Set years before Service Model, Adrian Tchaikovsky’s all-too plausible short story navigates a world where humans are increasingly redundant.

“Holring and Baselard value your contribution to our team” As one of the last non-robot employees at Holring and Baselard, Tim Stock retains a vital role in the human resources department: firing the multinational conglomerate’s remaining human workers.

But the soul-crushing task eats away at Tim. As he watches the company replace his human colleagues with cheaper labor, Tim starts to question his own job security. After all, what use could robots possibly have for an HR department?