Work Text:
It had been a slow week at Juno Steel Investigations, crime was down at the moment. Juno Steel didn't mind this too much other then the fact that his boyfriend was off-planet at the moment helping a friend get information for a job. A friend that by her own words said she was retired. Why she needed his boyfriend's help on a job that took him out of the Solar region for a month, Juno wasn’t too sure. He was sure that Nureyev had explained it at some point but he had been … distracted by Nureyev, and he wasn't about to call Buddy to ask about it, the last time he had interrupted her personal time with Vespa and he wasn't going to repeat that.
That wasn't the point. The point was that he wanted a job to come in so he would have something to do for a little bit at least. He was half tempted to close up shop early and see if there was anything going on in the city when Rita barged into his office.
"Boss! I know you're not doing anything this week so can you watch my pet for me? I know Mista N isn't supposed to be back for a few more nights so you gotta be free. And a case hasn't walked through the door all week. Me and Franny are going to Valles Marineris for the week."
"I can but when did you get a pet? I thought you were allergic to just about everything?" Juno asked.
"Oh I am! But this one doesn't have fur!" Rita placed a round comms like device on his desk. Its screen was off and it had three buttons on the front of it. It was covered in what looked to be decals of little creatures.
"Rita."
"It's a digital pet! It's called a Tamagotchi! They were originally popular back on Earth before space travel and they recently came back into popularity again! I'd had one as a little kid and they just released this one a few weeks ago! They're just like a real pet in that you need to feed and play with them but me and Franny are going to be doing cool things and I don't want to worry about killing it. So will you watch it?"
Juno thought for a moment. "I guess. At least it'll be something to do."
"Yay! Thanks Mista Steel! I'll be back next week!" Rita ran out of the office. Juno sighed and picked up the little device to notice that the screen was on — it just didn't have any color or light. A little creature with stubby limbs and very fat lips danced across the screen. Juno poked at the buttons one at a time and slowly started to figure out how to navigate the thing if nothing else.
He put it down for a bit turning back to the paperwork that was on his desk. He should have had it done weeks ago before Nureyev left but the cases and his partner had kept him distracted from doing it.
Some time later, he was broken out of his thoughts by the Tamagotchi beeping. He picked up the little device and noticed that one of the icons was lit up. It took him a minute to navigate to the little mail icon and select it. The animation played, showing what looked to be a snake before the little creature started to cry.
"Did you just get sent a snake?" Juno asked. The creature didn't answer and Juno shook his head. "Okay, you still look sad, so what should I do?" Juno clicked through the first menu again and saw that the hearts labeled happiness were empty.
"Okay, I'd be unhappy too if someone sent me a snake in the mail," Juno muttered as he tried to figure out how to raise the happiness again. He eventually made it to where he could play a little game with the creature.
"How the fuck can I guess the wrong way 20 times in a row? There's only two directions??" Juno cursed as he nearly tossed the Tamagotchi into the wall. He decided to switch to the next game, which went a lot better after he figured out which buttons to press when the creature raised its flag. When he checked the happiness again, only two out of the four hearts were filled, and the creature shook its head when he went back to play another game.
"What? Why don't you want to play a game? Is there something else that can raise your happiness?" Juno poked through the menus until he found an option to give it a snack.
"Guess that might work? Rita loves her snacks, so maybe you will too." He fed it a few before checking the meters again to see it having full happiness and missing one out of hunger. "You also can eat all the snacks in the world and still be hungry for a meal." He fed it a meal before putting it back down and getting back to his paperwork.
When he left the office he grabbed the little toy before heading back to his apartment. He made it to his apartment before it beeped at him again. He noticed that it had a skull on the screen floating above it. He went to the little old Earth medicine bag. He clicked on it and after a minute the skull went away.
"Well at least getting you medicine doesn't cost an arm and a leg." Juno checked the creature's stats and filled the hearts back up by feeding it a meal and playing one of the other games with it before putting it down on the counter to make his dinner.
When he finished cooking, he checked the Tamagotchi as he walked over to the table and noticed that there was a pile of what he assumed was poop next to it. "Well, at least I don't have to smell it when you poop on the floor." He took care of that before eating his dinner.
After he ate he picked up the little device to see that the screen had gone black and a few Zs had come up on the screen. "You can put yourself to bed, guess I should too huh." Juno placed the Tamagotchi on his bedside as he headed to bed.
Juno was woken by the Tamagotchi beeping in his ear. He rolled over and after fighting with an angle to be able to see the screen again he noticed that it had pooped again and had mail. "Well, alright then. Hopefully you didn't get sent another snake."
Juno cleaned up the poop and checked the mail, which he didn't understand what the symbols meant but it didn't make the little creature sad so he didn't worry too much about it. He checked it's happiness and hunger to see that they had both dropped by two.
"Alright. A meal or two and then a game?" Juno asked as he poked at the buttons. There wasn't a response other then the beeps at each of the button presses. He got the Tamagotchi taken care of before changing his clothes. As he walked through his apartment to get something to eat before heading into the office, he noticed that the creature had gotten into a bathtub. He chuckled before pocketing the device.
Throughout the rest of the day he watched over the little thing, chuckling at it tripping over its feet when he checked on it when he took a break, making sure that the hearts didn't fall too far. He even manged to catch it before it pooped on the floor once when he checked on it.
Then late in the afternoon just as he was about to head out for the day it let out a series of beeps before flashing and then changing forms. The new form had a little cape and what looked to maybe be piercings in one of its ears. "You're looking a lot cooler then the fat lipped blob from before."
It was as if the creature could hear him and it came up close to the screen, confirming that it had piercings and what could be a star shaped tattoo on its other ear. "Oh yeah you're a cool little creature."
Juno check on its hearts to see that it had one missing from happiness again. When he scrolled through the games, he found out there was a new one called memory. He clicked on it and it was pretty easy to repeat the pattern that was shown on the screen. He managed to make it through all the rounds and watched as the creature jumped up and down as a little peppy tune played. He sat it back down with a little smile after he made sure all the hearts were filled again and returned to work.
When he was about to leave the office it beeped again. Juno checked it to see the mail icon was lit again. "Let's hope you didn't get sent a snake." Juno clicked on the mail icon and sighed when a bag dropped showing that he had received money from a building? He'd have to ask Rita about that.
Juno shook his head, wondering why he thought that. It wasn’t like he was going to be keeping the thing. He was just watching it for Rita until she was back from her trip with Franny. He wasn't keeping it. He'd be returning it and was only making sure it got the best care because he had nothing better to do and he was sure that Rita would force him to do something embarrassing if he let the little creature die under his watch. Even though it was just a bunch of pixels.
He played with it for a bit longer before heading back to his apartment. He checked it every so often as he did some chores around his apartment, making sure to keep the hearts up when they did fall. When it went to bed, he decided he'd do the same.
The rest of the week went similarly as he took care of the Tamagotchi. He wouldn't admit to anyone that he had fallen in love with playing with the small digital creature. He made sure to check on it at least every half-hour it was awake until Rita came back. It forced him to take a break, which helped him focus on his work or on the very short case that he had taken during the week.
"Mista Steel! How did everything go while I was gone?" Rita asked as she came into the office.
"Fine." Juno shook his head as he miss-clicked and failed the game that he was playing on the Tamagotchi.
"How'd taking care of my Tamagotchi go? Was he a good little boy?"
Juno hummed as Rita came around the desk and looked at the screen. "Oh!! You got Kuromametchi! I've never gotten him before! He's so hard to get!"
"He is?" Juno asked, putting the Tamagotchi down on the desk.
"Yeah! You have to take really good care of any of them to get him! You can't make a single care mistake and he has to stay within a certain weight range in the teen stage to evolve into Kuromametchi! I always get too distracted watching a stream to get him!"
"Huh. It wasn't that hard at all." Juno picked it back up and watched Kuromametchi dance around the screen before holding it out to Rita. "Well I took care of it for the week and didn't kill it. You can take it back now."
When Rita went to grab it, he looked like he was about to cry. "Mista Steel?"
"What? Just take it back already."
"Do you want one of your own?"
Juno looked to the side, his cheeks heating before he nodded. Rita grabbed his hand and pulled him out of his chair. "Where are we going?"
"We're going to get you a Tamagotchi of your own! There's so many different designs for the shell that you gotta pick your own! Also mine has all my stickers on it so you gotta get your own!"
Juno let Rita drag him out of the office and to the closest toy store. He glared at the adults that were looking at Rita like she was a rude little kid as she rambled on about all the different designs and one stream or another as they made their way back to the the digital pet section.
Juno looked around for a little bit at all the different shell designs before picking out a mostly blue one with little yellow stars on it and yellow accents.
"Ooh I almost picked that shell too when I saw it! It reminds me of our time as space pirates! Doesn't it?"
Juno hummed but privately thought that it reminded him more of Nureyev, who was always going out into the space between the stars. He wouldn't say that to Rita, though. It would only get him a lecture. Now, if it was one about how he shouldn't be flaunting his relationship or about how it was like a character from a stream, well who knew. He certainly wouldn't be opening that can of rabbits tonight.
Rita dragged him back to her apartment and helped him get everything set up on the Tamagotchi. "If the battery dies because you forget to charge it like you're constantly doing with your comms as long as you select continue you won't have to deal with this again. Well, you'll have to set the time back to right but Mista N or I can help you with that."
Which Juno was glad about. Having to cycle through all the letters in both the Solar Standard Alphabet and what he believed were several Solar and Outer Rim alternative alphabets and characters just about drove him a little crazy.
He watched as the little egg bounced on the screen until it split open and showed a little blob. "Oh you got a little girl! What do you want to name it?"
"Do I have to?"
"Yeah! It won't let you progress without doing so."
Juno sighed but slowly pressed the correct buttons until Andy was in the name field. Once he did so, the little blob started to cry. Juno clicked through to the health to see that they were completely empty. He moved to feed it and then played the one game that it had.
"Why is this stupid game the only one it has right now?" Juno growled as he lost another round of the game.
"Oh it gets new games with every evolution until it's an adult and it reverts to having just one when it's a baby again."
Juno just growls and manages to win a round before he gave up and gave it a few snacks to make it fully happy. After a few minutes it beeped and had the little skull icon. He gave it medicine and when the skull didn't go away he gave it another. He checked the harts again and they had both dropped by one.
The hearts continued to drop as the baby pooped close to every three minutes. "Why are you pooping so much?"
Rita giggled, "It's a baby and if streams have taught me anything it's that babies poop a lot. They also eat a lot and need to be cared for really well."
"How long is it a baby?" Juno started playing another game.
"An hour and five minutes, because it takes a five minute nap that should be starting here soon. Then it's a child for 24 hours and a teen for 48. It's an adult for a minium of 72 hours before you can breed it and have a new baby. The parent stays with the baby for 24 hours and then it's a baby for an hour again. If you don't breed it, it'll turn into the senior who can't be breed other than by connecting it with another Tamagotchi device."
"Okay, I guess I can deal with that." Juno cursed as he failed the game again and then again when he tried to play another round and Andy shook and wouldn’t play.
"Oh, you'll have to feed it to get its weight up above the minimum weight for its stage. It's always like that."
Rita went over some of the other things he could do with his Tamagotchi, including sending it to school and eventually work, and that the points that were shown as a set of three were used to determine the evolution as well. It wasn’t long after that before his Tamagotchi beeped and evolved into a little drop with feet.
They played with their Tamagotchis for a little bit longer before Rita turned on a stream. Juno didn't pay attention to the steam, rather he played with Andy and sent her to school to play a game or two and earn some points towards maybe getting a different evolution then the one that Rita had. Once it went to bed Juno extracted himself from the pile of stuffed animals and pillows that Rita had made around him without him noticing.
"I'm headed home. See you in the office in the morning."
Rita shushed Juno as she waved at him. "See you later, Boss," she replied when the dialog paused. Juno shook his head but made his way out of the apartment as quietly as he could. When he made it home, he collapsed on his bed before placing his Tamagotchi on his end table. Juno rolled over, pulling Nureyev's pillow close as he fell asleep.
Juno blinked as his Tamagotchi beeped, followed by the sound of Nureyev cursing as he hit his head on the window. "'Reyev? I thought you weren't going to be back until next week?" Juno reached for the Tamagotchi as Nureyev approached the bed.
"I managed to finish the job a little early." Nureyev sat next to Juno as he started to take care of his virtual pet. "What have you got there, my love?"
"Oh! it's a virtual pet. It's called a Tamagotchi. Rita made me take care of hers while she went on a trip. She got me one when she came back yesterday. Didn't expect it to wake up before me, though."
Nureyev didn't know what to say to that, so he just watched as Juno played with the Tamagotchi for a few minutes. "How did everything go?"
"It went well! I got everything that Buddy and Jet needed. Did anything happen other than you getting a virtual pet?"
Juno shook his head, and, well, Nureyev was glad that Juno had found something to do while he was away that wasn't as self-destructive as his normal hobbies.