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Puzzles opened the door quietly, letting Rango and his boyfriend enter first before he and Mario did. Closing the door and the umbrella he was given with a sigh, Puzzles leaned back against the door and sighed in exhaustion, his screen dimming drastically as his power alert- signaling he was low and needed to plug in- flashed on his display. Rango and Randy hadn’t noticed the alert, as they had already stumbled away to go to bed and pass out. Mario, however, did notice the flashing signal, and with a hum of worry, took Puzzles’ hand and guided him to the couch. “You look like a mess... Come on, sit down.” He murmured, gently pushing Puzzles onto the couch and helping him out of his jacket. Puzzles groaned, his screen glitching, his expression barely visible through the static. “So-Sorry for tha-that.” He apologized, his words beginning to stutter. Mario winced. “I think your voice took a hit too.”
“I-I-I can tell-tell.” Puzzles huffed, and Mario held back a chuckle. “Alright, alright. Maybe I can try and fix you up! Do you have a toolbox, or manual, or something?”
Puzzles tilted his head to think. “... Nightstand in my bedro-room. I should ha-a-ave a small notebook in there with everything you-you need.” He said, and Mario nodded. “Alrighty! I’ll be right back.” He hummed, stepping away from the couch and running to Puzzles’ room.
He was surprised at how cozy it looked. A thick comforter lay on a queen sized bed, with several pillows and some covered in burn-marked towels. There were small ribbons in a few corners of the room, printed to look like film strips, decorating the otherwise bland white plaster walls. Mario smiled, walking towards the nightstand. “Film strip ribbons and camera flash bedsheets... Charming!” He opened the nightstand drawer and rummaged through it, sliding aside photos and discarded pens before finding the journal. It was small, about the size of Mario’s hand, and the cover was littered with small stickers of tigers and screwdrivers. Likely stickers Rango had placed, and a long time ago too, judging by the worn graphic on the sticker. Mario hummed and turned back around to walk to the living room, returning to Puzzles’ side as he looked through the manual.
“Did you write all this yourself?” He asked softly, flipping through each page. Puzzles shrugged. “It was a-a collaborative ef-effort.” Mario gave him an odd look. “What’s that mean?” He asked, and Puzzles sighed, the sound coming out like a glitching degauss noise. “Me and Wren wrote it. He compiled everything into tha-at notebook, and I-I-I organized it.”
“Oh. Huh.” Mario hummed, flipping to a page involving something about a voice box, and he perked up. “Ah, the fix for your voice should be easy! I just have to realign the box to your speakers and check if the wires are fully connected.”
“How simplistic-ic.”
Mario moved to station himself behind Puzzles on the couch, following the adware’s glitching instructions on where to put his hands and what to unscrew. Eventually, he found his voicebox, tilted off a broken dock in the back of his head with several wires unplugged. Mario winced at the sight. “Yikes, that’s ugly.”
“Don’t be me-mean.” Puzzles huffed, and Mario apologized. “Sorry!” He carefully reached a hand into the compartment, realigning the small box and the dock before replugging the wires where they belonged. Once done, he glanced over at Puzzles again. “Did that do anything?”
“I believe so.” Puzzles replied, his screen glitching to a smile. “Thank you, Mario.”
Mario grinned. “No problem, TV Man! Let’s see what else I can fix.”
The next hour was spent in relative silence, interrupted only by the sounds of metal clinking against each other and Mario asking if he did something correctly, with Puzzles confirming that he did. When everything else had been fixed and all that was left to do was replace the adware’s screen, Mario gently pushed the new pane of glass into the frame of his head, watching as the display flickered to life with a soft, colorbar smile.
“Thanks,” Puzzles began, pulling off the gloves he’d been given previously to avoid shocking anybody. “I owe you a lot.”
Mario grinned proudly and waved his hand. “Ah, no, you don’t owe me anything! Mario is-a just happy to help.” He exclaimed, and Puzzles smiled at him gently. “Well, I insist anyway. You didn’t have to help, yet you did anyway.”
“Well, what else am I to do?” He asked, and Puzzles considered the question. “... I honestly believed you were going to pass out when we got here.”
Mario let out a laugh. “Tempting! But I wanted to be sure you were okay first.” He chuckled, and Puzzles’ screen tinged a soft red as a heartbeat line spread from one side to the other, like a blush. He smiled and leaned in close, pressing the top of his screen to Mario’s forehead. “Well, you have my thanks.” He hummed, and Mario chuckled again, this time more sheepishly. “Aha, my pleasure...”
They sat there in silence for a long moment, simply enjoying the silence of the home and each other’s company. Mario felt the fuzz of his warm screen against his skin, the prickling electricity making his mustache fuzz and giving him goosebumps. Puzzles savored the feeling of his warm skin, how soft it felt under the glass of his screen. Subconsciously, their hands found each other, twining together and squeezing like a gentle comfort.
Mario’s eyes opened- He hadn’t realized he’d closed them- and looked up at Puzzles’ screen, smiling softly. “Feel any better?” He asked, his voice barely audible through the whirr of Puzzles’ fans, which had grown louder. Puzzles nodded. “Mhm.”
“Good.” Mario grinned, nuzzling his screen with his big nose. Puzzles laughed aloud. “Wha- Hey! That feels weird- Ahaha!” The feeling of his mustache brushing the cool glass was ticklish, Mario realized, so he continued to do it. Puzzles kept laughing, leaning away from the feeling while Mario leaned forward to keep going, until they both fell over.
Mario found himself hovering over the adware, propping himself up on his hands as he loomed above him, watching Puzzles’ screen gradually turn redder. The adware coughed. “Ahem, well...”
Mario smiled, leaning down and kissing his screen. Puzzles flinched at the action, a few sparks flying from his antennae, but he relaxed, holding Mario close before they pulled apart just a moment later.
Mario giggled. “You should smile more. It looks good on you.” He hummed, and Puzzles sheepishly let a staticky smile spread onto his screen. “Right. Thanks.”
After a moment of silence, Puzzles slowly sat up, clearing his throat and dusting off his ruined suit. “Anyways, we should probably settle in for the night.” He glanced over at the clock, reading 2 AM. “It’s late, and we should spend the weekend well-rested.”
“Good idea!” Mario hummed, yawning as he fell back against the couch. Puzzles smiled, pulling a blanket from a bin under the sofa and draping it over him. “Rest well, my dear.” He hummed softly, brushing a strand of hair from Mario’s face. “I’ll make you something nice in the morning.”
“Alright...” Mario hummed, yawning. “G’night, TV Man.” He mumbled, eyes shutting as he nearly instantly passed out. Puzzles chuckled, before remembering he too was on the verge of powering down, as he was reminded by a flashing warning on his screen. He sighed, wandering to the armchair in the corner and slumping into the cushions, his screen dimming like it always did. He sighed, turning one of the knobs to flick his screen to static, before laying back and falling asleep, comforted by Mario’s mere presence with him.