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“YOU KNOW I HATE ORGANIC LIFE. WHY ARE WE HERE AGAIN?” WX-78 asks aloud, not bothering to lower their voice despite the groups of people around them.
“It’s a couple’s thing, WX! Come on,” Wilson says, pulling WX-78’s hand entwined in his towards the entrance of a pumpkin patch. From afar, they can make out the farm’s title written across the archway in cheery, blocky letters.
‘Autumn Acres,’ it reads.
What a load of bullshit.
“ARE WE REALLY GOING TO SPEND FIFTEEN DOLLARS ON DECORATIVE GOURDS? SURELY YOU KNOW THEY WILL DO NOTHING BUT ROT AND STINK,” They say, doing nothing to conceal their annoyance.
“Just give it a chance, will you?” Wilson asks, flashing WX-78 a pleading look. “We’re already here, anyway. We might as well stay.”
WX-78 opens their mouth to protest, but Wilson stops walking and looks them in the eyes.
“Please?”
They frown.
“FINE. BUT JUST KNOW I AM NOT DOING THIS OF MY OWN VOLITION,” they grumble. Wilson breaks into a grin and squeezes their hand once in excitement. They continue the walk towards the patch and nearly reach the entrance.
“Think of it this way: when we get home, we get to remove their organs and carve into their flesh,” Wilson says, and a nearby mother looks at him incredulously and hurries their child away from the pair.
“HM. I SUPPOSE THAT IS A REDEEMING QUALITY,” WX-78 says.
A table awaits them at the front of the patch, and a friendly woman in overalls and braided pigtails greets them. The cloth sign hanging in front of the table reads the word ‘tickets’ in a large, orange font.
“Hi! Will it just be one each?” She asks, looking at their intertwined hands.
Wilson nods at her, reaching into his pocket to fish out his wallet.
“Okay. Tickets are seven each, so your total will be fourteen dollars.”
“Do you take card?” Wilson asks, and he feels WX-78 grab his arm.
“YOU ARE BROKE. I WILL COVER THIS,” they say, pulling their own wallet out of the pocket of the small backpack they wear.
“It’s just fourteen dollars, WX. I’ll hardly go bankrupt from–”
“YOU HAVE FIFTY-SIX DOLLARS IN YOUR BANK ACCOUNT,” WX-78 says, and Wilson flushes.
“Yeah, but I get paid–”
“Um,” the woman sitting behind the table interrupts awkwardly. “We take cash only. Sorry,” she says, looking between the pair.
“HA! I know you don’t keep cash on you,” Wilson says triumphantly, batting their arm away. He pulls some cash out of his wallet and hands it to her.
WX-78 seethes silently, staring at Wilson as if they could light him on fire if they concentrated their anger enough.
“Have fun!” The woman says, and both of them walk into the pumpkin patch.
WX-78 observes the field in front of them. It’s filled with hundreds of pumpkins, all varying in hues of orange and size. They look across the horizon and see that this is an egregiously large field filled with nothing but pumpkins. They can see a stereotypical red barn in the distance sometime after the patch ends. The crisp autumn air smells faintly of manure, and they’d have wrinkled their nose if they had one.
“I HATE FARMS,” they say, most certainly not sulking over their earlier loss of dominance. “I’M ONLY DOING THIS BECAUSE WE GET TO KILL THEM LATER.”
“Well, technically, they’re killed as soon as they’re removed from the vine–”
“DO NOT RUIN THIS FOR ME,” WX-78 says, and Wilson chuckles to himself.
And so, they start looking for pumpkins.
Wilson walks down the first row he finds.
“Aw, look at this one!” He exclaims, pointing to a grotesquely misshapen pumpkin. Its left side must be nearly double the height of the right side.
“IT IS AN UGLY FREAK OF NATURE. IT SEEMS YOUR DECISION-MAKING SKILLS ARE IMPAIRED” WX-78 sneers.
“You think all of nature is ugly. Why don’t you pick one that you like, then?” Wilson bites back.
“I WILL CERTAINLY PICK A BETTER ONE THAN THAT,” they say. “I DO NOT LIKE ANY OF THEM.”
WX-78 walks up and down several rows of the pumpkin patch with Wilson in tow, intently observing the pumpkins.
They find some that are a good shape, but their colors are uneven or dull. Some of them are fine in color and shape, but their stem is broken off too early or is misshapen. They walk through each row slowly and carefully, observing each of its inhabitants.
“Hm. I rather like this one,” Wilson says, and he picks up a small and misshapen pumpkin, looking at it fondly. “It’s gourd-geous.”
WX-78 rolls their eyes.
“Get it? Gourd-geous? Because, you know–”
“I AM WELL AWARE. EXPLAINING YOUR PUNS DOES NOT MAKE THEM ANY LESS AWFUL,” they say.
WX-78 looks up at the abomination in Wilson’s arms again, and they notice goosebumps on his forearms where he holds the pumpkin against himself. Upon closer inspection, they see the man faintly shivering.
“COLD?” They ask teasingly.
Wilson blinks at them for a second before shrugging. “I didn’t bring a jacket. Didn’t think it’d be so chilly out here,” he says, this time with a bit of an exaggerated shiver.
“..IT IS SIXTY-SIX DEGREES,” they say.
“Huh,” Wilson says. He shrugs again. “Guess it’s just the breeze, then,” he says, and cradles the pumpkin a little closer to his chest.
WX-78 continues to walk the rows of pumpkins, picking out potential contenders for their pumpkin and storing them in their memory drive carefully. Wilson follows them all the while, holding that stupid-looking pumpkin to his chest.
“Could you please hurry up and pick one already? I’m cold,” Wilson asks softly from behind them after about ten minutes. He punctuates the statement with a pathetic-sounding sniff, and WX-78 isn’t sure if it’s a manipulation tactic or not.
If it is, it doesn’t work.
WX-78 takes their loose hoodie off and throws it at him abruptly, and he’s so caught off guard that he nearly drops the pumpkin on the ground. He catches it in one hand.
“PREPARE TO WAIT, FLESHLING. MY PUMPKIN MINION NEEDS TO BE PERFECT,” they say, and they watch as Wilson sets the pumpkin down on the ground and puts on their hoodie.
The hoodie that is loose on them, which hangs below their waist and provides ample arm room, is nearly too small on the taller man. The sleeves come down to just above his wrist, and he has to pull the collar down so the hoodie will come down to his waist. Even so, WX-78 sees him relax into it a little bit.
They turn back around to continue their search for their pumpkin, but not before seeing Wilson hold his arms to his chest carefully, as if he were cradling the fabric he’d just put on.
Hmph. Humans and their sentimentality.
WX-78 continues to search. Wilson, ever helpful, points out some pumpkins that he seems to think look nice enough for them. WX-78 decides not to go on a tirade about how much more powerful their processor is than his human brain, that anything he picked would be inherently less superior than what they could pick because they could analyze the pumpkins at a far faster speed than he could ever comprehend anything. They figure it'd probably sour the mood.
Occasionally, they hear a sniffle or two from behind them from their cold partner. WX-78 shoots him glances every now and then, just to make sure he’s not actually freezing, but their focus is on finding whichever of these organics is up to even a fraction of their standards.
They’re so focused on intently observing the next row of pumpkins, having looked at dozens of them at this point, that they almost don’t hear the muffled sneezes from behind them.
“Excuse me,” Wilson mutters, from behind them after the third one, seemingly to himself, and they turn around to find him rubbing the top of his nose on the sleeve of their hoodie.
“YOU BETTER NOT GET YOUR SNOT ON THAT,” they say harshly, but soften their gaze upon seeing the redness of his nose and cheeks when he lowers the sleeve.
“Sorry,” he says, voice taking on a slightly congested tone. He sniffs. “I don’t quite know where that came from.”
“GROSS.”
WX-78 goes back to searching. It’s beginning to look like they’d be here for hours before they could find a suitable pumpkin. It’s been an exceptionally long time already, and they’ve looked at probably over a hundred pumpkins.
Just when they’re considering giving up so they don’t waste any more of their time on this pointless endeavor, they spot it. The perfect pumpkin. They intensely focus their gaze on it, and they hurriedly walk towards it to make sure their calculations are correct.
As soon as they’re done double checking that it meets the parameters they’ve set, out of nowhere comes a little girl, no older than five. She picks up that exact pumpkin with both hands, seemingly struggling to get a grip on it. She hefts it up to her chest.
“I like this one, mommy!” She says, and her mother next to her nods with a smile. They start to walk back towards the entrance of the pumpkin patch.
WX-78 sees red. They let out a noise close to a growl, grinding their teeth as they walk towards the family. They’re ready to fight for their perfect pumpkin. Suddenly, they feel Wilson’s hand on their wrist. It seems he’d figured out their intent.
“Can’t you just pick a different one?” He asks. They turn around to lay into him. How could he be so calm when they’ve spent a half hour searching for that pumpkin, just to have it ripped from them in front of their face?! He gets to have the pumpkin he wants. They see it tucked nicely into his arm, held against the front of their own hoodie.
“HAVEN’T YOU–” they start, but then pause upon noticing the look on his face. His brows are pinched in a somewhat uncomfortable, worried expression, and his mouth forms a slight pout. The redness hasn’t left his nose or his cheeks, and it stands out against his pale face as if he’d donned makeup while they weren’t looking.
He looks miserable. Maybe they’d kept him out here too long, considering how cold he was claiming to be earlier. This was supposed to be a couple’s activity, according to him.
“–HM. OKAY,” they say cautiously. WX-78 goes through their memory files of the last half hour and locates where the next best pumpkin is. They roughly grab Wilson’s hand and tangle their fingers, dragging him behind them as they make haste to walk to where they remember it to be, and Wilson seems shocked. They’d usually put up a fight about something like this, but..
They glance at him again to see him with a relieved smile on his face. He holds his other arm with the pumpkin cradled in it closely to his torso, in what looks like an act of heat conservation. They squeeze his hand once in a comforting gesture and he squeezes back.
WX-78 finds the second best pumpkin and releases his hand. They crouch down to pick it up, scowling bitterly.
“It looks fine!” Wilson exclaims, gesturing wildly to it. WX-78 stands up and holds in both of their hands, staring at it scrutinizingly.
“IT HAS A DISCOLORED PATCH ON THE OTHER SIDE,” they say, irritated, and turn it around to show him. On the back of the round, mostly-orange pumpkin, lies a single patch of yellowed flesh.
“Only one side of it will be facing the front when we set them outside,” Wilson says, exasperated. “Nobody will even see it!”
“BUT I WILL KNOW. AND THAT IS ENOUGH.”
“Just remember: you get to stab it,” Wilson says unhelpfully. He sighs and shakes his head.
“Well, since you’re finally done, can we leave? I really wanted to try the bakery near here, remember?” He says, and his voice comes out scratchy and crackled and wrong, and WX-78 looks at him sideways.
Wilson looks to the side and clears his throat. “I heard they have actually good pumpkin spice lattes. I’ve always wanted to try one that wasn’t from Starbucks,” he says, and clearing his throat did nothing, apparently, because he still sounds like shit.
“UGH. YOU AND YOUR COFFEE,” they say somewhat fondly, but they eye him suspiciously. They’re waiting for him to offer an explanation, but it doesn’t come.
“LET’S GET OUT OF HERE. THE SMELL OF COW SHIT IS EQUALLY UNPLEASANT AS IT WAS WHEN WE FIRST GOT HERE.”
Wilson chuckles and happily obliges, grabbing their free hand again to walk with them. As they walk back through the field and towards the car, Wilson talks about one of his recent projects.
“–And, for once, it didn’t blow up in my face,” he says proudly.
“IS THAT NOT THE BARE MINIMUM?”
“Well, for my experiments like–” he says, interrupted by such a squeaky voice crack that WX-78 can’t contain their laughter.
“It’s not funny!” He exclaims again, and his voice is now so awfully scratchy and pathetic that WX-78’s laughter catches a little, cutting itself off.
They’ve been on edge about his odd behavior for some time, but this is just absurd.
"WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?" They ask, and they force the bravado of disgust to mask their internal concern.
"I’m just cold," he says, and then pauses for a moment. He adds, albeit a bit hesitant, "Well, my nose is also a bit stuffy, and my head hurts, and my throat is a bit sore, but I'm fine, really," he says, and WX-78 comes to a shockingly obvious conclusion.
"It's just cold out here," he finishes, his scratchy, congested voice making the statement hard to believe.
"IT IS NOT COLD OUT HERE," WX-78 says. They're wearing a short sleeved shirt and are perfectly fine, and they gesture to themself to say as such.
"YOU ARE SICK. WE ARE GOING HOME. COME ON."
"What?" he asks, his voice once again cracking comically in the one-syllable statement.
"YOU ARE SICK. WE WILL GO–”
"I heard you just fine, but I'm not sick," he says, still with that scratchy, awful voice.
"OBSERVE YOURSELF FOR JUST A MOMENT, AND THEN SAY THAT AGAIN."
They watch as Wilson takes stock of himself, and then he winces a little.
"I'm not sick. It's just my allergies," he says, looking down at them. He clears his throat uncomfortably.
WX-78 frowns at him.
“Fall allergies exist,” he mumbles, now staring at the ground. “I’ve always had them.”
"THAT IS TRUE,” they say, and it is. Of course Wilson would be the type to have allergies. It’s a nerd stereotype that he fits quite well, and every year WX-78 observes how something as simple as ragweed pollen can render a man so normally cocky to be so pathetic and needy.
“It’s awful,” he’d croak, congested and headache-stricken, and every time, WX-78 would ask him what exactly he would like for them to do about it.
“Fix it,” he’d groan miserably, and apparently by that he’d mean for them to hold him until it stops hurting. And of course, they’d oblige, mostly so he’d stop complaining.
It’s funny, in a way, and somewhat endearing, but it’s also not relevant right now, because they’d convinced him to start taking allergy medication in advance this year to avoid all of that.
“WHY IS YOUR FACE SO RED, THEN?” They ask, guessing that he’d probably say the meds weren’t working.
Wilson looks down, furrowing his brows, as if he could see his own face if he stared at the ground long enough.
“I KNOW YOU, AND YOU DON'T GET THAT WAY WHEN IT'S ALLERGIES." They abruptly stop in their tracks, causing Wilson to stop too. They tug their hand from his and place it square on his forehead.
From an outsider’s view, it would seem comical how they’re both awkwardly holding pumpkins under their armpits while this whole scene takes place. And maybe it is, but WX-78 has never cared what anyone else has thought of them. Nor do they right now.
Wilson seems startled at the sudden contact. He curls in on himself, but doesn't move their hand off of him.
It would be an inaccurate reading, yes. However, they don’t feel like sticking their heat-sensing finger in his mouth, and it would give them a general idea of if he was really sick or not regardless.
"YOU ARE TOO WARM," WX-78 says sternly after a moment, frowning.
"I'm cold, though," he says, with some resignation in his voice, "Which usually doesn't happen with allergies, either."
"THEN WE SHOULD GO HOME," they say. They move their hand from his forehead to his cheek and cup it softly, purposefully being gentle now that they know what’s going on. He leans into the touch, closing his eyes and putting his hand on top of theirs.
"I wanted to get pumpkin cookies," he whines a bit miserably, and he ends the statement with a pathetic sniffle. Of all things..
"WOULD YOU RATHER SPREAD YOUR GERMS TO EVERYONE ELSE IN THE COFFEE SHOP? USE YOUR FEEBLE HUMAN BRAIN," they say, and Wilson frowns. He separates from them.
"It's not feeble," he grumbles, a somewhat annoyed edge to his voice. But then he sighs, rubs the front of his forehead with his free hand, and shakes his head. "Fine."
They arrive at the parking lot and WX-78 unlocks their car with the remote attached to the key hook on their belt. They get into the driver’s seat and Wilson in the passenger seat, and after a moment he slumps into the seat towards the window. He looks exhausted.
The drive home is fairly silent, although not uncomfortably so. As they pass the bakery they were going to visit, Wilson opens his mouth to speak, but WX-78 is faster.
“NO.”
“Awh,” Wilson replies, roughly clearing his throat afterwards. “Are you sure?”
“WE ALREADY DROVE PAST IT. YES, I AM SURE.”
When they arrive back at their apartment, the two bring the pumpkins inside and set them on the kitchen table. Wilson eyes them even as WX-78 ushers him over to the living room sofa.
“WE CAN CARVE THEM LATER. THEY WILL STILL BE THERE,” they say.
Wilson whines a little in response, even as he sits on the couch. WX-78 takes the blanket that’s draped carefully across the back of it and lays it over Wilson’s lap.
“STAY,” they command, and Wilson’s got his eyes closed so they doubt he’d be going anywhere anyway.
WX-78 returns a few minutes later with a steaming mug of tea to find Wilson curled up under the blanket and shivering miserably. They smile ever so slightly and set the tea down on the table.
“HEY,” they say, shaking him by the shoulder. He sits up and looks up at them pathetically, and then nuzzles into their side, into the fabric of their shirt. They wrap an arm around the back of his head.
He says something that’s muffled, and they pull back slightly for him to repeat himself.
“Don’t feel well,” he says, and they sigh.
“WHY DID YOU NOT TELL ME? WE COULD HAVE GONE HOME EARLIER.”
“I was having fun, and it looked like you were too,” he mumbles. “I didn’t want to ruin it.”
“HM,” they say, and hold him close again. “WE CAN ALWAYS GO BACK.”
“We got our pumpkins already though,” Wilson whines.
“I WOULD NOT BE OPPOSED TO SEARCHING FOR ANOTHER. I DID NOT GET THE ONE I WANTED,” WX-78 says, shooting daggers at the pumpkin they picked on the table. Wilson laughs a little at this, and it eases some of the tension coiled inside of WX-78 at seeing him in such a state.
“That would be nice,” he says, sniffling disgustingly. His voice has been reduced to a miserable croak, rendered barely understandable by the congestion in his voice. It’s odd to them how quickly he went from normal to.. this. Humans are so fragile.
“DRINK YOUR TEA,” they say.
“I would’ve preferred a pumpkin spice latte,” he mumbles, frowning.
“THEY WILL BE OPEN TOMORROW.”
“I doubt I’ll be better by–”
“THEY WILL ALSO BE OPEN NEXT WEEK.”
Wilson grumbles, but eventually relents, taking a sip of the lavender tea they’d made for him. He burns his tongue on it and makes a face, blowing on the tea for an obnoxious amount of time before taking another hesitant sip.
“OH. MY APOLOGIES. MAYBE YOU SHOULD HAVE LET IT COOL FIRST,” WX-78 says, and Wilson scowls. They sit on the couch next to him.
Wilson takes another sip of the tea and then sits it down on the coffee table. Still scowling, he flops over onto their lap dramatically. WX-78 laughs.
“What?” Wilson asks angrily, and they hold in another small laugh.
“YOU ARE PATHETIC,” they say.
“I am not pathetic,” he says, drawing his voice out in yet another whine. It almost seems comical how much he contradicts himself in this moment. He nuzzles into them, wrapping an arm around their torso. WX-78 sticks their hand into his hair and pets him lazily, noting the unusual warmth they feel where their fingertips make contact with his head.
“KEEP TELLING YOURSELF THAT,” WX-78 says. Wilson sighs, but despite his apparent anger does not make any effort to move. In fact, he relaxes into their touch. He settles into their lap with a content hum.
WX-78 removes their hand from his hair and, carefully, so as to not disturb the man clinging to them, reaches over to the coffee table. They grab one of the books off of the coffee table, Diaspora by Greg Egan, and open to the page they remember last reading.
They continue to pet Wilson as they read, listening to his congested breathing slow down until they're sure he's asleep.
They sit like this for some time, WX-78 flipping through the pages of their book and running their hand through his hair in a repetitive motion that soothes them as much as it does him. He vaguely resembles a pet, the warm presence resting on their thighs reminding them of a cat curling up on an owner’s lap. Fitting.
After some time, the figure cocooned in blankets shifts a bit, groaning in discontentment.
“WHAT IS WRONG NOW?” They ask, but there’s not much bite behind the words.
“My head hurts..” Wilson mumbles, still muffled from where his head presses into the front of their T-shirt.
“WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO ABOUT IT?” They ask, a question they’ve asked him what feels like a million times before.
He curls into a tighter ball, pressing his warm face closer to their body, and mumbles something. WX-78 grabs the back of the hoodie and pulls, separating him from their torso, and he whimpers.
“REPEAT YOURSELF.”
“Fix it,” he says. WX-78 rolls their eyes dramatically.
Instead of engaging in the usual banter that this brings about, they decide to take another route.
“I WILL IF YOU DO WHAT I SAY,” they say, and Wilson looks up at them with furrowed eyebrows and a slight pout, like it’s their fault he’s in this predicament in the first place.
“DETACH YOURSELF FROM ME.”
Wilson reluctantly replies, sitting up beside them and looking at their lap longingly.
“NOW WAIT HERE,” they say, getting up and walking into the pair’s bathroom. WX-78 rummages around in the medicine cabinet underneath the sink until they find what they’re looking for. They pour two Tylenol pills out into their cupped palm and stick the bottle back under the sink.
On the way back, WX-78 gets a glass of water from the kitchen and sets it, along with the pills, on the coffee table next to the cup of tea.
“TAKE THOSE.”
Wilson complies, taking them both at once and then immediately coughing harshly into the sleeve of their hoodie once he’s done. WX-78 confirms that they will absolutely be washing that hoodie before they even think about putting it on again.
They nod at him once he calms down, resisting the urge to call him pathetic again, and then give their next command.
“GET UP.”
Wilson groans in response.
WX-78 doesn’t bother telling him twice, instead grabbing him by his shoulders and forcing him to stand up. The blanket falls off of him and onto the floor and he sways slightly under their grip.
“NOW GO TO THE BEDROOM. I WILL MEET YOU THERE,” WX-78 says. Wilson haphazardly throws the blanket back onto the couch and starts walking sluggishly down the hallway.
WX-78 takes the teacup and the glass of water back to the sink. They refill the glass and leave the cup in the sink with no plans to wash it later. Sick or not, washing the dishes is Wilson’s job. Even if they have rubber gloves, nothing can convince them otherwise, especially if they have a fleshling to do the job for them.
They walk into their bedroom to find Wilson blowing his nose loudly into a very crumpled tissue next to the trash can.
“EW.” They say simply, cringing at the disgusting noises coming from the man they live with.
Once he’s done, Wilson flops unceremoniously onto their bed with a huff. WX-78 openly laughs at him.
“You said you were going to fix it,” he laments, muffled this time by the blankets he lays on top of.
“I AM,” they say, putting the glass of water on the nightstand on his side of the bed. “YOU ARE LUCKY I AM NOT STICKING YOU IN A COLD SHOWER.”
“That doesn’t even work,” Wilson mumbles. “Makes it worse, actually.”
“RECALLING YOUR DECADE-OLD MEDICAL SCHOOL KNOWLEDGE, I SEE. DIDN’T YOU DROP OUT?”
Wilson mocks them under his breath, but then goes still.
“CHANGE YOUR CLOTHES,” WX-78 says after a few moments.
“Why?” He asks, not moving a single muscle.
“I SAID I WOULD FIX IT IF YOU DO WHAT I SAID. DO NOT QUESTION ME.”
“Is that part of the deal?”
“IT IS NOW. CHANGE YOUR CLOTHES.”
Wilson begrudgingly changes into one of the many abhorrent looking pairs of pajama pants he owns (who knew how many ugly variations of plaid there were?) and a simple tank top. WX-78 simply watches with their arms crossed over their chest. He also puts on a pair of equally ugly fuzzy socks. Finally, he puts their hoodie back on top of the tank top.
“Have I fulfilled all of your commands, your highness?” He asks hoarsely, sitting down on the edge of the bed. He's shivering again, they note.
“LAY DOWN,” they say in lieu of an answer. He doesn’t need to be told twice, it seems. Wilson climbs under the blankets and brings them up to his chin, and they can see his form still shaking slightly through the blankets.
After he complies, they hunt through their nightstand drawer for their set of miniature tinkering tools. They sit down on the bed next to him, leaning against the pillows. WX-78 takes their heavily modified cell phone out of their pocket and sets it on their lap next to the tools.
“I AM GOING TO WORK ON JIMMY, AND YOU WILL SLEEP. I WILL WAKE YOU UP LATER TO EAT,” they say. Wilson hums, scooting closer to them so his feverish forehead just barely makes contact with their upper arm.
So clingy, they think. He closes his eyes and sighs with contentment.
They spend some time tinkering with their device, working on adjusting the camera’s range and microphone sensitivity. They do this with little more than an eyeglasses repair kit, a raspberry pi, and an IPad. This little setup is useful for tinkering late at night when they’re fully charged but don’t want to wake Wilson up.
Long after they thought he’d fallen asleep, Wilson pipes up from beside them.
“Thank you,” he mumbles, nuzzling into their arm ever so slightly.
“HMPH. YOU SHOULD BE THANKING ME,” they say, ruffling his hair briefly before going back to their tinkering.
“Love you,” he says even more quietly.
WX-78 looks down at him fondly.
“WHATEVER.”