Hello! How are you?
I've decided to go back and clean up some mistakes I've caught in my final products. While I'm working on my lengthy piece right now, I'm going to clean up some stuff. Don't mind me!
Enjoy!
--E--
The kidnapping of Kalinka Cossack set the world on fire. It set Russia on fire to know one of their greatest scientist's lost his daughter to a mad scientist. It was all over the news--twenty-four seven. But luckily, it ended. It came to a close with the defeat of Doctor Wily, the rescue of Kalinka, and the triumph of a hero. No one knew, of course, that Mega Man was just the stage's heroic figure while Proto Man saved her behind the scenes.
"Thank you kindly," Cossack said with wet eyes, embracing his shaking daughter. "My sweet Kalinka is safe… she's safe now."
Proto Man nodded. "Glad I could help."
The chaos ended.
A week later, after Cossack made it back to clean up his Robotics Academy and Lab, repairing his robots from their forced servitude, he discovered Proto Man was still in Russia. Through the lab's window, when he was replacing Pharaoh Man's leg, he saw the Robot resting under a white conifer tree.
A rod of gratitude prodded him to open his mouth. "Darling," he called to Kalinka in the kitchen, "can you call Proto Man inside? I'm busy right now."
"Sure, papa!" She said, finishing her apple juice, and got her coat on.
From the window, Cossack saw his daughter trudge through snow. It had to be a foot and a half thick, but, in time, she made it face to face with the Robot. She smiled. Her mouth moved sweet words as snowflakes swam through the wind like tropical fish. Proto listened, arms crossed, shield resting against the tree.
"He's one of Doctor Light's, right?" Pharaoh Man asked, sitting patiently as the Doctor went to work on his arm's weapon storage.
"Yes, he's the first model of the Robot Masters."
His eyes perked. "How come he's still in Russia then? Light didn't forget his creation, did he?"
"No, Thomas could never forget," Cossack said. "The boy's just troubled."
Moments later, as the snow picked up, two red figures walked toward the Lab.
"Will you contact his creator, Master?"
"No. I understand his pain. He needs time to find closure himself."
"How long will that take? I don't think housing a foreign robot is good for Kalinka."
"However long he needs." Cossack wiped his greasy hands with a brown rag. "He saved Kalinka, so I owe him more than I can give."
The snow came barreling down moments later.
--E--
Proto Man did not argue. He was terribly grateful for a retreat, but terribly misplaced. It was strange to see other Robot Masters in the corner of his eye, to see humans beside him. It was stranger than all the motels he ever lodged at. Even Cossack's living room was an uncharted kingdom he could not blend in with. The russian dolls on the piano. The apple basket on the mahogany coffee table. The fur carpets stroking his boots. It stung his security, and yet he spent most of his free time there.
Whenever he would finish helping the Doctor repair the Robot Masters, after replacing Bright Man's bulb, Proto went outside for a walk or recharged in the living room. This was his week's norm. While Cossack and his daughter made kasha and knish--the potato dough and buckwheat steaming thick in the air--he recharged his battery and slept. On the couch and plugged into a nearby outlet, he let his systems rest. It was easier for his nuclear heart to take in energy if he was inactive, like a nap after a meal. It helped. It was more efficient than charging in the cold he thought. But the E-tanks Kalinka would give him would be easy energy.
"Thank you," he said with the blue can in his hand.
"Of course!" Kalinka sang. "I hope the robot juice here tastes alright."
It did not taste different, he thought; he cannot taste, but it was watered down, like chicken broth for cream soup.
"Thank you."
One day, a day of sweeping up screws and stacking freight boxes, Proto was close to overheating. The boxes were a challenged after a couple hours of lifting as much as a forklift. He even felt a charred spot grow inside him since his powercore was still outdated. It was painfully inconvenient.
"Doc, I may need to go rest."
"Yes, please go recharge," Cossack smiled warmly. "I wouldn't want you straining your nuclear reactor."
"That would be catastrophic!" Skull Man said from his book: Oblomov. "If it does go off, lemme know. I love fireworks!"
"Very funny." Proto said and left.
An E-tank and a nap was the right formula. He should be ready to finish the freight organizing in an hour. Until then, he took up the entire couch, the one with the smushed cushions and the fleece blanket on the back. Plugging himself into an outlet, stretching a thick cord from his chest plates, he felt ounces of energy leak into him. The ceiling fan spinned inside his shades until his nuclear heart stopped whirling.
System slowed. Reactor froze. He fell asleep.
Meanwhile, in a comfy red dress, Kalinka Cossack skipped in the living room, her toes plowing through the bear rug.
"Papa!" She called to the Lab next door. "Where's Lada at?"
From afar, the Doctor cranked bolts and answered: "Isn't she on the couch?"
She went to check, but only found Proto Man with his mouth ajar and joints relaxed. It was funny seeing a robot sleep because they were not really sleeping. Just a catnap, she giggled. But her smile twisted once she saw a pink and gray wolf under his head.
"Papa, he's on Lada!"
"Who?"
"Lada!"
"No, who is?"
"Proto Man!"
"Oh, please leave him alone. He's tired, sweetheart."
"But..." Kalinka puffed her cheeks out and tried to yank the wolf from under Proto Man's head, but his head was a stake; it pinned her plushie against the arm rest.
He grunted and shimmied, which buried Lada under his shoulders. Only a fuzzy ear and paw stuck out from under his neck. He snoozed on.
She stomped her foot on the bear rug, flattening the fur. "You give Lada back! I need her for my afternoon tea party!" She demanded, pointing toward the dining room table where a painted tea set was displayed. At the end of the table, Ring Man sat with stale eyes--ones that drifted from a sugar cup to the fifteen stuff animals that crowd around a tea-cookie plate. He did not touch his cup of chamomile.
"Master's daughter," he said painfully, "can you please let me go. Skull Man's gonna ruin the lab if Doctor Cossack puts him to work on the element organizing."
"But I need Lada and someone to play with!"
"Can't you just wake the foreigner up and play with him?"
"I can't wake him up because Papa said not to," she said. "But can you move him for me?"
"If Master said not to wake him, then I won't," he replied, getting up and ripping his bib off. "I think I hear Master calling right now!"
He fled before she could whine to him. Now she was alone with an army of plushies, lukewarm tea, and a sleeping robot. Bolts squeaked in the distance. She did not smile. What was she to do? It was too cold outside and there was nothing else to do expect have a tea party. But, with given time, she started to smile when her plushie, Alla the monkey who wore sunglasses, gave her an idea. Kalinka took the cookie plate and set it on Proto's torso. The powdered sugar dusted the wires in his chest.
"If you're gonna borrow my Lada, I'll need a replacement," she decided, beaming brighter than the white sun outside. Of course, she will have to wait for him to wake up before she can set the tea party in motion. Until then, she moved the tea set onto the living room's coffee table, balancing the palm-sized cups with an armload of plushies. If she spilled anything, she would get Dust Man to clean it up.
"Alright!" She swept the powdered sugar off her dress and sat down next to her party guests. Pouring tea for Lev the lion and dressing Oral the eagle in a bib, she began, hoping that the Robot will wake up before the tea ran too cold.
"Would you like any tea, Zia?" She asked a baby octopus across from her. It said yes and she poured it tea with four cubes of sugar.
"And you, Nikita?"
The princess mouse smiled up at her as she poured it some tea.
"How about you, Gospodin Proto Man?"
He said nothing, but snoozed on with the wires and cookie powder mingling in his chest. She skipped him for now.
"Tatiana?"
The leopard wanted a bib.
"Gennadi?"
The baby doll wanted to sit next to Alla.
"Queenie?"
Queenie was fine.
She looked up at Proto again, impatient that he had not woken up yet. Catnaps were good, but tea, cookies, and plush friends were better. For now, to keep her patience alive, she dropped a cookie in his cracked mouth so he can play along. This would do for now.
"Okay, now down to very important business," Kalinka said, mixing her teacup with a dainty spoon. "We need to figure out what type of jewels I should get Wallis for her birthday." She pulled out a fistful of toy gems from her kangaroo's pouch. Ruby, jasper, citrine, and a pearl ring she got from a circus game. The plastic still laced the gems' edges.
Half of the animals voted for the ruby. It, Nikita reasoned, would bring out the doll's red lips. Citrine would be better, Mabel said. What about emerald? The lion and the leopard disagreed, bickered, then snarled at each other. They bared teeth and knocked over a row of teacups. Chamomile stained the floor.
"Whoa, whoa, calm down!" Kalinka gasped. "Maybe we should just ask her later then?"
The animals agreed.
"Okay, good."
Sooner than later, silence walked in and sat next to her. She asked anyone if they wanted tea, but they were all content with the stains and crumbs on the floor. Nothing else happened, except for the bolts squeaking off in the Lab.
She looked up at Proto again, wholeheartedly bored with her voice crowding the room. It was hopeless. It was like the time Drill Man played castle with her. She was trying to save the princess in the tower and befriend the dragon, but Drill Man bore a hole in the tower's head. He did not play with her anymore.
Perhaps she was bored enough to poke Proto Man's face. His cheeks were rubbery rose pelts. Perhaps she was adventurous enough to lift his helmet off. She did not dare touch his eyes and see if they were green like hers, but took the chance to get her brush and braided his bangs. They were artificially soft. It was fun, good practice for her own hair, until he pulled his head away and the six and a half braids became a mess. Perhaps she was compelled with such an opportunity to put the tea party on hold.
Within minutes, she found something else to do.
--E--
His nap ended.
Once his system's internal timer went off, he woke up to a brittle pit in his mouth. He puffed out cookie crumbs like a smoke cloud, spitting out sugar and seeing it land on a stuff animal beside him. He looked at his body: layers, layers, and more layers of blankets. Like sheets of sediment under a river, he was buried under an impressive amount of cotton. Even the fleece blanket from the couch covered him. An expensive purple throw tucked around his neck. It would have been silly if the mound was not so heavy, if a wall of animal plushies did not cram against his face. The fifteen stuffed animals made everything but his blanket pile hard to see.
He wanted to find out who did this, who had the time and nerve to do this, but he became agitated when he saw powdery fingerprints under his shades.
"Who did this?" He simmered, trying to get up. Why were the blankets so heavy?
Headbutting an octopus out of his face, cranking his head up, he saw Kalinka on his feet, lying on the thick layers of blankets like a bed. With her eyelids closed and fists balled, she must have fallen asleep. The plushie army crowding her head too. He did not know what to think about that.
He sat up and knocked the animals to the floor. A plate of tea cookies slid off his chest and onto the floor, leaving a streak of powdered sugar on the cushions and his power core. Why did she get all of this on him anyway? He brushed himself, put his wires and core away, and turned toward her.
"What's this all about?" He frowned, trying to take his feet back.
She sighed and turned to her other side, uncanny to a kitten on a lap.
He would say more, but more angry words or surprised words? She had been through enough the past week, been through enough to remember through her older years, so he just frowned to himself that his shades and power core were dirty.
"Proto Man?" Cossack called from a room over. "You and Kalinka in there?"
"Yeah," he said, quickly getting up from the blanket pile. He did not want Kalinka to fall and bump her head on the piano leg, so he picked her up and laid her on the couch, laid her under the blankets in his place. It was not much, but it made him feel like he served just desserts.
Doctor Cossack walked in with a grease rag in his pocket. He was about to ask about the destroyed cookies on the floor, but saw his daughter's blonde hair from under the blankets. He grabbed Proto's shoulder and stepped quietly out of the living room.
"I'm guessing Ring Man left you to play with her instead?"
It was easy to say yes from behind his shades, like telling a tall story from the other side of a brick wall. "I didn't mind. She's a good kid."
"And you even got her to take a nap! Wish I could've done that when she was much younger," Cossack smiled. "Maybe I can get you to nanny sometime."
Proto looked back at the living room, looking back at the mess and the blonde hair under the blankets. "I'll probably leave by then. I have to go back to my country soon."
"Ah, yes, that is true, but perhaps you can come by sometime," the Doctor said. "My lab is always open to you, my boy."
Proto Man did not know what to say, but his power core burned with a wonderful, unbearable appreciation. "I can't promise anything."
"Understandable, but I'm not sure if my daughter can."
The Robot kept his eyes toward the living room.
"Just think about it. I promise not to tell your father if you don't want me to. But in any case, Proto, I just want you to find your place in the world."
He was about to ask what that was, but Cossack walked off to his lab, a smile on his face. Bolts soon began to squeak in the distance.
Pondering, Proto Man went back into the living room. This time he saw Kalinka hug a pink and gray wolf.
He was not sure what to think, but kept it locked away safely in his mind, locked safely and securely for another day just in case he needed to return and watch out for her again. What else did he have planned? Being here, a place more homely than the place he was created in, was one of the few places on this planet that he felt sufficient. Perhaps the holidays would be the time to show up...
He turned for the door, preparing his teleporter, but Dust Man blocked the way.
"Ants," Dust Man pointed at the floor. "That's how we get ants. Now help me clean that up, you punk."
--E--
Have a golly good day!