Mr Morton-Hoffman - the first hostage to give evidence at the inquest into the December 2014 siege by Man Haron Monis - was not supposed to be at work that day, but had covered a shift for a colleague.
The then-19-year-old would come to play an instrumental part in Monis' plot, making calls to media and police to pass on the gunman's demands.
During one call, played at the inquest on Tuesday, Mr Morton-Hoffman pleads with police to move away from the building.
He was worried someone would die if he "screwed up".
"He's talking to me right now, saying can police go away right now or I'm going to shoot the lady in front of me," he says in the call to police.
He said Monis had "freaked out" after noticing a police officer behind a ballistic shield and pointed his shotgun at hostage Louisa Hope.
Still, even as Monis stood over him during the calls, Morton-Hoffman was trying to pass on coded messages to police.
"He would tell me what to say, but at the same time I was trying to answer questions without him knowing," he said.
"The words themselves were along the lines of what he wanted to say but the emphasis on which word was my way of trying to answer her question."
It was also revealed that in a call to police, at 12.56pm, Mr Morton-Hoffman passed on a demand from Monis for a number of bombs to be removed from the cafe.
"He needs it done fast because he has two bombs and he wants them out of the building," he is heard saying.
Asked by counsel assisting the coroner, Jeremy Gormly SC, what he believed Monis was referring to, Morton-Hoffman said: "I believe Monis might have said to me that he wants, he has these two bombs on him but he doesn't want to blow them up and he needs the police to disarm them ... take them out of the building so that we don't die."
It was confirmed after the siege ended there were no bombs.
Mr Morton-Hoffman was eventually stopped from making calls because Monis decided he was too calm.
"He said the media would respond better to someone who was crying and I guess had the relevant pathos that I didn't exhibit."
Earlier, Mr Morton-Hoffman recalled noticing Monis sitting alone in the cafe on the morning of the siege, and shortly afterwards talking with manager Tori Johnson.
He initially believed the Reserve Bank in Martin Place was being robbed, and shortly afterwards was ordered by Monis to lock the doors to the cafe.
A short time later, Monis pulled out a shotgun and put on a bandanna with Islamic writing on it.
"The danger was inside the cafe, not outside," Mr Morton-Hoffman said.
The inquest continues.
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