My heart was still going like the clappers when I got home. Even the front door noticed it. ‘Come in, Alfie. Your heartbeat is significantly raised. Have you been running? I’ll put the kettle on. Why not sit down and stabilize your metabolism?’

Mum wasn’t home. Normally I don’t mind that much. After all, the house always says hello, and the DustUrchin tells me the news. And for the last few days Eric had filled the house with tension and thrills.

But now I really just wanted a human to talk to. Where was Mum? I hadn’t even noticed until then, but she seemed to be home less than ever since my accident.

I opened one of the kitchen cupboards. It said, ‘Hi Alfie! I’ve got tins of beans, tins of tuna. There’s bread in the bread bin and cheese in the fridge. Serving suggestion: Why not make a delicious tuna melt? If you need recipe help, ask the cooker.’

I wasn’t going to be bossed around by a cupboard, so I went for beans on toast.

One good thing is I can use Lefty’s inbuilt can opener to open the tin. I just put my finger on the top, it latches on to the tin, spins it round and there you go – it’s open. It felt so cool I could have opened every tin in the house just for the fun of it. But what was the point when there was no one there to see it.

When I sat down to eat, the TV announced it had picked a news item that might interest me. ‘Your teacher is on TV. Shall I stream it for you, Alfie?’

‘Yes, please.’

There was a whole thing about Eric on the news. It showed the CCTV footage that the drone had shot of him crashing around the estate with me on his shoulders. It ended with a blurry whirl, where Eric had whacked the drone out of the sky.

‘Robots,’ said the reporter ‘are an essential part of all our lives. We live alongside them. They do the jobs we don’t want to do. But what happens when robots go rogue? We ask someone who knows the answer better than anyone. Police Officer Grady.’

Police Officer Grady turned out to be the very police officer whose car Eric had crushed. The answer to the question, ‘What happens when robots go rogue?’ seemed to be, ‘It makes Police Officer Grady sad.’ Because, not going to lie, he looked like he’d been crying for a week.

Officer Grady: ‘This is one bad robot. He’s assaulted a Pizzabot, wrecked a drone and gleefully and maliciously destroyed my car.’

Reporter: ‘That is bad.’

Officer Grady: ‘He crushed it into a little cube.’

Reporter: ‘So if a member of the public sees this robot, what should they do?’

Officer Grady: ‘First of all, keep away. This robot is dangerous. It has enormous strength. We believe it might have weapons . . .’

‘He hasn’t!’ I shouted at the screen. ‘All he wants is to do a bit of ironing and melt cheese!’

Officer Grady: ‘Keep well away. Inform the police. We will act swiftly to decommission this bad machine.’

In case you didn’t know what ‘decommission’ meant, they showed a clip of the crushing machine at R-U-Recycling chewing up mouthfuls of metal.

Reporter: ‘Is there a reward for the capture of the rogue robot?’

Officer Grady: ‘Yes – there will be a reward. A HUGE reward.’

He stared into the camera lens, right into the room, right over the beans on toast and into my heart, and said, ‘And if we catch the person responsible, they will pay a heavy, heavy price.’

I dropped the empty beans tin . . .

into the recycling bin.

The DustUrchin said thank you and then did its Mum impersonation. ‘Hi, Alfie. Sorry I’m late again. Message me and let me know that you’re all right. I’ve just heard about this business with the rampaging robot. The house has already updated me to say that you’re home, but you know how I worry. Give me a call – I like to hear your voice. Go to bed and don’t forget to say your prayers.’

That night, I did remember to say my prayers. Or to think about them. Is it all right to pray for a robot? Praying for pets is controversial. It’s debatable whether dogs and cats go to Heaven. It felt awkward asking God to help me save a robot. Especially one that was scaring people, smashing up police cars and interfering with their pizza deliveries. You don’t want to put God in a difficult legal situation.

How could I keep Eric safe? I went to sleep thinking about what Dr Shilling had said about the planet Mars being entirely inhabited by robots. I imagined somehow taking Eric to Mars. I saw him in my mind, happily chatting to the other robots. Mars only has about a third of the mass of Earth, so he’d only weigh half as much. He could skip around doing ballet like D’Arcy, free from gravity and safe from all the people who wanted to destroy him.