A/N: I've always kinda wondered about why Bender was still friends with Fry after in one episode, it shows the view through a bender unit's eyes and when placed on Fry, it says to befriend, steal money, and leave in a ditch.

Of Robots and Humans

Bender stood in the meter wide space of his apartment, running in sleep mode. As anyone of the year 3000 knew, sleep mode for a robot didn't contain the robot equivalent of dreaming, but just a free time when a robot could think of things. For Bender, tonight's subject was his friendship with Fry.

Every time he looked at him, the same old directives box came up.

Befriend

Steal money

Leave in ditch

But he never followed through with the last one. The question was why? Could it have been a result of when he was electrocuted? It had to be, it was that day he decided not to follow his programming. The day he realized he could bend what he wanted, when he wanted, and who he wanted.

But that couldn't have been that, or at least it couldn't have all been it. He and Fry had gotten in fights, but afterward always came back together. The time he had to leave Fry's new apartment because of his antenna, or when he joined the society of human killing robots. He and Fry had always somehow come back together as friends.

And it wasn't just, "yeah you're my friend whatever" friendship, it was a "hey I got your back" one. When he'd been taken by the Robot Devil, Leela told him about how she dragged Fry along. But when he asked Fry about, he said there was a part of him that was glad he was dragged along. That was what their friendship was. That's why he'd never able to do that last directive.

His door slid open to show his best organic meatbag of a friend, "hey Bender, you want to go downtown and see a saucy puppet show?" He got up, responding, "sure pal!" As they walked out Bender thought I'll never be able to do that third one. And as he reached for Fry's wallet he continued only the second one.

Fin