Royally Kissed | ✓

30; the robot's empathy

—thirty—

the robot's empathy

SHE TRIED. She really, really tried.

But halfway through the dance practice, Paige couldn't keep a straight face anymore. At first, Jouwee approached her as soon as she saw her inside the grand ballroom, knowing that she'd been missing for almost half an hour. What without answering her calls, it was only a matter of time that Jouwee would start to go panic.

She had pulled her eyebrows together when she saw that Paige's eyes were red-rimmed and swollen. Looking away, Paige just simply told her to proceed with the practice before positioning in front of Owen, who wore the same look as her friend's.

The facade was easy in the beginning, but when her footwork began to cause chaos to the dance as a whole while stepping on Owen's foot every now and then, she dragged a deep, shuddering breath and asked for a quick break before deserting the others, making the entire room go deathly silent. Paige then sprinted off to somewhere that wouldn't make her feel like it was so hard to breathe, leaving a ghost of confusion that easily swarmed the abandoned.

Everything was all a blur to her. She ran and ran, not realizing where her feet was taking her. Only then she'd realized where she was when her calves burned and found the building where the changing room of the mascots was located.

"Paige?" It was Owen. "Paige! Where are you? Talk to me!"

Not wanting to see him, or anyone, at the moment, she walked into the said area with a mindless demeanor and quickly hid at the furthest spot against the lockers. Certain that Owen wouldn't dare take a look inside this building, she let out a relieved sigh as she took a load off on the flat bench that was placed against the wall.

The room was quiet and almost dimly lit. It didn't help that it was nearing nighttime so the surrounding looked and felt relatively gothic. Like a scene out of a high school horror movie. Paige leaned her head back and stared up at the ceiling unblinkingly, her chest moving up and down in restlessness.

The silence was calming for awhile. She didn't even think of anything; just rested there without a care in the world. As if she wasn't Paige Cadwyn, no name, no past, no anything whatsoever.

Murmurs then came into her ears. The voices weren't particularly whispering. It sounded casual, like they were muffled because of the distance. Albeit it didn't seem like it came from somewhere so far, either. Her suspicions were quickly thrown out of the window when two figures rounded from a bend, two rows of lockers away from where she was.

One stepped out, and her heart careened when it was a cyborg. She was sure he saw her because he paused on his tracks as if surprised, only to hear him talking beneath his helmet.

Paige frowned. "Robby?"

He didn't make any hint of reply and continued on talking to someone. The voice was unrecognizable, of course, since the foam or some sort of mouthguard probably hazed over his airways. Then another shadow heightened behind him before another cyborg revealed himself.

Wait. So how many cyborgs are in here? Which one's Robby?

Both all but snubbed her since they resumed on chatting and walking off, which she suspected was to the exit. She sprung up from her sitting position and, quite in wonder since she hadn't seen Robby for quite sometime now, she aimed for the spot where they had been standing once and soon saw the two departing figures.

"Robby?" she asked, and the second cyborg conspicuously froze in his path. The other guy left him but the last one didn't seem too friendly to acknowledge her. It was no surprise, though, she thought. He'd been that way since the first time. "Robby, is that you?"