Chapter Text
Hummer eyes the chat with a great sense of foreboding. Some guy had emailed him a few days ago (he hadn’t noticed it for several days) asking him about his research on the leviathan. And for some inexplicable reason, Hummer had invited him - his name was Wifies or something - to his world to talk. It would no doubt be just another faker, but there’s always a chance.
It’s already been a couple minutes past five and there’s been no join message, so this Wifies guy probably wasn’t too serious about his interest in the leviathan. The stars faded into the vibrancy of a sunrise above him as he halfheartedly typed into chat.
Hello?
The moment he sent it he’s hit with a wave of embarrassment. There’s literally no one else online, and here he is half-expecting a response. What an idiot, eh? Well, if Wifies isn’t going to show up on time then he won’t bother waiting around. He’s got Levi to find. Maybe he’ll check the books for-
And then he nearly has a heart attack when he turns around and there’s a stranger standing directly behind him. “Hi! Hi, nice to meet you,” the stranger says in response to a cut-off shriek that definitely did not come from Hummer, must have been a mob! Haha.
“Hello?” He responds once he catches his breath. “Sorry, I didn’t see a join message. Nice to meet you to. Welcome to my world?”
Wifies (this is Wifies, right?) Shrugs awkwardly, glancing past Hummer at the ocean. “Must’ve missed it,” he chuckles. “Thank you for having me.”
They look at each other. The eye contact is intense, though possibly only on Hummer’s side of the exchange since he doesn’t actually have eyes to make eye contact with. Wifies’ eyes reflect the sun, the grey shining yellow-orange for a second as he shifts from side to side.
“Thank you for responding to my email, so out of the blue,” Wifies says. “Do you have any preferences? Is Hummer okay?”
“Hummer’s fine, 5718, I mean- whatever you want to call me man,” Hummer says. It’s nice of Wifies to ask, but this is a really weird situation, honestly. He knows he didn’t miss any notifications, and he should have seen Wifies join given the time that they met. Something is off.
“I just wanted to ask you a few questions, if that’s okay.” Right, the reason he’s here. Well, the thirty minutes have already started so he can’t be expecting the full time, but Hummer nods along. This is important. “I saw your post and I was like ‘I gotta message this guy’,” Wifies continues and Hummer feels a spark of curiosity.
“Oh really, are you some kind of journalist or something?” How had Wifies come across the post anyway? Why was he looking for Levi?
Wifies hesitates. “I… I make YouTube videos. Was going to make a video on the Leviathan, figure out what it is. You know.” He doesn’t know, actually. It doesn’t matter to him what Levi is. And, well. He’s not a YouTuber.
“That’s.. that’s interesting.” That isn’t promising. If this guy is so determined to figure out what Levi is, how can he put his belief in the fact that Levi exists? This is just going to be Arronax and her lying museum all over again.
“Have you been hunting the Leviathan for a while?” Wifies asks, with a tone that registers as cool disinterest against Hummer’s burning passion. Hummer feels a (somewhat unprovoked) deep sense of offence. But, he reasons, this can be salvaged! He can make Wifies believe, if Wifies is willing, if he noticed that the screenshot was fake and didn’t just decide to interview every single person who made a post on the leviathan or something. Who knows, really?
“I wouldn’t say hunting,” he denies, “I mean- I’ve been looking for Levi for now, over half a year?” He realizes his the error of his ways when Wifies pauses at a very specific point in the sentence.
“You call him Levi?” He questions, sounding vaguely amused. If Hummer wasn’t a TV he’d probably be frowning. He’s not entirely sure about that though, due to the fact that he is a TV.
“I mean Leviathan,” He stutters. “Levi is- just a nickname I have for him.”
“Yeah yeah, no worries. It’s kind of cool.”
The supposed YouTuber - Hummer certainly hasn’t seen any of his videos, he could literally just be lying - looks somewhat pleased about it, actually, and Hummer finds himself rather proud of that fact (though he’s still rightfully suspicious! Let it not be forgotten!). Oh, right. “Could I ask, why'd you reach out?” That is a rather important thing to determine, huh.
“Like I said, I just wanted to ask you a question about your reddit post, if that was okay. This is the ocean where you took that screenshot, right? The 20k 20k?”
Indeed. “Yeah right over here. My boat is over there - that’s where I was near when I took the screenshot.” It’s beginning to seem like Wifies fell for the screenshot, just like every other person, and Hummer quickly finds himself losing hope in this conversation. He has better things to be doing right now.
“Can I see it?”
“…no.” The audacity! Wifies chuckles sheepishly - at least he knows it was a long shot .
“Okay,” he continues, “Okay, yeah. So you took the screenshot in this ocean?” Hummer nods along, says something about it being close to the ice biome, and continues scheming. Not scheming - planning. Much more distinguished. The underwater elevator is probably unnecessary…
Then Wifies says something that makes his theoretical heart stop - being a robot, he doesn’t have a physical heart, but that isn’t the point.
“Why’d you fake it?”
This is the point where the hypothetical soundtrack would change songs, so Hummer switches the song stuck in his head to a more suitable tune. “Sorry?” He asks, doing his very absolute best not to get his hopes up. He’s probably just bluffing, this doesn’t mean anything- but it could! He could be the one!
“Why’d you fake your screenshot?”
He’s got to double down. “I didn’t?”
Silence.
“I mean, they are my screenshots. I didn’t fake them!”
Wifies looks- disappointed in him? That hurts slightly, but not enough for Hummer to change his stance. This is his world, his life’s work, and Wifies is going to have to prove that he’s serious about this. “Well,” he sighs, “If you don’t want to tell me that’s fine, but I’ve got other stuff I have to get to, so I might just disconnect.” No no no-
“Okay wait- wait, wait. Don’t go. Okay? I faked the screenshots, I admit it!” Hummer admits. He cannot lose this opportunity, not after everything.
“Okay, why? Why’d you fake them?”
Here he goes.