Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

“I really meant it, you know? I really would like to get to know you. The real you, this time.”

It was the kind of thing that Spamton would have never, not in a million years, imagined Tenna saying to him. To say the road to reconciliation had been a long one would be the understatement of the century, and perhaps even of the millenium. There were mountains of bitter memories to dig through, lies and manipulations and mis-directed cruelties. They’d beaten the shit out of each other and they’d screamed at each other and then they’d spent ages dancing around each other, talking in the stiff, stilted tones of actors that had forgotten to read the script until that morning. It had been about as messy as messy got. 

Things got better slowly. There wasn’t really a clear moment where everything shifted from being ‘awful’ to being ‘maybe okay.’ It was just a gradual progression, the tremors slowly fading out of their voices and their movements becoming less and less stiff. They were in a… weird place, nowadays. There was a fragility to their relationship that hadn’t been there before, but just because things were ‘weird’ didn’t necessarily mean they were bad. Neither of them were exactly great at handling instability, but progress, Spamton supposed, was progress nonetheless. 

And somehow, it had all led… here. Sitting outside Castle Town’s bakery on a bench too big for Spamton and too small for Tenna, watching the quiet falling of the first snow that winter. Warmth seeping into his fingers through the thick, fuzzy gloves he wore, courtesy of the hot chocolate Tenna had grabbed him from the Color Cafe. He found that he didn’t like coffee much these days, and he was past the point of being embarrassed about a more ‘childish’ drink choice. It helped that Tenna liked it too, even if the CRT’s wasn’t heated to near-boiling. It wasn’t like it was Spamton’s fault he ran cold these days. 

He took another careful sip of his drink to avoid responding right away. If he was being semantic, Tenna’s statement hadn’t exactly been one that needed a response, by the strictest conversational rules. But it probably deserved something. And it definitely deserved something more put-together than whatever scrambled thoughts Spamton was going to spit out if he tried to respond without thinking first. Tenna waited patiently, albeit with that underlying current of nervousness that was his trademark. 

It was a request that Spamton wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about. Guilty, maybe. He’d told Tenna as much as he could about his history. About his benefactor and the strings that had held him, about just how much of the Spamton that Tenna had once known had been a carefully constructed facade. The chains that still bound him, alterations to his code that lingered even after the connection was cut, didn’t let him explain everything as clearly as he’d like to, but he’d managed to explain enough for Tenna to fill in the pieces.

He knew Tenna was conflicted about it. He could hardly blame the guy, he knew he’d be pretty pissed if he found out that a solid ninety percent, probably more, of what he knew about Tenna was just bullshit. How Tenna still wanted… anything to do with him after that was beyond him, and yet here they were. On a bench. Drinking hot chocolate. Together. 

“Are you not saying anything because of what I said, or because it’s one of your bad days?” Tenna asked, prodding the silence as gently as he could. A long sigh whistled out through Spamton’s teeth as he set his cup back on his lap, trying to get some of the warmth to spread to his legs too. Even with most of his body bundled to high hell it was cold. He didn’t really produce natural body heat himself anymore, so there was only so much the layers could do. 

“JUST… THINKING,” he said finally. 

“What about?” Tenna asked. He shrugged haplessly, unsure how to even begin articulating the jumbled mess of thoughts currently rattling around his skull. He doubted it would make all that much sense if he tried to say it aloud. The wind picked up for a moment and he shivered at the cold, drawing in on himself in a feeble attempt at shielding himself. 

“Cold?”

“WHAT? OF [[Course]] NOT. CANT EV3N [Feel it],” Spamton said, his attempt at waving the concern off foiled by the way his voice shook as he spoke. Tenna rolled his antennae fondly, the unbroken one completing a full circuit while the other twitched weakly. He opened his arms in a wordless invitation. When Spamton didn’t object, an arm settled around his shoulders and pulled him flush against Tenna’s side. The warmth took a second to creep through the layers both of them were wearing, but Tenna was practically a furnace and it didn’t take long for the heat to envelop him from where Tenna held him. 

“Better?” Tenna asked, voice teasing. Spamton snorted, but the desire to appear unbothered wasn’t enough to stop him from pressing in closer. It really was better. He felt more than he heard Tenna’s resulting laugh. “Do you want to go back inside?” He shook his head, hoping Tenna either felt or saw the movement so he didn’t have to say anything out loud. “Okay. As long as you don’t freeze to death.” 

Spamton lifted his head, watching as the light from the streetlamps haloed out through the falling snow. The weather and late hour had driven most of the other residents back inside by this point. He could hear the faint sound of music from nearby, presumably from one of the various musicians that now occupied Castle Town. The music scene was good, in his opinion. The kind of thing he would’ve enjoyed taking part in, years ago, drunk enough to not care about looking like an idiot. Or maybe he wouldn’t have. Was it something he’d liked, if he’d had to be drunk to do it? 

That, he supposed, was the crux of his problem. ‘I’d like to get to know the real you,’ Tenna had said. But Spamton had no clue who the ‘real him’ even was anymore. His whole life was a series of masquerade masks, lined up on his wall to mark every moment where he’d lost himself to the whims of others. He’d been trapped by his purpose as a Darkner, then by his benefactor, then by the all-consuming madness of his quest for NEO, and finally, willingly, by his need to repay the endless debt he owed the heroes. If he really thought about it, he wasn’t sure he could remember a single moment that felt like… him. 

There was so much he wasn’t certain of. Did he actually like whiskey, or did he drink it because he felt like he was supposed to? Did he sing because it made him happy, or just because it had been the only thing that gave him a leg up over his more successful brothers? Had he become successful because that’s what he felt he needed to become a man, or had he become a man because that’s what he felt he needed to become successful? 

His mind was clearer than it had been in years, and the clarity brought with it questions he’d never had time to consider. He finally had the chance to be himself, and he was finding that… he had no idea who that was. He could hardly remember what he’d been like before the phone, and frankly, he wasn’t sure it even mattered. His time as an Addison had been all about sales and success and trying to fit into the mold of what his Darkner purpose told him he was. He was less a coherent entity and more just a scattered collection of mismatched pieces. He was a canvas that had maybe, once, had a painting on it, but that had been painted over by so many different hands that the original piece was lost forever. 

Tenna wanted to get to know the real him, but he wasn’t even sure there was a ‘real him’ to know. 

“You okay?” He let out a quiet hum, leaning his head against Tenna’s thumb where it rested on his shoulder. “Still thinking?” A glitched-out giggle left his mouth and he felt Tenna’s hold on him tighten just a bit in reply. 

“[Get it] TO KNOW THE [[Real deal]] ME, HUH?” he said finally. 

“Yes,” Tenna replied easily. Too easily, for the situation the two of them were in. “I don’t-” He paused, gathering his thoughts. “I know it wasn’t… entirely in your control, before. But I don’t want you to feel like you can’t be yourself. Especially now. I mean… what do we have to lose, right?” Spamton let out a quiet laugh and felt Tenna return it in kind. 

“YOU MI>GHT NOT [Like what you see] IT,” Spamton warned him. 

“Maybe. But I doubt it,” Tenna said warmly. The thumb on Spamton’s shoulder traced up to his neck and back down again, a grounding rhythm that he’d grown accustomed to lately. Tenna preemptively trying to keep him present because he worried about him spiralling. It was probably a fair assessment considering the route the conversation was taking, but Spamton found that he was surprisingly lucid for how emotionally straining the topic should be. He really hadn’t been lying when he’d said he was just thinking. His thoughts were uncharacteristically easy to wrangle at the moment. Not necessarily legible, but manageable. Soft waves lapping at the shore instead of a roiling storm threatening to pull him under. It left him strangely contemplative in a way he wasn’t used to. 

“I don’t think you give yourself enough credit,” Tenna piped up. Spamton glanced up at him, tilting his head curiously. “Just… maybe there was more of… you there than you think.” Spamton let out a quiet hum, turning back to the cup in his lap. It was still warm, though not nearly as noticeable with his body pressed right up against a walking radiator. 

“...MAYbE,” he conceded. He doubted it. He wasn’t sure there was any of him, really, at least not in the traditional sense. For his face to have been peeking through the mask he wore, he would have had to have a face of his own to begin with. After being given time to recollect himself, he wasn’t so sure he did. What even constituted an identity anyway? History, surely. But also other things. Opinions and standards and hobbies. The way you love and the way you hate. So many different variables, none of which were stable enough in him to form something viable. Even simple things were lost to him. He didn’t know which opinions were him and which were his benefactor and which were the nagging voices of the society that left him behind decades ago. It was all still so jumbled up. 

“Spammy,” Tenna said. When Spamton had accepted the nickname again, he didn’t know. Or maybe it hadn’t been him shying away from it at all, maybe it had been Tenna who had been regaining the confidence to use it. He wasn’t sure. He just knew that it was back now. “I’d rather…” He took a deep breath. “Even if I don’t like it, I still think-” He broke off, looking down to try and gauge Spamton’s reaction. Spamton met his gaze, urging him to go on. “I don’t think you’re going to be able to get rid of me that easily,” he settled on. It was probably the cheesiest dialogue option he could’ve picked, but it had Spamton smiling nonetheless.

“HAEHEHE. YOU SURE [Did you know] HOW TO [[Pick]] ‘EM, [Raytube],” Spamton teased. Tenna’s smile widened. 

“Anyway,” he continued, trying and failing to sound genuinely irritated. “My point is that I don’t care how all this turns out. I’m glad I’m getting to know you, for real this time.” He grinned down at Spamton, his screen tinged in that slight pink that said even he knew he was being a little cheesy. It never stopped him, though. “I want to know the real Spamton.” 

The real Spamton. What a concept. His identity was a figment, an illusion, like a unicorn or a fairy or the taste of freedom. Even now he wasn’t certain he was really ‘him.’ Whatever was talking to Tenna now was a mislabelled artifact. It was the benefactor’s programming and an Addison’s base instincts stitched together and absently labelled ‘Spamton.’ If there had been a person there at all, he was long-since buried. 

And yet… something Tenna had said stuck with him, refusing to filter down into long-term memory with everything else. Maybe there was more of you there than you think. Was there? By this point, his mind was too fragmented for him to know. He was too far gone, warped by the phone, by NEO, by years spent on the streets with nothing on his mind but survival and freedom. If he’d ever had an identity, it was long gone. Buried. Painted over. 

But maybe there had been one. Once. Bits and pieces of a real person showing through the cracks in the million shaky facades he wore. And if it had been there once, maybe enough of it had scattered around throughout his life, fragments left with the people he’d once known, that he could rebuild the basic structure. Not everything. Not a full person like Tenna or Susie or Noelle. Unlike Kris, he’d probably never had a full soul to be overwritten. But maybe there had been something. And maybe, just maybe, he could find the scraps of it again. 

I want to know the real Spamton. The real Spamton probably wasn’t all that pleasant to look at. He remembered enough to know that whatever he found if he went looking probably wouldn’t be good. But in that moment, sitting next to Tenna on that bench that was simultaneously too big and too small, looking out into the snowfall, he decided that it didn’t matter. 

He wanted to know the real Spamton too. 

Chapter Text

Addisons were creatures of habit. Most Darkners were, but one would think that a species whose entire purpose was to remain eye-catching and relevant would perhaps be a bit more flexible. In some sense, they were, but not as much as they probably wanted to be. As a species, they were fluid and everchanging, every young addison that broke out onto the scene coming up with new, fresh marketing tactics. But as individuals? They were far more static than any of them would ever admit. Sure, they’d try to adjust details around their marketing strategy, but the core structure of each addison’s niche wasn’t something they often strayed from. Whether it was cultural or biological or just happenstance, Spamton didn’t know. 

What he did know was that Banner’s store in Castle Town was about as close to a one-to-one replica of their old shop in Cyber City as you could get. 

Spamton hadn’t actually visited his brothers’ shops since getting to Castle Town. He’d seen them around, sure, but he hadn’t exactly wanted to associate with any addisons, much less those four. The few conversations he’d had with any of them since moving to Castle Town had been brief and cold. Unfulfilling. Enough to maintain the peace, but not enough to make any meaningful progress. Not enough to go back to any semblance of what they had before.

‘Brothers,’ in as much as Darkners like them could be brothers. It wasn’t the same biological bond that real siblings had. And it certainly wasn’t the way most other groups of addisons would describe themselves. The other addison cohorts called themselves ‘coworkers,’ or ‘marketing partners,’ or, occasionally, when more than one of them managed to get their head out of their ass at a time, ‘friends.’ But not ‘siblings.’ And certainly not ‘brothers.’ That had been for Spamton’s group and Spamton’s group alone. It was unique. Incorrect. 

Maybe they’d all been faulty, then, and Spamton was just the only one who couldn’t hide how broken his code really was. The one who took the fall for the disease that all of them shared, simply because he’d had the misfortune of having the worst case.

The nostalgia of stepping through the doors hit him like a physical blow. A bit over two decades and an entire world removed, and somehow it was exactly how he remembered it. The stone walkway under his feet gave way to short brown carpet, warm yellow light replacing the blue of the lanterns outside. Straight clothing racks lined the walls, circular ones dotted the middle of the store, all drowning in dresses. A few customers milling about, a couple of whom looked up, noticed his presence, and then silently decided that they hadn’t. 

Spamton poked his head around one of the racks and glanced towards the back of the store where the men’s section used to be. It was still there, exactly where he remembered it, pants and dress shirts neatly folded on wooden shelves, blazers hung up beside them. He could see a rack of intricately-designed ties hanging next to a long mirror and briefly wondered if Banner made those too. They probably did. They were always a stickler for making everything in-house, even the things that would’ve made more sense to just get from an existing brand. Because they’d been… passionate about it. 

That was why Spamton had come to Banner instead of one of the others. Well, one of the reasons. The easiest reason. After all, Banner just seemed like someone who knew who they were. They had a passion that they’d turned into a livelihood, and they’d done it all on their own. If anyone knew what an identity was, what it meant, then it was Banner. 

Besides, the only other addison that had set up a permanent storefront and was therefore easy to locate was Click, and Spamton would sooner gargle wet cement than go to Click for this. 

He felt something between his fingers and glanced down, realizing he’d started pulling at his sleeve unconsciously, hunting for loose threads. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his coat with an irritated huff. Old habits died hard, he supposed, and he actually liked this coat. He didn’t need it ruined by his nervous tugging. His fingers rubbed together in his pockets instead, still needing something to do. A crumpled wrapper of some sort was located in the left pocket and he resigned himself to fiddling with that instead. 

Sure, maybe a lot of emotions were rushing through him at the moment, but he was definitely not nervous about this. There was nothing to be nervous about! He was just checking in on an old… acquaintance. Sure, maybe the last time they’d seen each other in the past, Spamton had blown up and called them all fake jealous assholes who hated to see him happy. And maybe they’d then never spoken to him again. And maybe, just maybe, the part of him that remembered that betrayal was having a hard time fighting against the part of him that remembered when they were all he had. The part of him that still cared about them, despite how hard he’d tried to bite it down. There was a reason they hadn’t all really talked since coming to Castle Town. Not in the ways that mattered. They left me in that diner. They left me in that dumpster. They betrayed me. I had it coming. 

Spamton took a deep, shaking breath and stepped further into the store, instinct taking him towards where he knew the register was. Upon further examination, the store wasn’t quite identical to how he remembered it. The men’s section was bigger, for one thing, taking up the entire back of the store instead of just the one small corner. There also seemed to be a slightly medieval tilt to some of the designs, like the lovechild of a modern prom dress boutique and a ren faire tent. Banner experimenting with something fresh. Maybe something closer to what they’d wanted to make all along. Or maybe they were just capitalizing on the archaic fashion of the Card Kingdom and Fairground Darkners.

A particular dress caught his eye, a fluffy blue ballgown that looked like it would be a nightmare to try and sit down in. Or, rather, the mannequin it rested on caught his eye. He recognized the silhouette, though the face was blank and featureless. The thing had been made as a joke. Well, I still need someone to model my dresses, and white makes them pop. He’d had no idea Banner kept it. Displayed it even. The image sent a pang of… something through his chest. He swallowed thickly and tore his eyes away before his brain thought of a name for the feeling that he definitely wouldn’t like. 

There was much less fanfare to the actual moment than he felt there should be. He just poked his head out from where he was not hiding behind one of the racks and… there they were. They weren’t all that hard to spot, bright orange feathers standing out brilliantly against the pleasant green of their shop’s wallpaper. They were leaning against the counter, checking over something that Spamton couldn’t make out. A Pippins was just finishing up gathering their purchase from the counter. They turned to go and Spamton flinched back behind the rack by instinct. 

He leaned his head back against the dresses behind him, letting the soft fabric swallow him until he almost fell through and into the center of the rack. It muffled the sound of the world around him, at least a little. His fingers traced a splattering of rhinestones along one of them, trying to focus his thoughts on the sensation instead of on the sudden swell of panic seeing them again had summoned. 

He was already here, wasn’t he? The hard part was over. He’d spent the better part of the last week waffling about his apartment like some kind of moron, thinking of excuse after excuse not to do this before he finally forced himself to acknowledge that the only reason he didn’t want to was because he was a coward. He was afraid of what would happen. Afraid of trying to reach for something more than the simple stability he’d managed to cobble together. Afraid that he’d somehow manage to fuck it all up again. Afraid that Banner would have nothing meaningful to tell him, afraid that this whole endeavor would be fruitless. And, perhaps most of all, afraid that it wouldn’t. Afraid that he wouldn’t like what he ended up finding. It was a hell of a lot easier to convince himself that he had what it took to go looking for himself in the embrace of an empty night. The cold light of morning made things feel far too real for Spamton’s tastes. 

Forcing himself to poke his head through the dresses again revealed that Banner hadn’t really moved since he’d last looked. The addison now had their head propped on one hand while the other traced the paper in front of them, fingers idly tapping at their cheek. They were right there, ten paces and twelve years away. An echo of the life Spamton had lived before everything fell apart. A relic, from before the Heroes, before Tenna, before the phone, hell, before Spamton. 

When he’d decided to figure out who he really was, it hadn’t been hard to figure out where to go. The hard part had been accepting it. Stories, after all, had to start from the beginning, and for Spamton, the beginning was this. Cyber City. His purpose. His brothers. In front of him was the person who had known him at his purest. In the time when he was, presumably, fully himself. The questions he’d had since Tenna asked to get to know him on that snow-laden bench, they all pointed back here. 

All it took was letting go of that dressing rack and stepping out into the open. 

Banner didn’t notice him at first, too focused on whatever they were working on for the slight movement of Spamton’s emergence to catch their eye in any meaningful way. When they did finally notice, they noticed in stages. The first thing they noticed was that someone was standing in front of them. It took them a second to notice who. 

“Oh, hello! How can I-” The words died in their throat as soon as they lifted their head fully to see who they were talking to. They froze so completely that Spamton couldn’t even be certain they were still breathing. There was something utterly unreadable in their eyes, though maybe that was just Spamton’s awful eyesight not being able to read their expression at this distance, or just Spamton’s inability to read expressions in general. What? Spamton wanted to ask them. You look like you’ve seen a ghost. It sounded less funny once he actually put the words together in his head. Mostly because it was inaccurate. And you look like you’ve seen the shambling corpse of some guy you used to know just didn’t have quite the same ring to it. 

“Sp- S…” That, too, failed to make its way past their lips. Idly, Spamton wondered if Banner had the same problem he did. If names caught behind some inexplicable filter in their voicebox as well, drowned out by the same power that shifted their voice. 

“HEY HEY [Howdy]!” Spamton greeted, trying to inject some kind of confidence into his voice. He flinched as it came out too loud and cheery, the false timbre of a radio host instead of the friendly greeting of an old friend. Though, maybe it was more accurate that way. He doubted Banner considered him a friend anymore. “HoWS IT   GOING?” 

Banner just continued staring at him, caught in that state of total shock, bound in place by their inability to fully register the scene in front of them. If he still could, Spamton was sure he’d be sweating buckets by now. The hair on the back of his neck was standing up, and his knees were shaking just as badly as they had his first time on TV Time’s stage. Only this time there was no benefactor to yank his boneless body back into motion, to take him through the motions of an effective conversation until everyone, him included, was fooled into thinking he actually knew how to be a person. He was on his own for this performance. 

“How’s it going?” Banner echoed incredulously, seemingly finally getting their feet under themself. “How- You- Spamton?” There it was. That name. His name. His mouth felt dry. His hand twitched towards his sleeve and he rammed it into his pocket as quickly as he could. His name sounded so wrong on Banner’s lips. Stilted and uncomfortable. Out of practice. 

“IN THE [Taxidermy]!” Spamton confirmed. “LONG [[Time]] NO SEE, [Wallpaper]!” He grimaced at the intrusion and prayed Banner wouldn’t take it the wrong way. They probably would. 

“I-” Banner cut themself off, shaking their head as if to dispel the image in front of them. Part of Spamton wished it would. That he’d just dissolve into a cloud of vaguely Spamton-colored smoke and dissipate right then and there. It would sure save him a lot of trouble. “You’re… here,” Banner breathed finally. 

“OBVIOUSLY. GEt WITH THE [[Scheduled programming]].” He tried for a charismatic smile that just felt inside out. He’d never been more aware of how strange his new face was. “COME ON,” Spamton tried again, spreading his arms in some mockery of a welcoming gesture. His hands were shaking hard enough that he could hear his joints rattling. “IS TH2T AN yY [[Way to go!]] TO [Seasons greetings] AN OLD FffR- FI-” Fuck. “F-[Fried in-]-” He manually slammed his jaw shut before he embarrassed himself any further. Pain sparked through his mouth as his teeth clacked together and he prayed that Banner’s unfamiliarity with his new appearance hid the resulting wince. 

“What are you doing here?” Banner asked after a moment. Their hands hovered uncertainly above the counter as they stood there, caught in between too many options of where to go next. 

“Whh )AH T?” Spamton choked out, barely audible through the static in his voice. “CAaN//>T A [Joe shmoe] VISIT Hi S [Brother DCP Inkjet Printer] EVVERY OcNE IN A                 ?” Banner blinked, just once, like a camera shutter snapping closed and etching the moment into eternity. Spamton on one side of the counter, his brother on the other, everything hanging in the balance. A bridge that neither of them had been willing to cross. 

“I… guess,” Banner said finally, swallowing down whatever other responses they’d had brewing. “Just, uh… didn’t expect it.” Neither did I, Spamton thought, far less bitterly than he would’ve expected. 

“WELL YOU [Better than ever] BELI->E IVE IT!” Spamton informed them. The corner of his mouth twitched from trying to maintain this illusion of a friendly expression. It was all starting to feel a bit stupid anyway. He’d come here with the goal of learning who he was, yet he was already trying to slot another mask into place. How was he supposed to make any progress like this? 

“So you’re just here to, what? Visit?” Banner asked, their disbelief annoyingly palpable. No need to sound so incredulous. 

“WHAT, IS THAT SO [Hard times] TO [[Seeing is believing]]?” Spamton muttered.

“A little, yeah,” Banner admitted. “I-I just…” They shook their head helplessly, running a hand through their hair. It was so bewildering to see the gesture in the flesh. Spamton had been doing it himself for so long that he’d forgotten where he’d gotten it from. He remembered it clearly though. It had started as a joke, a way to mock Banner’s nervous habit, until it became so ingrained that he did it of his own accord. A specific motion. A relic. 

“...[Wanted] TO T-TDaL-” He broke off, coughing into his hand as the words broke into unintelligible static. “TALK,” he admitted finally. “TO YOU.” Banner pursed their lips, eyes flicking across Spamton’s face, searching for something. An ulterior motive of some kind. They didn’t seem able to find it, or at least not one that they found satisfactory. 

“Why?” they asked finally. Spamton’s teeth clicked together softly, his fingers scraping as he wrung his hands. What a question. Why. It wasn’t a question he was going to be able to answer satisfactorily, he knew that. He doubted he’d be able to find the right words even if half of them didn’t get swapped out and rearranged. He’d never been the best at saying the things that mattered. Not in a way anyone else would understand, at least. 

He had to try anyway. Because this was important. 

“I WANT…” He trailed off, realizing too late that he hadn’t planned out enough of the sentence in advance. Instead of continuing, he crept up to the counter, planting his hands against it for some semblance of stability. Banner looked very much like they wanted to flinch back, but for some reason they just… didn’t. The two of them just stayed there, closer than they’d been in who knows how long. It was a poor mimicry of years ago, when Spamton would lean over the counter while Banner was working, trying to get whatever leverage he could to be at eye-level, complaining about his sales and dreaming of better things. A time that felt simpler not because it had been, but because the decades had long since smoothed the details down into something more easily understood. 

“IVE BEEn… THINKING,” Spamton managed finally. Banner watched him carefully, mouth pressed into a thin, unyielding line. “EVERYTHINGS [Different model] NOW.” 

“Yeah,” Banner agreed quietly. Spamton gritted his teeth, forcing himself to soldier on. 

“I WANTED TO [Walkie talkie] ABOUT B>eFORE,” he said. “ABOUT… ME.” Banner tilted their head, lips parting silently as they took the explanation in. 

“What about it?” Banner asked. 

“I…” Who am I? “I DONT [Real deal] REMmMBER WH AT I WA,S [[Like what you see]].” He sighed, picking at the countertop so he could avoid looking Banner in the eye. It wasn’t really true, but it also felt more true than it should have. He remembered events, sure, but how could he trust himself to know anything at all? He’d tried picking his way through his memories, and all they’d revealed was the reality of just how little he knew. He couldn’t identify anything from his own recollections, shaded as they were by the thick, pervasive rot in his mind. That’s why he’d come here in the first place. For answers. For that small, hopeful possibility Tenna had given him. Maybe there was more of you there than you think. 

“I WANT. TO KNOW,” he decided. He forced himself to look up again and found Banner’s expression to be just as indecipherable as before. They looked different close up, Spamton realized. More lines around their eyes, sourced, he would guess, from one too many sleepless nights of frantic sewing. Their hair was crimped in that style that told Spamton it had been heat-curled the day before. Their shirt, which Spamton had previously written off as the standard addison v-neck, was actually a blouse, the softer, flowier material more obvious up close. 

“I… Uh…” Banner trailed off, chewing their lip as they turned away. Spamton drew back sharply. 

“N33VER>MmNID,” he hissed, the instinct taking over before he even consciously recognized it. “THiIS WAS [Win stupid prizes].” He turned, stiffly, and forced his legs to drag him back towards the exit before he collapsed in on himself. He didn’t want to spend any more time watching Banner waffle about for a delicate way to tell him they never wanted to see him again. 

“Spamton!” And just like that, he froze again, captured almost effortlessly. Stupid, foolish. Hopeful. So easily swayed by even the chance. His head clicked around slowly, painfully, until he could see Banner out of the corner of his eye. “I’m… I close up shop at 9:00. If you want, you can come back? And, um. We can talk?” Spamton’s hinged jaw opened and closed uselessly, unable to formulate a coherent response. A fragile, hopeful feeling settled in his chest, curling up inside his exposed ribcage like a caterpillar settling in to begin creating its cocoon. Fragile, but so full of potential if only it could make it through the transformation. Too many times, Spamton had watched it die before it reached fruition, torn from the branch it rested on, eaten by birds or ants or consumed by disease or knocked to the ground by the careless hand of a passing child. Somehow, he had never learned to just kill it himself before he got attached to the prospect. Somehow, every time, he still waited for the emerging moth, no matter how many times he failed to see it. 

“Y-YEAH. OKAY. [[Ninety nine]].” 

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“And then, get this, he tried to use a coupon for half-off bread! I didn’t even know that was a thing.” 

“There’s no way that’s a thing.” 

“Coupons are a good advertising strategy. I’d imagine there’s coupons for anything.”

“Yeah, sure, but come on. Bread? It’s a household essential! You don’t need to waste advertising dollars on bread.” 

“Maybe that’s the intention. Present a discount on an essential so the customer perceives themself as having money to spare and ends up buying more in the long run.” 

“Damn. Would that actually work?”

“It’s a well-respected strategy.”

“Sure, but all of this is missing the point, which is that I don’t sell bread!?” 

The table burst into laughter at the reminder, Banner nearly spitting their drink across the table after tragically mis-timing their sip. They took a second to carefully swallow it all back down and recover before promptly not learning their lesson and taking another swig. 

“Maybe he thought it worked for those bread slippers you sell?” Mags suggested. 

“Sure, if he was trying to buy those,” Vid shot back. “This guy was trying to buy sneakers!” 

“How big were his glasses?” Banner asked. “Maybe he was really blind.” 

“He didn’t wear glasses!” 

“Sounds like he needs them, then!” Banner said. 

“Hah! Yeah. Haha…” Banner glanced down at the addison next to them. Spam’s eyes flicked around the table, searching for some kind of reaction they didn’t receive. If the conversation even paused at all at their intrusion, it started back up very shortly after. 

“People like that are a dime a dozen,” Click observed, taking a slow sip of their drink. The neon lights of the Cyber Grill sparked off the liquid in their cup, highlighting the sharp violet color. It had more of a kick to it than the stuff Click usually drank. Off-handedly, Banner wondered if Click was having a bad day, though it wasn’t like they were going to do anything if that was the case. Click could deal with their own problems. 

“I run into those types at the shop all the time,” they continued. “Always trying to order some garbage I’ve never heard of as if the menu isn’t right there.”

“These people can’t fucking read!” Vid cried, slamming their hands on the table.

“Language,” Click reminded them. 

“We’re just hanging out!” Vid said. “It’s not like we’re trying to sell anything right now.” 

“It’s smart to maintain good habits, though,” Click said. The pointed look over at Spam was not missed, at least not by Banner. Spam didn’t seem to notice. Or if they did, they didn’t react to it, but Spam wasn’t a particularly good actor. They tended to wear their heart on their sleeve, as much as they clearly made an effort to hide their reactions, and it made them unfortunately easy to read. Bad trait for a salesman. All the world was a stage, after all, and Spam was something of a last-minute understudy. 

“Fine. These people can’t frickin’ read,” Vid corrected. “Better?”

“Close enough,” Clicks said, though they didn’t look particularly placated. 

“Tell me about it,” Banner said, gliding over Click’s complaints and back to the actual matter at hand. “The amount of times I’ve had to explain that 10% off doesn’t mean it costs ten dollars now?” 

“That-” 

“It’s crazy!” Vid agreed, cutting Spam off. Banner doubted they’d even noticed they’d done it. Hell, Banner barely registered it themself. 

“You would think that the massive ‘percent’ symbol would tip them off,” Mags conceded. Spam let out a bark of laughter, far too forceful for how funny the joke actually was, which was not very much. 

“Customers are a special breed,” Banner muttered. “It’s like everyone’s IQ drops fifty points whenever they go inside a store.” 

“Maybe everyone’s just stupid,” Click said under their breath. 

“I’m sure it’s just confirmation bias,” Mags decided. “You’re just more likely to remember the bad ones.” 

“Oh yeah,” Vid agreed. “Amount of people who come up to me to complain about the prices as if that’s my problem? I don’t make the fucking-” They paused, glancing over at Click. “-fricking prices! I just sell the stuff!” 

“Hah! Y’know, that reminds me of this guy I bumped into a few weeks back,” Spam jumped in. “Came up to me out of nowhere, and you’d- you’d think someone would know not approach an addison if he doesn’t- y’know- if he doesn’t wanna get sold shit.” The table had fallen uncharacteristically quiet, the laughter from before dying down as Spam spoke. “Haha. He, uh, tried to get me told off for soliciting.” Spam drew back, their excited smile growing strained at the lack of reaction. The face of someone who was quickly realizing that the joke had been a lot funnier in their head. 

“You know I saw Coms a few days ago,” Vid barrelled on, Spam’s interjection forgotten almost as soon as it ended. 

“No way,” Banner replied. 

“Yeah way.”

“And how are they doing?” Click asked, not even trying to hide their distaste for the other Addison. 

“Saw them trying to sell to some werewires down by that new music store.”

“Werewires!?” Click burst out. “Are they stupid?”

“That’s the thing, they actually made the fucking sale!” Vid said. Click was so flabbergasted by the revelation that they didn’t even comment on the profanity this time. 

“No way,” Banner breathed again. 

“Woah,” Spam agreed. 

“That is impressive,” Mags concurred, taking a sip of their cocktail. “But certainly not sustainable in the long run,” they added, because God forbid an addison give another addison a genuine compliment. Bad for business to be hyping up the competition, after all. 

“No. Selling to werewires is nuts,” Vid said. “Like, they don’t even talk! I didn’t even think it was possible!” 

“I’ve gotten close!” Spam said, earning a variety of amused and disbelieving looks from around the table. 

“And I hand-crafted Queen’s throne,” Click muttered. 

“I did!” they protested. Then, after a beat: “I mean, probably. It’s not like they’ve got a face or anything, so… But they stayed and listened! So, definitely- I was close, I could feel it.”

“The bastard was probably zonked out of its mind,” Vid observed. 

“The thing was probably hearing, like, every fifth word you said, man,” Banner agreed, tacking on the title very deliberately as they did. Spam’s expression twitched at that, though Banner couldn’t exactly place the exact emotion. Still, they added it to their evidence pile. There was something about Spam lately that they weren’t quite able to define. A sourceless discomfort in regular conversation. A sudden aversion to things they hadn’t minded before. It was becoming more and more of a trial to get them to help out at the dress shop by the day. Something was definitely up, so Banner had taken to doing a bit of experimenting. They hadn’t come to anything conclusive yet. 

“I’m taking bets,” Vid decided. “Whoever actually makes a sale on a werewire gets… uh…” 

“Free shit?” Spam asked.

“Language,” Click hissed, far more harshly than they had with Vid. “Angel.” Spam did their best to keep their expression neutral, but Banner caught the way their eye twitched at the reprimand. 

“Whoops,” they said, clearly trying to sound nonchalant, their voice already coming out just a touch thicker anyway. 

“I dunno, coupons or something?” Vid suggested. 

“I don’t want your coupons,” Click said dryly. Banner kept an eye on Spam, watching as they tugged nervously at the cuffs of their blazer with one hand. The other was curled into a fist, clearly pressed too tightly to be comfortable. They let their gaze drift back to the conversation, trying not to worry about it too much. 

“Tell you what,” Vid was saying. “If you make a sale on a werewire before I do, I’ll do your stupid ‘tea-shoes’ promo, but if I make a sale first, then you gotta let me put up an ad in the tea shop.”

“Stupid!?” Click demanded. 

“Come on, they’re ugly as hell.” 

“That’s hardly the point! If it sells then-”

“Yeah but it’s not gonna,” Banner chimed in, mostly because riling up Click was one of their favorite pass-times. 

“You arrogant-”

“Okay, okay, let’s not get kicked out,” Mags cut in. They grimaced, glancing over at the counter. “Again.” 

“That was Vid’s fault and you know it,” Banner declared. 

“And I have zero regrets,” Vid informed them. “It was bullshit and I reserve the right to say so.”

“Hey, two things can be true at the same time!” 

It was another half an hour before the evening finally wound down. Click was, as usual, the first to announce their intention to leave, stating they had to be up to open the shop. After that, the rest followed with their own vague excuses, gathering their things and preparing to leave. Mags caught the tab that day, the way they always did when it was technically Spam’s turn to pay. They didn’t seem to mind all that much, all things considered, but Spam looked positively tormented every time. They’d even started skipping get-togethers, though the streaks of absence never lasted long. It was like they couldn’t handle either option, being or not being there. 

When they left the Cyber Grill, the other three took off almost immediately, still animatedly making nonsensical bets that would likely never come to fruition. Banner was inclined to join them, but something caught their eye just as they were about to run to catch up. 

Spam had hung back, lingering just outside the Grill uncertainly. They were staring at the ground sullenly, kicking at the sidewalk but never fully committing to walking one way or the other. For a moment, they seemed almost ghostly, the neon lights of the Cyber Grill casting across their pale face and washing away the details until they were just a splash of white against the backdrop of the Grill’s brick walls. An overexposed photograph. A memory rather than a living, breathing person. 

Then they shifted out of the light and the moment passed, their face returned to full resolution, the unsettling image set aside. 

They kept glancing over at Banner, clearly trying to seem like they weren’t. It was the obvious kind of plea that Banner was used to seeing from customers. Wanting to ask for help but too proud or too nervous to actually ask an employee where something was, so they just stood there looking lost and pathetic until someone approached them instead. Normally Banner would just ignore it and carry on, but… they didn’t know. Maybe it felt more important today. Maybe this was the first time they’d even fully noticed it in the first place. 

“Forget your address or something?” they asked, sidling up next to their brother as smoothly as they could. Spam jumped in surprise at the sound, despite Banner being pretty sure they’d seen them approach. 

“I- Uh, just…” They trailed off, waving their hand vaguely. “Just hanging out.” 

“Nice,” Banner observed. They really had no idea where this was supposed to go now. “Uh. I’m gonna go home then. You coming?” Spam gave them a weak thumbs-up and Banner led the way, the path coming easily to them after so many trips there and back. They’d never admit it aloud, but they were glad that the Cyber Grill get-togethers had become a tradition. Even if Click was a prude and Vid was too loud and Mags was weird and Spam was awkward. There was something special about it that Banner couldn’t think about for too long without feeling like a sappy loser. Something to do with the fact that they liked to call themselves ‘brothers.’ Purely, of course, in a business sense. Because it was cooler than calling themselves ‘coworkers.’ And because it flowed off the tongue easier than ‘siblings.’ Why they’d chosen brother instead of sister was simply a matter of coincidence. 

They walked in silence for a bit, which was unusual for Spam. They weren’t the kind of person who could handle quiet for long. They always felt the need to fill silences, as if they were scared of listening to their own thoughts for too long. Or maybe they just felt like talking was what you were supposed to do when you were around people and didn’t know what to do when that component was removed. They weren’t talking now, though. In fact, they seemed particularly… sullen. Thoughtful, but in an unpleasant way. Weighing what they wanted to say a lot more carefully than they usually seemed to. 

“Why…” they began finally, their voice hoarse. They cleared their throat harshly. “Why do we call ourselves brothers?” Banner’s eyebrows shot up and they turned to get a better look at the addison beside them. Spam was picking at their sleeves again. This was it then, right? The thing they’d lingered at the Cyber Grill for, just hoping someone would stop and give them an opening to say it? 

“Sounds cooler than ‘coworkers,’” Banner answered with practiced ease, despite the fact that it didn’t. It wasn’t cooler, it was more… familiar. They tried not to think about it too hard, not since it had started. They weren’t even sure how it had started anymore. Someone had started using it and it had just caught on. Who it had been, that tried it out first, was lost to time. 

“Yeah, but…” Spam trailed off, biting their lip nervously. They sighed uselessly, staring at the ground to avoid meeting Banner’s eyes. Everything about this was off. It felt too raw for the way Spam and Banner usually interacted. Their relationship was making bad jokes and teasing each other and pissing each other off a little bit. Not… whatever this was. 

“You, uh… You ever feel like you’re… wrong, I guess?” Banner blinked in surprise. 

“Like… how?” 

“I dunno. I guess I just feel like I- I mean, you-” Spam groaned in frustration as the proper words failed to come. They paused, and Banner could see some kind of calculation taking place behind their eyes as they tried to figure out what to see. Paying close attention, they could almost track the train of thought, though the actual details were lost on them. They could see as Spam cycled through variations of what they wanted to say. They caught the momentary flashes where they landed on something that fit. And they also saw the moment they decided to abandon the real reason for this discussion they’d manufactured altogether. 

“I just feel like I’m missing something, y’know?” they said, and Banner could tell by the weight lifted from their voice that they had, even if only slightly, decided to change course. “Like there’s this, uh, this one fucking thing I gotta do and then I’ll figure it out. I’m close, y’know?” 

“That’s what she said,” Banner said, practically as an afterthought. 

“Fuck off,” Spam muttered. Clearly they had given up on whatever attempt they’d been making to keep themself PG while at the Grill. “Beat me to it by one second.” 

“Sure. Whatever lets you sleep at night.” 

“Anyway. I’m- Shit, what was I-”

“You’re close,” Banner reminded them. 

“Right! My big break’s coming- shut up- I just feel like there’s something I’m…” They grimaced as they brushed back up against their original, shoved aside topic. 

“Sounds like you’ve just gotta keep at it?” Banner suggested uselessly. They weren’t particularly good with advice. That was Mags’s thing. 

“Yeah…” Spam agreed, falling silent for just long enough for Banner to think that was the end of it. “And it’s crazy, y’know? I mean, this massive fucking city and I’m over here on, like, a random bit of the sidewalk? Who came up with that?” They were trying to play it off like a joke, but Banner could practically taste the bitterness wafting off of them as they spoke. “I talked to a guy the other week and you’ve never heard a stupider sales pitch. Pretty sure I watched the light leave his eyes as I was talking. Hah!” That, too, was delivered with the cadence of a joke. This one was laced with barely concealed shame. Like Spam was trying to convince themself that if they told the story enough times, it would stop being embarrassing and start being as funny as they were pretending it was. 

“Yeah, well, nobody around here appreciates a good sale anymore,” Banner huffed, trying to counterbalance the utter sinkhole that was Spam’s current mood. “Think they’re too good for a classic 15% off. That’s good shit! How is it my fault that they can get a better bargain three stores down? That shit falls apart in three days!” 

“Right. And the extra day yours gives them lets them go to church.” Banner frowned, tilting their head in confusion. The statement had sounded like an attempt at a joke, but they couldn’t quite place it. 

“Huh?” 

“I just mean-” Spam’s face scrunched up as they parsed through their own joke. 

“I sincerely doubt anyone is wearing my designs somewhere as boring as church,” Banner informed them. 

“Yeah. No, that’s not what I-” They sighed in defeat, shoving their hands into the pockets of their pants. “It was supposed to be a dig. At you. Like, you said theirs last three days, and I was saying yours last four. And- Cause it’s Wednesday. So they could go to church on Saturday before it fell apart- Fuck me, nevermind.” 

“Oh,” Banner said. “I didn’t get it.”

“Yeah, I know, jackass.” Banner snorted, giving Spam a playful shove in the shoulder. 

“Gotta work on your delivery, dude.” There it was again. A slight shift in their expression. Surprise, but not necessarily negative. 

“That’s what I’m trying,” Spam groused. “Customers just- suck!” That hadn’t been what Banner had been talking about, but they couldn’t say it wasn’t applicable. They would love to be supportive, but Spam was not skilled in the art of customer communication. They talked too much and too quickly, got too excited or too intense, not to mention their utterly abysmal presentation. A fake smile that made them look like they were in agony, the posture of a sickly child, none of it helped by their particularly poor draw in whatever the Darkner equivalent of the genetic lottery was. 

“Y’ever think about…” Banner tilted their head as Spam trailed off again. They tugged at the collar of their v-neck, an adjustment that clearly didn’t fix whatever discomfort they were feeling. “Just…” 

“I think you’re overthinking. Whatever it is,” Banner informed them. 

“Yeah…” Spam agreed. “It’s just- I feel like maybe this isn’t… fuck, man.” Banner bristled a bit at that. Man. They brushed it off, seeing as they’d been referring to Spam the same way. It made perfect sense to return the sentiment. 

“Take your time,” Banner said, voice dripping with as much ‘kindergarten teacher trying to politely listen to a shitty story a kid is telling her’ as they could muster. 

“Fuck off,” Spam muttered. A small part of Banner’s mind took a second to note that Click kind of had a point. Spam swore too much. All of them probably did, considering their role as brand-safe advertisements, but Vid and Spam were the worst, and Vid at least managed to keep it under control during sales. 

Banner looked up, taking stock of the street around them, and it was only then that they realized that they’d already passed Spam’s apartment building. 

“Getting lost?” they teased, jerking their head back towards where Spam’s door lay a few buildings down. Spam, to their surprise, didn’t startle at the realization that they’d passed their home already. If anything, they almost seemed a little… guilty, instead. 

“Nah. I, uh, I’m not headin’ home yet.”

“Huh?” 

“I just like, uh… walking around. Sometimes. Got nothin’ better to do,” they explained. Banner raised an eyebrow. It was, perhaps, the worst attempt at an excuse Banner had ever heard. The problem was, however, that they couldn’t quite understand why it was being employed. Deductive reasoning would suggest that Spam’s goal was to accompany Banner back to their apartment. But what after that? Did they want something? Banner couldn’t think of anything they had that Spam would be after, or at least nothing that this situation would allow them to access. But if there wasn’t a target, then… why? 

Banner continued walking anyway, letting Spam fall into step beside them yet again. Could it be that they just wanted to spend more time together? Even after the Grille? That wouldn’t make any sense.

Or maybe it would. After all, it was no secret that Spam wasn’t exactly like the other addisons. Some error in their programming, maybe, or maybe a product of the variety of advertisement they were in the first place. Whatever it was, they were different. 

Banner tried to ignore the part of them that kept trying to remind them that all of them were different. All five of them. Groups like theirs were rare. Groups like theirs that lasted this long were even rarer. Groups of brothers? It was unheard of. It was wrong. Faulty. 

Sometimes Banner wondered if the only reason they got away with it was because Spam’s defectiveness was so bad that it drew the attention off the rest of them. 

“Y’know, I wonder about them sometimes.”

“Whozawhatnow?” Spam shot Banner an unimpressed look. 

“Werewires.” 

“How’d we get there?” Spam opened their mouth and Banner quickly held up a hand. “Nevermind. I don’t have five hours to spend on that tangent.” Spam let out an irritated grumble, closing their mouth and turning to look at the ground instead. With any of the others, it would’ve come across as mild irritation. With Spam, there was something else underneath it that Banner couldn’t fully pin. Whatever it was, it made them uncomfortable enough to prod the conversation forward. “What about werewires?” Spam glanced up in surprise.

“Uh. Just that… it probably sucks.” 

“Oh. Yeah, totally. I coulda told you that,” Banner observed. They figured that would be the end of it, but Spam was rarely one to turn down an opportunity to run their mouth. 

“I mean, they don’t get a choice in… anything. Like, once you’re a werewire, that’s it, right? And they act like they can think and stuff, but they also just have to do exactly what they’re told. Always.” 

“Yeah, I mean… that is how it works.” Banner didn’t particularly think about the werewires all that much. At least, not beyond ‘they don’t make good customers’ and ‘avoid them when you’re out late.’ They didn’t want to think about the werewires. No one did. It was a bit of a faux pas, talking about them in any real way. Of course, Spam had never been great at reading the room. 

“A-and it got me thinking about the plugboys. And, like, how they’re kinda, y’know, made to turn into werewires. They gotta spend their whole lives thinking about it, right?” Spam’s hands flew about their head as they spoke, the way they always did. It was one of the things about Spam that Banner secretly envied. Them and Vid both, but Spam especially. That natural animated-ness. It was bad for sales, obviously, made them appear overly-excitable and immature. But there was something about the way it made them seem… alive. 

“They probably just spend all their time waitin’ for it to happen. And then when it does, they just do the same shit. Just…”

“Um. Cool?” Banner offered. They were nearly at their place now. They subconsciously picked up the pace. 

“My point- My point is, I, uh…” Spam trailed off, clearly having not picked a point prior to starting the sentence. “Y’think we’re kinda like that too?” Banner froze, hackles raised instinctively at the suggestion. 

“Like werewires?” 

“I mean, yeah,” Spam said. “Just… doin’ the same shit all the fuckin’ time. Just cause somebody told us to.” 

“What are you trying to say?” Banner asked sharply. Spam winced at the sound, withdrawing instantly even at that small indicator of a reprimand. 

“I dunno,” they mumbled. “I guess I just…” They had arrived at Banner’s apartment building now. The orange addison took a few steps up the stairs and, fortunately, Spam made no move to follow. And yet, they didn’t take their key out of their pocket and take their leave. They probably should. They wanted to. 

“That’s how I’m gonna make it big,” Spam decided. “One ‘a these days.” 

“Oh, yeah?” Banner asked, leaning against the railing beside the stairs. 

“Yeah. I-it’s- The problem is, I’m too… I’m just doin’ the same shit, right?” 

“I guess?” 

“So then, the way I gotta fix it is I just gotta find something new to do. Like, I’ve got the stuff I’m s’posed to sell, but maybe…” They shrugged, a little bit of the weary weight that had settled over them seemingly sliding off. They looked up at Banner, their smile brighter than they’d seen it all evening. “I’m gonna figure it out. Just gotta get something new, yeah? And once I find it, you all are gonna be eatin’ my dust.” Banner rolled their eyes. A smile tugged at their lips. In their head, they called it amused, to prevent it from revealing itself as fond. 

“Whatever you say, dude.”

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By the time Banner exited the store, precisely at 9:07 pm, Spamton could hardly feel his nose. Why he’d waited the hours between when he’d first shown up and when Banner finally closed up shop, he couldn’t exactly be certain. He could’ve left. Gone home, maybe eaten something, maybe watched something on the shitty old TV Tenna had forced upon him. Done anything except sit down on a wet bench without bothering to clear the snow and wait for hours. He just hadn’t been able to will himself to leave. 

Banner exited the store and quickly locked the door behind them, triple-checking to make sure everything was set before they turned around. They looked decidedly more fashionable than Spamton, he noted dryly. Practical wedged boots, one of those long, fancy coats that looks like it shouldn’t be warm at all but somehow is, a matching set of gloves, scarf, and hat to tie it all together. They looked good. They also didn’t look all that much like an addison. It hadn’t fully occurred to Spamton just how crucial the uniform apparently was to completing the full picture. Or maybe it had. He’d ditched it for a reason, after all. 

They jumped a bit when they noticed him, sitting there in the snow underneath the single, pale streetlight. They met his gaze with that new, agonizing caution that Spamton was growing unfortunately familiar with. It was the same look they all had, and he hated it. Hated it more than the subtly patronizing looks they’d give him back before he made it big. Hated it more than the bitterness and barely disguised jealousy of after. It was too uncertain for his tastes. Nowadays, they looked at him like he was some kind of wild animal. Dangerous. Unpredictable. They looked at him like they were afraid of him. 

“Spamton,” Banner greeted unsteadily, their breath puffing out in front of them like a cloud of cigarette smoke. He wondered if a cigarette would help with this at all. He hadn’t smoked in over a decade. “I, uh. I wasn’t sure you’d come back.” 

“EHEHEHAE. NEVER [left behind],” Spamton informed them, honestly. Their eyes widened at that.

“You’ve just been out here?” they asked. Spamton shrugged easily, hopping off the bench and onto the ground beside them. He was even shorter than them than he had been before, he noted glumly. Not by much, but enough to be noticeable. He usually tried not to think about it, but standing next to addisons definitely didn’t help. 

“WHATS A [Bitcoin] OFF [[Cold refreshing iced tea]]?” he said. It was total bullshit. He was freezing. He still didn’t understand why he’d stayed on that bench the whole time instead of going somewhere warm. 

“Geez,” Banner muttered. Still, they followed Spamton as he began to walk, falling into step just a bit behind him. Letting him lead the way. Granted, he didn’t actually have a destination in mind. He was just cold and wanted to warm up a bit. He was pretty sure that feeling warmer while he moved was just a placebo, considering the fact that he’d lost his circulatory system (along with everything else) during his transformation. But a placebo was still an effect, and he’d take what he could get. Besides, walking and talking was easier. You didn’t have to look the other person in the eyes.

“So…” Banner prompted after a few minutes of walking in near-silence. “What did you… wanna talk about.”

“TOLD YOU,” Spamton grunted out. “I [want it that] tO…” Well, shit. Maybe he hadn’t told Banner, because he seemingly didn’t have the slightest clue how to formulate the thought. How was he supposed to say this without sounding like a melodramatic idiot? It probably wasn’t possible, mostly because he was a melodramatic idiot. 

It didn’t help that talking to the addisons was so fucking difficult. There was so much weight between them all that Spamton didn’t have the slightest clue how to lift. With most everyone else, he was usually able to just let things slide off of him. He’d been a sensitive piece of shit when he was younger, but a good decade of living in the fucking garbage will teach a guy to let shit go. He couldn’t afford to care what people thought of him. There had been other things to worry about. 

It had probably helped that he’d been decidedly less… lucid, before. Clarity of thought was much less of a blessing than one might think it would be. All it did was make him more aware of just how fucked everything was. Made the moments where he lost that clarity all the worse. The longer the stretches of ‘good’ functioning became, the more unsteady he felt. Not because he was more unsteady, but because he was finally just steady enough to recognize it. When you’re being tossed around in every direction, you get used to it. Once your feet find solid ground, you have just enough presence of mind to recognize how precarious your situation is. 

The addisons just made the whole matter worse. Maybe because they’d been his first critics, all those years ago, before first the benefactor and then the streets taught him not to care what other people thought. His shoddily constructed walls had been built with his brothers already inside, and he doubted he had the manpower to ever fully push them out. 

“WHAT wWA*3.. [[Watchtower]]- [Wasting]-” He broke off into a small coughing fit as he tried to choke off the glitching and start over. Banner startled beside him at the sudden noise, looking down at him in mild horror. The others still hadn’t gotten used to his new speech patterns, he knew. Most people hadn’t. 

“WHAT.” He began again, taking his words painfully slowly. “WAS. I>. L1iKE?” Banner pursed their lips, watching silently as he fought to grind out a single sentence. They looked similarly unmoored, just as lost in this as he was. He supposed it was better that way. At least, if nothing else, they were on even footing. 

“That’s a… bit of a loaded question, man,” Banner said after a moment. Spamton huffed out a small, surprised laugh. “It’s… why?” 

“BECAUSSE I…” He let out a sigh, glancing up at Banner as his mind frantically tried to run the calculation in real time. They’d spoken maybe ten times or so since Spamton settled in Castle Town permanently, not counting the rare occasion when they saw each other on the street and exchanged brief, stilted hellos. By those numbers, he shouldn’t tell Banner anything. They were practically strangers. 

But then there were the other numbers. Week after week at the Cyber Grille, late nights in the sewing room, walks through town on the way to work. An entire lifetime, completely disconnected from the one he existed in now, where Banner and the others had been the closest thing a Darkner could get to family. A family they had forged for themselves, somehow, through whatever fault in their code they shared that made them crave each other’s company. 

Those numbers wanted nothing more than to trust him again. 

“AFTtER THE [[ring a ling]],” Spamton began slowly. He tried to choose his words carefully, to keep the important parts from being censored. 

“The phone?” Banner echoed. Spamton dipped his head slightly. They turned away, staring pointedly at the ground and running one hand over their hat. 

“AFtER,” Spamton repeated, “I WAS JUssT A [[long nosed doll]]. A [one-act marionette]. NOT… M>3#3.” Banner sucked in a sharp breath. They clasped their hands in front of them, fidgeting with the fabric of their gloves as they tried to formulate a response. 

“Spamton…” they began, in that tone that always sounded fake on them. “Look, I’m sor-”

“DONtT,” Spamton cut in. He didn’t want to hear it again. It all sounded so performative when they said it. It sounded like office acquaintances offering condolences for a lost loved one. I’m so sorry that happened to you. Oh, how awful! I wish you the best! You’ll be in my thoughts! Worthless platitudes, all of it. What was done was done. He didn’t need their apologies and he certainly didn’t need their pity. Not anymore. 

“YOU [[known]] M.E,” he continued. “BEf0RE.” He took a deep breath, steeling himself for the admission. “I [wander]- W8*A NT>. TO kNWO. WHO I [[wasn’t there someone here before?]].” 

Banner was silent for a long while. Long enough that Spamton was almost convinced they were just going to give up on the venture entirely, just leave him at some point and never return. He wasn’t even sure he’d mind all that much. He didn’t have high hopes for this whole venture. Or at least, he was trying to convince himself he didn’t. Fake it ‘til you make it, after all. 

“I dunno if I’m the right person to ask,” Banner finally admitted, voice so quiet that it almost got carried away by the soft Castle Town winds. 

“[not]?” Spamton asked. Banner shook their head. They were staring down at the ground as they walked, analyzing the way their footprints settled into the small layer of snow that had settled since it was last shoveled. They looked a hell of a lot less confident than Spamton was used to seeing them. 

“You were… hard,” they said after a second. 

“I [beggars] YOUR [presidential pardon]?” Spamton asked. It came out sounding more hostile than he wanted. He was genuinely confused. 

“You just… I don’t know. You were…” Banner turned away even further, ensuring that Spamton wouldn’t even be visible out of their periphery. 

“YoUU CAN [[telephone]] ME I*F ITS [bad news bears],” Spamton said, only half-teasing. “IVE [herd] IT AA<4L-  LLL.” Banner let out a small huff of laughter. It sounded less like genuine amusement and more like a peace offering. Just a small signal that they’d heard and that they were, for now, still willing to talk. 

“It’s not bad,” they attempted to correct. Spamton wondered when they’d become such a bad liar. It seemed his disbelief was evident enough in his expression, too, because Banner folded within seconds. “Okay, I guess you were a little… Shit, man, you were kind of annoying.” Geez. Okay.

“TELL ME [[something something]] I D(onT KNOW,” Spamton said lightly, even as he felt a familiar stab through his chest at the admission. He took a breath, trying to take it all in stride. After all, he’d made his peace with this. He’d known that whatever he found wasn’t likely to be… pleasant. Hell, ‘annoying’ was far more mild than what he’d expected. 

It still stung, though. It probably always would, from them. But he’d been through a hell of a lot worse by this point, and he liked to think that he was learning. It was like ripping off a bandaid or lancing an infection. Momentary pain for the eventual relief. Catharsis.

“You talked a lot. Like, all the time,” Banner informed him. “I think you just liked to hear the sound of your own voice.” 

“IT WAS A [five stars] V.OICe  3!” Spamton protested. To his surprise, Banner’s mouth split into a small, involuntary smile at the joke. A reaction. A genuine one. 

“Dude, it was constant,” Banner continued. “You were impossible to talk to.” 

“[taker] oNE TO kNWO [one by one],” Spamton said. Banner’s smile widened and a small giggle escaped their mouth. Spamton felt a small stab through his body at the sight. The entire thing was all so painfully familiar. It was a delicate dance, this hesitant walk along the edge of who they were now and who they’d been. Like a photocopy of a photocopy. A file, re-downloaded into the wrong folder. 

It didn’t take long for the small amount of mirth they’d managed to gather to filter out of Banner’s eyes. 

“I don’t think you liked the quiet,” they admitted. “Like you were scared if you stopped talking, everybody would forget you were there.” They did anyway was left unsaid, but Spamton could hear it clear as day. Banner, it seemed, could too. 

He remembered what that was like, to some degree. He’d never particularly liked being alone with his thoughts, but he’d also never been good enough at focusing to let other people wash them away. It was kind of still like that now. A constant race between him and his mind, where he had to keep talking to keep it from catching up with him. It was an instinct he was fighting, even now, trying to bite back the urge to just start spewing words about something completely unrelated in the hopes that somewhere in there he’d find the right thing to say that would make this whole uncomfortable atmosphere fall away.

“Do… do you remember that night at the Cyber Grille?” Banner asked suddenly. 

“GONNA [half and half] TO BE MOrE [Conspecifics],” Spamton drawled. Banner laughed softly. 

“Right. Sorry. Shit, you probably don’t, it was just a random one. But, uh… We walked home. Just you and me that time. And you were talking about werewires.” Spamton tilted his head, trying to scrape his way through the jumbled mess that was his mind to locate the moment Banner was talking about. He came up empty. 

“[No cigar],” he reported, a touch of bitterness slipping into his tone despite his best efforts. 

“That’s fair,” Banner said. “I, uh, don’t know why you’d remember. Shit, I don’t even know why I remember.” They let out a long sigh. “Just… something about it. You were talking about how werewires are trapped, doing the same shit over and over just because someone else told them they had to.” Spamton listened intently, trying desperately to latch onto something that would bring the memory into focus. None of it stuck. “You said you felt wrong, but…” They shook their head. 

“I don’t think you knew who you were,” Banner admitted finally. “I mean…” They turned to look at him, fully now, gesturing up and down his body. “Obviously you didn’t.” Somehow, despite the vagueness of it all, Spamton knew exactly what they meant. He drew in on himself instinctively at the mention. Even now. “But not just that. You just… you kept talking about finding something. The thing that would fix it all and make you big. But you didn’t know what it was. And then you did get big, and we thought you found it, but…” They trailed off, meeting his gaze as they did so. Looking past his glasses and into the empty sockets behind them. He wanted to say something, but his voicebox refused to function. 

“All of us had a calling, yeah?” Banner said. “Like my dresses, and Click’s tea. And you just didn’t find yours.” Spamton’s teeth clicked together harshly and he turned his gaze down to the snow below him. It was the shitty kind. The stuff you get after a day, once people have had time to walk through it and get it all packed and muddy. It was strange, the way people here so often associated winter with beautiful snowdrifts and white christmases, when those parts of the season were so fleeting. 

“This isn’t helping at all, is it?” Banner asked. 

“COUld BE [better than ever], CO>ULD BE ww)0RSE,” Spamton said uncertainly. Banner sighed. 

“Sorry. I, uh… I guess I’ll let you know if I think of anything else?” What a suggestion. ‘Hey, if I remember any details about your former personality, which may or may not have existed and which may or may not have actually been yours, I’ll give you a ring!’ He somehow still found himself nodding in agreement. 

“Oo-O      K4Y,” he choked out. And then, even more heavily: “tH[Thanksgiving day parade].” He considered trying again. Decided against it. Left it at that. 

Banner nodded, once, stiffly, and that was that. They stopped walking and Spamton followed suit. They looked down at him, once. They opened their mouth as if to say something and then thought better of it, and then they turned and began walking, heading off to some place Spamton didn’t have the privilege of knowing. Maybe their apartment. The new one in Castle Town that Spamton had never visited. He wondered if, like Banner’s shop, it looked like the one back in Cyber City that he had frequented so often that he knew it better than his own. 

With nothing left to do, he turned and began preparing to make the trek back to his own apartment to spend the rest of the night… wallowing, probably. He didn’t make it very far.

“Spamton!” He turned back around to find that Banner had stopped just before turning onto another street a good several feet away. He tilted his head curiously. “We, uh. Click has this tea, back at their shop. They make the flavor profile based on a person. It’s some weird magic bullshit, I don’t really get it, but it definitely seems like it works.”

“oKAY?” Spamton asked. 

“Um.” They glanced down at their hands uncertainly before looking back up to meet Spamton’s gaze. “We’ve been meeting up there every week. Just like with the Grille.” Spamton’s jaw clicked open, just a touch, the only physical manifestation of the barbed wire that constricted around his lungs at Banner’s words. “You should come. If you want. Just to try it.” They wrung their hands. Spamton was dimly aware that his lack of response was probably not helping their anxiety, but he hardly had it in him to try to muster one. “Maybe it’s stupid, but it might give you some insight?” 

“Yy-0E..UE*#3AHH-  YeEH,” he managed after a second. “MaYBE.” Banner nodded nervously, muttering out a few ‘rights’ and ‘cools’ and ‘okays’ before finally turning the corner and vanishing from view. Spamton watched them go, only half aware of his surroundings as his brain struggled to process… all of that. 

It was a dangerous middle ground to be in. Far more than he’d expected, but far less than he’d hoped. He’d wanted talking to Banner to just… solve the problem. Magically tell him everything he needed to know and reveal the secret true Spamton that had been hiding all along. Instead, all he had was vague conjectures and the singular trait of ‘annoying.’ Somehow, he doubted he could build a personality off of that description alone. 

But… at least it was a place to start, wasn’t it?
Banner was right. He hadn’t known who he was back then. He’d been an addison who couldn’t sell, a creature failing the singular purpose it was designed for. He’d been lost and afraid and still bound to that foolhardy need to somehow fulfill some arbitrary quota of Lightner attention. Lost and unmoored, left to drift aimlessly through the streets of a city that had never felt like his. Doing someone else’s job in someone else’s body and trying to pretend he understood. 

So no. That wasn’t who he was. He’d been just as lost before the benefactor found him as he was now that his benefactor was gone. 

But maybe, somewhere in the interim, there had been a moment where he wasn’t.