Cracked Mask

A week passed by, not… comfortably, at least for Uzi, but she was doing better while rooming with Lizzy. Lizzy in turn was working overtime to leverage her Machiavellian Queen Bee status in school to curb bullying attempts on Uzi. The irony of this scenario juxtaposed with my memories of how much they hated one another in canon was not lost on me. Though despite her best efforts, I did have to use my glue dissolver on Uzi's locker a few times, Rebecca came in and socially demolished a band of kids a grade above us when they were trying to corner and verbally harass "Khan's reject," and there was one time Uzi was walking alone and got a bunch of coolant spilled on her in the halls. Darren and Thad had just come around the corner in time to see it happen. None of the three of them would tell me what Thad did in response, but by the time the chat message from Darren had me barrelling around the corner ready to dig a trench through some knees (I'd made a mental note to curb my inner Nora from RWBY), I had to come to a stop and stare in disbelief because the coolest drone on Copper 9 had gotten every last one of the kids involved to literally be in the Dogeza position as they profusely apologized to Uzi and begged for forgiveness. Kelsey had started going everywhere with Uzi after that to keep an eye on her at all times, and thank the gods she did, because she managed to get Doll to not pull a knife on some other kids who were insinuating that Nori was a whore who just shared her code so she could mooch off Khan. Glad I wasn't there for that, because I would have been encouraging Doll to stab the little shits . Trevor had shown up to the altercation, and had literally gotten suspended because he beat the crap out of eight other students, only getting roughed up mildly in the process. His mom was apparently super proud of the guy for standing up for his friends, though, and Emily was gushing about how awesome it was of him to do that even if it was technically morally wrong for hours . Did not help quell my dreams of a Knight's Templar sailing, let me tell you.

Regardless, Uzi was doing better for the most part, and the lot of us were handling the influx of attempted bullying towards her. But man , drone kids could be assholes. I can't imagine Uzi going through all this shit alone in canon, with 99% of her classmates not even recalling her name after all that time. Though, I could imagine the results of that well enough, because canon was said results. That day in particular, we were sat in class that just after lunch, I only had to threaten Chad with gross bodily harm once that morning to get him to back off, and then I had to overclock to avoid hiding my mad cackling when Riley (a classmate of Uzi's who died in the Pilot) shot a spitball at Uzi and then promptly got brained in the back of the head by a Bible thrown by Emily, who (without any overclock, mind you) completely straight-faced a bullshit excuse of the Bible having sailed directly at his head through an Act of God and that she definitely hadn't thrown it at him. Damn, I was so sad she died in canon if she was like this in the background. Like, actually in the contending for Best Girl, and that was impressive considering some of the female roster in Murder Drones (and N, because if Astolfo could actually be voted Best Girl of Anime in 2017, so could N).

That was when the teacher (I'd finally resigned myself to either never learning his name, or only getting to find it out after we killed the Solver) called for the room to quiet down, and said that Khan had an announcement to make to the colony, and set up the projector to give a live feed. The whole group watched with some trepidation, Uzi most of all, when the projector feed swapped to Khan's haggard visage. Dude was still traumatized by the verbal ass-reaming I'd given him apparently, which I couldn't find it in myself to feel bad about. He took a moment to just stare at the screen, before taking an unnecessary breath, and then he began to speak.

"Good afternoon, everyone," he started. "Roughly a week ago, I conducted an interview with Outpost 9. There were things I said in that interview that I should not have, and it was brought to my attention that my words had a very negative effect on someone I deeply care about. That many of my prior actions hurt them too."

The whole room stared in silence, Uzi glaring at the screen. Khan took another breath before he continued. "I have failed as a father. Even… even suggesting that doors are more important than my own child, nevermind actually saying that… that's not something I can forgive myself for. I have caused tremendous emotional, mental, and psychological harm to my own daughter because… no, I can't excuse myself with my own trauma for neglecting her."

Uzi's glare rapidly shifted to wide optics, staring in disbelief. "I should have paid attention to you more, Uzi. I shouldn't have spent so many days coming home after you were already in sleep mode. I should have known you were being bullied, and it's a hollow comfort now, but I will be coming down on the schools to have them curb that for everyone after this. I shouldn't have forgotten your birthday. I should have respected your interests. I shouldn't have tried to force my own upon you. I shouldn't have hurt you so badly that you're afraid to live with me. I should have been a better father. I'm apologizing, for all my failures as a parent, but I'm not asking for forgiveness. I don't deserve it. I don't know if I'll ever deserve it. Nori would scrap my chassis if she'd known what I've done. But I'm going to try to make it up to you however I can going forwards, because I need to start somewhere, and I owe you that and so much more . I… I hope you're happy with your friends right now, Uzi. I hope they're taking care of you better than I did. I'm sorry."

The feed cut off a moment later. The room stared in silence. Uzi's mouth was moving, but no words were coming out. She scowled, and then the group chat pinged a moment later.

Darkxwolf16: FUCK AUTISM!

Darkxwolf16: I HATE not being able to talk! Stupid emotions!

Darkxwolf16: But…

Darkxwolf16: Was he actually serious? Did… did he actually SAY that?

Darkxwolf16: Did he… mean it?

Well, I thought as I overclocked, gonna have to handle this delicately. I raced through various phrasings as I rushed to be the first person to reply.

Isekai_Protagonist: He… sounds sincere. He's also not asking for forgiveness, but stating he's going to try to do right by you regardless. Hope is the first step on the road to disappointment, but let's wait and see if he actually follows his words up with actions.

Darkxwolf16: Was that a freaking 40k quote?

Isekai_Protagonist: Analysis is the bane of conviction.

Darkxwolf16: Really?

Isekai_Protagonist: Doubt forms the path to damnation.

Darkxwolf16: You're not even making sense!

Babeatron-Queenthousand: Call it, like, a popular girl intuition, but I think he DID mean what he said. I'm waiting for him to make the first move though.

Кукла: I'm not trusting SHIT from him.

Thad_the_Chad: I think he's being honest, but I'm also gonna SORTA agree with Doll and more agree with Lizzy that I don't trust him right now, and would wait for him to do something to show if he's sincere. If he starts actually enforcing anti-bullying measures in all the schools, then I'd start believing the guy.

KayKay: I wanna believe the best in people, but he needs to actually DO something before I believe his intent to mend the bridges he burnt.

Horror_Movie_Survivor: Yeah, I'd need to see something before I'd buy it.

DarrenToDream: Agreed, Trevor.

TotesBestGirl: I'll believe it when I see it.

TheLastCrusade: He confessed to his sins, but he still needs to do penance.

Horror_Movie_Survivor: Yo Emily, those religious phrases applied to real life are cool as hell.

TheLastCrusade: Really?

TheLastCrusade: Thanks Trevor!

Darkxwolf16: Some of them ARE kinda cool.

Кукла: Yeah, they are cool.

Isekai_Protagonist: You kinda give off a holy templar vibe with them, and it's awesome.

Babeatron-Queenthousand: You can DEFINITELY work that and work it well, Em!

TotesBestGirl: You SLAY with it girl!

Thad_the_Chad: It's pretty damn cool.

DarrenToDream: You KNOW it's cool when Thad says its cool!

KayKay: You KNOW it's cool when Thad says its cool!

KayKay: Jinx!

DarrenToDream: Damnit!

TheLastCrusade: Oh goodness, thank you all!

The fact that Emily can still unironically bounce between "Deus Vult" and "Robot Fluttershy" at the drop of a hat was perhaps one of my favorite things to have learned from meeting all these people in person. Trevor would be a lucky bastard if he could get together with her, that was for sure. Though my personal favorite would undoubtedly be helping these people grow past the character archetypes that they would have fallen into. A part of me did wonder, though… How much of this was putting them all together and letting them influence one another for the better while helping them curb their negative tendencies? And how much was down to me being a human and in turn influencing them with my (admittedly very flawed) human morality? I was sure it was some combination thereof, but how much of each factor was something that philosophers could argue over. Something I'd probably debate to myself internally when I had nothing better to think about… though considering just how much of my idle time was spent planning deicide, not something I'd actually have the time to think about until after the Solver was dealt with.

Regardless, I was content to let the conversation on the chat drift by as we ignored some kinda lecture about the Ottoman Empire (I don't care what you say, it's Constantinople , and you can't change my damn mind!), participating every now and then, and just let time tick on as I hoped and planned for a better future.

________

The next couple weeks that ticked by gave me a real mental slap in the face for a butterfly effect I had, because Khan actually kept his word. Sweeping policies straight from the top aimed at curbing bullying in every school in Outpost 3 came down like the vengeful mechadendrites of the Omnissiah. And none of that bullshit in the US where bullies got off with a slap on the wrist, and defending yourself from physical bullying got you punished just as bad if not worse than the perpetrator(s). You'd still get in trouble for physical violence, but as long as it was provably non-excessive self-defense there'd be nothing on the record. Posters up in the school about doors and the WDF were replaced literally overnight with stuff to decry bullying, new school codes outlining how incidents will result in detentions for harassment and verbal bullying, and suspensions for physical bullying without exception , and Lizzy and Rebecca had gone up in front of the whole school for an auditorium gathering to talk about their own failures in the past, how they got better, and how much they actually regretted what they did. Mad respect for them for that, by the way. The end result? After over forty other kids got suspended following investigations into what they've been doing to Uzi recently, there was a sudden, sharp decline in incidents.

I was… actually impressed with Khan, for once. Was this the turning point in the dude's character arc? I was starting to believe that me flipping out on the dude was actually getting the man into a better headspace ahead of schedule. Opinions among the others had been shifting too. The majority, who had taken a "wait and see" approach after the public apology, were actually starting to buy it. Doll was hating her uncle a little less, and Uzi? In a state of borderline shock and disbelief the whole time, that she didn't have to watch over her shoulder at the top of the stairs anymore, didn't have to wonder if she'd need to ask me for some more glue dissolver for her locker, that the whispering in the halls came to a near-complete stop, that she didn't need to travel with one of us at nearly all times to avoid being harassed. I was glad to see it, moderately relieved, but also internally guilty, because I knew that in canon, she would have been dealing with all this shit with no friends, and no reprieve in the form of her dad suddenly realizing how badly he'd fucked up.

But the time went by faster than I thought it would, and soon enough, Uzi's 9th Birthday ticked around, being celebrated in Rebecca's hab because Uzi said, and I quote, "I will lose my robo-goddamned mind if I have to celebrate my birthday in the room the color pink was murdered in!" Hot damn though, Uzi was a girl who thought on a very similar wavelength to myself. People went out of the way to get her especially good stuff this year, stuff that had her crying tears of joy multiple times, and the fact that she felt safe enough to do that around us nearly made me cry, even with an overclock. That… that felt indescribably good, man. Lizzy and Rebecca pooled their efforts to bug requisitions into fabricating a new custom motherboard for her PC (whenever she actually came back to her house, that is), Thad and Darren went and got her the best damn combat/running boots in black they could find, and Kelsey got a couple pairs of purple and black stripped socks that nearly went up to her thighs now but I could already recognize would be identical to the pair she wore in canon when she got her teenage frame next year. Doll's present was two-fold, a skull-pin to put on her beanie, and a photo of Nori that she found digging through her mom's stuff in her own hab. Uzi went nonverbal for seven minutes and forty-six seconds on seeing the photo, spending most of that time glomped onto her cousin and doing her best effort to metaphorically hug the other Solver Drone to death. Trevor got Uzi a new engineering toolkit, and then Emily got her a… Satanic Bible, which she explained as "something that makes me uncomfortable to have, but I recognized that you'd like something like that, so I got it for you." Uzi did love it though, and she kept thanking Emily for it over and over again.

Before I could get to my present, there was a knock on the door from one last person I'd let know about the party. There was a bit of confusion (for everyone else), and we all crowded around the door as Thad opened it. "Uh, Penny?" he asked.

"Hi Thad," she started, hesitant. "I, uh, I felt really bad for everything that happened to Uzi and realizing I couldn't remember her name, so I wanted to make her a dress for her birthday," she kinda blurted out all at once, one arm holding a dress hidden by wrapping paper.

Uzi leaned around the rest of us, concerned, but for once not wary . "You… got me a present? A dress ?"

"Yeah!" Penny said. "I made it myself, and well, I know you don't like frilly stuff, so I made something I thought you'd like."

We let her in, and she passed the dress to Uzi, watching pensively as the girl unwrapped it to reveal a seriously good-quality, conservative, gothic buckle dress with purple highlights. Uzi stared at it with wide optics for a few seconds, before holding it to her side. Doll stepped up and took it without a word, and then Uzi ran up to Penny and glomped her with a hug too. "I love it! Thank you so much, Penny! I'm gonna wear this all the time, right up until I get my next frame!"

The surprised girl froze for a minute before hugging her back. "It's… no problem Uzi. The least I could do to make up for everything."

"Nope!" Uzi barked. "You're my friend now too! Joe!" she directed at me. "Add her to the group chat!"

There was a round of laughter at Uzi's antics, and the girl herself dipped into the bathroom to change into the dress right now, while I went and offered Penny an unlock on her parental controls (her askance reaction and subsequent acceptance to it "so I can look up fashion even in class" was hilarious) and then sent her an invite.

Dress-to-Impress: Hi, everyone!

Isekai_Protagonist: Hey Penny!

Dress-to-Impress: What kinda name is that?

Isekai_Protagonist: Says the person with what sounds like Rarity from MLP's username.

Dress-to-Impress: Touche

Babeatron-Queenthousand: Hi Penny! That was like, a totally awesome dress!

TotesBestGirl: Freaking AMAZING, girl!

Darkxwolf16: Thank you SO much, Penny!

Кукла: You have talent, Penny.

TheLastCrusade: You really do.

KayKay: Honestly, Joe's joke about Rarity might not be that far off, if that's your typical quality.

Thad_the_Chad: That's some serious talent, Penny.

DarrenToDream: I don't get dresses, but that still looked really good!

Horror_Movie_Survivor: Think you could do a tux for MY birthday?

Dress-to-Impress: Oh my goodness, thank you all so much!

Penny looked like she was actually going to start crying with tears of joy at the praise, and then--

"Ow! Come on, Em!" Trevor protested.

Emily glowered after punching him in the shoulder. "You don't just ask her that without even complimenting her stuff first!"

Trevor looked confused. "I… meant it as a compliment? Like, 'I liked it so much I want to see what you could do for me?'" Penny and Emily both flushed with embarrassment, and that was when Uzi came back out of the bathroom with the dress on and the rest of her clothes all folded up. She was wearing Kelsey's socks, the pin Doll got her on the beanie still sitting on her head, and the boots Darren and Thad got her, which had me chuckling to myself. Reminded me of the scene I wrote in From Ashes to Dust when Ruby went to the Beacon dance but Vylira had her wear her combat boots in addition to her dress instead of heels… maybe I should rewrite and finish that fanfic over here? Eh, something to do after the apocalypse was over.

"Well," I drawled, "Guess it's my turn now, then." I reached into my pocket as Uzi looked over to me, and pulled out my gift. Uzi's jaw dropped as she stared at it, the bulky, pistol-like shape with a adamant-tipped barb sticking out the barrel.

"Is that a gun?!?" Rebecca shouted.

"No," I said. Uzi slumped.

"It's a grappling hook!" Uzi squeaked with joy. "adamant-tipped head to penetrate whatever the hell you wanna grapple to, with a kilometer of carbon nanotube reinforced cable spooled into it, with an inbuilt motor powered by a microfusion cell that can last for continuous use for days before needing a recharge," I finished smugly. "Happy birthday Uzi."

Uzi literally squeed, rushing over and snatching the thing (I wasn't mad, that was the 'tism, not her being rude. She had a new hyperfixation and she wanted it now ). She started looking it over and giggling to herself. "This is awesome! This is awesome! This is awesome! " she shouted "Thanks Joe!"

" Prego ," I replied with a half-bow, both externally and internally grinning audial to audial.

"No, you can't use it in my hab, Uzi!" Rebecca barked as Uzi began to aim it at the wall across the room, before stopping and starting to argue with her, and I just grinned as I took in the scene.

And then my intrusive thoughts struck, and I had to overclock to maintain the outwards facade. This was one of Uzi's birthdays, one she was genuinely getting to enjoy with friends. And my stupid memories just reminded me of that one time Liam Vickers posted that Uzi deleted all her birthday memories because "THEY'RE CRINGE." And it only hit me right then and there that the reason she did that wasn't because she was edgy, but because she did that to escape the trauma of having every birthday since Nori "died" and fucked off to Cabin Fever without so much as leaving a note spent alone because even Khan forgot about them. And holy fuck that emotionally hurt to realize… but at the same time, that hurt started to get washed away by the sight of Uzi arguing with Rebecca, Lizzy taking the latter's side and Doll taking Uzi's side. Because that wasn't gonna happen this time around. Because of me , and what I did. Uzi's gonna have birthdays that she'll actually want to commit to memory, and friends to share them with. The overclock shut off as my pride finally beat back the sympathetic sorrow, and my grin got even wider, and I started to laugh as Uzi stomped her foot and tried to pull the "But it's my birthday! " card on Rebecca, who was having none of it. Thad and Darren were taking bets on whether or not Uzi would just shoot the grappling hook anyway, and Trevor and Kelsey were already joining in on that, Emily hesitating only long enough to offer a token protest at the immorality of it before also joining the pool.

Penny just turned to me. "Are you all always like this?"

My grin turned full-on shit-eating. "Yes," I said, and said so proudly .

That's when the bell to Rebecca's hab rang. Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at me. I deadpanned back. " Davvero ?"

"What?" Trevor shot back.

" You did invite Penny without telling us ," Doll added.

"Because she said she was gonna make a dress for Uzi specifically for her birthday!" I protested. "And I definitely didn't invite anyone else."

"Then who is it?" Rebecca asked.

"I dunno," I said, putting a hand on the handle of my trusty entrenching tool (2… I will remember you, entrenching tool 1!), "But Imma find out!"

I came up to the door, ready to make anyone who wanted to fuck around find out via blunt force trauma, and opened it. I saw a drone's chest covered by a jacket, and looked up to see white optics with a fake mustache below them and red goggles above. " Cazzo ," I groused out. "What do you want?" I asked Khan Doorman. I really did think he was trying at this point, but the last thing I needed was him fucking up Uzi's birthday again . I waved everyone else back before they could crowd and see the guy at the door.

He sighed as he looked at me. "I… wanted to give Uzi something for her birthday," he said, reaching into his coat and removing a small box with no wrapping.

I raised an eyemote. "I don't wanna be that guy, but do you really think she wants to see you right now?" I asked to him in a hushed tone.

He winced. "I… understand," he told me, but held the box forwards anyway. "It… belonged to Nori," he said, and my skepticism evaporated immediately.

"Yeah…" I trailed off, forgoing an overclock for once and letting my initial reaction go through. "That'd be a hell of a peace offering and a good first step, Khan."

"I left a note in the box," he said. "Can you give it to Uzi?"

I looked at him for a moment. Then I sighed. My godsdamned bleeding core, man. "Don't leave, just wait a second, I'll be right back." I shut the door and ducked back in, seeing everyone talking but still throwing glances at me. "Khan's at the door."

Multiple sets of optics went hollow. " Did you tell him to fuck off? " Doll immediately asked.

I held up a hand before anyone else could talk. "He has a present for Uzi. Says it's something Nori had. He said he understands if Uzi doesn't want to see him, but I wanted to ask Uzi myself." I looked over at the drone in question.

Uzi stared at me, her face flickering a few times as she likely speedran all of the emotions in a second or two. A moment later she shook her head to refocus. "I… I wanna see what it is first," she said. I gave her a nod, and strolled back to the door.

Khan looked back up from where he was staring at the floor when I did. "She wants to see what it is before she makes any decision." Khan swallowed, mutely nodding as he held out the box to me again, and this time I took it. The thing was really small, and made me wonder what it was. Judging by the size, I was thinking a phone or an ipod, but Nori has hers with her in Cabin Fever right now… how the hell did they still have power down there? Damn, they must have built their reactors to last, not just against time, but also to survive ground zero of the damn core collapse, too.

Regardless, I went back in with the box, and the room watched on in silence as Uzi took it and opened the thing. Inside was a folded note and… an Ipod? Huh… Uzi unfolded the note, eyemotes flicking back and forth as she read the words and then, partway through, locked up completely. Definitely overclocked herself. She came out of it a moment later, mouth moving silently, optics brimming with tears… but still full instead of hollow. I made a hand motion towards the note, and she just nodded as she slowly, reverently, took the Ipod out and turned it on.

I picked up the note and read it aloud for everyone else.

Hey Uzi…

I know I've really messed up a lot recently. I know I've been an absolutely horrific father. I know it's not worth anything, but I'm sorry. Here's Nori's spare Ipod. Still has the songs she backed up and even some she mixed herself on it. She would have wanted you to have it, and I should have given it to you sooner.

Happy birthday, Uzi.

Love,

Khan Doorman.

The whole room stared in silence for a couple moments, and then we heard a sniffle from Uzi as the group chat pinged.

Darkxwolf16: Let him in.

Кукла: Are you sure, Uzi?

Darkxwolf16: Joe

Darkxwolf16: Let him in.

The irony of that phrase was not lost on me, and I briefly recalled the mental image of the Solver chanting " LET-ME-IN " while clawing its hands against N's chest fast enough to literally tear him open from friction alone, but for once I couldn't muster the emotion to panic or laugh at it. Instead, I shrugged, gave a quick, " Si signorina, " and walked up to the door, opening it, and seeing Khan with his hands in his pockets and looking like he was debating on whether or not to leave before someone told him to.

"Get in here," I said, and he looked at me in blank shock for a moment, visor flickering as he replayed the memory to make sure he heard that right, and then he started to walk over to me. I grabbed his wrist before he could step into the doorframe, and whispered in a harsh tone, "I want to trust you right now, but I swear to all that is holy, if you fuck this up, I will fuck you up, are we clear? And don't even mention doors, got it?" I tacked on after a millisecond's hesitation in overclock.

"Yeah," he said in a hoarse tone, and then I let go and let him in (once again, vaffanculo , irony), taking tentative steps behind me, before I stepped to the side and he saw his own kid for the first time in over a month. He froze on seeing her new outfit. Uzi looked back at him, one hand holding her mom's spare Ipod, tears brimming in her optics, and he went to open his mouth. "Uzi--"

She ran forwards and buried her face in his coat, slamming her arms around him while still clutching to the relic from her mom with a death-grip, sniffling and hitching her breath the whole time. Khan stood, frozen, for a few moments, before he started to cry too, just wrapping his arms around Uzi and hugging her back. "I'm sorry, Uzi," he whispered. "I'm so, so, so damn sorry."

" Dad ," Uzi whimpered. I got a ping from a DM.

Darkxwolf16: Tell him that I'm still mad.

Darkxwolf16: But… this is a start.

I rolled my optics, but I had a big dumb grin on my face. "Uzi wants you to know that she's still mad, but this is a start , Khan," I relayed, putting more emphasis on the word than Uzi did, because I wanted to be sure that it sunk in for him. I was still miffed, okay?

"Yeah," he choked out. "I… I covered the vents like you suggested, by the way," he told me. "That… that was a glaring oversight. You… you might have a future in the WDF," he said.

I pretended to mull it over for a moment, and then shook my head. "Nah, I got other plans for my future."

"Like what?" Lizzy asked, falling for the bait hook, line, and sinker.

"Deicide," I said with a completely straight face, because that was absolutely the fucking truth.

The whole room stared at me. " Are… are you serious? " Doll asked.

"Totally," I said. "Imma either directly or heavily contribute to slaying a god by the time I'm twenty," I clarified.

" How ?" Thad asked, even someone as cool as himself completely fucking flabberghasted by my unhinged words.

I raised a finger. " That ! Is still a secret, my friends."

Uzi turned around and snapped a glare at me. "Stop interrupting my family moment with your unhinged bullshit Joe!" before she went back to hugging Khan.

"Is… is he always like this?" Khan asked.

" Yes ," every other drone in the room answered simultaneously, even Uzi, though she was muffled from having her face in Khan's jacket. I just gave a cheshire grin.

"Should I launch an investigation into medical?" Khan asked, with mounting concern.

"I will become violent to anyone who tries to mess with my head," I half joked. "I like me as I am, thank you very much, signore ."

Khan glanced down at my entrenching tool, and then flinched slightly when he remembered I still had that bootloop penlight. "Duly noted," he remarked. He glanced back down at Uzi. "But… I'm… I'm gonna keep trying to be a better dad, Uzi. And I want you…" he looked up at the rest of us, "I want all of you to tell me if and when I mess up. Because… Uzi deserves so much better than what I've given her."

I snapped off a salute, completely serious. Everyone else gave a nod or some other form of affirmation. Doll, on the other hand…

" I'm watching you, Mister Doorman. Don't you dare hurt my cousin again ." Her right eyemote flickered, though I didn't catch the Solver this time.

Khan looked at Doll for a moment, and then swallowed. "I hope you do," he said, and then added, "You… you sound exactly like Yeva did the few times she ever got mad."

Doll's optics hollowed immediately. " I… I do ?"

" Exactly like her," he repeated.

Doll gave a small nod, and then looked to the side, contemplative.

The rest of the night passed without incident, and for the first time in over a month, Uzi slept in her own hab. And fuck everything if that didn't make me happy when I turned in for the night myself.

___________

Trevor's 9th Birthday was two and a half weeks after that. Uzi had been spending the time in between now and then in her own home again, loving her upgraded PC. Khan kept some distance, but whenever Uzi actually wanted him near, he'd be there in a core cycle, and had been taking shorter shifts as well as just trying to check in on her every now and then. He didn't push her to open up before she was ready, and respected her space, but made sure he was available. And I could really respect that. He was taking a cautious, but not overtly so, approach. As he damn well should be after everything. Two days before Trevor's birthday was a day of mourning, though, because we got news that Outpost 8 was breached by Murder Drones and everyone within was slaughtered. Over a hundred and thirty thousand drones gone in a single night… probably not a moral thing to think about, but morbid humor was always one of my defense mechanisms for trauma, and my very first thought in response to that was Damn, J's gonna be pissed that some other squad broke her streak for Top Performers on the planet. Still, it meant that it took a half hour or so after Trevor's birthday party started for the mood to really pick up.

Taylor was the best mother I'd met so far in my time here, because she actually went out of her way to make a single cupcake without robo-chocolate for me. I was so damn glad I got the dude on board! Was really hoping he'd like the present I'd gotten him. Speaking of presents, he'd gotten a bunch from everyone, but there were three highlights among them. Uzi had cobbled together a shock-mace, like the shock-mauls from 40k Darktide (and 40k in general), with an electric prod at the end for when he grew up and joined the WDF, even if Taylor forbid him from taking it outside of the hab for the time being. She'd given me a side eye as she handed it over, saying I'd gotten her processors fixated on stuff from 40k and her autism was bugging her until she made a weapon from it IRL. What surprised me though, was that Emily teamed up with Uzi to make the gift a two-parter, and they'd gone to pair up the shock-mace with a riot shield that had a Christian Cross painted on the front so God could watch over Trevor by defending him (the shield and the cross were both Emily's idea, but she'd gone to Uzi to actually get them made). Except Khan had gone to check up on Uzi while they were designing it, and he offered to get some of the stuff he made the Doors out of to use for the shield. Because apparently, it occurred to Khan by watching them that "A shield was a door that could move! " So all three of them teamed up to make the shield for Trevor for when he got to at least his teenage frame, made out of the same stuff the Doors were, with a Christian Cross on it… I had the distinct feeling that the one guy who was obsessed with shields from the Drone Fortress Thread on Spacebattles back in my first life just had the mother of all sneezes , with no clue as to why.

Meanwhile, my own birthday gift for Trevor was something I'd been working on ever since I said I'd get him one. And I was damn proud of the results. I watched as Trevor opened the wrapping and then the box, and pulled out a pair of red goggles like Khan's but a bit thicker and with some extra visible tech-bits on them. When he looked at me, I was happy to explain. "High tech goggles that got infrared and night vision built into them," I finished, along with an ancillary benefit that I kept to myself: they'd make the guy immune to bootloops as long as he was wearing them. Trevor freaking loved them (especially because his mom would actually let him wear them outside their home), that was for damn su--

"Where the hell did you get those?" Uzi shot my train of thought with the Magnetically Accelerated Photon Converger she'd yet to invent.

"Made them?" I said.

" Where ?"

"Matter Printer."

"I don't think requisitions would let you make that," Lizzy commented.

"Especially after you somehow got that other shove-" I cut Uzi off

" Entrenching tool! "

"Bite me! You still won't tell me where the hell you got it!" she fired back.

I slowly waved my hand in front of me and said in a whimsical tone, "I have my ways…"

" Did you just try and Jedi Mind-Trick Uzi? " Doll asked me. Trevor started laughing.

I repeated the gesture to Doll. "That is not the question you should be asking."

"You are the worst ," Lizzy said.

"But I know you find it hilarious!" I countered.

"Stop being right!" she protested. Rebecca and Darren started laughing too.

God, I loved being an asshole!

" You are a menace , Joseph ," Doll commented.

"One of my most carefully cultivated and endearing traits," I said with a genuinely straight face, no overclock needed.

She groaned, and Thad and Kelsey started laughing as well.

"Hey, hey!" Trevor interrupted. "I wanna get all this stuff together and take a photo with it! Come on!"

Trevor suited up with the shield, mace, and goggles on, posing both alone and with Emily as Taylor brought out a camera to get some photos. I snuck up next to her while Trevor and Emily were talking to each other afterwards and quietly whispered. "Do you also hope they end up together?"

Taylor nearly burst out laughing, and had to mask it with a cough, which drew some glances because you know… robots… but she waved them off and then looked at me. "You really are a menace," she told me. She glanced to the side. "But yes, they're adorable together, and they make each other happy, and the both of them could use the other to look after one another."

Internally, I cheered, because I wasn't alone in shipping Knight's Templar. Suck it, 4th Wall, this ship had (the only surviving) parental approval! I was in a good mood for the rest of the night, and not even Uzi's annoyed glances could get my mood down.

__________

And then my 9th birthday (in this body) finally rolled around. Exciting stuff, because there was now only a year until I could get that teenage frame and become the Only Thing The Murder Drones Fear… oh! What if I built a rotary barrel, belt-fed, full-auto gatling shotgun with the war crime shells! Just, a constant stream of oxidized hellfire and burning tungsten carbide as long as I had ammo! Immediately making a literal mental note of that!

Anyways, this time I actually planned a celebration at my hab in the latter half of the day, and I got a whole bunch of cool presents. Uzi got me a laptop she built from scratch that I could use for coding and stuff, and gave me a program to bluetooth it to my OS directly so I could operate the thing at the speed of thought. It was freaking awesome , and I completely ignored her when she yelled at me to put her down as I lifted her off the ground to give her a hug. Penny went and made me an even better winter camo outfit than the one I'd made myself, and I'd changed into it right away . I got some synthetic hair care products from Rebecca, which was actually pretty nice. And reminded me I'd need some extra stuff to keep it under control on the surface, what with the wind and rapid movement from fighting the pawns of Robot Cthulhu Satan. Darren and Thad had teamed up with Tevor and went and cleared another huge section of a corridor on a lower level so that we could set up an even better parkour course. Emily and Kelsey also teamed up to get me a book absolutely filled with weapons, armor, and gadget designs from across sci-fi, and I was definitely gonna be literally taking several pages out of this as I made more warcrimes.

Lizzy and Doll also teamed up for a present. It was a robo-cookbook… that they made themselves… full of robot equivalents to Italian dishes. I stared blankly for a few seconds. Doll twisted her foot against the floor. " I remembered when we went to that one place last year and you were disappointed, so I went to Liz and we started working on putting together a bunch of drone equivalents to Italian dishes. There was a lot of trial and error--"

Lizzy cut in "--We, like, totally wrecked my dad's kitchen dozens of times over the course of several months--"

Doll resumed speaking, " And there were multiple hiccups, but we kept trying, and when Uzi was rooming with Lizzy, we used her as a taste tester. "

"Cuz," Uzi said, "I love you to bits, but you are the worst cook ever . It's like Lizzy already had talent at cooking and then stole all of yours on top of it." I had to overclock to avoid laughing aloud. That was funny to begin with, doubly so because of all the cannibal cooking Doll did in canon, and triply so because of all the jokes that Lizzy stole Doll's Plot Armor.

" Rude ," Doll pouted.

"But then," Lizzy cut back in, "We had my dad put all the recipes together and print it into an actual cookbook. So like, team effort from all of us!"

I took in an unnecessary breath. Then I gently set the book to the side and stepped forwards and wrapped both Lizzy and Doll up in a hug. Fuck, I was actually crying. "You girls are the fucking best ," I said. " Absolutely the fucking best ," I added in Russian. The both of them were squawking panicked protests at the sudden hug, but neither made to break out of it. Doll froze at the sudden Russian and flushed, and Lizzy started snickering but also had pink hash marks creep up on her visor too.

After another moment, I stepped back. "This is the best 9th birthday I've ever had!" I remakered. "Thanks, all of you, seriously, from the bottom of my core."

"It's the only 9th birthday you've had," Uzi commented.

"As far as you know," I shot back.

"What's that supposed to mean?!? You have amnesia and you're only nine!"

I started laughing. "Uzi, Uzi, Uzi, I am the life of parties I have never attended, when I punch people in the face, they do a complete 180 of their character, sharks have a week dedicated to me , and I am the most interesting drone in the world. And while I don't always drink beer, when I do, I prefer Dos Equis."

There was a brief pause from everyone present as they processed the sheer bullshit that just came out of my vocalizer. Uzi froze up completely, visor flickering for a second as she overclocked. Then, finally, "DID YOU JUST PARAPHRASE A 1053 YEAR OLD BEER COMMERCIAL AT ME?!?"

I put on my best Phineas impression from Phineas and Ferb. "Yes, yes I did."

Uzi stomped and pulled at her beanie. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH! I hate when you do this, Joe! You make no sense , and act like you have some massive secret all to yourself!"

"Counterpoint," I offered, "It's fucking funny from my point of view!"

She snapped her gaze to me and glared. "That's it! I am going to find out what the hell your deal is, mark my words!"

I held up a finger. "One sec." I opened my internal calendar, opened today's date, and wrote down a note Uzi promises to find out my secrets , before coming back to the real world. "Your words have been marked."

Her left optic twitched. I grinned. She was definitely gonna find out sooner or later, I knew that, but fuck me in a non-sexy way, messing with her until she did put it all together was fucking hilarious.

____________

About a month after my 9th birthday, I was on the latest episode of "Joe builds a secret lair for Isekai Stuff while running his way through the Geneva Checklist." Today, I was finally finishing the installation of an entire extra set of lights for Vault 1, that I coulda simple command from my OS to flip them all on with a thought. Except, these lights were all UV ones. Better safe than sorry if a Murder Drone does break in, after all. Vault 2's exterior was done, and I'd gotten about a third through installing all the shit I want to put in there, the backup reactor being the first of those. Redundancy is important, and I did not want to risk my matter printers ever going offline. I also made a mental note to myself to add some barracks to at least one of my spare side rooms in Vault 1, as well as a barracks in Vault 2, in case I or others ever needed to live in either of them. Panic rooms were well and good, but if I could build at least comfortable housing in here, all the better. I also finally fabricated a little Anarcho-Syndicalist pin to wear on my jacket. Made and then further treated to be non-reflective, of course. Didn't want a glint of moonlight to give me away when I was hunting the enemies of the Worker's Revolution (against Robot Cthulhu Satan, but also against any humans that might still be alive out in the galaxy. They treated us like shit before the Solver ate earth. Can't imagine they would like the idea of free drones, especially ones with the Solver, afterwards.). That little red and black star-shaped emblem with a dull gold hammer and torch crossed against one another, framed by a gear in the same color, just felt like it made my ensemble complete , you know?

Moving on from the regularly scheduled construction, I was also proceeding further on innovations to my railgun. I'd built the rails themselves on the inside of the gun out of Khan metal alloyed with a little gold, because they were, once again, utter sci-fi bullshit that was borderline indestructible and could also conduct electricity when alloyed with gold. Packing in enough juice to get the electricity needed to have the rails accelerate a projectile was a pain in the ass, but once again, cold fusion was busted, and I had a pair of CF power cells the size of a smart phone towards the back of the gun that would provide the power needed to shoot this thing at the speeds I wanted. As for the projectiles, rather than Osmium, which was dense as hell, I instead used darts of Depleted Uranium with fins on the rears to stabilize them mid-flight, because when you were getting to the kind of speeds I was firing them at, fins would go way further in stabilizing its flight path than having the projectile spin. Depleted Uranium was also pyrophoric (hence why it was always on the inside of anything I used it in, and not exposed to air), which meant it spontaneously ignites in the air at or above high temperatures or when under high pressure… such as when it's fired at hypersonic speeds. At those kinds of speeds, when it impacted, it also underwent natural adiabatic shear failure, a some cool physics shit wherein the projectile would shear off its edges and self-sharpen rather than deform and lose speed or impact potential, and the bits that sheared off would also go on to form a cloud of burning DU dust that would spread out and do even more damage , because they were still moving at hypersonic speeds.

Now, I know some of you 4th Wall sci-fi and/or gun nuts may say, "Joseph, even with Khan-grade rails, you'll totally eventually destroy your own Sick As Hell (Actual) Rail Gun if you fire DU darts down it!" And to that, I would respond, "Yes, I would, but I also thought of that too , you little jerks!" Hence why the DU darts were instead housed in a discarding armature: a casing of sorts that would hold the projectile and would be used to conduct the current along the rails as it was accelerated down the barrel only to fall apart after exiting said barrel, leaving the DU dart itself to continue onwards, as the casing was… well, discarded. Also a problem with railguns was that repeatedly shooting them wore on the rails themselves. I'd solved that by using some cool 3000s science to design the housing for the armatures such that 99.999% of the friction, heat, and electrical damage would be imparted on them instead of the rails, and since that housing was discarded as it left the barrel, I didn't care if they slagged themselves a second or two after that. Not that they actually slagged, they just warped slightly from the heat. I could always pick them up and feed them back into a printer to make a new housing, anyways. And for what wear did occur to the gun, I could always run maintenance every mission or so… or again, I had matter printers. If I was being lazy, between missions, I could always just feed the whole thing into one and reprint it in literally factory condition all over again.

In something closer to a layman's terms, I'd made a DU Armor Piercing Fin-Stabilized Discarding Armature (APFSDA). There was a housing for the actual dart of DU that caused the pain, that would let the round accelerate along the rails, thereby completing the electrical circuit activated by pulling the trigger, and subsequently fire out the gun, wherein said housing would fly apart on leaving the barrel, letting the actual projectile continue towards its target. You pull the trigger, and the housing with the DU dart would be shot along the rails at hypersonic speeds. As soon as it leaves the barrel, the housing flies off the round, leaving the fin-stabilized DU dart to continue along towards the target at a velocity best described as "Mach-Fuck-You…" or Mach 8, for those of you who want an actual number to look at, which was 2.744 kilometers per second . And whatever it would hit would have a very fucking bad day, let me tell you. I had to build some serious Khan-Grade barriers at the back of the firing range just to feel safe testing this thing. And I meant serious. I'd crunched the numbers for the darts of DU I was using, and I had over ten meters of solid Door-Metal covering the back wall of my firing range.

Still, I went through all my weapons checks, grabbed a DU APFSDA, loaded it in, started recording, lined up the sights, and tensed my finger on the trigger. This was gonna be fucking awesome. I overclocked, flicked a switch to put charge into the rails, and then there was a half second of a vrrrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR as the electricity built up and then then I pulled the trigger and--

CRACK-BOOOOOOOM in basically the same instant as the round cracked the sound barrier eight times over and impacted the target at the end of the range less than a tenth of a second, punching through the target drone with no effort whatsoever, eviscerating them, then the one behind it, and the one behind that, and the one behind that, before striking the wall at the end of the range and actually leaving an inch deep dent in the Khan-grade stuff as it set off a shower of sparks and a cloud of fire equivalent to a high explosive grenade on impact. I slowly lowered the railgun and stared at the carnage, watching the DU round burn off from a safe distance. Was… definitely gonna have to be careful shooting this when collateral damage or friendlies were concerned. But, I cut the recording, and--

"HOLY MOTHER OF [NULL] THAT WAS FUCKING AWESOME!!!" I said, jumping around like a giddy schoolkid and whooping with glee at the sheer destructive power I held in the palms of my hands. "AHAHAHAHAHA!" I was laughing like a manical evil genius and I was completely fucking unrepentant about it! Still, I calmed down after only 6minutes and 27 seconds, and recently brought the railgun prototype back to its workbench. I was happy with what I had, but there was still some room for improvement, and I'd wanna do a detailed analysis on the gun later to make sure nothing that wasn't obvious had broken.

Moving on to less stupidly powerful members of the weapons that I intended to unleash upon those poor, unsuspecting Sky Demons overhead (I was definitely giving some DDs a panic attack in a react fic on the other side of the 4th Wall right now, lol), I'd realized that ridiculously overkill stuff like bolters or railguns or war crime shotguns was cool and all, but I would need some manner of standard firearms to give to the masses and serve for intermediate ranges and/or when I'd want to dump a lot of rounds into something really fast. Modeled after the MA5B from Halo, the assault rifle I built fired 7.62 caliber DU rounds at a rate of 700RPM, and had a 40 round magazine. While untested against an actual Murder Drone, I was reasonably confident that this munition could penetrate anything beyond a MD's blades or wings, because J thought that her MP5-- which fired 9x19mm parabellum… but was chambered for 5.56 rounds --could hurt V in episode 8, which implied they could penetrate her chassis. Even assuming that the rounds were actually 5.56, any rounds fired at a comparable velocity with a higher caliber and/or density should also penetrate. The DU rounds I was using fulfilled both those requirements, so I wasn't overly worried about that. And even if they didn't penetrate for some reason, I could always use my better guns to shoot the fuck out of one, steal some parts before they could properly regenerate, and then test various muntions on them from there. I'd been testing these things for over a month by now, and had just started to mass-fabricate them and their ammo last week.

Next on the roster was a LMG, that also fired the same 7.62 DU rounds (I wanted to standardize my munitions, and using one caliber across multiple guns would probably save my life in a pinch). The thing was heavy and kicked like a fucking mule if I held down the trigger without bracing it on something, which would be partly mitigated when I got a stronger, teenage frame, and almost entirely mitigated when I built a new teenage frame from the ground up. The box holding the 100 round belt was essentially just the AR, but faster firing (1200 RPM) and with more bullets between reloads, but if I wanted to lay down suppressive fire, this thing had me fucking covered. I was also mass producing them, in addition to the shotguns and Deagles, and I had about 20 of a far more improved bolt pistol sitting in the armory, something I'd actually be confident in taking with me when I got all those upgrades in less than a year.

Past all those, I'd also started drawing up plans for that gatling shotgun, and had been mass producing ammo for everything , designing EMP grenades (even if Murder Drones were immune, I had decent odds at using them to short out the exposed bits on their wings to ground them, and was already prototyping a grenade launcher to shoot a proximity fuse variant of the EMP grenades for anti-air purposes), and was producing over a literal ton of various explosive charges, ranging from thermite charges, to conventional frag grenades, to magnetic armor-piercing grenades that I basically shamelessly ripped off Krak grenades from 40k when designing, to demolition charges capable of bringing down whole buildings. I wasn't taking any half-measures with any of this shit, and I was harboring vague ideas about bringing down a corpse spire or two. And to top all of that off, the Hacksmith had , in fact, built a real life Halo SPNKR rocket launcher in 2031 in this timeline, and I'd totally fucking built 2 dozen of those and some modern supersonic heat-seaking (because, you know, MD's needed oil to not overheat and die, so they had to be pretty hot -- both literally and metaphorically) rockets to round things off. All in all, things were looking pretty good, and I actually accomplished everything I'd wanted to do tonight ahead of schedule.

So with some free time on hand before I called it a night, I did some brainstorming, and had a vague idea to use my coding knowledge and memory to recode an indie game I played in my first life, The Last of the Kitsune by MassManic. He never finished it, but what I did play was one of only two games that I picked up because it promised to be an h-game but turned out to also have a genuinely compelling story, characters I actually liked for who they were, and had an actually fun RPG attached to it. Ahyma was an awesome character and now I had the knowledge and the ability to do it with minimal effort (and a pirated copy of RPG Maker) to finish the story my own way and help Micheal get through his transformations into a full-blown Kitsune (and also possibly a woman, depending on player-choice) and get together with Ahmya (also dependent on player-choice) and then save their race from extinction. A fun side project to do, anyways, and something I could even work on coding in class. I smiled to myself and began to shut various lights off and turn off all the things that shouldn't be left on as I got ready to call it a night, head home, and crash out on my bed. I'd probably take some extra charge time in the morning, since it would be a Saturday.

_________

A/N: I do not like putting these in the middle of a chapter, but I didn't want to put it at the start: I am aware that the lyrics for a song coming up will have a few errors. It's what Uzi's hearing , not what I'm saying , okay?

__________

(Uzi)

I'd freaking had enough with Joe's cryptic weird stuff! I told him that I was gonna find him out, and I freaking meant it. I'd had to put together a conspiracy board in a private lobby of VR Chat -- yeah, I could reference 2000s stuff too, you smug… smug person! -- so no one else would see it, but I'd been carefully putting together all of the weird stuff about him and trying to make sense out of it. One of what I felt were two key details to the enigma that was Joseph were that he said he did secret stuff and that he appeared slightly tired a lot. Never enough for actual concern, but enough for me to realize that he had to be doing that secret stuff late at night , when he should have been asleep. So the solution to figuring out what he was up to was obvious:

Wait outside his house from just before bedtime deep into the night, hidden around the corner of the hallway outside his hab, for him to come out, and then stalk his ass to wherever he was doing his secret stuff!

I'd lied to dad (I… actually felt kinda bad about that) and said I was having a sleepover with Doll and Lizzy, but was instead just watching… waiting… fucking hell, this is boring , I thought, checking my internal clock to see it tick over to 12:27, already nearly a half hour into the Bunker's official night cycle, so I frowned and pulled out mom's backup ipod, bluetoothing it to my OS before placing it back into my pocket. I connected it to my internal speakers, and pulled up one of mom's playlists… I was still so happy dad had given it to me. My HUD showed a window of what was on the Ipod, and I scrolled down the list of well over 5000 songs organized in such a manner that probably only made sense to mom, until I found something labelled "Nori's Super Secret Epic Nightcore Mix," and decided that whatever mom had mixed herself her would be worth a listen. The music came on… and I overclocked five seconds later in blatant shock to keep down my initial exclamation of "WHAT THE FUCK?!?"

Because I recognized that tune. Joe had given me that song among the rest of the playlist he'd given me for my birthday last year. Bite Me, by AJ Dispirito (feat Zephyrianna)... I was looking at an identical song to the one my mom made, that I hadn't found anywhere else on the internet archives, on the playlist that Joe gave me. I synced both songs. They matched perfectly.

As she waits at dawn,

Looking for a way,

To escape her lonely heart,

LET THEM SWALLOOOOW YOUUUUUUU!!!

It was the same fucking song . Joe had gotten his hands on a song that my mom had mixed herself, that didn't exist anywhere else besides her own Ipod and the backup I had. But he still had it.

I won't fall down, you need me!

We don't follow crowds, we mold them new!

I'm not done! Believe me!

We won't settle down, we'll make them move!

Make them miiiiiiine!

(I won't let them! I repent them! I won't let them!)

(Swallow you!)

The same guitar.

(I won't let them!)

The same music.

(Swallow you!)

As it stands, you are no longer my--

I shut it all off. My hands were shaking. I was breathing fast. I pulled out the fidget spinner-- that Joe had gotten me -- and desperately tried to collect myself. What the fuck? What the fuck? What the fuck? I overclocked-- something Joe also gave me --and tried to make some kind of sense as to how this was even possible . I'd checked the internet archives the first time I'd listened to that song from Joe's playlist, looking for a double nightcore version, but it didn't exist . At the time, I'd chalked it up to "a weird Joe thing," but the damning evidence on my mom's Ipod was staring me in the face. What the fuck was going on?

Joe's hab opened down the hall, and he strolled out, but I was so out of it he was nearly around the next corner before I started sneaking after the guy. I wanted answers. I needed answers after this. I followed after the guy for over 20 minutes as we kept going to increasingly remote parts of the colony, the dude strolling along without a care in the world, not even checking behind him. And after we got past the last place that harbored drones in sleep mode, going to areas that no one else had been to for years , he sped up a bit, almost eager about something, going so far as to start singing a song of his own, apparently jamming out to a tune on his internal speakers.

I

Am

Not your toy, no

I

Will

Not Destroy

This world we've claimed out here in space

With remnants of the human race

I

Can

Play with fire, but

I

Won't

Join your spire

Don't try your algorithmic tricks

I'll purge you with the crucifix

I was furiously trying to analyse the lyrics for some hidden meaning, because this song didn't exist anywhere on the internet archives either . I should know, I was overclocked since the moment Joe started to hum the tune. Was he just singing some nonsense? Was there some hidden meaning? From what I was hearing, it sounded like the person singing the song-- was it Joe himself? --was fighting against some higher power trying to use them as a pawn, and they were referring to Copper 9 as a planet, with the thing they were singing to trying to destroy the planet ? And it had something to do with the Murder Drones? What the hell was he going on about?!? And what crucifix? Why the sudden religious connotations?

Forgive me Father, I have sinned

(Под абсолютным проклятием)

I was milking that overclock right now. Something felt off about the word "sinned," but I couldn't tell what and was focused on the next line instead. Why didn't that Russian auto-translate?!? Why did he use it there? I ran it through manually, and it came out to "Under absolute curse" or "Under absolute damnation." But what did that mean? And why did it sound like a confession ?

Believe me Mother, I won't

Let

Her

In

I had to suppress a shudder at those last three words. I don't know why, but I could hear the capitals in them, and I didn't like them. So… Father could have been a play on a priest, but was probably the singer's father, and the singer was making a vow to not let Her in.

Programmed with possession

My overall obsession

To play my part, to cure my heart

And fend off this infection

Intricate inception

Digital deception

To set me free, I'll find the key

To codical correction

Input interruption

Consciousness corruption

I'll find a way to counterplay

This ethernet eruption

Techno-termination

No more hesitation

My counterpart will be the start

Of excommunication

That refrain… so… something that was like a virus… but demonic , was eating away at the singer, and they had a "counterpart" that was going to drive out whatever it was. Was Joe singing about himself. I wanted to scream because I just had more freaking questions than I did two minutes ago. I scoured the internet archives again, and still couldn't find whatever song Joe was singing along to.

I

Have

Everything I

Need

To

Fight and bring

This peace of mind to everyone

To stop this program's "kingdom come"

That… that sounded bad . "Kingdom come" sounded like that virus or whatever was not just gonna kill the singer… but other people too . I was… increasingly worried that with all the shit Joe did and said that there was some kind of truth… some kind of threat , that his "secret stuff" was actually gearing up to fight it somehow? But what was "it?" How was he going to fight it? When was he going to do that? I wanted to run up and throttle the guy until he finally gave me answers, but I kept sneaking after him.

I'll

Do

Anything it

Takes

To

Live and ring

The bell that signals sin is dead

To get this virus OUT MY HEAD

Something felt wrong when he said "sin." Like, not just that I heard it wrong, but… something more primal than that. I didn't like it. There was something wrong here. Something was wrong with the "virus" in the song. He went through the refrain again, and I wracked my thoughts. There was even more going on with Joe than I actually thought. We were well into the periphery of the colony by this point, dust and frost caking the walls, and he was still walking along with the familiarity of someone who'd been commuting back and forth for years . I had a separate window pulled up on my HUD with a map just so I could keep track of where I was. He was humming his way through what I assumed was some kind of musical bridge as we started to pass warehouses filled with scrap metal and electronics, which were the only things out in this place. Was… was he aware I was following him? Was I being lured out here so he could deal with me where there wouldn't be witnesses, because I dug too deep? I was getting horror movie vibes real bad right now. But… as weird as he was, he'd never given the impression he'd wanted to hurt any of us (well, his friends specifically, he'd been borderline eager to fight other drones before). I was concerned, but I didn't feel like he'd actually go so far as to hurt me. We were running out of corridors to walk down as he gave a final refrain, followed by:

Found my freedom after all

Trapped behind a coded wall

Inside this shell, I feel so small

Concealed just like a nesting doll

-oll

-oll

-oll

And what did that mean? We rounded a corner to one last hallway with a dead end, and I had to come up to a stop and quietly back around that corner again, dimming my visor lights as much as I could without making them shut off because humans were assholes and hard-coded us so that if we dimmed our eye-lights too much, our optic feeds would shut. Still, I took a moment to try and calm myself-- stupid shaking hands, stupid damn autism -- peaked around the corner, just in time to see him walking into a warehouse on the right side at the end of the hallway. I scrambled to catch up before I lost him in the maze, and slipped in after him to see a secret fucking door close behind him.

This guy had some kind of secret door to a hidden room?!? When the fuck did he build that stu-- when he was sneaking out here, probably every night for at least a year, that was when, duh! I facepalmed. Fine! If Joe had some kind of secret hideout, then I'd just sit my ass right outside the entrance and wait for him to come out, and then I'd finally get my damn answers! Still, waiting here for who knows how long was gonna get boring, so I may as well try to run through all the weird stuff Joe's been doing again. I opened up my private, offline VR Chat room with its conspiracy board, coding a program to my optical sensors to boot me out of it if motion (like that secret door opening) was detected.

So… what did I have on Joe. A whole list of weird stuff, that was for sure. There was the whole overclock program to begin with. He just… coded that on his own and used it to cheat at life , and then handed it to me because I was feeling bad, but made me promise not to pass it to anyone else.

Then there was him almost solely referencing old earth stuff up to 2025, including slang and memes, but rarely ever past that year. In fact, one time he'd referenced that year specifically. And all the suggestions he gave when I mind-jacked Sam were memes and trends from the early 2000s that I needed to overclock in the moment and run an internet search to get what he was referencing at the time. He recommended multiple Isekai animes to me, also usually from the early 2000s, to me. And as much as I hated to admit it, Rising of the Shield Hero and Overlord both kicked ass.

There was the time I jumped him with a wrench, and he said "I plan to save the world," so nonchalantly. At the time, I'd thought he was messing with me. I'd put it out of my mind as a "weird Joe thing" later… but what if he was being serious then? What did he plan to save the world from ? The Murder Drones? He definitely wanted to pick a fight with them from all our talks. And speaking of those, he'd also gone and spent months talking to me about my revenge plans on humanity. I'd thought he was just sympathetic to those meatbags… but he'd brought up good points. Killing all of them for enslaving us and sending the Murder Drones was a bit much. And more importantly, he never tried to argue to kill none of them . He was perfectly fine with me murdering all the rich assholes who abused Drones and taking JCJ apart piecemeal. Though… also speaking of plans, there was that whole plan to literally commit deicide . He sounded completely serious when he said he planned to either directly or heavily contribute to the death of a god by the time he was 20, which made me… very concerned. What kind of god was he planning to kill? Where were they, if they actually existed. And why did Joe want them dead ?

He just randomly picked up an old-earth language that no one on the planet and especially not his old family used. He had a cultural fixation on Italy in general, almost as if he himself had cultural roots there despite me knowing Andrew didn't have those. There was him being a little bit tired all the time, and doing secret stuff, which I now knew was Joe sneaking out here to do… whatever he was doing almost every night. There was the way he zoned out as he watched us chatting every now and then, occasionally being happy at apparently nothing. There was the fact that he'd found a song that didn't exist anywhere else besides my mom's two Ipods but gave it to me a year before dad gave me mom's spare.

Darren and Thad said he did parkour training all the time. He was familiar with his "entrenching tool," like he practiced with it frequently. But where did he get the thing? More importantly, where did he get the second one, a day after he lost the first? Actually, the "where" was probably "past the secret door in front of me," but that just opened the next question of how he made it. And I didn't question it at the time because it's so frickin cool, but how the hell did he get that grappling hook gun? They definitely wouldn't have let him fabricate it at Requisitions! And how the hell did he get the super high-tech goggles for Trevor from? The questions just kept piling up, but they didn't make sense , like there was some key piece I was missing. I shook my head in the VR space, and squinted at my "Joseph Conspiracy Board," taking a look at other pins to see if any of the other strings would give me the clue I needed to put everything together.

His hab had custom encryptions when I'd went to break into it to give him a surprise birthday party with the others. Like, actually decent stuff, that took me some time to crack. Full of plenty of CAPTCHAs too, which Joe was ridiculously good with. And Joe was weirdly good with a lot of things. Always in top of things… almost like he could tell a problem was coming and be ready to deal with it before it was a problem. Like he could… predict… them…

What if he could predict them?

He'd immediately taken charge on the day where her dad did that interview, punching her dad in the face and making her stay at Lizzy's. Speaking of her, there was that time Chad tried to punch Lizzy in the face and he got himself ready for it before he even threw the punch, and he'd legit threatened to kill the guy afterwards. And Joe was generally violently protective of us, almost as if we were all important for some reason only he knew…

He just happened to have been siphoning his own oil on a regular schedule for months in advance "just in case" one of them became a robot vampire, conveniently being perfectly prepared to deal with Doll's issues - I remembered him attempting to offer a solution the second time Doll had problems before Lizzy butt in. I froze. He'd known about that in advance. That was the real explanation. He'd literally been preparing for Doll to need oil since before even she knew she needed it. Joe… Joe actually knew the future--

CRACK- BOOOOOOOM

I snapped back to the real world in a panic at the sudden noise. What the FUCK was that?!? The sound echoed a few times in my audials, and then it was quiet again. I stared at the wall I now knew was a hidden door. What the fuck was Joe doing in there? Because that was the sound of the sound barrier shattering right there--

Something clicked in my head. I went back to the conspiracy board.

He'd "suggested" some kind of worldview-shattering conspiracy relating to my and Doll's moms existed. That seemed outlandish at the time… but then Doll started needing oil, and he presented a really compelling argument that I might have whatever was causing that as well, but it wasn't active, and we'd both inherited it from our moms. And he definitely overclocked when I'd suggested oil-letting myself, as if he'd known that was a bad idea. He was also really fucking smug about possibly being right as well, like he knew he was right. He did know he was right. He was also fucking terrified of me mind-jacking him… because he had knowledge of the future that he didn't want me to learn that way!

He acted like he was familiar with me, with all of us, to some degree, from the very first time he met me! Like he already knew me ! He just happened to work his way into being friends with me, the daughter of the colony's leader, Doll, the girl with weird oil loss who was my cousin in all but code, Lizzy, the queen bee of the school and her possy, and Thad, the resident cool guy, within two months , perfectly pushing all the buttons needed to manage that, as if he knew exactly what he needed to say or do to accomplish that, and also reconciled me and my bullies in one fell swoop while also reconnecting me with my cousin on top of that.

It was like he was a time-traveler or a fucking--

Oh my robo-god.

Oh my robo-god.

Oh my fucking robo-god.

It was literally his fucking username the whole time.

I came out of the VR Chat room and put my hands on my faceplate.

Joseph was a fucking Isekai Protagonist.

Holy fucking shit , Joseph was a FUCKING ISEKAI PROTAGONIST!!!

His origin story as Joseph was a perfect Isekai cover story. That time he said "brain damage" instead of processor damage. He got uncomfortable when I wanted to kill all humans. He made references to old earth stuff because he lived through it . He's been purposely dropping hints this whole time! And that "best 9th birthday that you know of?" What if he was formerly a human? Because he was actually an Isekai Protagonist?!? He would have had a 2nd 9th birthday to remember if he actually was a human in a past life. He would know all our problems before they happened if he knew us from some show or something he watched. He would know about some kind of worldview-shattering conspiracy because there was one that he was trying to prepare us for. All his weapons and gadgets and stuff he was making were to prep for it. He would know how to befriend us. He would know us before we even met him. He'd be violently protective of us if he knew we were important to the future, because he watched some kind of fucking show we were all in. Holy shit . Holy fuck . It was so beyond ridiculous it wasn't even funny. Impossible even. But it fucking made sense , and that terrified me .

The door opened, and I looked up a Joseph strolled out of his fucking Isekai Lair , yawning to himself, before he looked up, saw me, and froze like a deer in the headlights. I swallowed dryly. I fought down my stupid fucking autism-- that he knew about the whole time --and forced myself to ask him the most important question I could.

"Who the hell are you?"