ROB BO$$:

Art is rebellion in the hands of Rob Boss. After BetterEarth Holdings bulldozed a stretch of federally protected wilderness where Rob regularly fished with his late father, the loss became paint, fuel for his landmark series Paradise Sold. These canvases, equal parts beauty and indictment, now anchor a movement as society edges toward collapse. When an ICE raid turns his Miami neighborhood into a warzone, Rob helps the community fight back, then auctions pieces from Paradise Sold to fund legal aid, clinics, and The Happy Family defense network. Each sale chips at the empire even as it reminds him the system may not be broken at all; it may be working precisely as designed.

Off-grid hacker Dot Miller digs into BetterEarth’s servers and uncovers ghost files for the shelved ARMIS-9 androids, machines Ethacle Robotics (a division of BetterEarth Holdings) desperately wants to revive. The missing key is a lightning-fast processor array patented by soft-spoken engineer Dr. Zubair Khanna. Ethacle’s swaggering CEO Harlan Drex and BetterEarth’s cold mastermind CEO Carter Grant craft a private plan: shower Khanna with flattery in public while securing leverage in private, all to avoid paying his steep asking price. Their internal emails drip with corporate cynicism, and an urgency that hints at stakes far beyond profits.

While the executives scheme, whimsical nature host Warrin Bicknell documents grotesque mutant wildlife near BetterEarth facilities, adding fuel to an already-building revolutionary fire. Dot, trying to connect these threads, leaves her desert hide-out on a beat-up motorcycle, bound for the Sierra Blanca co-op run by her old friend Alton Stevis Jr. If she can link Rob’s art, Warrin’s creatures, and Khanna’s silicon miracle, the whole façade might finally crack.