[color=92278f]ARCHIE[/color] - Sandy Coves Inn -- late afternoon

Celeste took the baseball bat and nearly dropped it, not at all prepared for its weight.  "Well, that's silly," she giggled.  "You're obviously just a machine, not a person -- even if the General was so smart to build you the way they did."

{INFLECTION CODE: AMUSEMENT.  ANALYZE.  RESULT: INAPPROPRIATE/PATRONIZING.  RESPONSE: IRRITATION.}  Archie summoned up the chain of code for his voice box to use an aggravated tone.  "Shouldn't you be going?"

"Right!  Yes!  I need to go to the clinic.  Can you take care of the inn for just a little longer?"

{INFLECTION CODE: REQUEST.  ANALYZE.  RESULT: REQUEST TO SHIRK DUTIES.  RESPONSE: AFFIRMATIVE.  ATTEMPT: THINLY-VEILED SARCASM.}  "Of course, of course.  The entire town will be here in a couple hours, I'll just keep busy making sure the dining hall can accommodate them."

Celeste nodded and left nearly as quickly as she'd entered.  Archie scrolled through several lines of coded flowcharts as he searched his logic banks for an explanation for her behaviour.  Ultimately, the algorithms could only suggest he required additional information for a more confident response, but so far, most suggestions pointed to a simple lack of intelligence.

"Too bad," he muttered to himself.  "Seems the standards for the manager job simply fell lower and lower as time has passed."  Archie idly tidied the desk and was about to turn and enter the dining hall, when the main doors opened once more and two figures walked in.

"Ah!  Guests!  Welcome to the Sandy Coves Inn," Archie greeted them cheerfully.

"Howdy Mr Handy," the man began kindly as he approached the robot, "My name is James Wilson and this is Susan Cooper, would you Happen to know if anyone came into town from South Boston recently? perhaps wearing someone of lab coat or Vault gear." 

"How wonderfully polite!  But please, call me 'Archie.'"  The robot paused momentarily as it processed the man's request.  "A lab coat, or Vault gear, you ask?  Hmm.  I can't say that I have, unfortunately!  Do you have a name, or description?"  Archie spun his lower body in mid air, though his three glass optical orbs remained fixed on James and Susan.

"Oh!" the robot suddenly exclaimed, after the algorithm prompted he begin tidying for the meeting.  "The entire town will be assembling here, in this very inn, within the next little while.  A meeting, of some sort.  Certainly if the person you are looking for is in town, they will turn up at the meeting.  So!  Shall I prepare you a room?  I assure you all our linens are clean and pest-free -- I have laundered them myself, you know.  It'd be a comfortable place to rest and freshen up from your travels before meeting the townsfolk.  What do you say?"