The idea was not so far as to destroy a robot, but just to make a dent in his aura, if not in his hull. Slings and pebbles on their side; ununderstood long-distance weaponry against them. In the worst case of close combat, it would be flesh against metal. Certainty of death, but a chance for fame.

No robot has indeed ever been touched nor shot at. No attempt has even ever reported. The robot lords would not have allowed it.

But now, in this gathering, there were a few suicidal candidates for breaking that taboo, and actually a robot presented itself for this opportunity.Well, in fact, the robot did not move at all. It had overlooked the ocean from the cliff for some weeks now, immobile, soundless, dead-like.

The elder squids had confirmed that it was unheard of. It was a point pushed forward by the youngest. Times were changing. But the squids as a whole did not yet consider a careful approach or probing. They planned a frontal attack or just a bit cleverer than that.

On the night of the full moon, again, a squad of squids walk up the long circling way to the cliff where the robot was still standing. That cliff was a vantage point above the ocean. A quite long route was possible from the rocky beach to the cliff top in a wide circle through the forest. It meant they could arrive in the robot back, assuming he looked only one way, i.e. towards the sea. The element of surprise was obviously expected, if not hoped for.

That squad was charged with surprising and diverting the robot from the main attack that was to come from the bottom of the cliff. Indeed, the meticulous reconnoitring of some daring octopuses had detected a flow in the shape of the cliff. A single cornerstone apparently hold the weight of a good third of it, and the hope was the entire cliff would slide, engulfing the robot with it.

Both teams knew they would certainly die, unlike the third commando only using mirrors who was in charge of coordinating the attack from a distance along the beach.

The diversion team reached its position at the edge of the forest on the cliff and the leader immediately ordered to covertly signal the sync team by reflecting the full moon light with a mirror. The pilot team received and forwarded the signal to the cliff team which rushed upward. They had to be quick.

The leader of the above diversion was totally impatient and did not cover his body language.

'Come on, cliff team, quicker. We're going to die of dryness up here.'

Down below, the sabotage commando had started to dig madly around the cornerstone. It proved difficult.

The village team had scattered in silence into the village, waiting for the green light from the cliff team, which would trigger the ground charge. They were to wake up as many fishermen houses as possible to create confusion which is always a useful diversion.

The leader above was furious. He had already lost one man who fainted due to the waiting and dryness.

'Why do they not signal back that they're ready to blow it up?'

His second answered, 'It may be a problem with their mirror?'

'Damn. We need to proceed. Tell the men we're charging in two minutes, with or without acknowledgement of the cliff.'

'But, Sir, it's not the plan.'

'The plan was never to dry out without a fight. Let's attack in one minute,' he said. And he added, as if possessed : 'Leave everything behind and follow me.'

The second hurried, almost forgetting to signal the villagers.

Down there, the scattered octopuses all saw the attack signal they were waiting for and proceeded to quickly make a mess with happy anticipation. No one really bothered that the signal from up there instead of the cliff bottom. Only the one in charge of relaying the signals was aghast. He understood that the above team was moving on its own, and that an unsynchronized attack was the recipe for disaster. Something you don't want to share with people you're trying to convince. He ran hopelessly after his comrades to shut them up.

Meanwhile, the bottom team was not progressing as hoped. One of the levers they had carried had broken at the first attempt at removing a minor chunk. The leader dared no more use them before the final touch, which meant slower progress, and he also asked his team to dig deeper around the cornerstone so they might squeeze behind it, and use their own body as a lever. So it took time, and he was aware of it.

'How long do you think they could hold up there?'

'I'm not sure, Sir, they had a long route already.'

'Well, I guess we're not ready yet, but we have to let them play their part. Signal back.'

'Yes, Sir'

And a pebble fell between them.

The second stared motionless at his superior.

'Damn. They've started... We have to catch up with them.' And he shouted at his team, 'the attack began, we will make history if we double up. So double up every one.'

And they complied feverishly.

A few dozens of meters above, the attack had indeed begun with a shower of rocks covering the run of the most daring. The leader was in front, having charged just after shouting 'Tonight, we'll be the first to touch a robot,' as a combined form of motivation speech and attack signal. The latter was not really understood as such. The runners rushed after him and try to catch up their leader, while he ran alone up front and repeated like a tantrum 'we'll touch it.' And the archers, equally surprised, armed and fired the first volley without proper aiming.

Though many pebbles ricocheted off his hull, the robot still appeared either unconcerned or rather dead, depending on the mood of the onlooker. The leader accepted neither point of views and pressed on until he reached the robot, at the same time as the third volley of rocks which had become more precise. His footsteps, though, proved imprecise, and with horror he stumbled in the last meter or so and he fell face flat in the mud. But having over extended his closest tentacle, he knew with undisturbed faith, 'I'm the first one to touch a robot, I can die now.'

His dream last only two seconds, while a runner up finally caught him up and asked whether he was all right.

Pissed off and smiling at the same time, he answered, 'never been better.'

And the second thought came, 'and don't stand here. Attack the bloody thing.'

The runners had all arrived now and encircled the robot, smashing their multiple axes on it. Meanwhile, the archers had turned into runners. As for the robot, it did strictly nothing.

The leader realised this, and ordered some to form a ladder with their bodies, so he could reach a bulge which he hoped might be an eye or a flow of some sort. While climbing, he asked for a fire to be set so as to be clearly seen from the village.

But the village had no need for it. The buzz of an imminent attack hadn't been contained and the entire community was watching the scene on the cliff gently enlightened by the moon.

The signal coordinator was at lost. He finally let go, when he also saw what everybody was pointing at. The robot had grown a hat in the shape of an octopus. But that wasn't a hat. A hat doesn't wave...

'Oh, fuck, they've done it... And without the cliff collapsing... Oh, fuck. I have to stop them...'

'One more try,' were the last, and lost, words of the cliff leader. As expected, they all died instantly, crushed by the sliding rumble. The sound of the falling rocks reached the fighters party, but not the view, as only the lower half of the cliff had sled. They sadly realised they were to survive the robot and the slide only to fell to the lack of water.

The second in command bent dangerously over the edge to assess the possibility of jumping. 'Nay', he said back to his folks. And he vanished instantly as the ground he stood on gave away.

This time, they felt the vibrations of the ground before the higher part of the cliff detached itself from the rest. It fell both down and sideways. The robot towering them all tilted at the same rate as the ground, five, ten, twenty degrees and then it was the first to fall.

And so the robot was waken up. Its secondary sensors called for an emergency reboot, which completed in the middle of the fall. The emergency gyroscopic system assessed the fall and immediately fired up the bottom boosters - effectively cooking seafood along the way - before adjusting his balance with controlled thrusts.

The other emergency systems didn't detect anything serious, so they handed the control over to the primary system which was still in the process of rebooting.

The robot floated quietly some thirty meters above chaos and disaster. When the main system rose to consciousness, it started blinking and turning around.

The robot matter-of-factly assessed the situation composed of -1- the certainty of a loss of consciousness recovered by a gravity-induced fall, -2- the half-explained absence of a something to fall from except for the nearby cliff and -3- the totally unexplained presence of an exalted octopus on its top. The behaviourist system translated all this in successive emotions: surprise, rage and a desire for revenge.