The boy called Felix stood between him and the bot, stone in hand, a vacuous grin lighting up his angelic face, his back arched slightly, crowing his triumph, head held erect and proud, just like the first time Albert had seen him—perfection in miniature.

Then the bot raised its arm and there was a puff of light, and Albert screamed—a single, shrill shriek that came from some primal place inside him as the world turned red and sticky and warm and wet and yucky, and he clawed at the mess in his eyes and his face and all over his clothes as the most beautiful child he had ever seen exploded in a mass of blood, tissue, bone and flesh all over him.

The children were screaming too. Wiping the gunk out of his eyes he looked up and saw the lawbots moving rapidly through the lot, faster than any human could possibly ever move, chasing the kids down and picking them off one by one.

He ran forward and shouted, so loudly he could hear his voice crack. ‘Stop! Stop! They’re just children! Just children!’

It made no difference. If the bots heard him, they didn’t acknowledge it. And the screams kept coming. Dizzy, he turned away, falling to his knees, tears burning at his eyes. The nausea kept coming, wave after wave, and he kept retching, even though his stomach was empty. He gritted his teeth, willing his heart to stop beating so wildly.

When the giddiness ebbed, Albert rose unsteadily, eyes still blurry. The screaming had stopped. He could see the lawbots, now moving slowly some distance away, systematically scanning the mountains of rubble. He felt a heaviness in his stomach, a weight that had nothing to do with his queasiness. He looked around for his communicator and spotted it near a large hole at the base of a nearby mound of debris. Walking over, he was forced to stoop under a low arch of rubble to get near the hole. Still crouching, he inched forward slightly and reached out for the communicator. His fingertips had just brushed it when he felt the earth give way under the hand he was leaning on, sending him face first over the hole.

Pleading eyes looked up at him from under an oversized cap.

Albert stared back at them for a long moment, and then he nodded, swiftly bringing a finger up to his lips in what he hoped was a surreptitious gesture. Retrieving his communicator, he crawled back through the arch and rose to his feet. The heaviness in his stomach dissipated, replaced with a white, cold, controlled fury. This time he would do something! He slipped the communicator into his trouser pocket and stalked over to where the bots were standing.

He could hear them as he drew closer, talking to each other this time. ONE HAS ESCAPED.