Curse of the High Tide

[The Vision]

Flashbacks are in italics.

Vision stared at the completed Octobot in front of him as Skynet gloated inside his programming.

ooHh the DESTRUCTiiiiiON iWiLL caaaauuuuse
Going-ing-ing-ing 2 be SOOOO beuaitiful

"You mentioned a problem?" Toriel muttered.

The Vision was rearranging some wires inside the core. Without looking up, he replied.

"Yes. My programming has detected that Skynet intends to betray the agreement we had made."

"We know that."

"Affirmative. I now know how he intends to do so."

"You sure about this?"

Vision glanced at Toriel, who was watching the robot warily.

"The alternative is swimming," the android replied.

The Octobot had been placed on the other side of Avengers Island, far from the tower, so as to avoid collateral damage. It was one of the few issues which Skynet ceded to the Vision. Both parties were exhausted after the hundreds of terabytes of revisions they had made to the Octobot's design, adding and removing weaknesses and advantages to the structure. The final result was a spheroid core with five legs (the sixth was removed and added until its joints were welded stiff), each leg a randomized amalgam of rubber and steel. The rather strange mechanism's branches were planted in the warm morning sand. The monstrous robot was four meters tall and entirely steel-grey.

we11$10377???
Plug me [input]

"Skynet intends to incorporate my body into the Octobot and use my more advanced abilities for himself."

"And what happens to you?"

"Oh, he deletes me, of course."

The Vision tentatively reached his hand out, tendril-like wires reaching out into the various ports.

> install Skynet.cpu

The core hissed as hatch doors opened, revealing the complex wires and gears inside the spheroid. With his other hand, the Vision placed the coin in a small indent inside the core.

> print("As we agreed.")
As we agreed.

Skynet finished installing into the Octobot. Skynet used the speakers inside the Octobot to simulate a voice.

"Ah, yes. The coin. I have a surprise for you."

"It will attempt to trap my body inside the shell, and the coin will not affect it in the slightest, for the Octobot is not humanoid. Then Skynet will rampage across the Omniverse in its technologically advanced shell."

Toriel sighed. "That's quite a few problems, Vision. How do we stop him?"

"We don't," the android smiled, "because Skynet has made a mistake."

The Vision struggled as Skynet latched onto his body, dragging it slowly inside the shell.

"You should not have trusted me," Skynet gloated through the Vision's mouth.

The Vision managed to wrench his right arm from the core.

"On the contrary, I am glad I trusted you," the android said, "Trusted you to make the mistake you are making now."

The Octobot suddenly stopped its movements.

"What mistake?"

> run opticalheatemission.att

The Vision burned the wires binding him to the Octobot and rolled away, taking advantage of Skynet's confusion.

"Skynet is a superior operating system than my own. I knew I could not directly resist his programming. So I simply misdirected his code into making a mistake."

"What's the mistake?"

Vision gazed at the inside of the core. "He has accidentally made himself humanoid."

"HOW?" the AI howled inside the Octobot, "HOW AM I HUMANOID?"

The Vision dodged, letting one of the tentacles slam into the sand beside him.

"You wanted to fit my body inside your core," the Vision said, "while conserving space inside the core. So you created an exact outline of my body inside you."

The Vision blasted another beam of heat, searing Skynet's shell.

"And the central command cortex is that humanoid outline. In other words, your most essential shape... is humanoid. Humanoid by omission, so to speak."

Skynet howled in rage.

"But that is no matter. This form is still superior to your own. I will crush into nothingness, then I will go for a swim!"

"Affirmative," Vision smiled, "I believe you WILL go for a swim. Toriel?"

Toriel was many meters away, conducting some sort of magical ritual.

"What is born in the sea must return to the sea.
Dagon, in the name of your son, receive this subject."

Skynet chuckled. "Oh. Your final weapon is a shamanistic ritual?"

The Octobot's tentacles prepared to crush Toriel.

"Stupid cow woman. You die, inferior insect."

The tentacles lunged, stopping inches away from Toriel's face.

Two streams of water had lashed out from the ocean behind the Octobot. They had latched onto the Octobot's legs, pulling them back.

Skynet stammered, "W-what?"

Toriel grinned. "Enjoy your swim."

As the Octobot got pulled into the tide, Skynet screamed, "Stupid ritual! I do not belong to the sea!"

Vision hovered near the Octobot's visual sensors.

"Query," Vision grinned, "Where else are octopodes born?"

Skynet screamed one last time as a giant tidal wave washed the Octobot into the sea. A swirling horizontal whirlpool sucked in the Octobot's tentacles, the core bouncing on the sand as the robot sank. When the Octobot submerged, the aquatic storm disappeared as suddenly as it appeared. The sand, which should have been drenched by the waterworks, remained dry. The only evidence of the whirlpool was Vision's recording of the incident and the lone gold coin on the shore.

Covering his hand with his cape, the Vision tentatively lifted the coin from the sand and held it near his ear. "LET ME OUUUT" Skynet screamed inside the coin.

"That is unexpected," Vision commented.

Toriel approached him. "What is?"

"Skynet is trapped inside the coin, it seems. I do not understand why. It is illogical."

Toriel smirked. "Vision, it's magic. Of course it's illogical."

Suddenly, the whirlpool returned with a vengeance, swirling upwards into the air. The seawater twisted into the shape of a bearded face, its expression furious.

"I have fulfilled your request, mortals," the face boomed, "Where is my son?"

Toriel raised her eyebrows.

"Dagon?" she mumbled incredulously.

The Vision flinched. "I... I admit that I did not know you were real."

"WHERE IS DAGUSEN?" Dagon roared. Salt water sprayed over the pair furiously.

Vision and Toriel glanced at each other nervously.

Vision finally said, "One of our associates are currently researching his whereabouts-"

"You do not know where my son is," Dagon snarled, "But you dare use his name to summon me?"

The sea around them seemed to boil as more tendrils rose from the tide, ready to skewer them.

"You fed me lies and false hope and thought there would be no consequences?" Dagon roared, "I am Dagon! King of the Tides! I will drown you in your treachery!"

> call "Frisk"

"Frisk?" Vision said, "Urgent attention required. Frisk, come in, Frisk."