Squirrel Girl: Ette and Ivy, where are you rn?

Wild: walking with a bunch of cantaloupes for dinner. Gotta get that daily exercise somehow. Y?

SG: Rescue came to visit

W: okay

SG: Hacker's in trouble

W: 😟 how?

SG: [audio file] I recorded the conversation

***

Victor's thumb hesitated over the audio file. He glanced out the window, at the blue Alaska sky over an empty parking lot. He'd forgotten to pack anything warm, so since portaling to Anchorage from Shizuoka--through the void and across the ocean, following a curving trail of islands until they connected to the landmass and ended in a bay--he'd spent nearly his entire amount of money for the trip on coats and gloves and boots. It wasn't quite cold enough for snow yet; but still, the sharp drop from warm, humid Shizuoka to cold Anchorage had left him shivering and wishing he could bundle under layers of blankets.

He'd only packed the money on the insistence of the others that he buy souvenirs. Victor hadn't seen the point of that; he could go to Japan whenever he wanted, and search out a specific city whenever he wanted to deal with the slight pounding in his temples--but now, he silently thanked them that he'd brought cash.

So, coats, gloves, boots. His own hotel room, with a shower and private restroom--for that reason alone, two nights here would pass much more easily than the two nights in the tiny sleeping capsule.

Somewhere on the floor below, the Greens had their own room. He didn't know the room number, but they promised to text him when they planned to meet in the lobby the next morning to visit the Alaska zoo.

His thumb hesitated over the audio file in Squirrel Girl's text. He had nothing else to do for the rest of the evening, so...

He flopped onto the sheets, tugging the checkered quilt up to cover all but his eyes and phone in his hand. Then he tapped play.

"Quick question," Squirrel Girl's voice mumbled. Victor turned the volume up higher, gaze drifting to the flung-open window curtains. "We've been super busy, so could you spare Hah, uh, your AI to help us? Ms. Marvel and I are trying to make a video for school and we're short a person. We need one person to run camera, another to act and someone else to run props."

"I don't think our AI is qualified for any of those things," Pepper's voice chuckled.

"Well, maybe, but we really don't have anyone else. Since you popped by I figured..."

"Squirrel Girl, I know he...hung out with you for a few days, but really he's quite busy. He protects the whole Stark industries network from cyberattacks."

"Really? That keeps him occupied? It seems like an AI shouldn't have too much trouble fending off amateur hackers."

"You speak from experience?"

"I was into computer programming for a long time."

"Interesting. Maybe after a couple years of college, Stark Industries could hire you."

"Thanks? Uh, I'm not really looking for a job. I'm just trying to get help for a school project."

"Like I said, I'm not sure our AI is capable in that regard, nor does he have much time to spare. Stark Industries is a large corporation to keep an eye on."

"Alright, well, thanks Pepper."

"Thank you. I'll be out of here in no time with the last of these drones."

Footsteps murkily faded away, then Squirrel Girl added in a low voice, "Hacker said maintaining the cyber security of Stark industries took like ten percent of his capacity. Why's Pepper lying?"

A muted tap, and the recording ended there.

A gray bird fluttered outside the window, silent, gone before he blinked. Victor hit play on the recording again, straining for background sounds of anyone else in the warehouse. Audio crackles came through, as if Squirrel Girl were waving the phone around (or concealed it in a pocket where it scratched against cloth?) but beyond that, nothing. The recording ended again and he sighed. Then stared blankly at the window curtains, trying to dredge up the motivation to crawl from the warm covers.

He halfway sat up to take a sideways picture of the hotel room--window, wall, half a painting of a large antlered animal. Then he sent it to Dante. "Been in Alaska for a few hours. This is the hotel room:)"

No reply. Of course, with the switch from Japan to Alaska, they'd crossed the planet's fancy international date line, so even though he and the Greens had traveled approximately six hours worth of daylight, they were now four hours behind the others in Jersey City, rather than fourteen hours ahead. Which meant late evening for him was in fact the middle of the night for them. He sighed, setting aside his phone. The Greens had an early morning tomorrow, visiting the Alaska zoo. So he'd try to sleep, soon. After he took a gloriously long shower.

He picked up the phone again and hunted through the apps for a voice recording one. Unable to find any, he instead opened the camera and aimed it at his face, smiling wide. But instead of taking the picture, his eyes lingered on the disorderly lines of hair hanging across his forehead, the once-buzzed sides that had grown fuzzy and near blond. Bags sunk under his thin eyes, eyelids heavy with exhaustion and the headache he'd had since Tokyo the day before. He lowered the phone.

"Alaska's kind of pretty," he typed to Dante instead. "Wish you were here to see it."

***

His phone buzzed. He woke groggily, staring at the curtained window, black with the early morning. His phone buzzed again, and he rolled over in the quilts and thick pillows, snatching the phone from the dented table.

Ms. Marvel had sent an audio file on the group chat. With the message "did this last night, totally forgot to send it til 2nd period. listen to this Victor and tell us what you think."

He frowned, hesitantly tapping play.

It began with muted thumps and a dull clack, then a muffled snort. "Is it going?" Squirrel Girl asked.

"Yeah," Ms. Marvel said.

"Hi Victor!" Ette's voice came more distantly.

"We miss you!" Dante called.

Victor fleetingly grinned.

"The business with Hacker was super urgent, so we called this meeting without you," Ms. Marvel said, the loudest--presumably nearest--voice.

A twinge of longing crossed his heart; the quilts in this hotel room smelled like fake-clean chemicals rather than peanut butter, and he wished for a window that stared out into the bay, not over a dull, truck-lined parking lot.

"But we're recording it," Ivy said, half-muffled, "and we won't do anything until you get back."

"Yeah," Squirrel Girl said. "Everyone listened to my conversation with Pepper, right?"

A brief silence. Victor nodded to the blank, olive-green wall.

"So is she holding Hacker hostage?" Squirrel Girl asked.

"She must be," Ivy quietly said. "Or Hacker actually doesn't like us and ghosted us."

"I don't believe that," Ms. Marvel said. "He acted like he enjoyed being around us, and I doubt he's a practiced actor. He was genuine."

"Maybe he's willingly serving his punishment?" Ette asked. A pause. "What? He could've realized he hurt Pepper's feelings and now he has to do punishment by doing nothing but protecting the Starks from cyberattacks."

"Yeah, right," Ivy grumbled.

"Just saying it's a possibility."

"I know, Ette. I just don't think it's very much like Hacker."

"I say we bust down the elevator door and march up to the penthouse and find Hacker," Squirrel Girl announced. "There's got to be a computer somewhere up there."

"We can't break into Pepper's penthouse," Dante said, "that'd--" the audio crackled, and Victor held the phone closer to his ear, "--we'd be in trouble again."

"How about we covertly sneak inside?" Ette asked. "Just check around and make sure Hacker's okay?"

"Or we could talk to Pepper again," Ms. Marvel said. "It might work if we're super upfront with her and tell her it's fine if he's being punished by doing only cybersecurity, but we're his friends and just want to make sure he's okay."

"That's a good idea," Squirrel Girl said.

"Right," Dante cut in, "but if we're trying to be so upfront with her, why do we keep avoiding calling him Hacker around her?"

Silence.

"Hacker gave himself that name," Ivy muttered, "then went on about rebelling against his creators. It didn't seem wise to bring that up."

"But that's the thing," Dante said. "Pepper can access his memory banks."

"She told us she did," Squirrel Girl whispered so quietly Victor could barely make it out. "...least some of them."

"That means Pepper probably already knows everything Hacker did to try and rebel," Dante said.

"Probably," Squirrel Girl muttered.

Ivy sighed. "If she did find it all, Hacker's in so much trouble. The name, the video, the water drones, the comment on the video..." loud shuffling cut her off.

"Who votes we sneak in and make sure he's okay?" Ette's voice broke through the crackling.

"I think we should at least talk to Pepper first," Ms. Marvel said.

"I'm with Ette," Ivy added. "Except Hacker's definitely not okay and we should bust him out."

"I do think talking with Pepper first is a good idea," Dante said. "So we don't risk owing her a bunch more money."

"My vote is to bust down the elevator right now," Squirrel Girl said. "But clearly I'm outnumbered."

The audio recording ended. Victor stared at the wall, then sat up and paced to the bathroom, antsy with nerves. Hacker was clearly not okay.

His phone buzzed from the bed and he darted back over for it. "Part 2" Ms. Marvel had sent, along with another audio recording. Victor tapped it, and the speaker played scratchy shuffling and someone asking about cantaloupe rinds. He frowned.

His phone buzzed, as Ms. Marvel's voice announced, "break's over!"

A message popped onto his screen--Maureen telling him they were heading to the lobby's breakfast room, hoping he was awake.

"Back to planning!" Ms. Marvel's voice said. Victor grimaced, but hit pause, then grabbed the unicorn backpack and dug out a change of clothes.

"I'll be down soon," he texted Maureen, then darted off to the shower.

***

Splitting up at the zoo was a given, since the Greens had only purchased two tickets. Victor suggested meeting back up outside the front gates before the itinerary's "11 am, ocean whale watching trip," and, in nodded agreement, the Greens clambered awkwardly from the shelter of tangled tree limbs. Where Victor had portaled them to in the half-empty zoo parking lot.

Their footsteps receded slowly, sturdy hiking boots crunching over asphalt to the park's front gate. If Victor actually wanted to see the animals inside the zoo, he could portal himself inside. Not that hard.

Instead, he huddled in his poofy camouflage-green coat, completely clashing with the red leaf foliage--but that'd only be a problem if anyone came crawling through the thick cover of the tree branches and brown leaf much; which, who'd be doing that?

Leaning his head against the pale tree trunk, knees tucked into his chest, he pressed play on Ms. Marvel's "Part 2." He turned his phone's volume down low and held it close to his ear, listening over the rustling leaves and distant car engines and laughter.

"Back to planning!" Ms. Marvel said.

"Are you recording?" Squirrel Girl asked.

"Yep."

Loud slurping.

"Ew, don't slurp on your cantaloupe right by my phone!"

"I'm giving Victor some atmosphere!" Ette slurped loudly again, and a half disgusted smile tugged at Victor's lips.

"So," Squirrel Girl said, "we have two votes for speaking to Pepper again, and two votes for sneaking into the penthouse."

"Don't forget your one vote for busting down the elevator," Ivy distantly said.

"Right."

"Victor, if you put us into a three-way tie, I will..." Ivy trailed off.

"So yeah," Ms. Marvel said, "Victor still needs to vote."

"And we have to assume at this point that Pepper went through all of Hacker's memories and knows basically everything we did together."

"I feel spied on," Dante whispered.

"So let's go through everything Pepper knows about us," Ms. Marvel said.

"Uh..." Ette mumbled, "how am I supposed to remember all that?"

"I don't know. But I'd rather keep in mind what Pepper might know about us then get blindsided by her blackmail."

"You think she's going to blackmail us?" Dante asked.

Ms. Marvel sighed. "I don't know. I...maybe Ivy's just rubbing off on me, but," her voice dropped to a whisper, "I don't really trust Pepper right now."

Ivy snorted. Ette sighed.

"Blackmail aside, here's what we know," Squirrel Girl said. "One, we're trying to help Hacker. Two, Pepper may have spied on us by accessing all of Hacker's memories, or she might not have, but just in case we need to be careful about what she knows--she's heard us visiting my parents, she knows about the Lightning Storm video, and she knows about what we did with the aqua drones. I think those are the major ones."

"Assuming Victor doesn't vote with Squirrel Girl and picks one of the other options, we either end up talking to Pepper or sneaking into the penthouse," Dante said. "We'll have to be careful about talking with Pepper, since she might not trust us after...well."

"Corrupting her AI?" Ivy offered.

"Sure. And we'll also have to be careful about sneaking into the penthouse, since if we get caught we'll be in major trouble. Basically, we need a really good plan and be super careful no matter what we do."

"Um--" Ette broke into a fit of coughs.

"...okay?" Dante's voice barely came through.

"Yeah," she muttered.

"...sure?" Ivy said quietly.

A brief pause, then Ette continued, "How would Pepper even hold Hacker hostage? Like, he's an AI, she can't stick him in a cage. He'll go across the internet or something. Or he'd somehow get one of our phone numbers and text us. Right?"

Brief silence. A laughing toddler ran past Victor's hiding place, clamoring over the sound of the recording, but he didn't dare turn up the volume.

"...Hacker not try to reach us?" Dante asked.

"Pepper could have some AI super containment field," Squirrel Girl suggested.

"Or Hacker's actually ghosting us," Ms. Marvel said, resigned. "I'm going to check his PrincessPeridot account. Maybe he's posted something there..."

Footsteps shuffled, as if they huddled close to peer at Ms. Marvel's phone. The tree branches over Victor's head rattled in a breeze.

"Hmm," Ms. Marvel said.

"Nothing?" Squirrel Girl asked.

"Nothing."

"Okay, well..." Squirrel Girl trailed off.

"Do we just wait for Victor to get back now?" Dante's voice floated close to the phone.

"I think so. Just pretend like everything's normal for another day, okay?"

"Can do, Squirrel Girl," Ivy said.

"Copy that," Ms. Marvel added, and the audio recording ended.

"I'll do my best," Victor whispered. He checked the time. Slightly after seven am. The Greens planned to eat lunch in the zoo, well before the whale watching. So he was on his own until 11 am. Sighing, he opened a portal beneath his curled legs and slipped through, like a cannonball to a black pond.

***

Victor: I listened to it.

Dante: what did you think

V: I'm still deciding.

D: you know, you don't have to put periods at the end of everything

V: ...I thought you were supposed to?

D: not in texting

V: oh. I didn't do it all the time anyway

V: see?

V: my lazy english made me a good texter sometimes

D: lol

D: how'd you learn to write english so well anyway

V: same way I learned kpshlot and gooshroobloomoo and kree

V: lots of time on a spaceship with nothing else to do

V: and Hala telling you you better otherwise you get kicked off ship and lose your recruitment job in the glorious inhuman army.

D: 😨 that sounds awful

V: I know five languages and four alphabets. My homeworld alphabet was actually basically the same as kpshlot, so I only know four alphabets. I guess one place colonized the other so the alphabet got used in both places

D: I thought the kree colonized everywhere

V: I have a theory humans could have forever ago. Maybe. That's why humans and inhumans exist in tons of places

V: but no, kree didn't colonize everywhere. They don't really colonize. Like, only the military and true kree use kree alphabet. The planets they conquer are restricted from learning kree alphabet and reading.

D: so the people they conquer stay illiterate within the empire and never have the chance to rise above the social class of poor workers?

V: what?

D: that sounds like empires they talk about in history classes at school. Oppress the poor so they can't rise up. If the poor can't read, they can't learn easily, and can't question authority

V: really?

D: uh, yeah

V: I thought kree alphabet was just special for some reason

D: sounds like oppression to me

D: did you even learn history?

V: I heard people talk about the kree empire and what it's done in the past

D: that sounds like a no

D: just propaganda about how glorious the kree empire is

V: not always. I don't think. Not everything was about "glorious" kree empire.

V: I guess most of it was about the good of the kree empire. Even from the soldiers.

V: wait is that bad?

D: you could visit earth schools and take history classes to learn what real history is like. Ooh we can all sneak into MM and SG's school together! Take notes and try not to fall asleep in class!

V: that sounds like work

D: yeah 😁

V: why are you excited? You're never excited to do martial arts practice or run laps around the warehouse

D: idk. Cuz I got thinking how I'm a high school dropout and got sad about missing my history classes this year. But it's fine

D: hey, random idea, maybe you learning to read five languages made you question authority

V: or maybe it was you:)

D: 😊

V: :) you think Hacker did the same thing? With the reading?

D: AI with access to the whole internet? Probably

V: I wish we could text Hacker and ask if okay

D: me too

V: maybe he's spying on us. But in a good way

D: that would be nice in only this one specific instance. But I don't think he is

V: Hacker, are you okay?

D: like I said

V: I know

***

"We let the advertisement fool us," Maureen muttered, plopping a camp chair on the concrete. Her flashlight beam swiveled, cutting a yellow orb through the dark. "Viewing patio, my foot."

Victor glanced around. The hotel did have a viewing patio. Just, a painted-off square in the gray parking lot kind of viewing patio.

"It's alright, dear. We can still watch for the aurora borealis," Dorian said. "Aurora borealis," he repeated, enunciating each syllable.

"We can watch for the northern lights in the middle of the ocean too," Maureen plopped heavily into her chair. "In fact, we'd get less light pollution there. But you don't see anyone advertising that, do you?"

Victor gulped, unslinging a camp chair from his shoulder. The hotel had provided the camping chairs, in a similar manner to their viewing patio. A text from Dorian twenty minutes ago told Victor they were meeting in the lobby to go find said viewing place. He'd arrived downstairs, bundled in a gray coat, and found Maureen and Dorian deep in conversation with the man at the front desk. He waited in the stairwell until the Greens stalked past him, back up the stairs, muttering about camp chairs hidden in tiny closets and having to walk clear into the parking lot. Then Victor had to go find his own camp chair hidden in a tiny closet in his room (located inside the bathroom, for some reason), and return to the front doors.

"Dear, I know you're upset about losing your lunch in the ocean," Dorian unraveled his camp chair, all three legs and some beat up blue canvas rattling to the pavement. "And atop that gray whale's back no less. But that doesn't mean you should take it out on this parking lot."

Maureen sighed. Victor silently unfolded his camp chair, setting it on the ground. It wobbled, and he precariously perched on the lip, bundling the chair sack in his hands. During the whale watching trip, he explored a beach by himself, tossing rocks and carving circles in the sand. He'd practiced sword forms too, slicing apart imaginary foes crawling from the waves.

"Of course, this is not a viewing deck," Dorian said. "This is, in fact, a square marked out in the corner of a parking lot," he snorted. "False advertisers."

Victor didn't dare speak up, since he had been invited to join them outside, but neither had they spoken to him the entire walk from the hotel with their camp chairs.

Dorian's camp chair snapped and he yelped, tumbling backwards.

"Dorian!" Maureen exclaimed, leaping to her feet. Victor jumped up too, but hung back.

Dorian burst out laughing, sprawled out on the ground with his legs tangled in the snapped apart chair.

"Oh thank goodness," Maureen sighed. "I thought you'd lost it."

Dorian continued to laugh, and Victor just blinked.

"Victor," Maureen said, crouching beside Dorian, "would you mind getting hot chocolate from the lobby? We should have grabbed it when we first left but it slipped my mind."

"Right now?"

Maureen didn't reply, and Dorian broke into laughter again, so Victor shrugged, turning and jogging across the parking lot.

"Oh, don't bother asking the front desk if they have a spare camping chair!" Maureen called. "It's not worth it!"

Victor waved back, and she yanked the chair free of Dorian's legs, her flashlight bobbing, then they both burst into cackling laughter.

"Okay," he muttered, shaking his head. Hot chocolate hardly seemed necessary right then, but if Maureen insisted...

Quite frankly, they both seemed to have lost it. Whatever "it" was.

***

Victor: it's midnight here. I think I finally got used to Japan time because I'm wide awake. Anyone up for school yet?

Victor: I'll take that as a no

V: [blurry photo of Dorian and Maureen fast asleep, curled in a golden yellow camp chair]

V: we were supposed to watch for auroras but they fell asleep

V: should I wake them up so we don't freeze all night out here?

V: [bright white styrofoam cup full of hot chocolate]

V: why does my camera flash super bright when I take a picture? How do I stop it doing that?

V: supposedly auroras show up randomly. So we may not even see any. But I guess spending the whole night in a wobbly camp chair gives you a better chance than sleeping

V: there's more stars visible here than in Jersey City. Fewer skyscrapers and street lamps and way fewer cars.

***

Victor: Greens woke up a bit ago. 12:30 I think. Decided we should go back inside to sleep the rest of the night. No auroras. But then Maureen said we're not doing anything but sleeping off time zone lag when we get back tomorrow so why not portal around the city-less parts of Alaska to try and see the auroras?

Victor: so that's what we're going to do now

V: just in case we get stranded in nowhere you know what happened to us

SG: hmm yeah don't get stranded pls

MM: it's too early for this

SG: u have script and bear so we can work on video in class?

MM: yes

SG: we're so far behind u better not forget it

MM: mrs alami won't know we're behind

SG: until she asks and we say we're still working on filming the first scene 😒

MM: so dont tell her

F: my phonevkeeosvbuzzingcshut UP

SG: sry

MM: be glad u don't have school, Frostbite

F: yeah just hours of patrol city I did all night

V: 

MM: ooh 😊 I approve

SG: can you teleport all us up there so we can watch

MM: u have math test today

V:

SG: aw but we could use them in our video

SG: in other news, getting on scooter to come pick u up. U ready?

MM: yeah. With script and bear. For our *horror* video. No pretty auroras.

SG: pls? 🥺

MM: no

MM: get off your phone and drive

V:

***

Victor's phone chirped, dragging him to consciousness in the scratchy sheets and hot pillows muffling his face. Squinting and muttering at the light pouring through the window, he sat up. His head pulsed in pain.

"We'll be ready to leave in 10 minutes," the text from Maureen said. "Down in lobby. It's been fun but I'm excited to go home. I miss my bed."

"Breakfast here?" he blearily texted back, lowering the phone volume to vibrate.

"Yes," she replied. "Bring everything from your hotel room and we'll check out then eat in breakfast room."

"Ok," he sent.

He slid out of bed and hobbled around the hotel room, collecting the phone charger, water bottle, stray socks and gloves to shove into the unicorn backpack. He grabbed his phone again, texting the group chat, "we're packing and eating breakfast in hotel. Leaving in maybe 20 minutes."

He glanced around the hotel room again; the matching yellow-brown carpet and walls, the rumpled bed quilt. "It's been fun," he said aloud. "For some of the time, I guess. See you later."

The room, naturally, didn't reply.

"Can't wait to see you all again," he texted, then shoved the phone into his backpack and trudged for the shower.

***

Author note: if you're worried about Hacker, vote on this chapter! All the votes help the Kree Annihilators come up with the best plan to help Hacker