Chapter Text
Delivery boxes and cup noodles filled the small apartment. The floorboards creaked as he crawled to flick the lights on. He made his way to the kitchen to peel open another cup of noodles. The TV flickered when he sat in front of it to spend his day. The kettle shrieked, and before he could get up, the TV played.
“Come in today to get your memories saved forever! There is an exclusive deal right now! Get the Natobot Surgery at an all-time low of $150! Book your-”
He snatched the remote from the couch and slammed his thumb on the power-off button. The screen went black, leaving the room quiet again. He barely recognized his reflection on the blank screen. He carried the cup back to the couch, letting the heat burn his hands.
Natobot Surgery.
His thoughts drifted to the lab, the late nights when he had built the system.
“They don't even know how it works,” he mumbled
The noodles in his hands had gone cold. The smiling families, perfect moments frozen forever. That's not what the system was supposed to do. It didn't make life better. It just kept it. Every mistake, every failure, every moment you wished you could forget. People used the surgery to save memories. But he knew there was more to it. He knew how to get more control. If the nanobots could access every memory, maybe they didn't have to keep them all.
The memory of his old friend Ricky came back. His grip tightened around the cup. Maybe that was the problem. They built it to remember everything, to capture every second and store it away, but no one ever stopped to think about what should be forgotten.
---
The building was unnaturally clean, and surfaces reflected every movement. He sat in the waiting area, fingers tapping, feeling out of place among the families. For a second, he thought of leaving.
“Nico!”
The voice wasn't from the time, but a memory of the past.
“Come on, Nico, you can't stay inside all day,” the voice said. The voice was light, almost laughing. “Let's go out!”
It was Euijoo. Someone he hadn't seen since they were teens, someone who had once stayed by his side no matter what. The memory of their "friendship" lingered, bright and warm. Something he hadn't realized he missed. The nicknames they playfully called each other, the way Nicholas' palms sweated when he was around, the times Nicholas got too close to him and had to pull away.
Another voice called his name.
-
The room was bright, filled with humming machines. The technician spoke, but Nicholas barely listened. He already knew the systems. As the equipment was prepared, Nicholas stared at a screen on which his profile had been loaded. The technician had asked him if he was ready for the procedure to start.
“Yes,” Nicholas said, still thinking. The technician gave a small nod.
“Just relax. The nanobots will begin syncing with your neural patterns. You may feel a slight pressure before the sedatives kick in.” Nicholas’ eyes were fixed on the screen in front of him. It flashed a display of the inner system. Then he fell asleep.
---
He woke up and looked around. The technician was gone. He saw the screen still in front of him. He reached for the keyboard and mouse below the computer and started clicking immediately. He initiated the sequence. For a moment, everything worked exactly how he expected. The systems responded, and the data shifted under his control. Then something went wrong. A delay. The system paused.
Nicholas frowned, “That's not right…”
A line of data appeared. Then another. The screen glitched as files overlapped his memories. These weren't his, but he recognized the name in the code. The system began syncing faster.
“What did I just-”
His sentence was never finished. A sudden rush hit him, sharp and overwhelming, as something foreign was being pushed into his mind, forcing its way through his thoughts.
Before he knew it, he stumbled out of the building.
---
For days, he lived with foreign memories, drifting between his life and happier glimpses of someone else's. New faces and conversations. Small moments filled with laughter and jokes that belonged to someone else. Suddenly, his phone rang. Ricky. His old friend, who had betrayed him and stolen the system.
“Nicholas,” the voice said calmly. “I see you've been busy with your new life. It's almost funny. Living someone else's life when you couldn't deal with your own.”
“What did you do?” Nicholas demanded.
“Not what I did,” Ricky laughed, “what you let happen. You'd better be careful. Tamper with those memories too long, and side effects will happen.”
Nicholas swallowed. “You're messing with me.”
“I'm warning you, you're free to figure it out on your own now.”
The line disconnected.
---
For two days, he wandered, replaying memories, trying to see whose life he was remembering. A sudden jolt of recognition came to Nicholas as he realized whose life he had been living in those memories. Someone who once called him “Nico”. It was Euijoo, the friend he hadn’t seen in years. The one who had been with him through everything. Every smile, all the hidden frustrations and all of the happy moments. They all belonged to Euijoo.
Nicholas realized that it wasn't just his memories that were replaced, but Euijoo had been experiencing the depression that Nicholas faced. His heart raced as he grabbed his phone and sent a message.
“I need to see you now.”
Euijoo responded almost immediately. “I know. Meet me at the old lab.”
When Nicholas arrived, Euijoo was already there.
“Took you long enough,” he said, worried. “These nanobots… they're dangerous. Notice anything weird?”
Nicholas hesitated. “I'm sorry. This is my fault,” he explained what had happened.
Euijoo listened carefully.
“You couldn't have known that this was going to happen. But it's not just about the memories, Nico. These nanobots don't just store experiences. Minds, personalities, even reflexes can merge.”
The weight of it hit Nicholas. Not just the situation they were in, but how Euijoo was in front of him again. The sound of his name coming from Euijoos' mouth made his heart skip a beat.
“I've been looking into the system ever since Ricky took it from you. I even went through the surgery to get more information. I never stopped caring about the tech you spent countless months on. The tech that took you away from me. Together, we can take it down.”
Nicholas paused again.
"Juju, you don't have to do-", he noticed right before finishing his sentence.
"Juju?" Euijoo questioned, "Now you start calling me that again?"
Nicholas hadn't called Euijoo that ever since that night. "Come on, Juju. It's been a long time since then."
Euijoo looked to the side. Remembering how he had stopped calling him Euijoo and switched to Juju after that night alone in the classroom. Nicholas had stayed late at school during their senior year.
---
Nicholas was spending another late night at school, working on his project before he got a text on his phone. It was from Euijoo.
"Nico! You still at school?"
Nicholas read the notification before opening the text. He had finally acknowledged his little crush on Euijoo. As much as he hid it, covering it up with fake crushes on random girls in their class, none of them made him nervous like Euijoo did.
"Yeah. Why you still up?" Nicholas responded a minute later, trying to come up with a nonchalant response.
"OK! I'll be there in 5." Euijoo responded immediately.
"What?"
Nicholas had forgotten his nonchalant persona to meet no response from Euijoo.
A few minutes later, there was a knock on the classroom door. Nicholas looked out to Euijoo's excited face in the window, holding up a bag against his face. Euijoo had bought them both coffees. He had Nicholas' order memorized by heart ever since he got him the wrong order during a study session. Nicholas knew that with Euijoo breathing down his neck, he wouldn't be able to focus, so he put his harder tasks to the side, prepared for any conversations Euijoo might have brought with him.
"Nico," Euijoo whispered.
Nicholas held his breath.
"Let's give each other nicknames."
"Haven't you already given me one?"
"Nico doesn't count. Everyone calls you that now. I want just for us."
Nicholas looked up from his screen, meeting Euijoo's big, round eyes immediately. "No"
Nicholas stared at Euijoo's lips as they began to turn downward, forming a pout.
"Come onnn. Nico is so boring, and I want a nickname too."
Nicholas looked up into Euijoo's eyes again. "Fine. Give me one first." Nicholas stated, trying not to sound excited.
"Nichol" Euijoo replied before Nicholas even finished his sentence
"How long have you been thinking about this?" Nicholas questioned. "Is this the whole reason you came to see me?"
"Now you give me one," Euijoo demanded, avoiding the question.
Nicholas tapped his finger and looked around, pretending to think.
"Juju"
Euijoo smiled instantly.
"See? It wasn't that hard."
-
Euijoo stayed quiet to let Nicholas continue working, occasionally offering input for motivation and help. Eventually, it reached 1 AM.
"You don't have to stay here for me, you know?" Nicholas said, breaking the silence. "Go home and sleep."
"I don't want to go home. It's lonely."
Nicholas sighed, "I know you're tired, Juju."
"I'm not," Euijoo demanded as he rested his head on the table, closing his eyes.
-
Nicholas finally lifted his head from his work after completing another section. He turned his head to his left side, only to see Euijoo drifting off, with his head resting on his arm. Nicholas stared at his face; this was his chance to memorize Euijoo's face without him knowing. His breath turned shaky as he lifted Euijoo's bangs to reveal his face. Before he could react, Euijoo opened his eyes.
Nicholas jumped back, "Uh, s-sorry."
Euijoo smiled, didn't respond; instead, he leaned closer, making eye contact with Nicholas' lips. Nicholas could hear Euijoos heartbeat increasing in pace as he got closer. He put his hand on Euijoos heart, measuring his heartbeat himself. Nicholas looks up from his hand, into Euijoo's eyes, that are still locked on Nicholas' lips. Nicholas matched Euijoo and leaned closer, scrunching the hand on Euijoos chest, pulling him closer aswell.
"Nichol," Euijoo whispered, "what are you doing?"
Nicholas leaned in again to close the small gap between their faces, making Euijoo shut his eyes as their lips touched.
---
For hours, they worked, combining both their experience into codes and schematics of the nanobot network. Nicholas guided Euijoo through his old designs, pointing out the weak points and loopholes they could work through.
“You're sure this will work?” Nicholas asked
Euijoo was quiet. “It's risky; if we mess anything up, we might lose our memories. There's nothing else we can do. This could end up spreading to the rest of the population if we don't stop it now.”
They imported the code onto a flash drive and waited until midnight. They returned to the natobot building. Breaking in was easier than expected. They just had to insert the flash drive into the same computer. Nicholas plugged the flash drive in with Euijoo standing nearby, ready to act if something went wrong. Lines of code streamed across the screen as the override started, the nanobots froze, and one by one, rogue data streams shut down. The lights flickered on and off while their memories began to untangle. Nicholas clenched his jaw, focusing on the sequences, forcing the nanobots to comply.
Nicholas exhaled; the weight lifted.
“It's done,” he whispered
“For now. We still need to make sure Ricky can't restart this.
"Juju are you still mad at me?"
"Stop calling me that" Euijoo responded with a serious tone.
"I'm sorry Juju. I was stupid. I didn't know what I was doing. I was 18."
Euijoo turned around, beginning to walk away from Nicholas, before he felt a hand around his wrist. He turned around to see Nicholas, whos eyes were tearing up.
"I'm really sorry Juju. I know I was wrong for leaving. Leaving you in that classroom was the worse mistake I ever made."
"And ghosting me until now? Was that not the worse mistake?" Euijoo yelled as he ripped his arm away from Nicholas' grip. "I'm over it Nico."
"No you're not Juju. You came all the way here to help me, you responded to my text less then a minute after I sent it, you never stopped caring about the tech I spent countless months on."
"That was as a friend Nico," Euijoo sighed. "Just let me go."
"Please Juju. Just give me one more chance. I can watch you leave me again. I'm not making the same mistake again."