The doors slid open to blinding light; blowing in a gusty wind of ancient earth dust. One by one, platforms branched out from the Axiom to their bridgeways. If one looked from a distance, they could see odd figures stumbling and waddling out from the doorway onto the bridge. The first ones who stepped into the foggy sunlight blinked at the unfamiliar bright light and squinted through the cloud. Thin red uniforms dressing each overly large human glinted as the fog cleared, finally giving them a chance to see their long forgotten planet for the first time in their lives. It wasn’t at all what they’d originally been told it was, a planet of green and blue with endless resources of life. Instead they looked at a barren desert lit by the murky blue sky, and in the distance found outlines of rusting iron and steel structures. They towered into the sky, and the humans recognized them as skyscrapers as if from a dream.

Not all beings that slowly emerged from the ship were human. The captain of the Axiom turned around when he suddenly heard the frightful hum of a robot. And flying past him over other humans’ heads, a white female drone hovered to a stop in the air and let her blue screened eyes search the barren earth. She remembered this earth, only being there days before searching for plant life to prove herself to the captain, and finally help the humans return home. But none of that mattered now, in fact, that wasn’t even the reason she’d returned to the planet. Her reason was the crushed and broken earth robot cradled protectively in her arms, unresponsive, nearly gone. That dreaded plant was the reason this had happened to him she’d thought bitterly to herself. But then the c***roach crawled up to them, jumping up to her metal arm and jumping frantically to see the earthen robot. It was the earthen robot’s pet c***roach, which she’d unintentionally gotten attached to here on earth. Just like the way she’d unintentionally fallen in love with the robot too. She sighed. “Wall-E…” She had to fix him fast, and with Wall-E in her arms and the c***roach on her shoulder, she flew off into the dusty desert to find Wall-E’s home. 

“EVA!” Another robot suddenly yelled from the bridge platform of humans. It was Mo, the cleaning robot. He urged the other robots beside him to follow her as she broke the sound barrier rushing into the abandoned city. She never regretted meeting any of the other robots, they were her and Wall-E’s friends. Of course, they always called her Eva, her real name was Eve. Actually, Wall-E was the first one to call her Eva, but it just stuck. The only one who ever called her the right name was the captain, who’d taken off his hat in the highest respect the her and the earth robot that had helped to bring them home. All humans bowed their heads before continuing their descent down to the ground. Eve spotted it suddenly, the rusty trash truck full of knick knacks and old human tools that Wall-E just found interesting in his daily working. That’s all he was, the trash plucker, at least he used to be to humans. But to her, he was everything. And he just couldn’t be gone now… He just couldn’t… The lever was pulled, the door swung down, and she flew in with her purpose. The c***roach jumped off while she put Wall-E on the ground and sped off towards the first shelves. Eyes scanning over the objects faster than any human ever could, she suddenly found what she was looking for and grabbed it. A rusty red lever was pushed into Wall-E’s crushed body and Eve’s arm suddenly cranked it at unseeable speed. In seconds, the robot was his normal height again and she closed his trash lid. Racing back to the shelves, her blue scanning light came on and it found the next things she was looking for. Cog wheels were replaced in Wall-E’s rollers, and she went back to the shelves again. The c***roach paced back and forth and watched as she then replaced his arm, took out the burnt wires and memory processor to replace, and hooked in a new eye. In light speed, she fixed the robot the rest of the way and unfolded his sun ray battery charger. Then proceeded to shoot a hole through the ceiling.

Mo and the other robots froze when they saw the smoke cloud rising from the trash truck. Glancing at each other momentarily, Mo shook himself furiously and signalled the others to follow him. Eve and the c***roach watched in silence; waiting for the newly fixed robot to do something, anything… BEEP, BEEP. The c***roach perked when a bar appeared in Wall-E’s charging screen with a blip, and then another, and then another, until finally a long ding signalled he was fully charged. Then, Wall-E’s head rose up, blinking and alive once again. The c***roach jumped up and down happily when his sun ray battery charger folded back up on it’s own. Eve felt her sparking microchip become bright once again as she relaxed in relief. “Wall-E…” She sighed to him, feeling shameful for letting this happen to him and for only now being there for him. But then she smiled and held up her hand, letting her fingers part in front of him. Now, she finally understood what it meant. To join their metal hands in communion; to show that no matter what they would always stand together. But Wall-E only stared at her for a moment and then started to turn around. She blinked her screen eyes and gently grabbed the robot to turn him back around and face her. She gestured to herself. “Eve!” She said with a smile, reminding him that it was her. She was there for him. He stared at her blankly, as if not knowing who she was at all. Concern was biting at her core, but she pushed it away when she saw the light bulb on the shelf. “Oh!” She said and grabbed it and the Rubix Cube. She blinked and lit the light bulb, showing it to the robot before handing it out to him.

He looked at both of them questioningly silent, and then looked up at the shelves where it came from. “Wall-E?” Eve questioned brightly with a nervous smile. She tapped her fingers patiently, looking behind her and getting another idea. “Oh!” She gestured for him to wait a moment before going back to slide the tape into the player and playing the tv. Dancing people appeared on the screen and it made her smile. Surely he had to remember this! “Put on your Sunday clothes, we’re gonna ride through town; in one of those new horse-drawn open carts!” But when she turned around, she had to do a double take. Wall-E was taking his knick knacks and crushing them in his trash box, then letting the new trash cube fall to the floor carelessly and rolling back out of the truck, with not even a word to speak. “... Wall-E?” Very confused, she looked to the cube and back to him. He couldn’t just think of his amazing treasures as trash now… Didn’t he remember them? The c***roach crawled in front of him, squeaking and jumping to get his attention. But Wall-E just kept on going without even a glance, running over the bug with his treads. Eve slowly floated out to the door as the c***roach bounced back up from the floor and watched Wall-E too. He didn’t even remember his own c***roach. Why doesn’t he remember?? Her eyes bended more in revealing sadness and she whined in deep distress before shaking her head in denial and floating out to him. After creating another trash cube just yards away from the truck door, he turned to roll further away into the city. But Eve beat him and grabbed him again, turning him to face her. That’s when a thought struck her memory, and she looked down at his music player. Pressing the play button, only static responded… But that would mean… “Wall-E.” She said again, trying to gain his attention, but he only stared ahead like he didn’t even remember his own name. Didn’t even remember the sound of her voice. She blinked emotionally and shook him. “Wall-E!” She said again more insistently, becoming angry with him, with herself, with everything. “WALL-E!” She nearly shouted, shaking his head to look at her. And then, as if the realization only had finally set in, she let her hands fall away from his head, letting it lower to again look straight ahead. So it was true, he’d lost his memory. She’d fixed him just in time, and yet was still too late… Her eyes bended low in deep sadness, letting the spark in her core die away once again. All that she felt was pain and emptiness.

With a sigh, she reached out to Wall-E’s metal hand and joined their hands together; the communion that would never be. Lowering her head to his level, she started to hum softly. If he still remembered, he would’ve recognized the soft melody of his old tv’s love song. The more she hummed, the more memories started to become clear and flash before her eyes. Seeing the earth robot for the first time as a threat; watching the robot follow her day and night for a reason she could not name; feeling the first pain she’d ever felt watching the little ship blow up in the distance thinking Wall-E had perished with it. Dancing in space beside the Axiom in joy of reuniting again; realizing for the first time that the earth robot loved her, seeing him tortured brutally by the autopilot, and finally watching him be crushed by the hollow detector… When they faded, she felt split in two, like one half of her had turned off and drifted away in the sandy winds. Eve touched their heads together and a little bolt of electricity connected them for just seconds. Her symbolic kiss. Her final goodbye to him. She turned, disconnected their hands, and floated away. No longer could she watch the memory-less Wall-E, her final and biggest mistake.
*
Eve boarded the small spaceship that was the next to leave, to find the rest of the BnL Fleet that still floated in the depths of space and help them to return home as well. It was her next mission, and the captain knew she would not fail. After all, if she could get the axiom home, she could get the others home too. Mo and the other robots watched sadly as she peeked out the window to see them. They all waved somberly. She hesitated before waving back, in promise that one day, a long time from now, she would return. When the pain and emptiness wasn’t so unbearable. Something caught her attention as the fire of the rockets started up. The little c***roach was there too, on the top of Mo’s head, staring up at her too. She blinked with a gasp and turned away from the window back into the ship. It was too much. The c***roach could only watch with the robots as the rocket sped up and away, back into space. Not too far away, an earth trash robot suddenly paused in putting down a cube and looked up. He watched the ball of red fire speed off higher and higher into the sky until he could no longer see it. He blinked twice, letting his eyes perk a little bit, and said one word. “... Eva?”