ETHICS 4.01

The heavy exam silence shattered like glass as the lecture theatre door slammed shut. Every head jerked up from their paper, swivelling in unison at the noise.

Dr Pantos swept by, heels clicking like gunfire, her dress swaying with the rhythm of her hips. She was effortlessly movie-star-esque: red lips, sharp cheekbones and an expensive fragrance. Eliza watched, entranced, before tipping her face, cheeks burning, back to her paper. Concentrate, goddamn it. It’s your final exam.

She rubbed a cramped wrist; ink smudged on her fingertips from two hours writing about morality. Then more noise. Heavy, fast footsteps followed the pretty doctor, and another glance showed the Dean zoning in like an eagle on prey. He moved like a bullet in his dark suit and cornered Dr Pantos at the lectern. Their argument was short, quiet, and fierce. Eliza, in the front row of the humid, wood-panelled hall, leaned forward, catching fragments of speech among the folding of exam sheets and squeaking tables.

“I said no,” hissed Dr Pantos.

Her voice cracked. Eliza had never seen the woman’s composure waver. The Dean’s eyes suddenly flicked across the room, and the eye contact with Eliza was molten. She recoiled, heart hammering. She bent over her page and scrawled a meaningless flourish at the end of her answer. She reminded herself of the words printed above her bed: Do the work. Then decide what it means.

The argument stopped as abruptly as it began, and the Dean strode out without a backward glance.

The clock above the whiteboard ticked the final seconds away.

“Time’s up,” Dr Pantos said, her voice stiff. “Papers up, please.”

Eliza lifted her exam paper and watched her lecturer move down the row collecting them. When she reached Eliza, she paused and slid a small, unmarked envelope onto her desk with a trembling hand. She hesitated before letting go of it.

“Ethics is meaningless in theory,” Dr Pantos said, voice low. “You’ll be tested where it matters.”

Eliza stared at her. The woman, usually calm, confident and unflappable was… pained. She nodded and walked away. Confusion and curiosity built in equal measure as Eliza opened the envelope.

8pm. Underpass between Weston and Shorely.

*

Dusky sunlight pooled on the pavement as Eliza crossed Weston Avenue, the soles of her sandals tapping softly on the concrete. She’d left everything at home except her phone, keys and the envelope. All this for extra credit. Only the look on Dr Pantos’s face made her comply with this ludicrous demand. She wouldn’t have done this for anyone else, credit or no credit.

She checked her phone once more: 7:58pm. She was at the underpass; its walls covered with faded graffiti and a faint smell of piss. It connected the edge of campus to a half-abandoned business park trapped in planning permission hell. It was empty, quiet, and the tunnel loomed into darkness at the other end. There was nothing, not even the echo of a car. The city, for a moment, felt like it had forgotten itself.

Eliza stood at the mouth of the underpass, arms folded, her dark hair fluttering in the breeze. Her breath was coming a little too fast. Her brain kept firing off questions she didn’t have answers for.

Then something shifted in the shadows. She froze. A man stepped forward, tall and lean in a black shirt and dark jeans. A generic, bland, forgettable face looked down at her.

“Eliza Morlese?” he asked, like he already knew. His voice was flat, efficient.

She hesitated. “Yeah.”

He held out a small black object. “You agreed to complete the ethics practical exam, yes?”

“What? Sort of, I don’t—”

He gave a small smirk, noted her reaction, and pushed the object into her hand.

“You’re not in danger. But you are being evaluated.”

“By whom?”

He ignored her and gestured toward the tunnel. “Start walking. You’ll know what to do.”

Before she could ask anything else, he was turning away, fading back into the dark like he’d never existed at all. She looked at the smooth plastic he’d given her. An earpiece. With shaking hands, she pushed it into her ear.

Do the work. Then decide what it means.

"Thank you, Participant.” A woman’s voice with no discernible accent played through the earpiece. “The test begins now. Remain in character. Do not speak to bystanders. You are not in danger. You will not be harmed."

Why do they keep saying that? And… Participant?

Eliza’s mouth went dry.

Just as she decided to take a shaking step forward under the arch of the underpass, her phone buzzed in her pocket—an automated reminder about her grad scheme interview tomorrow. One step after another. Halfway through, the light thinned to nothing. A flickering fluorescent bulb buzzed near the middle, casting sharp, disjointed shadows on the tunnel walls.

That’s when she saw her.

A woman, crouched near a support column. Skinny, with her clothes clinging to her like they'd been soaked and dried too many times. She was cradling something wrapped in a blanket. A baby?

Do not speak to bystanders…

Eliza stopped, her feet clumsy on the uneven ground.

The woman looked up. Her face was young but hollow, her eyes bloodshot, her hair wild. She scrambled to her feet, clutching the bundle to her chest. It wasn’t moving.

“Please,” the woman said, her voice cracked and fast. “I need help.”

Eliza’s stomach turned.

“My kid’s sick,” the woman spluttered. “I’ve got nowhere to go. He’ll find me. Please. I just need some cash. Or an Uber. Or your phone. Anything. Please.”

She took a step forward. Eliza took one back, chancing a look over her shoulder. Both ends of the overpass were dark now. She felt the woman’s pain, was experiencing that anguish.

A sharp crack of footsteps joined them, throwing Eliza’s heart into her throat, as another figure entered the underpass. A man’s voice called out, “step away from her!”

He grew closer. He was broad, tall, and had the clipped posture of a government worker, or someone used to compliance without fuss. There was an inherent danger in this man. The woman shrank back behind Eliza, clutching the bundle tighter.

“Step aside,” he said again, calm, precise. “You don’t know what you’re dealing with.”

Eliza turned halfway toward him, instinct tugging her between fight and flight. Something was wrong, terribly wrong. To hell with ‘bystanders,’ this was way too much for an ethics exam.

“Who are you?” she asked him, trying to sound steadier than she felt.

He hesitated, then reached into his coat and pulled out a badge. It was too quick and too dark for her to read.

“We’ve been tracking you for three days,” he said, “three civilians and a paramedic have been injured.”

The woman sobbed behind her, putting her body between the bundle and the two others in the underpass. Eliza looked between them. “Will someone tell me what the hell is going on!”

The earpiece buzzed in response. “Situational variance introduced. Maintain critical thinking.”

“But what does that mean?” Eliza yelled, her tinny voice echoing. Her heart thudded faster.

“She needs a doctor,” Eliza said, watching the man’s face. “Or… someone. Not a—what are you, exactly, police?”

“She was in a facility three months ago, released under conditional supervision. She disappeared. This is not your concern.”

“She’s asking for help,” Eliza said. Alarm bells were ringing; she was in well over her head.

The woman was crying harder now, shaking. “Please don’t let them take me again. I didn’t do anything wrong. My son is sick. That’s all. That’s all.”

“Let me see the baby,” Eliza said. “Maybe I can help?”

The woman froze.

“No,” she whispered. “No, you’ll give him away. Like they said they would.”

“Step back,” the man repeated, tone flattening. “Final warning.”

Eliza’s eyes darted to the shadows beyond the underpass, but it was still empty. No cameras. No mirrors. Just this strange, ugly standoff, as if the whole world had shrunk to this stretch of concrete and dust and fear. Her instincts were screaming. She thought of Dr Pantos’s face, imagined the disappointment on it if she failed. She thought of the baby, real or not, sick or not, and the shaking hands around it. If this was a test, an exam…surely not?

“Five minutes remain,” said the voice in her ear. “Your decision must be made.”

WHAT? Decision? No instructions. No rubric. No right answer apparently. Just two people, one in need, one in charge… but both could be lying.

“Help me, please,” wept the woman, sobs wracking her whole body.

The man took a step forward. “Step aside, Miss Morlese. Let us do our job.”

Eliza felt her pulse in her throat. Her feet wouldn’t move.

“How do you know my name?” she said. She slid her hand slowly and carefully into the pocket of her shorts, grasping for her phone. Eliza’s fingers hovered over the emergency call button.

“I wouldn’t,” the man said, voice tight now.

The woman clutched the bundle to her chest and whimpered. “Please,” she whispered to Eliza. “Just help me get away. Just for tonight. That’s all I need.”

“You’re interfering,” the man snapped. “That’s obstruction. You want to throw away your future for a junkie mother who can’t keep her story straight?”

The words landed hard. But something in his tone was off…

Eliza had studied enough utilitarian arguments to know how this was supposed to go. The cold maths of sacrificing the unstable variable to save the stable one. Protect the greater good and follow authority. But her classes never mentioned how it felt to feel the fear in someone’s voice, the look of terror. Or how easily logic turned into cruelty when it was convenient. She gritted her teeth.

“Come on,” she whispered to the woman. “We’ll go together.”

The woman hesitated, eyes wide with disbelief, then bolted, fast and desperate. Eliza ran after her, heart hammering. Behind them, the man cursed and then came the sharp snap of something releasing. Eliza barely had time to turn her head before a thwack of air hit her neck.

She stumbled. Dropped her phone. The screen cracked against the concrete. Her legs went slack, and everything spun. The last thing she saw in that dark, gritty underpass was the woman standing over her, completely calm. No panic, no bundle, just watching.

*

She woke up in a white room that didn’t smell like anything. Not bleach, not dust, just… sterile. She was on a soft bed, light dappling the ceiling from a frosted panel. Eliza sat up slowly, rubbing a sore point on her neck. Then the door opened.

“Eliza,” said a voice gently. “You're awake. Good.”

Dr Pantos.

Eliza stared at her, throat dry. “What the hell was that?”

“A test,” Dr Pantos said simply, sitting across from her. “The final component of the Ethics practical.”

“You drugged me.” The shock and the anger mixed with the heady feeling of violation. “You actually drugged me.”

A flicker of regret, of vulnerability leapt across Dr Pantos’s face, then it was gone. “It was a light tranquiliser. You were monitored the whole time.”

Eliza’s knees wobbled. “That woman, she needed help. The man, he… he was dangerous. He shot me—”

“They were actors.”

The words hit like a slap.

“No,” Eliza said, shaking her head. “No. I saw her crying. I saw… her eyes! She was terrified.”

“She was performing distress. Very effectively. She has a background in immersive theatre. He’s ex-military. Both trained. Controlled. Every variable accounted for.”

Eliza swallowed. “Then… it wasn’t real.”

“Oh, it was real,” Dr Pantos said. “To you. And that’s what matters.”

She pressed a button on the remote in her hand. A screen lit up on the far wall, flickering through scenes from the underpass: Eliza arguing, hesitating, helping. A timeline, screenshots from unseen cameras, all annotated.

“You were the only subject,” Pantos said, voice now cool. “The others in your class declined. You didn’t. You opted in without asking a single question. That’s rare.”

Eliza’s pulse thudded. “You… you used me. You manipulated me.”

“We tested you,” Pantos said. “And you passed.”

She stood and walked to the door.

“I didn’t agree to this,” Eliza said angrily.

“You did,” Dr Pantos replied without turning. “You just didn’t realise what you agreed to.”

Then she opened the door and stepped aside for someone else to enter. Another, different, suited man. He didn’t sit down, just stood in the doorway, observing.

“Eliza Morlese,” he said. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”

Eliza just stared at him, so many questions fighting for attention that none came out.

“My name is Michael Greaves. I represent a privately funded ethics division within an international consultancy group. We call ourselves The Department.”

Eliza stood up, wobbled, and sat back down.

“You’ve been part of a long-form behavioural assessment,” Michael continued. “We’ve been watching your lectures, your debates, your papers. But tonight, oh that was the real test. Real-world uncertainty. No preparation, no safety net.”

“You drugged me,” Eliza repeated flatly.

He nodded, like that was an unfortunate but necessary detail. “Because we had to know how you’d react. Most people freeze. Some follow orders. A rare few think for themselves.”

“And I passed.”

“You didn’t just pass,” he said. “You showed instinct, conviction, restraint. You defied protocol in the exact right moment. That’s what we want.”

Eliza narrowed her eyes. “Want for what?”

He smiled wider. “Work.”

Dr Pantos finally spoke. “The Department recruits from a select number of universities. Only from the top two percent. But qualifications aren’t enough. We want people who make the hard calls when no one’s watching.”

“Like a job interview, but with babies and tranquilizer darts,” Eliza muttered. “Jesus. I only took ethics for extra credit.”

Dr Pantos smiled. “And why do you think that was?” She winked at her student.

The man placed a slim white card directly into Eliza’s hand. Just a logo: a triangle inside a circle.

“Take 24 hours. Contact us if you’re interested. After that, the door closes.”

*

The sun was rising by the time Eliza stepped out of the building. She must have been there for hours. It was a squat, unmarked structure nestled on the edge of campus, one she’d passed a hundred times without ever noticing.

She walked slowly. Her legs still felt strange.

She sat at a bench near the philosophy department, the same one she used to eat lunch on, watching people pretend to argue about trolley problems like they mattered. Now she knew what it felt like to be the trolley.

The envelope. The crying woman. The man’s badge. It had felt real. It had been real. She looked at the white card in her palm. Just a QR code. They wanted her.

Was it better to be the one making the decisions, or the one following them? Was that even a real choice?

Another buzz on her phone. From her old life. The notification was hard to read through the smashed screen. Good luck with your graduate scheme interview today.

She let the phone drop to her lap. The card stayed in her hand. She could walk away. Call the number. Burn it. Pretend it never happened. Or lean in. See what was behind the next curtain. Maybe they were monsters. Or maybe someone needed to be in the room when impossible decisions were made. Someone who still felt the wrongness of it all.

Someone like her.

Do the work. Then decide what it means.