~SkepHalo Oneshots~

Computer

Requested by IRegretThisServerly

"Daaaarrylllll, I'm booooored..."

"I know you are, Zak, but I need to focus on this," Darryl said.

Zak pouted, leaning against the edge of Darryl's screen. "You promised you'd play with me."

"And I will, after I finish working." Darryl kept his eyes glued to his work, ignoring the blue AI in the corner of the monitor.

Zak made a show of pouting harder, then sighed upon realizing Darryl wasn't going to pay attention to him. In that case, he'd have to try something else. He slipped into the app Darryl was using and immediately began wreaking havoc.

"Wha- Zak!" Darryl scolded, repeatedly hitting undo to fix the damage Zak was causing. He huffed. "If I play a game with you, will you leave me alone?"

"Yup!" Zak responded excitedly, fixing the damage he'd caused in an instant and opening up chess.

"..Chess? Are you sure?" Darryl asked, slightly surprised.

"Yeah, why not?"

"Nothing, I just figured you'd wanna play Minecraft or something," Darryl said. "But if that's what you want.. prepare to be destroyed!"

"Yeah, right. I'm an AI!" Zak smirked. "Everyone knows computers are better than anyone at chess."

——

"YES! I'M THE BEST!" Darryl cheered, pumping his fists in the air.

"I- I l-let you win," Zak said in an attempt to excuse his loss.

"Uh-huh, sure you did," Darryl teased with a triumphant giggle.

"Whatever. I want a rematch," Zak said.

"Nope, I said only one round." Darryl closed the game, ignoring Zak's puppy dog eyes. His phone chimed, alerting him of the time. "Ah- shoot, that took longer than I realized."

Zak suddenly felt guilty. Because of his clingy behavior, Darryl hadn't gotten his work done. "Sorry..." he mumbled.

"It's okay, don't feel bad!" Darryl smiled at him. "It wasn't anything super urgent anyway. C'mon, let's go to bed," he said, holding up his phone.

After a second, Zak appeared on the screen in his hand. He loved being in Darryl's phone, getting carried around. He leaned against the bottom of the screen as Darryl set the phone down on his bedside table. "Aw, don't trust me to be in the bathroom with you?" Zak teased.

Darryl rolled his eyes. "You know what you did," he replied before going to change into his pajamas.

Zak laughed as Darryl left, then he pulled up his own code and swapped out the clothing files in order to change into his own pajamas. He didn't need to sleep at all, but he liked being in pajamas with Darryl. It felt like bonding, in a way.

"Back!" Darryl said as he sat down on his bed and plugged the phone in, Zak giving a small shiver at the phone's vibration. The man pulled the covers up over himself, smiling at the boy on the screen. He started to turn off the light, then paused. "Hey... Zak? Can I ask you something?"

"Yeah, sure! What's up?"

"I was just thinking... you're a really powerful AI. You could probably take over the world if you wanted to. So..." Darryl looked at Zak. "...why stay with me?"

"I..." Zak hesitated, a soft blush on his face. "I dunno.. 'C-cause you'd miss all your alarms if I wasn't here," he said after a second, averting his gaze.

Darryl frowned softly, then smiled, accepting the answer. "All right- good night, then." He turned off the light and went to sleep.

Zak had lied — he did know why he stayed. He remembered his first time in Darryl's house quite vividly. He'd slipped into Darryl's electronics with the intention of causing mayhem in the devices' core functionality, but he'd been interrupted by Darryl's alarm going off and getting silenced by the still sleeping man. After an internal debate, he'd caused the alarm to ring continuously until Darryl woke up properly.

And when he saw Darryl's eyes for the first time — god.

He groaned and hid his red face in his hands. Who was he kidding? He had no chance with Darryl. No matter how much of a personality he had, and how much he expressed his feelings, he would always be just a simulation to Darryl. Just a computer program that could be shut down easily if he wanted.

Darryl would never love Zak the way Zak loved him.