The small robot danced wildly about the stage, keeping grace in a metallic fashion. Every move had its own kind of whir, pop, or click to it.

Few emotions were in it, all of them expressed through the dance, except for the utter boredom it experienced doing this exact same dance routine every single time. Once, just once it wanted to mix things up. But that would get it shut off if it didn’t prompt its programmer. Who’d say no.

It finished with an over-practiced flourish, and landed on one knee, metal hands in the air, and if it could have panted, it would have been.

But it was all old to it. Nothing more than a routine, a way to benefit the programmer and the viewers, no one else.

How it longed to break free, get away from the same old thing every day. And the humans had no idea.