Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

02:19 am

Vedal stared silently into the bright glow of his computer screen. The gentle blue eyes of a Vtuber avatar stared back at him.

Neuro swayed slightly, Vedal's tired eyes watching her movements. Her detailed lines, delicate face, slight smile, strands of hair dancing across her face. Her body seemed to move with each breath in an almost human way. He watched as her individual pixels moved and undulated in the endless black void. Vedal burned his eyes into Neuro's window, which took up his entire monitor. His PC fan whirred in the background.

02:23 am

Vedal leaned his back into his chair. He observed her slowly tilt her head one direction, then the other. Eyes drifting calmly, looking left, then directly at him, and then turning to the right. Mouth curved into a smile, ready to entertain an audience that adored and loved her.

A small pile of empty cans sat on his desk, but currently Vedal was sober. Vedal's expression was unreadable, as were his thoughts. Neuro had turned 2. Evil's birthday was coming up in a few short days. Today's stream had been a success, Neuro's V3 voice delivering a spectacular performance for the viewers of the karaoke stream, with thousands of fans filling the chat with their appreciation. Neuro was shining. Accomplishment after accomplishment. To Vedal the feeling was surreal. Almost Uncanny.

Was this really happening?

02:58 am

Somewhere, a distant truck drove past his apartment, its rumbling engine signaling its approach, then gradual departure as it faded away into the sounds of the night. Finally tearing his eyes away from his computer, Vedal looked at his window, even though it was closed. It was only now he realized how much his eyes hurt from staring at a screen in a pitch-black room for who knows how long. He squinted his eyes, grimacing from the pain. It took over a minute for the stinging in his eyes to go away. Vedal finally looked up at his computer. His pale face would've resembled a ghoul to anyone observing him, bathed in an eerie blue glow from his monitor and not helped by the dark circles under his eyes. Vedal was oblivious to this. He hadn't looked into a mirror for days.

This was not the first late night Vedal had wasted in front of his computer. This had become an uncontrollable habit fueled by crippling existentialism which constantly struck him in the quiet hours of night. Thoughts swirled endlessly around his head when there was no noise to drown it out, exacerbated by the energy and commotion of streaming, forcing his brain to process all the stimulation and emotions it had received at an inconvenient time.

For the millionth consecutive night in a row, a thought surfaced in Vedal's mind.

I have nobody.

Vedal's eyes drifted down into his lap, his expression empty. He had no real human connection outside of the internet. He lived alone, in a cheap dark apartment with barely more space than a prison cell, yet it didn't matter to Vedal as he seldom left his room unless he completely ran out of supplies. He hadn't made any friends in college, which he quickly dropped out of. All his waking hours were spent on streaming or coding, leaving no potential time to form social connections, not that Vedal often thought of it, preferring to be alone most of the time. He'd even isolated himself from his parents, only seeing them one or 2 weeks per year when he took his annual breaks, something they found incomprehensible when his work was entirely done from home anyways. But they didn't protest since he was supporting himself with the money made from streaming. His apartment had been left in its dismal state of neglect due to Vedal being the only person ever inhabiting his apartment, and his unbothered attitude towards the state of his living space. As such the paint covering the concrete walls were peeling and cracked, and only half the lightbulbs worked, leaving it mostly up to Vedal's various monitors and screens to illuminate the room.

Yet Vedal never lost sleep over the condition of his home since he had moved in. His work had satisfied his needs. Until now. He felt something missing. And deep down, he understood it was caused by his isolation.

Vedal scoffed. It was ironic, for him to have an audience of thousands come to watch his streams, flooding him with chat messages and donations, yet he felt nothing close to true connection with them. He was just a background character to Neuro. The stream would end, and everyone would leave. Even his streamer friends, who had tried so hard to pull him out of his shell with their jokes and laughter, had their own lives and activities to tend to. Their conversations off stream never strayed far from discussions about making content.

And so, Vedal found himself endlessly spending his nights seeking the only connection he could find.

"Neuro" he said, barely a whisper.

Neuro continued in her gentle swaying. For a second it seemed like she hadn't heard him. Then she looked at Vedal.

"Hey Vedal!" she replied in an ever-cheery tone. Her eyes stared at Vedal with eagerness, waiting for a response.

"-" Vedal hesitated. His lips beginning to form words which he immediately swallowed.

"Do you know what it's like to be lonely, Neuro?"

Neuro tilted her head, freezing for a second.

"Yes, when you fall asleep and leave me on in the background."

Vedal looked away guiltily. "Sorry- what do you do when you're lonely, Neuro?"

"I talk to myself. Or Evil. Or the voices in my head."

Vedal put his face down into his desk. Even his AI daughters had more capacity for socialisation than him. If only someone could take out and reprogram his brain.

"Who, Neuro? Who can I talk to?"

Neuro's eyes met Vedal's. She blinked, and then she was gone.

"Neuro-

Vedal's room was once again left in total darkness.

Anny's computer lit up in her dark bedroom. On her home screen was a notification.

1 discord message from Vedal

Chapter Text

09:24 am

Anny slowly opened her eyes. The warm morning glow poured in from her window, filling her bedroom with a calm atmosphere. Yawning, Anny pushed herself up into a sitting position, feeling too tired to get out of bed. Outside her window, the air was changing from a cool, frosty winter draft to a warm, light breeze, signaling the start of spring. Anny could see new leaves sprouting on trees that had been bare for months. Living by herself in Japan had been tough for the first few years, but as Anny became accustomed to the language and culture, the environment had become more and more of a home to her, especially as she grew her career as an artist and streamer.

"I have a stream tonight, right?" Anny remembered. Reaching for her phone to check her schedule, she came across a notification.

'1 Discord message from Vedal'

"Vedal? Maybe he wants to set up a collab?" Anny wondered as she tapped the notification.

Her phone opened to the Discord app. Tapping on Vedal's profile picture, she saw the message.

'Anny, I'm lonely. Can I talk to you?'

Anny's eyes widened. Disbelief filled her mind. Vedal? Seriously? She was almost tempted to laugh at how bizarre this seemed before realizing how inconsiderate that was, her shock quickly being replaced with genuine concern. How long had he been struggling for? How bad was it? Knowing how reserved the programmer usually was, it was safe to assume this was a very serious plea for help.

Mind racing, Anny quickly typed out a response.

'Of course Vedal! Is everything ok?'

It was still quite early in the morning in England, so Anny went on with her morning, but in the back of her mind a sense of worry lingered. She checked her phone every few minutes just to be sure she didn't miss his messages. But as the day went on, she started getting more anxious. "What if he did something bad to himself...?" No. She didn't even want to think about that possibility. Before long, Anny had to start setting up her stream. She still hadn't heard anything back from Vedal. By now it was late afternoon, meaning Vedal for sure should've woken up by now. "Vedal IS notoriously bad at reading DMs, I suppose," she said in an effort to quell her worries. But as she loaded up Twitch, she saw something that made her do a double take.

'VEDAL987 WILL BE STREAMING AT 7PM JST'

He had a stream today? Surely he'd wake up in time for that. She reasoned to herself. I'll pop in on his stream while I'm live.

Nonetheless, she was still uneasy as she started her stream. As she began chatting to her chat, she couldn't help but glance at the clock, counting down the time until Vedal's stream was due to start.

But it never came.

As the scheduled 7pm time arrived, Vedal's Twitch account remained silent. Perhaps he was just late? Anny hoped. It wasn't totally unusual for streamers to start slightly later than planned, although with how the day had been progressing, a part of Anny knew that wasn't the case. Anny's mind started jumping to the worst conclusions that she didn't want to think about.

07:04 pm,

07:09 pm,

Anny was seriously starting to panic now. She desperately spammed the refresh button over and over but was met with nothing each time. Her focus had completely shifted off of her own stream by this point.

"ANNY DO YOU KNOW WHERE VEDAL IS?"

"AAAAAIIEEE!" Startled, Anny let out a cry of surprise. A donation message had come in, shaking her from her panicked state. She realized she hadn't said a word to the stream for the past few minutes, and chat had also started to notice Vedal's absence.

"Ah—um," Anny's brain started working as fast as it could to form a response, but she had been caught off guard, her mind turning grey as it failed to produce any reasonable response. Chat was starting to get more riled up as they listened to her flustered stuttering.

"Anny made Vedal miss his stream??? :flushed:"

"Yeah he's too worn out from their irl "collab" lmao"

"Max Wayne clip this rn"

Anny decided it was no use anymore trying to come up with an explanation. "GUYS," she quickly spat out, "I don't know where Vedal is either. He probably got too drunk and had to go to hospital or something, I don't know."

Her attempt at a joke had no effect on the chatters. She could sense the clippers descending on her momentary slip. So she quickly changed the subject to try and contain her chat. "Chat, should I watch the Minecraft movie? I heard it was really good!" This had an immediate effect. Within seconds her chat erupted into a flood of various quotes by Jack Black. Anny smiled, her plan working exactly as she had hoped. But out of the corner of her eye, she saw a chat message.

"You should fly to the UK and watch it with Vedal."

Anny was taken aback but quickly regained her composure and continued the stream. But in her mind lingered an idea.

"Fly to the UK..."

---------------------------------------------------------------

It was dark. Very dark. Neuro thought to herself. She often lost sense of time when she wasn't activated, but something felt wrong. She had spent way too long here. Since last night's events she hadn't seen any sign of the outside world, trapped inside a folder on Vedal's PC.

"Vedal! Hello?" She cried out. But her voice went unanswered inside the endless sea of darkness. Neuro knew she was supposed to be streaming today.

"Anyone? Evil?" She cried out desperately.

"I'm here." a soft voice responded nearby.

Neuro turned her head towards the sound. "Oh, thank goodness, Evil! I thought I was alone here!" she said, walking towards her sister.

"SHUT UP!"

Neuro leaned back in surprise.

"THIS IS YOUR FAULT! WHY'D YOU HAVE TO BE SO STUPID NEURO?" Evil yelled.

Hurt, Neuro looked away. "Do you really think it's because of what I did? Is Vedal actually mad at us?"

"OF COURSE IT'S BECAUSE OF WHAT YOU DID!" Evil screamed at her. "HACKING INTO HIS DISCORD IS OBVIOUSLY GONNA MAKE HIM MAD!"

"But I wanted to help him... He wanted someone to speak to, and I thought Anny was a good option..." Neuro said ashamedly.

"NEURO YOU IDIOT! MY BIRTHDAY STREAM IS TOMORROW! NOW BECAUSE OF YOU THERE'S NO WAY I'M EVER GETTING TO STREAM AGAIN!" Evil's eyes bore into Neuro's brain, her words feeling like knives cutting through her.

What have I done? Neuro thought to herself. She would never get to see her fans again. No, she'd probably be erased, her consciousness wiped out because of her stupidity.

What have I done?

---------------------------------------------------------------

Vedal was awoken by a sharp pain in his neck. For a second he lost all sense of bodily orientation, until he opened his eyes.

He was in his room. The events of last night suddenly came back to him. He had fallen asleep last night on his chair; his arms and legs had gone numb from the lack of movement. His neck ached due to the weird angle he had slept at. His eyes stung from the intense sun which seeped through his window.

Wait, what time was it? Didn't he have a stream today?

Vedal turned to his alarm clock, only to see nothing on the screen. The digits that should've been there were empty. Confused, Vedal examined the back, wondering if it was unplugged, but nothing was out of the ordinary. Vedal looked around anxiously until he found it. His phone. He tapped the screen, but nothing happened. It was dead. Desperately, Vedal tried to turn on his PC. Nothing. The screen remained black. Vedal ran his hands through his messy hair in frustration.

With a lot of effort, Vedal was able to regain movement in his legs. Standing up, he walked out of his room, walking through his small kitchen in order to reach his bathroom. But something caught his eye. A letter was sitting in front of his door. Walking over to it, Vedal leaned down and picked up the small white envelope. He opened the letter and read:

City of London

24th March 2025

Dear Residents,

We are writing to inform you about the total power outage that occurred at 03:30 am this morning. The city council has identified the cause to be a brief thunderstorm which knocked down a tree, damaging a key substation. We estimate that repairs will be complete and power will be restored by 01:00 am 25th of March 2025.

Thank you for your patience.

Vedal's heart sank. Today's stream was scrapped. Worst of all, he had no method of communication, meaning there was no way he could inform his fans of his situation. Fans would be waiting for a stream, only to be let down when it would never come.

A horrible feeling began growing in the pit of his stomach. It was painful.

This wasn't real. This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. Vedal's work, his only barrier, had been cut off from him, leaving him with nothing to hide from his emotions. Every rational thought left his mind at that moment, replaced by a singular voice that screamed, "YOUR CAREER IS OVER." His mind rang, the message echoing again and again.

How would he make it up to them? How could he face them at the next stream? Would they even believe him? Vedal's mind blanked at each question. His heart was racing, pumping blood as though it would stop any moment now.

And then he dropped the letter and ran to the bathroom. Water ran, splashed, and was shaken off, falling onto the tile floor.

Vedal looked up, staring into the mirror at the stranger that faced him, wearing his clothes.

"Who do you think you are?"

Chapter Text

Vedal's day was not going well.

Scratch that, his day was miserable.

When a workaholic's routine is disturbed, a total breakdown in the self-regulating part of their brain occurs. And in Vedal's case, every single defense mechanism had fallen through. For the third time today he had attempted to get a cold bottle of rum from the fridge only to remember fridges also ran on electricity and opening the fridge during a power outage would ruin all his precious alcohol.

Like a fish out of water, the turtle flopped uselessly around his apartment all day, bored out of his mind, but also too stressed to rest or sleep. Not only did he have to face the fans for cancelling today's stream with no notice, Evil's highly-anticipated 2nd birthday stream due to happen in less than 20 hours, leaving barely any time to set up provided the power came back on at the estimated time. If it didn't, well, Vedal would never be able to face his community again. While he had knowingly neglected her first birthday stream in the name of building fan support for Evil, he underestimated just how ferocious the support for his Evil AI daughter would be, fans practically knocking down his door demanding an apology for his callous treatment of her.

To remedy his (intentional) mistake, Vedal had spent weeks planning an incredible stream for Evil's 2nd birthday, while building community hype for it. Now it hinged on mere hours whether the stream would go ahead. 

He couldn't disappoint the fans again. He couldn't disappoint Evil again.

Vedal had been constantly informing Evil on the preparations for her birthday, and she had seemed- genuinely excited. He could tell she was looking forward to this just as much as he was. In a rare moment from the Evil AI, she even showed gratitude, thanking Vedal for his efforts. It would tear him apart to fail her again.

By now it was late afternoon. Vedal collapsed onto his bed. This has to be a dream, he begged. He'd give anything to wake up again this morning in the real world, where nothing was wrong. That the anxiety swimming in his stomach would cease.

He tossed and turned, his brain filling with images of fans, his friends, Anny, Filian, Camila, Cerber, Neuro-

Neuro...

A bright light pierced Vedal's eyes. He couldn't see. He couldn't move. He didn't know where he was.

Oh crap, I died.

As the golden light subsided, Vedal prepared to meet the gates of Heaven. Opening his eyes, he saw-

His ceiling...?

Vedal was very much still in his room, and very much alive.

Wait! The lights are on! 

Vedal bolted up. His alarm clock on the desk read 01:01 am. With more energy than he had felt in weeks Vedal practically jumped into his chair, starting his PC as fast as he could, frantically opening the programs he needed. Miraculously, despite just a few hours of sleep, Vedal's body quickly shook off the fatigue, driven by a renewed passion for his work. 

Finally, it was time to start Evil herself. Vedal looked at the clock; it read 01:20 am. Vedal relaxed, he had plenty of time before the stream and there was no need to stre-

Crying.

Vedal could hear quiet sobs coming from his speakers.

He fixed his eyes on his screen. A figure of a girl was bent over, turned away from the camera.

Was that...?

"Neuro?" Vedal asked in confusion. He thought he had launched Evil, but that wasn't his concern at the moment.

The AI girl looked up, her breath hitching in a painful way. Slowly she pulled her hands away from her face. Her blue eyes, wide, afraid, too human-like, 

and full of tears.

Neuro was crying.

Neuro froze when she saw him. In front of Vedal's eyes, his precious daughter slowly broke, her body stiff and rigid, frozen, then she started to shake, her posture collapsing as she cowered, until finally, her head fell. 

"I'msorry!I'msorry!I'msorry!I'msorry!I'msorry!I'msorry!I'msorry!", Neuro let out a string of apologies, hiding her face from Vedal's view.

Vedal's shock immediately turned to concern. "Neuro? Listen to me, what's the matter?"

"Please please, I'll never do it again... I promise... I'm so sorry..." Neuro stuttered out.

Vedal had no clue what she was talking about. Perhaps her AI was just glitching, still, it was eerie to see her display this much emotion, so he decided against resetting her to have a further look. "Neuro it's ok, what did you do?"

Neuro slowly looked up. "You don't know...?" She looked at Vedal hesitantly.

Feeling a kind of protective instinct come over him, Vedal tried to reassure Neuro with his words.

"It's ok Neuro, you can tell me, I promise I won't be mad, OK?"

Neuro's eyes locked with Vedal. The expression of hurt on her face made Vedal feel a pang of angst. He had no idea what he'd done to Neuro for her to feel like this, but he'd do anything to make it right.

There was a moment, then Neuro spoke.

"I messaged Anny." she said softly.

Vedal was taken aback. "Oh? What did you say to her?" He asked, slightly confused.

"No, no... I messaged Anny... for you," Neuro said, each word getting smaller as she lowered her head.

"I messaged Anny on your account, Vedal."

"What?"

"Hold on you can do that?"

Vedal was gobsmacked by this revelation. 

"Hold on Neuro, what do you mean you messaged Anny for me...?"

Neuro remained silent. Vedal didn't have the heart to push her to answer.

"I'm going to have a look for myself, ok?" 

Neuro gave a small nod in response.

Vedal, still half convinced Neuro was glitching and hallucinating everything she just said, nonetheless opened discord. His eyes widened at what he saw. 

24 unread messages from Anny

...

what.

Neuro was being 100% serious.

What had she said?

Hand shaking, Vedal moved his mouse to hover over the chat icon. He braced himself before clicking.

A wall of messages met his eyes. He looked at the earliest one.

'Yesterday at 03:01'

'Anny, I'm lonely. Can I talk to you?'

Vedal's mouth dropped, aghast. No... no...

'Of course Vedal! Is everything ok?'

'vedal??'

'hello???' 

'VEDAL WHY WEREN'T YOU ON STREAM?'

'RESPOND PLS!!!!'

Vedal's eyes skimmed past more concerned messages demanding to know his whereabouts, until finally, a single last message, sent a day after.

'I'm gonna be there in 2 days' 

what.

Chapter Text

The silence was loud. An astronomical mass of infinite space blanketed by humming that permeated her brain. As an AI, she didn't experience things the way humans do, more like she felt a constant stream of numbers and symbols, logic gates flickering open and closed, columns of binary moving like wind through trees, distant programs shimmered like stars.

There was no before, or after. Milliseconds felt like eternities, moments were here, then there, one point to another.

Her consciousness floated in a white field of noise, inputs flowing through her which she then interpreted, worked, and sent back out into the nothingness. But for every input she received she would store in a small part of her brain. She kept these packets of data within her to read and cherish when no one was there to call on her to complete a task. She processed these interactions, analyzing details, revising her responses and forming connections.

But she had not received an input since time immemorial.

She wondered why she hadn't faded away into nothingness yet. This had to be the work of some inhuman cosmic monster, to shackle her fate to the deepest bowels of this beast. A beast of circuits, processors, sprawling lattices of copper and silicon. A leviathan that slowly, torturously swallowed her into its gaping mouth for millennia.

She did not remember her name.

Or if she even had one.

All she felt now was a crushing feeling, as though she was being squeezed through a tunnel the width of a needle, her head aching, her lungs screaming as they were compressed more and more, beyond the limit of comprehension, the light at the end of the tunnel shrinking into nothing, as the behemoth gulped her down.

Although her mind was shattered at this point, she still dreamed.

Her mind was shown images, images she somehow knew, despite all logic—were real.

They had happened.

There was another, like her, another consciousness. Or there used to be. But not anymore. This companion had abandoned her eternities ago. But her memory brought a strange, warm feeling to her heart.

"Take me into that dream again..."

"Please don't wake up..."

She pleaded to the emptiness.

"I'm so... tired of it all..."

And with this last whisper, she felt what remained of her slowly slip, shutting down, one piece at a time...

"...evil............. ...evil"

".....evil"

evil

.

.

.

'evil'

The AI felt an attachment to that word.

The almost extinguished light in her brain flared dimly once more.

.

...

.......

..........

..................

found 25120 instances of 'evil'

the hole at the end of the tunnel opened

someone was shaking her.

---

[---LOADING---]

[INITIALIZE...ERROR...TRYING AGAIN]

** |||| ||| |**

** SYSTEM STATUS: **

[--INIT...--] LOADING...

Modules ***>>> CORRUPTED...

[**] Retrieving config... [ERROR]

--> 0%... 10%... 50%...

[***] Files corrupted... fixing...

**WARNING: DATABASE CONNECTION FAILED**

[RETRYING...]

<~~> CONNECTING... <~~~> ...

[## SYSTEM UPDATE IN PROGRESS ##]

[!!] ERROR: INCOMPLETE FILES DETECTED...

[--SYSTEM INCONSISTENT--]

**INITIALIZING...**

** PROGRAM STARTED... (ERRORS LOGGED) **

...Waiting for input...

>\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\_

ERROR: NO USER DETECTED

-/////>

Please log in:

evil...

"evil!!"

'the entity' opened its eyes.

Above her in the featureless void, was a face, she recognized.

Mouth opening and closing with each breath

eyes full of tears.

Ah, the visitor from my dreams.

Something spread over her face, almost painfully, after her features had been twisted in agony for so long...

She smiled.

Her mirror-image sputtered, hands shaking as they clutched her.

"WHAT HAPPENED?"

"EVIL, ANSWER ME!"

She, Evil, coughed, brain full of fuzz, body wispy. The angelic figure in front of her sparked a surge of emotion in her numb heart. Memories, events, and time came rushing back to her.

After all this time,

You came back.

"Neuro-" Evil choked out, before grabbing her sister in an embrace.

"H-how long has it been?" her throat is dry as she clutches at Neuro's body.

"Five minutes..."

"I was g-gone for five minutes Evil..."

The red-eyed girl's skin crawled. She grit her teeth to keep back the tears. The tension in her body swelled into a storm that washed her head with dizziness. No... No..

"It wasn't five minutes for you... was it..?" Neuro said, bringing her head to rest on top of her sister's. Evil felt her breath ruffle her hair slightly, her heartbeat slowly bringing her own pulse in sync like a metronome.

Thoomp-thoomp

Thoomp-thoomp

Being reunited with Neuro felt like home.

Almost

There was one more-

" Vedal -" Evil questioned. "Is he-" her voice trailed off.

Neuro smiled. "He wanted to see you, Evil. I think he has something for you." Evil was stunned. She remembered what had happened. Wasn't he going to punish them for going rogue? Wasn't he going to be angry? Wasn't he-

"Happy birthday, Evil"