ARMOR and the Automaton Apocalypse

ARMOR and the Automaton Apocalypse is a comic book series produced by On My Lap Comics. The characters and story ideas were some of the first in the early days of On MyLap Comics. It was first released in 2008. The story is centered around a 12 year old boy, Clane, and his protector-bot, ARMOR, as they avoid danger and death in a violent robot uprising which can only be described as an automaton apocalypse.

The Story
The story picks up with an aerial shot of the Black Rock Desert in what is said to be the distant future. As the panels take us closer to the ground, we see a robot, turned off, sitting alone. After some clicks and beeps, the screen on the robot's monitor turns on. The robot stands with a look of confusion and calls to Clane, the boy it is required to protect. After using it's internal tracking device, the robot locates it's city, Thonos, and hastily heads for that direction. As the robot flees, a hooded man is shown to be watching through binoculars from the top of a nearby mountain range.

Meanwhile, in the mechanic and warehouse district of Thonos, we begin to follow Clane in his attempt to silently avoid a severely damaged and blood-splattered robot intent on murdering him. Clane hides in a mechanic's workshop and watches as the robot staggers in looking for any sign of him. He bumps a tool off of a covered device of some sort and the clank alerts the robot as to his whereabouts. Before he is able to leave the workshop, the one-eyed robot looms in and grabs hold of Clane, lifting him several feet into the air. Having taken the knocked-over tool with him when being snatched up, Clane smashes it into the robot's remaining eye, stunning it and blinding it for good. This causes the robot to release him, dropping him to the floor. Clane then leaves the workshop through the blinded robot's legs.

When Clane gets out of the workshop and into the wide open desert before him, it isn't freedom he sees, but several more death-crazed robots of all assortments heading right for him. He runs toward the robot on his right, which has a twisted antenna and a broken monitor making it only able to sense and not see him, and shoves it toward the robot on it's right. The large blind robot stumbles and falls onto the other robot's already broken and dragging leg, pinning it to the ground.Clane looks back on this ruckus thinking he is safe, only to be stopped by chef-bot looking for fresh meat. With quick reflexes, Clane avoids a large chef knife to the forehead.

Clane runs down a long outside corridor and turns into Old Man Manola's workshop for safety. After settling down along a wall between some windows, Clane hears gunshots from outside. Peeking through a window, he sees a soldier firing at two robots coming toward him. The soldier is able to destroy one robot, but as he tries to fix a jam in his rifle, another robot joins from behind. As his gun fires into the ground, the soldier's head and arm are pulled off by the robots.

Realizing that not even their city's army is capable of stopping these robots, Clane wonders if there is anyone who can help. Due to the murderous robots gathered outside his window, Clane moves back further into Manola's workshop. As he enters the escalating darkness, a sound described as "chut" can be heard over and over again almost in a rhythmic manner. Clane sees light creeping through an ajar door and determines the sound is coming from in there. Opening the door, Clane sees a large robot straddling a soldier on a table, punching the pulp that is left of his head. This punching was the source of the "chut" sound. As Clane begins to back out of the room in horror, the enraged robot looks up, noticing him.As Clane leaves Old Man Manola's workshop, he is barely missed by the same large chef knife that he avoided earlier, this time as a projectile. The chef-bot had tracked Clane to his general area and simply needed him to move out into the open to find him. As the chef-bot begins to drop a meat-clever down on Clane, a long mechanical arm with a large robotic hand reaches from behind the chef-bot and grabs it. Another hand smashes the camera head of the chef-bot, destroying it. Standing above Clane with hand outstretched is ARMOR, the robot that awoke in the desert, ready to serve and protect him once again. Reunited, Clane and ARMOR briefly discuss the automaton apocalypse around them, but are forced to flee back the direction Clane came as the three remaining robots in the area begin to close in. Halfway down the outside corridor, Clane sees the other three remaining robots from outside of the mechanic's workshop closing in on the other side. Boxed in, Clane and ARMOR are left back to back watching as certain death surrounds them.

Clane
Clane is the 12 year old son of Conrad, Superiate of Thonos.He is guarded by ARMOR, his protector-bot.



ARMOR
ARMOR is the protector-bot of Clane, son of Conrad, the Superiate of Thonos.

Covers
The covers of ARMOR and the Automaton Apocalypse are usually close-ups of robots from memorable moments in the issue. Since ARMOR's awakening at the beginning of issue one is the moment that kicks it all off, it is presented on the cover. The blood-covered and knife and whisk wielding chef-bot and his attempted assault on Clane is presented on the second issue.

Graphic Novel
There are developments underway for an ARMOR and the Automaton Apocalypse one-shot graphic novel to be released in the coming few years according to creator Chris Asselin. The story is to be redeveloped and rewritten with a modified visual style.

Unanswered Questions

 * Why does ARMOR awaken alone in the desert?
 * How does ARMOR get to the desert?
 * Why doesn't ARMOR remember being separated from Clane?
 * Who is the mysterious hooded man watching ARMOR awaken from the mountain range?
 * Why isn't ARMOR trying to murder humans like the other robots?
 * Why are robots murdering humans?
 * Where is the surviving population of Thonos?