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Over vast landscapes of rusted wreckage, under rotted skeletons of architecture, a small robot went about his business. Packing up garbage into neat cubes, stowing away anything of interest, all to the faint strains of "Hello, Dolly".
Perhaps the robot did not have the best taste in music, but it was the only full-length movie recording he could get his metal appendages on. He could be forgiven for such things.
As the robot rolled home for the day, he passed his fellow robots, all broken. Unlike this particular robot, all the others had slowly fallen apart, driven by their need to clean and neglecting their own repairs. Something in this unit's systems, some wiring or software, had the little bot begin fixing himself. And so, while his counterparts became part of the trash, their red insignias of TO-NY scratching away, he kept moving. And although they were very foolish to let this happen to them, they had been an accustomed presence. The lone TO-NY found himself without a single companion-
Well, almost without a single companion. There was a tiny life-form, tinier than TO-NY, that seemed to follow him around. But it was not a robot. It was a cockroach. Still, TO-NY appreciated the effort. With this strange company, his duty, and little projects, his existence had purpose and he enjoyed it. What more could a robot ask for?
---
A sonic boom shook TO-NY out of his recharge state.
He scooted off of his swinging makeshift crib, scrambling to get the door open. He bustled out, turned, and hurried back in. TO-NY scooped up his pail and left again. He sped along the road, and then the worn track, circuits fizzing in anticipation.
TO-NY arrived at the pinpointed location just as the gigantic ship was leaving. It was streaking away, a blur of shining steel and unknown materials TO-NY would have spent days disassembling and then putting back together...
The robot drooped in defeat.
Until an explosion, less than a hundred feet away, blew him off his treads.
TO-NY slammed into the hull of a beached ship. He slid down in a cacophony of screeching metal, and tottered for a minute while his optics realigned.
And when he could see-
WHAT he could see-
Was beautiful. Sleek white material he couldn't identify made up the body, and detached in places for orbiting projections-that were firing. At everything.
TO-NY spent the rest of the day alternating between stalking and fleeing.
---
The strange new robot stopped firing at the strange old robot after the first few times of spotting his indiscreet observer. TO-NY began to inch closer in the rare moments of stillness. For days, he could never get close enough to touch. When at last he was within reach, he offered his arm. The robot thought it was only polite to offer introductions before attempting to inspect the other.
"TO-NY." He shook his arm, waiting.
Electric blue eyes flickered on the black screen. They seemed to consider his arm, before the polished bot rose into the sky and sped away.
---
TO-NY didn't have the appropriate interface for surrender. More days past, and he had another chance.
"TO-NY." He wouldn't be quite so polite, though. He jabbed the other in his perfect side, making a pinging sound. He wondered again what this strange material was. "TO-NY." He said again, insistently.
Silence. Then, the other seemed to tilt, and-
"STEVE."
---
After the reluctant introduction, STEVE would spend his day on his mission, and then follow TO-NY back to his shelter. TO-NY would gleefully show all of his inventions to the dispassionate robot, visibly perking up whenever there was a reaction. And the cockroach would perch atop the highest girder it could reach and stare imperiously down at them.
At first, TO-NY showed off his most complex and ingenious creations. A few here and there gained him a moment of attention before STEVE went wandering to look at something else. The robot began offering randomn inventions, and discovered that things that attracted STEVE the most weren't glossy or smooth or perfect. STEVE was enamoured by colour, and oddly-shaped inventions. TO-NY didn't have so many of those. His software drove him to perfecting his creations to be as efficient and level as possible.
So TO-NY created new things. Purposeless things that appealed to STEVE. And TO-NY enjoyed the attention.
TO-NY was a clever robot, but not clever enough to realize that making something without function didn't mean making something without purpose.
---
"STEEEEEEEVE."
STEVE focused his optics on the newest object presented to him. It was a small sphere that would easily fit into the robot's floating fingers. As the fingers tapped away at the surface, it emitted flashes and sounds. Certain patterns would make odd music.
STEVE looked at TO-NY and reached out. TO-NY stared, transfixed, as STEVE tapped him.
"TO-NY." STEVE said his name for the first time. He didn't say anything else.
TO-NY was estatic.
"STEEEEEEVE!"
The other robot seemed to wince at his excited companion's volume. There was a disdainful chittering from above their heads, and STEVE fired a shot without looking. TO-NY spun around in a panic, righting shelves as they fell and emitting distressed whirs.
STEVE watched, feeling almost fond of the odd unit.
---
"STEEEEEVE!"
STEVE looked up from his search. TO-NY had taken to rolling up to him during the day, every day, with new things to show him. The newer robot found that he didn't mind.
---
STEVE waited for his name to be called. It didn't happen that day. Or the next. But on the third-
"STEEEEEVE!" He turned and flew away from his task, eagerly following the faint calling. The robot thought, with two and a half days, this would be a particularly good invention.
---
At TO-NY's request, STEVE listed his composite and functions. He found himself almost jealous when the other bot ignored him in favour of pouring over the data.
He continued his duty. He fiddled with his many gifts. He used the cockroach for target practice.
And then STEVE went to TO-NY's corner, separated his arm into fingers, and linked them into the other fingers, so different than his. Brown and dirty and somewhat rusty. But they were fingers attached to TO-NY.
"TO-NY." He tugged, insistently. "TO-NY!"
The other robot stopped and blinked his optics. He stared at STEVE. At their joined hands. And, quite happily, allowed himself to be pulled out of his corner, and out of his shelter, into the world to do-anything. Everything.
Duties and inventions and functions could wait.
(And somewhere in the background a cockroach rolled its eye-stalks and buried itself in another Twinkie.)