The sound of a soft footstep made both Dr. Erica Slate and Lieutenant Dwayne Hunter look up from their late night chat. Unconsciously mirroring each other, the two adults looked up from their steaming cups of coffee to see a small red-head boy robot peering at them from the relative safety of his room.

"Rusty?" Dr. Slate questioned, setting her cup down on the edge of the desk. "It's past your power down time. What are you doing up?"

"Well, uh..." The boy robot stepped forward, moving his hands in nervous circles around each other. "I was thinking... and couldn't sleep..." He said hesitantly.

"About?" Dwayne questioned as Rusty paused in front of them, watching the ground. 

"Well, uh." Rusty rubbed the back of his neck, then just blurted out his question. "I know Dr. Slate's my Mom, everyone keeps calling Big Guy my Dad, and Dr. Poindexter is my Grandfather, but what does that make Lieutenant Dwayne?"

Both of the intellectually advanced adults summed up their feelings with a simple phrase. "Huh?"

Rusty blinked, then turned to the taller man. "Well, you help repair Big Guy right, just like Dr. Slate does with me. So that makes you part of Big Guy's family. But you're not his Father, that's Dr. Poindexter and you can't be his mother, so..." He trailed off, looking expectantly.

"Uh..." Now it was Dwayne's turn to look nervous. "Well, I guess I'd be a robot's uncle then."

Dr. Slate and her son stared at him, speechless for a moment. He just grinned, pleased with his answer as he took another sip of coffee.

"Soo..." Rusty drawled the word out, a thoughtful look on his face. "That would make you... Big Guy's Brother!!" 

It took Dwayne a moment to regain the ability to breath after nearly doing a spit take over the lovely Dr. Slate. She shot him an amused look. "Well, that does make sense, Rusty."

"You just have to explain somehow to Jeffie that the two of you are now cousins." Dwayne managed to add, choking slightly as he re-learned to speak again.

"Cousins?!?!" Rusty nearly cheered the word, his face lighting up like a mega-watt bulb. "Oh, Wow!!!"

Dr. Slate quickly put a hand on Rusty's head, to prevent the boy from vibrating to pieces, if nothing else. "Alright. You've got your question answered. Now, it's powerdown time before you start wondering if Donavon is related to you."

"Is he?!"

"No. And neither is Jenny."

"Oh."

"Now." Dr. Slate gave her son a gentle nudge toward his room. "Powerdown time. You can muse relationships in the morning."

Rusty nodded. "Okay. G'night Dr. Slate, G'night Lieutenant Dwayne!" He reached up to give each of them a quick hug before back off to his room.

Dr. Slate gave Dwayne of those 'looks' over the rims of her glasses. "A Robot's Uncle'?" She echoed. 

He shrugged. "It worked. Would you rather I had said 'Step-Father'?"

Both adults paused, rolling the connotations of that phrase around in their heads before breaking out in shy chuckles. 

"Better watch out." Erica giggled. "Or he'll be following you around calling you 'Uncle Lieutenant Dwayne'."

"If you can deal with being called 'Mom' occasionally," Dwayne grinned. "I think I can live with Uncle Lieutenant Dwayne."

Fin.