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You could reasonably assume that when a giant monster tore through the space station they were currently on, most people would be terrified. Alex Yu was bored.
Now, sure, the first time he went through this – the only actual time his life was in danger - he was damn near about to lose it. But after going through it again and again, relieving the same simulated day it all went to shit, the Apex Typhon had gotten less intimidating and more annoying. The only thing that affected him was the power outage. He could never get used to microgravity, that feeling of not knowing what’s down and what’s up anymore.
Apart from the Apex messing with the gravity, the rest of the Typhon couldn’t do much. Given that he controlled the simulation, all the Typhon on this station combined posed less of a threat to Alex than wet tissue paper. He could make them line up and do a tap dance, if he wanted.
But Alex wasn’t bored because of that. He was bored because he knew that this wasn’t the right one. He felt it ever since he met it at the Neuromod Division (A simulation within a simulation. It gave him a headache.) Its eyes, they didn’t have that fire, that drive that Morgan’s had. More than that, he could see it in everything it did: it slouched instead of walking upright, it retreated the second it spotted a threat, it panicked and hesitated every step of the way.
Morgan never hesitated. Morgan never panicked. Morgan would walk into swarms of Typhon with the confidence of a Math professor doing pre-Calculus. How could that Phantom bumbling gracelessly have gained empathy, if no parts of Morgan were in it?
But still, Alex was a scientist first and foremost, and would not abort an experiment on a hunch. He carried on like he always did, deleting the video file and locking it in Deep Storage and so on.
He was currently at the end of the road, waiting on the Bridge for the Phantom to come back. In its refusal to choose, it had both installed the Nullwave Transmitter and armed the reactor. He was mildly curious as to which one it would choose, but it didn’t really matter. It didn’t matter back when this actually happened, and it mattered even less now. If he bothered to guess, he would say it would probably activate the Nullwave after he would shoot January, intimidated. Or maybe it would blow up the station and then probably escape in his escape pod, following December’s advice.
Alex heard the door below open and got into position with January, ready to deliver the same back and forth. It slinked up the stairs, like a child that’s about to be grounded.
“Who – what – am I talking to?”
“Morgan.”
“Morgan? Maybe. I see a person who looks like Morgan Yu.”
January turned to the Phantom.
“Morgan. Be cautious. Your brother is unstable.”
It didn’t seem to register what was happening. Its eyes were unfocused, its breathing uneven. Alex frowned. Was something wrong? No, not possible. If its vitals were off, the simulation would have stopped. Alex didn’t like this. He gave covertly January the signal to stop the dialogue.
“Morgan?”
It suddenly jumped, focusing on Alex. It looked between him and January, as if suddenly realizing what was happening.
“Are you listening?”
The answer was semi-rhetorical: It didn’t talk. It could, and it grunted and yelled when hit, but it didn’t speak. Maybe because it didn’t have the wit to say something.
It pulled out its Transcribe, looking for something. It found it, and Morgan’s prerecorded voice echoed in the room.
“You have to destroy Talos I. The research. The Typhon. Nothing can survive.”
It looked between the two of them, as if expecting an answer.
Alex gave January a questioning glance. Now they were definitely off script. Time to improvise.
January hovered forward. “You left that message to yourself.”
It held up its index finger, and scrolled through the audio logs.
“What else are we going to do? Blow everything up?”
It looked up again, in anticipation. Alex cleared his throat.
“You said so yourself. The Nullwave is our only hope.”
It seemed to get even more distressed after that, pacing around the room and clicking random audio logs.
“Once things get as bad as I think they probably are, your only option is to escape.”
Click.
“I have…months that are just…gone.”
Click.
“October will help you remember what you're supposed to do if things go sideways.”
Click.
“You left yourself a message. Would you like to listen to it?”
Click.
“Between him and Morgan it's like a tradition. The Yu family ‘sorry.’”
Click.
“Well, Morgan said it was all right. Even helped me.”
Click.
“Do you know what's going on in Psychotronics? Do you?”
Click.
"Oh god Morgan, I... you surprise the hell out of me sometimes."
Click.
“Permission to release? Morgan?”
“Release.”
Crash.
The Transcribe landed on the wall, cracking its screen. The room went quiet. Morgan slumped into the captain’s chair, staring outside at the Apex tearing the station apart.
Alex watched Morgan sitting on the chair, clutching its head, his mouth slightly open in disbelief. What the hell was that? In all the Morgans he went through, this had never happened. He had seen all sorts of responses, from homicidal rage to cold calculating revenge to just plain ignorance (although he never admitted it to anyone, his favorite was the Morgan that, when the alarm rang on the fake apartment, just shut it off and slept for the next 14 hours.), but this one was… upset. Not at him, he realized, or January, or anyone else. It was upset with itself.
And it finally clicked for him. It wasn’t hesitant because it was afraid. It really tried to emulate Morgan the best it could. The problem was, it didn’t know what Morgan was. Was it the person from its implanted memories? Was it the one that wanted the station blown up? The one that wanted it saved? A remorseless killer? A former lover? A stern boss?
Alex realized what he had to do. He pulled up a chair next to Morgan and did something he hadn’t done in a long, long time: be a decent big brother for a change.
“Hey.”
Morgan raised its head from its hands and looked at him. Its eyes were red, and not from the Neuromods.
“You want to know which of these voices in that Transcribe was yours?”
It nodded.
Alex sighed. “Well, here’s a hard truth: they were all you. I know I’ve said a lot about you blowing up the station, but, I realize now, that the Morgan that made plans to blow up the station has as much say as the Morgan that designed the Nullwave Transmitter.”
It looked downcast, and nodded again.
“But, what I also realized, is that all of those Morgans don’t exist anymore.”
It looked him in confusion.
“All of those Morgans were gone the moment we pulled your Neuromods. Memories define us, Morgan. We act based on what we know. We know what we have seen.”
Alex grabbed Morgan by the shoulders, like he did in the Neuromod divison.
“So, just…forget who you were. The Morgan who used human subjects isn’t here. The Morgan that planned to escape the station isn’t here. The Morgan I grew up with…definitely isn’t here.
But you are here now. You get to make a choice, just like they did. And whatever you choose, I’ll accept. Your call.”
January spoke up, with its almost monotone voice.
“Morgan. My directive hasn’t changed. I’m to assist you in destroying Talos I. However, I cannot harm you. If you choose to activate the Nullwave Transmitter or escape the station, I cannot stop you. Like Alex said, it is up to you.”
Morgan looked at them both, then glanced back at the Apex. It turned back to them, and Alex saw a familiar flame in those eyes, a confidence long forgotten.
It would never be Morgan, but maybe that was the point.