Contrary to popular belief, Philip's memory is not flawless.
There are a lot of things he doesn't remember. His previous face, for example. His previous bed - no, bunk. His mother.
She had a beautiful smile, he knows that. Dark hair, short like everyone's in the future. Big almond-shaped eyes. Simple. But when he tries to picture all that - he can't. He can't see beyond a blurry reflection of the tall woman she used to be.
That's the one thing he actually misses, more than anything. No memory of his actual face - he can deal with that. He'll be over it soon. But not his mom. Not her.
It actually makes sense he forgot her, with all the pain in it. She died when he was eight, and by then his memory was already being trained to turn into an endless pit behind his eyes. And in those years of training, during tasks and tests and so many facts to contain, he had to absorb so much information the old memories had to crowd together so the new ones will have their space. Something must have slipped on the way. His mother must have stayed behind when he came to this century, in the shelters, in the grey corridors, in the dark, cramped rooms.
Again. Things he's aware of, knows, but can't picture. Nothing comes out of the endless black hole in his head when he asks for the information, not even when he closes his eyes and concentrates.
"Concentrate, 3326! You can't make mistakes in your next exam, or you won't pass the filtering to the teams!"
Sadly, his father he remembers clearly.
A tall and wide black man with thick glasses and an unimpressed tilt to his mouth. Probably what Philip would have looked like if he wasn't in a different body now. If he wasn't careful enough to avoid that destiny. If he wasn't brain-gifted.
"When you grow up, you get out of here. Do you hear me? You have to pass these tests because you have to leave. You can't stay here."
"But dad -"
But dad was already gone again.
When Philip was little (he wasn't actually Philip when he was little, but anything is better than those numbers. See me now, dear old dad? Embracing my twenty-first persona? Right to the last details. (He wonders what his father would say about the drugs, but then he cuts these thoughts off.)) he thought he wasn't good enough. He thought for a the first few years of his life that he has to be better, because then maybe dad won't tell him to go all the time. Maybe dad will want him to stay.
It took some time to figure out that that will never happen, because even if dad would have specifically asked him to forget the twenty first century and stay, Philip would be the one to refuse. Because the past was going to be great. The past needed him for his brains, actually needed him. Because his father is an asshole he can't share the same century with.
Since he was old enough to see reason, he wanted to leave.
It took 24 hours into this century until he realized he was majorly unprepared. For all of it. Knowing what's going to happen helped, but not that much. Not nearly enough.
He wonders how the others managed. But then, the others didn't get stuck in drug-addicted bodies, so he doesn't wonder that much.
There are other things, things he remembers but only vaguely. His exams. Meeting his teammates, learning to work with them. Shelter 41.
More specifically, he remembers the morning that shelter was destroyed. That's the one memory in his head from the future that he has, clear as day, no holes left to cover. He wishes he would have forgotten it as well.
The others didn't see how important it was to him on the one time he spoke about it, he knows. Understandable, since they were all held captive and had to shut up and act normal until they found a way to get out of that underground hole. But it wasn't an accident, that of all things Philip could say, the memory drug made him talk about that shelter. It was his home, after all.
It was the worst day of his life. He was awoken thirty minutes before the morning bell rang, by someone summoned by his father (who was in a council's meeting as usual) and then ushered to a small craft that took him to the council's shelter. Shelter 41 collapsed before he even made it there, and he saw it from the craft, the explosions, the instant death of the twenty thousand people he grew up with, spent his whole life with. It was like on a cue. One moment the bell rang and Philip was rubbing his eyes and yawning, and the next - someone was leading him to his new bunk in a different dome, and he was left to wait for his father, hollow-eyed and in shock. He stayed like that until he fell asleep, exhausted and belatedly realising his father was taking his time.
When they finally met and talked - it was their last real conversation, if you can call it that. The first and last shouting match between them. The last time Philip actually told his father what he thinks. It didn't lead to anything, so he never did it again.
Again, details he knows but can't remember them actually happening. He thinks he accused his father of saving just his son, because he is a privileged prick from the council, while thousands of people who were lesser than him died. Philip realised a long time ago that there was no way to save all those people, but still. Still. His father, who didn't appear even a little bit shaken by the whole thing, never seemed less guilty in his eyes. Saving him was wrong when so many other people died. Why should he live when all the others didn't get the chance?
His father told him his mother would have wanted him to save their son if she was there. Philip told him that's a sour excuse and that he just killed hundreds of moms without blinking.
They didn't talk at all for another whole year after that.
When they finally did, it was the most stilted and uncomfortable conversation Philip has ever had in his life. So they didn't do it much more afterwards.
The thing is, now Philip knows that, in a strange way, he saved that shelter. His team somehow changed the twenty first century enough to change the future. That's the only reasonable explanation to what happened. And now… The Faction exists.
If someone was sent to the future with his team instead of him, and he was still there when the shelter was saved and started rebelling… Would he have joined the Faction?
It's a strange thought and he tries to ignore it. He also tries to ignore the urge in his guts to defy the Director, to just go outside and save everyone he can get to in time. He ignores how belonging to shelter 41 and the need to cause problems seem connected.
No, that last one he ignores because that is just disturbing. And it has to be wrong.
It can't be true.
Still, somehow, he's happy the shelter was saved. It brings his team nothing but trouble so he never says it out loud, but it's good to know some of his actions caused life instead of death. He caused too much death to not be grateful for at least that.
It's funny how death seems to follow him more than any of his teammates. Possibly because he's the historian, which is somehow a grimmer role than even the tactician, who's supposed to be responsible for most of the death a team might cause.
Philip witnessed more death than Carly did, he knows that. He knows when people are going to die, after all. He knows when he can't do a thing to save them.
But he doesn't think that's it. He's pretty sure it's somehow about him as a person, not just as a historian. Too many people died because of him, and saying otherwise - giving any excuse to that - will be doing exactly what he stopped looking in the eyes of his father for doing. So he doesn't let himself think otherwise.
Philip doesn't remember many, many things. One of them, for example, is the last time he had a peace of mind. The last time he had a full night of sleep, no dreams or missions. The last time his hands weren't shaking.
And no, it's not just because of the drugs.