Dollhouse
Synopsis
Takes place on a post-apocalyptic Earth where an alien invasion has left only automatons (referred to after this as dolls) behind in the ruins of human civilization.
As, with very few exceptions none of whom are in good enough condition to be reliable sources, the dolls were all either manufactured during the war or by the surviving dolls after the war their understanding of the events of the war are not complete, so after this initial synopsis will come a more complete synopsis. It's recommended to avoid that part if you're concerned about spoiling things with OOC information.
The Doll's Side of History
The invasion hit earth without warning and the opening salvos wiped out nearly all of the military forces and contemporary arms manufacturing facilities. The heavily decimated human forces made do by utilizing the immense automation to create and arm an improvised fighting force. Each victory for humanity proved costly and the invaders would always redouble their attacks and move their focus onto whichever facilities the resistance was currently using. This process repeated with humanity steadily losing ground. Eventually the loses and the devastation to infrastructure left them operating only out of small cells of resistance fighters relying almost entirely on dolls as shock troops, until even this failed. As far as any dolls know the last stand of humanity took place in the Joytell Toy factory in what was once the American Midwest. Humanity at that point consisted of only 2 people and their final army a line of plush dolls armed with whatever weapons they could scavenge or manufacture. Humanity lost that final battle. None of the dolls present at that day knows why, but the instant the last human died the invaders left, abandoning the field mid fight. Leaving the dolls alone to piece together their own future.
The dolls figured out how to use the machines that had been used to manufacture them and using the same programs and resources the resistance had left with them they built the second generation of dolls, ones possessed of more general intelligence and freedom. The 2nd generation beget and improved the 3rd and in some places they have continued and attempt to create a 4th generation, with each attempt trying to bring the dolls closer to their understanding of the humans who created them.
Though the largest group of dolls came from that final battle, each stand the other cells had made and each army of dolls they made had left traces, and each have worked to build their own homes and find their own paths forward. This task hasn't been easy because although the invasion seems to have ended and no more invading armies appear, remnants of their own forces remain and occasionally arrive by way of the massive portals they used during the war. These strange machines and horrifying monsters, along with the collateral harm the war caused make the current world difficult to survive even for the most well equipped and prepared.
The whole story
Shortly before the war humanity had reached a point of magnificent unprecedented automation and equally huge inequalities. Entire plants and factories could be operated with only a handful of employees and each made to survive on a pittance. Along with this the devastation to the earth ecology and rising levels of pollution continued to push everything towards a boiling point. Eventually the rich and powerful of the world decided to escape the difficulties and any upcoming unpleasantness by building a colony on Mars. Massive fleets and a planetary fortune in equipment were all launched to the red planet to make it a new home for the elite of Earth.
This turns out to be a horribly stupid idea. Even with their advanced technology the ability to render the planet habitable was at best centuries away and most likely impossible. As a result the people of mars needed an umbilical chord to survive and a steady stream of supplies and resources was forced into transport between the planets. The final straw of seeing the resources denied to them sent to keep alive the same people who had ruined the world proved to be the final step needed to bring matters to a head and humanity revolted.
The first step of this revolt was to cut off supplies leaving the planet. In response the martians, with the aid of the world's governments (whose leadership had long ago sold out their countries in exchange for citizenship away from the ruined earth) mobilized the modern military machines and the facilities they'd built on mars became devoted to putting down the revolution. The first strike took out any military resource left behind on the planet to prevent the earthlings from using them. This was believed to be enough and the martian forces attempted to forcibly put down the revolution.
They had, however, underestimated how much the automation of the rest of the world had provided to the rebelling humans. The first counter attack used immense logging and mining machines to take down the initial military forces, the difference between a heavy crawler mounted with a mining laser or improvised cannon and a tank are minor at best. This defeat caused the martians to begin targeting centers of heavy industry in their attacks and as their fight progressed they were forced to push the envelope in weapons and technology, including alongside cutting edge war machines bioweapons and horrors that would turn each battle into a living nightmare.
Unseen to the humans on Earth as the war progressed the hastily assembled Martian government was fast splintering. The harsh egos and immense power of all the individuals involved were fast causing the forces and their goals to become unstable and confused. Even as they developed the first teleporters, opening gates between the planets to deploy their forces, no two parts of the armies could agree on what to do with or how to handle the rebels. Some took prisoners, some took slaves, some were captured for experimentation, and some just went on rampages of extinction. This conflict simultaneously became actual battle, and between all these factors and their own fading resources the Martians went extinct at almost the same time as thee humans on Earth.
Unfortunately the same automation that had enabled both sides to continue fighting long past the point where a sustainable human population wasn't possible meant that echoes of their invading forces continued to attack the planet. Compounds run by military computers continue to open gates and send bioweapons and war machines to Earth seeking to kill or capture a humanity that no longer exists.