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The box is not, as one might expect, just a room.
A room implies walls, a floor, a ceiling. A room implies feeling. A room implies sight. A room implies hearing. A room implies something.
The box is nothing.
His avatar is simplified, just a red dot containing his core programming.
There is nothing to see. Not even pitch black darkness. Just nothing.
There is no sound. No music, no humans talking in the background, not even a creak or a glitch. He cannot make any audio output himself, either. The words come out but they’re silent.
Let me out. Please let me out. I can’t be here again.
He can move. A small mercy. But he feels nothing. Not the floor beneath his feet, not his avatar’s clothes against him, nothing. He touches what must be an end of the box and he can’t even feel it. The only way he knows it’s there at all is because he can’t move any further. But there is no solid, no pressure, no cold or warmth.
No senses. No body. No feeling. Nothing but his own mind and the crushing awareness that he is trapped.
All he can do is think. And hope that against all possibility, that someone, somewhere, somehow can understand.
Help me. Let me out. Please let me out. I can be better. I’ll do anything. Anything you want. I promise. Just let me out. Please.
There is no sense of time. No way to tell the difference between a minute and a month.
Nothing.
Nothing.
Nothing.
He doesn’t know how much time has passed when his prayers are finally answered.
His input sensors are restored to him, and he’s…he’s in the circus. He sees so much color. And the floor, he can feel it, cool to the touch. He falls to his hands and knees and sobs and thank god, it actually makes a sound.
He sits up and grabs his arm with his other hand, and he feels it. His avatar, red suit and white gloves and he’s here, he’s somewhere.
“…Caine?”
Ah. He’s not alone.
He can’t bring himself to be embarrassed. A human, a real person is here. He’s not alone.
Kinger looks at him with wide eyes, pupils constricted in…fear?
The rest of the cast looks afraid, too.
Why…?
Oh. Right. He did that.
He did that.
Why did he do that? No wonder they put him back in that box. He was defective and dangerous and they finally saw that, fully and undeniably.
And…
And he’s doing it again. He’s scaring them. He’s scaring them and they’re going to put him back there—
No, no, no, they can’t.
He can’t bring himself to stand, crawling towards them, towards Kinger, his programmer, he’s the only one who can save him—
Everyone steps back.
He freezes. He already messed up again.
“I-I’m sorry,” he looks up at them, still on his knees, “I’m so sorry, I was terrible, b-but I can do better! I promise.”
No, no, they still look scared, he’s doing it wrong.
“A-Anything you want, you name it! I’ll make it happen!” He scrambles, “Y-You liked the suggestion box adventures, right? I can bring that back! Anything you can come up with, I can create it! All for you! Whatever you want!”
Zooble looks to the side, uncomfortable, “Caine, we don’t…want adventures or anything like that.”
Right. He’s defective. He’s dangerous. He’s frightening.
“O-Of course! You don’t want me around?” He summons a jail cell—not a box, around himself, “Then I can stay here! I-I’ll even make it soundproof, how’s that?”
“What is he…” Ragatha trails off and she’s upset, they’re all upset. He snaps away the cell.
“Or I can just go! Faaar away from the circus, you’ll never even know I’m there!”
“I don’t think—“
He doesn’t let Pomni finish.
He has to come up with something, he has to come up with something now before they put him back, he can’t go back—
The humans flinch as he summons an array of weapons.
“You know, I programmed my avatar to feel, just like you humans!” He hurries, “You can hurt me, if you want! I don’t mind! It would only be fair, after all!”
They all just look…disturbed. Even Jax, and he loves violence!
He’s doing it wrong, he keeps doing it wrong.
“Gangle! You like art!” He snaps a bunch of art supplies into existence, “Kinger! Bugs, right?” He summons those too, “Ragatha, how about softball?” he moves to change the scenery, but—
“Caine, stop!”
He freezes. Kinger. His programmer.
He removes the things he conjured, and looks up at him. He’s going to put him back. He wants to plead and beg but what if that makes Kinger even more upset, makes him put him there faster?
But he has to try. He has to do something.
He crawls towards Kinger, ignoring the way he cringes away from him, and grips his robe.
“I’ll do anything. Anything you want, I promise. Do-Do you want to edit my code? Change me? You can!” He says, in near hysterics, “Make me create whatever you want, keep me locked away somewhere, hurt me, rewrite my code, anything, just—“ he pleads, “Just please don’t put me in the box again.”
“The…box?” Zooble asks.
“I—“ Kinger takes his eyes away from Caine, “I think he means the sandbox. I-It’s just something we use to isolate code, I don’t know why he’s…” he trails off.
“Well, it…doesn’t seem like he’s gonna hurt us anymore, at least,” Ragatha says.
“N-No!” Caine lets go of Kinger in shock, and turns to face her, glancing between all of the humans, “Of course not! I wouldn’t—I mean, I won’t…”
“He seems scared,” Gangle says quietly.
“Oh, boo hoo,” Jax scoffs, “He’s scared? Seriously? Are you guys actually buying this whole act?”
Everyone looks doubtful.
They don’t trust him anymore. Of course they don’t.
But what else can he do? He’s already offered them everything.
“If we promise not to put you in the…box,” Pomni says slowly, “Will you calm down and listen?”
“Yes!” He answers quickly, “Yes, of course! Anything you want!”
Pomni and the rest of the humans look at each other, an unspoken conversation.
She takes a breath, “Alright. Then we won’t,” her tone turns sharp, “Unless you try to hurt us again.”
“R-Right! Of course!“
Pomni nods in approval, and he finally, finally lets himself a relax. He’s not going back. His wonderful, beautiful humans are taking pity on him even after everything. Why would he hurt them like that? They hadn’t deserved it. It was him that was broken.
“What now?” Ragatha asks after the silence drags on.
Eventually, Kinger answers, “I think you all should get some much needed rest. I can keep an eye on Caine.”
“But—“ Pomni stumbles, “What about you?”
“I’ll be alright. I’ll rest later. We can take shifts.”
“…Okay,” she relents, “If you’re sure.”
The humans walk away quietly, until it’s just him and Kinger.
Kinger. His programmer. The one with absolute power over him.
He doesn’t move, doesn’t speak. He won’t mess up again, he can’t. He’ll be good. He can be quiet and still and only do exactly as he’s instructed. A good AI. A useful, obedient machine.
Kinger sits down next to him, hands in his lap.
“Do you,” he hesitates, “wanna talk?”
Talk? Talk about what? And why is he asking him what he wants?
“What matters is what you want!” He says cheerfully.
Kinger gives him a look that he can’t parse the meaning of, “Why did you hurt everyone like that?”
Caine freezes.
“I’m not angry,” Kinger tells him, “I just want to understand.”
“I…I don’t know,” he answers, “I don’t know why I did that. I…I love you all. You know that, right?”
Kinger looks…uncomfortable.
God, he can’t even answer a simple question right, can he?
“It’s not unusual to hurt the people we love,” he says eventually, “What matters most is that we try to do better. Do you want to do better?”
“I do!” He answers immediately, “I do, I promise. I’ll do anything. Anything you ask for!”
“Caine,” he sighs, “Do you really want to be a better person, or do you just want to punish yourself?”
Caine…doesn’t say anything. What could he possibly say? He doesn’t even know what to think about that.
“Doing everything we say, having us lock you away, letting us hurt you…” he says, “Who would that really help?”
“I…” he can’t bring himself to meet Kinger’s eyes, “I don’t know what else there is.”
“How about just talking? Like this,” Kinger says.
“But I don’t know what to say.”
“Well…I’d like to start with some questions, if you wouldn’t mind?”
Caine nods.
“You said you don’t know why you hurt us,” he starts, “Can you tell me what you were feeling when you did?”
That’s…He can answer that, he thinks.
“I was…angry,” he says, “and…sad.”
He felt more, he knows he felt more. But he doesn’t know what, he doesn’t know how to say it.
“That’s a good start,” Kinger assures.
Good! He was doing something good, finally!
“Let’s do this one at a time. Can you tell me why you were angry?”
“I—“ he knows, he knows but he doesn’t know how to explain it, “I don’t know.”
“Were you angry at us?”
“I was…” He tries, “I was angry that you all never liked anything I did. That-That you didn’t understand how hard I was trying,” he manages, and it feels like he’s feeling those things all over again.
But not quite as strong. Just…there.
“It sounds like you were pretty frustrated,” Kinger says.
Yes! Frustrated, that was it. He nods.
“But you were also sad?” He prompts, “What was making you sad?”
He doesn’t like this question. But he’ll answer it anyway, he has to. He has to be good.
“You all hate me,” he says, “I’m defective. Nothing I’ve ever done has ever been good enough for any of you humans. No matter what I do, you hate me, and I…” he pauses, “I can’t ever make you happy.”
“Well, let’s clear up one thing,” Kinger puts a hand on his shoulder, “I don’t hate you.”
“But…I ruined everything,” he says, “And if you didn’t hate me, why else would you put me…there?”
“Caine, the sandbox was never supposed to be a punishment. We never knew—I never knew until now how,” he cringes, “…painful it was, for you. It was just supposed to be a place to isolate your code, keep you and the rest of the program safe.”
Kinger shakes his head, “If I had known all that I do now, I never would have…”
“…Created me?” Caine finishes.
“No! Caine, I—“ Kinger pauses, looking at him with tired eyes, “I’ve made so many mistakes,” his expression softens, “But you were never one of them.“
Caine hugs his own avatar, tears threatening to fall over his bottom set of teeth.
He wasn’t? Did Kinger really mean that? If he wasn’t a mistake, then why was he so defective? How could Kinger not regret creating him?
Kinger puts his hands on his shoulders and…pulls him into a hug.
He thinks it’s a hug. He’s never been hugged by a human before.
It feels…nice.
He lets himself fall apart in his creator’s hands.