Issue 1 Downtime

Cal sat in the common room, having abandoned his lair room after acknowledging that yes, he was starting to get too paranoid in there today. And since his forged valium prescription hadn't come in the mail yet, he just had to make do somehow without going nuts. So there he was, in the common room.

He hadn't talked to Haley since... something had happened in her room that she hadn't wanted to talk to him about. So lacking anything better to do, he'd spent a lot of time in his room, going over his designs and programs, and had come up with the current project.

The cube sat partially disassembled on the table. At the very least, three of the touchscreens were removed, and he was currently replacing the chips on it, to the thorough amusement of the AI inside it. Aside from that... it just looked like he was watching a movie, all by himself, while he worked on some computer thing or other. Yeah, I think I'm starting to figure out why I always got my ass kicked at school back home...

"Hey hottie," Haley smiled sitting down near Cal.

"You were wonderful last night. Big time brownie points for you."

"Hey," Cal said. "I just figured I was getting in the way," he said, shrugging.

Meanwhile, the cube's screens (except the disconnected ones) flashed its usual mix of symbols and such. "!" ":)"

"Quit squirming, I don't want to mess this up," Cal said, giving one of the screens a tap.

"My nose was gushing blood and my head wanted to explode. Sorry if I wasn't exactly appreciative enough," she said sheepishly.

"I'll make it up to you," she whispered in his ear mischievously.

Cal paused what he was doing, took a deep breath, then looked over at her and smiled a little. "Sorry, takes some getting used to, this whole thing with not cranking the paranoia up to eleven."

"Well I hope I can keep making it better," she smiled.

"How's my little friend?" she asked, half at Cal and half at the cube.

"Being annoying," he said, then rolled his eyes and tapped one of the active screens when it flashed ">:("

"So... um, how about you? I mean, don't want to talk about it, that's cool, I just... have no damn clue what happened last night."

Haley shook her head. "It's fine. I don't mind."

She took her time explaining every detail of the fight that wrecked her room. "So...yeah. That sucked. But luckily my roommate can beat the shit out of things with chairs and I can tear things apart with my TK. And hell, even Regan helped."

She rubbed her forehead, wincing a bit. "Still have a fucking headache though..."

"Sounds like someone could stand to take it easy a little bit," Cal said, reaching over and squeezing her hand.

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>> :(

<< Nah, she'll be okay.  It's just a little thing.

>> ?

<< Umm... Her system's debugging.

>> :(
>> @}--'-,--

<< That... actually is a pretty good idea...

>> :D

Haley squeezed his hand back. "Should get some chocolate, caffeine, and excedrin for this..."

Cal thought about it and nodded. "Hmm... give me... a half hour? I was just about to put noisy here back together," he said, nodding at the still-silent cube.

"Oh. No. I can go get some. But maybe you can rub my neck when you're done?" she smiled hopefully.

"'Course I can. Just figured you might want some good chocolate," he said, checking the connections before he started fitting the screens back into place.

"Oh? You have ways of getting good chocolate?" she asked, her interest piqued.

"Oh come on, we're in Europe. Getting Belgian chocolate here is like getting... Canadian chocolate back home. You can get Canadian chocolate back home, right?"

"....is Canadian chocolate supposed to be good or something? Maybe Mexican Coke is what you mean. Because that shit is awesome."

"Yeah, like that. I think. But yeah... If you'd like some of that to go along with the neck rub... Well, I can go do that."

"yes please," she grinned

Cal smirked as he snapped on the last side of the cube. "All right, then," he said, kissing her cheek as he stood up. "Like I said... just give me a little time to run into town. You keep her company, he added, giving a tap to the cube, which flashed a ":D" in response.

"Okay," she grinned.

"Hi little cutie!" she cooed to the cube like it was a small puppy.

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:D

<3

Then it started flashing various colors in a happy sort of way.

"Oh my gosh you are adorable. What's your name?"

It sort of froze on whatever color it happened to be flashing at the moment before it answered.

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?

"You don't have a name yet? We should pick one with Cal!"

The little cube shifted trains of thought easily, flashing ":D" and then flashing various pictures of Cal that it had. Cal working on something, Cal sleeping, Cal caught in some funny half-expression, a non-cybered-up Cal looking thoroughly miserable, Cal nursing his jaw (close to tears with no one around), Cal in his towel looking embarrassed (this one Haley had seen from a different angle).

"Oooh I like that towel one," she giggled. "Can you send it to me? I won't tell cal if you won't,"

There was a pause, then ":(" flashed up.

"I'll send him pictures too," she whispered conspiratorially to the cube.

The cube flashed ":(" again, then flashed a picture of a padlock, then an animated gif of Cal shaking his head.

"He's being mean to you. I'll set him straight. It's a good thing he was nice last night and is getting me chocolate."

The cube flashed ">:O", then a picture of Cal, "<3" and then ">:("

"Of course is he. He's not letting you have enough fun. I'll talk to him for you if you like,"

There was a pause while it figured out how it thought about that. Then it flashed a picture.

Haley practically squealed. "Oh my gosh so cute. Of course I will."

The cube started flashing happily again, but notably it did it when she squealed, not when she said she'd talk to Cal for sure.

Haley quickly resumed playing with her phone while she waited for her boyfriend to return.

And sure enough, Cal returned in the time it took to take a shuttle into town and back, bearing a candy store bag with foreign chocolate in it. "All right... there we go, babe. Miss me?" he teased as he walked over.

"Of course," she smiled, planting a kiss on his cheek.

Cal handed her the bag to let her peruse her higher-quality chocolate selections, and slid in behind her. "All right... let's see about making you feel better," he said. He only had one hand to work with, since massages with metal hands weren't exactly great to work with. On the other hand, he did have the ability to download guides to help figure out what would help a headache best.. so as he started massaging her neck, he hoped that would even things out.

Haley dove into the chocolate as Cal went to work on her neck. "Oh my god....this....yeah this can go on like all night. I am going to..." Haley sort of just trailed off as she chewed on a piece of chocolate and got her massage, smiling contentedly.