"You walk into your office one day to find your doppelgänger sitting at your desk, answering emails."
Morgan was running late. Again! This was the third time this week. How did this keep happening!? She thought as she pushed through the crowd to get off the train.
As she darted between people running up the stairs at Oxford Street Tube Station, she reached into her bag and pulled out her compact hairbrush. Morgan started to slow down and walked briskly as she reached her office building. Opening her compact hair brush to try and gain some control over her frizzy hair, she pulled her pass out of her pocket and went through the gates. Once at the lift, she checked her hair in her compact mirror and sighed. She could not sort out her hair before reaching her desk.
Once the doors to the lift opened, she went on in and leaned her head against the wall. Why is this week of all weeks late for work? Generally, at worst, she would walk in just a couple minutes past or right on queue but never a full half an hour. She knew what the issue was. For some reason, she was struggling to sleep, waking up in the middle of the night in hot sweats and panting. But why? Sleep was never a problem, but for whatever reason, was she having a bad dream? She couldn't remember what it was about if she was. There were so many questions going on in her head, but before she could think about it anymore, the doors to the lift opened on her floor.
Morgan walked out of the lift quickly with her head down. She couldn't get caught with being late again. She had already been yelled at by the manager in front of everyone yesterday. And if that wasn't humiliating enough, it was also in front of all the key people she had to impress this week if she wanted that promotion.
Morgan turned the corner and was about to take Ned down to hide between the cubicles when she suddenly stopped. Someone was already sitting at her desk. And it wasn't just anyone; someone who looked exactly like her.
"How did she get my password to my computer?" Morgan thought, followed by, "Of all the questions to ask, that's the first one you think of? Typical". Out of Morgan's eye, she saw something move and quickly ran around the corner to hide. Peering slowly back at her desk, she saw Carol approaching her. Oh my god, she thought. Carol is so going to know it's not me. I'm so screwed.
There, clear as day, was someone sitting at her desk. And it wasn't just anyone—it was someone who looked exactly like her! There she was, quietly typing away on her computer. "How on earth did she know my password?" Gill thought to herself. Suddenly, Carol, a fellow co-worker, approached my desk and placed a folder on top of my inbox pile.
"It's Good to see that you are actually in on time and working for once, Gill"," Carol said in a snobby tone.
"Thank you, Carol. I changed my nighttime routine, and it seems to have worked. I won't be late to the office again, " my imposter responded.
Carol was shocked by this response. It's not that I haven't wanted to tell Carol where to go. There are many things I have said to her in my head, but I never had the courage to do so. But clearly, this imposter was the braver version of me. Carol had kept hovering around my desk, clearly wanting to say something else. But my imposter had already turned back to my computer and was back to working on whatever it thought was important.
I heard Carol make her usual 'humph' sound that she generally did to express her dislike for something or, in this case, someone, and walked off back to her desk on the other side of the office. Morgan stood there, shocked. How was that even possible? My brave imposter even sounded like me in voice, tone and even the words they chose. You wouldn't even know it wasn't me unless I went and stood beside them, and even then, you would question who the real me was.
Suddenly, I heard the elevator ding and the doors opening. I realised I had to make a decision. If I was seen here, people would quickly notice that someone else was at my desk. This then would have led to people realising that I was late, and I would have been accused of setting up someone to fill in for me while I was away. Or they would think I have been using my evil twin sister to fill in for me when I haven't wanted to show up. Morgan had so many scenarios running through her head, and while she didn't know which one would play out, she knew that none of them would work in her favour. So she quickly found the closest desk, which was empty and hid underneath the table.
Morgan held her breath as the group of people passed. She heard one person say, "Did you see what time Morgan was in the office this morning?"
"Yeah, it was before even Carol got in, which is saying something because Carol is always in at 7 am at the earliest."
"being dressed down by the boss in front of everyone really must have gotten to her."
'Or give her the kick she needed. We all know she is way better at her job than Carol is; she just doesn't stand up to her."
"Exactly. We will see if this is a one-off or will stick."
Morgan tried to hear more, but whoever was talking had walked away, and everyone else from the lift was drowning out that conversation. While there was a lot to unpack from what she had just overheard, she had no time to process it as there was still the bigger problem of someone else impersonating her at her desk, and she had no idea who, how or why they were there. She knew that she had to get out of there and regroup. She checked to see if the coast was clear and quickly ran towards the stairs. Morgan knew that if she took the lift, there was a risk of people seeing her waiting, getting in, or getting out at the bottom. She took the stairs two at a time, wanting to leave any chance of being caught, and once at the bottom, she slowly peered through the crack of the door before briskly walking back through the gate and straight across the road to the café.
After ordering a coffee and sitting down, she took a deep breath. What was she going to do? There were so many questions, none of which would give her the answer to explain clearly to her bosses why it was her, but she wasn't at her desk this morning. There were only two options. Either go back to the office and approach her imposter in front of everyone and get them kicked out. But that could lead to her being reprimanded or, worse, fired for letting a civilian into the office and giving them access to classified information. The other was to just accept today was a complete write-off, and, when work was finished for the day, approach the imposter when they were leaving the office. It might mean she had to wait until that happened, but at least then, she could get to the bottom of what happened without anyone else knowing.
Morgan decided on the latter, which would turn out to be the biggest mistake of her life. One year later, she is still where she is today. Sitting at the coffee shop. Unable to stop this infant loop that the world was in. Yet no one bar her knew what was happening. If only she had approached her imposter when she had the chance and accepted the consequences, if she had remembered her dreams in the lead-up and understood why she woke up in a sweat, panting each night. That her doppelgänger was the virus that had spread itself, sucking on the energy of those people to build its army and to take over the world and probably even the universe, the only thing Morgan knew was that she was the only one who knew what was going on, which meant she was the only one who had to be able to stop it.
