Lobanov is once again late to work, and this time his excuse for that is way too elaborate to believe in. Bykov decides that today, Lobanov may do something more interesting than pretend that he's a medic — he may become a babysitter, telling children the fairy tales, under threat of punishment. Semyon tries to just tell the stock fairy tales, but Bykov leaved the specific orders — all fairy tales must be original, no plagiarising. Then he comes with a brilliant idea: to tell a fairy tale based on himself, his work under Bykov, and their hospital. It has a great success, but quickly spreads around the hospital and reaches Bykov himself — who actually likes it. However, Gleb and Phil feels insulted by their portrayal in it. Bykov even allows Lobanov to take seven day-offs... which is actually a joke, which Lobanov misses — and Gleb and Phil decides not to warn him.
Phil temporarily becomes Polina's boss. He plans to use this time to demonstrate how his more "civil" methods are superior to Bykov's abusive style. No yelling, no insults, not conflicts — just kind, gentle and civil cooperation. But due to complete lack of social skills, Polina gets rejected by three patients in a row. Phil feels surprised the first, irritated the second and enraged the third time, finally snapping and calling her hopeless. When Bykov yells on Phil, too, because he wasted too much time without dealing with the patients, Phil can only say that he understands him now.
Gleb is ready to do any dirty work for Rita if it means avoiding Bykov. She tasks him with sorting forgotten stuff of the former patients; Rita completely ignores his complaints that this stuff wasn't remembered in many months, and there's next to zero chances that it would be remembered now. While revisioning old stuff, Gleb notices that one golden necklace has disappeared — the same one Rita wears now. He tells Rita that he already notified the rightful owner, and tries to take the necklace, but she refuses, expecting a foul play, and says that she would deliver it personally. Gleb then tricks an owner of a rare T-shirt by pretending that he just ruined that T-shirt with urine (actually apple juice), and takes the T-shirt for himself when the owner feels too disgusted to even touch it. Rita tries to imitate his method with a necklace, but its owner is not as squeamish.
This episode provides examples of:
- Animal Motifs: "Burry Lizard" from Lobanov's fairy tale is obviously based on Bykov, with the species chosen from Bykov's old biker nickname and overall behaviour.
- Batman Gambit: In order to preserve that rare T-shirt and not give it back to its owner, Gleb, when the owner arrives, spoils it with urine (from one of the probes) and asks him whether he still wants to take it. The guy refuses, and even suggests to just get rid of it completely. When he leaves, Gleb reveals that it was not even urine: he simply used the apple juice (which he reveals to Rita, who had same reaction, after drinking the rest of it). Rita later tries the same trick with a necklace, but unsuccessfully.
- Benevolent Boss: Phil (who is temporarily assigned to be Polina's boss) acts demonstratively nice towards her in order to prove his point that Bykov's style of commanding is inferior to Phil's kind, gentle and "civil" style. But Polina manages to accumulate so many screwups in a single day, even Phil ultimately snaps at her and decides to quit his experiment.
- Drill Sergeant Nasty: Discussed. Phil thinks that Bykov is way too harsh, while Polina thinks that some people just can't learn otherwise. In the end, Polina gets proven right — by failing all tasks given to her by Phil and enraging him.
- Hidden Depths: Surprisingly, Semyon does manage to create a good fairy tale for the children, which they likes a lot. And not only them, since the nurse tells this story to Pasha, Pasha — to Rita, Rita — to Kisegach, Kisegach — to Kupitman, and Kupitman — to Bykov himself. Bykov actually rewards him for this, since he did exactly what Bykov wanted (used his brain to complete his task), while little satire in his fairytale can't hurt him enough to warrant a punishment.
- Hypocrite:
- Rita scolds Gleb for not caring to sort out the stuff forgotten by the patients — while openly wearing a golden necklace she claimed from there, stating that no one cares anymore. Gleb calls her out on it.
- Immediately after accusing Rita of stealing a golden necklace (which was forgotten for two months and never remembered until Gleb learned about it), Gleb decides to steal a rare T-shirt with Jim Morrison print. Rita immediately lampshades this, and forces him to call the rightful owner, too.
- Innocently Insensitive:
- Polina, full stop:
- Polina gets rejected by her first patient due to calling him obese. It's not why she was rejected, cause he's indeed obese and knows it; she was rejected for mocking him for it (without even realising it).
- Second patient rejects her when she "accidentally" (she claimed to do so because she simply didn't pay attention) ate all his tangerines. All five.
- Third patient rejects her when she accidentally ruins his daughter's painting when she tries to solve a crossword. When the patient started complaining about this ("What if I planned to put it on the wall? What would I say when my daughter arrives?!"), Polina suggests to just pretend that it was lost; Phil grabs her out before the patient can react in any way. At this point, Phil snaps and yells at her.
- Semyon considers his fairy tale to be funny, and so is almost everyone else (even Bykov, who was mocked in it) — except for Gleb (who became a pony Romashka — a Punny Name based on his surname and the word "romashka", Russian for "chamomile") and Phil (who became fleaish dog Philka); they feels genuinely insulted about their roles in the story.
- Polina, full stop:
- It Only Works Once: Gleb's "urine plan" works perfectly for Gleb himself when he claims a rare T-Shirt by exploiting its owner's disgust toward keeping "urine-stained" clothes (actually apple juice); not so much for Rita when she tries to use it with a golden necklace: firstly, it's way easier to clean, and secondly, its owner considers losing this necklace way bigger problem than just some discomfort.
- Laser-Guided Karma:
- Invoked by Bykov; since Lobanov likes to tell "fairy tales" to excuse his screwups, he may as well use this "talent" to tell children some real fairy tales (of his own). If he fails at it, too, he would be punished for real.
- Lobanov completely misses sarcasm in Bykov's promise to reward him with seven day-offs. Phil and Gleb, who were offended by his fairy tale (becoming a dog and a horse, respectively, with insulting names), refuses to warn him.Phil: How may I warn him? I'm a dog.
Gleb: I'm a horse; when he would return, the only thing I could do is neigh at him.
- No Fair Cheating: Lobanov tries to tell children the Thumbelina fairy tale, and gets immediately reminded by a nurse tasked with watching over him that he is no allowed to just use pre-existing stories, whether children knows them already or not.
- No Sense of Personal Space: Third Polina's patient tries to solve a crossword. When Polina arrives, she starts giving him answers to several words. When he sarcastically suggests her to just solve it by herself, she takes the crossword from him and proceeds to do exactly that. However, the real reason she was rejected for is something far worse.
- No Social Skills: Every patient with whom Polina interacts during the episode rejects her. Every. Single. One. Why? Because she never thinks what she's saying, and often hurts the patients' feelings. Even Phil gets surprised.
- Sarcasm-Blind:
- Polina "helps" her third patient (who tries to solve a crossword) by immediately providing correct answer to every single word he tries to solve; when he sarcastically suggests her to just solve it by herself, she proceeds to do exactly that.
- Lobanov completely misses Bykov's sarcasm when he "rewards" him with seven day-offs. As a Laser-Guided Karma, other characters he insulted in his "fairy tale" refuses to warn him about it, so seven day-offs would turn into seven slack-offs.
- Self-Insert Fic: The fairy tale about "Semyon-Bogatur" is obviously based on Lobanov's working under Bykov (who became "the Burry Lizard").
- Sophisticated as Hell: Lobanov's fairy tale mixes more or less "normal", fairytale-style things, like "medical kingdom" or "Semyon-bogatur", with the things like "Burry Lizard" and the words like "jerk".Lobanov: And [Semyon-Bogatur] inserted the Clyster of Goodness into him, which caused him to explode with happiness like a supernova.
- Speech Impediment: Burry Lizard (who is based on Bykov) exaggerates his usual problems with pronouncing "R" for comedic effect.
- Too Good to Be True: Olga, unlike her husband, notices that something must be wrong with Semyon receiving seven day-offs as a reward for something so minor, and tries to insist on double-checking. Semyon refuses. Turns out, she's right, and only reason Semyon believed in it in the first place is him being Sarcasm-Blind.
- A Tragedy of Impulsiveness: Why Polina was rejected by her second patient — because she grew tired of waiting for him, and "accidentally" ate all his tangerines. All five.
