Troy wasn't sure what to make of it all. Sitting quietly in the bed, he just looked at the wall at his front. It was white, without any details for his mind to concentrate on. A few details had appeared over time, suddenly disappearing when he actually moved his eyes. He did not take that as a good sign.

His body was still tired. It had been like that for a couple of hours now. What was the time? How long had he been here? Troy was not sure. Dinner might have rounded the corner by now.

That might have been why Dr Hale brought him food. It was a basic portion of the soup he had seen a couple of days before. Only, it was as bland as anything could be, the texture contributing more than anything his tongue gave him in feedback. How they had made anything more boring than plain water, he would never understand. Not that his head even wanted to think about it. Complex thoughts had been tiring.

Thinking about where Dr Hale went sometimes was one of the things he did not questions. When he looked at the chair beside him, she would sometimes sit on it, staring him down. Other times, she would be standing by the door, looking to be writing in her little notebook. Troy liked to imagine that she was making some pink skulls, even if there was only one colour being used.

And every now and then, the woman would be entirely gone, not a trace of her existence noticed. She had disappeared more times than he could count. Though, that might have been more his fault than hers. It was over five, at the very least.

What did she do during those times? Troy had been wondering about that himself. It was not like he asked her or anything. While it might have been shown in the wrong light, he still looked at her the wrong way. Nothing had been explained, and yet she still dared to stand close to him. She had stabbed him. There might not have been insurmountable proof, but it was clear that he could thank her for being in his current position.

She had said nothing about it. Bringing him food once, taking the food away, and then leaving yet again. That was all the interaction they had done during the last hours. There had not been a moment they met eye-to-eye. Was this how it felt with Charlie? The two never speaking, as they knew that the only result would be shouting. It was understandable, in a way. If anybody heard what they were shouting about, it would spell disaster.

Why was Troy even doing this? A vague sense of justice? Hate for everything about the government? Was he doing his best to stick it to The Man? Who even was that guy? Everybody was talking about him, but nobody actually had a picture of him or anything. He might just have never existed in the first place.

Was there a point to his actions? Dr Hale had spilt responsibility on him, and he had taken it without much questioning. She had shown something wrong with the government, and he had just decided to be personally responsible for stopping it. How could that be expected of him? How could she have expected him to say yes? They had already been too far in when he gave an answer, so maybe she had never expected much out of him in the first place. It was all smoke and mirrors. A sense of justice was the only result other than immediate execution.

…

Was Troy supposed to be angry? He probably was. Somebody had swindled him yet again, making him work for some vague purpose that they thought was the right one. Anybody should have been angry about that. The manipulation of others for their own goals, to stop others from manipulating others for their own goals. How many times had he been a part of that? Which side had he been on the last time?

Everybody thought that they had a perfect idea. That they could imagine a perfect world and make it work perfectly. From experience, Troy knew that those never worked out as intended. The mind had a way with words, making itself forget just how many flaws in everything there was.

There was not a single person without some goal. It did not have to be grand. Maybe they wanted to be rich, climbing the ladder to the top. How innocent a dream, making everybody forget what people had done to reach that top themselves. A vicious cycle of people standing tall for a few moments before being thrown down in the abyss. Were there any other goals like that? People wanted to be the best at something, mastering a skill to perfection. Maybe somebody wanted something to change around them. Maybe they wanted a friend. Maybe they wanted to sate their boredom for a while, brutally beating one of their classmates until they themselves were satisfied with their work.

Who would ever know? It wasn't like everybody knew exactly what they wanted. They sought for peace, never knowing how much they hungered to hold a knife… no, that was a bad example. Most that wanted to hold knives learnt it from a young age. The reversal of that, though… Yeah, that worked perfectly.

And there was the big work-up. If there were so many goals, so many manipulations, what did Troy have as his own goal? He had worked hard to make Dr Hale’s dream a reality, but had there been a single moment he had done the same for himself? Was he a selfless person, only working for the betterment of others? Would he sacrifice himself in the name of satisfying another?

No. Troy knew what he was doing. He was as selfish as one could get. There had not been a moment he hadn't thought of himself. There wasn't any moment in his life where he had wanted to sacrifice himself. That would have gone against his own goal.

He did not dream big, though he did dream a little bit. There was no striving for a constant life of luxury either. Those with money to spare was always those who lost the most, swindled by those higher above. Troy just wanted enough to live. His goal was to survive. He just wanted to see another sun rising. He just wanted to live a peaceful life. Honestly, he had dreamt of looking at a big book for the rest of his life. How could it have gotten any better?

That was not how it ended up for him. To live, money was needed. And money could not be gained easily. He had taken a step from his life of averageness, moving the border of his goal down to just leaving while not in poverty. That had been when he first stepped inside the facility. When he cheated in the poker game, he moved down his goals to just keeping his job. When Dr Hale came to him for help, he moved it down yet again, this hoping to live a single day more.

Did he care about the injustice made to Adam? Yes, he cared a lot. Troy understood it was wrong, that it should not have been allowed to continue. Yet… there were a lot of things in the world that should not have been allowed at all. But they still existed, as a large part of the world had grown indifferent to it. He had to. Honestly, he had grown up in a human debit machine. How could he not have understood what others thought? Troy had fully understood from the start that the facility would be screwed morally. Why had he been so shocked when he learned of Adam’s fate?

… Did he actually do it for somebody else? Was he going out of his way to help his friend, for the sake of saving him from a continuous cycle of pain that he did not realise he was in? Possibly. His excuse of just surviving was still standing solid, and it would remain there until it was put to rest. Troy liked to think of himself as selfish. That was what he had been doing for so long.

And it did not really matter what his reasons were. Even if Dr Hale had drugged him, he would try his best. It had taken her a decade. If he had to do it alone, he would be faster than her at it. This time, he would let Adam know. Screw her words about not being able to trust him!

Adam was his friend. That had been made clear. While the AI might not have had the same opinions of him anymore, the man liked to think they were still there somewhere. Yes, he had not been playing nice with him for a long time now. How could he? He had trusted Dr Hale, for there was nothing else he could do.

Even now, after she had drugged him, Troy still had to trust her. She was doing something and expected her help with it. If he stepped out now and she failed because of that, there was no way that he would not fall alongside her. Just as he had said many times before, Troy was too far in to stop. If he stopped following her orders, he would not survive. He would fail his one goal.

The white wall was beginning to grow colours again. Like before, he knew that this was yet another trick of the mind. Troy had been trying to use it as a measurement of time, using it to figure out how long Dr Hale had been away. Each time colours began to sprout, he would look over at the chair. Five had now passed, and the woman was still not present. It was a personal record for her.

Was it getting late? Having stared at a white wall for countless amount of hours, the young man could not tell the time based on his body. It had been tired from the start, and that had not changed in the slightest since then. His legs were numb, but that was more than likely because of his lack of moving them since he woke up.

Well… no matter what time it was, his eyes were growing weary of being constantly open. There were even a few tears in them, the body desperately trying to maintain composure with the dryness felt. Troy had not noticed it, really. There wasn't much in the pain-department being felt. His body just refused to send it over to the brain. His stomach had rumbled a few times as of late. It felt like his insides were moving around. But, there was no pain in it, no hint that anything extreme was happening under his layer of skin. Only his slugginess was felt.

Who would be hurt if he laid down for a few seconds? It wasn't like he was gonna sleep or anything. Troy was just going to rest his eyes for a few seconds. After that, he would be right and ready to move forward with his continued observation. Constant vigilance!

… A few seconds passed, and he just continued laying there, eyes closed and his breathing deep. Troy fully understood that he was going against his own plans, yet he just felt too heavy. His body was similarly not compliant in getting itself moving. Maybe this was fate. He would just continue lying here, for all eternity.

His body moved itself to a comfortable position. That at least made some movement occur. It was better than the attempts to get up from his position. Those had been wreathed in failures. And that was not a bad thing, really. He would just lay here for some time.

Maybe he should sleep. If his body was weak, maybe that would stop when it was allowed to rest, without Troy himself overlooking it constantly. Wasn't that just how it was when baking bread? Looking at the oven would stop it from progressing. That was how he read it. He had never done it himself.

Then again, who was he to question a primary source? He would just lay himself down and sleep for a few hours. His body would wake him up when the time came for it. That was the purpose of an internal clock. Not testing it every now and then would make it inherently meaningless.

… Yeah, no. Troy couldn't do it. He could fake his sleep, but he could not do it fully. Sitting up in the bed again, the drowsiness was still there, going on its accustomed full-throttle. There was nothing about this that felt well. He was never going to feel well again, was he? He couldn't make the time go faster by sleeping, so he just had to look at that stupid white wall. He had tried worse of course, but that did not mean he wanted to continue doing this.

It took less than a few seconds for the wall to swirl a little. His mind was quick on the uptake with it, making the eyes trick themselves into thinking that something was there. Even his brain was too bored to care now. What was he doing?

“Arent you supposed to look over at me now?” Dr Hale asked from the side, saying the first words. The sound of her made Troy jump a little, the young man not having noticed her return.

“How long have you been here?”

“An hour. You were sleeping through most of it.”

“I was faking it.”

“And I somehow couldn't care less.”

Troy wanted to make a retort, feeling a small bit of anger bubbling up inside. That is until he noticed a very familiar device sitting on the woman’s legs.

“I guess you have something you want to say to me,” Troy asked, realising what was going on now.

“For the first time in a while, you hit it spot-on,” Dr Hale answered, with one of her professional nods, before pressing down on the button that had been pressed times before

The countdown had begun and the clock was already ticking.