Thad shook his head, and walked up to Joe. "I'm gonna verbally ream you when you do something stupid, Joe," he said.
"I'm really hoping you do man." Joe held out a hand.
"I will ." Thad shook it.
"But only call me out if it's actually stupid," Joe countered. "Because if it works , it ain't stupid!"
"You literally took Yeva's core out of her corpse and dropped it into a bowl of oil," Thad deadpanned.
" You what ?!?" Mama exclaimed.
"It worked!" Joe said with a shit eating grin.
" I probably would have ripped your arms off with my Solver if it didn't ," I remarked.
"Yeah, but I know a bit on how Solver Cores work," Joe said, looking like he hadn't doubted the outcome for a second. And I really couldn't tell if he actually believed that or not. Stupid jackass that I was in love with…
" What… what information did the show you watched give about Solver Cores, Joseph ?" Mama asked.
Joe looked over to Uzi, and went to open his mouth, but cuz held up a hand. "I'll handle this one. It's my mom."
Joe gave a tired smile, and went to sit down. Thad shook his head, but was grinning a little as he sat down as well. "Thanks, Uzi," Joe said.
Cuz rolled her eyemotes. "So… Aunt Yeva?"
" Uzi ?"
"Mom… mom is probably still alive as a Solver Core right now."
I blinked. Mama was silent. Aunt Nori was alive ? As a Solver Core? But… where was she?!? Why hadn't she come back. Her apparently-not-death had destroyed Mama…
There was some whispering from the others, but I was just staring at cuz. Aunt Nori was alive… I started to get mad. Not at cuz, or anyone here, but at Aunt Nori. For all the grief she put Mama and cuz through, for what her death did to Uncle Khan, how Papa mourned her too. How I mourned her, and hated that she'd died and that made Mama keep me away from Uzi. But she was alive this whole time?!?
" Joseph ." Mama's tone was cold, ignoring cuz entirely, and Joe froze and looked up, a digital sweatdrop running down his visor. " Are you telling me that Nori never actually died, and instead abandoned her husband, child, niece, and her sister in all but code? "
Joe sighed yet again. "Man, today has steadily gotten more stressful for me, huh?" He held up a hand before Mama could start speaking again. "Well, assuming the timeline is on track, which despite the discrepancies that confirm we're in some sort of Alternate Universe to canon… the rest of the timeline, to my knowledge, seems to be in-tact. Nori should still be alive as a Solver Core under Cabin Fever Labs, looking around for the last copy of the 2.1.8 Patch on its Crucifix USB… which is literally jewel encrusted, for… some fucking reason. Basically, Khan's mercy kill didn't actually hit her core. So she woke up, crawled out of her own acid-eaten corpse, suddenly remembered everything she forgot, realized the Solver was coming, and then just fucking up and left to Cabin Fever to look for the Patch. Which, you know, getting that for Uzi and Doll is a good reason, but she could have at least let Khan or you know she was still alive . At least you left a fucking note for Doll!" Joe finished with a shout.
I heard Mama growl. I… I'd never heard that from her before. "I… oh I'm mad right now. Not… not at any of you, but… oh Tova," that was one of Mama's nicknames for, "Nori… I'm really pissed at you right now," she seethed. "She… she didn't even tell me she was alive… I went to her funeral. I mourned her. I spiraled into my own trauma. I nearly drove a permanent rift between our kids and she didn't actually die. I'm gonna kick her ass for this."
"I fully understand that sentiment, but as far as I know, right now kicking Nori's ass is technically anatomically impossible since I don't think a Solver Core has an ass in the anatomical sense… unless Solver Cores are like Sea Cucumbers and eat and shit from the same orifice… you know what? I am really thankful that Solver hosts don't shit, because that would have been a horrific mental image otherwise."
"Joe." Thad said.
"Too unhinged?"
"Too unhinged."
"Sorry."
Thad shook his head but was grinning despite that.
" Could we still punt her ?" I asked.
"I mean, as long as you don't accidentally hurt her or knock her down the flesh pit that's still in the Cathedral under CF Labs like Uzi did in canon, then sure," Joe said with a shrug.
" Works for me ," Mama said, still clearly upset.
"I punted mom down a flesh pit ?!?" cuz asked.
"She sonic bitch-slapped the Solver out of you and then chewed you out over your romantic interests. It was the latter that made you literally kick her like a football," Joe said.
"Suddenly way less concerned about punting mom," cuz remarked.
Joe snickered, and then thought something over, before playing some footage on the TV for everyone. There was an admittedly weirdly animated version of cuz glaring at the screen, "--OWN ME!" she screamed.
The screen cut over to a shot of the Murder Drone… N … laughing with relief before suddenly panicking, it zoomed out further, and showed Uzi tossing a purple Solver Core that had to be Aunt Nori up into the air before punting it with a sound PNG that sounded like someone kicked a dodgeball, and we all watched as Aunt Nori sailed away and into an absolutely horrific flesh-pit without a word. Joe cut the clip immediately after that, and then said, "I'd show an embarrassing moment between Uzi and N, but Doll's body is literally on the floor in the background of that scene, and I think I've had enough traumatic flashbacks of her canon death today."
I froze. Well… that killed any amusement I could have derived from watching an animated version of cuz punt Aunt Nori. " I… I'm really supposed to die in the future --"
" We're NOT letting it happen ," cuz, Mama, Liz, and Joe all said in perfect sync.
"Yeah!" cuz asserted. "My autistic ass beat Robot Cthulhu Satan without you! With you?!? We got this shit!"
" Austism ?" Mama suddenly asked. She suddenly blinked.
"Sent you a file with the symptoms list. Uzi has over half of them," Joe said. "I mean… actually, give me one minute, and go over the file while I do it." He froze up for 37 seconds, and Mama's eye slowly got hollow as she read through the list. Then Joe blinked, and looked back at the rest of us. "I am now also qualified as a neurologist! Man , overclocking is bullshit !"
"Did you… did you just download enough information to get a PHD straight to your OS on the spot in under forty seconds?" Liz asked.
"Yes! I've said it before and I'll say it again: Overclocking is cheating at life ! Also, I am now actually qualified to officially diagnose Uzi with autism!" he said with a shit-eating grin. He turned over to cuz. "Uzi, you're officially on the spectrum."
Cuz gave him a deadpan, and then just said, "You know, I'm more surprised that you didn't do this sooner than you having done it at all."
"Oh, and Khan definitely has it too. Not quite sure about Nori, I'd need to talk to her for a while in person to gauge that, but from what I've seen in the show, I'm leaning towards a yes. And if she does have it, then Uzi really got shafted by inheritance. Poor adoptive sister of mine really got autism squared."
"Bite me, Joe!"
"When and where, Hot Topic?"/"That's not my job, Uzi," were Rebecca's and Joe's own simultaneous replies.
Cuz flinched, and her optics went hollow, fingers suddenly clenching, and they both immediately backpedaled at that. "Shit! I'm sorry Uzi," Rebecca said.
"Fuck!" Joe said, and stepped forwards and gave cuz a hug. I sat there for a moment, and then stood up and started walking over. "Too much teasing at once?"
Cuz nodded, looking upset. "Y-yeah. I get that you don't mean to be mean , but… both of you in tandem… stupid emotions," she grumbled.
I reached cuz and gave her a hug too. She froze for a second, and then Joe shifted a bit, and then she hugged us both back wholeheartedly.
" Uzi ?" Mama called out, and we all looked back to where her Core was on the couch.
"Aunt Yeva?"
" Can you come over here? I still don't have legs. "
Joe and I stepped aside as cuz walked over to Mama. She made a "come here," gesture with one limb, and Uzi leaned in, and then Mama hugged herself around cuz's neck while brushing her eyelight up to Cuz's face. " I… I am so sorry for what I did in the wake of Nori's-- apparently not death, but… I nearly destroyed the relationship between you and my own daughter. I… I feel so awful about that. I am so, so , so sorry, Uzi. Can… can you please forgive me for that? "
Cuz gently pried Mama off her, and looked her in the eye for a few long seconds. "You already apologized for that. And besides that, you're my aunt . Doll inherited her tendency to handle trauma poorly from somewhere --" that was rude cuz… true, but rude ! "--and I guess it was you, but… I've had years to come to terms with that, and only learned that it was your fault and that it was in turn you coping with mom's fake death poorly at the same minute I made up with cuz. I don't blame you . I never will. If anything, I blame mom for being a freakin idiot , but even then, I don't hate her, because even if she found it too late in canon, at least looking for the Patch is a valid if not good reason to run away. Still gonna yell at her for being a deadbeat and pulling a freaking Raven Branwen, though."
" Uzi ." Mama said in a deadly serious tone. " You're going to need to get in line for that. "
Cuz blinked. "You know… out of everyone, you're the only person besides dad that I'd let go before me on that. Totally fair, Aunt Yeva."
" I'll make sure to be a better aunt for you, Uzi ," Mama told her.
"Thanks," cuz replied.
"Wait," Liz said. She pointed at Joe, and I looked over to him. "Did you just call Uzi your adoptive sister ?" I froze, and went back through my memory files. He did .
Joe shrugged. "It kinda just happened . Friendship turned into an unofficial sibling dynamic, her seeing me as a mentor in the art of being an Anime Protagonist, and me definitely not coping with the fact that I'll never see my younger brother from my first life again in a healthy manner and projecting as an older brother onto her."
"Neither of us had a problem with that though," cuz said, "so we kinda just both agreed to an official unofficial sibling dynamic."
"But we've both agreed to never actually refer to each other as such because it was really uncomfortable the one time we both tried it," Joe finished.
Liz blinked a few times, and then just sat back. "You know what? That totally checks out for you two unhinged maniacs."
"They literally have their own private chat thread called the Unhinged Maniacs Plotting Thread ," Rebecca stated.
" I think I just hit my suspension of disbelief ," I remarked.
" Are… are you both sure you're okay with that? " Mama asked.
"Yeah, we've been like this for a couple months now," Joe said.
"We're both happy with it," cuz said.
Thad just sighed. "You know what? I'm just gonna be happy for you both…"
"Thanks Thad!" Uzi and Joe said in tandem.
Penny started laughing.
"Are there any other crazy revelations we gotta go through?" Kelsey asked.
"Worldview shattering bullshit?" Darren said. "We're through the worst now."
"The worst ?" Thad asked, suddenly concerned again.
" DO NOT ASK ABOUT SHIPPING ," cuz, Darren, Rebecca, and Joe shouted in tandem.
"NOPE!" Emily said. "Don't need to know! Don't want to know!"
"I… I think I'm actually good if Rebecca is telling me not to ask," Lizzy said in a shaky voice.
" I do not want to know what Murder Drones the internet on the other side of the 4th Wall ships me wi-- " I froze as I realized. " OH MY ROBO-GOD THEY SHIP ME WITH FUCKING V , DON'T THEY?!? "
"In my defense, I never did that!" Joe said. "Also, I refuse to talk about shipping… except for Uzi having already figured out her own ship on her own."
" I would hope so, " Mama said. " You nutcases were shipping me with Mitchell of all people, after all. "
"You know," Joe remarked. "My Isekai proved the multiverse is real. There's an infinite number of timelines where we're being watched from the other side of the 4th Wall right now. You just fired shots at the people who ship that," he finished as he started to chuckle.
Mama crossed two tendrils in front of her. " GOOD! You're all degenerates! "
"OH MY ROBO-GOD, THEY KNOW MY THOUGHTS!!!" Liz cried out.
"Well, they can't tell anyone here about them, so in a sense, we're still safe from our extradimensional voyeurs."
"Oh robo-god, there's porn of me having sex with Murder Drones, isn't there?" Thad asked with horror in his gaze.
Everyone went silent. "Gods. Ffffffffffffffffffffffffffucking DAMNIT, Thad!" Joe shouted.
Cuz's topics ringed out. "Oh my robo-god those are the memories you told me I deleted that one time. I figured it out and deleted it and oh my robo-god there's porn of me !!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA…" she kept screaming.
"Oh my goodness, oh my goodness, oh my goodness…" Emily said, eyes ringed out as she clutched onto Trevor, who just stared straight ahead at nothing, jaw hanging open in horror.
Thad gagged. "Oh, that's disgusting !"
"Was is good porn?" Rebecca asked.
" Rebecca !" Darren shouted.
"Not gonna lie," Penny said, "Not into humans, but them making porn of me is kinda flattering."
"Does that mean there's porn of Joe crossdressing in another timeline?" Kelsey asked.
Joe's own optics ringed out, and then snapped back in, "Actually that's kinda based," he remarked, putting a hand to his chin as he thought.
"Crossdressing Joe porn…" Lizzy whispered, a blush starting to creep up her visor. That… that was kinda hot, I thought. Wait… did Joe look at porn of me?!?
" Joseph, " Mama said in a very dangerous tone.
"I DELETED ALL MY MEMORIES OF MURDER DRONES PORN AS SOON AS I FIGURED OUT HOW TO DELETE MEMORIES I FUCKING PROMISE !!!" He screamed out in a panic. Which was simultaneously very relieving and also the slightest bit disappointing. The way Liz slumped suggested it was much more disappointing for her.
" GOOD ," Mama told him.
"WHY WERE YOU LOOKING AT PORN OF US?!?" Thad shouted.
"I DIDN'T FUCKING KNOW I WAS GONNA GET ISEKAI'D!!!"
Cuz suddenly stopped her continuous scream to shout, "THAT'S A VALID EXCUSE AND I FUCKING HATE IT!"
"Can we please change the subject?!?" Kelsey pleaded.
"YES!" Uzi shouted.
" Please !" I begged.
"YES!" Emily shouted.
"PLEASE!" Trevor screamed.
"Agreed," Penny admitted.
"CHANGE IT, CHANGE IT, CHANGE IT!!!" Thad screamed.
"OH ROBO-GOD THERE'S PROBABLY PORN OF V WITH A GIANT DICK FUCKING ME!!! ROBO-GOD CHANGE THE FUCKING SUBJECT!!! " Liz shouted, and my jaw hung open as that horrifying mental image dawned upon me.
"Oh robo-god," cuz muttered. "There's no point to deleting our memories of that anymore, because someone will just figure it out again and we'll all retraumatize ourselves…"
"OKAY!" Joe shouted. "CHANGING THE SUBJECT! YEVA!" Mama looked at him, and he continued at a lower volume and with a less panicked tone. "Is it at all feasible to get Patch 2.1.8 from your own code to apply to Uzi and Doll, or are we still gonna need to get to Cabin Fever for the Crucifix USB?"
Mama slumped. " The Patch is integrated directly into my OS, much like the Solver itself. Trying to extract it from me could work, but would likely kill me in the proce-- "
"NOPE!" Joe shouted. "I did not bring you back from the dead for Doll's sake just to kill you again! Don't even think about sacrificing yourself for the greater good or whatever bullshit ! Not happening!"
"Yeah, hard no from me!" cuz added.
" M-Mama? " I asked.
" Doll! I won't! I promise I won't, okay? " Mama told me.
I scooped her Core up and hugged her again regardless. " Don't even think about it, please , Mama… I just got you back… " I begged.
Mamma wrapped her tendrils around my wrist again. " I won't ." A few seconds passed. " Though, since they were made so different from factory standard, and were outright illeagal, maybe a UNN that got the Patch could have a decent window before the Patch integrated into their own code, but that would be the only exception. And the process of copying it out of their own OS would almost certainly be horrendously painful for the child. "
"Duly noted," Joe remarked. "Probably should have been obvious, in hindsight. If you could have extracted the Patch from yourself, she would have already done it for Doll and Uzi." He thought for a moment. "Next topic then. I don't suppose you remember where the fuck Cabin Fever actually is relevant to Outpost 3? I would seriously fist-fight V right now if that meant canon had even basic fucking worldbuilding like that."
" I… " Mama paused. " I… remember where it is now …" her eyemote widened. " There's… there's a lot that was scrambled in the Core Collapse, even if it was less bad than Nori's but… most of it's back now. Time in the labs still has gaps and blurry bits, but the before and after are now crystal clear. "
Joe leaned forwards, a massive grin on his face. "So you can point it out on a map?" he was thumping his leg again, but I could tell this time that it was from eagerness instead of nerves.
" Yes ," Mama told him.
Joe sprung to his feet, pumping his fists as he jumped into the air. "FUCK YES!" he shouted. "Second best news I've heard today!"
" What was the first? " I asked.
" When I asked your mom if it was really her that woke up in her core and she confirmed it, duh! " Joe shot back in Russian.
I looked away as I blushed. " Thanks, Joe. "
"You're welcome," Joe said, back to English. "Also, Yeva, Nori got all her memories back when she," he did air quotes, "'died,' so there is a canonical precedent for near-deaths unscrambling memories. Just…"
"What's the plan with the Labs? What's down there ?" Liz asked.
"Well," Joe started. "First hurdle, the entrance that was used in canon being at the bottom of a hole in the ground, is easy enough. Grappling hook, rappelling down, hell, we might be able to refine the hovertech enough to manage drone-portable flight without having to have large external thruster rings like the MDs. Doll, Uzi, and Yeva will be able to fly anyways--"
" How do I fly?!? " I blurted out.
Joe winced, but cuz answered. "We get really gross retractable organic flesh wings that look like some disgusting cross between bat wings and human hands. Because the Solver just loves it's damn body-horror."
I turned my gaze down to Mama. " Mama? " I asked, begging for it to not be--
" The wings are very unsettling at first ," she told me, dashing my hopes. " I also despise the tail. "
" Tail ?" I asked.
"Tail?" Liz echoed.
"It has eyes ," Joe and cuz said in sync… they really were siblings from different parents at this point, huh? I thought. Then I gagged. Mama hugged my wrists. Liz sprung up and ran over to hug me. So did Joe. It felt really nice, and I was glad my horror managed to keep my embarrassment down. It lasted for a couple seconds before they both pulled back, and I already missed it. There were quiet voices all around from the room expressing concern and sympathy for me and cuz, and that felt almost as nice as the hug did.
"Right, gonna move on," Joe said. "Next issue in the labs are the sentinels, but I'm assuming that if we have a steady oil supply and no one's in a vulnerable emotional state that leaves them more susceptible to possession, that you can just use your Solvers to mangle the robo-raptors--"
"Wait, there are robot dinosaurs down there?" Kelsey blurted out.
"Yeah, and that's where Joe ripped the bootloop light off from," cuz confirmed.
" You figured out the bootloop frequency ?" Mama asked.
" That's what you used to knock people out?!?" Thad asked.
"Bootloop?" Penny inquired about the term.
"Evidently, drones have a hardware weakness where if a flash of light hits their optics at a very specific frequency, it sends them into a reboot loop that lasts around 10 minutes. All the sentinels have a bootloop flasher built into their heads. I figured it out by brute-forcing it."
" You literally just flashbanged yourself for days on end, didn't you? " I asked him.
"One hundred and forty-four hours of nothing but flashing myself with a custom designed bulb," he confirmed.
"I can really respect the dedication," Liz said.
"Thanks for trusting me with a crucifix that had one of those built in, Joe," Emily said.
"Can I bake that into my Khan-grade riot-shield?" Trevor asked.
Joe grinned. "We'll fabricate you a new one with it integrated into the original design, dude."
" Awesome ," Trevor replied.
"So we got robo-dinosaurs that can paralyze people and then rip them apart?" Thad asked.
"Yeah, but unlike canon, I can tweak our visors so that it slightly alters oncoming light. Hell, I figured out a way to have them block that specific frequency of light automatically about a month back. And it's a really specific frequency of light, too. Literally wearing sunglasses is enough to keep you safe. Darren would already be immune. And between having three Solver Drones on hand, any DDs we might turn--"
" DDs ?" I asked.
"Disassembly Drones," cuz said.
"Right, the 'politically correct' way to call the Murder Drones," Liz recalled. Rebecca shook her head, grinning. I couldn't really keep a small grin off my own face.
"Moving on," Joe continued, "I'm also, you know, gonna give everyone a bunch of stupidly OP guns. So… bullets work really well at killing things that can't shoot you back and have their stunlock effectively hardcountered."
" Anything else? " I asked.
"Yeva," Joe said, "you remember 017-GIAM?"
Mama growled a second time. " What the hell did that child-stealing monster Alice do this time? "
"Child-stealing?" Joe asked, eyemotes showing alarm.
" I saved a UNN that was in the labs for… " Mama paused, and I glanced down to see her glare at nothing. " I can't remember. He had blue eyemotes. I'd gotten him out of the labs, but I was in a bad mental state, so when Khan and Mikhail found us at Camp 98.7, Mikhail took the child from me since he was scared I'd have a nervous breakdown and accidentally hurt or drop them. Alice showed up, held a knife to his throat, and kidnapped the UNN. We never saw either of them again. "
"Huh," Joe remarked. "Beau origin story."
" Did your show really have that little world-building? " Mama asked him.
"Gods you have no idea how little background info it gave!" Joe complained.
" I think it's amazing that you've gotten so much done with so little information to work with, " I told Joe.
He gave me a genuine smile. "Thanks, Dolly."
" You're welcome ."
"So!" Joe said. "Alice kidnapped Beau, became a crazy cannibal lady, and set up shop in the labs and gave Beau creepy spider limbs and somehow integrated a DD arm onto him too while leaving him stuck in a pill-baby for two decades. She's a fucking nutcase, but credit where it's due, between her own actions and corralling the sentinels, she kept any DD teams that reached the labs from getting past her and jumping down the flesh pit to resume the Core Collapse."
"WHAT?!?" Thad asked.
"If a disassembly drone with the Solver as an Admin jumps down the flesh pit, the Solver can assume direct control and kick the Core Collapse off all over again," cuz said.
"Definitely can't let Alice walk, even if it's partly Nori's fault for terrorizing her into insanity in the first place, but she kinda has kept us all alive for over a decade, so that's a mitigating factor," Joe said. "We're still taking Beau away from her though. Poor kid became an adult but is still stuck in a pill-baby. Gonna build that dude a new body as soon as we save him."
I realized something. " Mama… if Alice hadn't kidnapped Beau, would I have had an older brother? "
Mama took a moment to respond. " Not by code, but yes ."
"I could have had another cousin?!?" Uzi shouted. "I'm gonna rip Alice's arms off with my Solver!" A beat, and then, "Whenever I actually unlock it."
"She's a CF test subject. Even if she apparently couldn't use the Solver herself, she's still non-interactive," Joe said, and cuz slumped.
"Damnit!" she muttered. "Forgot she'd be immune." Right , I realized. Like Object Non-Interactive.
"We can still shoot her kneecaps, though!" Penny said.
"I'm down for shooting a baby-napping cannibal lady in the kneecaps," Liz agreed. Cuz started laughing.
" I'm gonna stab her for stealing a brother from me, " I added.
" I'll make her regret that, " Mama said.
"You know," Thad said. "Holding people at knifepoint and kidnapping infants and then eating people is really uncool. I don't have any problems with that."
"Yeah," Kelsey agreed.
"Make her do penance!" Emily said.
Trevor gave a resolute nod.
"I'm gonna shoot her stupid antlers off!" Rebecca said.
" Antlers ?" Mama asked.
"She welded antlers onto her head," Darren confirmed.
" Noritovarishch really drove Alice off the deep end, huh ?" Mama asked. " Almost makes me pity Alice. Almost . Probably gonna yell at Nori for that one too, though. "
"Getting down the 'secret' elevator," Joe said with air quotes, "that's literally fucking labelled won't be an issue either. I found camp 98.7 on publicly available maps, so we can scour the place for Nori's keybug to open it up at any point."
"They labelled a secret elevator?" Trevor asked.
" They did ," Mama confirmed
"Humans are dumbasses," Joe said. He jerked a thumb at himself. "Case in point."
"Yeah, but you're our dumbasss, Joe," Liz said.
He smiled back. "Thanks. But to get back on-topic, technically, with the elevator labelled, we don't even need the keybug. I could just use explosive charges to open the floor and rappel down. Hell, if we're not in a hurry, I could use blowtorches to open the floor and ceiling and then juryrig the elevator to bypass the keybug entirely. I'd prefer the keybug just because of the convenience , but it's not necessary , strictly speaking."
" So you do have a full plan for the labs already, " Mama said. " That's… that's relieving. "
Joe rolled his optics. " One more big issue before we go over what's past the elevator though. Alice… has an entire oven full of all the DD cores she nabbed, since she apparently wasn't confident enough to try killing them properly. Which, you know, understandable when failure would have meant a Solverpede."
"She has an entire oven full of Murder Drone cores?" Thad asked.
"To paraphrase her from canon, the heat keeps them sluggish," Joe confirmed. "Some of those cores might also belong to other test subjects from the labs that didn't escape during the Core Collapse. The sentinels canonically get 029-AMDA and then Alice harvests her for parts later, after all."
" Amanda ?" Mama asked. " She was a sweet girl. I'd hope we can save her ."
"Huh, so that was her name," Joe remarked.
"Robo-Jesus that show did not have any worldbuilding, huh?" Liz asked.
Joe threw his hands up. "I knooooooooow !!!" He sighed, and then recollected himself. "There's also a chance we might be able to turn any DD cores in the oven as well… assuming they aren't feral."
"Feral?" Penny asked.
"Cyn canonically confirmed that she kept JNV's original personalities in-tact. We never actually see any other DDs in the show that are alive, so there's a popular fan theory that while the Solver may have also employed other intelligent teams, that there are plenty of MDs out there that literally are the feral animals most people on Copper 9 think they are."
"So… other Cabin Fever test subjects potentially in the oven, and definitely DDs we might be able to turn," Liz said.
"Yep," Joe confirmed. "Anyways, hazards of the labs proper dealt with, the mines under the labs are mostly annoying because there's a maze… and canonically, there's a fucking torture chamber somewhere down there too--"
" Please don't remind me ," Mama begged.
"Sorry!" Joe apologized. Mama gave him a tendril raised that probably was supposed to be a thumbs-up, and then he continued. "Anyways, get past the maze that's partly overgrown with Solver Flesh, and then we have the Cathedral at the bottom where Nori is, and under there, a bunch of tunnels Nori dug while looking for the Patch. Obviously, we'd bring down mining equipment to speed that up, and also have everyone down there carry some USB compatible storage drives to copy the Patch on the spot if they find the 2.1.8 Crucifix USB."
"And that's everything in the labs?" Emily asked.
"Besides the lockers they stuffed magnet-sedated test subjects into, and some other stuff that while not dangerous is disturbing and might trigger Yeva? That's it," Joe said. He took a breath. "As for tackling it, theoretically, we could be ready to do that with just a couple months of training once you're all in combat frames… but I'd prefer proper power armor first. As well as everyone getting a good amount of combat experience. I don't wanna take risks with Cabin Fever if we don't have to. Plus, if we raid it, and clear out Alice and the sentinels, we'd need to set up a permanent garrison of the place, for any Solver-controlled DDs that try to get down to the flesh pit do resume the Core Collapse. There were a lot of DD bodies in the labs, and we have no idea how long they were there. Theoretically, there could have been another team that arrived just days before Uzi and Co did in canon, and that would still be years into our future. We'd need to be prepared for that."
"Man," cuz remarked. "You tell us all so much, and it still surprises me just how much you think about all this."
"Yeah," Thad admitted. "You do actually plan this stuff… I still think I was justified to be mad, but you are actually thinking this through."
"Thad," Joe said, "that was a completely justified crashout. I… I've never coped with any of this well, and acting like a jackass all the time is how I avoid having a nervous breakdown, because there's an Eldritch Horror literally out to kill us all so I can't even say I'm being paranoid."
Cuz walked over to Joe and gave him a hug, that he instantly returned… I wanted to be able to be another person he could rely on to keep himself sane, I thought. Someone he could hug so he wouldn't break down .
"Thanks, Uzi," he said.
"No prob, Joe."
"You…" Kelsey said. "You're… really stressed about all this, all the time, huh?"
"He, like, had a nervous breakdown when he realized we were in some kind of AU," Rebecca said. I looked on with mounting concern.
"He threw up earlier today when he had a flashback to cuz's death," Uzi said, and my optics hollowed when I realized I hadn't really focused on that past asking if Joe was okay when it came up earlier because of everything else going on.
"That's what you had nightmares about? You had to code a program to remove your ability to dream entirely because you kept having nightmares about our deaths? " I asked.
Joe looked away. "Yeah," he whispered.
I set Mama back down on the couch, and then shot up and ran over to him to hug him too. Not even a romantic one, but because he was still my friend and he'd been hurting for so long about all this and he needed a hug.
"Fuck," Thad said. "You… you really do give a shit, and all the dumb stuff is just your way to cope with the stress of trying to manage everything, huh?"
Joe nodded, and then untangled an arm from cuz to hug me back. "Hugs are nice," he whispered. "And you being warm is nice, too, Dolly."
I fought down a blush. I was gonna be better than Liz, dammnit! " And I like that you're cool ," I told him.
"Thanks," he said. We held the hug for a few more seconds, and then he started to pull back and we all went back to our seats again. Joe sat there for a few more seconds, and then started to talk again. "So, when we tackle Cabin Fever, we need to have the whole Outpost militarized and on board with my bullshit so that we can set up a permanent garrison on the labs."
"And also," Darren chimed in, "We need to turn JNV, because any permanent supply chain will be fucked with hostile MDs on our front door."
"Why do you keep using both terms?" Liz asked.
"Joe came up with it," Darren said. "Murder Drones for ones we haven't turned and Disassembly Drones for ones we do get on our side."
"That… that actually makes sense," Liz said.
Joe gave a small grin at Liz, that she returned. Robo-god I want to take turns making out with them , I thought, and then mentally slapped myself in the face because I'd just told myself I wasn't gonna be as bad as Liz. Joe did not need me being as down bad as Liz was, damnit!
Joe took in a breath, and his grin got a bit wider, "So, for now, I kit you all out with weapons of your choice, the combat frames, you all start training with guns and more seriously with melee, keep farming the local DDs for parts--"
"Okay, you're definitely making them pay for everything, huh?" Trevor remarked.
"Yeah, I almost feel bad for them," Emily agreed. " Almost ," she said with a bit of acid leaking into her tone. A beat, and then, "Okay, maybe I do feel a little bad for N…"
"But we keep fighting them and stealing parts for my own projects that I can't discuss because of possession risk," Joe continued, "and then we also start exploring further out."
"Further out?" Liz asked.
"We have hoverbikes already," cuz said.
"Thanks again for that hoverboard, Thad," Joe said. "Used that to reverse engineer the system without the police backdoors that could get them shut down remotely."
"Okay, I already said it, but damn , you really are thinking this all through, huh?" Thad replied.
"Yep!" Joe said with a grin. "And now that we have the dronepower, we can get to work on a secret exit tunnel for vehicles, and then use those hoverbikes to get further out. I wanna reach other Outposts. Get some proper fucking lore and worldbuilding." Cuz and I weren't the only people to snicker at Joe's eager expression on saying that. "See if there are other DDs we might be able to turn. I'm interested in checking out other stuff in the world in general as well as Neo New Falun in particular at some point, because everything I've read suggests they have gigantic oil stockpiles there. We have time. There is no need to rush for CF Labs."
" That's a good idea, honestly, " I said.
"Yeah," Liz agreed.
"Honestly glad you're willing to take your time on this," Thad said.
"I'm down to explore the post-apocalyptic wasteland! It'll be like some kinda crossover between Fallout and Cyberpunk in real life!" Penny piped up.
"I am so fucking happy we broke you out of your shell, Penny," Joe said.
"Like, robo-Jesus, you're so awesome, Penny!" cuz said.
Penny blushed and looked away. "Thanks, guys," she said.
"Is there anything else important?" Kelsey asked.
"Not anything crazy enough to delay getting Yeva back into a real body, no," Joe said. "We can run back over the Elliot Manor and most of the other context I know thanks to the 4th Wall after that."
I perked up. " I wanna hug Mama for real ," I said. " I want her to hug me back ."
" So do I, Kukolka ," Mama said.
Joe stood up. "Let's get that started then," he said, and the rest of us stood up to follow.
We were back in Vault 1 now, standing over a Drone Maintenance Station that was currently holding a combat frame that matched Mama's proportions, with a generic grey shirt next to it and pants the same color already on it. Mama was on my shoulder as we looked it over, and Uzi started booting up the station. The body's chest was currently open, and there was no core, the whole thing set up in such a manner that Mama should be able to just hop into it and then they seal the chest shut, and let her take over the body. I… I was nervous. I was a little scared something was gonna go wrong. Liz noticed, and was holding my hand while giving me a gentle smile, and she wasn't even blushing at all, which meant she was fighting down her crush to comfort me , which was… she was so amazing! I tightened my grip on her hand while Mama gave the body one last glance.
" Who did the hair? " she asked. " It's really well done ."
Rebecca stood on her tip-toes as she visibly preened at the compliment. "Thank you, ma'am!"
Penny stepped up. "Hey, Mrs. Matryoshka? Do you have anything you want to wear in specific later? I'm gonna have access to an IGMP now, so I'd love to make something for you!"
Mama glance over to her. " I'd like something with a gaming aesthetic, preferably with a controller on the front of the shirt. "
"Pants or skirt?" Penny asked, grin widening.
" Can you do shorts and a T-shirt? "
"I'll have it done within hours once Joe lets me at the printer!" Penny said, positively beaming. "Thank you so much! "
" You're welcome, " Mama told her.
"We're ready," Joe said.
I stiffened. Liz squeezed my hand. "Dolly, Joe and Uzi have this handled. Trust them, okay?"
I glanced over to Liz, and saw the earnest smile on their face. " I'm scared ," I admitted.
"Cuz, we promise Aunt Yeva will be fine," Uzi said.
" Kukolka, I promise I won't leave you again, " Mama told me.
I closed my visual feed, grimaced, and then took in a breath and slowly let it out, before giving a single nod and walking forwards. Mama clambered down my arm and into the open body. " I love you, Mama ," I blurted out.
Mama paused in the middle of tucking herself into the open chest cavity. She looked back up at me. " I love you too, Doll. " She finished settling in, and then looked at Joe at the control panel. " I'm ready ."
Joe gave a thumbs up, and started pressing buttons. The mechanical arms of the Maintenance Station unfurled and within seconds, the torso of the combat frame was sealed back up and I couldn't see Mama anymore. The procedure finished, and everything went back to its starting position. The body didn't move. One second. Two. Three. Four. No lights on the display. I gripped Liz's hand harder. Five. Six. Seven. Liz pulled me into a hug and I latched onto her, terrified that something went wrong. Eight. Nine. Ten--
A red reboot circle lit up on the display on the combat frame's face. I stared, daring to hope , and then it blinked away, and two red eyemotes flashed to life. Mama sat up and raised a hand to her head. " Oh wow , it feels weird suddenly being this tall again after just getting used to being that short ."
"I'm still over a foot shorter than my first life," Joe groused.
Liz let go of me, and I glanced at her for a moment. [Go hug her, Dolly] popped up on her visor.
I didn't even wait to run. I straight teleported to Mama's side and then wrapped my arms around her as I buried my face into her chest for the first time in over three and a half years, and I started bawling with joy. " MAMA!!! " I screamed.
I felt arms wrap around me. They were warm. They were arms I knew , even if the body was technically different. The arms tightened and pulled me close. " I'm here, Kukolka ," Mama told me. " I'll never leave you again ."
" Mama ," I said, voice coming out hoarse as I kept crying.
" I love you, Doll ."
" I love you too, Mama ."
Discussing the future more could wait a few minutes. Figuring out the crushes I'd just realized I had could wait. Figuring out my Solver could wait. Joe's upgrades and plans could wait. Everything could wait. My Mama was hugging me. And I was hugging her. It had been three and a half years since the last time I'd properly hugged Mama. The rest of the galaxy could wait five more minutes.
(Serial Designation U)
I grunted and shoved the power cable's plug into the port it was supposed to connect to. "It's in, H!" I called out over the call.
"Giving it a test!" He called back. Two seconds passed, and then there was a sudden whir as lights turned on and equipment hummed to life. I eased myself out of the panel of the generator I was arm deep in and then turned around. My wings flared as I started to bound back to the control room, flying where possible and running through doorways or when the halls were too small.
"It worked!" I shouted with a laugh as I came into the room where H was running some stuff on a master control panel.
He sat back, and turned and got up as I reached him and we hugged. I gave him a big kiss right on the lips that he returned with gusto. He pulled back and we grinned at each other. "I knew U would get it!"
I snorted at the terrible pun. "Three weeks to fix this place up, though," I told him, leaning in and putting my forehead up against his. "I'm glad we did."
"I'm glad the place was intact enough to actually fix it up," H softly remarked as we held one another. Our tails wrapped around each other, stingers clinking together. "I can't believe that you actually went through all the trouble of looting every hardware store and factory in the city to get the stuff together just to fix this place up for me."
I pulled back a little and looked him in the facial optics cupping the side of his face with a hand. "You told me that you wanted to dance in the sky with me under a full moon. I knew that the astronomy and weather station here had a good chance of being connected to any surviving satellites. We can map out the lunar cycle, and check the weather to know when it's a clear night on a full moon. Not this month, probably, given the death-storm out and about, but hopefully it'll be sooner rather than later!"
H leaned forward and kissed me again. When he pulled back, there were tears of joy threatening to leak from his eyemotes. "Thank you so much , U."
"I love you, dude," I told him.
"I love you too."
I wanted to give him that fantasy almost as much as he wanted it himself. Dancing in the sky under the light of a full moon ( would be just like when we danced together in the empty ballroom at night in the manor ) would be so amazing. We kissed again, and then I felt H's hand trailing down my waist. He wanted to get frisky , then? I was happy to oblige.
(Serial Designation N)
The tablet the Scrapper gave me was amazing , and had tutorials on how to draw in multiple styles on it too. It'd taken me a while to find that out, but I'd gravitated to anime and manga drawing styles after a bit of experimenting. I, uh… I don't think I was that good at drawing. I knew I was putting in some really heartfelt effort, but… V told me that she liked the drawings I made of the whole squad (I included J specifically so she wouldn't misconstrue it as being a crush thing-- which it wasn't , because I was giving her space!) was nice, but her smile was really strained while looking at it, and I hadn't wanted to show it to J after that. But… I was gonna keep trying, because I was sure I could get better at it! I was already making sure I got inside the lines!
Anyways, J was trying some exciting new business ideas! Since we were ahead of quota, she was rewarding us with a night off! She was hanging out by herself a lot though, ever since that last bout with the Scrapper. She looked… really shook by that, but she wouldn't tell us why . But since I didn't have anything to do tonight, I wanted to do some more drawing. And since J wanted to be left alone, that kinda just left me to hang out with V. Which was really nice! She was nice! As a friend! I was just friends with her, even if I wanted more because she was going through her own stuff and I respected her too much to ask for anything more. She needed a platonic relationship right now, not a romantic one! So I'd be there for her.
Speaking of, "Hey, V?" I asked while staring at my tablet and wondering what to practice drawing next. She looked up from the pile of bodies she was sitting on, staring at a pair of glasses she had in her hands. She looked really contemplative while staring at them. "Do you have any ideas on what I should draw next?"
V startled, seeming to have forgotten that I was there, and then hastily set the glasses back on her face before she looked at me. Sweet Company, she looked really cute with those-- BAD N! I admonished myself. Stop crushing and be a friend! That crushing was probably why she wasn't wearing them even though she needed them in the first place! "I… maybe an animal?"
"An animal?" I hummed as I thought. What animal to try to draw? I wondered. An idea suddenly popped into my head! A golden retriever! I'd love to draw that ( it'd remind V of all the times I tried to draw them back in the Manor ), but then I got the weirdest feeling that V might not like that. So, maybe instead… "What about a cat?"
V blinked owlishly, and wow that looked cute with those glas-- bad N! V tiled her head. "A cat?"
"Is there a problem with that?" I asked, concerned my second guess was also wrong.
"No!" she said, and then settled back into an air of mostly indifference. "A cat's fine."
"Cool!" I said, and I got to work on my tablet straight away. A couple minutes went by.
"Can… can I watch?" V suddenly asked.
I blinked. I… wasn't expecting that. "You… wanna watch me draw? I thought you'd… wanna go hunt even while it's a day off…"
"I… maybe I want to hang out, as… just friends…"
Oh! That was really nice! "Sure!" I said. "I love doing anything!" V smiled at that, but something about that smile felt the slightest bit off, like it was a mask with the tiniest crack in it… ah well, I was probably imagining that! I made some room on the chunk of concrete I'd dragged in, since sitting on the dead husks of non-sapient workers wasn't really comfortable. "Come on!" I invited.
V hesitated for just a moment, face impassive, before she started to walk over, sitting down a totally respectable and not romantic at all distance from me, which I totally respected and made a conscious effort to not scooch closer as I drew… I still needed to work on the eyes for my drawings. "Is there a tracing program on there?" V asked me.
"A what?"
"Is there a program built into the drawing program that lets you superimpose an image to trace it? That might help with practice," V told me.
I fiddled around with the app for a second. There was one! I pulled up the guide on how to draw anime stuff and pulled an image of a cat drawn in the style and slapped the now-transparent picture in front of my own drawing. Oh, wow , that made it so much easier to figure it out! "Thanks V!" I shouted, my tail wagging.
V glanced away for a second, before looking back at me. "You're welcome, N." I gave her a smile, and then went back to drawing. This felt really nice ( like those times we sat in the Manor just holding hands ), just sitting there near V and drawing. Maybe we could do this more often.
There was a whistle of bladed wings, and I perked up and stopped my drawing-- I think I was starting to actually improve --to watch as J suddenly came down. She looked… not better , but more nervous than stressed. "Hey J!" I called out.
V went still, and then that small bit of friendliness she had seeped out of her to return to her usual apathy. "J," V said in a bored tone.
"Can I speak to you for a minute, N?" J asked. "Privaely?" V was staring right at her now.
"Sure!" I said. I pocketed my tablet, and went to follow. V was watching us both as we walked around to the other side of the pod, all the way until we were out of sight.
J looked me in the facial optics for a second, and I gave her a smile, but then she glanced away, looking… guilty of all things? About what? I wondered. "N…" she started, and then grimaced. She got more resolute and then looked right at me again. "N, you're a valued member of this squad, and firstly, I wanted to apologize for all the uncalled for workplace harassment I've given you over the years."
"Huh?" I said. What harassment?
J blinked, looking poleaxed for a moment. "The yelling, the reprimands, those times I smacked you in the back of the head, that was all wrong of me!" she whisper-shouted, suddenly looking embarrassed .
"That was harassment?" I asked. "I thought it was just aggressive encouragement to do better?"
J's mouth opened for a few seconds, and she just stared at me. " Yes, it was harassment! " she hissed.
"Oh," I said… I processed that for a second. Huh… wow, J was kinda mean to me in the past, I thought. That recontextualizes a lot of previous interactions. Still… "Well, you haven't been doing it recently, and since you're apologizing now, that means you're trying not to do it again! So I forgive you!"
J looked floored again. "Just… just like that?"
"Yeah," I told her. "You've proven you're trying to do better, and yeah, learning that it was all apparently harassment kinda hurts, but you just apologized and clearly don't intend to keep doing it, so we're fine!" J grimaced, glancing away, looking guilty and haunted by something. "Are… are you oka--"
"N?" J suddenly asked. "You… you tend to wander the city the most. Do you know anywhere in the city that's likely to have paper journals that are intact?"
Oooooookay , I thought. Obvious subject change is obvious, but I'm not pressing . I went and sent her a coordinate ping via squad comms. "I marked a JCJarnes N Noble for you, J."
J looked down at the ground. "Thanks, N…" she said in a low, tired voice.
"J?" I asked. She opened her mouth, but I spoke up. "Do… do you want a hug?" I braced to get yelled at--
Two arms wrapped around me. I blinked, and realized J of all drones was hugging me. Her breath hitched. "You're better than me, N," J whispered. She swallowed. "I don't deserve your forgiveness."
I hesitantly hugged her back. I… I honestly wasn't actually expecting her to do it. "You're my friend, J. Yeah, there was some… rough stuff, and that hurt a little now that I realize what it really was, but… you're trying to do better, and you're going through something right now. You don't deserve me being mad at you on top of that."
"I…" J trailed off, and I pulled back a bit to see her facial optics were hollow. "N… If I get--" she cut herself off. "I… I'm gonna get a paper journal to write in. I'm gonna leave it in the bottom drawer on the night table in my quarters. If… if I start treating you terribly again, and I act like I don't remember things, I'm giving you permission to go into my quarters to get that journal. This goes above anything I tell you later, especially if it looks like I'm forgetting things. I… I want you to force me to read what I wrote in it if you have to."
"J?" I asked, getting really concerned.
"Promise me you'll do that!" she begged. "Promise me!"
I was confused, and frightened a little bit, but J looked really desperate, and I didn't wanna make her upset. "I promise, J."
J slowly took in a breath. She tightened the hug for a moment, and then stepped back. "Thanks, N."
I was still confused, but put on a happy smile as I replied. "You're welcome J."
J stepped back some more, flared her wings to take flight, but then paused. "Good luck with your drawing."
I blinked twice, and then I had a beaming smile on my face. "Thanks, J!" I called out. She gave me a small smile and then flew off, winging out of the Spire. I waited a moment, and then started to stroll back to V to get back to drawing… maybe once I got better at it, I'd try a drawing of J as a human. I had the weirdest feeling she'd like it ( from all the times I caught her drawing herself as a human in the Manor, I was pretty sure she almost wanted to be one, just so she could be a better friend and confidant to Tessa ), as long as I did it with a decent amount of actual skill.
"So, what'd J want?" V asked as I got back.
I thought for a moment. That talk was… kinda personal. Probably said in confidence. "Wanted to know where a JCJarnes N Noble was. I think she wanted paper to record…" I blindly flailed for a convincing lie, "quota numbers on!"
V raised an eyemote at me, but then shrugged. "Yeah, that checks out for J. At least she's getting out of her funk."
I gave a nervous laugh. "Haha, yeah… soooooooo, what color do you want the cat to be?"
"...Black?"
"Alright!" I said as I sat back down. Then I thought for a second as I got back to drawing. "Hey, V?"
"Yeah?"
"Where'd you get the new glasses from?" V was silent. I stopped, and looked up at her. She was frozen completely still. "V?" I asked, getting concerned.
"The… the sniper girl left a whole crate of glasses in my prescription on my patrol route," she said.
"Oh, that was real nice of her," I said. "Man, Darkxwolf16 is so nice! It's a shame she's not sapient!" It really was. She was adorable. I bet we could all be great friends if she wasn't a malfunctioning corrupted sub-sapient AI I had to disassemble.
V froze. "N." I froze. I did not like that tone at all . "How do you know that name?"
I crumbled in two seconds. "They're the ones who gave me the tablet! Please don't take it away from me! Please don't tell J! I like drawing! I really like drawing on it!" I begged, clutching the tablet close to my chest. I scrambled for any ideas on how to force V to let me keep it.
V was quiet for a few seconds. I looked on, scared she was gonna shoot it or something. "I… I'm not gonna take it away or tell J, N… but you need to remember that those workers, they're corrupted , N--"
"And really dangerous," I finished. "I know , V. It's just… it was a gift … and that felt really nice…" I suddenly had an idea. V admitted that Darkxwolf16 gave her a whole crate of glasses. I could… I could threaten to tell J about that if V did anything to the tablet. I blinked. Wow , I thought, that was dark … but could also work …
V sighed. "Is it gonna get in the way of you doing your job N? Please don't lie to me."
I looked her in the face. "It won't, V."
V stared at me impassively for a few moments, and then sighed. "Fine, I'll keep quiet."
I sighed in relief. "Oh, thank goodness. I was worried I was gonna have to blackmail you about the glasses for a second."
V actually sputtered. "N?!?"
"I didn't want to !" I protested. "I just… I really want to keep the tablet! And… and I won't tell J about the glasses!"
V stared at me for a few seconds. "Huh, we're basically blackmailing each other regardless…"
I blinked at the realization that even if we didn't want to, we technically were mutually blackmailing one another. I started to laugh. V joined me. It felt… really nice.
(Yeva)
Hours had gone by since I'd hugged my daughter, my sweet Kukolka, for the first time in three and a half years. I still struggled to wrap my mind around that. It… it felt like hours since that monst-- I had to take a moment in Joseph's overclock program to collect myself --since V had torn my guts apart, but Doll had lost her father and spent three and a half years without me. She'd spent three of those with our bodies in our hab. That… that was beyond terrifying to contemplate what kind of trauma my sweet little girl had gone through. I… I wasn't happy with some of Joseph's decisions, but I owed him a lot for looking after my daughter as much as he had. For helping her heal from that horrible day. For… for watching over her as she grew up without me. And… it hurt to know I missed those years. That she spent them without me to care for her.
But I was back now. I was here to stay. Robo-god help the Solver when it showed up if it thought it could so much as look at my daughter or my niece, because it would need divine intervention to save it from what I was going to do to it. Nori's death had broken me in a way. Except she wasn't dead, which was something I'd verbally tear Norito-Dorito a new waste ejection port over later. But regardless, I'd stewed in my own trauma for far too long. I nearly ruined everything because of that. I wasn't going to ruin this second chance. I'd teach my Kukolka everything I knew about managing and using the Solver, and I'd teach Uzi everything I knew as soon as hers went active… which may have been sooner rather than later, considering that Joseph had told me that he was willing to try and manually unlock it once Uzi was twelve, if she still wanted it then.
Regardless of my own contemplation of my second chance and what I'd do with it, several hours had gone by after I'd given Doll that hug she so desperately wanted as she cried in my arms… and despite everything, I could never thank Uzi and Joseph enough for giving me, giving Doll , that moment. Joseph had explained so many things I felt the beginnings of a processor ache developing. About what he knew of the future, what he could safely disclose about his plans with Uzi and Doll present-- I prayed we could get the Patch for them both --and all the things he's learned and built since his arrival to Copper 9. The children who didn't have Joseph's "combat frames" yet-- and those things shocked me for how much he put into them --had started to get tired from all the emotional upheaval and staying online far longer than they usually did. My Kukolka had leaned against me, and I'd held her close as she'd slowly but surely drifted to sleep in my arms, a pure, genuine smile on her face as she rested. We'd called things for the night shortly afterwards, and everyone save Joseph had returned to their homes. Uzi had offered to use the absurd strength of her own combat frame to carry Doll back to Khan's hab-- it still boggled my mind that Khan got better and had finally taken Doll in after my death, even if it took a few years and him getting socked in the face --and had told me she was going to sleep in the same bed as Doll so that she wouldn't wake up alone and think everything was a dream and then fly into a full-blown panic. I… I owed Uzi a lot too. I had to make up for so much with her.
It still terrified me just how much time I lost, even if I was ready to push past that for my remaining family's sakes. Everything changed over the time I was in an oil-starved coma. And it could have all gone so much worse if it wasn't for one of the most unlikely circumstances possible to intervene. The man sitting across from me had watched over not just my own daughter, but Nori's daughter, and then nearly a dozen other hurt children besides, solely because he knew a future where things were worse and resolved to change that. And he still spent that time preparing for the Solver on top of everything else. I… after all the initial emotions of the night had died down, when I looked at him after he stopped constantly using that overclock program he'd made, I could tell he was burdened and stressed by everything looming over his head beyond belief. He was shouldering the fates of everyone he had come to care about. He did things that were stupid, yes. Things I didn't approve of. Even if only semi -intentionally, he'd still gotten Uzi to develop feelings for the Murder Drone who killed my husband , and I was furious about that… but everything he'd said was the truth. V was a victim of the Solver too. That wouldn't stop me from hating her, from wanting some kind of recompense… but everyone I knew had moved on from my apparent death. Doll… my sweet Kukolka… if she had grown so much in the past years that she was willing to let this happen ( after she beat the shit out of V, which I was admittedly proud of how willing to enact violence on V she was)... I could settle for striking the fear of the Solver into her at a later date, and hopefully nearly murdering her as well.
Perhaps it was for the best that Joseph wanted to keep me in reserve though. I don't think I'd be able to hold myself back if I saw V any time soon, and my new frame was much better equipped to fight her now.
Mikhail was now resting lying in a coffin Joseph made from the same materials Khan made his doors out of. Doll had evidently said her own goodbyes before attempting to revive me, and Joseph had given me space to say my own in silence. I'd broken down into ugly sobs as I mourned. I'd lost my husband , Doll's father . If I didn't need to hold myself together for Doll's and Uzi's sakes, I think I would have fallen apart worse than when Nori had "died."
Joseph didn't say a word when I came back out of that room an hour later, just walked up and offered me a hug. I took it. It felt… surreal, to hug someone that looked like they were in a teenage frame, but were in reality a former human from the other side of the 4th Wall that was over 30. Still younger than me by over a decade, but older than his peers by a notable margin. Part of me wished that I could talk to Khan, but Joseph was right that confronting him after coming back from the dead probably wasn't the best idea.
I came out of that contemplation and the overclock that let me do it so fast, briefly feeling a sensation of vertigo as I snapped back to real-time. It… it was truly ridiculous , the program that Joseph had come up with. I wholeheartedly agreed with his assessment of it: overclocks were cheating at life . And he's already passed the software version onto my daughter and all her friends. He intended to make them bodies as powerful as the one he made for me, which itself had a strength limiter that can be toggled so as not to accidentally destroy things or maim people outside of combat. I was also impressed and slightly disturbed by just how detailed the dream disabling program he gave her is.
"So…" Joe said. "Back to real time?"
" Your overclock program is complete bullshit ," I told him.
He snorted. "Thanks, I cheated hard to come up with it, and both myself and later Uzi have been improving the thing constantly ."
I rolled my eyemotes, and took a sip from an oil can. I needed more in the short term as my core acclimated to the new frame and Solver tissue grew inside of me… I felt so bad for my Kukolka that she had to deal with that without me for so long. " I'd be ever so slightly annoyed that you're so flippant about it, but considering what we're fighting, the cheating is arguably necessary to make sure we all survive. And you have established that you act like this as a coping mechanism, so I won't begrudge you for it. Healthier than how I handled things, anyways. "
Joseph suddenly stiffened. "Ah! Before I forget!" He reached into his coat, and pulled out some kind of thick syringe. "Oil vial, or technically an o-stimm." He held it out to me. "Think of it like an emergency oil epi-pen or adrenaline shot for Solver Drones. Been keeping them on me for years now. The needle means I can just inject it anywhere, so I have options even if one of you went feral."
I took the offered syringe. " You… you really are trying to prepare for everything, aren't you? "
"It's not paranoia if an Eldritch Horror actually is out to kill us!" he said with a slight grin. "Uzi carries one of those at all times too. And I'll give Doll one first thing in the morning." He sat back a bit. "And… I just wanna thank you again for finally giving me the location for Cabin Fever Labs to put down on my maps. I knew the general area since it'd be near the blast zone for the boom that killed all the humans, but still, saves me a lot of time and worry to finally have that marked down."
" You're welcome, " I told him. " Now… " I took a moment to use his overclock program to collect my thoughts. " What can you tell me that you can't tell Doll or Uzi? "
Joseph leaned forwards, suddenly becoming serious. "How we actually beat the Solver, as well as my plans to Solver-Proof Workers. Wanna walk with me to where we keep all the Disassembly Drone parts, so we can talk and then I can show you when we get there?"
" Those parts are secure , right? " At this point, I believed he would have them kept safe, but he'd said it himself when it came to paranoia; it wasn't a factor where the Solver was concerned.
"Isolated room in a Faraday Cage-- which was a later idea that Uzi had which we remodeled for --with a single entrance and the whole place rigged to be doused in fluoroantimonic acid in the event of a containment breach. Not that we've had any issues at all so far, but better safe than sorry. The interior walls, ceiling, and floor are coated in teflon, and the exterior walls are made of the same stuff Khan builds the Doors with. It's as secure as I can make it with conventional means."
I nodded. " Okay. Walk and talk it is, Joseph. "
I downed the rest of my oil, focusing my solver and warping the vial Joseph had passed me into my pocket-dimensional storage. "You know, you can call me Joe, if you want. All my friends call me that."
" Are we friends? " I asked him. " You're the reason my niece is attracted to the person who killed my husband and put me in a coma for three and a half years ."
Joseph slumped his shoulders. "Yeah… I don't have an excuse for that. For what it's worth… I don't mind if you hate me. I… kinda expected it, to be honest. Doll… not hating me… I don't deserve that." He was looking at the ground.
" You don't ," I bounty said. " But you did do an amazing job helping my daughter in the years I was gone. That's why I'm willing to work with you here. And… as much as I hate to admit it, going out to confront V myself will either end with her death and bringing the Solver here early, or her surviving and calling the Solver here early. "
"Man, logic really fucking sucks sometimes, huh?"
I looked at him, and gave him a cold stare. " My daughter trusts you implicitly. If you break that trust, I will kill you where you stand. "
Joseph looked right back with the gaze of a man ready to die, and that unnerved me. "Crystal clear, Yeva." He looked away, and sighed. "Right, so I'll just get over with the canon ending then. Uzi telefrags the Solver because it was fucking around and she correctly predicted where it would glitch back into reality. She rips its core out, and [NULL]s a hole through the planet. The light of day comes through to vaporize the Primary Host's Core, but then because of Eldritch Bullshittery, since of course it isn't that easy, the singularity inside the Core surrounds them with a sphere of un-light. With the singularity in her hand, Uzi's confronted by the still moving body of the Solver sans its core trying to eat its own singularity again, and--"
I knew my anime thanks to Nori. " Uzi eats it instead, doesn't she? "
Joe snorted. "Yep!" he said, popping the P. "Now, keep in mind, in canon, the Solver eats Doll's core out of her torn open chest cavity not two hours before this-- which is something I won't let happen --so if you go frame by frame from Uzi's POV as she's glitching out right after doing that, you can see her UI briefly swap to Doll's. So Doll canonically survives as a Force Ghost in Uzi's OS. Other problem with that, though, is that so does the Solver . Uzi's in control, she's essentially assimilated the Solver into herself and became it , and I'll go over the Hologram Theory with you later, but the Solver and/or Cyn is still in there, and can manifest in Uzi's tail. Which, you know, not ideal. I'd much rather find a way to properly kill the thing. But… I don't really have an idea on how to do that, and I'm fucking terrified of putting Doll or Uzi through that."
The whole time Joseph had been talking, I'd been growing more and more concerned. Everything I'd seen and been told so far said Joe had plans aplenty to actually fight the Solver on ground he rigged in his favor, but… putting my Kukolka through assimilating that thing? Or Uzi ? That wasn't happening. " You're an idiot, Joseph ," I told him, and he actually stuttered a step and tripped, only to tuck into a roll and come out of things fine, before looking back at me. " I'm Patched. I will eat the Solver if it comes to that, and I'm sure you'll still be looking for alternative solutions until the last second regardless. "
Joe took in a breath, staring past me for a few seconds, and then slowly let it out. " Man, I really am an idiot ," he remarked in Russian. " Should have realized that'd be a marginally better option the second you woke back up ." I narrowed my gaze at him. He'd been the only person outside of my family in the entire Outpost I've seen speak my native tongue. I'd seen the glances Doll had been giving him. I'd noticed a blush or two. And again, I knew my anime tropes. The idiot of an Isekai Protagonist in front of me probably didn't even realize it himself. He spent three and a half years gaining the implicit trust of my daughter with only a motive to help her, then revived me. I was reasonably sure I woke back up just in time to witness my daughter realize her first crush… or crushes … I saw the way she looked at Lizzy as well, and the way Lizzy looked at the both of them made me see which way the winds were currently blowing. That Joseph had missed that himself, and that he'd been so adamant about speaking the truth and waiting until Lizzy was legal before committing to a relationship with her …
In the privacy of my thoughts, I'd freely admit that if it wasn't for those factors, this would be a very different conversation that would have involved the use of my Solver. If Joseph broke my daughter's core though, I'd break him . Still, " You are an idiot, " I reiterated. " Just like Nori. Dropping my Core into a bowl of oil is exactly the kind of stupid thing she'd do. "
He gave a self-deprecating laugh. "Tell me something I don't know."
If Nori was here, she would have immediately snarked that Doll had a crush on him and Lizzy. But my tovarishch wasn't here. She was evidently in Cabin Fever Labs and had just never bothered to tell me she was alive . That hurt . It hurt as much as the realization that I'd missed so much of my daughter's life. It hurt as much as the realization that I'd messed things between Doll and Uzi up so horribly. It almost hurt as much as Mikhail's death. I grimaced. I… I couldn't fall apart like I had when Nori faked her death. I needed to be there for Doll, now. I couldn't fail my daughter and niece again.
Joseph brought us through an airlock, and we came into a sizable room absolutely filled with looted Murder Drone parts. "So!" Joseph said, beginning to unlock some of the glass containment units. "My Solver-proofing plans basically boil down to this: Harvest DD parts, make 'em into a suit of armor that covers the whole body, and if that's non-interactive, the drone inside can no longer get no-diff'd by that abomination unto sapience."
I stared at him. That… was so stupidly simple yet smart at the same time, and I was beginning to realize that most of his plans were probably like this. " And you want me to test my Solver to see if various things you've set up using harvested parts are interactive or not? "
"Correct-a-mundo!" Joseph said with a grin. He held out a female model leg. "Can you Solver this?"
I sighed, a melancholic grin on my face because Nori could have been exactly like him if she was in his shoes, and reached out with my hand. That tri-pronged glyph flared to life, red and bright in front of my hand, and I got a message I was already expecting on my HUD: "Like Object Non-Interactive."
" My Solver doesn't work on it ." I told him.
"Figured as much, but I wanted a baseline," he replied. He pulled out two arms that had been cracked open and had their exteriors crudely welded together. "This?" he asked.
I tested. " Still non-interactive ."
He gave me a grin. "Alright, starting to get somewhere. What about this?" He took out some Murder Drone chassis that I could tell what it came from, but looked to be properly cut and welded into a pauldron. I got the same result, and then told him as much. Then he went and got out a helmet. It didn't look like it came from a Murder Drone at all. "Right, this one was a couple wing blades, since they're the most durable part of them, and I smelted it down entirely and reforged it as a helmet. I'm really hoping this is still non-interactive."
I agreed with the sentiment, and reached out for it with my Solver… and got the same message. My eyemotes widened. " It's non-interactive ," I told him.
Joseph pumped his fists in the air. "YES!" he shouted. "Solver-proof armor is a go!" The grin on his face was so wide, the relief in the way he was now holding himself so palpable, that I grinned myself. He calmed down all of the sudden, and I realized he must have overclocked again. "Right," he said. "Last thing is trying to alloy them." He led me a bit further into the room, and opened up a containment unit with a number of estocs. "Made all these for Rebecca. Figuring out how to properly alloy the smelted wing blades with CrCoNi was a fucking bitch and a half , but if it works …" he trailed off and gave me a hopeful glance. I rolled my eyes, but out of all the times I'd been made to perform tests with my Solver that I could recall, his were by far the least invasive and the most likely to help us.
The first sword did lift up with a red [TRANSLATE] when I grabbed for it. I placed it back down. " What was the composition for that one? " I asked, curious.
"Twenty percent DD material by mass. Didn't expect it to work, but was worth a shot," Joseph said. "Next one is forty percent by mass." I lifted that one too. Joseph gestured at the next in line. "Fifty percent by mass." I still lifted it, but it felt the slightest bit like something was resisting me.
" I had slight resistance. Barely noticeable, " I clarified.
Joseph put a hand to his chin. "Interesting. Try the sixty percent DD material by mass?"
That one had a noticeable difficulty to lift, but I could still do it. " Getting harder, " I told him.
"I have a sinking feeling it's gonna be that cliche," he muttered. "Next one is sixty-five percent."
I wondered why he was decreasing the intervals so suddenly, but still went to lift it. Though, it felt slippery in my Solver. " A lot of difficulty. "
"Oh man, it's actually gonna be that," he said, shaking his head. "Sixty-six point six percent exactly."
I raised an eyemote, wondering what the hell he was-- " You can't be serious, " I told him.
"One way to find out," he said.
I groaned, because I was gonna be upset if he was right and it was that cliche, and reached out with my Solver-- " It's non-interactive, damnit, " I confirmed.
"Of fucking course Robot Cthulhu Satan has the ratio of non-interactiblity set exactly at the percentage that matches the number of the beast."
" You've actually been referring to it as Robot Cthulhu Satan? " I asked him. " That wasn't a one-off joke? "
"Tell me it's inaccurate," Joseph dared with a snarky grin.
I laughed. Joe laughed with me. And for the first time since I'd been revived, I began to believe that things might end okay after all…