Dear diary: Today hasn't been a great day.

I lifted my face off the desert's silky floor and looked towards the nearby city lights, wondering exactly what part of me thought jumping off that tower was a good idea. At the time, it made sense. Right now... yeah, no. It looked like it'd be a short trek before I'd be back in the city, and my right leg definitely did not feel completely functional.

My name is Aural Automaton. I'm just a regular robot from planet Zynima who likes to perform at nightclubs and put music together in my spare time. Which is exactly what I was doing earlier today – relaxing in my home near the top of the tower I just bailed from, working on a musical whim in my messy, one-room home.

I should mention that Zynima doesn't have a lot of serious crime. It's really only petty stuff like rough-housing or minor theft, so when I heard that a murder had occurred a handful of days ago, suffice it to say the news caught my attention. A machine had been utterly destroyed by another robot. I was pretty jarred, of course, but the worst part is it kept happening. Literally everyday since then, someone else had been killed, and no one knew who the perpetrator was.

So I called one of my good friends who works in the technical field (or, to us robots, the medical field). We'll call her Shock. She was one of the people who ended up getting dragged around by this mess of homicides, being called to these scenes to see if there was anything that could be done to save those poor, junked bots. Spoiler alert: there wasn't. She told me that every single one of these robots not only had extensive damage basically everywhere, but their drives had been totally wrecked. Those guys were perma-gone.

But eventually, the killer messed up and a clue was left behind, according to the news. A word was loosely written in the stains of a deceased bot's coolant fluid – “Trivo.” Sounded like a name, but it wasn't one I'd heard of before. Regardless, it was a word I'd certainly be avoiding.

All of this is the reason I'm lying face down in this sandy hell instead of jamming to some tunes right now. I received a knock on my door, as friendly as ever. But get this – as soon as I get up to see who's there, the door, at least ten feet away at the time, somehow manages to fly in my direction and smash into my whole body. Granted, it's a pretty flimsy door, but talk about confusing and unexpected. It took me way too long to get my bearings after being whacked to the ground by that thing, but after I did, I saw another machine standing in my doorway. It was big. It was scary. And it stared right at me with these two light blue, circular eyes that I could only describe as empty, or... devoid of feeling. And it obviously had a bone to pick with me if it had that little respect for my door.

“Yo, what the hell?!” I shouted. But I got no reply. It just started walking towards me with total disregard for everything in its way.

I'll be honest again – I hate fighting. It's just not my thing. So when this thing started approaching me after the break-in, I scrambled to my feet as fast as someone can with a door lying on their chest. I wasn't about to get in a tussle with this intruder; it was clearly way out of my league. Not only that, but it was already reaching out for me with one hand and balling up a fist with another. Did I mention this thing had four arms?

This is where the desert floor comes in. In front of me was a scary robot, and behind me was a door leading to a small balcony. This part's genius, get this – my processor tells me that the best action for me to take at that moment is to run and jump off the balcony in order to escape.

Here's the kicker – my house is about a dozen storeys above the ground.

In a moment of totally sound logic, I bashed that door open and jumped over the railing in some sort of awkward swan dive.

After a once-in-a-lifetime free-fall, I swivelled around in the air and landed directly on my right leg in an attempt to soften my collision with the ground, which is probably what screwed it up so badly. Good thing most machines aren't programmed to feel pain.

I don't know if that thing's still up there or what it even wanted with me, but it sure wasn't going to be taking me out any time soon.

Limping to a repair shop was not how I wanted to spend my day off, but life obviously had other plans for me. I couldn't feel or control anything beneath my right knee, so I had to do some ridiculous hop-walk that involved me swinging my calf forward every time I wanted to take a step. Thankfully, I don't think there was anyone around to see my embarrassing display.

I had to endure a good 15 minutes of this torture before I reached Zynima City's outskirts. I knew there was a small shop here run by an old robot named Decker; he and I didn't really see eye to eye on a personal level, but I knew he was reliable in a pinch. Normally, I'd avoid off-the-grid merchants like him, but I'd encountered him enough times in the past to get a good sense of his character. Good thing, too, since it looked like he'd probably be my only option for repairs right now.

I continued my hobbling until I got to the front window of his shack. It was a really dainty and isolated building, almost in disrepair. He was in there, reclining on his hammock, without a care in the world. That is, until I spoke up.

“Hey, uh... Decker?”

He grunted and raised an eyelid. “Ah, whaddaya want?” he scowled.

“I broke my leg.” I changed the normal eyes on my visor to something more sad and pathetic looking.

“...Hmph, ain't that a shame. You want me to fix 'er up, kid? It'll cost ya.”

“Yeah, I could use a hand.” I didn't have the money available right then, but I figured I could pay him off later.

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Another grunt as he rolled off the hammock and onto his feet. “Git on in here, then. Door's on the side.”

I was kind of reluctant to go inside. Might have been because of his gruff disposition, or maybe because it seemed like I was bothering him. Who knows. Nevertheless, I stumbled over to the side of his building and entered the shack.

I could hardly move in there. Lots of miscellaneous pieces of junk, parts, and other goods loaded onto all of the shelves lining the walls. There was even stuff hanging from the ceiling. I had to maneuver through all of Decker's possessions just to get over to where he was, and my leg didn't make it any easier. He didn't even make any attempt to help me through, either. He just gestured for me to take a seat on a big metal box once I made it to him.

“So,” he said, grabbing a couple of tools from a nearby shelf, “how'd it happen?”

“Well, I... I fell off a building.”

Decker momentarily stopped what he was doing and stared at me. “...Ya did what now, kid?”

I looked off to the side a bit to avoid his gaze. “It's a bit of a long story.”

He chuckled before continuing his tool search. I sat quietly for about a minute as he gathered all of the equipment he needed to fix me up.

“Yer leg ain't that bad, can tell ya already. I seen a helluva lot worse in my days.” He knelt down beside me, taking a closer look at my knee. “Can ya move it at all?”

“Yeah, I can move my thigh all the way down to my knee.”

“I'm gonna hafta open yer knee up to take a look. Sit still.”

I complied. Once again, I was very thankful I wasn't programmed to feel pain.

“I reckon it'll be an easy fix if the damage's all internal. 'Specially if you can still move half of it.”

I could feel him taking part of my kneecap off, which was one of the stranger feelings I'd experienced in my life. I didn't think anything could top that until he started probing the inside of my knee. I wouldn't recommend it.

“Yup. Easy fix. Whoever built ya built ya well, if this's all that's wrong. You gotta coupla wires disconnected from yer actuator.”

Whew – looks like my life wasn't about to end.

“Try movin' it a bit. Gently.”

I almost swung my leg up in the air in excitement right in Decker's face when I realized I could move it again. In both of our best interests, I restrained myself.

“Look at that. Simple fix,” he boasted.

“Nice! Man, thank you so much.”

Decker finished up the repair by replacing my kneecap and asking me to stand up on the leg to see if it worked, which it seemed to. Probably the highlight of my day.

“Good. Now git on outta here and over to the front desk.” Even though my leg had been fixed, it wasn't much easier getting out of his shop, especially with Decker ushering me out so urgently. I ended up tripping and slamming into a rake hanging on the wall, which then fell on my head.

“And be careful why don'tcha!”

After I escaped his shop, I stood up near the front desk and waited for Decker to clean up a bit before giving me the price.

“Ehhhh. Wasn't near as bad as I figured. Let's call it 800 bytes.”

“Well... do you take payments?” I wasn't fond of not being able to pay someone up front, but I really didn't have a choice.

“Are you tellin' me you can't pay?” Decker's voice became even more stern and grumbly.

“No, I can, it's just a bit complicated right now. You know that building I jumped off to break my leg? It's... complicated.”

“Listen, pardner. I don't do I-O-Us.”

“Look, I'll get you the bytes, I'm not playing you. Swear on my life, I'll get you the money.”

“Ya better! I'll have yer circuits if ya don't!”

“I will! 800, I'll get it to you!” I shouted back as I walked away from the shack and towards the city.

“850!”

“Okay, okay!” My walk turned into a jog. I appreciated the help, but my relationship with that guy wasn't getting any better. I had more important things on my mind, like the fact that I was almost beat up a little while ago.

After I was far enough away, I wiggled my leg around a bit more to make sure it was totally functional. Everything felt normal, but now I needed to get home to see what was going on.

That robot might still be there... maybe I can get some advice from someone first. Shock knows all about this whole serial killer situation, so maybe I can get a hold of her...

I didn't have a phone or communication device on me, so my only real option was to walk along the path to the inner city.

The good news: it was wonderful getting my feet out of the sand and onto some solid concrete. I hate sand.

The bad news: the path to the inner city was essentially the sketch-street of gang-town. There were hooligans and punks all over the place, and some were already taking some interest in me from afar, making the odd gesture or giving me a glance every now and then. I was still a bit jumpy and paranoid from that whole break-in situation, as anyone would be, but what made matters worse was I had to walk through this place to get home.

I knew that if I looked like a bad-ass, they probably wouldn't bother with me. Some of them probably already saw me wiggling my leg around like a goof, though, so there was only so much I could do in that regard.

I went all in and just kept walking. The street all too narrow and poorly lit because of the evening sun, and lots of the buildings were closed up tight. Some were even boarded up, which didn't help make the environment any more comfortable. And I couldn't help but notice some shady looking bots – you know the ones with backwards ball-caps and boomboxes on their shoulders – staring me down as I passed by, but thankfully, no one approached me for the first little while.

A couple minutes in, I spotted a godsend. A miracle. Whatever you want to call it – there was a public phone hanging on a nearby wall. The best part was there was almost no one around it. It took me no time to bolt over to the phone.

I quickly yanked the phone off the reciever and dialled Shock's number as fast as I could, with every button press bringing forth a tiny surge of anticipation. Zynima's phones had the wonderful feature of allowing a caller to enter their name as the caller ID, and I did just that to make sure she knew who it was.

[https://zynima.net/assets/lit/soulless1.png]

...

It rang once.

It rang again. Surely she'd answer, right?

It rang a third time, and that's when the anxiety kicked in.

But, before I heard the fourth ring, there was a click, followed by a voice.

“Hi, Aural. How've you been?”

I emitted a loud sigh of relief. “Shock! Where are you?”

“I just got home, why...?”

“Shock, I-” I leaned in really close to the phone and lowered my voice, “I need you to listen. I was in my home and this bot just smashes through the door like nothing. It tried to attack me, but I got out of there before it could trash me. I'll tell you everything that happened, but I need you to get down to Zynima's border near the outskirts. Near the bottom of the tower I live in, there's that public phone. That's me right now. I'm kinda hurt and I really need help.”

She paused for a moment before muttering some words. “Christ, no... can you hold out until I arrive?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll be good. My leg just got a bit busted up and there's a bunch of rowdy-ass punks all over the place around here.”

“Okay. I'll be down there in a couple of minutes. Don't go too far and don't let those punks hurt you.” Shock stressed the word “don't” particularly hard.

“No worries - they couldn't take me down anyway. Thanks so much, though. Hurry if you can!”

“Be there soon.” Shock hung up.