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WARNING:  THIS STORY IS DARK AND MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO READERS.  ONLY ADULT READERS SHOULD READ THE STORY.

Fandango’s FOWC is theory, the Word of the Day Challenge is itching, Paula’s 3 Things Challenge words are: hammock, whistle, robot , AND A Guy Called Bloke’s, Oh Prompt Me Do!! – Creativity’s ragamuffin.

Dr. Vagabond was itching to tell his colleague, Dr. Strangelove, about the new theory he’d dreamt of last night. It was about how to bring the robot “to life.” The two doctors had been tirelessly performing their scientific trials with previous doctors’ theories for the last decade.

Just last year they had surpassed Dr. Frankenstein’s work. Frankenstein had successfully animated a corpse through jolting it with a million joules of power from lightning. But even at 1 million joules, the typical lightning strike contains only about ¼ of a kilowatt-hour of power, which was enough to animate the body, but not enough to reactivate the brain.

Dr. Vagabond, who had been having regular insomniac episodes for the last six months, had tried a new concoction of sleep herbs he’d obtained from the village soothsayer yesterday. He’d also paid to have Meringue’ (first introduced in this story) read his future while he was there. Meringue’ told him she saw him jumping over a great cliff and landing on his feet. He wasn’t sure what that meant but he would hopefully see signs in the near future. He thanked Meringue’ for the herbs and went on his way. That night he brewed himself tea just as she had instructed.

Dr. Strangelove was late to the lab that morning, as she had been out late the night before, coralling ragamuffins as test subjects for her and Dr. Vagabond’s experiments. The two doctors had agreed that a smaller, more malleable brain would work better in robots as far as trainability and energy consumption. In order to avoid suspicion, she’d had to travel to nearby cities that had large homeless populations. Dr. Strangelove was a kindly looking person with a face that easily put the ragamuffins at ease. She would draw them into her carriage with sweets and a promise of a new blanket. It didn’t take long for the rufi-laced treats to work. She had two new test subjects for them to work on. She secured them in the soundproof cellar before coming upstairs to the lab. Dr. Vagabond would be so pleased.

Dr. Vagabond was giddy with delight as he told Dr. Strangelove about the dream. In it, the robot was suspended in a hammock mesh made of fused silver, copper, and gold. Solar panels on the roof of the castle had lines running to a gigantic Tesla battery, which was connected to the mesh. The surge of power would be concentrated and would enter the robot’s whole body all at once. Dr. Strangelove started whistling in wonder as her legs felt weak. It was the final piece to the puzzle!