box—)
The scientists talk around him, discussing his results while he sits there and slowly makes his way through the briefing. He wonders, briefly, how many times he's done this—the pages cover years, but he's not clear on how often the experiments run. He could ask, but...he can't dredge up the energy to care.
Had he been sick? Maybe it was recent, recent enough that it wouldn't have been included in the briefing. It would explain the weight on his chest and the throbbing in his head. No sniffles, but then again, he is on a space station. Maybe it's something he wouldn't recognize.
(—Chair. Button. Box. Chair. Button. Box. Chair—)
"Excellent work today, Morgan." One of the scientists says—he looks vaguely familiar, but Morgan can't remember his name, can't be bothered to check the briefing. "One of your best yet, I think."
"Oh. Good." Morgan can't keep the blankness from his voice, and so says nothing else. A bit distant, maybe, but he's sure he'll be more pleased with the news once he feels a bit better. He'll find a medical operator once he gets out of here and have it fix him up.
Because that does seem the most likely explanation—he's probably just caught whatever bug is going around the station and that's why he isn't quite right. That's why he feels so drained, like he's clawing himself up a cliff, tooth and nail for every inch and no relief anywhere in sight—
(—Button. Box. Chair. Button. Box. Chair. Button.)
(Box—)
…
—your sibling is indeed…different. I've sent the comparisons to you and Bellamy for evaluation. As you'll see, there's noticeable personality drift, more than I'd expect from heavy Neuromod cycling. It's even more prominent—
—In Test 9 he exercised precise control to move the boxes one at a time. In Test 10 he simultaneously lifted them all straight up a few inches, technically completing the test. Then, in 14, he incinerated them. If not for the safety glass, you'd be dead.
What is happening after reset that's leading to this variance?
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this meeting."
Someone is screaming. It isn't him, even if he'd like to.
It's a green-suited "volunteer," clawing at the air as a shadow made of claws and smoke shoves itself down his throat. The harsh sounds of choking are almost worse than the screams. The slick sound as the typhon removes its tendril is even worse than that, but the sound of the now-desiccated body hitting the floor is somehow the worst of all.
Morgan's throat convulses, his gag reflex triggering sympathetically as his heartbeat trips and doubles, clawing at his ears and the backs of his ribs. He swallows it back, manages to turn it into a cough, and the elderly psychotronics scientist next to him sighs in something like irritation.
"You see?' She says like she's pointing out a chip in the paint. Like he should know what she's talking about. Like all of this is normal . "Nothing we do seems to affect the process. Poison in the system doesn't make any difference—at least, not before it terminates the test subject. We've started on radiation with this batch, but so far there hasn't been any visible change—"
Poison. Radiation. Like these are just lab rats, easily replaced, not people that they're casually sacrificing to see if any of their little ploys work. Like they didn't just murder a man in the middle of the room without anyone blinking an eye.
How are they doing it? How are they all just walking around, taking notes like it was a mildly interesting nature display? Had Alex recruited complete psychopaths? And God, the backlash if any of it ever comes to light—and it will, there would be no way to keep something like this quiet if someone with even a spark of conscience got wind of it.
And there is already a half-formed plan in the back of his mind. He still has high-level clearance; he could get the records and evidence he needs, though getting it back to Earth would be more difficult.
It would be a betrayal of his family. His brother, his parents, the company. But can he really follow them into this—?
"—and we've certainly missed having you down here with us, Dr. Yu." His name shakes him out of it and back to what she's saying. "Your insight and suggestions were invaluable, though of course I understand that you have other responsibilities now—"
Something creeps up his spine, skittering across nerves like the eerie movements of the multiplied creatures now roaming the tank. Does she mean that—? Is she really saying that he—?
But of course she is.
He'd been the Director of Research, hadn't he? This would have been his department.
Realization hits him like an ice cold wall, a wash of horror that leaves him empty and breathless, his stomach turning over. He'd allowed all this to happen. No, more than that—he'd signed off on the plans, encouraged the work. Participated, quite willingly by the sound of it.
"—but I don't suppose you have any advice for us?" She looks up at him hopefully, clipboard on her arm. She looked like could have been someone's grandmother, if one ignored the corpse sprawled out behind her. "We've hit quite a wall lately, so any new inspiration—"
Inspiration, and he almost laughs, high and horrified. There is a litany running in his mind, of please and god and no no no, scrabbling for any semblance of denial. He finds that he is almost gasping for breath, kept upright only by his stiff, shock-frozen muscles.
His anger at Alex has faded, as has his urge to plan. He has ceded any moral high ground, if he ever had any to begin with. Because he has no way of knowing how much he's responsible for, whether or not it all came to be because of his suggestions—
It is selfish, but he is glad that he does not remember.
(oh god oh god no no no no)
The scientist is still looking at him. Waiting.
" No ." He says, is all he can say, and he turns around and flees.
…
"This is the fifth time."
"I said no. That's not me."
"You agreed to this. This was all your idea."
"I didn't agree to any of this. That – Morgan – is not me! I would nev– do you know what's going on in Psychotronics? Do you?"
"Morgan. Take a deep breath."
"I don't want a pill. I want this station shut down. I want Earth–
"Morgan…"
"I said no!"
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration set for this—"
He wakes up, blinking in the sunlight, and he smiles.
Today is a good day—his first day working for TranStar, yes, but it's also the first time in years that he'll get to see his brother in person and that's worth any amount of early rising.
He doesn't know why his hands are shaking as he pours his coffee and drinks. He isn't fearful; he isn't cold. Excitement, maybe, but he's not a child. He's not bursting with an overabundance of it. Whatever the cause, it's surprisingly hard to stop.
His eye is a bit red in the mirror when he goes to brush his teeth. It itches a little, but nothing terrible, so he leaves it alone.
He meets his brother at the TranStar building and doesn't hug him or steal his glasses because they're being professional today. Alex looks older than he should, worn and tired, and when they're alone later Morgan plans to ask about the stress of the job and tease him about grey hairs.
"It's just a few tests." Alex reassures him. "Nothing to worry about. A Yu family tradition."
Morgan balks at the door to the testing room. He doesn't know why. Some silly impulse.
He makes it in, forces himself forward on suddenly heavy feet and lets the door slide shut behind him. And he smiles at the scientists' greetings, nods at their instructions, and resolves to do exactly what he's asked to do.
It's like an itch in the back of his mind, though. He can't help feeling like he's been here before.
…
—need you to remove all sensitive material regarding the psych evals immediately. Of special importance are Morgan's log sessions. I need those materials in my office. From this point forward—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment with Alex in his office. There is no duration—"
He wakes up—
(Box. Chair. Button—)
He wakes up—
(—Box. Chair. Button—)
He wakes up—
(—Box. Chair. Button—)
Today is a good day. He gets to see his brother again.
(It is, it is, it's a good day, so why does he feel so—)
(—Box. Chair. Button. Box. Chair—)
…
—At this point, Morgan's exhaustion is inhibiting our ability to get any useful results. That's to say nothing of the long-term damage we're likely inflicting from the constant Neuromod installation and removal. Tell me again why—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032. You have a 9 a.m. appointment—"
He wakes up, blinking in the sunlight and he's tired. But he gets up anyway, because today is a good day.
He's brushing his teeth, slow and careful, wondering if he'd caught some sort of bug because the coffee didn't do much and his hands won't stop shaking. He peers at his reflection in the mirror and he doesn't look too ill, but one of his eyes is a bright, vicious red, like he'd gotten something in it that he shouldn't have.
And it's like a punch in the gut—he's afraid, he's terrified, like there's a gun at his head, a knife to his throat, a precipice at his feet and his lizard hind brain is screaming get out get out get away go now.
But he can't get out—he can't move, he can't think, his toothbrush clatters into the sink as he curls in on himself, swallowed alive and there's no end to it .
He's gasping and shaking and struggling to breathe and—
He thinks he hears voices, but he can't turn to see and—
There's a pinch at his neck, something cold and metallic and—
He wakes up.
...
—of our main product line you know that sometimes we need to put in extra effort to hit our milestones, and any external risks are fully taken into account when these decisions—
"Good morning, Morgan. Today is Monday, March 15th, 2032—"
He feels a bit slow when he wakes up. Cotton in his brain. He wonders if he caught a bug somewhere.
But he gets up anyway. Because today is a good day.
"Just a few tests." His brother promises.
They're not hard tests; the scientists reassure him every step of the way.
Move the boxes from the circle. Hide in the room with the chair. Press the button.
Box.
Chair.
Button.
…
DANGER. LEAVE NOW.
DANGER. LEAVE NOW.
DANGER. LEAVE NOW.
"Good morning, Morgan—"
He wakes up and the world doesn't feel quite real.
Or he doesn't feel quite real. Not quite right. Though he doesn't know why that would be. Today…is a good day.
Today…is…
He gets to see his brother again.
He makes it to the roof, he makes it out to the helicopter, and then something sparks hot in his dull, muffled mind and he stops dead on his feet.
He doesn't want to get in. He doesn't want to get in. It doesn't make sense, because this helicopter will take him to everything that he's been working towards for years, but he doesn't, he can't, he won't.
He turns back towards his apartment and just as quickly spins away again, because the thought of going back in there is like ants on his skin, like he's trapped in something too small and constraining. He has a whole city spread out below his feet and he feels like a bug beneath a glass. Unbearable.
He heads for the rooftop edge, because maybe if he can look out on San Francisco and just breathe it all won't feel quite so close. And something jumps in his gut like he's breaking the rules, like he's doing something he shouldn't, but he still makes it to the edge and—
—he bounces off.
He falls back on the roof with a grunt and stares. Kicks out with a foot and that bounces off as well. The city, the sky, the edge of the roof all waver like water with a stone thrown in. Like glass, or a mirror.
Like a giant fucking fishbowl and he's trapped, he's trapped, he's trapped —
There's green mist coming from nowhere, out of the sky, out of the glass, and he doesn't know what it will do exactly, but now something in him is shrieking.
(no no no I won't you can't make me get out get out GET OUT NOW)
And he whirls and he runs, but there's nowhere to go, with the green closing in and glass-roof on all sides. Nowhere to go, but the waiting helicopter, the engine still running and the blades still whirling.
And it's not so much a thought as an urge, an impulse, a driving hiss of raw fury and fear that sends him moving forward before it's even fully formed.
(I won't I won't I won't do it again)
He hears a screech in his ears as he gets his hand on the nose—a garble of voices and static and feedback. Panic. Footsteps.
His name—his brother— Morgan—!
But he's gotten where he needs to go, hands on the windshield and his feet underneath him and then he is standing and leaping straight
up—