Dust to Dust

Detritus Ladder is one of the Cyborgs: part robot and part human, working at the ruins of Chernobyl to make it habitable for humans again. He is often cruelly ridiculed by his supervisors and as far as he can tell, his work serves no real purpose at Chernobyl. Despite his lack of human emotions, Ladder unexpectedly finds himself hiding a stray puppy from the eyes of his human supervisors who will kill it or worse, experiment on it. But how long can a growing puppy be kept secret?