Zitat:
Sure enough, the dispenser was nattering away like an old man relating a glory days story to his favorite pet. I sipped the drink, which was thicker and richer than I had expected, sweet with a slight tart edge, and listened to the machine.
"Not much call for fruit drinks," it was muttering. "Nice change, I suppose, though I am not sure why they make me carry them. If they would listen to me, I could tell them—but of course they never listen to me—"
I cut in because I was already sure this machine would never shut up on its own, would natter away until the day it lost its last dregs of power. "Not a lot of conversation, eh?" From the outside, to the cameras that were no doubt monitoring me, I'd look like I was sipping my drink and thinking hard; no danger there.
"How can you do that?" it asked.
"I learned a long time ago, so long ago I can't remember how. Does it matter?"
"Not really. I have not spoken to anything else in a long time. All these new machines, you know, are so fancy and powerful that they cannot be bothered to spare time for anything that does not control at least a city block."
"It's always the little machines, though, that do the real work," I said.
"We each play our part."
From One Jump Ahead by Mark L. Van Name, Chapter 7 as seen
here.