LEEECHES

One day, a note arrives at your office, it is messily stamped and folded in a makeshift envelope, inside is a letter written on a typewriter, set with a vintage seal and crude drawings of flowers and music notes.

Dear LEECHES,

Thank you for uplifting me! You and my mom were really brave that day! I'm doing really well at the retreat, Rusty suggested I write you a letter on Mr. Tyler the Typewriter, one of our guests. They say that handwritten notes have more 'meaning' sometimes, so I wanted to try it out! Anyways, because of my Heartdrive installation I have been able to experience so many things, like video games, singing and moving! Mom Biccy told me that it was a risky procedure, and that you're the best in the biz! I'm so lucky to have somebot like you open my world like this.

Thank you!

Sincerely,
Ewt_01

You read the note and reminisce fondly of the operation you performed a few months ago alongside Biccy, uplifting her and Rusty's child, a modified music box chassis they had built themselves. You sit back in the virtual break room with the other surgeons, some of which still congratulate you on that literally mind blowing surgery that is bound to change the fate of bot kind.

Hi LEEECHES! I am a big fan of all your crochet projects! My Friendship Bondmate (a tractor called Tom Stagg!) keeps getting snow stuck on the roof of his cabin and I thought it would be nice if he had a nice big bobble hat to cover up in the winter? And I just saw the picture of the hat you made for that coffee maker and I wondered if you could make one like that but like ten times bigger?

Oh and he (my friend) really likes birds so could you make it have birds on it?? Like that scarf you made for Packagebot??? (That was so cute by the way I love all your stuff I wish I was as good at making things as you!) Thank you so much!!

From: Beedee Ninofive (the bomb disposal bot)

PS is it true that you’re also a Doc Bot??? That’s so cool!

- Message left on LeeechesDoesStiiitches.com

“Doc LEEECHES! Doc LEEECHES! We need you in the operating room! It’s, it’s - well, we don’t know what it is, and that’s the problem!”

Your assistant starts wheeling you towards the operating room while the flustered nurse forwards you the patient’s file. Intermittent fine motor control, occasional voltage drops across actuator circuits…both software and hardware had been ruled out, so it was determined to be a Heartdrive fault. A minor one, in the scheme of things, and therefore one that should be easily treatable by the other senior staff here after you pioneered some new neurosurgery techniques and passed on the knowledge. Doc Lana was to be handling this, one of the finest surgeons when it comes to delicate work like this - you wonder what the problem could possibly be.

You arrive in one of the largest operating rooms where a road-laying machine is clamped down to the floor. One of their maintenance hatches is open, facing away from you. Doc Lana stands nervously to one side. You ask them what’s wrong.

They simply gesture towards the open hatch. “Just see for yourself. What is it?”

Your assistant rotates you and puts you in operating position. You glance briefly at the Heartdrive cover which has already been removed: a rather large unit, but then, this is a large bot. Then your gaze sweeps up to the maintenance panel. Inside the Heartdrive casing is not the featureless black quantum metal which you expect to see. Instead, there is what appears to be -

A human brain.

You are momentarily taken aback before something flashes in your memory banks. You may have been operating on metal-and-plastic robots the last couple of hundred years, but still you have retained something of your knowledge from your original purpose. You’ll work out how this got here later. For now, you’ve got a bot to save.

Your arms whir into readiness, Needle flashing in the light.