An Offer I Couldn't Refuse
The girl ran toward the starting point. "Ah... Ah..." I tapped the microphone in front of me to begin the test. Sitting behind the massive wall of reinforced glass, the girl did nothing but stare blankly back at me.
"Are you feeling alright?" As always, there was no answer. Though she obeyed my commands meekly enough, I could never coax a single word out of this little girl.
My voice was undoubtedly echoing in the room where she sat. Yet, she ignored my every question as if she couldn't hear a thing.
I checked off the girl's condition on a sheet of white paper. Any injuries? Any changes from yesterday? Any specific requests? I simply jotted down the basic details. I had to fabricate the parts she refused to answer, but no one ever questioned the reports I submitted.
My new job was incredibly easy. And incredibly dull. My entire day consisted of staring at the girl and trying to talk to her. No abnormalities today. No injuries. No requests.
Since electronic devices were strictly banned, I passed the time with books I brought from home. Sometimes the girl behind the massive glass wall would disappear, but I didn't worry. She was obviously being dragged off to the lab while I was engrossed in my reading.
I had no idea what kind of experiments they were performing on her. All I knew was that whenever they finished, she would return completely limp and fall straight to sleep.
I felt sorry for her at first—dragged here like a lab rat to spend the rest of her life in captivity just because her powers had manifested the wrong way—but that pity only lasted for the first week. A girl who showed absolutely no reaction, like a doll, quickly ceased to feel like a fellow human being.
I repeated the routine mechanically. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow. I would scribble down a half-assed report on her condition, submit it, and that was it. I'd go home, watch TV or play games, and fall asleep. Commute every morning. Repeat. I was living those mindless days when I received a certain proposal.
"Do you honestly think that makes any sense?"
"What can I do? It's an order from above. Who else is going to do it besides you?"
"No, but... you want me to have a conversation with her in a body identical to hers?"
The supervisor who came to see me had proposed exactly that: to attempt a conversation with the test subject using a body identical to hers. He claimed she might actually react to it.
"I thought you needed the money?" It was absurd. If they tempted me with cash, there wasn't much I wouldn't do, but what kind of idiot had come up with this idea in the first place?
"What about a doppelganger esper?"
"Do you really think we haven't tried what you just thought of?" My boss, Dr. Hebrum, let out a hearty laugh as he pulled out a cigarette and lit it. "So, are you in?"
"Do I even have a choice?"
"Of course you do. Though, if you decline, you'll have to start looking for a new job tomorrow."
I rubbed my tired face. My future looked bleak. It was an offer I couldn't refuse.
"How long?" The moment the words left my mouth, a stack of documents slid out from his coat.
"A week should do it. By then, the higher-ups will have forgotten all about it."
I took the stack of papers Dr. Hebrum handed over. It was surprisingly thin.
"Is this actually safe?"
"Of course. Absolutely safe."
"It's really just for a week, right?"
"Why don't you read the contract carefully?" His subtle smirk rubbed me the wrong way. I desperately wanted to throw a punch straight into this middle-aged fatso's grinning face, but doing that would land me right on the streets.
"Just make sure the pay is good."
"That single week will pay you six months' worth of your current salary."
I read through the contract and skimmed the document containing the precautions. They weren't much different from the rules I'd received when I first started as Dr. Hebrum's assistant. The job itself wouldn't change. Only my body would, for a single week. Taking a small, deep breath, I signed the contract right then and there.
"Done?"
"Yes."
"Excellent! Let's go!" Snatching the signed contract from my hand, Dr. Hebrum immediately grabbed my arm and began dragging me down the hallway. With his white lab coat fluttering behind him, he looked like a pig wearing a white cape.
The laboratory Dr. Hebrum dragged me into possessed an incredibly bizarre atmosphere. The test subjects suspended inside the massive glass tubes didn't budge, looking as though they were dead.
"Ah, they're actually alive. We've just extracted their consciousnesses, that's all."
"Is my body going in one of those soon?"
"Indeed." A creeping sense of dread began to crawl up my spine. The grinning fat man continued, "You'll just fall asleep for a moment, and when you wake up, you'll be swapped."
With that, Dr. Hebrum walked deeper into the facility. Following him, we arrived in front of a glass tube that sat isolated from the others, as if receiving special treatment.
"What do you think? Looks identical, doesn't it?" Floating inside the tube with her eyes closed was a girl who looked exactly like the one I had faced every single day for the past year.
"It's perfect..."
"Say hello. This will be your body for the next week."
"I'm not really in the mood." Caressing the surface of the glass tube, I sat down on the edge of the bed placed beside it.
"Here, take this. Swallow it when you're ready." Dr. Hebrum held out a small pill. When was it? I had consulted him once about my insomnia, and this was the exact same pill he had given me back then. Having experienced it firsthand, I knew its efficacy was guaranteed. The moment I took it, I would undoubtedly pass out within minutes. After a brief hesitation, I tossed the pill rolling in my palm into my mouth.