LOST IN SPACE

Retrofuturistic style and unsettling horrors can't quite send ROUTINE into orbit

- By Kerry Brunskill

You know it’s going to be a bad day when the automated company machine spits my ID badge straight into a forgotten gap under the printer and I have to not just crouch, but really get down among the dust and dirt to pick it up. I’m soon wishing ID cards were my biggest problem on this vast, empty moonbase. I’m all alone, the security system seems to take my continued existence as a personal insult, and every skeletal T5 robot in sight will happily relieve my skull of its contents.

These Type-05s manage to shred my nerves before they’ve gone anywhere near my skin. I’m usually alerted to their presence by the distinctive heavy thud of their feet stomping around as they search for me, or the sight of their lasers scanning a dark corridor. They’re smart enough to check around corners and open locked doors. The good news is that only one can be activated by the security system at any time, although this does leave metal husks standing in corridors, waiting for me to dare myself to sneak past, praying this one on standby won’t suddenly judder and shake up to its full height.