#think i got too nervous about the whole ai scrapping

[elegyofthemoon]

Unforeseen

finally works on a prompt

this kinda turned more into a bit of a ventfic...ish?

but warning for child death mention

one word prompt

35. Unforeseen

He saw his death coming. Perhaps this was what made him lucky on his last few days of living: to allow himself the preparation for the death to come…or maybe there was more to it than that.

Ion was a kind kid. And a self-aware one. He knew of the people’s views on the Sunchildren — knew that they would not take kindly to him. He knew of the Jibashiri’s reluctance towards him after facing the failures of Risutaiosu and then Surepio after, and it all weighed upon him. 

He must have wondered: what could I do better for my people? What could I do that the other Sunchildren failed to do? It was a feat too much for a child like him, but he took it all the same in a way that a child would. 

Ion was a skilled fortuneteller, or he claimed to be before his people, and people had their doubts at first — the same way they had doubted Surepio’s capabilities of tending to their wounds. 

But Ion insisted, and he’d tell their fortunes, staring into the scry glass he had, waiting and waiting until it felt like time had frozen over him — that was when you knew that their fate had been revealed to him. And he’d take a few seconds more before a smile pushed its way across his face, and he’d gaze at the person and tell them, “There is good fortune ahead of you.” 

Ion would say more than just that: he’d sprinkle in how it’d come to them, what to do to curry the fortune all the more, and what to avoid, and at the end of it, he would give the person a handcrafted sigil, made the night prior in his quarters. 

People did like good fortunes. People enjoyed hearing good things for themselves, and therefore, they would become piqued by his fortunes. More and more people would come, and more and more fortunes would be told, and Ion would not reject any one person from a good fortune. 

Perhaps we should have suspected it sooner, but we had never seen the people so happy when they interacted with the Sunchild. And so the fortunes stayed, and the sigils with them. 

But soon enough, fate would bring these fortunes to light — the false fortunes to light, and in the face of these misfortunes, he would become a victim of his own making. 

Ion was — that was how he could predict his own death. Whatever he had truly seen in the scry glass, it must not have been good for anyone if he had chosen to lie for their sake — not wanting to tell of their doom or the tragedy that would play out. 

Our leader was a liar, but Ion was a kind kid. 

The Solar Rite came, and his people couldn’t wait for the start of a new reign.  The son returned to his father, and his people built a grave to honor Ion no Mikoto's name. 

I wonder: Was he loved in the end? 

He couldn’t be worse than those children of the past, gifting things instead of destroying them, giving hope instead of crushing it. 

The rejections of these sigils he gifted say otherwise. The anger these adults would unleash against their leader — a child, no less — would say otherwise. They build this shrine to Ion no Mikoto, at the edge of Byakuyakoku, and lay the remnant of their former leader with it like they wash their hands of any relation to him. 

But when he offered them these sigils and dreams of a bright future, there was love in the eyes of people — something that no other Sunchild would ever face. When people came to visit, seeking out more fortunetelling and he gave them happier things to hope for, there was love there. Despite the results of his short-acting kindness — despite the cruelty of his final days — wouldn’t these joyful moments be considered love? 

Was he loved in the end? No, but I like to think he was, even for a brief moment. And maybe in future generations to come, the brevity of this love will echo in time, and they will see these rejections as gifts to a leader they had once adored. 

That is all I could hope for for Ion. 

I place my own sigil beside his grave. 

[fatherbearfreddy]

Hey ralphie. How exactly does the AIs work?

Aren't they adaptive? But then why do management expect them to stay the same?

Could you clear anything regarding that up?

So, I'm gonna be honest I don't quite get it either but yes. They're AI is adaptive and constantly making micro improvements. It's like a rudimentary mind of a child, but there's so many little tricks going that I'm not really sure how to explain.

Management, excuse my language, doesn't know a rats ass about their robots. We have levels of staff, usually dictated with the security clearance passes. Those are less for the security staff and more for a basic identification of who to go to about certain problems. Management is clueless about how their own programs work. That's our and the programmers, and the mechanics jobs.

Basically they have thresholds enforced that they aren't allowed to cross anymore.

Don't tell them but our current band is the second generation, the old set had the same systems in place and we had a really unfortunate series of accidents. I was one of the old programmers at the time and... well they were sad. Really sad, and since they didn't have anyone to talk to about it except each other it turned into a looping cycle of increased misery. They couldn't perform onstage anymore because they were too upset. I advocated with a few others to get therapists in for them but I guess it was cheaper to scrap the whole group.

We had to wipe them back to the base of their learning model and put new shells on them. Eclipse, or he was back then, got split into our Sun and Moon drops because we couldn't actually risk resetting him. Too many special things like ban lists and face identification for children protections. So we knocked out a bunch of memory data and redesigned his body into our solar duo.

Now Fazbear decided instead of having therapists like human staff, they have boundaries of awareness they aren't allowed to cross. Especially death or major injuries.

After Sundrop had his nervous meltdown they finally listened to us and I got promoted to Chica's technician. They found the rest of us who weren't already technicians soon after. Things were going really well and we've been good at steering them to grow without tripping the lines.

And then Bonnie went missing. Freddy started wandering the place aimlessly and stopped talking to customers. He wasn't depressed, at least no where near what his 1.0 reached, but management got worried. So they put Shine on duty for him and started watching him closely. They don't know about this blog. We've never had a band member go missing and all of the animatronics are handling it differently. They're almost like children in big metal bodies, and we have to help them stay safe.

(Don't tell Claire but I think her mother daughter relationship with Roxy is really sweet, Roxy needed something like that.)

So until Shine is back and can remove some of this from him, he might be put in standby until her return if he acts too strangely.

I'm planning on encouraging him to interact with guests.

Freddy doesn't know how to lie, but we may need to teach him if we want him to be up and about.

[deepseamuse]

I give you 1, 2, and 7 for the ask game.

it’s a lot of text so ill put it under a cut

1: What memory would your OC rather just forget?

Hana has a lot of things that she’d like to forget, but it’s never anything serious. Probably that time she died for a stupid dare. She watched the video of her jumping afterwards, it wasn’t even that funny, what’s the point.

Mathilda wants to forget the death of the girlfriend she’d once had, a long time ago.

Takeo doesn’t have a memory he wants to forget per say, but rather the fact that he’d genuinely cared about Mathilda and Hana and still harbors a bit of affection.

Alexander wants to forget his life before he became his parents’ puppet. He was so… imperfect back them. Why had he ever wanted anything except mindless compliance?

Matthias wants to forget the procedures the King and Queen had done on him in their attempt to make him a puppet like Alexander.

Pixy doesn’t have anything he wants to forget. He did, but then he forgot them, so everything’s fine! :)

2: What's something about your OC that people wouldn't expect just from looking at them?

Hana is a brilliant poet, and many people actually know her for her published work rather than… you know, actually knowing her. To many of her fans, it’s actually a surprise when they see what she’s like irl!

Mathilda does not take care of herself very well. Sure, when she gets time to relax she makes sure to eat proper meals, clean herself properly, get a good amount of sleep… but most of the time she’s either traveling or involved in some kind of conflict! Please take a break honey- (also lesbian. you’d think she’d be straight but nah)

Takeo has a lot that fits into this. I mean deceiving and manipulating people is something he does constantly, of course he does. But anyways, aside from what he’d picked up from Mathilda, he doesn’t actually understand humans that much. As much as he seems to know what’s going on in his victims heads and how to make them do whatever he wants, he’s kind of lost when it comes to the reasons people behave the way they do. Like, he’ll understand that a person is greedy and selfish, but he won’t ever consider why they’re that way.

Alexander, again, kind of has this as his whole thing. Aside from his parents’ orders, he’s barely got anything going on in his head. Zero brain cells because he’s not allowed to think.

Matthias is actually a nervous wreck who has to calm himself down before and after an argument with Alexander or the King and Queen, even if he seems very confident at the time.

Pixy can be terrifying when he’s upset. Best case scenario, he just starts crying, but anything besides that? He’s either eating whoever upset him or turning them into a doll that’s forced to play with him forever. It is somewhat expected considering he’s a god of madness though, he’s just cute enough that you wouldn’t think it at first.

7. What's one way your OC has changed since you first came up with them?

I’d mentioned before that Mathilda and Hana used to be gods about as powerful as Takeo, but I feel like writing some new ones.

Hana used to be able to remember the events throughout time loops. This was relevant at the time, but after that whole plot point was scrapped this went with it.

Mathilda was originally able to cast magic through song. I mean, I might still keep this, but it’s definitely not something she’d be able to do right away.

Takeo had a much different backstory, initially. He’d basically been created as the god of death, and the brother of Hana and Mathilda, but the god of creation actually ran out of the celestial material they used to make gods. So in a rush they grabbed some of the void, since it wasn’t too far off from the incomplete Takeo’s essence anyways. The end result did work as intended, except it had the lovely little side effect of leaving him basically soulless!

Alexander initially just received orders directly from the King and Queen through a magical necklace, but I changed it to basically be an AI based on them, since that way they’d have control even after their deaths.

Matthias originally hadn’t gone through the same procedures as Alexander, but the King and Queen wanted him to. I thought it made more sense for them to have attempted to make him a puppet but failed.

Pixy is a bit too new for this. However, he is basically an offshoot of the original idea for Takeo, who was much more unstable and actively malicious at the time. (I.E. trapping a bunch of people in a time loop and making them repeatedly die horrible deaths, claiming it was because of the horrible things they’d done in the past, but actually because he just liked making people suffer.)

[bondibee]

whoa remember when I made Content

Here’s a technically nsfw LaaC thing! Yeehaw  In which GLaDOS just wants to do a perfectly innocent test and Chell is a little shit

Chell had been back in Aperture for a little over a week already, but it didn't feel like it had been that long. Settling into life back underground was proving a little harder than she had anticipated, even though it was remarkably comfortable compared to the way she'd been living on the surface. There was nothing GLaDOS could say to get her out of that big soft bed before noon, or stay in the shower for less than thirty minutes. It was odd in a way, to think of Aperture as comfortable considering her history with the place, and those less than pleasant memories still held a prominent spot in Chell's mind. For as nice as her new little apartment was, finding a rhythm with GLaDOS, her only companion down here, and presumably the person she'd be spending the rest of her life with at this point, was… tough. They'd learned a bit about each other during their long climb back up from the depths of the facility together, enough for Chell to realize she might've been unexpectedly fond of the AI, but it wasn't as if they'd grown up together. GLaDOS seemed a little unsure of the situation herself, and for the most part acted as if Chell wasn't there unless she wanted attention, of one form or another. She was obviously out of her element, but then, so was Chell. She didn't exactly have a slew of successful romances to look back on for reference, not counting a messy slew of one night stands and drunken club encounters. So the cycle of their days together was still rocky, with neither party entirely sure how to interact with the other now that the initial joy of their reunion had worn off.

For Chell, figuring out just what exactly she was supposed to do now was the hardest part. GLaDOS didn't give her any restrictions other than “Please don't break anything.” which Chell was pretty sure she could ignore without too much consequence, so really the world was her oyster. But she was bored. Before returning she had given some thought to what she might spend her time doing down here, but not much. Honestly she was still shocked that GLaDOS let her back in at all, her goodbye had seemed so final. Chell had half expected GLaDOS to just shoot her through the door or, much more likely, not respond at all. She hadn't really considered that she would just… walk right back in. That GLaDOS would want her back. But she did. And now Chell was here, and she had to figure out what to do.

For now her usual afternoon go-to activity was to pester GLaDOS in the central chamber while she tried to work. It wasn't as if Chell could go much further than there and a few repurposed offices without any portals, so it was either that or… stare at the ceiling. So she finally dragged herself out of bed and pulled on a jacket- GLaDOS kept it freezing in here- and headed down the hall.

The core was predictably in the middle of the chamber, her massive robotic chassis hanging still and dark in the center of the room. She was human today, luckily. It was much easier to talk to her like this, but there didn't seem to be any clear reasoning behind which body she chose to be in at any given time. The instant Chell passed through the door GLaDOS broke her attention from the array of monitors before her and shot her gaze over to her visitor.

Chell waved.

“Oh, hi.” GLaDOS said, sitting up straighter in her chair and running her fingers carefully through the snowy hair covering her blue eye. She fidgeted slightly before settling on crossing her legs. “To what do I owe the honor…?”

Chell chuckled softly as she approached the glass platform where GLaDOS sat. She shrugged in response, hands in her pockets and eyes downcast. She felt a little underdressed now with her gray sweatpants and messy hair still loose around her shoulders. Glados always dressed much too nicely to just be sitting around all day, Chell thought. Black heels, black stockings, tight black skirts, today the blazer was black too. It couldn't be a comfortable go-to outfit, but it did look nice. Perfect hair, perfect makeup, perfect nails, perfect posture. GLaDOS was beautiful, strikingly so, in a way that made her hard to look at for long without making Chell turn her head away in nervous laughter. GLaDOS herself was equally awkward, though she did a better job of hiding it.

“Well,” she said, “Do you need anything?” GLaDOS tilted her head to the side slightly, giving a glimpse of her right eye as her gaze flicked over Chell curiously. “...Or are you just going to stand there looking pretty?”

Laughter broke from Chell's lips, and a slightly unsure smile came to GLaDOS’s. Chell leaned over before she had a chance to think through it too much and caught the core's chin in her hand, guiding her into a kiss. If nothing else it put GLaDOS at ease a little, Chell could feel her relax and she sighed softly into the kiss. This time it was GLaDOS who bashfully averted her gaze, looking down at her lap when Chell pulled away.

“Well, uh, it's nice to see you too.”

Chell smiled, and nodded to the empty space beside glados in her chair.

“Oh! Yeah, go ahead.” She scooted over a little to give Chell more room, but it was still a comfortable squeeze with both of them there. Chell was getting used to sitting in here with her, after a while GLaDOS would relax against Chells shoulder and let herself be held. Today though there were dozens of thick black cables extending from her back, a new development and an explanation for the strange affixed to her back. The wires ran up to the chassis in a messy tangle and Chell couldn't quite figure out a good way to get an arm around GLaDOS without touching them, which she didn't really want to do. While she considered the situation, GLaDOS sat up abruptly.  

“Oh- hold on.” She leaned forward and turned on the microphone, Chell noticed the harsh shift in her tone when she spoke into it. “What are you two doing? Honestly I should've scrapped you for parts ages ago.”

Chell swung her feet awkwardly, recalling feelings of watching a friend get yelled at by their parents.

“Yes, you.” GLaDOS continued, “Who else would I be talking to?”

Chell could hear faint distressed beeping behind GLaDOS’s sigh as she slumped back in her chair. “Ugh, sorry. They're useless.”

Chell glanced over the monitors for a few moments, and she had to agree. The test the poor little bots were trying to solve was simple enough, and Chell had it figured it in just a few seconds.

“...Frustrating,” she mumbled.

“You don't know the half of it.”

“...I could do it.”

At that GLaDOS shot up straight and looked Chell dead in the eye. Almost immediately though she caught herself and relaxed, looking back at the monitors nonchalantly. “Well, I… I'm sure you could.”

Chell raised an eyebrow in questioning.

GLaDOS continued, “I mean, if you felt like it… there are a few tests you could try. Just some I had lying around.”

Chell smiled, and nodded. Back when she first met GLaDOS she had thought that testing was pretty fun, up until she tried to kill her. The ones after they both woke up again probably could have been fun too, if GLaDOS hadn't still been trying to kill her. But, now GLaDOS was much less likely to commit any murders, so why not give it another go? It wasn't as if Chell had anything better to do down here, and maybe it would be something they could do together.

“Really…?” GLaDOS asked, probably thinking back to the same close calls that Chell was remembering. “It… is dangerous you know. There are no safety considerations in place.”

Chell rolled her eyes. She’d made it through all of GLaDOS’s little tests this far, a few more would be a breeze. Not willing to give the core any more time to doubt Chell got up and stretched her arms, signaling just how ready she was to do anything other than sit around bored for another day.

“Well, fine, if you're going to be so pushy.”

Within no time Chell found herself holding a shiny new portal gun, disappointingly not the same one she'd carved her name into before, with new long fall boots on her feet and very little patience. She bounced idly in the elevator as it went down, and down, and down, to wherever GLaDOS had been building the new testing tracks. Chell tried to keep a mental record of where exactly she was going, just in case she needed to get back out. Finally the elevator slowed its descent, and came to a smooth stop. The doors opened, and Chell all but ran down the dark hall, ignoring the sign on the wall like she always had.

“Think you can beat your record?” Came GLaDOS’s familiar voice over the speakers, a strange callback to before they were quite so friendly. Chell nodded confidently to the nearest camera, and set off.

------

So, maybe that confidence was a bit premature. It took Chell what felt to her like an eternity to solve the relatively simple puzzle, and then once she did figure it out it took even longer to actually execute it. Thankfully GLaDOS had been fairly quiet the whole time, Chell didn't really need any comments about how much difficulty she was having catching a stupid cube. All she had to do was push the button, and then jump in the portal, and if her timing was right down the millisecond, apparently, everything would work and she could take the cube to the laser, and the laser through the portal, and maybe then GLaDOS would let her get some lunch. Chell took a breath and tried her best to calculate the time again, before giving it one more try.

This time would have been perfect, but instead of catching the cube she managed to slam into it mid air and ended up landing hard on her side with a small cut on her cheek. She groaned in frustration, and tossed the portal gun away toward the far wall.

“Hey, careful!” GLaDOS chided, “Do you have any idea how expensive that device is?”

Chell nodded against the floor, pretty sure that GLaDOS had told her before exactly how expensive it was, and she hadn’t listened. Slowly she sat up, and steeled herself to try again. It was going to work eventually, it had to, she just had to keep trying.

Thankfully it only took two more tries to get it right, and from there the rest of the test was easy. Chell carried the cube over to the laser and angled it through the portal to activate the switch. As she lined it up properly GLaDOS spoke over the speakers again.

“There, fina- ah-”

The sound of the speakers abruptly cutting out was covered by that of the exit door sliding open. Chell looked up curiously, signaling to the camera by the door. What happened?

She waited, but no response came, so she just shrugged and headed onward. It was a little strange to not hear GLaDOS’s voice as she walked into the elevator and waited through the short trip down, but Chell supposed the AI didn’t really have a reason to talk to her much now, since she was no longer trying to get under her skin. Even so it was somehow eerie to enter a new test chamber and hear nothing, so Chell paused in front of the first camera and waved to it.

“What?” GLaDOS asked, after a short delay. “Yes, I see you.”

Chell tilted her head to the side as she listened to the voice. GLaDOS must have still been in her human body, if the heavy breath behind her words was anything to go off of. Her tone was so different than it had been just a few minutes ago, but at the same time there was something familiar in it, like Chell had heard her talk this way before… Oh.

Chell couldn't stop the low chuckle that escaped her throat at that dawning realization.

“What? What are you laughing at?” GLaDOS insisted, her voice unmistakably hurried and unsteady.

Chell could practically see the flush on her cheeks as she spoke, remembering clearly the AI’s trembling words as she lay panting in Chell's bed the other morning. She shot a quick smirk at the camera, and walked on into the test chamber. ‘In it for the science’ she said. Yeah, right. Chell would have scoffed before but now the situation was just funny, and kind of cute. And it gave her notably more motivation to finish the next test. It wasn't difficult, and she was pretty certain she had it figured out after her first scan of the room. However as soon as she started placing portals, GLaDOS spoke up.

“Wait- I-” She sputtered. Chell paused in her tracks and looked back at the camera with feigned curiosity. “You… don't have to hurry, you now.”

Chell chuckled again to herself, and carried on. GLaDOS might have said not to hurry, but this chamber was simple, and it wouldn't take long no matter how Chell solved it. As she stepped carefully over another laser a low, approving hum sounded over the speakers. If GLaDOS had been like this from the start maybe things would have been different, at least a little. But then… why hadn't she? Chell thought about it as she maneuvered behind a turret to place a portal on the far wall- GLaDOS had never been so compromised by testing before. Maybe it was her new body? But then she ran tests from it often enough, and didn't seem to have any trouble. If anything watching Blue and Orange test just seemed to annoy her. For a moment Chell wondered if it was just because it was her, if GLaDOS had feelings for her now and that somehow changed things. She shook her head, deciding that was silly. The only other variable she could think of were the new wires connecting GLaDOS to her old body.

Slightly distracted by her musings Chell picked up the turret and carried it over to the ledge, and dropped it into the acid below to get it out of the way.

“Oh.”

Chell looked back at the camera again, and it actually turned away. She grinned. GLaDOS really was adorable sometimes, when she wasn't awful. What else would she like? Chell wondered, looking around the chamber for another turret to drown. Unfortunately there was only the one, so she kept going.

It was easy enough, and the solution Chell saw upon first entering the chamber turned out to be the right one. It took her less than 10 minutes to get the cube she needed over to the button that would unlock the door. As she trotted over to it GLaDOS’s voice came over the speakers once again, sounding impatient despite her best efforts.

“Oh, good, just- … Well, you know what to do from here.”

“Hm?” Chell paused, setting down the cube. Had GLaDOS almost said the solution?

“No don't put it down, come on!”

Chell raised an eyebrow, and smirked. She picked up the cube again.

“Good, just- Chell!”

The test subject's shoulders shook with silent laughter as she set the cube down again, this time right next to the button.

“I know what you're doing. It's not funny.”

Chell shrugged and nodded, thinking that it was in fact pretty funny. She climbed up and sat on top of the cube.

“Oh now you're just being mean.” GLaDOS whined. Her voice was becoming notably less patient, and less composed. Chell stretched her arms and leaned back, relaxing against the cold metal of the cube.

“Chell. Chell get up.”

“Hm?”

“Come on, it's right there,” GLaDOS groaned, “Stop stalling!”  

“Said not to hurry.”

“What- ughh.”

Chell yawned and closed her eyes, laughing to herself at GLaDOS’s frustrated groaning.

“Fine, I see, clearly this chamber was too challenging for you to solve.”

Chell rolled her eyes, GLaDOS could do better than that.

“You're just- where are you going? Hey!” GLaDOS called after Chell as she hopped off the cube and wandered over to the ledge. She aimed her portal gun at the far wall again, lining up a shot.

“What are you… don't you dare. You'll have to do it all again- no!!” Chell could hear GLaDOS hitting something, the arm of her chair maybe? As she stepped through the portal and back to the other side of the room, and back through the emancipation grill right in front of the entrance. Both the portals immediately blinked out of existence, along with the cube.

GLaDOS let out the most exasperated cry Chell had ever heard, her voice getting quieter near the end as she presumably moved away from the microphone.

“Ughhh! You. You have to be the worst test subject who has ever set foot in this facility.”

“High praise.”

“I hate you.”

“I hate you too.”

Chell blew a kiss to the nearest camera, and went on her way to solve the test again. This time around it only took a few minutes, mostly just the time it took her to walk around, she wasn't in any rush after all. All the while GLaDOS grumbled and admonished Chell from the central chamber, the pitch of her voice rising with the rate of her breath as Chell made it back over to the door with her new cube.

“Okay, now just. Don't do that again.”

Chell paused, and thought about it. She thought about it some more.

“Chell!”

“Where does it go?”

“Oh my god.” GLaDOS groaned. Chell swore she could hear her foot tapping quickly in the background. Chell laughed, but she couldn't keep this up forever. It was a little mean, and GLaDOS was starting to sound less playfully annoyed and more genuinely angry, so she moved the cube over the button. GLaDOS’s breath caught in her throat in response- her fed up growling giving way to silent anticipation.

But, Chell wouldn't let her off that easily. She lowered the cube down slowly, and just barely let it rest on the button. The door wasn't even activated, but apparently that was enough for GLaDOS’s system if the squeaky gasp that escaped her was any indication. As soon as that sound left her lips though, Chell moved the cube away again.

She grinned at the ensuing scream that cut through the room, accompanied by the clattering of a clipboard hitting the floor.

“Chell for fuck’s sake.”

“Language.”

“Ugghhh.”

“Ask nicely.”

“What…??” GLaDOS sounded absolutely attacked, her voice shrill and uncomfortable and breathy. “No! Just put--! Ughh, Chell come on.”

Chell shook her head, still holding the cube just a hair's breadth above the button. She wished that she could see GLaDOS’s face, she could hear the movement of fabric and would've killed to see GLaDOS squirming and fidgeting in her chair. Chell looked at the camera and raised an eyebrow. Well?

“You do not need me to ask you to do your one job.”

“Hmm…” well that wasn't the right answer. Chell lifted the cube up higher and started to move away. Flicking her eyes back to the other side of the room again.

“No-! No no, wait, don't start it over again!!”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah- just. Finish the test.

“Finish the test…?” Chell repeated, trailing off in suggestion of one more little word.

“No.” GLaDOS said sternly. Her voice was starting to lose some of the edge of frustration, so Chell quickly tapped the cube back down on the button. GLaDOS squealed in response, a cute high pitched little sound that quickly degraded into a shriek of annoyance.

“You're awful!! God!”

Chell rolled her eyes and nodded.

“Y-you can't stay in there forever, you have to solve it eventually!”

Chell shrugged.  

“Look just do it and I'll- I'll give you something. I promise, you'll like it!”

“Hmm…”

“You're ruini- ah!! Stop that!!” GLaDOS yelled over Chell's laughter as she tapped the cube down again, her voice now shrill and wavering.

“Ask.” said Chell.

“I am asking!”

Chell gave the camera a look. GLaDOS knew what she needed to do, it wasn't hard.

The AI groaned deep in her throat, and grumbled again, “No.”

Chell sighed, and turned back toward the ledge, taking the cube with her.

“No!! No- no no, wait, turn back around, Chell!! Don't you dare.”

Chell paused, but didn't turn around.

There was a moment where she could tell GLaDOS was thinking, mulling over the options in her head. She mumbled and whined and cursed, before finally, she did it.

In a low, growly voice, GLaDOS mumbled “Please.”

There, now was that so hard? Chell smiled triumphantly, and finally dropped the cube on the button.

The noise that GLaDOS made in response was positively lyrical, a deep, throaty moan that Chell was starting to become familiar with but still sent a rush of heat through her body. She stood still for a moment listening, picturing GLaDOS’s pink cheeks and furrowed brow- the tremors of her body as her voice finally gave way to ragged panting.

“Move.” GLaDOS commanded between heavy breaths. Chell startled from her position of staring vaguely in the direction of the speaker and hurried through the open door and onto the elevator. Even GLaDOS’s harsh tone didn't wipe the smile off her face though, she felt as if she'd just learned some great secret.

“Feel good…?” She asked as the elevator doors closed behind her.

“Shut up.”

Chell smirked, but that faded when she realized the elevator was moving in the wrong direction, remarkably fast.

“It seems you found an… unexpected bug.” GLaDOS said as the elevator rose. “How nice.”

A sudden worry overtook Chell- GLaDOS didn't exactly sound happy. She racked her brain trying to remember if there were any good routes away from the central chamber, just in case GLaDOS was really angry with her. Slowly the elevator came to a stop, and the glass doors opened.

Chell scanned the room, but GLaDOS was still sitting on her throne, legs crossed, chin in her hand.

“Come here,” she said.

Chell cautiously stepped into the room, and walked about halfway over to the central platform.

“That was not nearly as satisfying as it might have sounded to some people.” GLaDOS glared from the shadow of her chassis, tapping her foot on the glass platform.

A tension left Chell's shoulders as she realized she probably wasn't in danger, and slowly she closed the distance between herself and the core.

“No?”

“No. And you don't get to start things like that and not finish them properly.”

A small smile tugged at chells lips as she walked up the stairs. “Oops.”

“Just come here, you monster.”

Chell grinned, and scooped GLaDOS up in her arms. The smaller woman melted into her body instinctively, wrapping her arms and legs around her easily.

“You know,” she said, “you still have to finish the rest of the tests.”

Chell rolled her eyes, and shut GLaDOS up with a kiss.

[clonerightsagenda]

We were joking about this again last night and I didn’t want to work on research was bored so here’s a relatively unpolished thing of the Game Over kids coming up with a (in hindsight) blindingly obvious solution to their problem. I remain stupefied by this apparent oversight.

Starring Nepeta, because she’s earned it.

After what you've been through, the silence of the dream bubbles is comforting. You sit still and hug your knees. It's nice to be just you, in your own skin, with nothing else in the way.

"I'm going to be sick," says the human you were imprisoned with, and he is. Nothing comes up.

You can't blame him. It had been suffocating, and he'd been throwing a fit for most of it. You'd kept quiet, but not because you didn't care. You didn't see the point of screaming when it didn't help. Instead you waited, watched, and at the right moment finally struggled just hard enough that the entity that you'd become hesitated as the Furthest Ring cracked apart and the growing void sucked you in. At least your ghosts woke up here, instead of being trapped in the singularity forever.

Wherever you are now, the black hole hasn't eaten it. The darkness is still illuminated by glittering cracks, but the surface beneath you is whole. There's no sign of Lord English, or the army. Is anyone nearby?

You didn't need to learn much about Heart during your session. Your existing combat skills were enough. Once you'd been out here for a while, you started to think it was about souls. About who people are, deep down. Maybe that's why you can handle a place where you're stripped down to your Self with a thousand others vying for the title. Maybe that's why you're recovering faster from being crushed beneath some other consciousness and buried under an aggregate of other lives. You know who you are. You're the Rogue of Heart, and here, you are useful.

There's a cluster of bright sparks in your inner vision. Souls, glowing with the dim luminescence of the dreaming dead. Part of you would love some solitude, but you also want to interact with people as yourself, to hear people call you by your name. It'll help you settle more firmly back into your skin.

"I feel some spirits not far away," you say. "I think they're friends." Dave doesn't look at you at first. Maybe you should just leave, but you feel some level of loyalty after what you've been through. "Want to come?"

It takes him a few tries to stand, but he does.

 You see Karkat and Kanaya with a cluster of the humans. You shouldn't know all their names, but the entity that possessed you rifled through the memories of all Nepetas everywhen, picking whatever scraps it felt like plastering onto itself in an off-key impression. The remnants had been left scattered through your thinkpan, and so you vaguely remember being a sprite in their session. Terezi is there too, sitting next to Vriska. They're leaning into each other's shoulders. Equius isn’t there. He must still be mixed with that AI who does most of the talking. You don’t see Gamzee either, for which you are grateful.

When you approach, Jade grabs Dave by the shirt and starts asking questions about her brother that you know from your time together he can't answer. Kanaya approaches you a little more slowly. "Nepeta," she says. "It's good to see you again. I wish we were meeting under better circumstances."

"Yeah." You tuck a strand of hair behind your ears, a nervous habit you fall back on sometimes during conversation. It’s been a while since you’ve seen these people. They’re older than you now. "It's not so bad for me, but I thought you guys might win. I'm sorry you didn’t."

"Have you seen Rose out there?" she asks.

You remember Rose, the human who'd been nice enough to let you talk to her cat-lusus. It would've been hard to miss her, considering her brother screaming "That's my sister, leave her alone, don't touch her" what felt like right into your auditory sponge. "She was like us," you say. "Made into a sprite, and then prototyped too many times. So... she's still alive. Sort of.”

"She's trapped," says Dave, smoothing out the front of his shirt. He looks relieved to be able to change the subject. "And she must be pissed as hell. It's like some Lovecraftian nightmare with a sugar high sets up shop in your brain to make a mockery of everything you hold dear. Thank god none of you saw us, I'd never live it down. Figuratively."

"Then we have to get her out," Kanaya says firmly.

"Hey, I'd be right behind you," Dirk says. The others have drifted over to listen in. It’s not like there’s much else to do – this part of the bubbles doesn’t have much in the way of scenery. "I could yank her soul out and everything; that's a thing I can do. Problem is, our mobility is limited due to us all being fucking dead."

Jake scratches his head. "Ghosts can come back. That Aranea did."

"The ring," Vriska says, looking up from whatever quiet communion she and Terezi had been locked in. "She stole the ring of life from John somehow."

"That piece of shit?" Dave exchanges a look with Jade. "Did you know about that?"

"I didn't know it was magic," she says. "I just thought it was something he'd found somewhere. He didn't like to talk about it." She frowns. "He didn't talk to me a lot that last year."

"Well, there's only one of those," Karkat snaps. "So that's not very useful, unless we want to elect an ambassador to the world of the living or draw up a schedule."

"Roxy might be able to make more..." Jade says slowly. "Where is she, anyway?"

You shrug. You would have looked for her, you like Roxy, but you didn't see much of the new session, and you don't have many memories of what went wrong in the old one.  

"She's alive," Terezi says. "Her and John. I saw them before I died. They were going to fix things."

The other Dave, the one that traveled on the meteor, looks around at the shattered dreamscape, the crowd of ghosts. "Not to criticize, but things don't look fixed."

"They're setting things right in a new timeline," she explains. "We're stuck here as rejects from the old one."

"A new timeline," Kanaya repeats. "Going how far back?"

"Our problems really kicked in as soon as your crew arrived," Jake says. "Although I suppose we could have dealt with things if only that troll hadn't gotten her mitts on the ring. That's the crucial moment that truly sealed our fates. As long as you stop that, I’m sure we could manage."

Terezi shakes her head. "Think further. I told them to save Vriska."

Even Vriska looks confused by that. Karkat is the first to speak. "You undid whole sweeps of our lives? Why the fuck would you do that?"

Terezi spreads her hands out. "Look, maybe it wasn't the most rational decision in hindsight, but it's not like you've never made calls based on some sort of emotional impulse."

"And look how that turned out." He shakes his head. "We should've talked to you about that guilt complex earlier so you didn't change the entire universe just to try to deal with it."

"Yeah," meteor-Dave deadpans. "If you'd sat backwards on a chair earlier this could've all been avoided."

"Shut the fuck up," he says without real rancor. "Well, good luck to those poor bastards."

"I'm right here," Vriska says.

"I notice you haven't actually disagreed."

"No.” She shakes her head, and her long braids – unraveling at the end – shudder. “I met the new me. She's a bitch."

"Good. We're all on the same page here. I'm almost glad I'm dead."

"You know..." you say.

Terezi glances at you and then away again to continue their squabble. They've never taken you seriously because you were the silly shy girl, who spent her time having fun and playing games while the others made important decisions. But you have memories of time spent with a Life player, and you'd know that color scheme anywhere. "You know," you say again, louder. "I don't think you need a ring to come back to life."

"What do you mean?" That's Dirk. He might not know you well, but he looks desperate enough to look anywhere for input.

"Well...." You shrug. "You've got a Life player right there."

The Life player in question stares at you for a moment and then down at the symbol on her chest, like she’s checking to make sure it’s still there. "You mean...?"

"That can't work, can it?" Jake asks. "It would be too easy."

"Feferi helped us once," Karkat says. "A dead one from a doomed timeline. Her powers still worked. I don't know why I didn't remember sooner."

Jane looks down at her hands. "With a body, I know I could do it. But with a ghost... I don’t know. I guess I could try."

"Just a moment," Kanaya interrupts. "I wasn't convinced by your threats earlier that Life abilities could harm the undead, but if that principle does hold, you might hurt us instead of helping."

"I volunteer," Dirk says immediately.

Jane sighs. "Dirk, really."

"I'm serious. I glitched myself into fucking pixels and I'm still here. I'm indestructible. Do your worst."

"Well in that case…” It takes Jane a moment to catch up with herself. “Wait. You did what? Are you saying the way you got here... you did it to yourself?"

Before Dirk can respond, Terezi interjects. "Save that for later. As the Seer here, I say you give it your best shot. It's a good idea."

"We're not through talking about this," Jane growls. Then she points a blue-laced hand at Dirk and gives it her best shot.

"Well?" Kanaya asks after a moment. "Did it work?"

Dirk looks himself up and down. "I don't feel any different."

"We can't see through your shades, Strider," Jake says.

Dirk hesitates (whether out of reluctance or for theatrical effect you’re not sure) and then pushes the pointy glasses on his face up. You get a good look, as does everybody else. Orange. Humans have such strange eye colors.

"It worked," Jane breathes. “Isn't that something. Gather round, everyone. I'll fix us right up." She turns, looks at Karkat, and then her face changes. "Oh. Oh no."

"What?" Jade follows her gaze and then puts a hand to her mouth. "Ohhhh."

"What?" Karkat's voice rises. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"I can only do this once," Jane says. "Once per person. And I've already done you."

"What are you talking about?" Terezi asks. "Karkat, are you telling me you got yourself killed that quickly? And I missed it?"

"Don't blame me!" He points at Jane, who takes a step back. "Blame her. Jade too, it was her idea. Crocker here was just the willing hand with the fork.”

"The two of them decided to demonstrate Jane's abilities," Kanaya explains. "They were following the Empress's orders at the time."

"That's right," Jade says quickly. "I was bad then. And." She bites her lip. "And I was angry."

"So we can't hold that against them, right?" Jake says, with a smile that looks unnaturally stiff. "Let bygones be bygones, right Jane? After all, I've already forgotten that little interaction in the jail cell. In fact, forget I mentioned it!"

"What did Jane do?" Dirk asks. Jane groans and covers her eyes. "What the hell are you all talking about?"

"That's what I want to know," meteor-Dave adds. "Jade, you killed someone because "you were mad"? What the fuck happened to you in the last three years?"

"What happened to you, defending the aliens?" Dave snaps back. "Since when are they really on our side? No offense," he adds, glancing over at you. "You seem ok, I guess."

You roll your eyes. "I appreciate it, human scum."

Meteor-Dave has ignored this aside. "I know you were off bleeding instead of being useful during our game, but they are on our side, you outdated fucking museum specimen."

"The tiara top," you hear Jane saying to no one in particular. "I was going to apologize and explain, we just didn't have time-"

"Will all of you shut up?" Karkat demands. "I'm a little more preoccupied with the pressing matter of my mortality than whatever hangups you've got with each other. You can all pile into the confession booth later if that'll make you happy."

"But Karkat," Terezi says, "it's like watching one of your memos in real life."

"Will you ever let the memos go?"

"Like I said," Vriska interrupts, "there's the ring."

You took a step back when she spoke - your last memories of her aren't great. But this one seems milder, though maybe that's the dreambubbles nipping at the edges of her soul, like they do to everyone eventually.

"That's right," Terezi says. "The ring. The Empress killed Aranea, I saw that much. So it might be up for grabs again. It likes to vanish and reappear."

"But where?" Dirk asks. "Do you think it would be near her ghost?"

Jake balls his hands up. "Are you saying we could go beat up that spider troll's ghost? Because I am ALL for a rematch. Don't bring me back yet, Jane. That way if she tries to kill me again she won't be able to."

"I could find her, maybe," Terezi says. "This place is made of memories, so if I follow her mind... With the ring so smashed up, there aren’t that many places to hide."

"How do we tell she's the right one?" Jade asks. She’s latched onto this new subject eagerly, probably to escape the last one. "We can't just jump on every version of this troll, can we?"

"I can tell," you say. You have a knack for that out here. You can strike up a conversation with one Tavros and later pick him out of a crowd of twenty, even if his outfit is different. Once you know a little bit about how the person has changed, they don't wear their face the same. This Aranea - what she did will show.

“Sounds like a plan,” Dirk says. “I like it."

"You'll have to sit this one out," Jane says. "You're mortal again, and I can only save you once. Perils of being the guinea pig, I'm afraid. And I am officially team leader. I think it's time I actually lived up to that. Metaphorically, if I must."

He scowls but doesn't argue.

Jade turns to Terezi. "You said there's a new timeline, right? Does that mean there’s a new group of all of us?"

"That's right. It's up to that set to win now."

"I doubt they'd like us crashing the party," Dirk says. "God knows I have enough problems fighting myself, and it looks like that's a family trait."

"Can't do it no matter what," says Dave. "The Furthest Ring is neutral territory, but once we're in the same Skaia-supervised universe, doomed double rules apply. We'll get picked off."

"Great, more complications." Karkat throws up his hands. "Then where do we go, even if we do come back?"

"It's a big multiverse," Kanaya says. "There must be somewhere."

"There must be somewhere," Jake agrees. "I'm not going to sit here in the dark for eternity because some troll got a bee in her bonnet about how our story was supposed to go. I was never that concerned about winning the game on its terms anyway, as long as we made it out ok. I don't even know what the victory state is supposed to be."

"Then it's agreed," Jane says. "We find Aranea, get that ring, I bring us all back, and we go somewhere. Somewhere better."

"And we find Rose," Kanaya adds.

"Definitely," says meteor-Dave. "We can call up John and Rose's mom too, see if they want to hang out with us losers or stick with the winning team. Maybe we can get shared custody."

“If we see other people…” You almost trail off, but they’re looking at you, so you complete the thought. “Maybe we should let them come too, if they want. It seems fair.”

Jane nods. “I’m willing to try. The one time rule might not count for different versions of the same person.”

"Can I come?" Vriska asks. You’re surprised she was polite enough to ask. She really has changed.

Terezi links arms with her. "Wouldn't have it any other way, sister."

"Hold on," Karkat says. "I’m still technically leader of the Alternian band of chucklefucks, which means I get to make that kind of decision. You're not going to try another megalomaniacal plot as soon as our backs are turned, are you? If I recall correctly, you got killed for a reason.”

She juts her chin forward, a bit of her old vigor returning to her voice. "I'm not like that anymore.”

"I guess we can keep an eye on you if you’re lying."

Terezi pinches the bridge of her nose with her free hand. "Karkat, do you think you could be a little bit less of a dick if you really tried?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, I'm a little on edge. I've been murdered."

"We've all been murdered," Kanaya says. "Or most of us, at least. Just establishing that for the record."

"And it sucks.”

"I don't blame him for not trusting me," Vriska says quietly, which shuts even Karkat up. You look her over. You don't know what she's been doing since you saw her last, but the person behind the face is different now. It makes you think of a drawing in that smudgy, formless state when you’re still working out the details. On its way to being something, but not there yet, tenuous enough that a stray line would ruin the entire picture. It’s the point where you have to make a decision about what the final product ought to be.

"Well," Terezi says at last. "That's settled, then. We'll get some vengeance, and then we'll figure out what to do next. How's that for a plan?"

"It's actually three quarters of a plan, because some leetspeaking weirdo wrote a four instead of an A, but otherwise it sounds good," says meteor-Dave. She sticks her tongue out at him.

Jane nods and uncaptchalogues an enormous fork. That’s right – she is an heiress, technically, and she handles the official weapon with ease. "It sounds good to me too. Let's go win this game on our terms."