He checked the calendar twice, hoping the date was wrong. The symptoms had started exactly a week ago. Subtle at first—fatigue, headaches, small lapses in memory. He had ignored them. Everyone had. The announcement had promised a cure. Fast, efficient, permanent. No side effects worth mentioning. The world had lined up for it. He had too. Now, staring at the date circled in red, he felt something colder than fear. Recognition. Seven days. That was what the trial report had said. Seven days until full integration. He stumbled to his desk, pulling out the printed materials he’d been given at the clinic. Most of it was marketing—bright promises, smiling faces. But there had been a manual. He remembered it now, barely. Dense. Technical. Easy to dismiss. He flipped through it, scanning faster as his vision blurred at the edges. The words seemed to shift, rearranging themselves as his mind struggled to keep up. Integration meant replacement. The illness wasn’t being cured. It was being overwritten. He looked at his hands. They didn’t feel entirely like his anymore. Memories flickered—some his, some not. The calendar wasn’t marking the end of his sickness. It was marking the end of him. The manual had been honest all along; they just hadn’t read the footnotes.