The Wild Robot

by Peter Brown

  As Roz worked her way downhill, she scanned the aftermath of the storm. Giant mounds of mud and debris had formed below the cliffs. The island’s central river had crested its banks and spilled into the nearby fields and forests. Some trees had been uprooted. Others were submerged, their upper branches barely poking above the floodwaters, their lower branches swarming with fish instead of birds.

  After such a storm, you might expect to see animal corpses scattered among all the devastation. But the animals seemed to have survived just fine. Somehow, they had known the storm was coming, and they had found shelter long before it rolled in. Lowland creatures, who had sought refuge on higher ground, were waiting patiently for the water to recede. Deer were wading through the flooded fields. Beavers were busily collecting a trove of fallen branches. Geese honked in the sky before splashing down into a watery section of the forest.

  Clearly, the animals were experts at survival.

  Clearly, the robot was not.

  Roz was crusted with mud and grit, so she gave herself another good cleaning, but that only revealed her dents and scratches. They were really starting to add up. She hardly resembled the perfect robot who had appeared on the shore just a week earlier.

  The wilderness was taking a toll on poor Roz. So she felt something like relief when she spotted the quiet hole in the side of the mountain. It looked like a safe place for a robot. She stomped across the hillside and up to the cave, but never stopped to wonder what might be lurking within.

  CHAPTER 14

  THE BEARS

  Roz stomped into the cave. And then she stomped right back out.

  “Please stay away!” said the robot to the two bears who were now nipping at her heels. You see, when Roz stomped into the cave, she accidentally woke a brother and sister bear from their morning nap, which is never a good idea. And to make matters worse, bears have an instinct that drives them to attack when a creature runs away, especially if the creature running away is a mysterious, sparkling monster. So as the startled bears watched Roz stomping out of their cave, they really had no choice at all. They simply had to take up the chase.

  Roz tried her best to outrun the bears. She leaped over rocks and wove through trees and stomped across the mountainside at full speed. But the bears were young and strong and fast, and the robot still had so much to learn about moving through the wilderness. She never even saw the tree root. One moment she was stomping along, and the next moment she was flying through the air and thumping down onto a rotten log. Clumps of soft wood stuck to her side as she stood and faced her attackers.

  Wouldn’t you be afraid if two bears were charging toward you? Of course you would! Everyone would! Even the robot felt something like fear. Roz was programmed to take care of herself. She was programmed to stay alive. And as the robot watched those bears charging toward her, she knew her life was in serious danger.

  The bears slammed into Roz, knocking her against the trunk of a towering tree. Then one bear dove at her legs, and the other clawed at her chest. If only the robot had swung her fists or kicked her feet, she could have scared them off. One good bop in the nose would have sent them running. But the robot’s programming would not allow her to be violent. Clearly, Roz was not designed to fight bears.

  Powerful jaws chomped her arms. Sharp claws slashed her face. A massive head rammed her chest.

  “Please stay away!” said the robot.

  “Roarrrr!” said the sister bear.

  “Grrrrrr!” said the brother bear.

  And then the bears went in for the kill.

  But the robot had vanished.

  CHAPTER 15

  THE ESCAPE

  Using all the strength in her legs, Roz jumped straight up, high into the air, and landed on a tree branch overhead. The tree shook with the sudden weight of the robot, and then—thunk thunk!—two pinecones bounced off Roz, and a moment later—thunk thunk!—the same pinecones bounced off the bears below. The bears grunted with annoyance. This gave Roz an idea.

  The robot’s programming stopped her from being violent, but nothing stopped her from being annoying. So Roz plucked pinecones from the nearby branches and lobbed them down at the bears.

  Thunk! Thunk! Thunk! Thunk!

  Each pinecone bounced off its target with annoying accuracy and whipped the young bears into a frenzy.

  “Roarrrr!” said the sister bear.

  “Grrrrrr!” said the brother bear.

  “I do not understand you, bears,” said the robot.

  Roz was about to unload a whole armful of annoying pinecones when a distant roar echoed through the forest. Back at the cave, the mother bear was calling for these two, and she did not sound happy. The young bears looked at each other. They knew they were in trouble. But before lumbering home, they glared up at Roz and snorted one last time. More than anything, they wanted to kill the robot.

  CHAPTER 16

  THE PINE TREE

  Roz was in no hurry to leave the tree. She stayed on her branch long after the bears had gone, enjoying some peace and looking herself over.

  In addition to bite marks and claw marks, the robot was also covered in dirt, which, of course, meant it was time for another cleaning. She was making good progress when she felt something sticky on her arm. The problem with sitting in a pine tree is that, eventually, the tree’s sticky resin will find you. It always does. And it found Roz. The robot scrubbed and scraped at the resin, and soon her fingers were completely coated in the sticky stuff. Then it was all over her arms and her legs and her torso. And things were about to get even messier.

  A robin swooped into the tree and began screeching and fluttering around Roz. The bird had recently finished building herself a new nest. It was a little work of art, a delicate basket woven from grass and twigs and feathers, and it was right above the robot’s head.

  “Screech! Screech!” said the robin.

  “I do not understand you, robin,” said the robot.

  The robin continued screeching and fluttering, and then—splat—she splattered her droppings across the robot’s face. This bird was serious. So Roz scooted away, farther out on the branch, until she heard a quick, sharp crack. Before Roz knew what was happening, the tree branch snapped under her weight and she went crashing to the forest floor. She hit the ground hard and lay there as broken branches and pinecones and needles showered down on top of her. There was another splat. And then quiet returned to the forest.

  CHAPTER 17

  THE CAMOUFLAGED INSECT

  Roz was a mess. She lay under the tree, covered in a heap of broken branches and pinecones and needles. She still hadn’t removed the sticky resin from her body. And then there were the bird droppings. She was about to get up and give herself a rigorous cleaning when she noticed a peculiar twig. The twig was moving. It was crawling along one of the broken branches on the ground. With a gentle touch, the robot picked up the twig.

  “Hello, stick insect, my name is Roz. You are very well camouflaged.”

  The stick insect’s body was long and thin. He had the same shape and colors and markings as a real twig. But if you looked closely, you just might see two tiny eyes and two spindly antennae. The insect didn’t make a sound, and he sat perfectly still. As still as the robot. The two of them sat still and silently stared at each other for a while.

  “Thank you, stick insect,” said Roz as she placed him back where she found him. “You have taught me an important lesson. I can see how camouflage helps you survive; perhaps it could help me survive also.”

  CHAPTER 18

  THE CAMOUFLAGED ROBOT

  As you know, reader, Roz had always liked to keep herself as clean as possible. But her desire to stay alive was stronger than her desire to stay clean, and our robot decided it was time she got dirty. Roz was going to camouflage herself.

  She’d gotten the idea from the stick insect, but Roz quickly realized that camouflaging herself as a twig was out of the question. No, the robot would have to blend into the landscape itself. She
began by smearing handfuls of thick mud over her entire body. Then she plucked ferns and grasses from the ground and sank their roots into her new muddy coating. She placed colorful flowers around her face to disguise her glowing eyes, and any bare patches were covered with tree leaves and strips of moss. Our robot now looked like a great tuft of plants walking through the forest. She waited for darkness, and then she padded to the center of a clearing, nestled herself between some rocks, and became part of the landscape.

  A few hours later, the sky was brightening, the fog was lifting, the nighttime animals were slinking home, and the daytime animals were beginning to stir. It was just an ordinary morning on the island. However, there was that new tuft of plants in that one forest clearing. Only the bees had noticed the tuft. They buzzed around it, completely unaware that the robot was hidden beneath. And so Roz sat there, right in the open yet completely unseen, and observed the wilderness around her.

  She watched flowers slowly turn toward the sun.

  She listened to rodents crawl through the weeds.

  She smelled the moist, piney air.

  She felt worms wiggle against her muddy sides.

  A week later, the tuft of plants was gone, but there was a new clump of seaweed on the shore. A week after that, the clump of seaweed was gone, but there was a new bramble on the mountain. Then there was a new log on the riverbank. Then a new rock in the forest.

  CHAPTER 19

  THE OBSERVATIONS

  Clouds scudded through the sky.

  Spiders spun intricate webs.

  Berries beckoned to hungry mouths.

  Foxes stalked hares.

  Mushrooms rose up from leaf litter.

  Turtles plopped into ponds.

  Moss spread across tree roots.

  Vultures hunched over carcasses.

  Ocean waves beat against the coastline.

  Tadpoles became frogs, caterpillars became butterflies.

  A camouflaged robot observed it all.

  CHAPTER 20

  THE LANGUAGE OF THE ANIMALS

  It started with the birds. They had always been skittish when the robot was near. They would stare and screech and then scatter. But now that Roz was camouflaged, she could secretly observe their normal behavior, right up close.

  Roz noticed chickadees fluttering through the same flowers and singing the same song every morning. She noticed a lark who swooped down to the same rock and sang the same song every afternoon. She noticed the same two magpies singing to each other from across the same meadow every evening. After weeks of robotically studying the birds, Roz knew what each bird would sing, and when they would sing, and eventually, why they would sing. The robot was beginning to understand the birds.

  But she was also beginning to understand the porcupines and the salamanders and the beetles. She discovered that all the different animals shared one common language; they just spoke the language in different ways. You might say each species spoke with its own unique accent.

  When Roz first listened to the chickadees, their songs had sounded like “TWEEE-tweedle! TWEEE-tweedle!” But now when the chickadees sang, Roz heard “Oh, what a lovely day it is! Oh, what a lovely day it is!”

  Deer spoke mostly with their bodies. By simply turning her head, a doe could say to her family, “Let’s look for clovers by the stream.”

  Snakes often hissed to themselves, things like “I know there’s a tasty mouse around here sssssomewhere.”

  Bees said very little. They used their wings to buzz a few simple words, like nectar and sun and hive.

  Frogs spent much of their time searching for each other. One would croak, “Where are you? I can’t see you!” And then another would reply, “I’m over here! Follow my voice!”

  When Roz first stomped across the island, the animal squawks and growls and chirps had sounded like nothing more than meaningless noises. But she no longer heard animal noises. Now she heard animal words.

  CHAPTER 21

  THE INTRODUCTION

  There was an hour each morning, in the dim light of dawn, when all the island animals were safe. You see, long ago they had agreed not to hunt or harm one another during that hour. They called it the Dawn Truce. Most mornings, the island residents would gather in the Great Meadow and spend the hour chatting with friends. Of course, not everyone attended these gatherings. The bears had never made an appearance. And the vultures just circled high above. But on this particular morning, an unusually large group of animals had come out to discuss some important news.

  “Settle down, everyone—I have something to say!” Swooper the owl hooted to the crowd from the lowest branch of a dead tree. “Last night I saw a mysterious creature right here in the Great Meadow. It seemed to be covered in grass, so I couldn’t get a good look at it, but I think it may have been the monster.”

  Looks of concern swept over the crowd.

  “What was the creature doing?” said Dart the weasel.

  “It was speaking,” said Swooper. “It kept repeating the same words over and over again. But each time it sounded a little different. At first it sounded like a cricket, and then it sounded like a raccoon, and then it sounded like an owl!”

  “What was it saying?” said Digdown the groundhog.

  “I could be mistaken,” said Swooper, “but I think it was saying, ‘Hello, my name is Roz.’”

  The crowd began to chatter.

  “Just where was this creature?” said Fink the fox.

  Everyone turned as the owl slowly pointed his wing to a grassy lump in the meadow. It was a rather ordinary-looking grassy lump. Until it began to move.

  As you probably guessed, that grassy lump was Roz. She had been there the whole time, camouflaged, watching, listening, and with all the animals looking at her she decided to introduce herself. The crowd stared in disbelief as the grassy lump started shaking and bulging upward and crumbling apart, and there was the robot! Then, using her body and voice, the robot spoke to the animals in their own language.

  “Hello, my name is Roz.”

  The crowd gasped.

  Swooper fluttered up from his branch and screeched, “It’s the monster!”

  “I am not a monster,” said Roz. “I am a robot.”

  A flock of sparrows suddenly took off.

  “Leave us alone!” squeaked Dart as he crouched low in the grass. “Return to whatever horrible place you’ve come from!”

  “I come from here,” said Roz. “I have spent my whole life on this island.”

  “Why haven’t you spoken to us sooner?” screeched the owl, from higher up in the tree.

  “I did not know the animal language until now,” said the robot.

  Crownpoint the buck had heard enough, and he slipped into the forest with his family.

  “So what do you want from us?” growled Fink.

  “I have observed that different animals have different ways of surviving,” said the robot. “I would like each of you to teach me your survival techniques.”

  “I’m not going to help you!” screeched the owl, from the very top of the tree. “You seem so… unnatural!”

  “The monster is just waiting to gobble us up!” shrieked Digdown. And the groundhog disappeared into a hole.

  “I will not gobble anyone up,” said Roz. “I have no need for food.”

  “You don’t need food?” Fink relaxed a bit. “Well, I need food. And lots of it. Why don’t you make yourself useful and find me some food?”

  “What would you like me to do?” said Roz.

  “Can you hunt?” The fox smiled at a hare on the far side of the gathering. “It’s almost time for breakfast.”

  “I cannot hunt. But I could gather berries.”

  The fox’s smile disappeared. “Berries? I’m hungry for meat, not berries! Good luck to you, Roz. You’re gonna need it!” And the fox trotted away.

  Roz looked up at the tree, but the owl had gone. And when the robot looked down again, she realized that everyone else had gone too.

&nb
sp; CHAPTER 22

  THE NEW WORD

  A new word was spreading across the island. The word was Roz. Everyone was talking about the robot. And they wanted nothing to do with her.

  “I don’t think I’ll ever feel comfortable knowing that Roz is on the prowl.”

  “I hope Roz camouflages herself as a rock. Forever.”

  “Shhh! There’s Roz now! Let’s get out of here!”

  Roz wandered the island, covered in dirt and green growing things, and everywhere she went, she heard unfriendly words. The words would have made most creatures quite sad, but as you know, robots don’t feel emotions, and in these moments that was probably for the best.

  CHAPTER 23

  THE WOUNDED FOX

  “My face! My beautiful face! Somebody help!” Fink the fox was lying on a log, howling in pain, with a face full of long, sharp quills, when Roz appeared. “Isn’t there anybody else who can help?”

  “Would you like me to leave?” said the robot.

  “No! Please don’t go! I’ll take what I can get.”

  “What happened?”

  “I didn’t think that porcupine could see me in the bushes, but when I went for his throat, suddenly there were quills in my face!”

  “Why did you go for his throat?”

  “Why do you think? Because I was hungry!”

  “If you had not attacked the porcupine, you would not have quills in your face.”

  “Yes, Roz, I know that. But a fox has gotta eat! I just didn’t expect him to put up such a fight. Look! There are even quills in my paws! I can’t walk! My face is numb! I could die if you don’t help me!”

  “What would you like me to do?” said the robot.