#c!becker | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

d8tl55c · 9 months ago

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chosen watches the Cursor fly away. this time, it doesn't disappear at the top of... whatever must have happened during the fight. maybe from His perspective, the window was very small. that would explain the scale... and anyway, now, it must be fullscreen.

can ALAN see the whole world from out there?

the Cursor flies up, up, up, up, up and away to the little hole chosen poked in the IP address shell. hopefully ALAN won't be mad about that.

little colorful dots climb off of the Cursor, and hop back through the Wi-Fi tunnel.

then the Cursor starts to get bigger. whuh?

no, wait, it's getting closer.

shit. is He mad?????

chosen watches it fly back down, with that strange halting acceleration. going, going, GOING, and slow slow slowing. it takes only three swipes to return to sea level.

the Cursor hovers next to them. they feel themself being watched, but this time they can't watch back; only infer His perspective, from the angle of ALAN's sole limb in the digital world.

they can't help but turn to look where ALAN sees from anyway. empty air. creepy. but turning again, they see the Cursor wiggling gently. a little wave. disturbingly cute.

ALAN scoots the Cursor upward. brings it down. up, and down. up. up?

it takes a second to translate. of course, they can't hear each other, so they both have to infer from context clues.

"Do you want to come with?"

before they can think, they're already shaking their head. "no," i can't.

the Cursor scoots down, hiding much of itself below the cliff they're standing on, only the tip peeking over. somehow it still translates.

sheepishly, "please?"

it could mean several other things. "why not?" or, "okay," or, "im sorry." it could be another invitation to step on, and return to that sanctuary (PRISON PRISON PRISON PRISON PRISON PRISON) over the clouds. chosen doesn't know. they shake their head.

they shake their head, quick, several times.

they refuse it all.

they turn away from ALAN, and jump into the air, arms splayed in a maneuver they've done thousands of times before.

the fire doesn't catch right in their hands. it sputters, blasts too hard on one and not the other, and then shuts off completely.

they've been stupid, just now, and overestimated themself.

they're going to hit the water spinning out of control.

and then, they're not.

the Cursor has them by the back.

fear shoots through exhausted limbs. it flows, as it always does, from their core to their head to their fingers, and this time they...

...let it wash through them. excess stress chemicals stopper and fade. nothing is left behind.

the Cursor sets them so, so gently on their feet. they want to crumple and take a nap right now in the dirt, but they desperately don't want to offend His kindness.

still, their body is not cooperative at present, and it loses it for just enough time to trip their balance.

the Cursor is there again for them to lean on.

chosen is blindsided by anger.

why is He still here? shouldn't He be playing with His new pets??

chosen pushes off from the Cursor, hard, so they land a short distance away at the edge of the cliff ledge. they sit in the dirt, pull their knees in tight, and refuse to look at it any more.

waves sploosh against the rocks, one after the other.

the bay is a relatively calm offshoot of the local sea. too rough for normal swimmers; the perfect private spot for a pair of HI-PWR hollowheads.

green flashbangs fire in their memory. they squeeze their eyes shut, then open them, afraid of seeing something worse left alone with their imagination.

one after the other, waves sploosh against the rocks.

chosen peeks over their shoulder.

the Cursor is still there.

it doesn't fit into the landscape at all. it hovers with a distinct anxiety, too nervous to move a single pixel, yet aching to do something. as chosen looks back, it shifts a little closer- then quickly moves back to its original spot. the picture of, "nonthreatening." on another day, chosen would laugh at it.

they wave their hand in a repetitive motion. "shoo! go home."

the Cursor returns to peeking over the top of the ledge. it doesn't budge.

"GO HOME!" chosen gestures more sharply at the sky to the tunnel that leads to that place where no one would know where they'd gone and they might be (not not not not not not) safe. they feel nothing.

then He does something different. it's the same up, down, up, down gesture, but this time at an angle. chosen traces it along the cliffside, right to... the top. it's-

He's offering a ride to the top.

not all the way up to His domain.

just a lift to stable ground.

just to help.

a little nothing something.

just for them.

all thoughts leave their brain.

whatever this is, is

unfathomable.

they nod, once, outside of themself. why not?

the Cursor darts to attention- remembers itself- and moves in, slowly.

chosen gathers enough wits to stop it before it can click their back again.

to their relief, it complies.

they climb aboard its upper slope.

each movement is precisely calculated to hide signs of weakness.

it's warm to the touch on the black surfaces, like a rock under the sun. it's............

... nice.

when they're settled, ALAN moves the Cursor up the slightest bit - maybe ten pixels. "Ready?"

the way He treats them like such a fragile thing is starting to feel weird.

chosen grips the Cursor and spits a small burst of fire towards the loose rocks. "get a move on!"

and so, He does. He pilots the Cursor (smoothly, carefully) up over the cliff, then down, settling it as close to the grass as it can go without touching.

chosen slides off the slope.

the Cursor recoils back into the air. it hangs there, motionless, anxious again.

or maybe they're projecting.

whatever.

waves sploosh against the rocks, far below, quieter now. it's so quiet away from the trees. exposed. they should probably get out of here.

chosen stands on the cliffside.

the Cursor hovers in the air.

...

their peripheral vision detects it rapidly changing shape, and draws their head to follow the motion.

the Cursor is flipping between different Flash tools; Box, Hand, Line, Transform. it stops at, Text.

then ALAN types something into a floating text box.

[Im sorry]

so that is what he was trying to say earlier.

or maybe it wasn't, and this is only what he's trying to say, now.

or maybe

maybe chosen is far too tired for any of this.

they're tired, and they hurt, everywhere, and of course dark had to be late to lunch AGAIN for his stupid fucking secret surprise project, so chosen had to go fetch him, and now-

-is that-?

they reach up, and pluck ALAN's apology out of the sky.

the Cursor twitches, but doesn't intervene, as they tear it into its individual charset characters, piece by piece, and lay them in the grass.

when they're finished, they pick up the 's,' and stuff it in their mouth.

it's Times New fucking Roman.

a shot of savoury-sweet explodes on their tongue in singular taste, the way only charset can.

they eat both 'r's and the 'o' before slowing down.

the 'm' and 'I' are fine, but it's the 'y' that gives them pause.

they snap off its tail, and are left with a 'v.' TNR is nicely modular like that.

the 'v,' they hold up to ALAN (still lurking overhead).

the Cursor wiggles incomprehensibly.

chosen waves the 'v,' pointing at it for extra emphasis.

He scrolls back to the Text Tool, and chosen nods.

He summons a second 'v.'

chosen grabs it. now they have two 'v's: this is the moment of truth.

chosen holds up both of them, one next to the other, so they look like a-

ALAN types a 'w' into the text box.

chosen nods rapidly!

they toss the 'v's to the side.

then, they gesture at the 'w' - without taking it - and widen their hands, vertically.

it's quiet while ALAN thinks, in that unknown dimension outside of the screen.

He deletes the 'w,' and types a 'W' - and not just one, either. He summons a whole mess of them, overflowing onto several new lines of the text box!

chosen leaps at the wall of charset as though afraid it's a mirage. they crash through, landing in a pile of the things, and seize a 'W' from the air.

they bite from the left-hand leg where the ascender is thickest.

it's unspeakably delicious. it's been too long since they've had their favorite food. they've had a terrible morning, and a horrible afternoon, and it's all over and done with and noo- and ALAN brought them TNR again-

right now, He's copying ever more 'W's, pasting batches in the text box and chipping them off with the Cursor. it looks like manufacturing hard candy. chosen wants to laugh again.

they also want to cry, really, really hard.

later.

chosen chews their 'W' and hopes pathetic weeping isn't rendered on ALAN's screen.

and the Cursor works away, chipping, chipping, chipping, until a real pile forms in the clearing by the cliff over the bay.

...

eventually, the authorities will rise from their asses and come investigate the source of the explosion. the burnt trench leading directly from the brand new caldera to this cliffside, where a conspicuous amount charset is piled would be a dead giveaway of something going on. chosen will stash it somewhere under the trees or something, later. they don't care right now.

ALAN does.

[Will you be okay?]

it's odd.

chosen plucks out the extra 'W,' tosses it in their pile, and simply knocks down the rest so only, [okay] remains.

the Cursor sways gently. He deletes his message, then re-types, [okay.]

...

[If you need anything you can use The]- He halts, and carefully deletes the capital T.

[you can use the console again. To reach me.]

chosen nods, not knowing how.

[okay]

...

there's nothing left to say.