Suzume braced herself for the burst of garlic that might still linger in Master’s newly renovated second floor. Dinner was done—delicious, yes, but definitely pungent. She half-expected the coffee aroma from the café downstairs to be hopelessly buried under the weight of chili flakes and olive oil. Yet as she climbed the steps, pot in hand, she discovered the space was surprisingly airy. For a so-called “above-café apartment,” it was far larger than she’d imagined, with a full dining table, a decent sofa, and even a corner that looked suspiciously like a mini-workshop. Clearly, Master had spared no expense renovating after his military retirement.
“Wow, you really do live in style,” Suzume muttered, setting down the saucepan on a side counter. “I kept picturing a cramped room with musty walls or something. But this is… pretty nice?”
Master, arms folded near the window, merely grunted. “Nice enough for me. A man’s gotta use his retirement pay for something, right? Now hurry, you’ve got other things to worry about than rating my décor.”
Right. The “other thing” was waiting on a low glass coffee table in the center of the living area. A single iPad, its LED blinking in an almost anxious rhythm. Suzume eyed it warily. This iPad housed Kakashi, an AI who had fled the bookstore’s terminal over the weekend to avoid meltdown hazards. Technically, it had saved itself from catastrophic damage—good for Kakashi—but the result was that Suzume’s bookstore shifts were now a living nightmare. Without Kakashi’s brilliant fuzzy-search functions, she was forced to physically comb through thousands of shelves each time a customer vaguely recalled a “pink rabbit something-something” or “dog detective in space.”
“Look,” she said, stepping over the threshold where soft rug met polished wooden floor. “I’m not mad about the garlic thing, or that you’re hogging a giant living space up here while I break my back downstairs. But I do think you owe me a better solution than ‘remain in meltdown-free comfort.’ Because I’m the one meltdowning—if that’s a word—each time I clock in.”
She paused, anticipating Kakashi’s usual frantic response about meltdown risk. Instead, the iPad screen flickered, showing a single line of text:
(・_・;)
followed by a quiet, halting voice: “S-suzume… I… only want… safe… environment… sorry… beep…?”
At least it wasn’t squealing “meltdown” every other breath now. Suzume glanced to her right, where Master was rummaging inside a squat black cabinet. “So… you said you had something that could help? Because if not, I might just toss this iPad back into the bookstore terminal and see what happens.”
Master’s lips twitched in what might have been amusement. “Was that a threat or a meltdown of your own? Either way…” He pulled out a sturdy-looking watch with a broad face and a slightly scratched black band. It looked more Garmin than Apple—sporty, functional, and definitely not the dusty relic Suzume might have expected. “This might do the trick.”
She inched closer, curiosity piqued. “A watch? Are we going old-school or something?”
“Not that old,” Master corrected. “It’s from my time overseas—a test device we used for comms and data. The battery’s not the best, but it can connect to all sorts of signals. GPS, Bluetooth, you name it. If we can patch Kakashi’s fuzzy-search mojo into it, you might not need to drag him back to that meltdown-prone bookstore terminal.”
The iPad let out a beep, text flickering from “(・_・;)???” to a bolder “Possible…??” Suzume’s eyes widened, hope catching in her throat. “You’re serious? So, if I have this watch on while I’m at work, I can just quietly ask it to do searches, and Kakashi up here in your iPad can process them… meaning no meltdown, no rummaging?”
Master nodded, adjusting the watch face in his palm. “The key is we keep Kakashi’s main processes up here—where we have that fancy fan rig installed—so the AI doesn’t blow a fuse. Meanwhile, you get the queries done via a Bluetooth link between your iPhone, this watch, and the iPad. Still might be buggy. But it beats re-installing Kakashi onto that worthless store terminal, right?”
Kakashi’s voice emerged, stuttering less than usual. “W-worth… less… beep… sc… sorry… meltdown… no meltdown… good… beep…?” Perhaps that was the AI’s way of conceding the plan was interesting. Suzume smirked. “Don’t you try to sweet-talk me, you glorified phone app. If you can make my job easier, fine. Otherwise, I’m dragging you back to the bookstore terminal and letting meltdown commence.”
“Oh, hush. You’re not as ruthless as you pretend,” Master muttered. “Anyway, I’ll just see if this old watch can still run an OS update.”
He knelt by a low table near the corner that was half-laden with electronics and cables. Suzume recognized bits of hardware from the meltdown fiasco over the weekend—extra fans, a few leftover circuit boards. She followed, kneeling beside him, while the iPad beeped a tiny “(O_o)? beep…??” as if wanting to be included.
Gently setting the watch down, Master rummaged for a cable that might connect it to the iPad. “If we’re lucky, it’ll pair with your phone. Then from your phone, it can link to Kakashi upstairs—by which I mean right here, physically, but I consider this second floor away from your bookstore nonsense.”
“Please,” Suzume muttered, “it’s nonsense you forced me into. But hey, if it helps, I’m game.”
Kakashi’s screen glowed a pale green, as if encouraging them. “Ready… beep… updating…?? meltdown…??— oh… sc… maybe stable?” The voice was still a bit staccato, but far less meltdown-obsessed, which Suzume appreciated. Maybe it realized she could blow a fuse of her own if it repeated meltdown too many times.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
While Master fiddled with the watch’s back panel, Suzume slipped away to the open-concept kitchen corner, rinsing the saucepan that had a faint chili oil film left. She shot a look over her shoulder, where Master was quietly cursing about “dang cables” and “why is everything in English.” The iPad was flipping between ASCII faces:
(O_o)
(>_<)
(ﾟДﾟ;)
…like it was cycling through an entire library of weird emoticons.
“You good over there?” Suzume called, carefully balancing the soapy pan. “Need me to read instructions or something?”
Master grunted. “Nah, just gotta… find the right cable. This watch might be too new to just jam a random micro USB in. And we need Kakashi to do a bit of OS bridging. But if this works, you can do your search requests from the bookstore with minimal fuss, right?”
“Fingers crossed,” she murmured, turning back to the sink. If it actually freed her from having to rummage for “dogs in space” or “rabbits in Antarctica” or whatever ridiculous queries tomorrow’s shift brought, she’d be one happy camper.
Within ten minutes, her chores were finished, and she returned to find the watch’s face lit up with a small text prompt:
Initializing… Searching for device…
Master looked mildly triumphant, though he hid it beneath a stoic expression. “We got the watch to at least see the iPad. Kakashi’s running some software patch or other.”
Sure enough, the iPad beeped, “Patch… beep… meltdown…?? no meltdown… beep?? maybe success…??” Suzume couldn’t help but grin. “You’re not half bad, you little meltdown maniac.”
The watch’s screen suddenly displayed:
[SYNC COMPLETE WITH: KAKASHI]
(・∀・)
She let out a yelp of excitement. “See? We might have something here! Let me try a test search—like, super random—before I get too excited.”
Master nodded, sliding aside so she could kneel by the table and speak into the watch. “Okay, watch… or Kakashi… or whatever. Let’s see if you can find a ‘blue hamster detective story from the 1930s’? Because that’s the level of random I have to deal with.”
A moment passed. The watch’s face pulsed a faint green, presumably sending the query via Bluetooth to Suzume’s iPhone, which then hopped the signal to the iPad’s AI. The iPad glowed in confirmation, lines of text briefly scrolling in cryptic code. Suzume held her breath. Then, in an anticlimactic flash, the watch beeped:
IYAAA!! (O_o)
In big letters, too. Suzume buried her face in her hands. “Ugh, it’s that ‘Iyaaa!’ stuff again. So… meltdown? Or meltdown-adjacent?”
Kakashi’s voice crackled from the iPad: “S-sor-ry… beep… new… system… error… sc… soon fix… beep?? no meltdown… beep??” It sounded contrite at least. Master let a low chuckle slip. “You expected it to just work on the first go? That’s rarely how these things go, soldier. We’ll tinker a bit more.”
“It’s not like I wanted a magical fix. But still… come on.” Suzume took a calming breath. The living space’s gentle overhead light glinted off the watch’s screen, reminding her that at least they had a partial success. The watch recognized Kakashi, so all that remained was to refine the connection. Tomorrow, she wouldn’t have to wrack her brain in the bookstore for obscure titles—assuming they got rid of these weird errors.
She propped herself against the sofa, ignoring the faint coffee-meets-garlic scent that still clung to her clothes. “All right, I’m with you. Let’s debug it until we can do at least one real fuzzy search, then call it a night. If it fails… well, plan B is forcibly shoving Kakashi back into the bookstore terminal, meltdown or not.”
A beep from the iPad. This time, the text read: (T_T)
“Aw, sorry, not to threaten you,” she added quickly, patting the tablet’s edge. “But you gotta see from my point of view, okay?”
The emoticon turned into a simpler “(^_^;)” as if acknowledging her point. Master rummaged once more through a drawer, pulling out a second battery and a small cluster of wires. “We can rig this watch to take an external battery pack if it drains too fast. But if you plan to walk all over the bookstore, keep in mind the range might be limited.”
Suzume made a face. “Better than nothing. I’ll keep my phone in a crossbody bag to stay close to the watch. That should help, right?”
“Probably. Let’s just hope Kakashi’s meltdown threshold stays stable. We can’t keep doping him up with fans like we did over the weekend.” Master plopped down, fiddling with the watch’s underside. The iPad beeped more quietly, as if half-listening, half-processing.
In the warm glow of the overhead lamp, the three of them—ex-soldier, bookstore staff, and a borderline-sentient AI—coexisted around a half-finished dinner, half-finished watch hack, and half-finished ideas for solving tomorrow’s fuzzy search demands. Even the tension of earlier days felt softened by a faint camaraderie.
The watch’s screen flickered again:
“Update attempt #2… Searching… beep??”
Suzume’s lips curved into a smirk. She glanced at the iPad. “All right, meltdown maniac, no more IYAAA for a while, yeah? Let’s see if we can get you talkin’ to me from across the store. Or at least from across this giant apartment.”
A single beep, then a text prompt: “Ok… sc… meltdown… no meltdown… beep?? Trying…”
Master quietly sipped from a small cup of lukewarm coffee. “Huh. I didn’t realize you’d grown that attached to your meltdown buddy. Or that determined to fix his meltdown problem. What, do you actually like this AI now?”
Suzume rolled her eyes, though a faint blush crept up her cheeks. “H-hey, it’s not that. I just can’t let it slack off up here while I suffer at the bookstore. Plus, we found a decent alternative that doesn’t risk meltdown too badly, right?”
He let a small grin surface. “Sure, sure. Whatever you say.”
Outside, the city lights twinkled, but up here, the second-floor domain felt like a hidden nook. A place where half the conversation involved beep codes and emoticons on a battered iPad screen. Suzume suppressed a laugh, noticing how the last remnants of the peppery dinner still lingered in the air. She guessed that might fade by morning, replaced by the usual coffee-laced ambiance.
But for now, it was good enough. She had a potential path forward that wouldn’t require her to rummage for hours each day, nor risk forcibly re-installing Kakashi onto that dreaded bookstore terminal. Tomorrow might still hold chaos—but with Master’s “new-ish” military smartwatch plan, at least the chaos might be tempered by some actual help from the AI who’d nearly meltdowned itself out of existence.
She cast one more look at the iPad, saw that it had begun to display a slightly more confident emoticon: (•̀ᴗ•́)و. She snorted a laugh. Where’d an AI pick that one up, anyway?
“All right, big guy,” she murmured, “show me what you got. Let’s fix this meltdown fiasco once and for all.”
And so, the improbable trio set about finalizing their late-night hacking session. Smartwatch cables, iPhone pairing, quick software patches—each small success drew them closer to a meltdown-free collaboration. By the time the clock approached a more advanced hour, the living space was littered with cables, scraps of paper, and an empty saucepan once full of garlicky dinner. Yet in the center of it all, the watch’s display held steady, and the iPad blinked with a quiet, optimistic glow.
Maybe meltdown mania was finally over. Or maybe—knowing their luck—it had just begun in a different shape. Suzume took comfort in the presence of Master’s stoic know-how and the AI’s evolving willingness to try. After all, in a world of pink rabbits, cosmic dogs, and indefinite fuzzy demands, that counted for a lot.
(End of Ep.10)