They shrug. "Cricket?" Felix asks. "If you don't mind to wait until we can repay you and you there is something to pay Doors for the time."

"Like, I can't eat glawg, so I'd be enabling you to do something that's forbidden for me but not for you... 's honestly not that bad, it's like, maybe on a level with talking back to one of my aunts."  She shrugs.  "Up to you, I really don't mind."

"What is glawg?"

"Glow dogs- omnivores, related to wolves, get a bit over knee-high, we saw one on the elevator...?"

They look at each other. "Okay, lets... pass that culinary opportunity."

"Sure- Doors won't mind 'long as we leave before the dinner rush really gets going."

"We would want that anyway."

"Yeah, then you get to go meet whoever of my family's in the district tonight."  She unlocks the door at the foot of the stairs and heads out into the 'street'.  "Right, thisaway."  The boot vendor has moved on and the old man at the hot drinks stand has been replaced by a bored-looking teenager, but the blonde woman with the cart is still visible at the end of the block, more or less where she was earlier.

They follow Peg, being attentive to their surroundings.

There are fewer children at this point, and at one point the ball escapes and bounces over toward the triplets before getting corralled by one of the larger children with a "Sorry!"

"Hey, Doors!  Got a bit to chat?"

     "For you, kiddo, always.  Who're your friends?"

"Felix, Fernando, and Thomas Vaesteri- they're from offworld- meet Doorframe Sanri."

"Hello!" Felix gives his best grade-A smile.

"Pleasure to make your acquaintance."  Doors sketches a salute with the tongs she's holding.  She could be anywhere from a careworn thirty to a well-preserved fifty, at least going by human ages, with short, spiky blonde hair and a tattoo of a jumping shark on her left cheekbone, done in a somewhat blocky style.  "What brings you down to Eridani?"

"Likewise! Family business."

"Family, or-"  She tilts her head toward Peg and raises an eyebrow. "-family?  If you don't mind my asking."

"Family business."

"Ah-huh, gotcha.  Anything I should be sure to stay away from?"

"You don't have anything to worry about from us. Anyway, sorry if that is the sort of thing that makes you uncomfortable, but we have never talked to a Synth before and it turns out it is more of a controversial topic than we expected. Do you mind if-" he waves vaguely "you talked more about yourself?"

Doors raises an eyebrow at 'never talked to a Synth before', but doesn't comment.  "Uh- I run this here cart, my wife's an accountant, I play junkyard percussion in a terrible folk band when we can get everyone in one place, which isn't often..."

"They were thinking more along the lines of Synths in general,"  Peg interjects.  "But you don't have to answer anything too personal."

"Yeah, absolutely tell us to fuck off if you want to."

"Duly noted."  She gives a sideways smile.  "Not that you have to tell me that, kid."

     "Would you stop calling me that?"  Peg's putting on a halfway convincing tone of exasperation, but it has the air of an old argument they just rehash for fun at this point.  "I'm still older than you."

"Yeah, and you spent what, four, five years barely sentient?"

"Huh, that's a good starting point. If you didn't spend four to five years barely sentient how did you spend your early life?"

"Full-sized, first of all, with procedural memory for all the normal stuff like using a fork and doing math.  None of this learning how to walk business, we got to jump right in with navigation and sterile technique."

"Sterile technique?"

"Straight to work?"