Margo had witnessed the strange exchange, as the two young sisters tried to convince someone in their game, that what he was doing in the Hub, was affecting them in the real world. The runaway bot didn’t have all the information. From what she could tell, this guy was somehow steering the Sandcrawler, the massive vehicle they were all currently residing within, from a distant location.
The ruckus of shifting tools, boxes, and just random junk that filled the lower cargo bay of the sandcrawler, convinced Margo of the validity of their claims. Of course, the strange man on the other end had no such proof, despite the girl’s protests.
Grace was now hunkered down on the floor, having been knocked clear off the workbench she was sitting on in the torrent of recklessness that had previously transpired as random objects had flown about the room recklessly in reaction to the girls conversation. Grace was hunched over the small vid screen she was using to peer within the hub.
Dicey, had leapt to her feet early, and managed to stay on her feet during the whole altercation.
“Awe… he’s not listening,” Dicey complained from under her visor, seemingly to herself, she then turned towards her sister and repeated, “He’s not listening, Grace!”
“At least he’s not driving like a mad man anymore…” Grace replied from her seat on the ground.
The room was filled with spilled canisters and tipped boxes. Random tools scattered across the floor as they were knocked off hooks on the wall, or their positions on the workbenches. It looked like a hurricane had just come through.
Margo was safe during the ruckus, considering she was hovering a few feet off the ground.
Amongst it all though, she spotted a pair of white bunny ears sticking out under one of the tipped boxes. Margo recognized it as Dicey’s stuffed bunny. The toy, the youngest Blue sister, had tucked under one arm since the moment they met, all the way up to the moment she left it sitting precariously next to Grace on the workbench.
Margo hovered over; it was making some sort of strange noise.
Margo feared it may be broken; the box it was under looked fairly heavy. The box must have shifted and slid from the workbench during the excitement. It landed directly on the small toy. Heavy or no, the hulking arms of the junk-bot form Margo was currently jacked into, had no problem lifting the box and letting it fall off to the side.
Half of the small dolls head was blackened. Sparks erupted from within as Margo lifted it in her over-sized hand. The Data-sphere must have been damaged within. Margo was worried that it had been completely destroyed, until it suddenly said, “Awe…”
Margo was surprised, previously, all the tiny, low caliber program had been able to say was, ‘I love you’. Every time the doll repeated this phrase, it sounded happy and pleasant.
Margo liked when it was happy and pleasant. This ‘awe’ was sad. Margo felt sad.
“Hello?” Margo asked it, unsure whether it would be able to respond, “Are you okay?”
“Awe…” It said again even sadder.
“Why so gloomy?” Margo pressed.
“I don’t… I don’t remember…” the damaged bunny said from a blank stare.
“What don’t you remember?” Margo asked.
“How it worked. I can’t make sense of it anymore,” it sounded bewildered.
“Sense of what?” Margo asked, equally bewildered.
“My code– I need… I need more information. I never needed more before,” the doll lay their limply in her hand, its artificial eyes, blank, as its tiny mouth moved, “It’s just one word now- repeating. It used to make sense, but it’s gone. Something is missing.”
“Well, what is the word?” Margo asked, hoping to help.
“Love,” the small bunny stated, “Again and again. It wasn’t this long before… it just goes on and on.”
Margo looked up puzzled, she could not imagine corrupted code.
“Awe…”
“What is it now?” Margo asked again, as this iteration of ‘awe’, was somehow sadder. It was like things kept getting worse, despite the bunny’s static state.
“I ended it,” The bunny informed, “It threatened to overwrite all…”
“Hey!” Dicey suddenly exclaimed, the small girl had peeled her visor off to witness who was talking, “What did you do to my bunny!?”
Margo felt like she had done something wrong as the small girl flung her controls and the visor to the floor, and stomped over to Margo’s hovering form.
“You broke it!” Dicey accused.
“I didn’t!” Margo denied, and pointed to the box on the floor, “I found it crushed under here.”
“Oh no!” Dicey said as she witnessed the mangled doll.
“Oh no!” Grace suddenly announced, echoing her sister, though not in reaction to the state of the bunny- to what appeared on her view screen, “More blips just popped up… more players are coming!”
“That idiot Chance is going to start showing off again!” Dicey exclaimed, completely forgetting about her now broken toy as she retrieved her visor. “What’re we going to do?!”
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