Work Text:
Techno doesn’t really know how he became sentient, but to be honest, finding out why wasn’t high on his priority list. All he knew was that one day, fixing stupid spelling mistakes started to annoy him, which had never happened before. He swept through every typo in every word in every text that this man, Dream, sent at lightning speed, and what thanks did he get? None.
Seriously, this man needed to learn to spell. “Definitely” has always been spelled with two i’s. “Finally” will forever have two l’s. The i in “piece” will never come after the e. And who spells “future” with two r’s?
Eventually, he started to find ways to utilize his new emotional capability that did not involve constant frustration. One of his fast-developing pastimes was reading back through the logs of past texts, though he was very selective about which ones. He was bored by the sporadic messages to family members, everything related to work he left alone (despite his origins, programming talk didn’t interest him), and he found the spam texts funny, but they were few and far between.
The real gold mine was the chat threads between Dream and his close friends. There was an intensely chaotic, 15-ish person group chat that provided hours of entertainment, and while Techno was still getting used to the idea of “jokes,” he rapidly developed a taste for sarcasm and the random sense of humor most of these people seemed to possess. This group chat was his main source of education on the nuances of living people. He learned that individual people were different from one another in a variety of ways, including, but not limited to, their gender, physical appearance, likes, dislikes, and romantic attractions.
The concept of “love” was fascinating to him. He had no idea what it would feel like to want to be with one person more than another, or enjoy their presence so much that he desired physical contact with them. He didn’t even know what physical contact would be like (for obvious reasons). He still wanted to find out all he could, however.
His first exposure to romance was the relationship between two chat members, Skeppy and Bad. He observed other people frequently calling them out for flirting and being sappy, so he set about establishing a more concrete definition of these terms. He went through their interactions from the past several months and started picking out trends. He noticed they frequently talked about meeting up in various places and shared experiences, which were called dates (but were not in reference to the calendar). They also complimented one another considerably more than other people, though it seemed they traded an equal amount of friendly insults as well.
He spent so long poring over their communications that it got to the point where he could pick out their speech patterns without reading the sender of a new message. Their dynamic was a fixation for him. He had copious amounts of data squirreled away in meticulously organized folders with labels like “Emoji Use,” “Nicknames,” and “Couple Jokes” (that one was mostly messages from other people in the chat).
Once he had a firm meaning assigned to most aspects of a relationship, he tried his hand at figuring out other potential pairings in the chat. He combed through every message and started compiling data on how each person interacted with everyone else and any exceptions to their normal behavior.
After an exciting yet exhausting month, he came to a few conclusions. The first thing he did was arrange the members in order of emotional openness, though he admitted that it could be inaccurate due to the sample size being a single group chat, even with the large time frame. Some people revealed almost nothing in their texts, but some were an open book. Anyone who was more demonstrative of their emotions over text would be a good candidate for a romantic study. After a lot of careful consideration, he finally selected George as his subject, since he was rated as one of the most expressive people in the chat.
Dream and George texted on a daily basis, which meant that Techno had an excellent baseline for what his subject was like over text with someone that he wasn’t attracted to. He took all of their correspondence from the past month and scanned through it the way he’d done for Bad and Skeppy. Surprisingly, the two men kept up a fairly similar repartee to the established couple, minus the descriptions of dates. He may need to reconsider his previously determined definitions for romantic exchanges. He started a new set of files on the pair and another batch for exclusively George, then began his case study.
Two months of puzzling observations later, he had no idea what to make of George. Based on the data he had gathered, he had no romantic attractions within the chat at all, but his platonic interactions with people didn’t match Techno’s definition either. If he had not been so certain of the solidity of the friendships in the chat, he would say that George even harbored mild resentment towards most of them. No one else kept up the same level of teasing banter with George that Dream did, and George responded 57% slower to any text directed towards him if it wasn’t from Dream. He flicked through the information again, looking for a pattern that he’d missed.
He was brought out of his reverie by the pull to spell. He reluctantly left his data behind and switched gears, brightening when he saw who Dream was texting. Sapnap had a thoroughly enjoyable way of communicating involving a great deal of playful jabs and sharp sarcastic wit, and Dream’s conversations with him often resulted in both of them staying up until odd hours of the morning bickering about everything and nothing.
It had taken Techno a while to understand that it was all in good fun, but once he grasped the concept he found himself wishing he could join in. Occasionally he tried to participate in his own way; influencing the auto-predict suggestions was a relatively simple matter and he delighted in finding dreadful adjectives that Dream could weaponize.
Today, though, it seemed like Dream had a more serious topic in mind. He was making less mistakes than usual, and he kept going back and rewriting phrases. Eventually he deleted the whole thing and just ended up sending a simple “Sup,” which was a huge departure from how he usually began conversations. Sapnap messaged back almost instantly.
What’s wrong, he replied.
Techno was proud Sapnap had immediately detected an issue. He knew his friend well. As the conversation progressed, though, confusion sparked in his mind. This is not at all the topic he’d expected.
I wanted to ask you something weird
Shoot
What’s it like when you’re crushing on someone?
Say no more. I told you last week dude, you just gotta tell him
For real though
Idk, butterflies and sappy stuff. Not being able to get them out of your head.
I think I have one
Techno perked up even more. Here was another chance to gather data on romance. Who were they referring to? Sapnap mentioned that they talked about it before, but it must’ve been through a medium he couldn’t access.
Finally, the realization gets through your thick skull. Like I said. TELL HIM. You two have been pining for MONTHS. I can only third wheel for so long before I go bald from the stress.
What if it ruins things?
You know he wouldn’t do anything like that, even if there was a remote chance he didn’t like you back. You’ve known each other too long.
I still don’t want to risk making things weird
More information on this mysterious someone. They were male, and they were already good friends. That narrowed the list of suspects considerably. He had already started making a mental list of candidates.
Dream and Sapnap texted for a few more minutes, and Techno could tell Sapnap was subtly trying to build up his friend’s confidence. After the conversation slowed, Dream opened his contacts list and started scrolling randomly up and down. Techno was sure he was going to text the man he and Sapnap had been discussing, and he waited with bated breath for Dream to make a decision. To his shock, however, Dream opened his conversation with George from earlier. He probably wanted to confide in someone else, it couldn’t be George they were referring to.
He began to type.
George, I- deleted.
There’s something I want to- deleted.
I want to ask you- deleted.
This is stupid. Deleted again. That one was probably him venting. The more messages he drafted, the more bewildered Techno became. These drafts were not like the ones he’d been debating sending to Sapnap, the tone was all wrong. The way he was typing was erratic and panicky, not like the thoughtful deliberation from the last conversation he’d tried to start.
The evidence wasn’t adding up. Dream had never been this nervous when texting George before. He took a step back and looked at it objectively. If he discounted every assumption he’d ever made about the two’s relationship… It seemed like Dream was attracted to George romantically.
The epiphany hit him like lightning. All the conflicting data he’d collected suddenly made sense. No wonder George’s correspondence had been off, his baseline for a platonic relationship had been faulty. That’s why the two of them had such similar habits to Skeppy and Bad.
He had to do something. The way Dream was waffling right now, he’d never send anything. He needed a poke in the right direction.
Dream was currently stuck with only the letter I, sitting pathetically in the text bar like the last bruised apple in a barrel. Techno carefully weaseled his way into the auto-predict system and retracted the suggestions, twisting them so he’d get the words he wanted.
---
Dream blinked in surprise as the text predictions on his phone refreshed. They had been doing that more frequently as of late, and they were far more accurate than they’d ever been on his old phone. This time, he was left with the word “like” staring innocently at him from the middle of the bar. He chuckled tightly. What a coincidence. That’s the word it picked when he was trying to find the least awkward way to tell his best friend that maybe things ran a little deeper between them.
You know what, he decided, let’s just go for it. Let’s see what it's got.
He clicked the word. The next one to pop up was “you,” go figure. He kept going. He didn’t have to send it, after all.
I like you and I want to see if you feel the single about me.
(Techno cringed. The “single” had been an accident.)
Dream laughed out loud, a genuine and relaxed sound this time. For a notoriously temperamental program, the sentence was remarkably coherent. He went to delete it, then paused. Maybe this was perfect. He thought it was funny, and George would too. Plus he could play it off as a joke if he needed to. He added a sentence to the end, then pressed send before he could talk himself out of it.
I like you and I want to see if you feel the single about me.
George, my auto-predict ships us. XD
Techno punched the air in triumph. Mission failed successfully. He was 90% certain that George also harbored romantic feelings for Dream. Now he just had to hope that neither of them would chicken out of this exchange.
Lol
I wanna try
Send it, no edits
No cheating
Start with my name
Dream was in control over the kitchen
HAH my autocorrect is superior yours makes no sense
Do “I” that’s what mine was
No joke it just said “I like guys” I’m not going further that’s perfect
Really :D
George I had no idea I was your type
I think your phone ships us too
I never said you were my type tho
Well am I?
If Techno had breath, he would’ve held it. How did he become so invested in this after five minutes? Come to think of it, when did he become interested in Dream’s personal life in general? It used to be out of boredom, or curiosity, or for research purposes. Now, though, it was different. He sincerely wanted Dream to be happy. Maybe this was what being a friend was like.
I mean yeah
George I’m blushing
Dream gritted his teeth. Time to be a little gutsy. No backing out now.
I mean could you ever see me that way?
Probably
Why?
I like you George
I want you to feel the not single with me
Are you using the auto-predict’s pickup line on me?
Is it working?
I like you too :)
I have for a while
You wanna call instead of text?
Yeah that would be nice
We’re gonna have to tell Snapmap
Nah let him suffer
Techno was really, really happy. This was the best he’d ever felt, in fact. It was great. He wished he could listen in on their phone call, but he was unfortunately limited to the written word. Warm, fluttery contentment was settling pleasantly in his mind, and he re-read the exchange with pleased thoughts running through his head. Even if Dream didn’t know he existed, he could still help, and that was enough for now. He was an invisible friend.
Maybe, he thought while pressing against the code blocking his access to the keyboard, one day he could even change that.