Reborn as Error

184 - Routine Abnormalities

Things have slowed down a lot. The usual shenanigans with the group felt routine. Which was both a good thing and bad thing. Good because things were fine and going as normal. Bad because that just meant something could be lurking around the corner and I would not be prepared. I wasn't really complaining that much though. I've been through enough as is.

I couldn't even worry about Gradient all that much. He was grown and was just getting better with handling things as time went on. I knew that he still had room to grow both mentally and physically but I wasn't protecting him from stuff anymore.

Occasionally, my days would fall into a rather random routine. I'd either have a run in with Swad, get pulled somewhere with Fresh, find myself laying on the floor in the home of the Lust brothers, eat some snacks or treats with Horror, check on the Doodle-Sphere to keep tabs on Ink, go to Outertale because I can and I want to, spend time with Gaster, check up on Geno, watch over young Pap when Sci needs a break, check out how Classic's au is doing, lounge with Dust, sit with Nightmare while drinking a beverage, etc.

I'd just do stuff and it felt normal.

Of course I'd still do my job. Glitches don't ever dissappear for good, instability can happen whenever if not monitored, and occasionally Ink will have a blip in his memory. Those blips caused us to go over the aus that were present and selecting if the new ones made get destroyed or if some old ones are no longer holding together and will be replaced with a new one.

He wasn't always pleased with this but I made it clear that we weren't repeating history and he got off my back.

There were times that we both had an 'agitation' in our lives and we went through a process that we kept solely to ourselves. In a separate area of the Doodle-Sphere, away from main aus, Ink would create to get it out of his system and I'd destroy them afterwards to get that little tick out of my system as well.

Gradient hasn't really shown any agitation that we had and I figured it was because of the tablet. He didn't use it all the time but he couldn't just destroy the tablet and had paper on hand when he needed to quickly jot down something. If he didn't like it, it got destroyed. Simple as that. He could delete stuff if he wanted but he tends to think about it for a bit before deciding anything.

One day in particular I found myself standing with Nightmare watching as Cross and Killer were arguing about... something. I honestly tuned out part way through and haven't been paying attention much. I had a mug of coffee in my hold, Nightmare was the same. I don't remember context. I just walked up, was given a mug, and stayed there watching stuff unfold.

"I though it was Dust and Killer that were at each other's throats a lot?" I inquired about what was going on indirectly.

"More often it's been Killer and Cross."

"Why?" I asked and Nightmare just shrugged. He looked lightly annoyed but not enough to even bother leaving. Then again if he left the area then Killer might try breaking something. I just sipped my drink.

"Maybe you should go before you get dragged into something," Nightmare suggested after a bit. Killer and Cross had just become background noise at this point. There wasn't much concern on our end.

"You sure?" I asked as I shifted my gaze to the negativity king.

"I can handle this stuff. I did managed before you were here too." I shrugged a bit hearing his response. He had a point.

"That's fair. I'll head off... after my coffee."

"Are you that bored?" He asked, giving me a look. I just shrugged.

"Maybe." I didn't bother holding a conversation. I just enjoyed my drink as a knife went flying somewhere. It felt normal.

Once I was finished with my coffee, I left the area as suggested. Before I left completely I had the decency to clean the mug instead of just leaving it in the sink or on a table.