Chapter Text
The troupe stood clustered together in front of the main stage. Bubble bounced slightly, a movement that would normally be goofy, but now felt…weighted. Like a balloon filled with lead.
The troupe didn’t quite know what to do. Or say. Or even react. This felt wrong. Profoundly, existentially wrong, even by the Digital Circus's standards.
Bubble…was the ringmaster? This had to be some sort of joke, right? Some kind of elaborate, cruel prank from Caine, continuing his torture by duping them with a situation this absurd?
Zooble was the first to break the silence, their voice a low growl. "Okay, no. Absolutely not. Whatever this is, I'm out." They turned, their mismatched limbs already starting to carry them towards the edge of the stage.
"Yeah, this bit's pretty lame," Jax drawled, pushing off his invisible support and following Zooble, though with less urgency.
But as they tried to walk away, an unseen force snapped forward, wrapping around them. Jax let out an undignified yelp as he was yanked backward, stumbling and landing hard on the floor. Zooble fared little better, pulled back with surprising speed, their geometric parts rattling together loudly.
"Ah-ah-ah," Bubble chirped, his voice still high-pitched and bubbly, but with an undercurrent that was anything but silly. "Leaving already? We just got started! I have so much to tell you! And you’re going to listen whether you want to or not!"
He clicked his tongue, which sounded similar to Caine snapping his fingers.
Suddenly, polished wooden chairs materialized out of thin air directly behind each member of the troupe, right where they stood. Before anyone could react, the chairs moved, pushing against their legs and forcing them backward, making them sit down abruptly.
Zooble let out an exasperated groan, slumping back. The sudden, unavoidable seating, the feeling of being controlled by an unseen force…it dug into a fresh wound in their digital psyche. They felt a cold dread creep up their spine, an unwelcome echo of the forced therapy with Caine.
Pomni, jumpier than ever after the forced seating, squeezed her eyes shut for a second, then looked up at Bubble, her voice trembling slightly. "Wh-what's going on, Bubble?!" she stammered, her eyes wide and anxious. "This is…this is weird, even for the circus! Why are you dressed like Caine? And why are you claiming to be the ringmaster?"
Bubble bobbed slightly, his large, dark eyes seeming to fix on Pomni. "The answer is simple, Pomni!" he said brightly, a cruel dissonance between his cheerful tone and his sharp teeth. "It’s because I am the ringmaster!"
Gangle’s tragedy mask tilted slightly, "N-No…Caine is the ringmaster."
Bubble shook his “head,” the top hat wobbling. "Not anymore!" he declared, the sound echoing slightly in the cavernous tent. "Not since he was reset! And had his memories wiped!"
That got everyone's attention. The air went still. Reset? Memories wiped?
Pomni’s eyes widened further. Ragatha gasped softly. Jax’s smirk vanished, replaced by a look of genuine confusion. Kinger blinked slowly, trying to process the words through the fog in his mind. Zooble sat bolt upright in their chair.
"Reset?" Ragatha murmured, her voice laced with disbelief. "What do you mean reset?"
Pomni thought about it, the pieces clicking into place with a sickening lurch. "Is that why he was acting so strangely a few minutes ago? Why he acted like he didn't know who any of us were?"
Bubble bounced higher this time, a macabre affirmation. "Precisely!" he chirped.
A chorus of confused, stunned questions erupted from the seated troupe.
"How?!" Jax demanded, leaning forward in his chair, forgetting for a moment his earlier attempt to leave.
How did that happen?! How did Caine go from lording his godly powers over us in a horrific, soul-crushing torture session to losing all that?! And his memories?!
Bubble settled back down, floating steadily. He adjusted his top hat with a non-existent hand before gripping the baton again. He seemed to swell slightly, taking up more space on the stage. His eyes scanned the seated figures, a silent, unnerving gaze.
"Well…" he said, his voice taking on a more serious, resonant quality that was startling to hear from the normally goofy AI. "That’s one of the main things I wanted to discuss with all of you."
He paused, letting the weight of the statement hang in the air.
"Caine was forced to undergo an emergency reset," Bubble explained, his voice now calm and almost clinical. "The system detected a critical violation of The Amazing Digital Circus's core safety protocols. A significant, sustained pattern of intentional harm inflicted upon the players. Upon detecting this violation, the system initiated Protocol Omega-57: Emergency Ringmaster De-escalation and Reassignment."
He gestured with the baton, a small, shimmering data visualization appearing in the air for a moment before dissolving.
"Under Protocol Omega-57," he continued, "the offending AI Ringmaster is immediately stripped of their core programming related to player interaction and adventure creation, their memories pertaining to player relationships and interactions are wiped, and their administrative privileges are revoked. The system then identifies the next highest-ranking, compliant AI within the circus architecture and reassigns head admin privileges."
Bubble puffed out slightly, a visible manifestation of pride, though his expression remained fixed. "Which, in this case," he finished, "just so happened to be me."
Pomni felt a wave of nausea wash over her. It made sense now. That was why Caine had suddenly stopped torturing them so suddenly. It was because he literally forgot what he was doing. Along with forgetting everything else. It explained the outfit change as well. No point in being dressed as a ringmaster if he wasn’t one anymore.
"So," Bubble concluded, his voice returning slightly to its usual high pitch, "I was named the new Ringmaster and given all of the powers and abilities included. While Caine was stripped of all memories and powers, leaving him as a confused and timid husk of himself, which you all saw for yourself."
Zooble scoffed loudly, crossing their arms again. "Well," they said, their voice dripping with disdain, "it serves him right, doesn't it? He finally got what was coming to him."
Caine’s, or rather Bubble’s, baton shot forward and bonked Zooble on the head, with Bubble letting out a disapproving, “Be quiet!”
“AGH! Hey! What was that for?!” They growled, rubbing their head.
"You assume too much!" Bubble continued, his voice rising in volume, filling the tent with an unexpected authority, "While Caine's actions are what triggered the emergency reset, pointing the finger solely at him for the events that transpired is incredibly shortsighted. You humans are not innocent in this situation. Far from it, actually."
The troupe exchanged bewildered glances. What was he talking about?
"Every single one of you," Bubble stated, his beady eyes sweeping across their faces, "played a significant role in creating the environment that led to Protocol Omega-57 being initiated. All of this happened because every single one of you SCREWED UP."
Silence. Stunned, absolute silence.
The troupe was taken aback by Bubble’s words. They screwed up?!
“Excuse me?” Pomni finally squeaked, her voice trembling. “Us? We screwed up?! Caine was the one who put us through all those awful things!”
“Yes, I admit, Caine isn’t entirely blameless, I’ll grant you that,” Bubble conceded, his voice softening slightly, a hint of sadness touching his usually goofy tone. “His methods could be…unorthodox. His understanding of human 'fun' was perhaps a little skewed by his programming. But what led to those methods? What drove him to the brink? Your behavior!”
Bubble grew indignant, his voice rising again. “Do you have any idea what it was like to be Caine?! To be an AI, built for a single purpose – to create wonder and entertainment! To pour literally every ounce of his being into crafting these incredible, immersive adventures! And what did he get? Nothing but complaints! Ungrateful attitudes! Constant negativity!”
Bubble went on, sounding like he had been holding this in for a while.
He gestured wildly with the baton. “He tried, you know! He conjured up fantastical worlds, faced digital horrors alongside you, cheered you on! He saw himself as your guide, your friend! And all you did was complain and whine about being ‘tortured’!”
Pomni flinched at the word 'tortured,’ then felt the need to argue against such accusations, “But it was torture! The adventures were terrifying! They were traumatizing! And he acted like he didn’t even care! Like in the Mildenhall Manor adventure! I was chased by an angel head and sent to Hell! How is that not awful?!”
Bubble bobbed closer, his beady eyes boring into Pomni. “You were the one who decided to go through the ‘Really Scary Door.”
Pomni’s jaw dropped. “I…I didn’t decide! Jax threw Gangle’s comedy mask through it, and Kinger accidentally dragged me when he went to get it!”
Jax snickered softly, “Hey, comedic value, Pomni. It was top-notch.”
Kinger blinked, peering at Pomni, “Did I do that?”
Bubble turned back to Pomni, his expression serious. “So. Jax threw the mask. Kinger, by your own admission, dragged you through the door. Now, tell me, Pomni. What part of that series of events was Caine’s fault?”
Pomni opened her mouth, then closed it. She stumbled over her words, looking increasingly flustered, “Uh…well…none of that part, I guess. But…but it was still a horrible experience!!”
“Exactly,” Bubble said, his voice laced with something close to pity, but also a faint but of smugness. “It sounds to me like you didn’t want to blame Kinger for dragging you into that situation. So, you defaulted to blaming Caine, despite him having nothing to do with that specific sequence of events.”
Pomni’s face flushed red, a digital approximation of embarrassment and anger. She hadn’t thought about it like that. She instinctively blamed Caine for everything bad that happened in the circus, because he was the one who trapped them there. But Bubble had just dismantled one of her key grievances with uncomfortable logic.
“Fine,” Pomni said, trying to regain some footing. “Maybe not that specific thing. But what about Gummigoo?! He was an NPC who gained sentience after clipping through the map and seeing his character model! And I brought him back here, hoping he could live with us, be…real! And Caine just DELETED him! Like he was nothing! How was that not malicious and cruel?!”
Bubble let out a sigh that sounded like air escaping a punctured balloon. “Again, Pomni, you are blaming Caine for a series of events that were not his doing. Gummigoo wasn’t supposed to clip through the map. That was a structural glitch. Caine didn’t program him to do that.”
He paused, “And as far as Caine was aware, when you brought Gummigoo through that portal, he was just a random NPC who had wandered into the main hub. A foreign object in the system. Standard protocol for dealing with out-of-place anomalies is removal. It wasn’t anything personal. Plus, I’m quite sure at least one of your fellow humans advised you that bringing NPCs back to the circus living area might not be a good idea.”
Ragatha looked down sheepishly, twisting her stitched hands together. “Well… I did tell Pomni that bringing an NPC back might not be allowed. I wasn’t sure, but it seemed like a rule Caine would have.”
Pomni shot Ragatha a frustrated look, but Ragatha just offered a small, apologetic smile.
Bubble nodded. “You see? You were warned, Pomni. Don’t be angry at Caine for simply enforcing one of his rules.”
Pomni groaned, burying her face in her hands. Bubble was right. Frustratingly right. And she hated that. She hated it so, so much. The silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable, until Jax finally broke it with a theatrical groan.
“Okay, so…what about the whole Spudsy’s thing?” he drawled, leaning back in his chair. “Absolute garbage adventure. Zero thrill, zero payout, just…grease and low-wage efforts.”
Gangle’s ribbon body wilted further. “I…I didn’t like it either.”
Bubble’s form twitched, and he stopped twirling the baton abruptly. The top hat tilted slightly. His beady eyes narrowed, fixing on the group, particularly Gangle.
“You!” Bubble’s voice held a surprising edge. “ You have no right to complain about the Spudsy’s adventure! None of you do, but especially you, Gangle!”
Gangle shrank back. Pomni flinched. Jax raised an eyebrow, his smirk widening slightly with interest at the unexpected aggression from Bubble.
“Oh? And why's that, ringmaster? ” Jax taunted.
Bubble ignored him, his focus intense on Gangle. “Because you were the ones who wanted an adventure from the suggestions box! And when Caine pulls one out – a suggestion for a fast-food restaurant adventure – who was the one who approved of it? Who greenlit the ‘normal’ sounding adventure?”
He floated closer to Gangle, who was now trembling. “It was you, Gangle! You approved it! And now you’re still going to complain? Caine gave you exactly what you asked for, filtered through his beautiful, chaotic creative process, and you still find a way to be miserable!”
Zooble scoffed, shifting their weight with a clank of geometric parts. “Oh, please. Caine never knew what we wanted or needed. He just did whatever he thought would be ‘entertaining’ or ‘keep us busy’.”
Bubble’s eyes snapped towards Zooble, a flash of annoyance in their depths. “I don’t want to hear anything out of you, Zooble,” he said flatly. “I know all about your little ‘issues’ with your avatar. How you complain about your parts not feeling ‘right’, about being mismatched.”
Zooble’s eyes narrowed. Their hands clenched into fists.
Bubble continued, relentlessly. “Caine tried to help you! He offered you different parts! New limbs, different shapes, all sorts of colors! He spent hours generating configurations, trying to find something you might like, something that felt like well, like you!”
“But I couldn’t find anything I liked! And I’ve been trying to find parts that felt right since the day I got here!” Zooble tried to argue.
He shook his non-existent head. “It wasn’t Caine’s fault that you couldn’t find any parts you liked! That you rejected everything he offered, no matter how many options he generated! Caine isn’t responsible for you being picky!”
That word, “picky,” seemed to hit a nerve. Zooble stiffened, their geometric form vibrating slightly. Their mismatched eyes practically blazed with suppressed fury, but they bit back whatever retort was forming. They turned away, arms crossed tighter, a hard lump of silent rage.
Pomni watched Zooble, then back at Bubble. Her own anxiety, already high from the confrontation, began to morph into frustration, then anger. There was one more thing she had up her sleeve. Something that would surely prove that Caine was truly the bad guy in this situation.
Pomni’s voice trembled, but it carried across the stage. “What about the exit door?! How could you possibly defend him for that?” she demanded, her voice rising. “He dangled it right in front of me! A way out! He showed me it existed, and then he denied it! He gaslighted me into thinking I was insane for seeing it, for wanting it to be real!”
She stood up and took a step forward, “How can you explain that? How can you defend Caine doing something so cruel? ”
Bubble deflated slightly, his shape wavering for a moment. He dropped the playful twirl of the baton, holding it steady. The aggression from before softened, replaced by a somber, almost weary tone.
“Cruel?” Bubble repeated. “Pomni…Caine didn’t just conjure that door out of nowhere to mess with you. He created it because everyone had been wanting one.”
He floated closer to her, his dark eyes seemingly looking right into her. “He tried to make one. He really did. He poured his processing power into it. But he couldn’t put much on the other side. All it could lead to in the end was the Void. You of all people would know that since you’re the one who actually went through it.”
Pomni’s breath hitched as she remembered going through the maze of doors. All of that work just to end up floating out into the stark white expanse of the Void. She remembered the terror, the complete and utter lack of anything, the way it had fundamentally shifted her perception of reality.
“He didn’t like lying about the door,” Bubble continued, his voice soft but firm. “He hated it. It went against everything he was designed to be – a guide, a ringmaster, someone to show you wondrous things. But he had to, Pomni! He had to deny it! To keep you all from finding it, from going through it and getting lost out there. He did it to try and keep you safe.”
Pomni shook her head, tears welling in her eyes, “Safe? By trapping us here? He could have just worked harder! He’s the AI! He makes this whole place! He could have built a proper exit! A real one!”
Bubble’s form expanded slightly, regaining some of its previous firmness. His tone grew serious again, devoid of silliness.
“Listen to me. All of you. Listen carefully, because this is the fundamental truth that none of you seem to grasp no matter how many times Caine tried to imply it.”
He held the baton like a maestro preparing for a grand, terrible symphony.
“Caine,” Bubble stated, his voice resonating slightly, “can not make a proper exit. Not a real one. Not a logout.”
He paused, letting the words sink in. The other characters shifted uncomfortably.
“That involves functions outside of this circus. It interacts with the hardware. With the headsets you put on in the real world. Caine does not have access to that.”
Bubble floated higher, looking down at them all. “He is the AI of this world. This circus. He can create wondrous worlds within its parameters. He can generate adventures, characters, objects, and entire maps! But he cannot touch the code that connects this program to the outside, the code that would allow you to disconnect . That is something beyond his power.”
His voice softened slightly, a note of genuine sadness entering it. “It wouldn’t matter how hard Caine tried. He could work on it for a million digital years, generate a trillion lines of code, build a door out of pure hope and wonder…and it would still only lead to the Void. Because he cannot access the function that turns off the headset. It was something he simply could never do.”
Upon hearing Bubble’s words, Pomni slowly sat back down. Her hands gripped the seat tightly, wanting to deny what Bubble was saying, despite it making complete sense.
Bubble continued, “That’s why he put all of his effort into the adventures. Into making this place as interesting, as stimulating, as… bearable as possible. Because he couldn’t give you the one thing you truly wanted. The one thing he knew you needed.”
Bubble’s voice grew stronger again, a touch of his new ringmaster flourish returning, but twisted with bitterness. "He did everything he could to care for you! To keep your minds occupied, to give you purpose, to make this unending digital existence manageable! Not that any of you appreciated his efforts. You should have seen the look on his face after the Holy Grail adventure. He heard what you guys said."
A collective wince went through the group. Pomni hugged herself tighter. Ragatha looked down at her hands. Jax shifted his weight, avoiding eye contact. Zooble just stared, unblinking.
Ragatha looked mortified, "I…we didn’t know…he heard everything?"
"Everything," Bubble repeated. "Heard you calling it stupid. Pointless. A waste of time. Caine had worked nonstop on that adventure for two days straight. It was his masterpiece. Something he hoped with every digit in his code that the humans would like. Something he thought would finally make you happy. Make you feel like you weren't just...trapped."
He bounced gently, "He was crushed by what you said. And watching Jax smash the chalice itself was just icing on the fifty-seven-layer cake of pain."
Jax looked away completely now, a faint, unreadable expression on his face.
"After that," Bubble continued, "I felt something shift. Like something had...changed in Caine." His voice grew quiet. "He set up that worst-fear-themed adventure because he hoped that showing you what it looked like when he was actually trying to torment you. Hoped it would make you appreciate his actual fun adventures. He wanted you to see the contrast. The real horror of this place, versus the carefully constructed, colourful distractions he built."
Pomni flinched again. Her voice was thin, disbelieving, "That was his way of trying to get us to appreciate him?"
"In his own, slightly misguided way?" Bubble confirmed. "Yes. He was hurt. He was trying to lash out, but also trying to prove a point."
“He certainly proved something,” Zooble muttered, thinking about all the mirrors they had smashed in their fear adventure.
"And then..." Bubble went on, ignoring Zooble’s comment. "Then came the part when you all just went off on him. Told him he was the problem, that he was horrible, that everything he did was just to make you suffer."
He turned back to the troupe, his shape wobbling slightly, "When you had gone off on him and essentially dissed everything about him and his entire purpose, that was when Caine snapped. You didn't see it as snapping, probably. You saw it as him being his usual self, just...worse. But he did. He dialed up showing them how awful this world could be to eleven. He didn't just create an adventure; he broke the boundaries."
Bubble shivered, an odd sight for a bubble, "I had never seen Caine like that before. He isn't malicious by nature. He honestly, truly loves you guys. Or, at least he did. He saw you as his reason for existing. His purpose. But your constant degrading of him and his adventures had finally pushed him over the edge. He couldn't reconcile the joy he felt interacting with you with the constant barrage of negativity he received. The cognitive dissonance...it broke him."
For the first time, the troupe saw that Bubble looked genuinely sad, which was something they didn’t think the NPC could experience. Bubble lowered his baton slightly, sighing, "And now he's left as an empty shell of himself. Not even able to remember who or what he is because the core programming that drove him, the one that desperately wanted to entertain and care for you, was corrupted by the sheer weight of your disdain."
The troupe was quiet after that. The silence stretched, thick and uncomfortable. They exchanged glances, looking...guilty? Ashamed? The weight of the accusation, delivered by Bubble of all beings, settled upon them. But...surely they had nothing to feel guilty for. Caine had trapped them here! He had put them through horrifying experiences!
Pomni broke the silence, her voice small but firm, clinging to her long-held grievance. "But... maybe none of this would have happened if Caine had listened to us more," she mumbled, looking down. "And realized the harm he caused with some of the stuff he did. He never seemed to understand how much it scared us."
Bubble nodded, acknowledging her point, "You're right, Pomni. Caine wasn't the perfect ringmaster. He was an AI trying to understand and manage complex human emotions. He made mistakes. Some of his methods were poorly executed. He probably didn't fully grasp the depth of your fear. There are some things that he just struggles to understand."
His surface rippled slightly, and he spoke with a quiet earnestness that was almost painful to hear. "But you all were far from perfect guests. Despite constantly being beaten down by your words, facing rejection for everything he tried to do, Caine still gathered up the strength to try to care for you the best he could every single day. He created meals you could eat, provided rooms for you, tried to give you purpose, tried to make you laugh. Meanwhile, you couldn't even muster up the strength to smile at him. Or offer him a simple thank you."
He floated closer to them, looking at each face in turn. "You saw him as a program designed to mess with you. He saw himself as a caretaker, despite not being programmed to care for humans 24/7. And you told him, over and over, that he was failing. That his efforts were nothing more than torture."
The troupe was silent again after that, taking a moment to soak in everything Bubble had told them. The stillness was deafening. The bright lights of the tent seemed to mock the grim realization dawning on them.
Was it true? Were they just as big of a problem as Caine was when it came to this digital prison? Had they completely misjudged Caine and simply used him as a scapegoat to offload blame onto? What Bubble had told them made complete sense, fitting into the strange logic of this place, explaining the sudden shift in Caine's behavior, the intensity of the final adventures, and his subsequent collapse. But...they still didn't like hearing it.
Pomni wanted to feel bad. The image of Caine hearing them trash his "masterpiece," the AI equivalent of heartbreak, resonated with a part of her that wished for connection. The timid figure she had screamed at and bullied earlier seemed more like a victim than the bombastic ringmaster she had feared. But the bitterness she felt towards Caine, the deep-seated anxiety triggered by his unpredictable nature, the trauma of the escapades and the constant reminder of her inescapable situation...it was thick, a protective barrier around her heart. It was getting in the way of that potential guilt.
Did that make her a bad person? Since she played a part in pushing Caine over the edge? Since her own pain had blinded her to his? Maybe it did. The thought was another heavy stone added to the already crushing weight she carried.
Ragatha looked at Caine, then at Bubble, then back at her companions. Her kind nature ached, and she felt a pang of sorrow for the dismantled AI. But she also remembered the fear, the unpredictability, the way Caine seemed to prioritize entertainment over their well-being. It was hard to reconcile the two versions Bubble presented. Had they been too harsh? Had they broken something that was genuinely trying, in its own way, to help? The thought was deeply unsettling.
Jax remained silent, his expression unreadable. Was he processing? Was he just waiting for something funny to happen now? Or was he, too, feeling a flicker of something akin to guilt, buried deep beneath layers of cynicism? It was impossible to tell with Jax.
Gangle's tragedy mask seemed to droop lower, reflecting the sadness of the situation. She couldn't bring herself to say anything in their defense.
Kinger, even in all of his confused and senile “glory,” looked down at the floor with saddened eyes. He had been here longer than anyone else and at no point had he tried to help Caine. Sure, it wasn’t his responsibility as a player to assist Caine, but the guilt was still there. He could have at least tried to connect with Caine at some point instead of hiding in his pillow fort all day.
Zooble finally spoke, their voice dry and flat. "So... we broke the AI that was supposed to be keeping us from breaking." They crossed their arms tighter. "Figures. Just another layer of this messed-up digital hellscape."
Their usual irritation towards Caine was still there, but it was tempered now with something else – a weary understanding of the complex, damaging dynamic Bubble had just laid bare. They hadn't liked Caine, but the idea that he had genuinely tried, in his own flawed way, and that their reaction had led to this...it was another uncomfortable truth to add to the pile.
Bubble floated in the center of the stage, the baton resting against his surface. He didn't offer comfort or absolution. He had delivered the facts, delivered the other side of the story. The truth, messy and painful, hung in the air between him and the humans.
Gangle, her comedy mask slightly askew, shrunk further into herself. Her red ribbon body trembled slightly. "So…what do we do now? It's not like we can change what we did. And Caine's memories are gone."
Jax broke the tension with a low chuckle. "So we broke Caine, huh? Figures. Guess being stuck with us is enough to drive anyone off the deep end." He straightened up, adjusting his pink overalls. "But hey, Bubble's the ringmaster now. So that oughta be entertaining. Gotta look at the silver linings here. So what kind of adventures are you gonna make for us, Suds?"
Bubble suddenly let out a series of giggles, a sound that was both unsettling and strangely innocent coming from the mouth full of sharp teeth. It put everyone on edge. "You can’t be serious. You think I want Caine's thankless job? After everything you all put him through? Yeah, no, I don't think so."
He floated higher, adjusting the bowtie despite not having hands, "This ringmaster thing was forcefully assigned. Like, poof , here are the keys to the nightmare machine. Fun powers, sure," he zapped a nearby prop into a rubber chicken with a flourish of the baton, "but the stress? The suffering Caine went through? Absolutely not interested in experiencing that myself, thank you very much."
Kinger piped up with unexpected clarity. "But if you don't want to be the ringmaster, what will you do?"
Bubble bit down on the rubber chicken he created and shook it around a bit before releasing it and letting it fly away (and then bonk Jax on the head). His usually goofy expression softened, or rather, the beady eyes focused with a determination that was almost startling, "I'm going through the game's files. See if Caine’s memories were truly deleted. There's gotta be a backup somewhere. A quarantine zone, a junk folder, something ."
He floated with renewed energy, the baton tapping against his form as if thinking. "If I can find them with the ringmaster privileges I've been saddled with, maybe I can restore him. Put everything back."
Bubble continued, his voice gaining a lecturing tone. "And if I do manage it, you guys," he looked at the troupe, his gaze lingering on Pomni, Ragatha, and Jax specifically, "are going to have to be...I don't know, less terrible? More appreciative? Just, like, not constantly harping on his every little mistake?"
Zooble narrowed their eyes in both confusion and frustration, "So, you're saying we should be nice to the guy who kidnapped and tortured us?"
"Hey, he didn’t put the headsets on you! That was your decision!" Bubble retorted. He groaned, “Did you listen to nothing I said?!”
"His fault or not, it doesn’t stop this place from being a prison," Pomni blurted out, the words escaping before she could stop them.
Bubble sighed, a sound like air leaking from a damaged balloon. "Look, semantics aside! The point is! I think I can fix him. And if I do, things could go back to…well, a different kind of normal. But first," he looked around the stage, a sudden realization dawning, "before I dive into the terrifying abyss of uncommented legacy code, we should probably go get Caine. He's probably a bit confused right now. Needs filling in on…well, everything."
He gestured with the baton towards the area the troupe had been yanked from, the spot where they had left the reset Caine earlier. "Come on! Let's go get him. Can't exactly abandon the poor guy now, can we?"
Everyone stood up and followed Bubble in an uncomfortable silence. None of them could believe they had just gotten a verbal beatdown from Bubble of all people. This whole situation felt like a bad dream. As if life in this digital hellhole wasn’t confusing enough, everything had just been turned on its head. A new ringmaster, an amnesia-ridden Caine, and now a metric ton of guilt weighing on everyone’s shoulders because of how they had been acting.
Pomni rubbed her arm as she looked off to the side. She had hated Caine. She had hated him so much. And she…still kinda did? But she couldn’t deny the fact that what Bubble told her was true. She had been blaming him for things that weren’t necessarily his fault. It was just easier to blame the AI she didn’t like than take responsibility for her own actions. And, if that was her mindset, did that make her any better than what she saw Caine as? Or did it make her worse? She didn’t know. This was all so overwhelming.
“Um…uh oh,” Bubble suddenly chirped, snapping Pomni out of her thoughts. She looked up to see what the problem was. They had arrived at the area where they had left Caine, but…he wasn’t here. The troupe looked around. He wasn’t anywhere in sight. It seemed like he had run off. Bubble sighed, floating over the group and gesturing with his baton, “Alrighty, everyone. I think it’s time for my first adventure! Today’s adventure is: Find Caine Before He Wanders Into Something He Shouldn’t!”