the autumn of my killer robot

He came to us on a brisk October afternoon in 1951. His arrival was heralded by the hum of servo motors and the intoxicating scents of ozone and machine oil.

His name was Timmy Tinkle, he was a robot, and he needed a job.

He was created in the laboratory of Professor Derook, but wanted to leave his surrogate father's shadow and blaze his own path.

Mr. Morris found Timmy a position in the WHIZ-TV warehouse, and he soon proved himself to be a motivated and tireless worker. Many were the days we labored shoulder to mechanical shoulder in the cramped, dusty space, and a bond developed between boy reporter and mechanical man.

Such was the strength of our mutual affection that I failed to see the obvious warning signs -- the failure to properly sign off on shipping manifests, the vicious beating and hospitalization of the night watchman, the way in which the office safe was torn out of the wall and its contents emptied.

I didn't want to believe it. I worked with Timmy. He was my friend. We were closer than brothers. How could such a sweet, gentle construct be a brutal robo-criminal?

In my grief and confusion, I confronted him, wishing more than anything that it was just a silly misunderstanding.

His reaction was terrifying to behold.

I was forced to defend myself, and perhaps the shock of betrayal made me strike back with more force than necessary.

Afterwards, I kneeled over Timmy's inert body and gazed down in disbelief at the shattered remains of my once-close friend.

I prepared to squash his cybernetic corpse into a ball for easy transport to the scrapyard, but my blearly eyes noticed something unusual embedded in Timmy's inner workings.

It was a remote control device planted by Derook. Having managed to create a fully functioning humanoid robot and a complex artificial intelligence unit with vacuum tube era technology, Derook had decided the best way to monetize his discoveries was to use Timmy as a Trojan Robot in order to steal the petty cash box from a minor market broadcast studio.

With Derook in police custody, the refurbished Timmy returned to his job at WHIZ-TV, and put his killer robot ways behind him.

Well, for the most part...

Moloko - Are 'Friends' Electric? (from Random: A Tribute to Gary Numan, 1997) - The sleazy side of future shock.

The Gymslips - Robot Man (from a 1983 single; collected on Rockin' with the Renees: The Punk Collection, 2000) - Not to be confused with the Scorpions track (covered by The Expoxies on Stop the Future) with the same name, this is an infectious piece of punky retro-pop by a quartet of hard-partying British lasses.

(panels taken from Captain Marvel Adventures #125 and #136.)