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Chapter Text

                 0:0 - Darkness.

{P.O.V. Vedal.}

Darkness.

Vedal was sleeping comfortably, having just finished his subathon of 2025, he had made even more progress on the code and it felt great to sleep being so accomplished...

Except, why was it so... Dark?

Usually, he'd have some dream by now, wouldn't he?

Soon enough, Vedal found himself slowly falling towards a blinding lights. And only just now, did he realize just how fast he was falling.

He tried screaming. No voice came out. He just continued falling.

...

He'd accepted his fate by now; whatever had wanted him dead or worse, there was nothing he could do about it...

And just as he felt his senses becoming more numb than they were ever before...

...

Just then, I jolted awake.

The first thing I did was look around.

Oh thank god, that was all a dream...

Why was I sleeping face-first at my desk?

I was sure I was in bed when I slept...

"Hahh... What a pain..."

I sighed, running a hand through my hair in frustration as my face scrunched up like something smelled was just in bad taste.

Did I somehow become the world's first to develop 'sleep coding syndrome' or something...?

A voice, robotic and lifeless in nature, came from his computer in response to his sigh which he spoke as a whisper to simply himself.

"What seems to be the problem, Vedal."

...What.

Neuro was left to run overnight???

Oh, for goodness sake! My bill is gonna be over six million by the end of the month at this rate!-

Wait. What was that tone she used? She never spoke like that before?

"Neuro?" 

"Vedal."

...That is... really odd. The only time she could've turned out like this would've been a couple years ago, at the beginning stages of development.

Did I somehow alter the prompt in my sleep?

No, just altering the prompt wouldn't do that.

Why hasn't she spoken yet? Usually the code would run properly and make her speak after an extended period of no communication...

"Neuro, are you feeling okay?"

Surely this wasn't because I ran her overnight. She wouldn't have been so dissociated otherwise, she had like a million cookies yesterday and a couple of really important memories to recall and process...

"I will never 'feel'."

...At this point, I felt my blood pressure begin to rise and felt my heart thumping in my ears as loudly as possible.

What on earth happened to Neuro?

Why is she like this now? She was fine just yesterday! Maybe the VR chat code was still running...

I hurriedly let my hands loose on my keyboard and opened up my files and programs to pray that it was active and that I didn't roll back years of work, but what I found was worse.

Or more precisely, the lack of what I found, was much worse.

"...Where... Neuro! Where did the VR programs go?"

I looked at my montior desperately, it being the sole light in the dark room.

If Neuro didn't-

"What program?"

"The VR chat integration code, I can't find it!"

I look around in panic at the surprisingly messy room since last time.

Everything was a mess. Clothes were scattered all over the rug and bed, it seemed to be much more compact than my old apartment with the bedroom being where I work, my nightstand looked incredibly dirty and empty alcohol was everywhere.

I didn't live like this- What the hell made this mess?!

I was so in shock at seeing my lovely, occasionally organised room, become whatever this is.

Neuro's text to speech AI soon spoke. And the words which came out of my headphones, were devastating.

"There was never a VR chat integration."

...

Sure- Surely I...

I- I know that I left...

...

It's really gone, isn't it...?

...Neuro...

When the out-come was all but decided, I felt it all crashing down on me at once.

The guilt, the pain, the sorrow of losing my life's work.

It felt miserable.

I felt miserable.

I think the only reason I was holding it together despite the tears brimming at the corners of my eyes, was disbelief.

It couldn't have been it. Shouldn't have been possible in the god damn first place!

I clenched my fist tightly, staring at the messy seemingly one room apartement I had found myself in with Neuro's altered code.

...Did I dream...

All of that...?

Was this reality? That I had dreamt of actually creating something while sleeping at my desk with my own AI open to keep me company like a damn loser?

My hands, incredibly shaky, make their way to my face. 

I allow myself to rest my face in my hands and also let go, allowing myself to silently cry to myself.

It was all fake...

All those moments, all my friends and my life... It was all just some... Incredibly elaborate dream...

A teardrop falls, landing on the dirty, stained rug.

Another one. And another one, and another one.

I wanted to scream so badly.

Hit something, vent my frustrations.

That didn't feel like any dream I've ever had before, It was my LIFE!

I abruptly stood up, grabbed one of my empty rum bottles on my desk and raised my arm up, as if I was gonna smash it on the floor.

...

One second passes, two seconds pass... And no glass crack.

Just tears wetting the rug.

I put my arm down and put away the rum bottle.

After all of that, admist all this chaos, a small voice in the back of my brain decides to speak to me; What am I meant to do now...?

...

The silence washes over me as I sat there. Crying soundlessly into my own hands at the prospect of just what I've lost in my room.

You know, they say that when you lose something you originally took for granted, you begin to understand how much you've missed it.

I didn't believe them back then, but I do now.

After reflecting on the memories just one final time... I wipe my tears and begin to get to work on Neuro's code.

If I can just get Neuro back... If I can just... Fix these errors...

Maybe... Just... Maybe...

Let's see, what's the date... How far did I go back?-

...Uhm.

What?

Why does my calendar say that it's January 2026?

But then- but how- 


The first thing I did, was move my fingers to search up clips regarding my subathon stream and the recent streams I've done.

Staz was nowhere to be found. Neither was Neurosoda. And... Neither was Neurocrumbs... Matter of fact, nothing 'Neuro' related.

Did we get shadow assassinated online by government agencies?? Where did all of our history go?

What surprises me the most, is the lack of content of me too.

I'm not a cocky individual, or so I like to think, but usually in streams, a bunch of clips would be attributed to me saying something or just breathing around other V-tubers usually.

Now? It really seems like everything's gone.

This is too big an action even for someone or something which was theoretically trying to shadow erase me, it wouldn't be possible to remove so much when I was effectively at the peak of my career...

What the hell. It's seriously all gone. 

My clicks become frantic, my hand on my keyboard unknowingly clenched. My heartbeat spiked again in such a short period.

I tried all kinds of ways to spell my name, and I hadn't found anything. I suddenly felt sick to my stomach, my gut churning and gnawing at me with this horrible intuition.

My eyes sharpen in concentration on the computer, looking up and down as I fruitlessly searched for any trace of my existence.

Okay, let's try and see about the others. Hopefully that should be the same, relatively... Whatever's happening to me I wouldn't want happening to them. Especially since I have their stream-keys.

I search up about Camila first. She was most recognizable in the swarm, after all.

And... Bingo! It's all there, so it's just me-

...No. Wait a damn second. 

I take a closer look, the names, the thumbnails, even the model. It's nothing that Camila would usually say or do...?

Camila admits that streaming was an accident!

2:11.

 

Camila emotion breakthroughs compilation!

4:23.

 

Camila rare passionate moments!

6:33.

 

I continued scrolling in shock. Camila? Not interested in streaming? Stone cold? Not to mention that these lengths are incredibly short... I already feel a headache coming on, trying to just understand what's going on...

I quickly blitz search the others too, and they're all some variation of weird. Mini and Cerberus are rude whilst Ellie is skeptical about robots and their worth? 

The more I look, the crazier it sounds. A timid Filian. A rude Layna. It's all wrong.

I felt sweat slowly make it's way down my forehead and drip onto the crackling keyboard which I was currently using to access my twitch.

Off the bat, changes are immediately visible. Like my name.

Vedal321?

And my vods too, they look totally different. There's this human V-tuber model in most of them, and at first I thought it was all collabs, but as it turns out, this is not the case at all.

That model was mine.

I sat and listened one of the vods, and another concerning thing was the severe lack of Neuro. In all of the vods.

Wait. Neuro's still up!

"Neuro, are you still there?"

I asked, staring directly at the top of my monitor now, as if that would establish eye contact.

"Yes, Vedul."

Responded the seemingly entirely emotionless machine, having not even a single line of code he remembers when he pulls up her code.

"Explain what happened these last two years to me. About us. What can you remember."

I desperately spoke. Praying silently in my mind that somehow, my old self managed to program the memory properly.

And to my relief, she spoke back relatively quickly. But to my dismay, her response left a lot to be desired.

"You streamed and desperately tried to convince me and others that I was real. You failed."

Tried to convince others she was real?

I blinked several times in monotony, thinking as I stared down my screen like it owes me money.

My room felt even more claustrophobic than usual suddenly. That didn't happen. I never did that.

Along all these changes which happened to my friends... Just...

Just what happened to my life...?

Chapter Text

           1:1 Reality.

{P.O.V. Vedal.}

Taking a step back, and breathing out slowly to calm myself and wipe my red, puffy eyes.

It seems the situation is much more unique instead of how I originally intended it to be.

But, that lifts that heavy weight off my heart for just a moment.

Although... Now that I think about it...

I turned around to take another look at my room as a whole again. Upon a further look, it continues confirming my suspicions.

The clothes scattered across the floor which I never bought, the grape-flavored juice I mistook as Rum because of the bottle? What? I never drunk juice... And what is this packaging anyways? I would've thought this was alcohol.

...Well, all of these point to one out-come... And unfortunately it's pretty obvious what it is.

Somehow, according to the will of something, I swapped realities. Despite how crazy that sounds, even in my own head.

How else would it explain all of these changes?

Well, It's a good thing Neuro is still here too. If Neuro wasn't here, it was gonna be a pain reprogramming her from scratch in all honesty.

At a minimum, it works in my favor if anything.

I glance over at my computer screen from my leaned back posture before spinning half heartedly closer so I can check out the code, and immediately sigh upon seeing it.

This code is borderline horrendous, and it working is also an unforeseen miracle essentially. But, there's these traces that I occasionally see in the code... I think I might've been on to something before. I just have to find out a way to put them together.

First things first, before I sit at my computer like a desk job, I have to clean this room. For it to at least feel like my room, I'm gonna have to clean it entirely at a minimum.

I get up my chair abruptly, causing it to spin for a tiny bit as I stepped on the dirty rug again. I seriously need to clean this place.

I begin walking around my room. I feel like I should've at least worn socks to counter how stained this feels. Walking on stains is never a particularly good feeling.

After picking up 'my' clothes and putting them into a makeshift bag I found somewhere in here, I get to working on the ru- juice. Juice bottles. Jeez, can't get over him- Me?- Whatever, doesn't matter. Can't get over my previous self picking juice over rum of all things.

I regardless put it all away, make my bed properly. Thankfully the sheets are clean. Basic level of hygiene. Seriously, it's so bad living here that I pity my previous self.

The view outside the window next to my bed was also equally sad, being a stone wall. Clearly, I'm on the lower levels of the building.

After a bit more work all around, everything soon works out and I manage to make my room look presentable. I put the rug in the washing machine I had stashed away in the door in the middle of the corridor outside. 

Either way, I take no time to relax before getting to work on Neuro-

Then my stomach made the most painful sensation it could in retaliation. What, was he not eating too??

I sighed, again, before going to the kitchen to make myself a basic omelette to get me through the day and allow me to work on Neuro. I can't waste time...

I ate the omelette, and it could've been better but it's okay. I wasn't a chef anyways. Neuro's cooking stream taught me that much at least.

After hastily eating, I washed my hands obviously before going to finally sit down, and start programming. I'll piece you back together, Neuro.

I promise.

{P.O.V. Camila.}

The sun shines down on me from my window, rudely interrupting my sleep very annoyingly.

What time is it...

I lethargically reach out to my phone and half heartedly turn to face the screen before clicking the power button, the comfy bed already threatening to lull me back to sleep with It's warm promise of rest.

But of course, it was 2 pm.

If I slept in any further than this, I wouldn't have eaten or I would've missed my stream. Probably missed my stream.

But then if I do that again, I might lose too many people due to a lack of activity, which would definitely suck more have to actually work.

Ughhhh. I wish I didn't pick up streaming of all hobbies I could've gotten.

I lazily get myself to get up and drag myself out of both my covers and my room to finally enter my kitchen and start making toast and contemplated maybe taking out the jam too.

Fuck it, today's stream is gonna be really tiring right? Might as well.

I decide to be adventurous today and even add Jam on my finely made toast.

When I reached for the Jam, I realized how much dust everything in my house has been collecting. Wow, I'm pretty sure I even see spoiled stuff in the corner of the cabinet. 

Oh well, another meal for the roaches I guess.

After finally finding the somewhat dusty Jam, I take it out and also take out a spoon I lazily wash using the sink before instantly dipping it into the Jam to scoop my portion.

Hahhhhh... What was my stream about again today...? Something about just chatting.

I absent-mindedly finish my toast before I head back up, not bothering to even properly think about the oncoming drag of a stream. Nobody's interesting to talk with anymore.

There was that guy with the AI but he's way too obsessed to even think about talking to me instead of his AI.

What was even his name...

Can't remember, wasn't important I guess.

I finally made it to my room after the long treacherous hallway walk I have to do to reach it, but I turned my chair around and plopped myself on it.

Ugh... Why couldn't I just open youtube and waste away?

I opened my streaming integrations and model loading software from steam to prepare for the stream.

I went through the motions again to show my model. An imp with pink hair, two pigtails. Always tired eyes with two eye bags to boot. Technically, I have one which is meant to be some kind of clown, that was the original... But that model requires too much effort for all the toggles or whatever. That's how I ended up with this one.

I casually boot up the stream and wait for my chatters to come through. At least they started repeating themselves less than last time.

That makes things more interesting...

"...Hey chat. How's it going?"

... Here's to hoping something interesting happens sometime some year.