Chapter Text
June 2026
Five people were moving into the Doorman residence, and though Uzi loved them all, she couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed. Tessa and Khan were moving boxes and bags of their stuff into the house. N and J were setting up beds in the spare rooms upstairs. Thad was trying to impress V with his strength by stacking as many boxes as he could on top of each other and carrying them, but she was too busy looking at something on Lizzy’s phone and giggling maniacally. Doll was brooding in the corner, and Nori and Cyn were watching it all with bowls of popcorn.
Uzi decided to hover in the corner with Doll. She crossed her arms and leaned against the wall, trying to exude “I am too cool and edgy for this” energy instead of “so many things are happening at once and it’s overwhelming” energy. That just so happened to be the time that Thad lost his balance and all the boxes came crashing down.
“What were you thinking?” Lizzy asked, looking up from her phone.
“Uh . . .” Thad glanced at V from where he’d fallen on the floor. “That’s definitely a question.”
Ah, to be a boy with a crush. Of course he chose the worst way possible to try and get V’s attention. Uzi smirked at his predicament. She felt a little bad for him, yeah, but the humor of the situation outweighed everything else.
J and N happened to return at that moment. J put her hands on her hips. “What happened here?” She spoke with authority.
“It’s Thad’s fault,” Doll said. Though her tone was solemn, her lips twitched in amusement.
“It’s true,” Thad seconded. “My bad.”
J sighed. “You’re paying if anything’s broken.”
“Yeah, that’s fair.”
V offered him a hand up and he took it. “Your shenanigans should be a TV show,” she stated. He laughed.
Uzi scoffed. “His shenanigans? I think you mean everyone’s shenanigans.” The chaos they created, both when they were together and when they were separate, was unmatched. Not to mention their time in youth prison, which was a source of many tales in and of itself. All of their “shenanigans” put together would make a good fifteen season long cartoon . . . or an anime. Yes, an anime.
“It’s too bad nobody would hire us for that,” Thad said wistfully.
“Nobody would hire any of us,” J retorted. “Not for anything.”
“Someone hired V and Doll,” N pointed out.
“It was a hyperbole, idiot.”
“C’mon, J, be nice–” Tessa started.
“Don’t call him that,” Uzi snapped. Sometimes she wanted to punch J for how she talked about N. How could anyone say stuff like that about N? He was too kind and amazing to take all this flack, and yet he did.
“Besides, it’s technically true,” Doll added. “V and I both have jobs.”
“You’re a hotel receptionist, hardly an amazing career path,” J said.
“Don’t mind her. She’s just salty she’s not going to be able to be a CEO or a lawyer with a murder under her belt,” V interjected.
Yeah, but there’s stuff all of us won’t be able to do and you don’t see the rest of us taking it out on everyone else, Uzi thought.
“TBH, we should just start our own business,” Lizzy said. “It’d be easier than searching for a job with a criminal record.”
“All you have on your record is thievery. My siblings and I have murder, sad sigh,” Cyn said. “You would have a much better chance of getting a job than us.”
“Yeah, that’s why I said we should start our own business. It’d be way easier for you guys.”
“What, like a TV show?” J said dryly.
“I think a podcast would suit us better,” Thad mused.
“You’re not wrong,” V replied.
“Yeah, a podcast would be doable,” Uzi said. There were enough of them that the skills necessary should be spread out, and it didn’t require as many moving parts as a TV show. And it actually sounded interesting.
“I think you guys would be great at podcasting!” N exclaimed.
Uzi elbowed him. “You would be too.” His sweet personality was sure to capture the hearts of many. Not that Uzi had any experience with that or anything. No, his presence did absolutely nothing to her heart. It definitely didn’t flutter around him. That would be ridiculous.
“You’re not seriously considering this, are you?” J questioned.
“I think it sounds like a great idea,” Nori piped up. “It would give you something productive to do with your time, and even if it never takes off enough to make money, it’ll be a good experience.”
“Tessa would be a great host, grab,” Cyn said, grabbing a fistful of popcorn and shoving it in her mouth. “She is very good at organizing,” she said with her mouth still full of food.
“She would be,” N agreed.
“Are we nominating people into positions against their will now?” J said.
Tessa shrugged. “I’m open to the idea.”
“Tessa would be a good host, if she wanted to be,” V said. “But we wouldn’t want her to do all the work, so she should have a co-host.”
“We could all be co-hosts,” Cyn suggested.
“That would get way too chaotic. We need to pick a few main hosts and the rest of us can cycle in and out as necessary.”
Tessa pulled out a notebook and pencil and started jotting something down. “Okay, what are the various jobs needed?”
“I can do transcriptions for hearing impaired people or people who prefer to read,” Doll volunteered.
“I can edit the audio and stuff,” Uzi said. She had some sick computer skills, which she might have used to give her bullies malware once or twice. What can she say, she was really fed up with them at the time. Her parents had found out and had a long talk with her–she’d been grounded for a month. Except that month was also the one where she’d been sent to youth prison, so she’d never finished her sentence. Or, well, it had been replaced with a different sentence. A prison one.
“I can manage social media and promoting everything,” Lizzy said.
“I can draw art to go with the episodes. Cover art and stuff,” Cyn said.
It was such a strange and funny coincidence that their various skills were all slotting right into place. Though, there was one thing they really should figure out. “What’s the theme of our podcast? Like, what’s it about? Are we really going to just record stories of our lives for everyone to hear?” Uzi asked.
“It could be about life after prison,” N offered. “Er, youth prison. Y’know, what’s it like, what are our struggles, stuff like that! We could also talk about what it was like in the prison.”
Uzi would rather not talk about what prison was like for her. Surely Doll and Cyn felt the same way–they’d been through the same things as her, things none of them had told anyone about. She’d rather not revisit those days, even if she had a constant reminder in the parts of her that were no longer flesh. “Life after prison sounds good to me.”
There were nods of agreement all around. Uzi breathed a silent sigh of relief. Crisis avoided.
“I can manage the schedule,” Tessa said. “Y’know, who’s talking on which episode, that sort of stuff.”
“Thad could co-host,” Lizzy stated. “Since he’s the one who came up with the podcast idea.”
“I’d prefer not to. Maybe on occasion, but I don’t think hosting is really my thing,” Thad said.
“You could use that guitar of yours and come up with a little jingle for an intro,” J said sarcastically.
“Oh! Yeah, I could! I know you were being sarcastic, but that’s actually a good idea.”
Uzi tapped N on the shoulder. He turned to her, shoulders softening. “Yeah?” He murmured.
(She could stare at those warm brown eyes forever, but she probably shouldn’t. That would be creepy.) “I think you’d be a good co-host. Only if it’s something you actually want, though.”
“It does sound fun . . .”
“What are you two whispering about?” J demanded.
“I could co-host!” N announced.
“Did the purple thing put you up to this?”
“Hey, that’s my annoying nickname for Uzi,” V interjected.
“Bite me! I just mentioned that he’d be good at it if he wanted to!” Uzi retorted.
“This podcast is happening, so are you with us or not, J?” Lizzy questioned.
J sighed. “I think this is a stupid idea, but I’ll help you out.”
“Glad to hear it!” Nori declared. “Now you should probably get back to setting up the house.”
“Whatever, I’m just here for moral support,” Lizzy said, resting on her back on the couch and playing on her phone.
“If we didn’t already have more than enough people helping, I’d make you work,” Nori said.
)( )( )(
There was one problem with the Elliott kids moving in with the Doorman family, and that was space. There was a spare room for guests downstairs and another empty room upstairs, but putting any more than two people in a room would be cramped, which meant that Uzi had to share her room with one of them. And somehow, it had ended up being V whom she shared a room with.
She’d moved around all her stuff to fit a second bed in the room. Her desk with her computer was now against the center of the wall instead of all the way to the side, and she’d had to shift her dresser a couple feet to the right as well. The closet had two bars to hang clothes on opposite sides and she didn’t need to use both, so there hadn’t been much reorganizing of that. Uzi’s bed was against the left side of the room when walking in, and V’s to the right.
Currently, V was huddled under the covers with a book. Uzi, meanwhile, was gaming on her computer. She was decimating at PVP on a Minecraft server. It was something she’d missed during her prison years. It had taken a while for her to shake off the rust after she returned, but now she was back and better than ever!
. . . Okay, she wasn’t quite to her pre-prison standards, but she was still pretty good. When she got in a good kill, she’d grin and let out a little “hehehe” of victory, only to get distracted by a message popping up. This one wasn’t a message from the Minecraft chat, but rather a message from Doll that got sent directly to her interface.
Yes, she was a human and shouldn’t have an interface. Yes, she had one anyway. No, she did not want to talk about it.
Subject 003 | Doll: how’s the roommate situation
Subject 003 | Doll: has V murdered you yet?
Yes, Doll’s username said “Subject 003”. Uzi’s and Cyn’s also had “Subject” on them. No, there was no way to change it. Uzi had tried to hack it many times. She quickly composed a message to Doll.
Subject 002 | Uzi: no
Subject 002 | Uzi: she’s actually been pretty chill
Subject 002 | Uzi: she’s just reading
Subject 001 | Lucynda: r u guys talking without me???
It was always a surprise to see Cyn’s full name, despite having been able to message her like this for several years. They couldn’t see each other’s messages if it wasn’t directed to them, but unless it was specifically private, they could see that other users were active.
Subject 002 | Uzi: Doll just wants an excuse to rag on V
Subject 001 | Lucynda: Be nice to my sister, Dollie
Subject 003 | Doll: -_-
V suddenly appeared, waving her hand in front of Uzi. Uzi took her headphones off.
“Hey, purple thing. I’ve been calling you for the last couple minutes,” V said.
“Why?” Uzi replied flatly.
Subject 001 | Lucynda: I mean it
Uzi wished there was a way to ignore the words, but there was no way to turn off the messaging feature.
Subject 003 | Doll: Yeah, yeah
“Because you stopped laughing under your breath. I was worried, believe it or not,” V said.
“Just spaced out,” Uzi muttered, wondering if this would be a problem. She, Cyn, and Doll often talked at night. Would V notice anything out of the ordinary?
“Yeah, you didn’t even notice that you died.”
Uzi glanced at the “You died!” screen, then back at V, who was smirking. “Oh, you’re enjoying my loss, aren’t you?”
“Maybe I am, maybe I’m not. Either way, it’s one a.m. and I want to sleep. Could you turn the computer off?”
Now this might be a problem. Uzi regularly stayed up into the early hours of the night during summer. If she couldn’t do that, it would grate on her. But for now, she’d respect V’s wishes. For now . . . “Yeah, sure.”
Subject 001 | Lucynda: Uzi r u still here?
Uzi climbed into bed before responding.
Subject 002 | Uzi: V noticed me spacing out
Subject 003 | Doll: We should be going to sleep anyway
Subject 002 | Uzi: Says the one who started this conversation
Subject 002 | Uzi: Gn
Subject 001 | Lucynda: Goodnight!
Subject 003 | Doll: Good night.
There was silence for a while, but then another message popped up.
Subject 001 | Lucynda: [PRIVATE MESSAGE] Thank you for opening your home to us, Uzi. It was scary, not knowing where to go. Nervous chuckle.
Subject 002 | Uzi: [PRIVATE MESSAGE] np. You guys have been there for me during my worst times, it was only fair I be there when you needed me
Subject 001 | Lucynda: [PRIVATE MESSAGE] My brother appreciates it too. More than you probably realize.
What was Uzi supposed to say to that? What did it even mean?
Subject 001 | Lucynda: [PRIVATE MESSAGE] :)
Oh well, sleep was a lost cause now. At least she could send emoticons Cyn’s way.
Subject 002 | Uzi: [PRIVATE MESSAGE] :)