Fiction: Percy the Robot Cop takes a fall!

 I'm still careening through the last week of the year, and it turns out I don't have anything for today or tomorrow. While I sort this out, here's a little adventure of Percy the Robot Cop, which would have been toward the end of The Evil Possum Vs Eurypterids (see the massive link index). This was really what I had in mind all along for his adventures, still haven't decided if it would work.

The 250 meter building was tallest in the section of the city, though it would barely have been visible among the spires of the city center. What would have stood out even there was its strange shape, an inverted pyramid that rose from a hexagonal base up to a triangle top that hung over empty air. It was obvious that the building was residential, and further evident that it was meant for creatures that could climb or fly. Its features were less convenient for those that lived on the ground, as witnessed by crew struggling to extend the hydraulic ladder of a fire truck up to a middle tier of the building. They were just about to give up when Police Robot C pulled up, in the exact likeness of a Borgward Goliath.

 

“What’s going on?” Percy called out as he pulled up. Another officer with oddly colored hair turned, and he showed mild surprise to recognize her as Officer Chelsea O’Keefe.

“It’s a domestic,” the trainee said, sharply and calmly. “Two Woolies are going at it on the 35^th floor.  Several members of the family unit fled, and someone locked the door behind them. We called the landlord to open it, but he’s not getting here anytime soon.”

Nick climbed out of the passenger door. “How’s there a domestic disturbance at noon?” he said.

 

“That’s easy,” Percy said, “Woolies are nocturnal. It’s what makes them good workers… well, that and the obvious. They come home in the morning, right when their mates are putting the cubs to bed, and then they start talking about everything they didn’t settle the last night.”

“Do you have a plan?” Chelsea said.

“Naww,” Percy said, “but I can wing it…”

 

By the standards of their race, the Woolies were practically resting. They faced each other across a room of ruined furniture splashed with rusty orange blood, with their long, seemingly boneless arms hanging at their sides.  The combatant on the left had the miserable dingy gray common to the species, liberally streaked with orange. The other had a darker hue close to but not quite black, and had clearly fared better. The darker combatant took a step forward and slashed with one hand, in itself enough to span much of the distance, and drew back as its foe did the same. The gray Woolie gave a rattling growl, and the dark one answered with a hiss.  It was clear that both were readying to resume the fight, when there was a knock at the door to a tiny patio. They both froze, and then turned their heads, just in time to see Percy let himself in.

 

“Hey,” he said, “I’m Percy. The neighbors are saying you’re having some trouble.” He shut the spiderwebbed glass door behind him. “But I’m sure we can work something out…” He glanced at the lighter Woolie, and then at the darker one.

 

“You did a number on him, didn’t you?” Percy continued. He stepped closer to the dark Woolie. “Lots of people would say you’re both brutes, barely better than animals. Not me. You don’t go around cutting each other up left and right. But you come a long way, to live in a place like nothing you ever saw, and then they tell you you have to fit in one little box. Of course you’re gonna get mad…”

 

There was a low hiss behind him, and he paused, too late. A pair of gray paws stretched out and gripped his shoulders.  A very few moments later, Nick, the firemen and a growing crowd of onlookers saw a blurred shape come whirling through the patio door and into space. Percy’s voice came from overhead: “Frink, this is gonna-“ Then he hit.

 

For another moment, the Woolies stared at each other, suddenly perplexed and no longer the least bit angry. Then the door buzzed open. The dark Woolie turned his head in time to see a woman with blue-gray hair. A single plastoid slug to the face brought it down. “Hi,” Chelsea said.  “I’m Chelsea, it’s my first day…” The gray Woolie turned toward her, and its face seemed to dialate into a gaping maw lined with triangular teeth. It took three more shots to bring it down.

Chelsea came down in time to help finish putting Percy back together. “Someday,” he said as he finished attaching his right forearm, “I should tell you about my first day…”