Numb (Sollux x Hacker! Reader) 3/4

Numb (Sollux x Hacker! Reader) 3/4

((TW: Poorly thought out Undertale references.))


“You ready, (y/n)?”

“...Are you sure he hasn’t used them yet, Sol?” You asked, looking over at the gold-blood, biting your lip. He hated that nickname with a passion, but after a while he’d gotten used to your name-calling game. You and Sollux had been working on a strategy for 6 months, monitoring Caliborn’s activities through various forms of computer software. He was the world’s most advanced hacker. Despite being ignorant and a bastard most of the time, he was very, very good at learning things quickly, which made him especially good at what he did.

You had hacked into his server a couple of months ago so you could see whether or not he was, in fact, the one who stole Sollux’s codes. It was fairly easy, considering that you didn’t have to engage his skills to simply look at some files, not steal them. Sure enough, they were all there. You had a feeling Caliborn had let you get through his firewall, though. It was too easy. Either that, or he didn't care what you saw. The worst case scenario was that he was expecting everything that you and Sollux were going to throw at him. The best strategy you could come up with was attacking him with all of your best codes at one time, hopefully when he was the slightest bit vulnerable. Sollux looked at you, his blue and red eyes shining from behind his similarly bi-colored glasses. His expression remained serious at first, but he easily sensed your apprehension and nervousness and proceeded to give you a wide grin.

“I’m thure. Believe me, you’d know if he uthed them.” He stated confidently, ruffling your (h/l), (h/c) hair. You frowned at his actions but felt relieved anyway. The both of you were stationed at two laptops next to each other in Sollux’s room, or, as he liked to call it, his respite block. ‘Today really is the day, isn’t it?’ You thought. Your feelings confused you. You’d never been anxious about a hacking job before. It’d always been easy – almost trivial and tedious for you. There was nothing for you to worry about. So why were you so nervous? Your heart was pounding hard and your palms were borderline sweating. It didn’t make any sense and the mystery of it frustrated you to absolutely no end.

You felt your cheeks heat up as Sollux shifted closer to you. He placed a grey hand on the back of your chair, using his other to reach over you so he could grab one of the headsets he had laid out. He had equipped the help of another fellow hacker prodigy. Her name was Roxy and the both of you needed to be able to communicate with her during the process.

‘D*mmit...’ You thought, chastising your heart as its beating sped up, a reaction to the warmth radiating off of him from his closeness. You’d been noticing things about him more and more. It was the longest time you’d spent with a person that actually showed interest in getting to know you, and he’d begun to make you nervous in a way that you couldn’t quite describe.

You watched him out of the corner of your eye as he retracted his person from yours. He was fixing the headset onto his head with his slender fingers in such a way that it didn’t get caught on his dual horns. He was absentmindedly staring at the blank screen, gripping the hem of a black T-shirt with the Gemini symbol etched into the fabric. You’d noticed that it was a habit he couldn’t help but exhibit when he was anxious. A lot was riding on hacking into Caliborn’s firewall, so you understood why.

“Well, I’m ready now, Sollux. We’ve got it all planned out, so nothing can go wrong, right?” You asked, trying to reassure him in a roundabout way. He didn’t accept it when you tried to be worried about him. He always denied the feelings that could paint him as vulnerable or emotional, so instead of confronting those feelings directly, you’d learned to remind him that everything should be fine. It always sparked his confidence, especially when you asked or reminded him in such a way that suggested you were the worried one, not the moody Captor. His bi-colored gaze snapped up to meet your (e/c) one, and after a blank expression, he smiled. Genuinely smiled. Your cheeks gained a dusted blush as you stared. His smile was beautiful. You’d never been fortunate enough to witness anyone smile like that. Not at you. You saw the peaks of his canines before he looked back at the screen of his laptop.

“Yeah. Everything’th gonna go thmoothly.” He reassured both himself and you, his grip on the hem of his shirt lessening. His eyes took on a new brightness, his eyebrows furrowing. The thought of being a few commands away from victory had filled him with determination.

“Let’th kick thith guy’th athth.”


~Timethkip (Quit making fun of my lithp!) Nah.~


You and Sollux had worked late into the night. There were probably some hackers that would have had bottles of soda and empty bags of chips strewn around their desks. H*ll, even Roxy had bottles of vodka around, from what you could hear. But no... The both of you worked in near silence, completely focused on the task at hand. You and Sollux were more similar than you gave credit for. Though Sollux was far more attentive than you were, he was still pretty neglectful towards his own self. And though he was more social than you were, he still tended to shut people out. You didn’t understand why, but you had a good feeling that it had to do with the game he and his friends played before they came to Earth for good.

You were getting bored again. Caliborn was supposed to be one of those people who was easily provoked, but so far you had seen absolutely no activity coming from his server. It kind of ticked you off, because you’d met him a few times, and he was a real gullible bastard. You didn’t understand why he hadn’t engaged you, Sollux, or Roxy’s servers yet. The three of you had decided to use the strategy you used to hack into Sollux’s laptop, considering how well it had worked last time.

After a few more hours of simply waiting, you finally got your first signs of life. A message.

<IF YOU REALLY WISH TO DRIVE ME, ABSOLUTELY MAD, WITH YOUR FOOLISH PESTERING. I SUPPOSE I CAN GRACE YOUR SH*TTY DISGUSTING SERVERS. WITH MY AMAZING SKILLS.>

You nearly sneered, and Sollux wasted no time in doing exactly that. Roxy was snorting. ‘He really thinks he’s hot stuff, doesn’t he?’ You thought.

“Letz find owr if his “amzing skllz” are rlly sooooo amazning...” Roxy trailed off, sending him a message in her own horrendous pink text.

<id lik 2 c u try, ya dirtty sistr killr. >

Roxy had a bone to pick (ba dum tsss!) with Caliborn, which was the main reason Sollux was able to convince her to join your little team. Caliborn was a cherub, which meant that he once had a ‘female’ counterpart. Her name was Calliope, and she was very close to Roxy. Until Caliborn was able to figure out a way to bring his sister to her demise on their dream base, Prospit. Roxy had been itching for revenge ever since.

<F*CK THAT, WEAK PRETENTIOUS B*TCH. YOU SHOULD BE HAPPY. I ENDED HER SAD DESPICABLE EXISTENCE. I AM A GREAT BROTHER AREN’T I? I PITIED HER DISGUSTING NATURE. SO I PUT HER OUT OF HER MISERY! AHAHAHAHAHA!!!! I’M THE BEST!>

With that last bit of angry text, you glowered at the screen in front of you. You had no family, and he willingly chose to get rid of his. Even considering the circumstances of his situation and culture, it was something you couldn’t accept. You looked at Sollux, barely able to suppress the dark glint emanating from your (e/c) eyes. You wanted to get this over with, and as his honeyed eyes met yours, he understood this. He began speaking to Roxy, giving her different codes to run against his system. You hadn’t been listening to the conversation over the sound of your blood rushing past your ears, practically boiling. Who did he think he was?! You felt more disgust, building up inside of you, completely repulsed by the entirety of his being.

You had two choices here. Unbeknownst to the yellow-blooded troll next to you, you’d been working on a code that would completely obliterate any and all files on anyone’s computer, effectively enacting a virus that would shut technology down for five minutes before opening up with a countdown. This countdown gave the person 30 seconds to clear the area before the laptop blew up, destroying anything within a five-yard radius. It couldn’t be countered, and it would take effect immediately, once sent. You could send it. It was literally just a couple of commands away. Or... You could stick with the plan that you’d spent so much time working on with Sollux.

You looked over at him. He didn’t notice you, as he spoke directly into his microphone with his eyebrows furrowed in concentration, gesturing wildly to his screen. His jawline was slender, h*ll, everything about him was slender. His black, cropped hair was a soft mess, as usual. His voice was soothing, reassuring, even though he wasn’t talking to you. It amazed you, how he was able to effect you to the point of distraction, to the point of feeling something. He was different from anyone you’d ever met. You couldn’t say that he cared about you... No. You didn't know what he thought about you. But if anything, at least he acted like he did, in his own sort of way. There were days that he seemed to know exactly how you were feeling, even when you didn’t. Sollux wasn’t boring. He was an endless maze, and you kept getting caught up trying to figure him out.

You looked away. You couldn’t send that code. It was completely against the plan, and Sollux wanted his codes returned, not destroyed. Not only that, but somehow, you didn’t want to do it without asking him. Maybe Caliborn deserved it... But you couldn’t bring yourself to tap those keys. Your boiling blood began to cool down, the anger in your system subtly making its way out.

“(Y/n), now’th your cue!” Sollux’s voice brought you completely back. That’s right. You still had a job to do. An important one, for someone that you - much to your dismay and fear - had come to care about. In a swift motion, your fingers were deftly pressing keys left and right, sending your least effective codes first, saving more advanced and complex ones for later. Roxy and Sollux were both working just as hard as you to get this job done.

After a while, it became evident that Caliborn was having a bit of a hard time handling so many codes at once, considering how they were coming from three separate servers and all at once. His commands became sloppier while your group’s only became more resolute. He was getting impatient and, probably much like you with Sollux’s computer, bored. You figured it wouldn’t be long before he cracked under the weight of his own need to save his pride and give in. This was something the three of you had anticipated. Caliborn wasn’t one to accept defeat, nor did he want to make it appear as though he had given up in any way, though that was exactly what he was going to do.

<UGH. I SWEAR TO F*CK. YOU THREE, ARE ABOUT AS F*CKING BOTHERSOME. AS IT GETS. I’LL LET YOU HAVE, YOUR SH*TTY CODES BACK. I DON’T REALLY EVEN NEED THEM. ANYWAY. BECAUSE I AM A GOD! AND I CAN GET, WHATEVER THE H*LL, I WANT, BY MY OWN ACCORD. HAH!>

With those last words from the cherub, his firewall deactivated just long enough for Sollux to go in and extract the files from his server. You let out the breath that you didn’t even know you were holding. Sollux looked like he didn’t believe what just happened, and you couldn't blame him. Caliborn was someone of whom his every move was predictable and yet so unexpected that it almost seemed like it was too good to be true. You buried your face in your hands, breathing heavily and trying to organize your thoughts. You couldn't hear anything, not even the sound of Roxy cheering into your ears that you had succeeded. You exhaled... And a thought came to you. It was something that you had never considered... And yet it was obvious that you couldn't believe you didn't regard it earlier. Your eyes widened.

‘It’s over. It’s all over.’ You really couldn’t believe you’d never thought of it before. Sollux really was just like everyone else. Your eyes dulled. He’d leave. He only needed you to get those stupid codes back, after all. How could you be so idiotic? How could you let yourself be deceived? You got up, your (h/c), (h/l) hair creating shadows to hide your hurt expression. ‘You idiot. You didn’t see this coming? God...’

“(Y-Y/n)? What're you doing?” You looked over at the owner of the voice.

“You got what you wanted, right? You don’t need me anymore.” You spoke quietly. Strange, how words from your own mouth could cause pain inside of you that you had never experienced. How could you let him affect you like this? The questions, the self-derogatory comments, the pain, it all just kept coming and it wouldn’t go away. You couldn’t even look at him. Suddenly, everything seemed darker again. Grey and lonely, just as it had always been. Just as you were used to. Shadows covered everything. Numb. You'd reverted back to those feelings.

“W-Well, I wouldn’t thay-” He began, but even hearing his voice hurt you, somehow. God, he was still affecting you. You didn't care to know how, or why. You didn't care. You didn't care! It didn't matter! How out of routine had you gotten that you could let go of everything that you'd deemed as right? You thought you only viewed him as interesting! 'What the h*ll is wrong with you?!' Your eyes burned, stinging with the tears that you didn’t want to let fall... But for once, you couldn't stop them.

“I’ll leave. Goodbye, Sollux. I hope you’re satisfied.” And with those words, you left, silent tears leaving their first trails down your cheeks.