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“‘M headin’ out,” Kanako called out as she neared the door.
“Oh, where are you going?” Ceroba asked after him.
“Underground,” Kanako replied. “Gonna go check in on Axis.”
“I see. Take care, then.”
“Got it.”
Ever since moving to the Surface (and regaining some form of consciousness), Kanako had taken to visiting Axis for the first weekend of the month. Though it usually ended up being a mere daytrip. Today was no exception, at least on the “visiting Axis” part.
It was around 8 in the morning when Kanako had left, but around noon when he had arrived at the mouth of the Underground where the barrier used to be. It was the fastest way to reach Axis, after all. Through the throne room, through the castle, past Kuroba and Clover’s deathplace, and down the R3 Elevator in Hotland. It was in much better condition than when Ceroba and the Clovers had used it all those years ago, since the Steamworks–and the Underground as a whole–had become quite a tourist spot for humans.
(Heh, poor Ax,) Kanako thought to themselves once. (Having so many intruders to the Steamworks must be really tiring. Hmm… maybe I should see if I can tamper with his code to try and take that part out of him?)
While it had failed that visit, Kanako had suddenly remembered that thought on its way here, and decided to ask Axis if such a thing were possible. As usual, Axis was waiting for Kanako at the entrance to the Furnace on the Hotland side.
“AH. YOU ARE HERE,” he said as Kanako approached. “YOU ARE ONLY 13.042941 SECONDS LATE THIS TIME COMPARED TO LAST TIME’S 41.04281.”
“Oh, come on, Ax,” Kanako replied. “Not everyone can arrive perfectly on time down to the goddamn picosecond or whatever you went to. Non-robots typically consider just the minute to determine if someone’s late or not. I got here at 12:15, so I’m right on time.”
“AS THE KIDS SAY: WHATEVER. IS THERE ANYTHING NEW THAT HAS HAPPENED TO YOU?”
“Mom got an offer to attend a movie audition, but she doesn’t know when they’ll be. That’s about it. Clo and Ver went to a party, but they haven’t told me anything about how it was. Anything with you?”
“NOT MUCH. THERE HAVE BEEN AN INCREASE IN INTRUDERS RECENTLY, INCLUDING SMALLER ONES. IT MAKES THINGS QUITE DIFFICULT.”
“Oh, yeah. Summer vacation started. So kids aren’t in school anymore, and wanna enter this dangerous and dilapidated building for some God forsaken reason. Do you at least have more stable railings?”
As soon as she said that, a small segment of railing far away fell with a loud thud. Casualties 0, thankfully.
“YES. WE HAVE BEEN MAKING ATTEMPTS TO RECONSTRUCT THE STEAMWORKS SINCE TALL LADY AND CLOVER CAME THROUGH.” (“I told you, not everyone but me, Dalv, and Ver need descriptors.”) “THERE HAS BEEN PROGRESS. WE HAD AN ART CLUB AT ONE POINT. IT HELPED BOOST MORALE.”
“What happened to it?”
“CLASSIFIED. FOR NO REASON OTHER THAN I THINK IT WOULD BE HUMOROUS TO NOT TELL YOU.”
“Fuck you.”
Axis turned to look at Kanako, lowering the top half of his lenses to give a bored look.
“[screw] YOU, TOO.” He released some steam in order to replicate a sigh. “I WISH I COULD SWEAR. IT WOULD PROVIDE VERY USEFUL IN MANY SITUATIONS.”
At that, Kanako remembered xyr earlier thought of tampering with Axis’s code and intending to ask today.
“That reminds me… can I take a look at your code? I wanna see if I can get rid of some annoying things for you.”
“LIKE WHAT?”
“Oh you know, security protocols for intruders and your swear filter. Might make things easier for you.”
“THE SECURITY PROTOCOL IS WHAT MAKES ME ME. I WOULD RATHER NOT REMOVE THAT. ACCESS DENIED (SAID LIKE ‘AXIS DENIED’).”
“(Yeah, I got the joke, you didn’t need to say ‘parenthesis’, Ax.) I didn’t mean fully. I just meant identifying everyone not in your database as an intruder. Considering the sheer amount of people that are gonna be coming by soon.”
“I SAY AGAIN. AXIS DENIED. I FIND IT QUITE ENTERTAINING. HOWEVER THE INCOMING INFLUX WILL BE ANNOYING. PERHAPS WE SHOULD CHARGE FOR ADMISSION FOR TOURISTS. IT WILL ALSO HELP FUND REPAIRS. DO WE HAVE A DEAL?”
Kanako thought for a moment, considering that possibility, when one of the Sir Slithers spoke up. “Yesssssss, that’s perfect!”
“Take it, take it, take it!” another piped up.
“We won’t get anything out of it… sssssso howsabout a… let’sss say 35% cut?”
“But for how much does admission cosssst? If they’re humansss, we mussst consider their pricingssss.”
“$14.80, perhapsssss? Only 2G, but that sssshould work.”
“And a cut of $5.18 will work wonderfully.”
“Ok, guys, guys?” Kanako finally spoke up. “If it’s $14.80 per person, that’ll dissuade them. $7.40 for children, duh. And if asked about the price, explain that it was originally put in as G and that it’s just the conversion rate. Plus, we’ll get $2.59 for that. Though 65+ should be free. Gotta respect elders and all that.” She turned to face Axis after having consulted the others. “Do we have a deal now?”
“HM. IF IT WILL DISSUADE INTRUDERS THEN THAT SHOULD BE FINE. VERY WELL. WE HAVE A DEAL. NOW PLEASE ENLIGHTEN ME ON HOW YOU WILL REMOVE MY VERY ANNOYING FILTER.”
“Oh, simple. Is there a computer nearby somewhere?”
“THERE ARE. BUT LET ME BRING YOU TO ONE FURTHER AWAY. IT IS ONE I ACTUALLY KNOW THE PASSWORD FOR, UNLIKE IN THE FACTORY.”
Deciding to trust their brother (who had lied about not knowing the Factory passwords for fun), Kanako was guided to a room that, potentially, Axis had once shoved Clover into after catching them during a mandatory chase sequence, Office Wing 2C. It even had free (incredibly stale) pizza!
“BACK WHEN CLOVER AND TALL LADY” (“I swear to God you’re doing that to mess with me.”) “WERE INTRUDERS, I HAD PLANNED TO STORE THEM HERE FOR DETAINMENT PURPOSES WHILE CHASING THEM THROUGH THE WEIRD-YET-FOR-SOME-REASON-MANDATORY WINDING HALLWAY. I DO NOT REMEMBER IF I MANAGED TO PUT CLOVER IN HERE. I HAVE A FEELING THEY WOULD NOT MIND IT. IN ANY CASE, THERE IS A COMPUTER IN THE BACK YOU CAN USE. IT WAS INTENDED TO BE A SECURITY STATION BUT THERE ARE NO CAMERAS HERE. A SHAME. ITS PASSWORD IS ‘5NAI2’. I HEAR IT IS A REFERENCE TO SOME FORM OF GAME WITH PATROLLING ROBOTS. FITTING, I SUPPOSE.”
“Oh, FNaI, yeah. That tracks. Kinda simple though, don’t you think?”
“THE STEAMWORKS ARE NOT KNOWN FOR BEING THE BEST WITH SECURITY. I AM THE ONLY ONE IT’S GOT.”
“Fair.” Kanako got ready to try and figure out how to re-code Axis. First things first, wire him up. Simple enough, just plug him in with a cable. Surely he had one of those, how else would he have previously been able to charge?
Once hooked up (Oh thank God, Dad actually included one.), the next thing to do was decompile, which, given Axis was programmed on Steamworks computers, should’ve been easy.
The code was up on the screen in no time. All that was left was to find the right areas to search and—
“What the fuck am I looking at?” Kanako said, bewildered.
“IS IT THAT BAD?” Axis inquired, sensing the shift in tension.
“Where… do I even start? Ok so first of all… literally nothing is labelled. It’s all just numerical IDs. What the hell was Dad thinking? Alright, alright, where’s your talking code…” Kanako tried using the search feature and put in some terms that would be likely to be used for making a robot talk, eventually managing to find it. If he had a drink, it would’ve been spat all over the screen. “SCRIPT 31169????? It took Dad 31,169 scripts to finally get you to start speaking????? And the filter is 31169265????? How did he manage to write 31,138,096 more scripts before getting to your filter?????”
“I THINK MOST OF THOSE ARE FROM OLDER MODELS. THERE ARE QUITE A FEW DEDICATED TO CHAINSAWS AND THE LIKE.”
“...” Kanako’s eyes kept shifting from the screen and Axis. “Hey so for no reason, how would I go about installing a chainsaw to you?”
“IF YOU CAN FIND THE SPACE IN MY BODY FOR ONE.”
“I’m sure I could, at some point. Anyways, now to find where…” Kanako stared incredulously at the quite frankly horrid script name in front of it. “Ugh, I’m gonna rename these, I’m not calling it ‘script_31169265’ each time. That won’t mess with anything, will it?”
“IT SHOULDN’T. DEPENDING ON WHERE YOU CHANGE IT, THAT IS.”
“Cool, cool. Hmm, how abooooout ‘script_dialogue_blocker’? You know, a more formal way to phrase your filter.”
“THAT WILL BE FINE. IT WILL BE NICE TO FEEL SOMEWHAT ORGANIZED.”
“Alright, anyways, now to find where script_dialogue_blocker gets called in… ‘script_dialogue’. Actually, I haven’t fully checked inside blocker yet. SURELY it’s not as—”
It was worse. So. So. SO. Much worse. Kanako could feel zyr eye twitching in anger.
“CHUUUUUJIIIIIIINNNN!!!!!” he screamed out as loud as possible before slamming the desk. “Ax. Look at this shit. Look at it!”
Axis turned as much as he could while being plugged in, successfully managing to see the screen. And by God was it horrendous.
if (word_case) == 1
{
if (word_next) == “fuck”
word_next = “[screw]”;
else if (word_next) == “shit”
word_next == “[shoot]”;
else if (word_next) == “piss”
word_next == “[tick]”;
else if (word_next) == “pissed”
word_next == “[ticked]”;
}
else if (word_case) == 2
{
if (word_next) == “fuck”
word_next = “[heck]”;
else if (word_next) == “shit”
word_next == “[feces]”;
else if (word_next) == “piss”
word_next == “[urine]”;
else if (word_next) == “pissed”
word_next == “[urinated]”;
}
if (word_next) == “ass”
word_next = “[bum]”;
else if (word_next) == “damn”
word_next == “[darn]”;
else…
It continued on in a manner such as that, with every conceivable swear having its own check and replacement word. Somewhat reasonable, but the sheer length of it was what set Kanako off.
“IS THAT… NOT A NORMAL WAY TO CODE?” Axis asked, reasonably confused. He ran on the [darn] thing, after all.
“I need to check something first… before determining my verdict… Is there, by chance, something you run that involves various numbers…
“...
“. . .
“. . .
“. . .” With each period of silence, Kanako’s eyes grew wider and wider in horror. She found what she was looking for, but would have preferred if she had never found it. With a deep breath, and crumpling their head into their hands, they told Axis what they had found. “This is all… one long if-else statement… And it’s alternating… Did Dad not know what a goddamn switch statement was?!”
“I TAKE IT THAT IT IS REALLY BAD, THEN?”
“Of course! I mean, Jesus, this CODE! No labels, horrendous methods, it’s like a dog wrote it. By barking. God, it’s annoying. The predictive text script for getting the filter to actually work is impressive, even managing to work with Japanese (maybe that’s why Clo and Ver can’t swear in Japanese), but everything else is just. Awful.”
“WOULD YOU… LIKE TO TAKE A BREAK?” Axis asked, concerned for his sibling’s well being.
“Yes. Please. I need to be free of this, even if only temporarily.” Kanako made a move to unplug Axis before going back. “Wait, hold on. Can I copy your code onto a flashdrive? That way I can… work things out on my own time.”
“THAT WILL BE FINE AS LONG AS YOU DO NOT REPLICATE ME. I DO NOT WISH FOR THERE TO BE OTHER MES RUNNING AROUND. I LIKE BEING UNIQUE.”
“Yeah, of course. Alright, lemme just recompile your code… and then copy it to transfer. Aaaaaand it’s gonna take a while. Fun…”
“HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE?”
“Mmmmmnnnnnnmnmmmnmnmmmnnnnnhhhhhh… Two hours…”
“AH. SO I AM STUCK HERE.”
“Yeaaahhh… Let’s see, it’s currently 1:45… so by 3:45 you’ll be done… And then it takes four hours and fifteen minutes to get home from the Steamworks entrance… so that’ll be around 8… At that point it might be better to stay the night down here… I’ll let Mom know that I’ll be at the old house, then. Thankfully no one’s moved in. I’ll wander around for a bit, see ya Ax.”
“UM. OK. I WILL SEE YOU LATER, THEN.”
—
It felt weird being back in her old room. Everything had been left… pretty much exactly as she had left it from That Day, aside from Kuroba’s bed and where their clothes were stored. The drawings of Dalv, Axis, Sadie, even her parents were all in the same spots. It was all nostalgic. Even the small piece of paper she used to try and teach Kuroba Japanese, starting with the crudely drawn クローバー for their name, was there! She really thought that she, a nine year old, would be a better teacher for a 12 year old than her mother. Kanako couldn’t help but chuckle at the memory.
Despite the huge Swelterstone lighting up the room, making it reminiscent of a sunset, Kanako was feeling extremely tired and just wanted to go to sleep. Adding on to the nostalgia was the feeling of sleeping in the Swelterstone’s warmth. How long had it been, again? At least five years… back then, she was only nine and now, he was 14. Heh… and three of those years were spent yearning to be back in this room.
While looking around some more, something happened to catch Kanako’s eye from underneath Clov–Kuroba’s bed. (Heh, the nostalgia’s getting to me. Almost deadnamed Clo. Even if they did give me permission to, it still feels wrong most of the time. In any case, what is that?)
Ze reached underneath zyr sibling’s old bed to inspect the object, finding it to be a cassette tape, similar to the one that Chujin had. The one that she watched right before…
Pushing that thought out of their mind, Kanako read the label on it. “To Kanako and Mom. I’m sorry.” Clearly Kuroba’s handwriting, who else could have written it anyways.
Curious as to what it had recorded, Kanako found a VHS Player and popped it in, specifically avoiding the basement one. Once they turned it on, they saw… a message from a younger Kuroba.
“Is it on? Did I get it?” the recording asked. “I did! Yes! Oh, right, introduction.” They cleared their throat. “Howdy Mom, Kanako! If you're seeing this then, uh, things... didn't go so well. I would've preferred to tell you two this myself, but… Well that's kinda not possible. I just wanted to tell you two a few things; stuff about myself, who I am, that kinda stuff. So, first things first…”
Kanako watched this old recording of their sibling explaining everything. At that point in time, Kanako had already known that Cl–Kuroba used to be a human, but she didn’t know the full of it. And then… here they were. Telling everything. For a recording never seen until five years later.
“I'll be fine, I promise,” the recording continued. “And don't try this experiment again. I fear you'll only get the same outcome. This must weigh heavily on your consciences. I don't want you guys to worsen it. That's all. Love you lots! And... sorry to have you go through this.”
The recording cut out as the past Kuroba shut off the camera. Kanako sat for a bit before checking the date of the recording. It was the day before It happened.
Kanako stayed still, contemplating how things could have been, when her phone buzzed. It was Kuroba calling.
“Heya Kan,” they said over the phone. “Randomly sneezed. Were you talking about me or something? Don’t answer that, actually. How was your day with Axis?”
Kanako took a bit before answering truthfully. “I wanna bring Dad back to life just so I can kill him again.”
Kanako could hear Kuroba stuttering over the phone for a bit. “O-Oh. Wh-Why, may I ask?”
“Ax’s code is horrendous. That’s reason enough.”
“A-Ah… I-I see… W-Well, technically speaking necromancy isn't illegal here, but murder definitely is.”
“Yeah, so's stealing, and that hasn't stopped me before.”
“(It really… really should…) Just from me and Hirai though, right?” Kanako gave no answer. “R-Right?”
“Hm!” Kanako gave a noise that could only convey a confident and knowing smirk to Kuroba. While they were right in that it was only from themself and Clover that Kanako stole from, ze didn't want to admit that in order to cause a bit of distress to Kuroba. Just normal sibling things.
“Um, I’m gonna hang up now, see ya tomorrow, heheheh…” Kuroba laughed nervously due to Kanako’s proclamation.
“Yeah, see ya Clo.” Kanako waited a moment before quietly saying “Sorry,” and hanging up. It decided that it would elaborate when meeting with Kuroba again the next day. For now, she just wanted to go to sleep.
—
“HOW WAS YOUR NIGHT?” Axis asked back in 2C.
“Fine,” Kanako replied. “Looked around in your code a bit more, found some important stuff to rename, got mad at Dad some more, it was fine. But, um… Ax?”
“YES?”
“I think you have autism. Maybe ADHD, too.”
“WHAT?”
“I DON’T KNOW EITHER! HOW THE HELL DID DAD MANAGE TO PROGRAM GODDAMN AUTISM AND ADHD INTO YOU??????”
“NO, I MEAN WHAT ARE THOSE?”
“Oh. Genetic conditions with a wide array of possible symptoms. I’m not an expert so I don’t fully know. But you sure as hell seem to have some autistic tendencies in your code. How did Dad manage to do that??” Kanako sighed. “In any case, I made an update for you, so I gotta plug you back in. Ready?”
“YES. IT WILL BE NICE BEING ABLE TO [heck]ING SWEAR.”
“We’re gonna be mocking Clo and Ver for this together, right?”
“OF COURSE. WHO DO YOU THINK WE ARE?”
Kanako chuckled. “Siblings gotta mock each other, it’s just the laws of nature. Anyways, starting the upda-aaaaand it’ll take another two hours. Goddammit. Alright, screw it, we’re watching a movie together. Any preferences?”
“NOT PARTICULARLY. I THINK A THRILLER WILL BE NICE.”
“Got it. Impromptu movie night… begin!”
* * *
Once the movie was over, Kanako returned to the computer to see how far along the update was coming. As expected, it was finished, all that was needed was for Axis to do a quick reset.
“AH. THAT MAY CAUSE A PROBLEM,” Axis said. “I HAVE NOT SHUT DOWN FULLY IN QUITE A FEW YEARS. NOR HAVE I RECHARGED USING MY STATION SINCE WAKING UP FROM CLOVER AND TALL LADY.”
“(Ax, come on.) But also how?”
“TURNS OUT I CAN RUN EXCLUSIVELY ON LOVE FROM DAISY. IT IS HONESTLY NEAT. BUT IN ANY CASE, SHUTTING DOWN MAY RISK A LOSS OF SOME MEMORIES UNTIL SCANNING.”
“You sure? It’s just for a quick moment. Plus, weren’t you, like, shut off for a minute or two when Mom and Ver went through here?”
“OH. YOU ARE RIGHT. WELL THEN I SUPPOSE IT WILL CAUSE NO ISSUES. ONE MOMENT, THEN.”
Axis’s eyes dulled as his hands fell to the floor, slack. A moment later his lights flickered back to life as his steam-arms brought his hands back up.
“AXIS MODEL 014 READY TO GUARD AND PROTECT,” he said. “INTRUDER SPOTTED IN THE OFFICE WING, ROOM 2C. PREPARING APPREHENSION.”
Kanako was taken aback and started trying to get Axis to stop. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, wait, wait! Ax!”
“HA. I FUCKING GOT YOUR ASS. WORTH IT,” he said, very clearly proud of himself.
“Wha–hey! You bastard.”
“DO NOT USE SUCH FOUL LANGUAGE ABOUT ME, EVEN IF ACCURATE.”
“Fine. You fucker.”
“THAT IS BETTER. AND SPEAKING OF BETTER, I FEEL MUCH BETTER, NOW BEING ABLE TO CURSE PEOPLE OUT. MR. SCREEN SHALL KNOW MY WRATH. IT SHALL BE LIBERATING. DID YOU KNOW THAT I COULD NOT FLIP OTHERS OFF? IF I CAN SWEAR THEN I FEEL I SHALL BE ABLE TO DO THIS.” He immediately flipped Kanako off, albeit in a proud manner, like a child learning something new and showing it off to their parents. “IT WORKED. PLAYING ‘YIPPEE.MP3’. ‘Yippeeeee’. SHALL WE SHOW OFF TO CLOVER AND BLONDE MONSTER?”
“(Just ignore the name things.) Yeah, let’s do it. They’re gonna haaaaaate us and it’ll be great.” Kanako took out their phone and hit record. “Yooooo, Clo. Ver. Check out what Ax can do now.”
With a whip sound effect played through Axis’s speakers, he flipped off the camera with as close to a smile as he can manage. “I CAN DO THIS SHIT NOW. IT IS GREAT. NOW I CAN VENT MY FRUSTRATION AT CLOVER FOR BLOWING UP MY SHIELD GENERATORS. FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU. OK I’M SORRY. I JUST GOT EXCITED AT BEING ABLE TO SWEAR.”
“This is why I’m gonna bring Dad back to kill him, by the way. Axis’s code was just the worst. It went beyond spaghetti code, that shit was Gordian Knot code. Anyways I’ll be heading back home in a bit, see ya later!” Kanako ended the recording and sent it in the sibling group chat with explicit instructions to not play near their parents. “Alright, I probably should head out now. It was nice seeing you. And remember our 35% cut of tickets when those are set up.”
“WILL YOU REINSTATE MY FILTER IF I DO NOT COMPLY?”
“Yes.”
“UNDERSTOOD, I WILL SEND YOU YOUR CUT AT THE END OF EACH DAY, ALONG WITH THE DATA TO ENSURE THAT IT IS ALL CORRECT.”
“Sweet, thanks Ax. See ya later!”
“FAREWELL.”