Chapter 8

 One Forty Two finished his work at dusk. He went to the well, watered plants, sorted through and washed the pile root plants in the back, and picked anything in the farm that may have been ripe.

When he got back to the porch, no one was there, but lights were on in the house and the windows glowed. He let himself into the house sweaty and covered in dirt and walked quietly towards the sound of people talking.

He made it through the living and stood in the doorway between the kitchen/ dining room and living room. He stared at the group sitting at the table, the father at the end with his back facing One Forty Two, ikarid to his right, and the boy next to her, Alistair was sitting on the kitchen counter, putting pieces of meat on a plate, and the mother was cleaning up.

It was odd.

“Now don’t make fun of me for the meal,” she said to the group without turning around. “I’m used to picking the food, not cooking it.”

Alistair let out a robotic laugh and Ikarid smiled slightly before returning to her normal scowl.

“My mom sucks at,” the boy started as he turned to Ikarid. He stopped in the middle of the sentence whn he noticed the onlooker in the door way. “You’re back!”

Everyone looked to the doorway that the boy was pointing at. One Forty Two gave them a little nod and continued standing where he was.

“One Forty Two!” Alistair said cheerfully. “Sit down at the table.”

One Forty Two looked to Alistair, then to the father already sitting at the table.

“Come on.” He said as he motion One Forty Two to come near him. “Sit down, we promised you a meal, didn’t we?”

One Forty Two nodded again and walked reluctantly into the room.

“Sit across from me!” the boy said as he jumped up and down in his seat.

“Timmy calm down!” His father scolded as One Forty Two walked past him to take a seat. He sat down where the boy instructed him to, and Timmy squirmed even more and let out an excited, quiets scream.

“Martha, can you tell your boy to calm down?” George called out as he turned to his wife, who was now scopping sliced root plant covered in some sauce onto the plates.

“Boy, if there’s one thing I’m good at doing with a spoon its whoopin’ your butt, you hear me?”

Timmy nodded and calm down some, but he continued to rock back and forth as he stared at One Forty Two.

“I thought you said you didn’t have a name.” The boy said when he finally calmed down. His mother was carrying Alistair to the table, sitting him on top of a stack of books in the seat next to One Forty Two.

“I don’t.” One Forty Two responded plainly. Martha came back with a plate in each hand and sat them down in front of Ikarid and Timmy, with One Forty Two watching courisously as she did.

“Thank you.” Ikarid said in the politess way she could, attempt to hide her disgust with using the word with such people.

“Your welcome.” Martha responded warmly.

“But the robot called you One Forty Two.” Timmy continued.

“His name’s Alistair.” One Forty Two said.

“Timmy, what did you forget to say?” George interrupted. Martha was coming back with two more plates in her hands.

The boy let out an irritated ‘ugh’ and looked up at his mom, who was passing behind him with the plates. “Thanks, Mom.”

“Your welcome.” Martha repliedin an equally irriated voice. She sat her plate in front of her seat, then one in front of One Forty Two.

One Forty Two looked at the plate, then at the woman as she passed behind him and started for the kitchen.

“Th-thank you.” He stuttered quietly.

“He said ‘thank you,’” Alistair said in a louder voice. “Didn’t know if you could hear him!”

“You’re welcome sweetie.” Martha said as she turned around gave him a smile. She grabbed the last plate and put it down in front of her husband.

“Thank you honey.” He said to her. She leaned down and he gave her a peck on the cheek.

One Forty Two watchd them then looked down at his food as she walked back to her seat.

“So…” Timmy said. He hadn’t touched his food since it was given to him. “Whyh’s your name One Forty Two?”

“Timmy, can you let the man eat.” His mother said to him angrily.

“You nned to eat your own food anyway,” his father said.

Timmy sighed, stabbed a piece of the root plant and stuffed in his mouth.

One Forty Two lifted up his fork and began to slowly eat. The root plant was stiff, even after being boiled, and crunched in his mouth. He knew the flavor and texture but it never had a name until now.

Root plant.

The sauce was sweet, and worked well with the flavorless vegetable. He had always eaten it plain.

The meat he was given was fatty and given to him in one chunky slice. Everyone else’s was cut in the same way, except for the boy’s. His steak was cut into pieces, and most of the fat was removed. He raised an eyebrow at this and did the same to the knife near his plate when he looked back down at it.

I have to… cut it myself?

He picked up the knife awkwardly and examined it. In the background the rest of the people at the table were talking, but he didn’t care about that. He sliced the meat into several cubes like he was used to and began eating. It was familiar meat, but he still didn’t know what it was, and really didn’t want to.

He looked up to see Ikarid faking a smile and a small laught, and raised his eyebrow once more. George was laughing too, and his wife was shaking her head and smiling, trying to contain her laugh.

“What?” Timmy asked. “I don’t get it.”

“You aren’t supposed to.” His dad said through laughter.

“I don’t get it ether.” Alistair said.

“It’s a human thing.” Ikarid said.

One Forty Two looked at them all curiously, but stayed quiet.

“So, I’m guessing you’re wondering what we’re doing out in the middle of the desert.” George said after the joke faded away.

“Yes, I was. It is very odd.” Alistair said.

“Well, the short story, and the only story you’re going to get,” Martha said in a serious tone. “Is that we were part of a… a group. But their interests and ours… diverged. So we left.”

“We were part of a gang,” George said. “Joined when they came to the Nation, looking for recruits. We were inmpressionable teens, with the life we lived and all.”

“George!” Martha said, insulted that he would give out so much to some strangers.

“What, who are they going to tell? Timmy’s heard the story plenty of times, and I wanna tell it.”

“We were trying to warn him…”

“And I’m trying to have a conversation.”

Martha sighed and closed her mouth, nodding irritatedly. George anticipated an argument later on, but continued on.

“Anyway, we had no family besides each other, and they promised one. We didn’t like what they did, or what we did for them, but we did it. Eventually we had to, or at least we thought we did. What were we supposed to do in the desert, how would we survive?” He sighed and loked back at his plate. “Anyway, Martha got pregnant, and they didn’t allow that. But she wanted a kid, and I was sick of them, so here we are.” He stuffed a piece of meat in his mouth and began chewing it vigorously.

“And that’s our whole live’s story.” Martha said when he was done.

“That’s why we need the car fixed. We want to get back home.” George added

Martha rolled her eyes. “Yes, now you know. How about your story?” She turned to Ikarid, but only gave her a glance. Instead, she mostly looked to her husband with a smirk.

“I… My father own one of the factories,” she lied, making it up as she went, pieceing together stories and gossip that she had before. “When I found out what he did, why I lived the life I did I...” she hesitated, not knowing if she could pretend to be the ind of person. “I fe- felt ashamed. I couldn’t do it anymore.”

“Then she met with me.” Alistiar said. “I was a medical bot, in one of the factories. I was friends with One Forty Two, even though I wasn’t supposed to get so attached. I convinced her to help us get out.”

“Are there a lot of robots like you?” Timmy interrupted. “That think and stuff, like people?”

“Uh,” Alistair said, trying to decide whether to tell the truth or lie. “Yes, not a whole lot, but there are others.”

“Cool!” Timmy said with big eyes. He turned to One Forty Two, who was still watching th conversation wuietly. “Is that how you got your robot parts? You got hurt at a factory?”

“I�",”One Forty Two began.

“Timmy!” His mother interrupted. “You don’t have to answer that,” she said, turning to One Forty Two.

“But he promised!”

“He probably only said that to get you to be quiet!”

“Uh, I--,” One Forty Two stuttered. “Yeah, I got hurt,” he mumbled. It was barely audible, but Timmy could hear.

“Did…” Timmy hesistated shyly, the first time One Forty Two had seen him think before he spoke all day. “Did it hurt?”

One Forty Two took a sharp breath in. Suddenly he was young. On a table. There were people in lab coats everywhere. They were pushing him down, they tied him down. It was bright. It was loud. Everyone was talking to each other. Jones was there, looking down at him, talking to him in a sly voice. Alistair was in the background, pleading with some one. And then there was pain. He felt blood splatter on his thighs. He screamed. Jones laughed. Everything went black and suddenly he was back in his seat at the table.

Now that he was back, everything was crystal clear. Voices were crisp, the world was in high defintition The lights were too bright, colors too saturated, sounds too loud. But he didn’t feel like he was there. He felt like his body was a camera, and his mind was somewhere else far away. So he sat there and said nothing, staring straight ahead were he had been his entire trip, silently going crazy.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” Timmy was yelling, more directed at his parents than to One Forty Two.

“One Forty Two? Hello?” Alistair was poking his arm left leg. “Hello?”

One Forty Two’s eye flinched down towards him, but soon shot back up, looking straight ahead again.

“One Forty Two?”

Ikarid was telling the family over and over, “He’s fine, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” But Martha and George instisted that it wasn’t.

“What did I say?” George yelled. “Room, I said room, why aren’t you there?”

“I’m sorry,” Timmy said with tears in his eyes. “I didn’t know it was going to bother him so much.”

“I’m getting the spoon,” Martha said as she stood up. “I told you,we told you, twice to stop it.”

“But he said he would talk to me?” Timmy started crying. “He lied to me, why am I getting a whoopin?”

“Because you don’t know when enough is enough, that’s why!”

Timmy cried louder and got out of his chair. He ran to his room, covering his butt with his hands as he ran past his mother, who was coming back with the spoon.

“Do not punish him anymore, please.” Alistair said. “I do not think One Forty Two would like it. Besides, he likes to keep his promises.” Alistair crawled into One Forty Two’s lap and snuggled into his stomach. He began to vibrate and hum, purring like he had done so many times before.

“Hey,” George said, leaning into the table towards One Forty Two. “We’re sorry, are you alright?”

One Forty Two took a deep breath and nodded slightly.

“Ok, that’s good. You’re going to be ok, ok?”

One Forty Two nodded again.

Ikarid’s forehead was in her palm, but Martha sat back down and her and george started eating again, so she did too. The table ate in silence, save for One Forty Two, who was still sitting there with Alistair in his lap thirty minutes later.