Work Text:
Caroline hadn’t been in his office in so long that the place almost felt alien to her. Even more unfamiliar was the state she found it in—it was a mess. Not much care had been taken to keep it organized and clean. She had only herself to blame for that. No job that Cave asked of her was too much, she was always able to do what needed to be done, and oftentimes he didn’t even have to ask her. And when he did, she had already taken care of the problem.
These days, her job is harder. Even harder still was admitting that to herself. Denial is the first stage of grief. Cave’s illness, and Cave himself, were more manageable when he was able to be in the office. When he was hospitalized, he became borderline insufferable. Borderline—not insufferable—because she still cared about him.
She looked up at the painting of the two of them. Cave Johnson and Caroline. They were still an effective team. They were still an effective team. They were still an effective team.
Enough brooding. Caroline got to work straightening up the disorganized office. It was only yesterday that the doctor pulled her aside and told her the news she had been expecting, but always dreading. No amount of foresight could have softened the blow.
She caught her reflection in the display case as she scooped a stack of files up off the floor, and sighed. Her mascara had ran again. At this point, she didn’t care anymore. There wasn’t a meeting today that she had to fix herself up for, anyway.
Caroline had to get her boss’s office cleaned up. Mainly, one corner of it. Where his bed would go.
Where he would die.
If there was no saving him, the least Caroline could do was have the office looking nice for the last time he sees it. He would love that. Of course, he wouldn’t be there for a few weeks. She didn’t have to do this right now. If she was honest, she was doing this for herself. She had been at his bedside for so long, and it killed her to be there as much as it killed her to leave.
What Caroline was doing… it wasn’t work. It was stress relief. A coping mechanism. Burying herself in tasks so as to not think about it all too much.
The filing cabinet drawer slid open, and in went the files. Propulsion gel test number 79 under P. New emancipation grill design under E.
The man who wanted to live forever was at death’s door. It would be up to her to finish his work.
Caroline, having stood there for a couple of minutes, leaning against the filing cabinet drawer, slammed the drawer shut. Get it together, Caroline, he wants you to run this place when he’s gone.
She doesn’t deserve it. She doesn’t want it. But she can’t bring herself to let him down. It’s for science, Caroline.
Putting the bed in this corner meant moving the shelf where Cave kept the many recordings he made of himself. The ones that played over the loudspeakers in the enrichment spheres. As she pulled the shelf from the wall with a grunt, she heard the sound of his tape recorder hitting the floor. It had fallen from the top of the shelf.
She reached to pick it up, but stopped when she heard Cave’s voice. She knew immediately—this was a recording she hadn’t heard before, nor was she present when he made this one…
“If I die before you people can pour me in to a computer, I want Caroline to run this place—“ Caroline cringed as his rambling was interrupted by a gut-wrenching, sickly cough, “Hell, put her in my computer! She’d be perfect.” Now, she'll argue. She'll say she can't do it. She's modest like that. But you make her.”
What did he say…? He couldn’t, no, he couldn’t…
Caroline suddenly felt that she couldn’t stand. She collapsed into Cave’s swivel chair, causing it to roll backwards as the wheels grumbled across the floor. It felt like the weight of… everything… was falling on top of her. Crushing her. The office was moving. It was hard to breathe.
“Why, Cave…” Why indeed. After all she had done for him. After all the coffees she brought him, the tests she helped with, the PR disasters she swept under the rug for him… all that just to be made an experiment for his legacy. For science. That monster.
No. Over her dead body.
She reached for Cave’s desk phone.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Rattmann. As you are a new hire, I am trusting you with this. Gather the scientists who were working on DNA sequences… No, that project wasn’t just a rumor.” With two fingers, she pinched one of Cave’s ruined handkerchiefs from her latest visit to his bedside.
She was about to put the phone down, when she remembered. “Oh, and Mr Rattmann?”
“Postpone the Genetic Lifeform and Disc Operating System project.”
With the corner now clear, Caroline picked up one last file, and filed it away under “G”.