"Madman isssss never going to let up for what you did to him," said Denny, reaching up to hand a screwdriver his taller, leaner brother, Lenny. Standing on their tech-department issued AV cart gave Leonard, the older twin by a whopping extra three feet, just enough height to reach the compartment he was working on-a tall, ominous machine darkened by the shadows of their windowless lair, computer screens as the only source of illumination.

The twins were located in the central room of their secret in-school laboratory. This particular space they fashioned into their hub was huge, with a ceiling at least forty feet high to accompany an industrial fan, wedged between the boiler room and the downstairs archives. In a school as big as Polyneux, in which new sections had been added frivolously over the decades, blueprint keeping had fallen to the wayside, allowing the Yogmans to convert this unused and unchecked space into their own private base of operations.

Though the twins had the fortune of not being discovered throughout the previous school year, Madman was growing suspicious of the boys, who were truant to class half of the time and frequently found themselves in detention, despite their perfect grades. Madman was well aware of the boys' incredible intelligence, and found it a shame that they couldn't stay out of trouble-but then again, Madman sent practically everybody to detention for one reason or another.. As it was, the Yogmans typically tried to avoid getting into significant trouble and drawing suspicion towards them. One bad tip and their whole base could be uncovered, and they couldn't afford that, not quite yet.

"All I need is a poor ssssap to keep Madman occupied long enough for me to get this thing running, and watch. We'll have the ssssschool zombified before Midterms," Lenny said, the thought sitting on his mind like butter on his tongue.

"But who would be that much of a pain to the Principal that he would get off our backs?" asked Denny thoughtfully.

As per usual, Lenny answered his brother with a slam to the interior panel that he was tweaking. "Quit your worrying, we'll find a pigeon. In this school of idiots?" he gestured to the open space around him, then folded his arms. "It shouldn't be that difficult."

Lenny handed the screwdriver back to Denny, who replaced it in the toolbox, and hopped off of the cart. The brothers stood back and looked at their masterpiece with proud grins-two large trash cans which the boys and confiscated from the back of the school, which made up the feet of their blood, sweat and tears monstrosity.

It was perfect. It was gorgeous. It was imposing.

It was dead.

Artificial Intelligence wasn't as easy to fashion out of pieces of dump trash and parts from their own garage at home. Even the twin geniuses couldn't quite create a self operating robot like those in the multi million dollar catalogs with the means with which they were forced to work with right now. And it was hard to steal parts from these new robots, because now they were capable of beating the crap out of you. Until they took over the school, and the world, they had about the same resources as any dumb kids-their 10 dollar a week allowance, and their creativity.

The monstrosity needed a brain for the brothers to even run it from a remote control, but as much as they searched, the brothers couldn't figure out how to get it.

"Let's get some lunch," Lenny said, tired of thinking about it. "I'm famissshed."

"Righty-O." Denny replied, following his brother through the tiny air duct on the wall on the left, leading through an elaborate system of tunnels-overly elaborate, even for the massive size of the school. There were multiple reasons the Yogman Twins decided to build their base within the schools. They certainly couldn't keep a base at home, not with their parents snooping about, and the phrase "hidden in plain site," had some truth to it, proven as their year-old secret base of operations was hardly a rumor in the halls of Polyneux. But there was no actual proof the staff had that it existed. As an added bonus, the base was only accessible through the ducts unless walls were to be knocked down, and the complication of the air ducting in the enormous school made it so that anybody without a map of the air duct system would surely become lost before finding their lair. Furthermore, it helped a great deal that the security and staff of Polyneux in particular was anything but competent. Overall, a surprisingly good location for their purposes, ,but if all was to go according to plan, they wouldn't need it by Thanksgiving-they'd have the Principal's Office to themselves.

Unscrewing the vent from the inside, Denny lifted the metal cover off of the end of the vent and dropped down onto the tile hallway floor, like a James Bond movie. "All clear," he called to his brother, who joined him shortly thereafter, landing nimbly on his overgrown, size-eleven feet.

Rising from his crouched position, Lenny gazed left and right to make sure nobody had seen them emerge, and that's when his pale, unhealthy yellow eyes on the short metallic figure in front of him. "Is that…? "

"Hey, it's that robot from Math class!" Denny shouted. "Hi Ro-"

"Pssssst! Quiet!" he hushed his brother, slapping a hand over his mouth. The robot standing with his back towards the brothers in front of the electric outlet at the end of the hall didn't seem to notice. "What do you mean he was in your class?" Lenny asked.

"Yes," Denny smiled. "I wanted to tell you. I thought that was pretty cool, since he's a robot, and we're building a…. brother, why are you sssssslapping your face?"

Lenny mimicked McMcMc's slapping of the face. "Oh, Dennis. How I'd love to destroy you do I not love you so dearly." Lenny seemed to emphasize those words to convince himself, rather than his brother, that that was true. The real question that mattered to Leonard was not if the robot was in Denny's first period class and why did it matter, but why was it out here in the open? Unattended to? Lenny had assumed that after its task at the school was completed-fixing a pipe or connecting some wires or some of that nonsense-that the robot's operators would would wrap it up and dolly it on out of there. Now he knew for sure that this wasn't a typical robot after all.

Lenny led his brother around the corner, watching every few moments to see if the robot moved. Either it appeared that he was immobile while he charged, or that he was too senseless in general to be aware of what was going on around him. "So it is a student," Lenny said, cracking a wicked smile.

"Yep," Denny nodded. "A Robot kid. Pretty neat, huh?"

"And he's here all alone?" he laughed quietly, and grabbed his shorter brother by the cap, making him scowl. "This is too perfect."

"W-what'ssss too perfect?" Denny asked.

"What's perfect is, dear brother, I think we just found the ssssssolution to all of our problems," he whispered, now pointing to Principal Madman, who entered the cafeteria, humming a tune to himself.

"Huh?" Denny asked, looking confused.

"Follow me," Lenny said. "I've got a plan."

Slithering closer up behind it, Lenny peered carefully over Robot's shoulder, and was pleasantly surprised by the dopey expression on the robot's face as he recharged-with his eyes closed, no less. The automaton, in his own little peaceful world, would have no idea what was going on. Lenny carefully picked up the blue cord protruding behind his backside, and carried the impressive amount of slack settled at his feet all the way back to the cafeteria. With a harsh tug, Lenny felt the cord pop out of the wall way back over where Robot was standing in the hallway, and quickly pulled the plug end back to where he was.

In the hallway, Robot heard a 'ping' that meant he was unplugged. His eyes opened, and he looked back and forth for a moment, but before he could see that his plug was no longer in the outlet by his feet, he was plugged back in in the cafeteria, and his systems resumed charging. Thinking it was just his mistake. Robot returned to his meditative stillness.

Lenny giggled, while his brother looked more confused than ever. "What was that for?" asked Denny.

Lenny narrowed his eyes devilishly and hugged his shoulders. "Denny, I may not know a lot-actually, I know an incredible amount of things-and one of those things is the trip around the cafeteria that Madman lovessss to take before buying his own lunch." He pointed to the hefty principal as he hummed, scolding children left and right for everything from chewing gum during lunch time, to slouching in their chairs-

"A straight esophagus promotes better swallowing," Madman said to the boy

-to finally yanking away Mitch's headphones and Cubey's portable video game.

"Electronic nonsense," Madman shook his head. No matter how many times he had to confiscate them, the two videogame loving boys insisted on bringing their gadgets to school. Video games and rock and roll were distractions, and promoted a reluctance to keep up with academics, or so Madman believed. So even when he caught children using them on their lunch period, which was supposed to be the children's free period, Madman took entertainment devices hostage, on the grounds that school was for learning only-all 6 hours of it. "Nope, no electronic garbage in my school. No sir-e-bob."

"Come on, let's grab a table," Lenny said to Denny, both brothers now with their trays of food. "I can't miss a second of this."

Spying a free chair at the end of one table, Denny ran up to the boy sitting in the left seat next to it. "Is this seat taken?"

The curly dark haired boy with a blue and green striped sweater paused while holding his sandwich. "Um, it is?"

Denny tossed the chair backwards, causing the boy to fly back onto the floor, his sandwich and all its messy contents covering his face. "Well. now it's not! Hehehhehehe!" And when the mess of the boy ran away to the bathroom, Denny replaced the seat next to the empty one, and sat in it next to his brother.

It was like clockwork. As Lenny raised his straw to spit a paper wad at the cute girl next to him, Madman's foot caught the great blue wire jutting from the cafeteria's outlet. It was a simple trick, and nothing should have gone wrong. But what wasn't in Lenny's plan was how far Madman would stumble. The pompous Mr. Madman slammed into the nearest table face first, sending the table tossing onto its side, and all the food flying right for the brothers' table. Lenny and Denny's grins fell almost the instant before they were hit with the greasy projectiles.

Opening his eyes, Lenny's pulse began to race. That had gone wrong. Very wrong.

Half of the entire cafeteria was covered in food. Even the lunch lady and Madman, who, lying on the floor, had an industrial sized slop pan covering his head, and began to growl

Covered in food, Denny looked up at Lenny looking irritated."Was that part of the plan?"

"Grrrrrr," Lenny growled, frustrated that he'd overlooked this scenario, "Just go get me some paper towels!" he ordered, wiping mashed potatoes from his face.

Because he was somewhat always afraid of his taller brother, the smaller Denny lost all anger from his face. "R-right away!"

With his annoying, in-the-way, twin brother gone, Lenny jumped up and left the table again, jumping over spilled food trays and fallen lunch ladies as he exited the cafeteria, long before Madman could stand back up. He was following a stream of children who had trickled outside to find the source of the mysterious blue cord that had caused this mess, attempting to look as innocent and confused as the others.

Technically the plan hadn't fallen apart, but now he had to sink the bait.

At the same time this was happening, Shannon headed for one of the girls' first floor bathrooms. She habitually went straight after lunch to check for food in her braces.

Walking in by herself, she found, luckily, that she had the bathroom to herself. As she approached the first of the three sinks, she felt the almost nauseous feeling in the pit of her stomach again. Staring at herself in the mirror, coming closer every inch, she felt so uncomfortable, so alien.

She leaned over the sink, opened her mouth, picked at an invisible speck in the space between her teeth and gums, and rubbed the tooth clean with the tip of her finger. Then, while monitoring for sound in the doorway, she let herself stand back and get the general picture of herself.

Her mouth was a mess upon a mess. Her parents might have noticed her need for braces years ago, from the time her adult teeth really started sprouting up when she was eight. While she had a flawless set of baby teeth, her adult teeth sprouted up fast, crooked and awkward.

Kind of like herself.

She was just thankful she didn't need a back brace on top of everything else. Her posture was terrible, but thankfully her spine wasn't so bad that it demanded physical correcting, too. There wasn't anything else metal they could possibly use to fix her with. If she were to be fixed with more metal at this point, they'd need to just shove her into an iron lung.

It felt like so much of her needed fixing. So, so much.

Connected and held tight by a haphazard set of wires, the braces she wore were the most extreme she herself had ever seen, and as one might expect, they resulted in some unpleasant reactions.

Not only was the headgear unsightly, but very annoying, too. From getting caught on her pillow, her bedpost, doorways and lockers, every day and every night was irritating. The sharp corners got caught on her sweater, and nearly every night they got snagged on her toothbrush as she carefully tried brush her teeth. The braces found a way to make her adolescent life even more difficult. Even her own fingers weren't safe. Frequently, she tangled her index and middle fingers in the wires when she wasn't paying attention. The sharp steel cords left red, sore rings on her knuckles, if they didn't cut the skin open, like they'd done a few times.

And every three months she went to get them tightened, her mouth hurt. She couldn't eat anything solid for three days afterward. Even brushing her teeth was painful, and chomping on a mint or a piece a gum was far out of the question, so she often just refused to open her mouth. One of the reasons she stayed so quiet was that she was constantly sensitive to how her breath smelled.

Where once two near perfect little baby teeth sat on the upper part of her mouth behind her lips, her reflection now showed two new, large, crooked buck teeth shooting down from under her upper lip. That was the worst part. She couldn't stand that. Her mother said she was adorable with those buck teeth, but they only made her feel like a rodent. She tried pulling her bottom lip over them, but it only made her look even more ridiculous. She tried moving the bottom of her mouth forward instead, but her jaw would not agree to stay like that. Part of the job of her headgear, along with straightening her upper row of teeth, was dealing with her overbite. Unlike her teeth, it was a problem that couldn't be completely corrected, even if she wore the braces for the rest of her life, but they were supposed to make it a little better.

Finally, she released her jaw, letting it fly back under her overbite, and her two front teeth to stick out in front of her bottom lip. She realized once again that there was nothing she could do about it.

Sure, she could do things to make up for her mouth. She could wear cosmetics, except that her mother had forbid it until she was fifteen. And why draw more attention to her face, anyway? No doubt somebody would comment that Shannon wearing makeup was like a lizard wearing legwarmers—silly and pointless.

She could also cut two small holes in a paper bag, slip it over her head and never take it off until college, but she felt that that would also bring on unwanted attention, not to mention causing some adults, specifically her parents, to worry about her mental health.

Besides, she knew a bag was only a temporary fix. She imagined sitting in class, and one of those annoying Yogmans reaching behind her in class, pulling off the bag and screaming "AAGH! It's the metal-mouth monster!" Anyway, she wasn't even sure she could find a bag big enough to cover her big, fat orthodontic device.

Shannon had to live with the reality that there was nothing she could do about how she looked. She was stuck with herself.

Just outside the cafeteria, Robot was still by the wall standing exactly as he was when the Yogman last saw him. He was the only one besides Shannon on that floor who had no idea what had just happened.

Then came that tug. Robot's eyelids shot up, his eyes going wide. Before he could turn around and see what was the problem, that first kid's voice shot out of nowhere.

"Hey, look everybody!" the excited, lanky boy in the red Devo hat called for all persons in the hallway to look.

When he turned his head, his eyes bulged, and his body tightened with shock. A crowd of children were staring at him. With wide mouth grins. They'd found the blue-corded culprit.

"That robot kid eats lunch with his butt!" Lenny shouted as loud as he could, making sure everyone, including Madman, had heard.

Then came the laughter. Those horrible chuckles that would engrain themselves in Robot's mind, never to lift for years to come.

In moments, Madman came to, and peered from under the lunch tray at the thing that had made him trip.

What's this, a cord?

His face turned bright red. He growled like a dog, his eyes dilating. How did a cord wind up here?

The principal grabbed the tin pan sitting on his head, threw it forcefully across the room. His hands were shaking, with shock and fury.

Madman found his knees, standing carefully up on his feet, trying not to slip on the brown and yellow sludge, aggressively wiping his face and hair to remove the food. He forcefully ran his hand across his black scalp, gathering up all the slop, and slapping it, disgusted, against the white floor. He, too, left the cafeteria, but stomping on heavy feet, despite nearly slipping several times on food residue, listening to the laughter of children in the hallways. Laughter always lead to trouble.

He fully expected to be catching some over-enthusiastic punk with his boom box hooked up to the outlet, or maybe even Clancy-the old, crazy coot often left the cords of his vacuums trailing all over the-

He came to a sharp hault. He was tall enough to see over the crowd of laughing children, who were surrounding the tiny metal child with the confused and embarrassed look on his face.

Him? AGAIN?

That was the last straw. That little government robot thought he come into my school and make a fool out of me?

He saw that clueless look on Robot's face, and his blood began to boil. He knew he wasn't supposed to, he knew he really shouldn't, with his heart history, but it was war, now. Like his principal before him, Madman sucked in his breath, and like the big bad wolf, let out all his frustration in one bellow.

"RRRRR-ROOBOT JOOOOOOONES!"

With that familiar voice, and the volume level, the little automaton's eyes grew even larger, and metal face almost seemed to go pale. Great. The human authority has arrived.

As the children continued to laugh, Madman stomped up to the robot and stood above him, just two feet away, his girth casting a scary shadow over Robot's tiny body, looking so frail in comparison.

"Well, you've messed with the wrong human this time, buddy!"

He wasn't sure how many adults, or how many principals Robot had made fools out of in the past, but come high water, Madman was going to make sure that this would be the last. He couldn't say for sure that this was all on purpose, but Madman had been principal long enough to suspect student revenge when he encountered it. After the way he intimidated Robot that day, it was only obvious to expect some retaliation. And in a seemingly humanistic, childish prank. How clever, clever, clever, Madman thought. He was two seconds from total detonation, and he wanted to prove to the robot spy once and for all who was in charge of this school and the way that it ran.

"I'm giving you three months of detention," he shouted, scribbling cursive in his book that amounted to nonsense except the words 'three months of detention, Robot Jones.' "Maybe staying after school with me," he shoved the paper in his face, "Will teach you some respect!"

Robot was an idle firecracker. Respect? Respect! What did this human know about respect?! Barking at him like that! And for what? For enjoying his lunch charge? For avoiding humans in the cafeteria in the chance they'd make fun of him some more?

To think that Robot had sat in that chair in his office and promised himself that he would change his ways. He was sorry he ever thought that this human should be respected!

The anger was too much this time. It consumed Robot's body faster than he could control it. Defense mode was kicking in, and he began to tremble violently.

"Wh-wh-what's he doing?"

This was a backfire Madman hadn't seen coming—of course, why should he have? He had never had a robot student before. Sure, kids have 'blown up' once or twice at him in his career, but that wasn't anything to fear. This was nothing quite like that. Robot was physically incapable of controlling his body once his anger became too high.

"He's gonna blow!" one girl cried, as the children up and down the hallway began to panic, running around in circles, into the bathrooms, into the janitor's closet to escape the impending danger.

"Oh, good heavens..." Madman clutched his notebook in his hands, bending the cardboard back in fear.

What have I done? What have I started? He pleaded with someone above to give him the answers. But this wicked principal was looking to the wrong place for help.

Madman thought he knew what he was doing. He thought, if anything, he could handle a stupid robot kid and turn the tables on his little government scheme. He had no idea, had given no thought whatsoever to retaliation, or what kind of a hot temper a robot could have. Now as Robot Jones stomped around zombie-like on his feet, completely absorbed in his fury, Madman realized he'd agitated the sleeping beast. Finally, he tossed the bits of his detention booklet into the air and ran. "What have I… Oh, forget about it, Robot. No detention."

To his students and staff that he was supposed to protect, he shouted as he fled, "HEAD FOR THE HILLS! MAD ROBOT!"

Later, when all was clear, and the hissy fit blew over, Madman's first instinct was to call the boy's parents-it was a fortunate surprise on his part of learning that the robot did, in fact, have a full set of parents who supported his public schooling-but he didn't. He didn't call, because this wasn't as easy as regular, simple discipline anymore. This was more complicated. Robot Jones was more complicated.

After the shock of that day had passed, Madman began to reflect on his own behavior with anger and embarrassment. Maybe he could have handled that better. Maybe there was some chance that Robot had never meant to upset Madman personally. But he was the principal, for goodness sake! How could he let a child scare him like that?

Nobody, no snot-nose kid comes into his school and turns everything upside down, intimidating him to the point of running away.

Madman now considered this personal.

From now on, it was war.

She had had enough for one day.

It was two o'clock, she was thirsty, and after the lack of sleep she got last night, she could really use the caffeine. That naturally left one option: Soda.

Shannon had the second to last lunch hour of the day, which sucked for her, even more today because the cafeteria was covered in greasy sludge from what looked like a food fight. Rumors in 7th hour started that some kid got upset with Madman and tossed a sandwich at his head, but missed, and the result was the school year's first lunch battle, although nobody had any names to give about who started it. She heard something about the Yogmans being there, but she doubted they'd be so stupid as to start a food fight-what with their academic excellence on the line.

Her last class for the day started in 5 minutes. That gave her just enough time to head to the soda machine near the basement's back doors, and grab a cold one and chug it down before seventh hour.

At first, her brain thought it was some sort of extension of the soda machine, but then she was drawn to a stunned halt as before her eyes...

It moved.

Not only that, it stood up on two feet and started marching around, like a real kid.

I don't believe it. She coked her neck. Is that... ?

Her mind flashed back to the image of the bus that nearly brushed her from the sidewalk that morning. That second window from the last. That thing.

Is that what she saw this morning?

There was only one way to find out.

Shannon approached it timidly, even though she was aware that her prosthesis made it impossible for her to be completely silent. She didn't want to startle it. "Excuse me?"

Before her eyes, the machine spun around-body first, head second-and looked her almost immediately in the eye with it's two huge yellow beams of light.

She didn't mean to come up to it from behind him like she did, but that was how it stopped, right in front of the soda machine. If she wasn't so startled by its sudden turning, Shannon could have sworn that he—at least she assumed it was a 'he'-looked surprised when he looked up at her. Amazed, almost.

The shock of what he was took her voice away. This wasn't just the normal kind of sudden silence from her lack of social confidence. The creature was staring at her so intensely, it scared her a little.

"M-mind if I get a soda?" she finally managed to spit out.

The metal creature seemed to process the request, and as she watched, he soon took a clanky step to the side. The whole time, he never took his eyes off of her.

She gave the creature a silent expression of thanks, then marched up to the soda machine. She let it have her dollar, hit the button with the side of her fist, and pretend not to notice the creature just over her shoulder, with creepy penetrating eyes.

He didn't speak. He didn't say anything to her. For the first time in quite a while, Shannon came across someone, who, even alone, had nothing to say to her-about her, rather. Nothing to ask. Nothing stupid or insulting or condescending. Nothing at all.

For an instant, she actually did forget that the robot was there. But only for an instant. He began making a strange, mechanical noise that reminded her that he was right there behind her. She turned her head, and from the corner of her left eye, she noticed that he was doing something strange with its claws-for-hands. He flexed his arms, the tip of his metal claws making contact with a tiny 'clank' every time the arms came in close. Like a small child playing with their index fingers, just as they are approaching someone they are afraid of.

He just stared at her, almost like he saw her as his superior.

Like he was contemplating a feeling that he couldn't properly express.

Finally, she couldn't stand the tension anymore. Throwing manners to the wind, she let her curiosity get the better of her. She had to know what was up. "Hey," she asked softly, turning back to his attention, "Are you okay?"

He froze, dropping his arms the moment he realized that she was looking at him again.

It made a face—was that a smile?-and began to shutter, its limbs quaking, and began making a series of beeping noises.

She watched this for a few moments. With no reply, Shannon figured that maybe he didn't even talk. Robots. It figures.

The sounds he was making were slightly starting to unnerve her. She looked at the clock on the wall. It was time to get going, if she was going to make it to her next class before the second bell.

She said the only thing that she could think of next. "Well... take it easy."

Soda in hand, she headed back up the hallway without once looking back. But she could feel his big, yellow eyes burning into the back of her head, like headlights in the night. He was most definitely watching her, and it wasn't until she was at least ten feet away that she felt his overbearing gaze finally shift away. By then, she was at the intersection in the hallway, and she took a sharp left and started running up the stairs. Why? She didn't quite know. All she knew was that something about that robot that rubbed her the wrong way..

Was that a worker robot? Or a student? He was so small. Shannon had never encountered such a tiny automaton. Like many children of her generation, she had only encountered a handful of robots in her entire life, and these were nothing like the one she saw in the hall. Most of them didn't have two legs, or two eyes, for that matter.

That feeling of pity for the timid little robot she met that day soon passed for a stronger feeling of annoyance. For once he knew that she was a compassionate person on the inside, the robot would never leave her alone, determined to reach her—the real her, buried in the layers of apathy.

Robot's thoughts when he returned home were not on Madman. His thoughts were no longer on the meltdown at all. His anger was long gone, faded into a new emotion that was simply undescribable bliss.

What his parents understood was that he had just finished the very first day, and very first entry of the data log which he would be expected to keep for an unforseen time into the future.

Unbenounced to the humans overseers, or his parents overseeing his research, the young boy's life had just taken a dramatic turn from which it would never return. The young robot's careful logic and reasoning had been turned upside down.

Robot Jones was experiencing the development of his first real infatuation.

Before laying eyes on that girl, humans and robots, to him, were two different kinds of creatures that were cursed to coexist. But now, Robot was forced re-evaluate his previous views on human beings. The difference between them and he suddenly seemed smaller.

And it was exciting.

If there were humans out there composed partially of metal, he could just think of what other kinds of connections there were to be made between robots and humans. The hopes of finding someone who would understand him seemed almost plausible. He was overwhelmed with the anticipation that he might, for once, belong to something greater. The children at the school on the whole weren't all that alien in their ways, he confessed to himself. After all, he was a kid, and he could relate to some of their traits on the surface level. Maybe there was more to discover.. Despite the fact that they had mocked and laughed at him the whole day, he understood that he was different, and it was going to take some time for them to get used to his ways, just as he was going to need time to get used to theirs. Plus, they were just humans: Leave it for them to mock what they didn't know.

But the girl...

Now she was a different matter entirely. Because of her, he could see the brighter side of his misfortunes, and forgive.

He forgave the bus driver for glaring at him for trying to be courteous and greet the bus.

He forgave the math teacher for getting short with him for showing his algebraic talents.

He forgave that one kid for calling him out for his required—and somewhat indecent, he admitted, now that he thought about it—way that he refueled, and making him feel self-conscious.

He forgave the principal for threatening him and trying to give him an unreasonable load of detentions.

He forgave the entire school for being so quick to hate him simply because he was operating correctly..

Because of her. He figured that if that one girl could tolerate everything that he faced that day, every day of her life, then it couldn't be all that bad. If she could put up with it, so could he. Despite their lack of logic and intelligence, and grave misunderstanding and insensitivity about those who were different, there was something more to be understood about human beings. Something good, something hopeful, something that could change everything he ever thought about humans from prior experience—and she might have been the entire forefront of that new theory.

Robot smiled. "I simply must learn more... especially more about her."

Hey there! This is a pretty old one-shot Robot Jones fanfic I decided to polish up and post.

This was originally going to be all from Shannon's perspective, because I wanted to flesh her out more than anybody else. The first scene was the first one I wrote for this, and then I decided to go ahead and do a little bit with Robot, then everybody else. The main reason I went and wrote this whole thing up is to show my appreciation for the really interesting character dynamics that are going on/set up in this pilot.

Let me know what you think! Comments/Criticism greatly appreciated.

Whatever Happened to Robot Jones? © Greg Miller & Cartoon Network