In an alternate 1930s world, a scientist is ordered by his dictator to create a robot in the apparent name of progress, and so the scientist creates the B.R.A.I.N., a highly intelligent robot. The dictator seizes it upon its apparent completion, and turns it into the Fabrication Machine, an armature that can construct an army of war machines to destroy the dictator's enemies. But the B.R.A.I.N. is seized before the scientist could give it a soul, thus causing the Fabrication Machine to decide to exterminate all of Earth's population. The Fabrication Machine reprograms the other war machines to attack humanity, wiping out all plant, animal and microbial life with toxic gas and chemical weapons. On the verge of destruction, the scientist uses alchemy to create nine homunculus-like rag dolls known as "Stitchpunks," giving them portions of his own soul via a talisman he created. He dies upon completion of the final doll.