DOGS. Most seem nice. But some are just evil.
Everything felt numb. His eye was forced close, and he couldn’t breathe.
Was he dead?
He shook his head. No. Apparently, living was his punishment.
Robo had been built to withstand a nuclear blast, so the acid was merely a setback. Much of his fur was burned away, his skin was damaged, but most of his robotic parts were still working—with the green fluid running through his body keeping him alive—if just barely.
It was so peaceful down here, so quiet. It had been a long time since he had such solitude.
Robo started to swim upward. Robo broke through the acid with huge gulps of air. He was able to crawl to the landing. Walking past the sparking wires, and the broken cables in the control room, he was hit with the smells of war: humans, burning rubble, and Blue.
“You thought this was over,” Robo said, under his breath. “Clearly, you are wrong.”
He turned and called to the dogs that remained, some trapped by fallen beams, others injured, and a few too disoriented to leave.
“We will rebuild,” Robo barked to the dogs. Many of them exchanged glances, or simply ignored him. A few wagged their tails, and howled with pleasure.
Robo limped back to his private quarters. Even he wondered exactly how he had survived. Only one man knew the answer: Dr. Dexter Rune. Too bad he was dead.
His natural eye looked at his reflection in a piece of broken glass. With no robotic eye, and barely any teeth, Robo looked more like a skeleton than a dog.
That wasn’t important. He had averted death. He had another chance.
“Oh, Blue,” he snarled. “We’re not done yet. You forget I always win.”
He climbed over the broken glass and concrete in the control room, back to his den, hidden by rubble and dirt. His natural eye still was recognized by the retinal scanner, and the steel door opened. Robo quietly entered the room, letting the cool darkness comfort him. As he stepped across the floor, his paw slid on a piece of paper. He looked down, only to discover it was the faded photo of him and Becca that he had kept to all these years.
He shoved it aside, sending it swooping across the room, only to fall behind a darkened monitor.
Love is pain, and he had had enough. Robo curled into his bed, now at peace, slipping into a deep sleep. He had survived another night—and he would see another dawn.