#decodetalking

Feeling the telltale stirrings of a human slowly waking up from sleep, Ai gently wrapped his arms a little tighter around Yusaku.

“Nooo...” He protested quietly, even putting on that adorably dopey voice humans get when they’re half asleep. Scrunching his face, he hid it in Yusaku’s bedhead. Normally, Ai would jump out of bed on this very important day - dragging Yusaku along with him - but, just last year they’d had a big, energetic party more suited to Ai’s taste. Ai wanted to show Yusaku that he was more than happy to stay home and celebrate their birthday in the way that Yusaku would no doubt prefer. He was such a good and mature partner! ...Even if his preferred form of “compromise” was him hugging onto Yusaku like a clingy octopus.

Still... he was worried he wouldn’t be able to stop Yusaku workaholic nature completely, but maybe he’d be able to poke at the Ai-shaped weak spot in Yusaku’s cranky armor long enough to convince him to take the day off even though Ai didn’t have any big plans for them to go anywhere.

She still couldn’t believe she went through eight years of medical school for this.

It wasn’t like Aki hated her job as a school nurse, but the times she had felt actually useful and that she was making a difference in her career like she’d always wanted were few and far between. Besides a passing recognition, she hardly even knew this ‘trouble maker’ student. Whatever it was he did that got him into trouble so many times, it certainly wasn’t picking fights with other students or he would have ended up in the nurse’s office sooner.

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Aki let out a sigh before remembering where she was and that the student in question is sitting right in front of her. She straightened up immediately and gave the kid a tired smile.

Perhaps staying out at the soiree this late hadn’t been her best idea. Curiousity had gotten sidetracked in exploring the castle, and had ignored the warning signs of her battery life slowly dwindling down. After all, it was a castle; it wasn’t like there weren’t beds she could crash in if she stayed up too late to go home.

Only, now she was having a hard time finding said bedrooms. The door she had just opened lead to yet another hall. Was it worth it to try and find her way home instead? If she could figure her way outside, she could call up a taxi instead of walking home; she was sure she had a little bit of money remaining from her last paycheque. It could definitely get her to at least one of her safe hidey holes. 

As Curiousity stood there debating her options, she noticed someone else enter the hallway from the other side. Someone she knew, too!

“Are those... duel monsters cards?” 

Ryou really hadn’t meant to be nosy, but he couldn’t help it. While he was more of a tabletop gamer than a duelist, that didn’t mean he disliked duel monsters. Honestly, it would be pretty hard to dislike the game while friends with Yugi and Jounouchi, with how often they’d play during lunch breaks.

More than once, Ryou had thought about bringing his occult deck into school to join in- but he’d never managed to get the nerve up. He loved his deck, and he was proud of the strategies he’d thought up, but he was nowhere near as good as those two. Maybe someday he could bring it in and ask for tips... although, given how Jounouchi got with horror, he didn’t think he’d want to take too long a look at his cards.

“Have any grand plans for tomorrow?” 

Reines was staying late to set up the shop for the Valentines’ crowd she knew to expect the next day. Flower arrangements were more over the top than normal, special chocolate goods ordered in and nestled in the display case, all the seating rearranged to be two per table. With the amount of work needed, she had naturally asked one of her employees to stay late and give Trimmau a hand.

The same employee she had made a point of not scheduling on Valentines Day in order to avoid his lackluster performance from affecting what she knew would otherwise be higher than normal tips tomorrow.

I TRUST AI, AND I TRUST OUR PARTNERSHIP. IF HE LIKES ME AS I AM, THEN WE’LL JUST HAVE TO DEFEAT YOU INSTEAD. WE BRIDGE THE GAP BETWEEN HUMANS AND A.I. TOGETHER.

Looking at his finished schematics, Shulk leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms over his head. He had repaired numerous things since arriving in Spirale, but this was the first time in months where actually had plans to build something. He supposed he could build something just for fun, but he didn’t like the idea of making something without a distinct purpose. Already the idea of making the little bot in the plans he had just drawn up had him feeling nostalgic.

Originally, he hadn’t planned on entering the Scrap Battle Showdown. Sure, he could make a fine weapon, but programming the bot to the controller was beyond his rudimentary understanding of coding. Especially since Shulk had decided to go all out and the bot he had planned was somewhat complex.

Thankfully, the internet was a wonderful tool. He had been introduced to it recently and quickly found a forum dedicated to all of the SpiraleFES activities. He opened up the forum on his house’s computer and made a new topic under ‘Scrap Battle Showdown.’

Looking For a Partner to Compete With in the ‘Scrap Battle Showdown.’

ReforgedFuture:

( @darknessfoundlove , @decodetalking )

Curiousity had never expected to find herself in the role of a Test Subject. That was a human thing, after all. What information could robots potentially give when they were programmed to act in specific ways every time?

However, one of the tasks had called her name. Bellatrix’s Task, near the bottom of the selections. It was an excuse to finally use her Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device. No humans here had one, who else was supposed to prove Aperture’s superior technology? It would be just like back at the facility, use the ASHPD to get from point A to B to C. Simple, easy.

Or so she had thought. While the clone seemed unwilling to attack a child, they found other ways to stop her. Obstacles piled in her way, broken bridges, and now literally just standing in her way. There didn’t seem to be any surfaces conductive to her portalling through, leaving her stuck with only Fibonacci’s safe zone checkpoint left before she could return to Golden.

How was she supposed to fix this? Doubling back would take too long, right? Curiousity glanced back trying to figure out how much time that would take, only to spot another pair coming along the same narrow path. A pair she was growing increasingly familiar with.