A fiercely independent scavver boy doesn’t expect his next salvage to be an overprotective butler bot, but now his very survival depends on him. The main theme, though, is one of loneliness / lack of connection, which made the relationship between the protagonist and Bits very endearing. — Emmie Christie, Writer Spotlight I saw the wreckage as soon as I crested the hill. Twists of metal, bent crane limbs, burnt servos. And what was left of Rigs—torn apart and scattered like the broken pieces of a child’s doll in a junkyard. Limbs still twitching. The sharp smell of burned engine oil hung in the air. Scampering around the remains—tumbletots. Six of them that I could see. Completely feral and permanently children. Or maybe they never lived long enough to mature. Naked and dirt-streaked. Backs bristling with spikes of scrap metal like a protective shell. Their wild hair and eyes a mutant white. Arrows of sunlight glinted off their jagged, needle-sharp chrome teeth. They ate scrap. Metal or organic, didn’t matter to them. In Lightspeed Magazine, Issue #195, August 2026. ReadA boy. A bot. An apocalypse.
Notes, fragments, and strange signals from the edge of story.
Ladd's Robot Repair.