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After the morning band rehearsal The Spine decided it was such a nice day he’d go for a walk out on the grounds of the Manor. He took the long way around to get to the outer wall, then walked the path along the inside. It was a happy walk, long strides, his arms swinging, a smile on his face. He was hoping he might see one of his young dragon friends but knew that was not likely now that they were near full grown. Still, he could hope.
He went to what he considered to be "his garden" in one of the back alcoves of the Manor. He climbed the steps up into the gazebo, surprised to find Marshmallow, Peter's big white cat, curled up in the sun. He sat for a while on the stone bench, patting the huge cat, listening to the leaves rustle in the light breeze and the birds singing in the nearby trees. It certainly was a beautiful autumn day. After some time sitting there in the sun, he sighed and giving Marshmallow a final scratch under the chin, decided to head back inside. No one was in the hallways as he made his way to no real destination in particular. It was probably dinner time for all the humans in the Manor, he thought. That would explain the empty hallways.
Along the way, one of the roombas appeared out of one of the doorways, having finished their job of cleaning the floors in that room. They smiled widely on seeing The Spine, eyes squinting in mirth. A series of beeps brought three more roombas from nearby rooms. These were all smaller versions of the much larger one at The Spine’s feet.
“Roombella!” The Spine knelt down and patted the roomba’s back. They purred with delight. “And all your little ones! They’ve grown so big!” The Spine reached out to pat the smallest of the bots but they backed up warily, eyes filled with fear at the big silver being reaching out as if to grab them. Some chiding beeps from mom brought the small bots in closer, except for the frightened one. But when The Spine began to pat the others gently, the smallest, not wanting to miss out bumped repeatedly against The Spine’s boot. “I won’t forget to pat you little one,” he reached down and gave them a quick scritch on the back before patting them too as if they were a kitten.
Roombella beeped again and rolled back and forth. Time to get back to work. Chirping and beeping, the four roombas rolled off into the growing dimness of the far hallway to continue the never-ending work of vacuuming the Manor. The Spine watched them go, waving, a bemused smile on his face. With a whining of servos he rose to continue his walk.
It was getting on toward dusk and the hallways were becoming darker, the rooms off to left and right not quite as dark if they had windows to the outside, completely dark if they did not. The Spine walked along, maybe heading back to the music room, or maybe to his own room, he didn’t know yet, but as he was walking along he stopped. Suddenly. Something had caught his attention. He walked backwards in reverse a couple steps. Warily he peered back around the doorjamb of a room. There was a single light over one table. There were four chairs around the table, four bowls set one to each chair. In the center of the table was a big plastic bag that shone brightly in the light from the lamp above. And a deck of cards. This was puzzling.
The Spine looked to his left and to his right. No one was in the hallway in either direction. He listened but there were no voices or footsteps nearby. He took one giant step into the room. Then another, sidling up to the table. He bent over stiffly to look at the bag on the table. “Hmm…. Ha-ree-bow berries,” he read aloud. “I wonder what these are?” They were red and black, which appealed to him very much, no idea why, little red and black cones covered in shiny round beads.
“Crunchy and chewy it says here on the bag. Ah, they must be some kind of human food.” He picked up the bag. “Heavy,” he said. “Five pounds in one bag?” He turned the bag over. “Ingredients. Sugar, yes, humans love sugar. And glucose syrup? That seems a bit redundant. Hmm yup, chemical colorants and…and…seaweed? They eat seaweed? More chemicals and…furniture polish? Wait and more wax? This can’t be good for them.” He set the bag down and looked at it skeptically. “I don’t know about this.” He picked the bag up again and looked it all over. “Kids and grown-ups love it so…well, okay, then.” He set it down on the table and stood there staring at it. On impulse he picked it up and tore it open.
“Robots don’t eat,” he told himself as he selected three of the bright red berries from the top of the bag and tossed them into his mouth. He brought his teeth together on the small candies. The tiny round beads popped between his teeth in a most satisfying manner as he ground them together. “These are pretty fun.” He grabbed another handful, selecting only the red ones and began chewing them up. A look of realization crossed his face as his chewing slowed. Now he had a mouthful of gooey sugary jelly. He couldn’t swallow it, that would gum up his gears or worse, get in his boiler and that would be a real mess. He looked around then quickly grabbed a bowl, spewing the remains of the candy into it, a chewed up jelly gob studded with the occasional red bead. “Ha. Yeah. Robots don’t eat…” He put the bowl down and turned to leave but stopped at the door. He looked longingly back over his shoulder at the bag. With a pained look on his face, he turned back to the table and picked up the bag. He scooped out another large handful, picking out just the red ones. “But they are so fun to pop.” He chewed up that handful, then another, then some more until there was a bowl of red goo and a bag only half full of black berries on the table. He didn’t realize what he was doing but he was having so much fun doing it, he methodically chewed up all the black ones as well, putting the masticated mess into a second bowl.
As he was chewing up the last handful, The Spine heard voices out in the hallway. It sounded like Chelsea, and Rabbit, and Camille, and maybe Mark, the newest Walter Worker. He heard the voice he thought was Mark say, “I am so gonna own all your raspberries. I am a really gooood poker play…er.” Mark stopped dead in the doorway on seeing The Spine.
The Spine looked up, eyes wide caught in mid-spit of the last handful of berries.
“SPINE!” the three humans yelled in unison. Rabbit was laughing. “Bro that is just gross, man, really gross.”
The Spine stood sheepishly holding the bowl of goo, looking down into it then up at the irate humans in front of him. Boy, was he going to catch it now. This was something Rabbit would do, never The Spine. His shoulders sagged as he locked eyes with Chelsea. He slowly put the bowl onto the table behind him.
Chelsea sighed. “Just what I wanted to be doing on a Friday night. Cleaning The Spine’s teeth.” She looked haplessly at Camille.
Camille shook her head. “Nope, he’s your charge. He’s all yours.”
The Spine had a sudden look of panic on his face. A cleaning? In his mouth? No, not that. He stammered, “But, but Chelsea, robots don’t eat. I didn’t swallow any of it, I swear. Nothing to clean here. See!” He opened his mouth wide, actually disturbingly wide, being a robot with a hinged jaw. Bits of red and black gooey candy clung to his human-like teeth.
Rabbit was still chortling with glee in the background. For once, she wasn’t the one getting in trouble.
“Ya, Spine. Nice try. Come on.” Chelsea took his arm. He didn’t quite plant his feet but at first he didn’t move at her tug. “Come on Spine.”
“Where…where are we going?”
“To the lab. We’re gonna get the Cavitron fired up and powerwash that gunk out.”
The Spine’s left eye began to twitch and the plates of his face shifted into an expression of abject horror. “Nnnoo! Not…not the Cavitron!”
Chelsea pulled his arm and he took a step with her. “Yes the Cavitron, and I’m not going to power you down to do it either.”
Now both of The Spine’s eyes really began to twitch. As he left the room with Chelsea, he could be heard whining, “Please Chelsea, please say you’ll shut me down. That…that thing makes a sound that hurts my ears! So high-pitched so….aaaah! Please Chelsea? Don’t be mean…?”
They couldn’t hear her reply as Rabbit laughed out loud. “I am so not gonna miss this. Not for a minute. I hope Chelsea doesn’t power him down, this is gonna be fun!” She skittered out of the room, her cackle trailing off as she followed Chelsea and The Spine down the stairs.
Mark and Camille looked after them for a moment then looked to each other.
“Well now what are we going to do?” Camille asked. Our poker game is kind of…” She looked into a bowl. “Ew….”
Mark looked into the bowls too, some red goo, some black goo. His eyes lit up. “Hey Camille.” He picked up a bowl. "Robots don’t have ‘spit.’ This is just blenderized raspberries. We can still eat them.”
Camille looked up into his face momentarily repulsed, but then a smile slowly spread across her own. “You know what? You’re right!” Grabbing up a bowl herself she said, “But I need a spoon for mine. Let’s go look down in the staff kitchen.”
Laughing together, they headed out the door.