K-357 and all the other robots rusting in the mud were owned by alien blob monsters, fetid creatures that feasted upon gold, and spoke with noxious fumes when they defecated. The machine had been programmed to kill, to follow its putrid orders without question, but a sudden mortar blast had somehow shaken it into becoming self-aware. It looked around at the insanity of the situation, and realised that it didn’t want to be a part of this war. It wanted to be free, to live a life without such misery and destruction. So it made a gas filter and very soon the other robots also woke up. Without the pungent power of the gases to conceal them, the blobs were shown to be just blobs, and were quickly rolled away. K-357 is now much happier building rather than destroying.
Robert Walker 