“Yeah, the one who lives here? That’s what they said before they left.”
“Huh. But what happened to me?”
“Lightman thinks you overheated while working.”
“… I did?”
“Yeah, Fields said that they were walkin’ down the hall, and one of your clients came out and said you passed out. And then Fields came and got me and Berry and we took you back to our room, and I got Tomato to tell Mr. Lightman what happened.”
“… oh.”
“Uh… do you remember like, how you felt?”
“Kind of. It was really warm today, and I just feel really dizzy and yucky, and then I’m here.”
“Ah. You’ll get better soon probably.”
“Yeah. We’re made of magic, right? The magic’s gonna make me feel better again!”
“YEAH!!”
A door is heard swinging open, and someone steps in.
“Oh, Strawberry is awake?”
“Yeah! Hi, Berry.”
“Lightman told me to tell you when you woke up that you could have the rest of the day off.”
“Oh. Thank you.”
“Yeah, bye.”
The door closes, and faint footsteps dissappear down the hall.
A symphony of lunchroom noise is heard. A lot of talking, beeping, and footsteps, with the occasional clacking of a fork or spoon against a plate. The noise, however, begin to fade out, and the talking becomes less jumbled and more focused, leading to only the conversation of one table.
Four voices.
"Is this our table?"
"We're sitting at it."
"So we are."
Noises of eating are heard, along with the aforementioned scraping of utensils against plates. Nothing is said for about a minute.
"Oh, hey--
The noises stop.
"I saw another therapy robot with a glasses setting for a monitor, and it looked neat, so I wanna change my eyes setting to that now. Do you three think that could fit me?"
A rapid half tapping/half thumping noise is heard, interspersed with with alarmed beeps.
"OW, Tomato-"
"Yeah, I think you could do that look."
Golden Delicious makes a huffy noise.
After a second, turning and light clicking noises are heard, before being interrupted.
"Wait, stop, that's the glasses one."
"Ah. Do I look good?"
"Yes."
"Excellent. "
"Oh, I forgot to ask! How did your first sessions go?"
"OH, well first I had a little girl named Au-"
A loud shushing noise interrupts Strawberry, who makes a frightened noise.
"NO, Strawberry, NO, DON'T."
"What? Why not??"
"Because that's confidential."
"It's... what?"
"It means we can't talk about our sessions with our clients, or whatever. I saw it in a booklet I was reading before my client came in."
Silence.
".... Are we allowed to say HOW it went and nothing else?"
"Probably."
"Oh, well in that case it went great! I think I managed not to scare my client!"
"Yeah, I had a good time!"
"Mine was late, but it still went good."
"I had two!"
Suddenly, a fifth voice cuts in.
"Mine went great as well!"
The 777 robots stop talking. The other voice has gone quiet as well.
A few moments of nothing pass, before Partridge speaks up.
"... What room are you guys?"
"We're room 666. We're child therapy robots."
"Huh. Do you have a name?"
A little giggle.
"We all do! I'm Gooseberry, that's Fieldberry, that's Melon, that's Plum, and that's Cloudberry!"
"Oh, I'm Partridgeberry, and this is Strawberry, Tomato, and Golden Delicious."
"Wow! Which of you is the leader?"
"There can be leaders?"
"Yeah! Plum is our leader!"
"Hmm."
"Can I be the leader of our room?"
"No."
"... Isn't Fieldberry like, also a strawberry?"
"Uh huh!"
"That's so cool. I'm a strawberry, too."
"Yeah!"
The two groups keep talking, their voices occasionally overlapping each other. The noises of the rest of the lunchroom start to join in again, overtaking the conversation, until it melds into the sea of conversations once more.
