Cuddly Holocaust is a Bizarro Fiction novella written by Carlton Mellick III.
In the near future, humans have created smart toys, toys with artificially intelligent personalities. Julie is a ten-year-old girl who has been gifted a panda-shaped smart toy named Poro. As the days go by, her parents disprove of Poro’s inappropriate behavior. However, outside Julie’s neighborhood, incidents of smart toys killing humans causes the companies responsible for creating these smart toys to recall them. In retaliation, the smart toys declare war on the human race.
Seven years later, the smart toys have won the war. Human civilization is almost entirely destroyed, replaced by isolated groups of soldiers trying to protect what they have left. Julie has now gone under multiple reconstructive surgeries to transform herself into a panda plushie just like Poro, who she left behind during the war’s beginning. When the base she lives in is attacked, Julie escapes and fits in with a group of stuffed animals, hoping to find her parents.
This novella contains examples of the following tropes:
- After the End: Of a war between smart toys and humans.
- Apocalypse How: A Class 2, heading towards a Class 3a.
- Bittersweet Ending: Julie’s panda surgery is completed, and she now lives with Poro as his wife. Humans are confirmed to still live on in the form of stuffed animals. However, the unaltered human genocide still continues.
- Body Horror: By the truckloads!
- Funny Animal: The stuffed animals are a robotic variant of this.
- Robot War: Of the toy variety.
