It's a good time for a heart-to-heart.

Erica and Madison stared analytically into the large makeup mirror they had set up in the corner of Ross's bedroom.

"So we wanna make this," Erica gestured skeptically to Madison, "look like a professor?"

"Exactly," Andrew said. He fidgeted nervously with an empty coke bottle. "Can you do it?"

"Why can't we use her instead?" Madison asked. "She's obviously sculpted to be older."

"We gave you makeup scripts, not interrogator scripts," Andrew snapped. "Just do the fucking job."

They shrugged and turned to the makeup bag. As they looked over all of the products they had borrowed or stolen, they began to discuss their plan. "Do you have a permabase?" Erica asked.

"Feels like it," Madison replied as she touched her face lightly. "That's gonna be a problem if we wanna get a realistic sag."

Leaving the golems to their efforts, Ross turned to Andrew. "Hey, man," he said gently. "You doing alright?"

"What? Yeah, I'm fine." Andrew answered quickly, still turning the bottle over in his hands. "Don't worry about me."

"Ok, well, I'm gonna get a beer. You want one?"

Andrew shook his head and Ross left the room. Andrew nervously stared at the golems, who were comparing eyeliners. Ross re-entered the room with a beer and stood silently next to him, drinking beer and watching them work.

After a few minutes, Ross broke the silence again. "It's just, you seem really stressed out, is all."

Andrew grunted. "Yeah, well, we're trying to cover up a crime that could get us expelled at best and might lead to prison time. I'm sorry if I'm not as Zen as your little sexbot."

Ross took a long pull from his beer. "Stop calling her that."

Andrew scowled and Ross realized belatedly that he was trying to pick a fight. Ross had taken the bait.

"Stop calling it 'her'," Andrew said sullenly. "No matter how much you stick your dick in it, it's still a lump of dirt. You're fucking dirt."

Ross tried suppress a flash of anger. "So are you."

"You're right." Andrew turned to look at him, resentment in his eyes. "That's all I ever wanted. The plan was simple: deactivate Levinson, fuck her, reactivate her, repeat. Nice and simple. But then you got your crush involved and now we're running around making modifications on modifications and buying fucking makeup and clothes and trying to trick technicians. We're in over our head."

"You didn't object when we printed out those sex scripts."

"For sex," Andrew emphasized. "I just wanted to fuck my hot professor, man! I mean, it 's a little weird but at least I'm getting my rocks off in private. It's just masturbation, not..."

"What?" Andrew ask pointedly. He was failing to control his anger. "Not what?"

"You know what," Ross said bitterly. He gestured to Madison, who was looking up while Erica applied something to her neck. "All this cutesy, lovey-dovey shit. Walking around campus holding hands, calling it your 'girlfriend.' It's pathetic."

"I'm pathetic?" Ross asked incredulously. "You cooked up a plan to **** your golem professor, and I'm pathetic?"

"It's not ****, you dipshit!" The golems looked up briefly, startled by Andrew's shouting. After a moment they returned to their task, uninterested in the argument. "You keep acting like they're people! That thing is just a big fucking fleshlight but you act like it loves you! Jesus Christ, dude, it's like falling in love with a fucking calculator."

"Fuck you," Ross said quietly. "She's more than that and you know it. A week ago you thought she was as real as you and me."

"And fifteen years ago I thought Santa was real. Then I grew up. When are you gonna grow up and stop treating your cock holster like a person?"

"She is a real person!" Ross spat. "There was a real girl named Madison Hill who died. Her parents made a golem of her out of grief, so she's completely real!"

"Oh my God," Andrew said. "You mean that some poor girl died and you're getting blowjobs from a machine with her face? That's so fucked up, man! Think about her family, about what you're doing to her memory. That-" he pointed at Madison, who was debating shades of nail polish with Erica, "-that is not Madison Hill. That's dead, mindless lump of clay that looks like her. God, what the fuck is wrong with you?"

"She told her mom about me. She's excited to meet me."

"Oh, perfect," Andrew said. "You can go hang out with some bereaved parent and together you can pretend that this soulless thing is her daughter."

Andrew stormed over to the table angrily. The women stopped and looked up at him, expecting him to say something. Instead, he punched Madison in the stomach with all his might. She dropped to her knees and began wheezing while Erica knelt to assist her.

"What the fuck?" Ross cried, horrified. He rushed to Madison's side.

"Hey Madison, how did that feel?" Andrew sneered.

The young woman was back on her feet already, looking expectantly at him. "It didn't feel like-"

He interrupted her with another sharp blow to the gut with the same results. Ross rushed over and grabbed his arm. "Stop hitting her," he snarled.

Andrew ripped his arm away from Ross and spoke to the golem again. "Did that hurt?"

"No," she said pleasantly. "Why did you do it?"

"To prove a point. Did it hurt your feelings or upset you? Would it bother you if I did it again?"

"No."

Andrew looked Ross in the eye. Ross saw smug triumph and disdain. "Why not?" he asked.

"I'm only a golem," she said. "Now can I finish working on this makeup?"