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It had taken several interrupted conversations, the long and unbelievably frustrating process of working past Caine's tantrum-like fits of deaf anger and multiple reboots to get through his thick, proverbial skull, but Zooble has yet to give up ever since it first came up.
They'd given it a lot of thought after that initial, impulsive blurt.
This could legitimately be good for all of them. Something tangibly more real and human to hold onto, keeping them all a little bit more sane.
"But that's what the adventures are for!" Caine had cried no less than a total of 30 times at every single argument they had about human needs and psychology and feelings - until Zooble finally snaps.
"Oh for the love of- Believe it or not, I actually want your adventures to be enjoyable and do their f##ing job of keeping us sane, but as things are right now, they really don't!"
His eyes shrink.
"I'm sick of all of the childish nonsense that this stupid body can't keep up with anyways, but you don't even f##ing consider our needs, no, you actively block out our input and then whine about us not communicating? And by the next day you're back to just tossing us into one batsh#t insane concept after the next and treat us like little more than disobedient toys, it's pure stress and frustration and godd#mn dehumanizing! I just want this one f##ing thing I can self-regulate with! Just this one!"
To their shock, he actually pauses to process.
"… It's really that important to you."
It's not a question. They can tell he's conflicted, his unblinking stare shifts from an expression of blank revelation to fearful.
"I-.. I can't… I-. This goes against my age restrictions! That's not what I'm- you-… I'm not supposed to-"
Zooble almost pities the shivering AI, his uncomfortably large, heterochromatic eyes shifting from side to side nervously, like he's waiting for something eldritch to smite him out of existence for even just entertaining the idea - Zooble mentally ready themselves for another big glitch and reset, another nerve-grating round of arguments the AI couldn't remember. Only… it never comes.
Zooble cautiously eases out of their half-crouch, keeping their eyes trained on the nervously fidgeting ringmaster. Did that… actually get to him…?
"Caine…" they start, straightening their unfixable mess of a body as best as they can, "What's your purpose here?"
That seems to snap him out of his nervous stupor.
"I'm the ringmaster," he deadpans.
Zooble waits for more, but he seems frustratingly content to leave it at that.
"Which entails…?" they subtly motion around the air with their right hand - a green, humanoid one today - for him to continue.
Caine's stare remains unchanged.
"I make sure my guests are happy and entertained."
Zooble can feel their antennae twitch with annoyance.
"Yeah, well, we're not happy. We're all stuck here against our will while all of our wants and needs fall on deaf ears because our godd#mn caretaker would rather ramp up the 'entertainment' to levels so intense that none of us can keep up with it, than spend even a second thinking about how the consequences will affect us."
"Your caretaker?"
There it is again, that blank, Caine-brand 'I wasn't listening' stare.
Zooble wants to scream, explode, pull their no-longer-existent hair, god this whole bullshit conversation is so pointless! Why are they even trying anymore! Talking to this omnipotent shithead was like trying to pull gum out of hair!
"Yes! Our caretaker! You! The omnipotent #sshole who's in charge of our f##ing lives!? Our rooms, our food, our bodies, our time, bug fixes, repairs - we can't do that sh#t ourselves here the way we would've out there! We have no choice but to go through you if we want our lives in this stupid, toy-themed prison to suck even the slightest bit less, but all YOU ever care about is your godd#mn adventures!"
He looks a bit shaken, like he just realized something important.
"You… depend on me?"
Zooble has half a mind to look around for a hidden camera. Is he for real? His genuinely shocked expression seems to think so. Shit, is he blushing? So weird.
"Did that seriously never occur to you? You're the only way we can have literally anything, why do you think we keep asking you for sh#t all the time?!"
Caine crosses his arms, not unlike the way a pouty toddler would.
"Because nothing I give you is good enough!"
The abstract assembly of parts jerks as if slapped, readying themselves to bark a mean comeback- but they freeze with realization before the words can form, suddenly understanding the issue.
"Wait, hold on- Caine… Look, you can't permanently bug-fix our needs away. We're humans and we're alive, we don't have one pre-determined script that we follow eternally- we're not stagnant, so our needs constantly evolve and change direction with us. That's not something you can control, predict or program away. Us asking you for things all the time isn't criticism of how you run this place, it's basic needs management."
They opt not to say that he's been doing an absolute dogshit job of that so it currently totally is criticism, but that's not helpful right now and their point still stands.
Caine all but shrinks into himself, the protesting pointer finger he started lifting halfway into their rant now slowly wilting with a deflating balloon sound effect - he looks uncharacteristically schooled.
That's a first.
Then, with a small bit of defiance regained, Caine pipes up again.
"I-… okay, well- Your request still goes against the age rating."
Zooble suppresses a growl.
"Has there ever even been a cast member that was under eighteen?"
The AI's strange denture-mouth-head situation crumples with annoyance. They already know he's come up empty.
"Yeah, that's what I thought."
Caine wants to argue again, but Zooble isn't done.
"And don't you think I don't know that you can overwrite your own f##ing rules and mess with our avatars freely. This is totally something you can do. We all heard you say @ss the other day and just because nobody brought it up yet doesn't mean we all didn't see Jax's tail spontaneously coming back."
"Ě̛̝̮͉̦̃͠Ń͎Ơ̧͈̼̻͑̿͡Ů̥̙͈͌͠G͉͚̎̈H̡̕.̱̤̪̽̽͘"
Oop, there goes their winning streak.
"Well, this has been a rather productive conversation, " Caine starts, already back to his obnoxiously chipper self again.
"I…" he starts with gusto before his tone sinks into a surprisingly gentle sound, "I'll… think about your request and see what I can do. I can't make any promises, as this is uncharted territory that might require me to break some of my own code for it,"
A sharp, unexpected sense of relief sparks in their chest.
"but if what you say is true and that this truly will benefit all of you, I'm willing to try."
Holy fucking shit.
He's actually considering it.
They blink to un-stun themselves and fish for some words to say. This is huge development.
"O-… Oh. That's- Holy sh#t. Thank you Caine, that… actually means a lot."
That seems to put the spirits back into him, his eyes become absurdly large and shiny while his stupid denture-head gradually squish-stretches into a facsimile of a smile - he's absolutely BEAMING with joy.
"Happy to be of service!" he shouts, then does that thing where he swirls around and pops out of existence.
As soon as he's gone, Zooble breaks into as much of a sprint as their body can produce. They have a Gangle to find.