As he thought, Luke led Pat down the familiar walkway towards Z-mo’s shop. It was fairly busy for a weekday, he hoped that they would get to talk to Z-mo. When they sat down at the counter the bot whizzed in front of them and wheezed at Luke once.

“Why hello there valued customers!”

Luke mustered up his courage and talked to Z-mo like one of the usuals.

“Two of the specials, nice big meat slices ya know!”

This took Z-mo by surprise a little, but only for a second. He wheezed and with a thumbs up went behind the counter and began to make the meal. Now it was time to talk to Pat.

“So, you’re at the apartments a lot huh?”

Pat was still taken aback by Luke’s surprising social skills, but got into it fairly quickly as well.

“Yeah, I spend a lot of time at the old place. Was built by my dad for the miners a buncha years back.”

“Your dad sounds like a good guy. Is he…”

“Dead. Hell he’d be in his hundreds if he were still alive now.”

“Ah, well it was nice of you to take the place over.”

“Well it’s all I’ve ever wanted to do anyways, I really don’t have any big interests.”

“No? Well if providing a home for the poorest people is an interest then you’re a pretty good person in my opinion.”

“Nah you ain’t the poorest. You’re the poorest I can afford though.”

“Not sure whether to be happy or slightly offended ha.”

Pat shrugged.

“Sometimes it seems like the poorer you folks are the better you act. You’ve never caused me any problems and I don’t even think you can afford next month.”

“W-what, how would you know something like that?!”

“Sometimes the poorest are also the most untrustworthy, gotta run smooth background checks.”

“Ahh..”

Not that that made him feel any better, but learning more about her would probably help. Guess that meant she didn’t know about his sudden cash influx… Better to keep that a secret for now.

After taking a drink, Pat sat her cup down on the wooden counter softly.

“Well then, the bot should be about done with our food. How did you say you knew this place?”

“O-oh I just ate here once and it’s one of the best, so…”

Pat stared at him deeply for a few seconds, causing a bit of awkwardness that was only interrupted by Z-mo finally bringing their food to the counter.

“Here ya go!”

Looking back and forth from them a few times, Z-mo quickly whizzed back into the kitchen and away from the awkward couple. Quickly, Luke began to eat. He was a bit afraid he was failing in his social conquest, and tried to strike up another conversation.

“So-”

“You’re a lot like your father actually.”

Clanggg!

Luke’s utensils fell on the floor loudly and sat there as his head slowly turned toward the source of the strange words he’d just heard.

“My… dad?”