Penny Duty

“You’re being put on Penny-duty, soldier.”

These are words that strike an unprecedented fear into most any Atlesian Soldier. Taking care of the oddball ginger isn’t tough exactly, she never tries to cause trouble. The problem is, she has a knack for wandering off and out of sight something awful, if she does get caught up in trouble while you’re supposed to be looking after her then you aren’t going to see the light of day until the toilets in Ironwood’s office are so clean you’d eat off them with your significant other and confidently propose afterwards.

Penny-duty itself wasn’t a punishment, not necessarily, it was something that had to be done, there was a raffle as to who did it. That isn’t to say, however, that if you happened to particularly piss off a commanding officer, your name wouldn’t be in there a couple dozen times extra.

Bill Marwn didn’t quite get the concept of staying on his commanding officer’s ‘good side’. He got put on Penny-duty a lot. However, he never really had a problem with it, after his first few rounds, He’d grown a comfortable bond with the robotic girl. Some of his peers had begun to expect that Will was pissing off the CO on purpose to see his new friend, while others stuck to the idea he just authority issues.

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Bill boarded the airship, taking a quick glance around before spotting Penny sitting next to an Atlesian soldier in blue-highlighted armour, and called across to her and waved as he made his way towards the pair.

“Hey, Penny! Howya doin’?”

“Salutations, William! I’m absolutely splendid!” The young android answered, beaming up at the soldier approaching her and giving an eager little wave back. The man beside her gave no indication of caring about the situation one way or another, or at least none that could be betrayed by the meager amount of his face visible in the Atlas armour’s helmet.

“I told you Penny, just call me Bill, okay? No need to be so formal with a friend.” Bill replied endearingly, returning her smile. The blue-highlighted soldier gave an un-amused grumble below his breath as he turned his head away and, Bill suspected, rolling his eyes underneath his helmet. He ignored this, continuing happily to talk with Penny as he took the seat beside her, opposite the other man. “So, where we headed this time around? Into town again?” Penny looked like she was about to answer him but was cut off by the gruff, annoyed sound of other soldier’s voice.

“We’re heading to beacon for a gathering of the students, Miss Polendina has been invited as a guest as a favour from the headmaster to General Ironwood for the purposes of testing her out in enclosed social environments.” He asserted, speaking with a tone that implied Bill’s lack of prior knowledge was laughable yet disappointing to him.

A brief silence hung in the air around the trio, before Bill gave Penny a gentle nudge with his elbow and smirked playfully at her. “Ooooh-ho-ho-hooo, so Ironwood’s finally letting you go to a party, then?” He teased, though that element seemed to pass over the redhead who just took it as any other question.

“Yes, he is! Oh, I am simply ecstatic!” She brought her hands together and up to her chin, another smile gracing her lightly-freckled face and the curls in her hair bouncing slightly at the movement. “I have researched parties greatly, there is going to be ‘punch’ and dancing and so many things! Bill, have you heard of ‘dubstep’? I hear there is lots of that at parties!” Bill chuckled at this, patting Penny on the shoulder, earning what was likely a brief glare from beneath his blue colleague's helmet.

“I know what dubstep is Penny, but this is a fancy school event, it’s probably just gonna be pop music and stuff like that, Remnants top 40 and that sorta thing. Still, I bet you’ll enjoy yourself! Got anybody in mind you plan to dance with?” He decided against putting the teasing tone into this question, It seemed like it’d be a little while before Penny understood the idea.

“Unfortunately, I don’t really know any dances for two people…” Penny looked a little degected for a moment, and Bill wondered quickly what he could change the topic to in order to keep her happy, as seeing his young robotic friend sad wasn’t a great sight. Also, if Penny’s diagnostic records showed she’d been upset for too long when talking to him, then he’d be answering to Ironwood himself in suspicion of mistreating the girl. The soldier’s worries were luckily cut short when Penny perked up on her own. “But, I do know how to dance the ‘robot’, my friend Ruby showed me it once a while ago! Would you like to see, Bill?” She inquired eagerly, bright green eyes shimmering with a sense of pride in her claims.

“Heck yeah, go ahead!” He replied encouragingly with a matching smile as the girl started standing up out of her seat, only to be interrupted by a rough and intrusive cough from the blue soldier.

“Miss Polendina,” He asserted, his tone sharper than before in a way that Bill didn’t appreciate at all. “You should remain seated, the airship will be making its departure shortly, and I'm sure you understand basic safety regulations for passengers at this point.” While he spoke to Penny, his words seemed to be directed at the fellow Soldier beside her, clearly displeased more with his encouragement of the behavior than with Penny herself. Bill huffed at this, but he couldn’t exactly refute it, the other guy was correct after all. Penny sat back down quietly, not seeming to deterred by the sequence of events having understood the logic shown by the Blue soldier, though she was beginning to label any files and recordings relevant to him as “spoilsport” within her memory banks.

Bill felt at least he should make an effort with the soldier to the other side of Penny. He leant forwards in his chair and turned to him, getting his attention. “So, hey, I’m Private Bill Marwn, didn’t catch y-”

“Private First-Class Tobias Glas-Tywyll.” He was cut short, Tobias’ voice sounding a little more exasperated and bored than before. Bill grumbled a little about the rudeness of it, and leant back in his chair thinking to himself about how it was going to be a long, quiet flight.

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