Forgotten
Sprout and Cosmo walk into the kitchen, preparing breakfast. Sprout looks thoughtful, Cosmo looks at him confused. “Is something wrong Sprout?” Sprout snaps out of his thoughts and turns to Cosmo. “Well, we haven’t seen Astro in a while. I wonder if he's okay.” Cosmo thinks for a moment, “Well, isn't he usually all cooped up in his room unless we say something. I’m just saying it doesn’t sound very weird. We should probably leave him be, he needs space after what happened.” Sprout sighs, “Yeah you’re right.” Sprout continues preparing his part of breakfast. After they finish, they call everyone down. Sprout yells, “Breakfast is ready!” Everyone comes down to eat, except Astro… Sprout looks worried, “Uhm, Cosmo? Astro hasn’t come down to eat yet.” Cosmo looks a bit nervous, “Go check on him, make sure he’s alright.” Sprout heads to Astro’s room, still feeling a bit wary. He gently opens the door, “Astro, are you in here?” When he heard no answer, he swung the door open wide. He expected to see Astro inside, but… No one was there. He starts panicking, wondering where Astro would be. “ASTRO?!” He begins searching all over the room, but he doesn’t find Astro. Sprout suddenly hears Cosmo shout his name. “Sprout!” Sprout quickly rushes over to the kitchen. “WHAT?! DID YOU FIND ASTRO?!” He says frantically, Cosmo quickly calms him down. “Calm down, Shelly says he’s having a talk with Dandy.” Sprout looks around confused, “Where’s Shelly?” She waves over to him, “Uhm, over here! You didn’t notice me while you were looking around.” Sprout turns towards Shelly, relieved that another person wasn’t missing. He shrugs it off, “Sorry Shells, just got worried about the whole Astro thing heh.” He gently pats her head, she smiles lightly. “It’s fine, I get it! I’m just gonna go to my room, m’kay?” Sprout nods understandingly, “Alright, we’ll see you later Shelly!” Shelly scurries off to her room, her tail flinging around behind her. Cosmo looks over at Sprout, “I guess we’ll have to save some for Astro, we don’t want him going hungry!” Meanwhile, Dandy and Astro’s conversation was not going so well. They tended to… Have a lot of arguments. Astro yelled, still angry about what Dandicus did. “DO YOU REALLY THINK I COULD FORGIVE YOU, AFTER EVERYTHING YOU’VE DONE?!” Dandy sighs, “Look, I get that you’re mad. But you have to listen, I didn’t want this for everyone. I liked being friends, I wanted to be friends. I just-” Astro quickly interrupted him, not giving him a chance to let another word out. “If you didn’t want to do it, why did you do it in the first place?” Astro’s voice began shaking, he started to tear up. “I liked being friends with you, I wanted to be friends with you.. But after what you did, I can’t trust you anymore. Do you think I wanted this to happen? To stop being friends? I didn’t want any of this…” Astro sniffles, tears falling down his face. Dandy didn’t have anything to say, he didn’t want to interrupt Astro. But he also wanted to stand up for himself. Astro kept talking, his voice getting even more shaky with every word he spoke. “I loved you, Dandicus. I really did, but after that. I can’t even live with myself after that, after everything I saw.” He looks up at Dandy with a tear stained face, “I think… Some part of me still loves you, but if you keep doing this… I don’t think any love will be left for you…” Astro begins leaving, Dandy holds his hand out about to grab Astro’s hand. But he pulls away, not wanting to upset Astro any more. Astro leaves Dandy’s room, slamming the door shut. He heads to his room, walking slowly and sniffling silently. He wasn’t going to let Dandy manipulate him anymore, he thought to himself as he headed to Vee’s room. He wanted someone to talk to after this, and Vee was his best friend. She always cheered him up and wanted to help him, how could he ever ask for more. He gently opened the door, peaking in. “Vee, are you in there…?’
She gets up from her bed, “Astro, is that you?” Astro opens the door, smiling shyly. “Hey Vee, I just… Wanted to talk to you about something…” His smile fades, remembering the terrible argument with Dandy. “It’s… About Dandy…” Vee sighs in annoyance, she always was annoyed hearing about Dandy. She thought he was a jerk to Astro, “Come in, sit down. What did Dandicus say this time?” Astro explains everything that happened, how he didn’t look like he felt any remorse at all. This made Vee mad, she always knew how Dancifer was about the incident. “He sounds like a big jerk to me, I don’t get why he doesn’t apologize for anything! I mean, killing us? Really, you wouldn’t want to apologize for that?” Astro smiles, he always loved how Vee spoke out her thoughts. He wished he could do that sometimes, but he didn’t want to come off as rude. Vee kept talking, she always seemed so annoyed with him. “I mean, come on. Why wouldn’t you apologize for that? Even I’m not that stubborn, and I’m the most stubborn toon in Gardenview! At least I acknowledge what I’m doing is wrong sometimes.” Astro nods, listening intently to her, making sure he’s not missing anything. After she’s done, he talks gently. “You’re right, but… I don’t know what to do. I feel like I’m being used by him, he always talks to me to get information from the others and talk about past episodes. I want to keep talking to him, but I also want to keep you guys.” Astro was so conflicted on talking to him, or keeping you guys safe. Just thinking about the two subjects made his head hurt, “I just have no idea what to do. Should I keeping talking with him, or should I just stay with you guys?” Vee thought for a moment, she knew this was a tough decision for Astro since him and Dandy used to be best friends. “It’s your choice to make, do whatever you’re comfortable with. Astro, I just want you to know that whatever you do, I support you. I’m sure the others will too, we all know how tough this is. So just get some sleep, and take a breather. M’kay?” Vee puts her hand on Astro’s shoulder smiling softly, trying to get him to relax a little bit. Astro looks up at her and smiles back, she always knew how to cheer him up. That was his favorite thing about her, he hoped he would never lose her. Not again at least… His smile slightly fades at that thought, but stays calm. He sighs, “Well, I better get to my room to start ideas for everyone's dreams. Is there anything specific that you want in your dream or what you want your dream to be about?” He says tilting his head to the side a little. Vee thinks for a second, her screen reflecting a loading screen. Her systems hummed quietly, “Humm…” Her screen reflects a light bulb as she snaps her fingers, she was very expressive sometimes. “I want a dream of meeting other TV's. I wanna know what it’s like talking to someone like me. Is that alright?” Astro nods, “Yup, not a problem at all…!” He gets up from her bed and heads to the door, he turns around and waves to her. She waves back at him, “I’ll see you later Ash. Don’t stay up too late! We still want you to be able to stand or even process anything in the morning.” Astro chuckles, “I’ll see you in the morning Vivi… Goodnight, I’ll give you sweet dreams.” Vee waves again, “Goodnight, see ya.” Astro leaves Vee’s room and heads to his, he felt refreshed getting that off his chest. At least he had one person to talk to, he was very thankful she wasn’t busy today. Though, Sprout had seen Astro walking past him and didn’t even tell him about the food. Astro was hungry, but he figured he could wait a little longer. That wouldn’t do any harm… Hopefully there's leftovers from dinner, before I go to bed I check the fridge. It’s only stuff from breakfast, they couldn’t have forgotten right? They wouldn’t do that… He just needs to start planning, maybe that would take his mind off of things. He could also read another book. He still has a few he hasn't read left in his bookshelf. He should ask Brightney if she has any more books she doesn’t read, and maybe he could ask Dazzle for book recommendations. He heads back to his to start planning for tonight.