It was with huge force that I slammed the front door behind me.  I heard the house’s frame shudder as if it were made of jelly, and I felt a satisfied smile sneak onto my face as I walked down our garden path, Coco trotting along before me.  The art of slamming doors – my teenage trademark sign of anger, and in all my years of practicing, I had become a master.  It had taken me years to perfect, but I had finally learnt how to swing the door with enough force to send a shock-wave pulsating down the house’s length.  

Of course, it never stopped my parents from asking me to do stuff – taking the dog for a walk, for example, as they had today.  It just made me feel a lot better, like hammering a punch-bag or throwing darts at a picture of my worst enemy.

Feeling suddenly pleased with myself, I strode down the street, listening to Coco wheeze as he tugged and pulled at his lead to go faster; he sounded like a chain smoker, and I had to giggle at the mental image that came to mind.  Coco was our pet Jack Russell and he was, quite frankly, the most hyperactive little thing I had ever seen.  It was like watching a video set onto fast-forward – he zoomed from here to there, bum and tail wiggling busily and sticking his nose in some of the most unfortunate, repulsive of places.  He seemed to be on a constant caffeine-induced high, and for that reason, we had named him Coco.  

“’Kay, Coco…” I chortled as he pulled me along with the determined strength of something five times his devious little size.  “Don’t worry; I’m taking you somewhere nice.”

Nevertheless, he continued to jerk and heave at his leash, and I knew that if dogs had a speed limit, he would definitely have been breaking the law by now.  He pulled me down the road as the hover-cars whizzed by, lights flashing and music booming, then turned at the little path that ran down the side of our street, walled by bushes and brambles.  It had been years since I had last set foot down in the forest that grew behind our house, namely because it was only a tiny corner of wilderness in a huge mass of concrete, glass and metal.  I usually took Coco down to the parks with their artificial grass lawns and shiny red swings – when it wasn’t acid-raining everywhere, of course.  

We strolled down the dank path, patched with mud and dirt, and continued to walk as a few rays of sun broke through the purple-green ceiling of clouds.  Hurry, little plants, photosynthesize while you still have the chance! I thought to myself.  Who knew when we would see the sun properly again?  My hand brushed against the thorn-spiked bushes, and I couldn’t help but notice the empty potato-chip packets, the chocolate-bar wrappers, all strewn across the branches like a band colourful ribbons; a collection of decades-worth of junk-food and waste.

Finally, we emerged into the small dome of forest that was left.  The lighting shifted, and a rinse of green was splashed across the little bubble of world before me.  More crisp packets decorated the trees like oriental rainbow lanterns, some more aged than others, and plastic bags fluttered in the wind – the proud flags of a small, yet surviving, corner of the planet.  An upturned shopping trolley sat at the base of a gargantuan tree, consumed by gentle tendrils of moss and ivy; it reminded me of the shipwrecks people used to find on beaches before the ocean grew and swallowed them all up.  Upon the ground flowers bloomed, but they weren’t the flowers I remembered seeing in some of the natural history encyclopedias we had at home – these flowers were sparkling, glittering with reflective colour, but seemed to glow with a tin-like quality.  The names of my favourite fizzy drink brands stared up at me from their metallic petals – Coca Cola, Fanta, Dr. Pepper.  A thousand strands of rock hard chewing gum stretched from branch to branch, all splayed and broken, like spider webs clinging to the bark.  

I didn’t remember it looking like this when I had seen it last.

A sudden yelp from Coco caught my attention, and I glanced over to him, seeing nothing but his tiny behind dancing frantically as he hopped excitedly from side to side.  “What’s the matter, boy?” I asked, with a punch of enthusiasm to make the little canine feel better.  “What’ve you found?”  I made my way over to the corner where Coco stood, and he looked up at me with wide, eager eyes, tongue dangling as if it were too big to fit inside his mouth.

A gasp filled the air, and it took a second to realize that it had come from my mouth.  For what stood before me wasn’t something I remembered from the natural history books, either.

At first glance, it was a ladybug – and a big one at that, I was sure it was slightly bigger than my fist.  When I looked closer, however, I realized that it was something more than that.  Its back shell seemed to be made entirely of plastic and cans; I spotted dozens of household names all blended together to create an elite shield of protection and colour.  Its coal-black head seemed to consist of more of the same.  It reminded me of recycling factories, where huge amounts of rubbish where compressed into a giant cube – except in this case, they’d been pressed into a ladybug-shaped mould.  It had no legs; instead, it seemed to wheel around on what looked to me like batteries.

For what seemed like ages, I couldn’t bring myself to tear my gaze away from it.  Any idea that the thing was alive or could move hadn’t seemed to enter my brain yet – until, of course, it lurched forwards.  I screeched with fright and bounded backwards to a chorus of piercing barks from Coco.  Its entire body seemed to click and grind as it moved - a shrill, tinny squeal as its metallic anatomy rubbed together.  Its shell divided into two and slid away from each other smoothly to form a pair of wings, which then began to flap mechanically as the creature hummed away.

I watched, breathless, as it disappeared into the overgrowth, then gave a shudder.  I had never been one to admire bugs, but robotic litterbugs appealed to me even less – and they seemed so much tougher to squash, too.  Coco went about his duties once again, cocking his leg up every here and there and prodding every surface with his nose.  I glimpsed around me once more, just to make sure that there were no more creepy litterbugs around, when something caught my eye.

The chewing gums… they looked like spider webs, right?  They reached from branch to branch like a sticky net, but there was definitely something missing.  Where was the spider?  If the ladybugs freaked me out, I dreaded to think what a big metallic arachnid would do to my sanity – or at least what was left of it after that little incident.  

Then, from behind me, I heard an army of clanging sounds… almost as if something big, and with lots of legs had moved into the clearing...