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Vox lay on his back on the couch, utterly motionless—with one exception. On his darkened screen, the bright blue-and-scarlet VoxTech logo tracked steadily towards the right-hand corner—then bounced, bounced again, and resumed its steady pace in a new direction.
Velvette white-knuckled her phone; Valentino hissed in displeasure, and she shushed him.
The logo zig-zagged from one edge to another, torturously slow. The logo rebounded off the bottom of Vox’s screen, then the top, then the bottom again, soundless and inexorable. The logo bounced a neat triangle around the bottom-left corner, then made its steady way over to the top-right corner and did the same thing.
“You’re killing me, baby,” said Valentino, breathless; he was perched halfway over the couch, braced by three arms. His sole remaining antenna was drooped precariously over the sleeping Vox, and one of his hands was wandering beneath his wing-coat. He was probably jerking off—scratch that, he was definitely jerking off.
Without moving her vPhone, Velvette punched him in the ribs, and he folded like a damp towel. Wordlessly, she gestured, and he scowled back, she gestured again but more furiously, and he finally retreated—though not without a sour look in her direction. Velvette ignored him utterly.
Vox did not stir. His chest did not rise or fall—he was a dead man, after all—but in the quiet room Velvette could hear his cooling fans whirring softly. The logo bounced again, imperfectly. In the dim room, it seemed brighter than ever.
Velvette checked her livestream, and readjusted slightly to keep Vox in view (and Valentino out). A steady stream of <3 and :0 were bubbling up from her followers, fluttering over the image of Vox’s unconscious figure like stupid butterflies. When the logo approached a corner, these transmuted into intense !!! bursts !! of !!! exclamation !!!! marks, but when the logo rebounded imperfectly—yet again —these were replaced in turn with a chorus of :( and >:(.
Velvette bit her tongue, and waited. Valentino whimpered like a kicked dog.
The logo drew out another triangular path on Vox’s screen, hit the bottom, then bounced—directly towards the top-left corner. It seemed like the perfect path, it always did, but as the logo drew nearer and nearer it did not waver. It was on course, Velvette realised. This was it!
Valentino grabbed her, and she grabbed him; exclamation marks peppered her vision.
The logo stuttered closer, closer, closer—and then, with a soundless wink, it hit the corner head-on.
Velvette roared, Valentino shrieked, and every light in the building simultaneously turned on and shattered in a hail of glass and electric-blue energy as Vox bolted upright, screensaver dismissed in favour of his angry face—which was, in Velvette’s undeniably true and superior opinion, a dreadful downgrade.
“WHAT THE FUCK?” roared Vox, relatively calmly.
“Thanks, babe!” said Velvette, ending the livestream with a tap. “We’re trending, it’s huge, you’re welcome.”
“Oh, babe,” Valentino gasped at the same time, then groaned long and loud as he collapsed over the couch in a pile of arms and wings. “You can’t edge me like that, Voxxy,” he said, panting between clauses. “Nothing but edging...” pant “For three hours, babe!” pant “Why would you do this to me?” pant “So perfect... hit that corner just right.”
Yeah, he was definitely jerking off. Velvette curled her lip in his direction. “I’ll leave you to it,” she said, and hopped off the end of the couch before either of them could regain their composure. “Bye.”
“Wait—” said Vox, his face cycling through ‘confused’ and ‘affronted’, “What—” but she was already gone.
As the door swung shut behind her, she checked the views—34 million already, but by the end of the week the replays would net them another hundred, easy. Behind her, Vox and Valentino’s raised voices settled into a familiar ambiance, and Velvette hummed along, pleased. All in a good day’s work.