Chapter 17: Fatal Flaw

As soon as Doralien walked into class, he noticed something was off. The atmosphere in the room didn't feel right. He looked around at his classmates, noticing that several students were strangely quiet.

Is the teacher in a bad mood or something? This class is usually pretty noisy, he thought.

He looked over at Doramen's desk and could immediately tell why some of the other students seemed to be on edge. Doramen had his head laying on his desk, his arms crossed around it so his face was hidden. His ears were flat, and his tail was drooping. He was ignoring everything happening around him.

Wow, he looks pretty upset. I wonder what's got him down, Doralien thought.

He got situated at his own desk and quietly waited for class to start.

"Psst! Hey, Doralien!" whispered the student sitting behind him.

Doralien turned around to face the student behind him, who just so happened to be Dorami.

"What is it?" he asked quietly.

"What's going on with Doramen? He looks like something's really bothering him," Dorami said, gesturing to Doramen.

"I have no idea," Doralien replied with a shrug.

"Really? I thought for sure you'd know."

"He hasn't talked to me at all today. I didn't even see him before school, but I just thought he was hanging out with Doraemon."

"I haven't seen Doraemon, so I don't know. I have the next period with him though, so I'll ask him when I get the chance."

Doralien's reply was cut off by the teacher announcing that class was starting. Doralien turned back around and kept his half-gaze on the teacher as she introduced that day's lesson. When she turned her back to the students, Doralien took this opportunity to look at Doramen.

He looked really down in the dumps. He leaned his cheek against his propped-up paw with a deep and unhappy frown on his face. His gaze was fixated on his desk. When the teacher instructed the class to get out their textbooks, his movements were very slow. He seemed to struggle to lift his textbook up onto his desk.

Wow, something bad must have happened to him, Doralien thought. What could've happened to make him look so upset?

...

At lunch, Doralien decided to eat at the hangout table for the first time in a while. He sat there, alone, and waited for either Doramen or Doraemon to come.

Quite a while passed and nobody ever showed up. Doralien, now concerned, decided to go look for his friends. He left the table and began his search, making sure to look carefully.

"Hey, Doralien!" called a female voice.

Doralien turned to see Dorami sitting on a bench, waving at him.

"What's up?" he greeted, sitting next to her.

"Remember how I was telling you I had the next period with Doraemon?" Dorami asked, lowering her voice.

"Yeah?"

"Well, apparently he's just as upset as Doramen."

That only worried Doralien even more.

"Wow, really?" he asked.

"I tried to talk to him, but he didn't give me any answers. He told me he's 'fine' and 'just having a bad day'," Dorami explained.

"Doramen will probably say the same thing."

Dorami sighed a little.

"I hope it's nothing too bad. I'm really worried about my brother," she said.

"Yeah, I hope nothing happened to their relationship," Doralien replied, nodding in agreement.

"Have you talked to Doramen yet?"

"No, I was actually in the middle of looking for him."

"Oh, he's sitting near the bathrooms."

"Really? Thanks."

Doralien said his goodbyes to Dorami and went over to the bathrooms. Sure enough, Doramen was sitting at a table by himself. He was in the same position he was in at the beginning of math class.

Poor guy, Doralien thought.

He approached the table and stood in front of it, hesitating to sit down.

"Hey Doramen," he greeted.

Doramen moved his head until his whole face was visible.

"Doralien?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's me," Doralien confirmed as he smiled awkwardly.

"What are you doing here?"

It was then that Doralien decided it was time to be serious, and sat down across from Doramen.

"I wanted to make sure you're okay," he said.

"Why?" Doramen asked, as if he hadn't expected anyone to be worried.

"You're my best friend. You mean a lot to me, and I can tell something's up."

"I'm fine."

Doralien honestly wasn't too surprised that Doramen was brushing this off as if it was nothing, but that didn't make him any less determined.

"No, you're not 'fine'! It's obvious something's bothering you. You can tell me what it is," he said.

Doramen shook his head.

"It doesn't matter," he murmured.

Doralien let out a frustrated sigh.

"Come on, stop being so stubborn. What happened, Doramen?" he asked in a stern, yet calm voice.

Doramen was silent for what seemed like forever.

"I messed up," he confessed.

"'Messed up'?" Doralien echoed. "What do you mean you messed up? That's awfully vague."

"I convinced Doraemon to do something I shouldn't have convinced him to do. Now we're... stuck."

"You're not making a whole lot of sense, buddy."

"Whatever. I'll explain to you later. Right now I just want to be alone."

"What about Doraemon?"

Doramen fidgeted. He glanced to the side for a moment, remaining silent for several seconds.

"Don't worry about him. None of this is his fault," he answered finally.

Doralien was silent, trying to think of a response. Doramen laid his head back on his arms and averted his gaze, making it clear he didn't want to talk anymore. Doralien gave up and sighed in defeat, then left the table.

As he thought the situation over, he realized that Doramen hadn't been with Doraemon. In fact, Doraemon had been nowhere to be seen. He knew something must have happened between them. But, what exactly was something he clearly wasn't going to find out anytime soon.

...

"Have a seat, buddy," Doralien said gently.

He stood in his dining room, looking at Doramen. The two were standing on opposite sides of the dining table. Doramen glanced at the table, hesitating, but relented and sat down in one of the chairs. Doralien did the same, and now they were sitting across from each other.

"Why did you want me to come over?" Doramen asked.

"You know exactly why," Doralien answered in a quiet, yet stern voice. "I want to know what's bothering you."

Doramen's gaze immediately dropped to the table as he let out an annoyed groan. Doralien shifted in his chair, choosing his words carefully. Getting information out of Doramen when he clearly didn't want to talk about it was not an easy task, even for Doralien.

"Doramen, it's no secret that you haven't been happy recently," Doralien began.

"Yeah, I guess," Doramen muttered.

"What's going on with you? You can tell me. It's just you and me here, in the privacy of my house. You know that anything you say here isn't going to leave this room."

Doramen hesitated.

"I was selfish," he murmured.

"How so?" Doralien inquired.

"I convinced Doraemon to do something I shouldn't have. I messed up. It was supposed to be a little, one-time thing, and now…. It's a mess."

Doralien nodded slowly in understanding.

"I see. What happened between you and Doraemon?" he asked.

"I can't tell you that," Doramen murmured, flattening his ears.

"Why not?"

"Because you'll get mad at me."

Doralien looked down at the table thoughtfully.

"I won't get mad at you," he insisted, looking back up at Doramen.

"Yes you will," Doramen argued.

"You won't know that until you tell me what's going on."

Doramen whimpered in response.

"Who is this really about?" Doralien asked after a period of silence.

"Doraemon," Doramen answered reluctantly.

"So, you made a mistake that caused something bad to happen to Doraemon?"

"Yeah…"

"What happened to Doraemon? Is he hurt? Sick? Something else?"

"I… guess you could say he's sick."

"What is he sick with?"

Doramen was silent. It was obvious to Doralien that he was very scared to truthfully answer the question.

"You can tell me," he ushered softly.

"He's… w-well…," Doramen stammered, hesitating.

"Yes?"

"He's…"

Finally, Doramen let out a big sigh of defeat.

"He's… pregnant," he mumbled.

"Pregnant?" Doralien echoed in surprise.

That was an answer he had not been anticipating.

"He's pregnant," Doramen repeated, more sternly this time.

"But, he's male. That doesn't make any sense," Doralien said.

"You'd think that, but…. It happened."

"How on Earth did that happen?"

Doramen blushed suddenly, which immediately gave Doralien an idea on what the answer was.

"So… umm... Doraemon introduced me to this gadget…," Doramen began.

"Uh-huh?" Doralien inquired.

"It… uh… it gives you body parts, like an arm and such… So I used it to…. Well…"

"Yeeaaahhh..?"

Doramen buried his face into his paws, groaning in embarrassment.

"Come on, you can tell me," Doralien beckoned.

Doramen remained silent for several seconds before finally uncovering his face. He was blushing darkly. He let out a sigh and looked down at the table.

"I had sex with Doraemon, okay? There, I said it!" he hissed before promptly covering his face again.

Doralien was silent, trying to think of an appropriate response to that.

"So it wasn't a gadget that got him pregnant," he observed.

"Yeah, it was me, because I'm an idiot," Doramen growled.

"Wait, did you even use protection?"

"No…"

"What!? Why? Don't tell me you forgot how that works!"

Doramen whimpered again. Unbeknownst to Doralien, he was starting to tear up.

"I didn't know the gadget gave him… everything…," he murmured.

"Oh, I see. You didn't realize the gadget gave him what he needed to actually become pregnant?" Doralien questioned.

"Yeah… I thought it only gave him… well, you know what I mean…"

"Right. So, you and Doraemon are actually having kids together?"

"Yes… I'm gonna be a dad…"

Doralien took in a deep breath, trying to stomach the situation. While he thought of a response, Doramen couldn't take it anymore. The red robot cat began to cry, sniffing and whimpering quietly. Doralien immediately picked up on the sounds and flattened his ear. He rose from his seat and sat down in a seat right next to Doramen.

"Hey, it's okay, buddy…," he murmured.

"No it's not… I'm such an idiot! First I ruined your life, and now I ruined Doraemon's life!" Doramen exclaimed.

"I bet you didn't ruin his life…"

"I can't do anything right… I wish I could go back in time and prevent this from happening. I wish I could go up to my past self and tell him, 'Hey, wear a condom, dumbass!'... Then none of this would be happening. But, Doraemon said I shouldn't change fate… So I'm not gonna do it."

"If Doraemon doesn't want you to change anything, then I think you should embrace the fact that you're going to be a father."

"How am I supposed to do that when I didn't want to be a father? And Doraemon never asked to be a mother!"

Doramen sighed deeply as he began to cry to the point where it began affecting his ability to talk.

"Let me just tell you the whole story... So, it was that one night that me and Doraemon agreed to use the body part gadget… The gadget has a reset button that gets rid of all its effects… The next morning, we tried to use the reset button to turn Doraemon back to normal, but it didn't work… No matter how many times I hit that damn button, nothing happened… Doraemon was worried the gadget was broken… He told me that he was gonna talk to Dorami and see if she could help him fix it, or let him borrow hers… Then some days passed, a week I think… Doraemon wanted to talk to me because he said he had an update…"

Doramen trailed off for a moment to cry harder. Doralien remained silent, a little excited to hear the red robot cat opening up so much about the situation. It wasn't often that he was willing to give so many details, although Doralien could tell that Doramen was really needing to vent it out.

"He told me that Dorami couldn't find anything wrong with the gadget, and that her gadget wasn't working on him either… That's when he figured out that the gadget wouldn't let him get rid of the parts because he's pregnant... We have no idea how many kittens he's having, we just know that they're inside him now and there's nothing we can do to get rid of them…"

Doralien nodded thoughtfully.

"Sounds like this was an accident," he observed.

"I guess," Doramen muttered, wiping his face.

"I really don't think you should blame yourself over this. It's not your fault that you didn't know. What's important is that you and Doraemon can work together to get through this."

"He told me he's kind of excited to be a parent."

"Are you?"

"Not really… I had no plans of becoming a dad.."

Doralien was silent for a moment, thinking.

"What are you guys gonna do about it?" he asked.

"Deal with it, I guess. I don't know how much longer Doraemon can stay at the Robot Academy before he has to go home," Doramen answered.

"He should go talk to the principal."

"Yeah, he said Dorami suggested that to him."

"So Dorami knows he's pregnant?"

"Apparently."

Doralien sighed softly.

"Listen Doramen, I think you guys are going to be just fine. You've got each other, and Dorami and I are here to help. Plus, Doraemon can always go to the Robot Hospital for advice. I'm sure this isn't the first unplanned pregnancy that gadget has caused—or the first male pregnancy," he said.

"I guess you're right," Doramen mumbled as he started to calm down.

"I don't think things are as bad as you think they are. Is a guy getting pregnant weird? Yeah, kinda. But, this is the 22nd century. I'm sure this has happened before. There's resources to help you guys out."

Doramen finally nodded.

"I don't want you to cry over this, buddy. Like I said, we're here for you. You and Doraemon aren't gonna go through this alone," Doralien continued in a softer, more assuring tone.

"Thank you," Doramen murmured, finally making eye contact with Doralien.

"No worries, buddy. That's what friends are for. I'll always be here for you. Always."