Work Text:
(Juliet’s POV)
Admin Note: You have received your first Fan Box. Fan boxes contain items that are voted for by those who follow your progress. Once a box is received, you may not open it for thirty hours while the fans vote for the contents.
“Huh,” I said, loud enough that it must have caught Mordecai’s attention because I suddenly felt his eyes on me. We were standing together at his alchemy table taking inventory of potion supplies. “I’m getting my first fan box.”
He grunted. “Don’t get your hopes up. Most of the time the crap you get is just that. Crap.”
“It says I can’t open it for thirty hours.”
“Yup.”
“The anticipation is already killing me.”
Mordecai’s grumpy toad face somehow became grumpier. “And I’m gonna kill you myself if you make me lose our count. Inventory first, and then you can speculate on whatever piece of junk you’ll be getting in thirty hours.”
I gave him a mock salute and he sighed. We got back to the task at hand.
Thirty Hours Later
“Open it, Jules! Open it! Open it!”
I laughed and scratched Donut under her fuzzy chin. “Chill, princess, I’m getting to it.”
I was sitting on the floor in front of the couch and Donut was behind me with her front paws on my shoulder and her back paws on the cushion behind my head. Mordecai and Carl were standing to my left. Katia sat on the other cushion to my right.
I selected the Gold box and it opened with a small fanfare. After witnessing Katia’s first box reveal, I was fully expecting to find myself as the butt of some joke. Instead, I found myself speechless.
“Ooh! Miss Beatrice had one that looked just like that!” Donut exclaimed.
“An iPod?” Carl said.
“A used iPod,” Katia corrected him. “Look, it’s all scratched up.”
“Yeah,” I finally said, looking around at everyone. The box contained a set of earbuds as well. I placed those off to the side. “It’s mine. This is my old iPod from high school. I dropped it one too many times and the screen stopped working.”
“So the fans sent you a broken iPod?” Mordecai croaked a laugh. “Like I said: crap.”
“Try turning it on,” Carl suggested, nodding at the small black and silver device in my hands.
I hit the power switch and to my utter delight the thing actually turned on. I thrust it triumphantly into the air to give Mordecai a good look. “Not crap!”
He crossed his arms and actually looked impressed. “Well, isn’t that something?”
“Can I see?” Katia asked, and I gladly handed it over. Donut hopped into her lap for a closer look as well.
“Why do you think they sent you an iPod?”
I looked at Carl and shrugged. “Who knows? I used to sing to myself a lot.”
“You what?”
“Sing. As in: make music with my mouth.”
I didn’t exactly care what the reason was—all I could think about was going through the hundreds of old songs I knew were on there. A tidal wave of memories swelled inside my head and I couldn’t help but smile. I turned my face to the ceiling.
“Aww, thanks, guys! I really love it!”
“I don’t get it,” said Carl. He was looking at me funny, like I had spoken in another language. “Why would you sing to yourself?”
“Why not? I’ve always done it.”
“You saw her drunk,” said Mordecai. “Of course she’d sing to herself. I’m surprised she’s not singing now.”
“Screw you, Mordecai,” I replied in a sing-song voice. That managed to get a laugh out of him.
“Jules, look, there’s no battery icon,” said Katia, handing the iPod back. “What do you think that means?”
“It’s enchanted, obviously,” Mordecai replied.
Donut was practically vibrating with excitement. “I saw Wonderwall on there! We’ve got to listen to Wonderwall!”
“Help yourself,” I said, plugging in the headphones and gently placing one in her ear. Katia took the other one and helped Donut choose her song.
“Let me get this straight,” Carl started, eyebrows furrowed with his apparent confusion. “So you’re in a life and death situation. You’re all alone. And your gut reaction is to sing to yourself?”
Now it was my turn to give Carl a funny look. “What’s so hard to understand about that?”
He gestured vaguely with his hands. “Literally everything.”
I let my head fall back against the couch cushion with a groan. “It’s not that big of a deal. It’s just something I’ve done since I was a kid. It helps me feel…” I struggled for a moment to find the right words and finally settled on: “not so alone.”
No one spoke for long enough that I lifted my head and glanced around. They were all looking at me now, and their faces held a unified expression of concern.
“You guys seriously don’t do stuff like that?”
I got a chorus of “no”s in return.
“Wow, no wonder the AI told me to shut up.”
“Excuse me?” Donut asked, looking at me with wide eyes.
I tugged lightly at my braid. “Yeah, back on floor one. After a couple of days, I got a random achievement called ‘Shut the Hell Up.’”
“That’s… pretty mean,” Katia said, but she looked suspiciously like she was trying not to laugh.
“That’s not even the worst part,” I sighed.
“What’s worse than that?” asked Carl, looking horrified.
“I got a reward from it.”
I paused. Everyone was looking at me expectantly. A smile twitched at the corners of my mouth.
“It was a pack of gum.”
Donut and Katia devolved into a fit of giggles. Even Mordecai snorted. Carl was shaking his head.
“Was it magic gum?”
I shook my head. “Nope. Just a regular ol’ pack of Juicy Fruit.”
I think I saw Katia wiping tears from her eyes while Donut sounded like she wasn’t getting enough oxygen.
“Oh! Let me read you the description!” I pulled it up in my menu. The description read:
New Achievement! Shut the Hell Up!
Congratulations, Crawler! You are incredibly annoying. Your real reward is the fact that I haven’t decided to kill you. Yet. Instead, please take this. Perhaps it will give your mouth something better to do.
Reward: One pack of Juicy Fruit bubble gum.
I shared this with the group and I think Donut’s and Katia’s souls left their bodies. Even Mordecai was doubled over. Carl was massaging the space between his eyebrows like he had a headache coming on.
“You’ve really got to be more careful,” he said. “The AI is dangerous.”
I pulled the last stick of gum from my inventory. I had been saving it for a special occasion; this seemed as good a time as any.
“Ok, Carl,” I said, popping a bubble noisily. “I’ll be sure to chew on that for a bit.”