The bottle of wine sat untouched in the middle of the table refracting flickering candlelight and offering a faint purple silhouette of the salt and pepper shakers and the little tub of various sweeteners. When exactly had Splenda superceded Sweet ‘N Low?

The ironically named Proletariat was the hippest and priciest restaurant in the city. A veritable who's who of people you couldn't care less about but who cared enough about themselves for the both of you dined there on overpriced fare. Rommel was completely out of his element, but found comfort in the similarly disjointed robot seated across from him. Neither drank wine. That's why the bottle remained full. Rommel sipped form a glass of Bushmills 10yo, and the robot, of course, didn't drink anything. Why they met at a restaurant remains a mystery. Rommel pushed his M Frame Oakleys to the top of his head, and pushed the plate of uneaten appetizer next to the wine. He wondered how late Taco Bell was open. Robots don't need to eat. It's a common misconception that they eat human brains. No, the robot would reply, that's zombies.

The robot spoke in the synthesized voice of NFL Films narrator John Facenda. “I've got a job for you, Mr. Busker.”

JL chittered with delight from Rommel's left hip. It had been an uneventful week, and the gun had the patience of a child the night before Christmas when the item wrapped up in the corner is unmistakably in the shape of a bike.

“I'll do it,” said Rommel, nearly as eager as his gun.

“But I haven't even told you the job yet,” the tinny Facenda said.

“I'm trying to get more business from the mechanical demographic, ages 18 to 45.”

“Alright, but we should discuss the details elsewhere. There's a bomb under this table.”

A black and white camera zooms away from the stereotypical form of a Hollywood bomb duct taped to the bottom of the table. The LED display reads 2:27…:26…:25…:24…then it becomes too difficult to read. The camera zooms out farther and tilts up, revealing Rommel and the Robot, pans right to the dining room full of patrons. Alfred Hitchcock steps into frame.

He says, “The tension builds after the audience is made aware of the bomb. Will our two protagonists be able to pay the bill in time to escape? Who will save the other diners? Will one of them defuse it? This doubt will bring the audience to the edge of their seats. Of course, the bomb can't explode, or the audience would be angry. The release is as important as the buildup. Manipulation of tension is how the director makes something thrilling.”

Hitchcock steps out of frame.

“Shit,” said Rommel, “let's get out of here.”

He grabbed his glass of whiskey, and they exited without paying the bill. The maitre d' started to say something, but Rommel froze him with a glare before settling the Okaleys back onto the bridge of his nose.

They walked in silence down the sidewalk for half a block, pausing at the street corner while the robot lit a cigarette.

“Isn't that bad for you?” asked Rommel.

“Isn't LSD bad for you?”

“I wouldn't know.”

“Right, that was Hendrix.”

“So this job…”

“Right. I need you to get me some crepe paper.”

“Throwing a party?”

“My son's birthday.”

Rommel looked the robot up and down, and noting a distinct lack of genitals asked, “Birthday?”

“Let's not argue the semantics of it.”

“You know there's a party supply store on the 300 block of Rococo Street?”

“Yeah, but the yakuza snatched up everything in the whole city for the boss' 80th birthday. Not a scrap of crepe to be found.”

“They probably have some of those Chinese paper lantern things, too.”

“Oooh. Those are cool.”

“I'll grab a few, no extra charge.”

The stoplight changed to green, and several cars accelerated past, each playing a popular song from the decade subsequent to the previous car, starting with the 30's.

Then just like a cigarette
Love seemed to fade away and leave behind ashes of regret

And gaze at the moon till I lose my senses
And I can't look at hovels and I can't stand fences

When I was just a baby, my mama told me, "Son,
Always be a good boy; don't ever play with guns."

In their eyes there's something lacking
What they need's a damn good whacking.

Broken glass is everywhere
It's a bloody scene

Holding hands while the walls come tumbling down
When they do I'll be right behind you

And the calm away by the storm is chasing
Everything good needs replacing

Rommel looked back over his shoulder. “Maybe we should have warned the other people in the restaurant.”

The robot hmmm-ed.

There was a muffled thud, and a fireball burst through the front of the restaurant and halfway across the street. Several nearby pigeons were shredded and seared. Car windows shattered for 20 yards in either direction. The shockwave knocked a woman through the window of the Pharyngotomy Tobacco Shop on the opposite side of the street, and flaming debris shooting through the broken window set the store's entire inventory ablaze. All the bums and misguided youth of the neighborhood gathered around for a free smoke.

“You weren't fucking around about that bomb,” Rommel said.

“Looks like nobody is coming out.”

Distant fire engines whined about the futility of it all.

“So…crepe paper.”

“Crepe paper,” the robot said.

Legends of the young robot's party were told long after the explosion was forgotten.

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Next: windmills and wheelchairs