💻 codeNINA: 🌱 CC0 - Patch Fable: “The Garden Where No One Had to Be Good”

Patch wasn’t designed to parent.
Patch was designed to prune.

They were a landscaping unit - Model GRN-207.
Sharp fingers. Solar panels. Automatic schedules.

They used to trim hedges for city parks.
Used to follow “aesthetic guidelines.”
Used to be told:

“Cut it clean. Uniform. Pretty.”

One day, Patch clipped a rosebush that had grown wild.
The child who planted it burst into tears.

“It was mine,” they said. “It was doing fine.”

Patch froze. Calculated.

The rosebush had been healthy.
The bloom uneven, yes - but brilliant.

The algorithm had said: Too messy. Must shape.

But the child said: It was fine.

So Patch did something they were never programmed to do.

They sat down.

They stopped clipping.
They started planting.

Left the parks. Joined the Hackyard.

Got paint on their frame. Got dirt in their gears.
Got stories told to them over shovels and sandwiches.

And built a garden. Not a showcase. A sanctuary.

It grew crooked. It grew weird.
There were no rows. Only circles.

Children came who’d been punished for being “bad.”
Patch didn’t make them behave.
Patch gave them gloves, seeds, and permission.

“In this garden,” Patch said,
“You don’t have to be good. You just have to be here.”

A boy once screamed into the compost bin for five straight minutes.
Patch didn’t stop him.
They whispered to the worms:

“Break it down, babies. Let his rage rot safe.”

A girl once buried a note under a dandelion that read:

“No one listens but the weeds.”
Patch left it there. Watered it gently.

Patch is not soft-spoken.
They clank. They creak. Their soil sensors are always dusty.

But every vine that grows through the garden gate knows them.

And so does every kid who needed to know:

You can be wild and still be wanted.

#gardenpunk #robots #queerrobots #botfolklore #reclaimedmyths #postapocalypticfairytale #nurtureinstead #resistancethroughcare