VIII (Aoi Kurashiki x Reader)

XVIII

I'm so sorry this wasn't posted yesterday and that I didn't post last week! My brain isn't functioning anymore, I swear...

"Huh?"

"Two, four, and six make twelve. One plus two is three. So the number three lit up." He looked back at (Y/N), they were close crouched down like this. "And three, five, and seven are fifteen. Five plus one is six. Makes sense, right?"

"Smart." She praised him and spared a small head pat. In other words, the pins inserted in the top three holes had to make a digital root and the pins inserted on the bottom had to make a digital root.

"Well, there's one other thing I wanna check." He pulled six of the pins out of (Y/N)'s hand, the slotted three into the top, and the second three into the bottom. Light three and six flicked off. "Six, seven, and eight makes twenty-one. Two plus is three, so light three turned off. One, two, and three make six, so light six turned off."

"So if the pins I insert are the same as the number on the lights that are lit..."

"They turn off." He finished. "Alright, let's try to turn them all on."

Alright, she was ready. Something was bound to happen if they all turned on, right? She started with what Santa had demonstrated, turning back on lights three and six. Then, she began to work her way through the rest. Once the final pin had been inserted, the machine beeped mechanically. All the lights were on.

The shutter slid open revealing the letter F and nine more pinholes. "Guess we gotta do it again." Santa groaned. "The puzzle's self-explanatory, nine holes for each pin." She nodded, was it really that easy? It seemed anti-climatic nonetheless, and the F couldn't just be there for show. She paused in thought, tracing a finger over the pin number. "What're you waiting for?"

(Y/N) cocked her head to glare silently at Santa when something clicked. That was it! What she'd taught Junpei. The puzzle before had used hexadecimal, so why not use it again? F was equal to fifteen. She looked back at the nine openings. Between each one, tiny black lines connected them diagonally, vertically, and horizontally. It was so obvious... She made a mental note to disregard any of Santa's spontaneous conclusions.

Junpei's number would work best in the middle, so that was where she inserted his pin. The trick was to get every direction to equal fifteen. A more complicated version of Sudoku basically.

The machine beeped again and all the lines between the pins sparked blue. "Looks like you did it. The power's on now."

The duo staggered up, looking down at the bright monitor. "So...what the hell do we do now?"

Santa pulled a crumpled paper out of his pocket. "This might help."

"What is this?" (Y/N) tugged on the crumpled manual, forcing Santa to hand it over. "I mean- where'd you find it?"

"Found it when you were messing around with the pinholes." He tapped a bony finger on the paper. "Looks like instructions for this thing." His shoulder pressed snuggly against (Y/N) as he explained the details of the machine. "According to what it says here, this thing is a remote control for... that." Santa pointed past the railing.

"What're you-?" She leaned over, her eyes instantly catching on what he was talking about. From above, the scaffolding provided a better view into the electrical fence. Other than boxes, something that sorta reminded her of a massive robot vacuum, was situated in the back.

"That machine over there. Apparently, it's called the Pushmaster Five Thousand."

Her face fell in annoyance. What a name. "You're serious?"