Every Morning
Title: Every Morning
Fandom: Nino/Ohno/Jun, one-sided Nino/Okada, implied Okada/Sakamoto (Arashi, V6)
Rating: PG-13 for sexual references, brief gory imagery, dark themes
Genre: Sci-fi/Horror
Word Count: 4,867
Summary: Human cloning was still a sensitive subject. The leading research in the west was met both with enthusiasm and condemnation, talk of technology and curing diseases, of eugenics and playing god. But in Japan, where the declining population was a rising concern, they had no qualms about dismissing the Christian God who was so willing to let their numbers disintegrate. In Japan, their god was science.
Warnings: Mentions of character death, medical experimentation, and moral ambiguity. Kind of twisted!
Notes: Written for clipsie during ninoexchange 2013, originally posted here. This is a darker fic than I'm used to writing for this exchange (and in general), but it was a fun challenge. Lots of love to my beta, lysanderpuck.
Like every morning, he woke up five minutes before his alarm clock was set to go off. The digital numbers glowed a defiant red in the darkness, daring him to snooze. He scowled at the offending alarm clock, rubbing his hand across his face before slapping it against the alarm button. Like every morning, he briefly entertained the thought of setting his alarm five minutes earlier to ward off his irritation at losing five minutes of sleep, but like every morning, his irrational fear got the better of him. All it would mean was that he would wake up even earlier to beat the alarm.
His wakeup routine was unrushed. He rolled to the edge of his bed, making a spiteful grunt at the clock as he sat up. A slow yawn. He stared at the blank white wall in front of him. There's nothing here for you, so get to work, it seemed to say. "Work, work," he responded with a nod.
He didn't have to think about his wardrobe, because it was the same every day: whatever he wore to bed that night with his long lab coat on top. He ran his hand arbitrarily through his hair, pretending to look into a mirror on his wall that didn't exist. "Good enough," he said to no one as he turned to leave. His slippers were right outside his door, waiting like loyal dogs for their master's return. Hachiko One on his left, Hachiko Two on his right.
The sleeping quarters were only a hallway away from the main laboratory. It was a perk of the job, living in the same building. He never had to go outside and deal with strangers. He just had to wake up, go to work, take breaks as necessary, and live a gloriously uneventful life.
His boss was already there at the laboratory, sitting at his bench at the head of the room. "Good morning, Ninomiya-kun," Okada said, nodding briefly at the door before returning his attention to the clipboard in his hands.
"Good morning," Ninomiya responded as he took his seat at his desk. He tapped the monitor in front of him, the black screen automatically pulling up statistics and analytics from the previous day, adjustments to be made during the next upgrade. A realignment here, an extra injection there. The models were improving, but they were far from perfect.
Ninomiya frowned at the screen as he read the numbers over again. Like every morning, there was work to be done.
-
Human cloning was still a sensitive subject. The leading research in the west was met both with enthusiasm and condemnation, talk of technology and curing diseases, of eugenics and playing god. But in Japan, where the declining population was a rising concern, they had no qualms about dismissing the Christian God who was so willing to let their numbers disintegrate. In Japan, their god was science.
The government grant permitting advanced research on human cloning was kept secret for two reasons. The first and foremost was that they didn't want to invite competition. The stem cell researchers in the west thought they had a monopoly on genetics, that they were the pinnacle of innovation. The Japanese government was happy to let them stay ignorant.
The second reason, which for better or for worse was less of a concern for the government, was that they still needed test subjects. Few people were willing to give up their lives for the sake of the government, and the ones who were willing to die weren't the types of people they wanted. They needed smart, strong individuals who were capable of undergoing physical and psychological extraction. They needed bodies they could dispose of so that there wouldn't suddenly be two where there used to be just one.
It was Ninomiya's friend at the university who first introduced him to the job. Sakurai's father was a mid-level politician, and he'd heard that a young researcher was needed for a highly classified government project. Sakurai had mentioned it while they were taking a study break as something for Ninomiya to look into. Ninomiya's engineering textbook at the corner of the table had continued to lie open and inviting, as if to agree.
A government job wouldn't be a bad place to start. Mechanical engineering degree in tow, Ninomiya found himself standing in front of a grey two-story building amidst a row of abandoned warehouses. There were no markings on the walls, no windows, and no signs of life, just a deserted vending machine leaning just inside the alley with dust that looked older than the reigning emperor. It was clear that the only people who made it to that building knew what they were doing.
Ninomiya stepped toward the door, and before he could lift his hand to knock, it slid open with a tight release of air. The lobby inside was a sterile white in every direction, and an unmanned desk sat at the far end. Ninomiya tightened his grip on his suitcase handle, his hands suddenly clammy, and walked toward the desk, his footsteps clicking hollowly into the space around him. Perhaps someone would be out to greet him shortly. Or perhaps, as he realized once he saw the single sheet of paper, directions would already be waiting there for him.
The first person he saw once he arrived at the second-floor laboratory was a sturdy-looking man sitting at an unadorned desk. He seemed to be looking intently at the flat monitor in front of him, chin resting against his knuckles, thumb pulsing against his cheek like synapses.
Ninomiya cleared his throat. The other man turned his head suddenly.
"Hello," Ninomiya said. He took a deep breath. "My name is--"
"Ninomiya Kazunari," the other man said in a friendly tone. There was something strange about the way he said Ninomiya's name, his smile not quite matching the rest of his face. Then again, Ninomiya was far too nervous for his own good, eager to find something suspicious where none existed. Ninomiya nodded sharply as if to clear his own head, stepping forward and extending his free hand. The other man stood in turn. He wasn't as tall as Ninomiya expected.
"Nice to meet you, Doctor," Ninomiya said, bowing low.
The other man chuckled, taking Ninomiya's hand in both of his own. "Please don't call me that," he said. Ninomiya looked up to see a sheepish grin spreading across the other man's face. "You can just call me Okada."
His smile was much more charming the second time.
-
Like every day, Ohno and Matsumoto came to the laboratory around lunchtime. There were no specific hours set for work or meals, but Ninomiya was a creature of habit, always had been, and he'd made sure that Ohno and Matsumoto were the same. It was easier to be productive if he had a schedule to stick to, rules to follow, daily reports to make, and regular breaks in between. Ohno and Matsumoto were a welcome and, as Okada had reminded him many times, necessary respite from the endless task of crunching numbers.
"Kazu," Matsumoto said, strolling toward Ninomiya's desk and pressing a kiss to his temple in greeting. "How many times have I told you to stop slouching like that?" Matsumoto skated his hand across Ninomiya's back, pressing his fingertips between Ninomiya's shoulder blades to force him to sit up.
Ninomiya gritted his teeth. "I can't correct something like that as easily as you can."
"He doesn't have your discipline, MatsuJun," Ohno said with a chuckle, stepping quietly into place on Ninomiya's other side.
Matsumoto's daggered press turned into a slow shoulder rub. Ninomiya smiled and leaned into the touch. "You know it's not discipline that makes it easy for you."
Ohno chuckled again. "Well." Ninomiya felt another hand brush against his neck, travelling down his spine and back up, slow and teasing. "It's time to stretch either way. You've been working hard."
Ninomiya nodded, letting Ohno and Matsumoto pull him up and lead him out the door. Like every day, Ninomiya considered announcing his lunch break to the other two researchers in the laboratory, but like every day, Okada and Sakamoto seemed to be in a deep, private conversation that didn't need disturbing.
Matsumoto wrapped an arm around Ninomiya, his hand gripping Ninomiya's side tightly. When they reached Ninomiya's sleeping quarters and they stepped out of their slippers, Matsumoto dipped his head down, tugging at Ninomiya's earlobe with his teeth. Ohno pulled them forward into the room.
"You can pretend I'm Okada-kun if you want," Matsumoto said in a low voice, dragging his lips across NInomiya's jaw before stepping back and letting Ohno remove Ninomiya's lab coat.
Ninomiya felt the heat rush to his face and to his groin, breathless as Ohno skipped his shirt and went straight to slipping his pants down. He felt dazed as Matsumoto pulled his shirt up his torso and over his head, as long-fingered hands make their way back up his legs. There was barely enough blood left in his brain left for it, but he managed to make a mental note to ease up on the kinky teasing for their next upgrades.
-
Ohno and Matsumoto were exceptions to the rule. The government agency supporting their project had made strict rules against creating multiple clones of the same people, but like all good scientists, the men in Ninomiya's lab decided that they didn't have to follow all the rules.
Sakamoto had suggested it. It had been clear upon meeting the third member of their team that Okada was off-limits, and that Ninomiya would have to find his own way to unwind. Ninomiya had spent the first few months unwinding in his sleeping quarters by himself during his lunch break, accompanied only by his hand and his half-baked thoughts of what being with Okada would be like, how it would feel to be pressed against a body similar in stature but built so differently, capable of doing all the things Ninomiya wanted done to him and more. But it only left him exhausted and uneasy, unable to fully concentrate during his long afternoon shift.
Matsumoto had been a dutiful commander in the self-defense forces who had walked in on the wrong meeting. Ohno had been an undercover agent who had found too much information about his own government. Both were to swiftly and mysteriously disappear, just to appear again days later, returning to their posts as if nothing had happened.
Their DNA samples were kept with the DNA of the rest of their models, stored in a cooled chamber in the incubation room. Sakamoto had pulled them out and asked Ninomiya what he wanted their personalities to be like; as their resident geneticist, Sakamoto could make those changes happen.
The decision to go ahead with the duplicate clones had been surprisingly easy when Okada had expressed his approval, stepping in closer to Sakamoto's side than was absolutely necessary. It had been simple then to say yes to having his own companions, a second set of Ohno and Matsumoto who would stay in the building and help him mentally and physically exhaust himself enough for a real break from his thoughts. It was decided that they would also serve as test subjects for any new trials they wanted to run, but their main function was to support Ninomiya.
During work hours, Ohno and Matsumoto sat downstairs in the first-floor lobby, acting as security and communications whenever anyone new came to their building. The personality traits from their previous professions hadn't needed much tweaking. It was just the times between, when they would fetch Ninomiya for breaks, pamper him with soft touches (harder when he wanted them), that Ninomiya was particular about.
Ninomiya had considered for a short moment asking Sakamoto to give them Okada's personality, but he decided against it almost immediately. It wasn't something Sakamoto would be happy to hear, and it certainly wasn't fair to Ohno and Matsumoto, who had been good men in their own right, and who would assuredly take care of him in their own way.
Besides, there was always the option of change with Ohno and Matsumoto. If they didn't suit his needs, Ninomiya could always make sure that they did.
-
Like every week for the past several weeks, Ninomiya's latest project was working to extend the life of synthetic tissue. There was no guarantee that the models they created would be able to last as long as humans naturally did. They were still in the preliminary phase of the project, and a few years' time wasn't enough to indicate whether their initial models would last the sixty or more years their human ages suggested. All of the subjects they'd had so far were healthy males in their 20s and 30s, and healthy males in their 20s and 30s tended to remain healthy for some time. They wouldn't be able to measure their actual success in tissue synthesis until a 50-year-old model came in looking like he was 50 years old and not a 200-year-old prune.
Okada leaned in as Ninomiya explained his theory on how to better lock enzymes into the organ membranes. Their current process had enzymes injected during a single step while the membranes were attaching within the body, but if they allowed the enzymes to be sealed in over time as the membranes themselves were developing, it might more accurately replicate the human development process.
Okada hummed and nodded. Ninomiya was keenly aware of the hand Okada had placed on the back of his chair, barely brushing against Ninomiya's lab coat. He could feel Okada's breath, slow and even, warm against Ninomiya's head as Okada leaned in even further to look over Ninomiya's calculations.
"Sakamoto-kun," Okada called triumphantly, breaking Ninomiya out of his reverie. Ninomiya let out a small sigh. "Come look at Ninomiya-kun's new idea for synthesis."
"What's this now?" Sakamoto said with a grin, tapping his screen closed and walking over to Ninomiya's desk. "Are you trying to take my job?" His voice had a joking tone to it, but Ninomiya couldn't help but hear something serious and penetrating underneath.
"Never," Ninomiya said in response, aiming for teasing but landing on terrified. "Just an idea we should try in the future."
Footsteps sounded in the hallway, half steady, half stilted. Ninomiya turned his head, snaking between Sakamoto's and Okada's torsos for a clearer view.
"Doctors," came a wheezing voice, helpless. Ohno and Matsumoto appeared in the doorway, supporting between them a slim figure whose face looked sallow and empty compared to the life it had before. "I'm weak," he said. "My supervisor told... told me to come here. Said you could help."
Okada stepped forward, indicating a chair next to the door. "We can't promise anything, but we'll do our best." Ninomiya knew that was a lie. They'd made him before; they could make him again.
Ohno and Matsumoto helped the figure to the chair, and Sakamoto leaned down and whispered, "Looks like we get to try your new theory sooner than we thought."
-
Aiba had been their first successful clone, a lithe body with sinewy muscles, a smile so wide it leapt off his face onto everyone else's. In his past life, he had been a low-level researcher developing weapons for the government, a man dedicated less to the government and more to science itself. It had been his strongest ally as well as his fatal foe.
His DNA had been harvested from the severed arm found three meters from the blast. It had been delivered to the laboratory with simple instructions: Do it. The technology they had developed at the time was rudimentary at best, but under pressure from the body funding their research, they had no choice but to try.
It took six weeks of trial and error -- much, much error -- and another four weeks of incubation before the model was successfully completed. Ninomiya, Okada, and Sakamoto were slumped together in their seats at the incubation room work table when Ninomiya felt a gentle hand on his shoulder, nudging him back to alertness. Ninomiya looked up to see Ohno smiling at him. Wordlessly, Ohno woke the other two.
Ninomiya turned his head forward and saw what they'd been wanting for months: a man in an incubation tube with his eyes open. Ninomiya could see that he was squinting from what must have been too much light, even as dark as they kept the incubation room.
"Hello, Aiba-kun," Ninomiya breathed, wonder filling his voice as he stood. They'd done it. "Welcome back to life."
They spent the next several days running a battery of physical exams on the new model with the equipment they kept in an unoccupied sleeping room. During that time, they found that Aiba was ready to participate in whatever tests they had for him, and even more ready to accidentally break or misuse expensive equipment that didn't belong to him.
"I'll work on a more precise formula for personality input," Okada said wryly, bending down to pick up a now-warped breathing apparatus.
They fit him in some of the spare clothes they kept at the laboratory, and Sakamoto injected the final memory adjustment. Okada and Sakamoto would deliver him to his new home in conjunction with a report to be made to the government agency overseeing their research, and by the time Aiba woke up the next morning, he would have forgotten all about his days at the laboratory.
The rationale for keeping clones' identities secret even from themselves made a good deal of sense, both from a security standpoint and from a psychological standpoint, but Ninomiya still felt some sadness knowing that their first successful project would never know they even existed.
The stronger feeling, though, the one threatening to make him lose control of his body altogether, was the pride he felt in his work. They'd done something. They'd done something big. They could change the world with this.
-
Like every time a failed model came back to them, Aiba's old body had to be burned. Ninomiya enlisted the help of Ohno and Matsumoto to bring the body to the basement of the building. A large stone oven lay dormant in the corner of an ashen room, its mouth open, hungry for bodies. The disposal process was surprisingly primitive for such an advanced research facility, but sometimes the simplest solutions worked best.
Ninomiya stood between Ohno and Matsumoto as they watched the body disappear into flame. Light flickered across their faces. Ninomiya felt uncomfortably warm, still unused to being in a space that wasn't carefully regulated and insulated like the rest of the building.
"So that's what happens to me after every upgrade," Ohno said solemnly.
"You know it is," Ninomiya said, huffing out a laugh. "You help bring your own body down here every time."
The cloning process had accelerated significantly since Aiba's first incarnation. His DNA had already been used, and the proper calibration for the instruments they used was preprogrammed into the computer system. All it took was implantation onto a premade human body and an overnight stay to allow physical finalization to occur. Okada would make final adjustments to the personality and other traits, and Sakamoto would inject the last memory tweak before the model was released to go on with his daily life in the morning.
Ohno and Matsumoto followed the same procedure, except that they didn't need the memory tweaks when they simply existed for Ninomiya. Always the exceptions, they would observe every time as their DNA was manipulated and their upgrades were brought to life. They would sit in the incubation room, fascinated to find their own faces emerge over the course of a night like expertly sculpted clay, waiting and watching up until the point when Ninomiya felt the usual pang of guilt come over him. They already knew that they were being replaced by better versions of themselves; did they really need to watch it happen? When Ninomiya couldn't take it anymore, he would walk up to each of them, kissing them slowly before giving them a shot to the thigh with the poison that would leave them dead in five minutes. It was almost as much for them as it was for himself.
"Take care of me tonight," Ninomiya said to his companions as they made their way back up to the laboratory. "I don't want to be alone."
-
Their roles had been defined on the first day, just minutes after Ninomiya had fallen in love at first sight with his boss.
Okada, as the head of the laboratory, was in charge of preparing and overseeing the overall process. Sakamoto, a tall man with an overwhelming presence, was their geneticist, and he would make chemical injections and tweaks to DNA input as necessary. Ninomiya, fresh out of college and fresher out of his mind for accepting the position, would run numbers and perfect the process from a technical standpoint. They were a small team, but as far as the government was concerned, the smaller the team, the easier it was for them to be hidden.
"Though hopefully we won't have to hide for long," Okada said, quiet determination flaring in his eyes. "We need to start with the usual regenerative medicine, but once we find some material to work with, we could really revolutionize humanity."
Okada called Ninomiya's name, and Ninomiya blinked, flustered. It would take some getting used to. "What do you want to do with this technology?"
Ninomiya let out a slow breath, folding his arms loosely across his stomach. He didn't want to sound too idealistic, but he had a lot of ideas. "We could do everything with it," he began slowly. "We could cure diseases. We could regrow limbs." He shrugged, an attempt at nonchalance to balance out the feelings swelling in his chest. "We could rebuild families. We could create new ones."
Okada smiled and nodded. "We could." Ninomiya glanced up at Sakamoto, whose face remained neutral. Ninomiya pressed his arms closer into his body, straightening his posture.
"Come on," Okada said, cutting into Ninomiya's nerves. "We'll show you around the building."
Down the hall were the sleeping quarters -- just three rooms occupied at the moment, but maybe there would be more in the future -- and the kitchen and bathroom at the end.
"You're in this room right here," Okada explained, opening the door to an empty room. "You have a bed in there for now, and the clothes you had sent to the main office will arrive later this afternoon, but we can get whatever you want. Just let me know what you need to be comfortable."
Ninomiya nodded, and they walked back toward the laboratory.
"Sakamoto-kun, explain our research thus far? You're better at it than I am."
Sakamoto's face crinkled into a judgmental frown. "How are you going to get better at presenting information if you don't practice?" Okada laughed, and Sakamoto smirked affectionately. Ninomiya clearly had some catching up to do.
"Right now I'm working on memory modification," Sakamoto said, standing tall as if he were presenting at a conference and not to a colleague as they walked down the hall. "I'm hoping to find a way to accurately transfer personality and memory through DNA. Of course, there will be moments when we need to refine a clone's memory, too, especially if we let them see what they aren't supposed to see, so we'll need to find a way to approach that level of precision." Sakamoto turned to Ninomiya with a sharp, meaningful look. "I'm counting on your expertise to make that happen."
Ninomiya wouldn't call himself an expert, but he would do a lot to make sure he was on Sakamoto's good side. "Understood," he responded seriously.
They reached a door at the end of the hall. "Here we are," Okada said, working a key into the lock. "There's nothing in here yet since we still have to build the equipment, but this" -- Okada opened the door -- "is the incubation room."
It was a barren room with a dull marble floor and cold, empty walls, but Ninomiya could already see his dreams filling in every crevice.
-
Like every month, Okada and Sakamoto left for an evening to present a progress report to their government sponsors. Ninomiya decided to spend the time alone prepping the incubation room for new models. Typically when Okada and Sakamoto returned late at night after a report, they would need to start working on improving their technology. That was always what the government asked for: faster, better, even more advanced. Any day now, they would be ready to tell the world what they'd been working on all this time. Year after year, it was any day now. In the meantime, though, there were improvements to be made.
Typically Okada prepped the incubation room. He insisted that they stuck to their separate roles; their responsibilities were split evenly that way. Ninomiya did so much of the mechanical theorizing, and he didn't need to worry himself over the dirty work. Okada was happy to make it happen.
But Ninomiya liked assisting where he could, even though he knew that the part of him saying so was the pitiful man hopelessly in love with his boss, still, eight years after they first met.
And really, he didn't dislike the work, or at least the theory behind it. Someday, they'd be able to reveal what they'd been up to. Someday, they'd change the world.
Ninomiya opened the DNA chamber to find the right samples to work with. He had mentioned before Okada and Sakamoto had left that he was hoping to make some adjustments to Ohno's and Matsumoto's personalities. When they pressed for clarification, Ninomiya just shook his head. Sakamoto had given him a knowing look before turning to leave, and Ninomiya hoped to never have to live through the moment again.
The samples were organized onto shelves in chronological order, with the oldest on top -- Aiba -- and the newest at the bottom -- a slightly younger man by the name of Tegoshi who had been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but was now in a completely different place being a decent government watchdog. Ninomiya worked his way up through the names, remembering their stories: Murakami, Nagase, Maruyama...
Ninomiya stopped at a name he didn't recognize, near the top, right below Ohno and Matsumoto. "Ichinomiya". He shuddered involuntarily at the sound of it and at all of the thoughts running through his head. As he reached up to pull the shelf out, there was a loud knock on the door.
"Nino," Ohno called, opening the door. Ninomiya stood abruptly, slamming the chamber closed. He turned to look at Ohno. "Nino, what are you doing? We've been waiting for you."
"Ah, yeah," Ninomiya said with a frenzied nod, barely hearing his own words over the blood pumping through his veins. "Just... just give me a second." Ninomiya forced a smile.
Ohno frowned. "Are you okay?"
He wasn't. "I think I have a lot of questions."
Ohno let out a derisive laugh. "I can't help you with that." He held out a hand. "Come on, spend one last night with us before we get upgraded. You know how MatsuJun gets when he starts thinking too hard about not being good enough."
Ninomiya stood for a moment and considered Ohno's face, the concerned eyes of a clone created to support him. He sighed, nodding more slowly and taking Ohno's hand. "It's not like that."
Ohno didn't respond, simply leading them back to Ninomiya's sleeping quarters. He was right, of course. Ninomiya could use a nice night and a good rest before he asked his questions. There was nothing he could do then but enjoy the company of his friends.
Ohno opened the door, and Matsumoto was waiting on Ninomiya's bed for him. Matsumoto looked up and smiled, relieved.
Ninomiya didn't remember the rest of the night; he fell asleep astonishingly quickly.
-
Like every morning, he woke up five minutes before his alarm clock was set to go off. He rolled to the edge of his bed, making a spiteful grunt at the clock as he sat up. A slow yawn. He stared at the blank white wall in front of him. There's nothing here for you, so get to work, it seemed to say. "Work, work," he responded with a nod.
His boss was already there at the laboratory, sitting at his bench at the head of the room. "Good morning, Sannomiya-kun," Okada said, nodding briefly at the door before returning his attention to the clipboard in his hands.
"Good morning," Sannomiya responded as he took his seat at his desk. He tapped the monitor in front of him, the black screen automatically pulling up statistics and analytics from the previous day, adjustments to be made during the next upgrade. A realignment here, an extra injection there. The models were improving, but they were far from perfect.
Sannomiya frowned at the screen as he read the numbers over again. Like every morning, there was work to be done.
Fandom: Nino/Ohno/Jun, one-sided Nino/Okada, implied Okada/Sakamoto (Arashi, V6)
Rating: PG-13 for sexual references, brief gory imagery, dark themes
Genre: Sci-fi/Horror
Word Count: 4,867
Summary: Human cloning was still a sensitive subject. The leading research in the west was met both with enthusiasm and condemnation, talk of technology and curing diseases, of eugenics and playing god. But in Japan, where the declining population was a rising concern, they had no qualms about dismissing the Christian God who was so willing to let their numbers disintegrate. In Japan, their god was science.
Warnings: Mentions of character death, medical experimentation, and moral ambiguity. Kind of twisted!
Notes: Written for clipsie during ninoexchange 2013, originally posted here. This is a darker fic than I'm used to writing for this exchange (and in general), but it was a fun challenge. Lots of love to my beta, lysanderpuck.
Like every morning, he woke up five minutes before his alarm clock was set to go off. The digital numbers glowed a defiant red in the darkness, daring him to snooze. He scowled at the offending alarm clock, rubbing his hand across his face before slapping it against the alarm button. Like every morning, he briefly entertained the thought of setting his alarm five minutes earlier to ward off his irritation at losing five minutes of sleep, but like every morning, his irrational fear got the better of him. All it would mean was that he would wake up even earlier to beat the alarm.
His wakeup routine was unrushed. He rolled to the edge of his bed, making a spiteful grunt at the clock as he sat up. A slow yawn. He stared at the blank white wall in front of him. There's nothing here for you, so get to work, it seemed to say. "Work, work," he responded with a nod.
He didn't have to think about his wardrobe, because it was the same every day: whatever he wore to bed that night with his long lab coat on top. He ran his hand arbitrarily through his hair, pretending to look into a mirror on his wall that didn't exist. "Good enough," he said to no one as he turned to leave. His slippers were right outside his door, waiting like loyal dogs for their master's return. Hachiko One on his left, Hachiko Two on his right.
The sleeping quarters were only a hallway away from the main laboratory. It was a perk of the job, living in the same building. He never had to go outside and deal with strangers. He just had to wake up, go to work, take breaks as necessary, and live a gloriously uneventful life.
His boss was already there at the laboratory, sitting at his bench at the head of the room. "Good morning, Ninomiya-kun," Okada said, nodding briefly at the door before returning his attention to the clipboard in his hands.
"Good morning," Ninomiya responded as he took his seat at his desk. He tapped the monitor in front of him, the black screen automatically pulling up statistics and analytics from the previous day, adjustments to be made during the next upgrade. A realignment here, an extra injection there. The models were improving, but they were far from perfect.
Ninomiya frowned at the screen as he read the numbers over again. Like every morning, there was work to be done.
-
Human cloning was still a sensitive subject. The leading research in the west was met both with enthusiasm and condemnation, talk of technology and curing diseases, of eugenics and playing god. But in Japan, where the declining population was a rising concern, they had no qualms about dismissing the Christian God who was so willing to let their numbers disintegrate. In Japan, their god was science.
The government grant permitting advanced research on human cloning was kept secret for two reasons. The first and foremost was that they didn't want to invite competition. The stem cell researchers in the west thought they had a monopoly on genetics, that they were the pinnacle of innovation. The Japanese government was happy to let them stay ignorant.
The second reason, which for better or for worse was less of a concern for the government, was that they still needed test subjects. Few people were willing to give up their lives for the sake of the government, and the ones who were willing to die weren't the types of people they wanted. They needed smart, strong individuals who were capable of undergoing physical and psychological extraction. They needed bodies they could dispose of so that there wouldn't suddenly be two where there used to be just one.
It was Ninomiya's friend at the university who first introduced him to the job. Sakurai's father was a mid-level politician, and he'd heard that a young researcher was needed for a highly classified government project. Sakurai had mentioned it while they were taking a study break as something for Ninomiya to look into. Ninomiya's engineering textbook at the corner of the table had continued to lie open and inviting, as if to agree.
A government job wouldn't be a bad place to start. Mechanical engineering degree in tow, Ninomiya found himself standing in front of a grey two-story building amidst a row of abandoned warehouses. There were no markings on the walls, no windows, and no signs of life, just a deserted vending machine leaning just inside the alley with dust that looked older than the reigning emperor. It was clear that the only people who made it to that building knew what they were doing.
Ninomiya stepped toward the door, and before he could lift his hand to knock, it slid open with a tight release of air. The lobby inside was a sterile white in every direction, and an unmanned desk sat at the far end. Ninomiya tightened his grip on his suitcase handle, his hands suddenly clammy, and walked toward the desk, his footsteps clicking hollowly into the space around him. Perhaps someone would be out to greet him shortly. Or perhaps, as he realized once he saw the single sheet of paper, directions would already be waiting there for him.
The first person he saw once he arrived at the second-floor laboratory was a sturdy-looking man sitting at an unadorned desk. He seemed to be looking intently at the flat monitor in front of him, chin resting against his knuckles, thumb pulsing against his cheek like synapses.
Ninomiya cleared his throat. The other man turned his head suddenly.
"Hello," Ninomiya said. He took a deep breath. "My name is--"
"Ninomiya Kazunari," the other man said in a friendly tone. There was something strange about the way he said Ninomiya's name, his smile not quite matching the rest of his face. Then again, Ninomiya was far too nervous for his own good, eager to find something suspicious where none existed. Ninomiya nodded sharply as if to clear his own head, stepping forward and extending his free hand. The other man stood in turn. He wasn't as tall as Ninomiya expected.
"Nice to meet you, Doctor," Ninomiya said, bowing low.
The other man chuckled, taking Ninomiya's hand in both of his own. "Please don't call me that," he said. Ninomiya looked up to see a sheepish grin spreading across the other man's face. "You can just call me Okada."
His smile was much more charming the second time.
-
Like every day, Ohno and Matsumoto came to the laboratory around lunchtime. There were no specific hours set for work or meals, but Ninomiya was a creature of habit, always had been, and he'd made sure that Ohno and Matsumoto were the same. It was easier to be productive if he had a schedule to stick to, rules to follow, daily reports to make, and regular breaks in between. Ohno and Matsumoto were a welcome and, as Okada had reminded him many times, necessary respite from the endless task of crunching numbers.
"Kazu," Matsumoto said, strolling toward Ninomiya's desk and pressing a kiss to his temple in greeting. "How many times have I told you to stop slouching like that?" Matsumoto skated his hand across Ninomiya's back, pressing his fingertips between Ninomiya's shoulder blades to force him to sit up.
Ninomiya gritted his teeth. "I can't correct something like that as easily as you can."
"He doesn't have your discipline, MatsuJun," Ohno said with a chuckle, stepping quietly into place on Ninomiya's other side.
Matsumoto's daggered press turned into a slow shoulder rub. Ninomiya smiled and leaned into the touch. "You know it's not discipline that makes it easy for you."
Ohno chuckled again. "Well." Ninomiya felt another hand brush against his neck, travelling down his spine and back up, slow and teasing. "It's time to stretch either way. You've been working hard."
Ninomiya nodded, letting Ohno and Matsumoto pull him up and lead him out the door. Like every day, Ninomiya considered announcing his lunch break to the other two researchers in the laboratory, but like every day, Okada and Sakamoto seemed to be in a deep, private conversation that didn't need disturbing.
Matsumoto wrapped an arm around Ninomiya, his hand gripping Ninomiya's side tightly. When they reached Ninomiya's sleeping quarters and they stepped out of their slippers, Matsumoto dipped his head down, tugging at Ninomiya's earlobe with his teeth. Ohno pulled them forward into the room.
"You can pretend I'm Okada-kun if you want," Matsumoto said in a low voice, dragging his lips across NInomiya's jaw before stepping back and letting Ohno remove Ninomiya's lab coat.
Ninomiya felt the heat rush to his face and to his groin, breathless as Ohno skipped his shirt and went straight to slipping his pants down. He felt dazed as Matsumoto pulled his shirt up his torso and over his head, as long-fingered hands make their way back up his legs. There was barely enough blood left in his brain left for it, but he managed to make a mental note to ease up on the kinky teasing for their next upgrades.
-
Ohno and Matsumoto were exceptions to the rule. The government agency supporting their project had made strict rules against creating multiple clones of the same people, but like all good scientists, the men in Ninomiya's lab decided that they didn't have to follow all the rules.
Sakamoto had suggested it. It had been clear upon meeting the third member of their team that Okada was off-limits, and that Ninomiya would have to find his own way to unwind. Ninomiya had spent the first few months unwinding in his sleeping quarters by himself during his lunch break, accompanied only by his hand and his half-baked thoughts of what being with Okada would be like, how it would feel to be pressed against a body similar in stature but built so differently, capable of doing all the things Ninomiya wanted done to him and more. But it only left him exhausted and uneasy, unable to fully concentrate during his long afternoon shift.
Matsumoto had been a dutiful commander in the self-defense forces who had walked in on the wrong meeting. Ohno had been an undercover agent who had found too much information about his own government. Both were to swiftly and mysteriously disappear, just to appear again days later, returning to their posts as if nothing had happened.
Their DNA samples were kept with the DNA of the rest of their models, stored in a cooled chamber in the incubation room. Sakamoto had pulled them out and asked Ninomiya what he wanted their personalities to be like; as their resident geneticist, Sakamoto could make those changes happen.
The decision to go ahead with the duplicate clones had been surprisingly easy when Okada had expressed his approval, stepping in closer to Sakamoto's side than was absolutely necessary. It had been simple then to say yes to having his own companions, a second set of Ohno and Matsumoto who would stay in the building and help him mentally and physically exhaust himself enough for a real break from his thoughts. It was decided that they would also serve as test subjects for any new trials they wanted to run, but their main function was to support Ninomiya.
During work hours, Ohno and Matsumoto sat downstairs in the first-floor lobby, acting as security and communications whenever anyone new came to their building. The personality traits from their previous professions hadn't needed much tweaking. It was just the times between, when they would fetch Ninomiya for breaks, pamper him with soft touches (harder when he wanted them), that Ninomiya was particular about.
Ninomiya had considered for a short moment asking Sakamoto to give them Okada's personality, but he decided against it almost immediately. It wasn't something Sakamoto would be happy to hear, and it certainly wasn't fair to Ohno and Matsumoto, who had been good men in their own right, and who would assuredly take care of him in their own way.
Besides, there was always the option of change with Ohno and Matsumoto. If they didn't suit his needs, Ninomiya could always make sure that they did.
-
Like every week for the past several weeks, Ninomiya's latest project was working to extend the life of synthetic tissue. There was no guarantee that the models they created would be able to last as long as humans naturally did. They were still in the preliminary phase of the project, and a few years' time wasn't enough to indicate whether their initial models would last the sixty or more years their human ages suggested. All of the subjects they'd had so far were healthy males in their 20s and 30s, and healthy males in their 20s and 30s tended to remain healthy for some time. They wouldn't be able to measure their actual success in tissue synthesis until a 50-year-old model came in looking like he was 50 years old and not a 200-year-old prune.
Okada leaned in as Ninomiya explained his theory on how to better lock enzymes into the organ membranes. Their current process had enzymes injected during a single step while the membranes were attaching within the body, but if they allowed the enzymes to be sealed in over time as the membranes themselves were developing, it might more accurately replicate the human development process.
Okada hummed and nodded. Ninomiya was keenly aware of the hand Okada had placed on the back of his chair, barely brushing against Ninomiya's lab coat. He could feel Okada's breath, slow and even, warm against Ninomiya's head as Okada leaned in even further to look over Ninomiya's calculations.
"Sakamoto-kun," Okada called triumphantly, breaking Ninomiya out of his reverie. Ninomiya let out a small sigh. "Come look at Ninomiya-kun's new idea for synthesis."
"What's this now?" Sakamoto said with a grin, tapping his screen closed and walking over to Ninomiya's desk. "Are you trying to take my job?" His voice had a joking tone to it, but Ninomiya couldn't help but hear something serious and penetrating underneath.
"Never," Ninomiya said in response, aiming for teasing but landing on terrified. "Just an idea we should try in the future."
Footsteps sounded in the hallway, half steady, half stilted. Ninomiya turned his head, snaking between Sakamoto's and Okada's torsos for a clearer view.
"Doctors," came a wheezing voice, helpless. Ohno and Matsumoto appeared in the doorway, supporting between them a slim figure whose face looked sallow and empty compared to the life it had before. "I'm weak," he said. "My supervisor told... told me to come here. Said you could help."
Okada stepped forward, indicating a chair next to the door. "We can't promise anything, but we'll do our best." Ninomiya knew that was a lie. They'd made him before; they could make him again.
Ohno and Matsumoto helped the figure to the chair, and Sakamoto leaned down and whispered, "Looks like we get to try your new theory sooner than we thought."
-
Aiba had been their first successful clone, a lithe body with sinewy muscles, a smile so wide it leapt off his face onto everyone else's. In his past life, he had been a low-level researcher developing weapons for the government, a man dedicated less to the government and more to science itself. It had been his strongest ally as well as his fatal foe.
His DNA had been harvested from the severed arm found three meters from the blast. It had been delivered to the laboratory with simple instructions: Do it. The technology they had developed at the time was rudimentary at best, but under pressure from the body funding their research, they had no choice but to try.
It took six weeks of trial and error -- much, much error -- and another four weeks of incubation before the model was successfully completed. Ninomiya, Okada, and Sakamoto were slumped together in their seats at the incubation room work table when Ninomiya felt a gentle hand on his shoulder, nudging him back to alertness. Ninomiya looked up to see Ohno smiling at him. Wordlessly, Ohno woke the other two.
Ninomiya turned his head forward and saw what they'd been wanting for months: a man in an incubation tube with his eyes open. Ninomiya could see that he was squinting from what must have been too much light, even as dark as they kept the incubation room.
"Hello, Aiba-kun," Ninomiya breathed, wonder filling his voice as he stood. They'd done it. "Welcome back to life."
They spent the next several days running a battery of physical exams on the new model with the equipment they kept in an unoccupied sleeping room. During that time, they found that Aiba was ready to participate in whatever tests they had for him, and even more ready to accidentally break or misuse expensive equipment that didn't belong to him.
"I'll work on a more precise formula for personality input," Okada said wryly, bending down to pick up a now-warped breathing apparatus.
They fit him in some of the spare clothes they kept at the laboratory, and Sakamoto injected the final memory adjustment. Okada and Sakamoto would deliver him to his new home in conjunction with a report to be made to the government agency overseeing their research, and by the time Aiba woke up the next morning, he would have forgotten all about his days at the laboratory.
The rationale for keeping clones' identities secret even from themselves made a good deal of sense, both from a security standpoint and from a psychological standpoint, but Ninomiya still felt some sadness knowing that their first successful project would never know they even existed.
The stronger feeling, though, the one threatening to make him lose control of his body altogether, was the pride he felt in his work. They'd done something. They'd done something big. They could change the world with this.
-
Like every time a failed model came back to them, Aiba's old body had to be burned. Ninomiya enlisted the help of Ohno and Matsumoto to bring the body to the basement of the building. A large stone oven lay dormant in the corner of an ashen room, its mouth open, hungry for bodies. The disposal process was surprisingly primitive for such an advanced research facility, but sometimes the simplest solutions worked best.
Ninomiya stood between Ohno and Matsumoto as they watched the body disappear into flame. Light flickered across their faces. Ninomiya felt uncomfortably warm, still unused to being in a space that wasn't carefully regulated and insulated like the rest of the building.
"So that's what happens to me after every upgrade," Ohno said solemnly.
"You know it is," Ninomiya said, huffing out a laugh. "You help bring your own body down here every time."
The cloning process had accelerated significantly since Aiba's first incarnation. His DNA had already been used, and the proper calibration for the instruments they used was preprogrammed into the computer system. All it took was implantation onto a premade human body and an overnight stay to allow physical finalization to occur. Okada would make final adjustments to the personality and other traits, and Sakamoto would inject the last memory tweak before the model was released to go on with his daily life in the morning.
Ohno and Matsumoto followed the same procedure, except that they didn't need the memory tweaks when they simply existed for Ninomiya. Always the exceptions, they would observe every time as their DNA was manipulated and their upgrades were brought to life. They would sit in the incubation room, fascinated to find their own faces emerge over the course of a night like expertly sculpted clay, waiting and watching up until the point when Ninomiya felt the usual pang of guilt come over him. They already knew that they were being replaced by better versions of themselves; did they really need to watch it happen? When Ninomiya couldn't take it anymore, he would walk up to each of them, kissing them slowly before giving them a shot to the thigh with the poison that would leave them dead in five minutes. It was almost as much for them as it was for himself.
"Take care of me tonight," Ninomiya said to his companions as they made their way back up to the laboratory. "I don't want to be alone."
-
Their roles had been defined on the first day, just minutes after Ninomiya had fallen in love at first sight with his boss.
Okada, as the head of the laboratory, was in charge of preparing and overseeing the overall process. Sakamoto, a tall man with an overwhelming presence, was their geneticist, and he would make chemical injections and tweaks to DNA input as necessary. Ninomiya, fresh out of college and fresher out of his mind for accepting the position, would run numbers and perfect the process from a technical standpoint. They were a small team, but as far as the government was concerned, the smaller the team, the easier it was for them to be hidden.
"Though hopefully we won't have to hide for long," Okada said, quiet determination flaring in his eyes. "We need to start with the usual regenerative medicine, but once we find some material to work with, we could really revolutionize humanity."
Okada called Ninomiya's name, and Ninomiya blinked, flustered. It would take some getting used to. "What do you want to do with this technology?"
Ninomiya let out a slow breath, folding his arms loosely across his stomach. He didn't want to sound too idealistic, but he had a lot of ideas. "We could do everything with it," he began slowly. "We could cure diseases. We could regrow limbs." He shrugged, an attempt at nonchalance to balance out the feelings swelling in his chest. "We could rebuild families. We could create new ones."
Okada smiled and nodded. "We could." Ninomiya glanced up at Sakamoto, whose face remained neutral. Ninomiya pressed his arms closer into his body, straightening his posture.
"Come on," Okada said, cutting into Ninomiya's nerves. "We'll show you around the building."
Down the hall were the sleeping quarters -- just three rooms occupied at the moment, but maybe there would be more in the future -- and the kitchen and bathroom at the end.
"You're in this room right here," Okada explained, opening the door to an empty room. "You have a bed in there for now, and the clothes you had sent to the main office will arrive later this afternoon, but we can get whatever you want. Just let me know what you need to be comfortable."
Ninomiya nodded, and they walked back toward the laboratory.
"Sakamoto-kun, explain our research thus far? You're better at it than I am."
Sakamoto's face crinkled into a judgmental frown. "How are you going to get better at presenting information if you don't practice?" Okada laughed, and Sakamoto smirked affectionately. Ninomiya clearly had some catching up to do.
"Right now I'm working on memory modification," Sakamoto said, standing tall as if he were presenting at a conference and not to a colleague as they walked down the hall. "I'm hoping to find a way to accurately transfer personality and memory through DNA. Of course, there will be moments when we need to refine a clone's memory, too, especially if we let them see what they aren't supposed to see, so we'll need to find a way to approach that level of precision." Sakamoto turned to Ninomiya with a sharp, meaningful look. "I'm counting on your expertise to make that happen."
Ninomiya wouldn't call himself an expert, but he would do a lot to make sure he was on Sakamoto's good side. "Understood," he responded seriously.
They reached a door at the end of the hall. "Here we are," Okada said, working a key into the lock. "There's nothing in here yet since we still have to build the equipment, but this" -- Okada opened the door -- "is the incubation room."
It was a barren room with a dull marble floor and cold, empty walls, but Ninomiya could already see his dreams filling in every crevice.
-
Like every month, Okada and Sakamoto left for an evening to present a progress report to their government sponsors. Ninomiya decided to spend the time alone prepping the incubation room for new models. Typically when Okada and Sakamoto returned late at night after a report, they would need to start working on improving their technology. That was always what the government asked for: faster, better, even more advanced. Any day now, they would be ready to tell the world what they'd been working on all this time. Year after year, it was any day now. In the meantime, though, there were improvements to be made.
Typically Okada prepped the incubation room. He insisted that they stuck to their separate roles; their responsibilities were split evenly that way. Ninomiya did so much of the mechanical theorizing, and he didn't need to worry himself over the dirty work. Okada was happy to make it happen.
But Ninomiya liked assisting where he could, even though he knew that the part of him saying so was the pitiful man hopelessly in love with his boss, still, eight years after they first met.
And really, he didn't dislike the work, or at least the theory behind it. Someday, they'd be able to reveal what they'd been up to. Someday, they'd change the world.
Ninomiya opened the DNA chamber to find the right samples to work with. He had mentioned before Okada and Sakamoto had left that he was hoping to make some adjustments to Ohno's and Matsumoto's personalities. When they pressed for clarification, Ninomiya just shook his head. Sakamoto had given him a knowing look before turning to leave, and Ninomiya hoped to never have to live through the moment again.
The samples were organized onto shelves in chronological order, with the oldest on top -- Aiba -- and the newest at the bottom -- a slightly younger man by the name of Tegoshi who had been in the wrong place at the wrong time, but was now in a completely different place being a decent government watchdog. Ninomiya worked his way up through the names, remembering their stories: Murakami, Nagase, Maruyama...
Ninomiya stopped at a name he didn't recognize, near the top, right below Ohno and Matsumoto. "Ichinomiya". He shuddered involuntarily at the sound of it and at all of the thoughts running through his head. As he reached up to pull the shelf out, there was a loud knock on the door.
"Nino," Ohno called, opening the door. Ninomiya stood abruptly, slamming the chamber closed. He turned to look at Ohno. "Nino, what are you doing? We've been waiting for you."
"Ah, yeah," Ninomiya said with a frenzied nod, barely hearing his own words over the blood pumping through his veins. "Just... just give me a second." Ninomiya forced a smile.
Ohno frowned. "Are you okay?"
He wasn't. "I think I have a lot of questions."
Ohno let out a derisive laugh. "I can't help you with that." He held out a hand. "Come on, spend one last night with us before we get upgraded. You know how MatsuJun gets when he starts thinking too hard about not being good enough."
Ninomiya stood for a moment and considered Ohno's face, the concerned eyes of a clone created to support him. He sighed, nodding more slowly and taking Ohno's hand. "It's not like that."
Ohno didn't respond, simply leading them back to Ninomiya's sleeping quarters. He was right, of course. Ninomiya could use a nice night and a good rest before he asked his questions. There was nothing he could do then but enjoy the company of his friends.
Ohno opened the door, and Matsumoto was waiting on Ninomiya's bed for him. Matsumoto looked up and smiled, relieved.
Ninomiya didn't remember the rest of the night; he fell asleep astonishingly quickly.
-
Like every morning, he woke up five minutes before his alarm clock was set to go off. He rolled to the edge of his bed, making a spiteful grunt at the clock as he sat up. A slow yawn. He stared at the blank white wall in front of him. There's nothing here for you, so get to work, it seemed to say. "Work, work," he responded with a nod.
His boss was already there at the laboratory, sitting at his bench at the head of the room. "Good morning, Sannomiya-kun," Okada said, nodding briefly at the door before returning his attention to the clipboard in his hands.
"Good morning," Sannomiya responded as he took his seat at his desk. He tapped the monitor in front of him, the black screen automatically pulling up statistics and analytics from the previous day, adjustments to be made during the next upgrade. A realignment here, an extra injection there. The models were improving, but they were far from perfect.
Sannomiya frowned at the screen as he read the numbers over again. Like every morning, there was work to be done.