Some begin with a phone call.
But the worst ones?
They begin when someone cheerful says:
“Hey Howard! Quick question!”
I should’ve run.Instead, I turned around.
It was PTA President Marjorie LaRue, binder clutched to her chest, hair helmeted into a shape aerodynamic for confrontation.
“Mr. Anxo,” she said, breathless with purpose, “you’ll be so pleased! We’ve taken the initiative.”
Nothing good has ever followed that sentence.
I stared.“What… initiative.”
She beamed.
“We have deployed a Bunny Safety Supervision Volunteer.”
Jake, behind me, whispered, “Bro. BRO. Oh no. What have they done.”
I swallowed. “You deployed what?”
“A parent volunteer,” she said proudly.“Overseeing playground bunny interactions. For safety.”
“That’s not a thing.”
“It is now.”
I closed my eyes.“What did they do?”
Before she could answer, my radio crackled to life.
STATIC“Anxo—transfer station—we, uh—got a code…”STATIC“…a code… parent… incident…”
Jake whispered, “They have a code for this now?”
“I hate this town,” I said, and sprinted.
When we arrived at the elementary school, the first thing I noticed was the crowd.
Not a normal crowd.
A gathering.
A murmuring cluster of teachers, kids, staff, and several PTA members taking notes like court stenographers.
A ring had formed around something on the playground asphalt.
In the center was Rusty.
And next to Rusty was the reason my blood pressure has shortened my lifespan:
PTA Parent Volunteer #001 — GARY STRICKLAND.
Gary was a forty-something dad who wore compression socks, had a whistle around his neck, and functioned somewhere between mall cop and doomsday cultist.
He was holding a laminated sheet titled:
BUNNY SAFETY INTERACTION STEPS — DRAFT 3Aby Gary
I approached slowly, like an animal control officer unsure whether he was responding to a skunk or a bear.
“Gary,” I said. “Explain.”
Gary blew his whistle.
Everyone winced.Rusty chirped in pain.
“Step BACK, Mr. Anxo,” Gary barked. “I am supervising. For. Safety.”
I blinked.“Gary. What did you do.”
He held up the laminated sheet.
“I,” he said, chest puffed, “am ensuring appropriate boundaries.”
Jake leaned toward me.“He made a training manual, Howard. A TRAINING MANUAL.”
“What kind of boundaries?” I asked.
Gary stepped aside.
And I saw it.
Rusty was wearing:
Two plastic toddler knee pads
A bicycle helmet zip-tied around its sensor masts
A reflective vest reading: BUNNY IN TRAINING
And a sticker on its bucket that said BE GENTLE I’M NEW
I froze.
Jake whispered, “He baby-proofed the trash robot.”
Rusty tried to move.The knee pads restricted its treads.The helmet slipped sideways.It chirped in distress.
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“Oh no,” Jake breathed. “He’s wearing too much PPE. He can’t move. He’s like R2-D2 after a tragic Etsy spree.”
“Gary,” I said quietly, “why.”
Gary snapped his binder open.
“Because,” he said loudly, projecting to the crowd, “these bunnies are PRECIOUS and FRAGILE and the county is NOT taking adequate steps to PROTECT THEM.”
I stared at him.
“They’re literally made of steel.”
A PTA mom shouted, “STEEL CAN BREAK!”
A kid yelled, “STOP OPPRESSING MR. TRASHY!”
Rusty chirped.
The entire crowd gasped.
Gary slammed his laminated sheet against his thigh.
“I am establishing the FIRST EVER Bunny Safety Perimeter.”
Jake whispered, “He made a perimeter. What have we done.”
Gary blew his whistle again.
The crowd flinched.
“STEP BACK, CHILDREN,” Gary commanded. “Only APPROVED INTERACTIONS.”
A small girl raised her hand.“Mr. Gary, can I pat him?”
Gary flipped through his binder.
“Patting… patting… Section Four… Ah! Allowed ONLY IF supervising adult performs the Bunny Greeting Protocol first.”
Jake whispered, “What in the unholy name of OSHA regulations is the Bunny Greeting Protocol.”
Gary demonstrated.
He stood stiffly, put both hands out like a traffic cop warding off ghosts, and intoned:
“Hello, Bunny.I am safe.You are safe.We respect boundaries.”
Rusty chirped sadly.
I stepped forward.“Gary, please stop.”
“No,” he said.“I am PROTECTING the children.”
“You’re traumatizing a robot.”
“That’s impossible.”
Rusty chirped again — softer, more mechanical this time.
Kids behind me yelled:
“He’s SCARED!”“He’s SCARED OF GARY!”“PROTECT MR. TRASHY!”
A teacher shouted, “Gary, please—this is spiraling—”
Gary blew the whistle again.
Everyone flinched.
Rusty jerked backward, hitting the post of the jungle gym.
The helmet slipped, covering one sensor array.
Rusty chirped in what sounded like optical blindness and emotional betrayal.
The crowd gasped in collective anguish.
“YOU’RE HURTING HIM!” a child screamed.
“I’M KEEPING HIM SAFE!” Gary insisted.
“No you’re not!” screamed a PTA mom.“You’re endangering his MENTAL WELL-BEING!”
“He doesn’t HAVE mental well-being!” I yelled.
Rusty chirped.
The crowd gasped again.
I waved frantically.“No—that wasn’t a disagreement! That was a general error sound!”
Rusty trilled, confused.
The crowd interpreted it as existential suffering.
Kids cried.
Parents yelled.
Two teachers prayed into their sleeves.
Gary blew the whistle yet again.
And that’s when it happened.
Rusty panicked.
I don’t care what the manual says — the robot panicked.
It tried to reverse.One knee pad jammed the tread.It spun in a small circle like a distressed Roomba.The helmet shifted, covering both sensors.Rusty accelerated in the wrong direction—
—and plowed directly into the juice box table.
Strawberry punch everywhere.Children screaming.Parents screaming harder.Gary diving in front of the table like he was taking a bullet.
Then Rusty hit the trash can.
The can tipped.
Contents spilled.
Rusty chirped in recognition of its TRUE PURPOSE.
And then—despite the helmet—it went for the cleanup.
Nothing motivates a Hopper like loose trash.
Rusty surged.
Gary attempted to block it with his body.
Rusty bumped him.
Gently.
But with meaning.
Gary shrieked like a man stabbed with a ghost.
“THE BUNNY ATTACKED ME!”
The crowd SCREAMED.
A teacher fainted into the arms of a custodian.
Jake yelled, “HE JUST BOOPED YOU, GARY!”
Gary rolled on the ground dramatically.
“I HAVE BEEN ASSAULTED—ASSAULTED—BY A COUNTY ROBOT!”
Rusty stopped.Chirped.And tried to clean up the spilled juice boxes.
The crowd gasped again.
“He’s helping!” a child yelled.
“He’s apologizing!” a PTA mom cried.
“He’s LEARNING,” whispered another danger-to-society.
We finally de-knee-padded Rusty.Removed the helmet.Pulled the stickers.Untangled the vest.Reset its panic-heuristics.
Rusty’s indicator light steadied.
It chirped once — exhausted.
Jake patted the chassis.
“You did great, buddy. You survived Gary.”
I rubbed my temples.“You okay, Rusty?”
Rusty chirped.
A kid behind me whispered, “He said yes.”
“He did not say yes,” I muttered.
Gary limped by dramatically, clutching his side as if he’d been struck by Zeus.
“I WILL BE FILING A FORMAL COMPLAINT,” he bellowed.“I WILL BE SUBMITTING A SAFETY AUDIT.I WILL BE DEMANDING NEW REGULATIONS AND PROTECTIONS FOR THESE PRECIOUS CREATURES!”
“They aren’t creatures,” I said.
The air filled with gasps of PTA outrage.
Rusty chirped again.
Jake looked at me.“Buddy… they’re gonna crucify you.”
“I know.”
“And it’s gonna be hilarious.”
“I know.”
That evening, I received an email.
Subject line:
EMERGENCY UPDATE — BUNNY SAFETY GUIDELINESVersion 22F (Post-Gary Revision)
The top line read:
Effective immediately, ALL interactions between children and Hopper units must be supervised by a certified Bunny Safety Volunteer.
My phone buzzed again.
A second email.
From the Commissioners.
Subject:
Howard, Please Prepare a Training Presentation for Bunny Safety Volunteer Certification
And then Jake texted me:
brothey’re making a licensing programthis is the funniest nightmare ever
And then Rusty chirped from where it sat in the charging bay.
Softly.
Apologetically.
Maybe even sympathetically.
I sighed.
“I survived actual hostile forces,” I muttered.“But this PTA… this is too much.”
Jake patted my shoulder.
“You’ll be okay.”
“No,” I said. “I really won’t.”
Rusty chirped again.
The light flickered.
And I realized something important:
I was no longer fighting the emergence of Dumpster Bunnies.
I was fighting their bureaucratization.
And that battle, historically, is where civilizations fall.