"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
06-18-2015, 07:54 PM (This post was last modified: 06-22-2015, 08:09 PM by Grumblesnakes.
Edit Reason: Because questions
)
Once upon a time, Grumblesnakes had been an optimist, an idealist, a young fairy with bright eyes and hope for the future (despite a rather grumpy-sounding name…). He’d wanted to make the world a better place, one child at a time. That was why he’d enrolled in Fairy Godparent University – to make a difference. Five minutes with his first godchild, a spoiled little brat named Nerissa, and all those hopes and dreams had turned to cinders. Why the devil he’d been assigned to her, he would never know. Her parents gave their little princess everything she could ever want, even before she asked for it. Well. Except for one thing. Her birthday wish.
A pony.
Of course she wanted a pony. Who didn’t want a cute, chubby little pony with whiskers that would tickle her face when it nuzzled her, great big sparking brown eyes full of mischief, and a sense of adventure? HE wanted a pony, even! But alas, young Nerissa was allergic to horses, to hay, probably to fun. Maybe that was why she was such a miserable little—uh, so and so. Still. She was hardly used to hearing the word no, even if it WAS for her own good. She whined, she cried, she begged, she screamed, all to no avail. And then? Then she WISHED. And right up until that moment, he was free to let her have her little tantrum. Right up until she threw around the W-word. Especially on her birthday, he couldn’t refuse a WISH. He had to make it come true. Somehow.
Where exactly was he supposed to get a hypoallergenic pony anyh—oh. Ohhhh, now that was an idea! Grumblesnakes had a buddy from University who had liked to brag, when they were deep in their cups and telling their tallest tales and their biggest lies, about how he’d banged the elusive Beqanna Fairy, keeper of the magic land of misfit ponies. Grumblesnakes was willing to wager any action Stumbleduck had gotten was purely of the imaginary variety—which, really, was what Stumbleduck was the best at anyhow, the dirty little scoundrel. But pseudo-conquests aside, there was a world chock full of ponies. No one would miss a few if he snuck in and stole them, right? A little magic, and he’d have them hypoallergenic alright! And real pretty, too. Just the ponies that wretched Nerissa dreamed of, if maybe a little smaller than she’d like.
She never said the ponies had to be full-size.
Grumblesnakes closed his eyes and reached out with his magic, chanting the name of his destination in his head. Beqanna. Beqanna. Beqanna. And when he opened his eyes, he was Elsewhere. And Elsewhere was up to its neck in ponies. Excellent. He flew around, cloaked in magic, and reached out to horses at random, touching them on the forehead and sending them instantly into a deep sleep. Each one shrank down, and each one he tucked into his backpack, flying throughout the world and grabbing one or two everywhere he went, careful never to take too many at once. This one from an oasis in the middle of a desert, that one from a canyon with a fascinating cave just waiting to be explored--well, it would have to keep waiting! These two from the depths of a jungle--one mid-leap, the other mid-wander. On and on he went until his backpack was full. And when there was no room left, not even for a teeny tiny falabella with more sass than sense, off he flew back to the meadow he’d started in. There was a faint shimmer still in the air where he’d come through, a cloud of glittering rainbow dust to mark his passage. And when he walked into the shimmering cloud, he found himself back home. With a few new friends for the...sweet-tempered Nerissa. Once he got them all polished up, anyhow.
Grumblesnakes took the sleeping horses out of his backpack one by one, waving his hands over each in turn, muttering a few magic words and throwing a handful of glittering fairy dust on them. And when they were all prettied up he took them to Nerissa’s playroom and hid them in her toybox with all her other toys. She’d be home soon, and good luck to the poor suckers then.
~*~*~
Alright. Wakey wakey. Welcome to the toybox. Each of you has been transformed into a plastic toy pony (for mental image, google My Little Pony Generation 3. You are not, of course, MLP toys. That would probably be copyright infringement or something. This is purely for visualization purposes…). Congratulations, you’re adorable! And lucky you, you can still move. Because ~*~*~magic!~*~*~ However. You’re trapped in a giant box with just about every toy under the sun. Some of them don’t look too great, though. Maybe whoever plays with them plays a little rough. Missing limbs, missing hair, broken pieces…you might not want to be around when she gets back. Bust out of the toybox, and do it fast. Oh, and one last thing. Every toy you touch will come to life, and will stay that way ‘til the box is open. And not all of them are friendly. Have fun! Stop when you get the lid open. Good luck! You have 48 hours.
Erebor: You are a deep wine red, with a mane and tail striped navy blue and very dark green.
Syl: You are amethyst-purple ombring (pretend it’s a verb) on your legs through royal blue to dark green, and you have those same blue and green colors in your mane and tail.
Erling: You are now bright pink, with royal blue and mint green mane and tail stripes. You still turn everyone you touch grey during the quest, except for your fellow questers.
Sinder: Surprise! You are teal, with pink and blue striped mane and tail.
Speck: You are now orange that fades ombre-style on your legs into yellow, with yellow and lime green striped mane and tail.
Dagny: You are now navy blue fading to pomeroy blue on your legs (again, all ombre-style, because I’m so creative) and a sunshine yellow mane and tail.
Munroe: You are green, with black and blue striped mane and tail.
Engelsfors: You are burgundy that changes to blood red on your lower legs, and you have a black mane and tail, both striped with red.
Smother: You are…uh, a pastel minty-green color? Is what the first one looks like. With a mane and tail striped in…dark purple and like baby blue? Those three colors you picked. If I misinterpreted the hex codes, let me know, because you did say no green.
Wichita: You are soft pastel yellow, with robin’s egg blue and pale lavender striped mane and tail.
Sleaze: You are dark purple, with black and bright pink striped mane and tail. And despite being plastic, your knees are still bare and skin-toned.
Shannisoran: You are now pale silver that fades into teal down your legs, with a little bit of dusky purple along your topline that blends into the pale silver, and with teal and dusky purple striped mane and tail.
Shaytan: You are maroon, with a blue and white striped mane and tail.
Malis: You are indigo, indigo, indigo! With a gold mane and tail that fade ombre-style into fuchsia. And okay, more indigo by way of a few thin stripes in your mane and tail.
Ephrelle: You are now purple, with Slytherin-style green and silver-striped mane and tail. Except, you know, not Slytherin green. Which is probably for the best. You don’t seem like you’d be a good fit for Slytherin. Whatever, you’re super cute.
Yronwood: Well, that’s appropriate. You’ve got the Slytherin-style mane and tail just like your twin, silver and green striped. And you’re fire-engine red.
Fraktyr: You are sky blue that fades into royal blue on the legs, and you have a dark copper mane and tail with a few royal blue stripes.
Storybook: You are cerulean blue fading into white on the legs, with black primitive markings and cerulean and black striped mane and tail.
Also all of you can keep your normal eye color or pick a new one from the colors you are now.
As before, any questions can be directed to the cbox if I’m around, or to me on the OOC board. Good luck, and have fun!
Questions so far:
So everyone is in a separate "toybox reality"?
Yes. Exactly. You're replying to this, not to each other. You don't have to take previous responses into account, and you can't team up with other questers. Sorry for the confusion!
The toys come to life from touches both accidental and deliberate, yes?
Oh, absolutely. That's half the fun!
Does my character still have her original markings?
Nope! No markings other than what was specifically stated.
Does my character have any idea what things are?
...good question. Yes, for the sake of things making sense, feel free to magically have knowledge enough to identify things even if you haven't seen them before. Like teddy bears and dolls and humans and whatnot. And boxes. That might be slightly important.
Is the toybox locked or just closed?
Just closed. I figured lock picking would be tricky for a horse.
Do they know they got snatched together, or is each one in their own reality from the very start?
They wake up alone in their toybox with no knowledge of the events leading up to it. So as far as they know, they're on their own.
One moment he is in the Chamber, and the next he is not. Years of training keep him from instant panic, but he is instantly wary.
The first thing he notices is silence and stillness, and he follows the first rule of self-preservation by doing exactly as everything around him is doing: being silent and still too. Barely moving, barely breathing, he looks around. He is surprised to find himself recognizing the things stuffed in here. They've been rather rudely piled atop one another, as though thrown together in a hurry. He is resting on the top of the pile, lying on his right side, his legs tucked but not tightly. His left foreleg touches something that feels smooth like ice, but almost warm. His right shoulder presses into something soft and fluffy; looking up, he can just make out the head of a teddy bear rather far above him. Looking down toward his legs, he can see two identical dolls, one wearing a fluffy pink dress and one wearing a fluffy blue dress. He's just about to scrutinize where exactly "here" is when he feels something moving beneath him, and he scrambles up to stand mostly on the teddy bear.
As it turns out, he'd been sitting on an alicorn (a unicorn-pegasus), and had apparently woken him/her up in the process of said sitting. The creature is mostly white, but looks a little the worse for wear – and most unfortunately, one of his/her wings is broken off. Nothing else major seems to be chipped or broken, he notes as the creature draws itself up to its full height and looks at him. Female, he notes. And taller than he.
She doesn't speak at first, tilting her head to look at him curiously. He wonders for just a moment whether she can speak. "Hello, miss." he greets, and is astonished that the voice that comes out isn't his. He's always had a deep voice, a handsome voice, but this voice sounds…well, like a whiny child's voice. With a strange accent that makes it seem as though he's a very posh, almost pompous little weanling. He doesn't know the name of it, but the accent he's acquired is roughly British. He's become some weird mashup of the hero of every romance novel and a bratty boy-child.
But if his voice is strange the alicorn doesn't seem to notice. "Hello." she returns, her voice soft and tentative. She doesn't seem worried about him so much as unsure what to think. "Do you know where we are?" he asks, gently, his accented voice sounding both handsome and childish all at once. "Nerissa's toybox." comes the quiet reply. This time, there is definitely fear in her voice – but it doesn't seem to have anything to do with him. He gives her a smile, and is pleased to see that she returns it, although much more tentatively. He's about to speak again, but then, like a ghost in the mists, the two dolls he'd glimpsed earlier rise up behind her, mirroring each others' movements exactly.
And grinning in absolutely terrifyingly diabolical fashion.
Without thinking, he throws himself into the alicorn, pushing her aside so that she will be out of harm's way. These two dolls are bigger than he, towering above him, and they look quite horrifying. They're like a thing of nightmares, with matted hair and Cheshire-cat grins, but they don't seem to have anything beyond their hands to really cause harm.
As it turns out, those hands are more than enough, as they reach out to grab him and he sees clearly that they'd be able to pull him apart if they wished. And so, without hesitation, when the hand reaches out he bites it. Hard. It's the hand of the doll in blue, and he manages to actually take a chunk out of the hand – it comes out right in his mouth and it's a credit to his battle instincts that he spits it out without a second thought. All that's left on the blue doll's right hand is the ring finger and the pinky finger, so that hand isn't much of a threat. There are still three other hands in play though.
While he's been keeping blue occupied, pink has been trying to circle around toward his alicorn friend, who is cowering on a corner of the teddy bear's rather ample stomach paralyzed with fear, shrinking slowly back into the corner as far as she can go. Clearly, these are at least part of what she's afraid of. He jumps in front of her again, blocking pink's access with unhesitating fierceness. "Try someone your own size!" he says strongly. Unfortunately, the line loses some of its punch given that a) the alicorn is actually taller than him, and therefore more the doll's own size than he is and b) he says it with his strangely more childish voice, with its strange British accent.
But regardless, the doll utters a wordless cry of terror and rushes at him. At least this one doesn't seem to have much of a brain, and simply barrels into him full force. He takes the blow easily enough, stuttering back into the softness of teddy's stomach for just a moment, registering faint movement but chalking it up to him hitting the surface. He sinks into the softness for a moment before using it as a springboard to push himself and the doll backwards. Her mask-face registers surprise before she lands on her back, Erebor on top of her. After a momentary scuffle the boy manages to struggle to his feet and stand, terribly heroically, right on top of the doll. She might be bigger than him, but she isn't big enough that she can push him off. Her face is a snarl, and she growls at him wordlessly.
It is then, standing above her, looking at her, that he really notices his own forelegs.
They're red, a deep red like wine, or like blood. And they don't quite seem to have hair, per se; they're entirely smooth, with an area carved out to indicate a hoof. He registers it, but he also has more important problems right now, like the fact that Blue is trying to reach out and grab his face as he stands over her. Reacting purely on instinct, he rears back and plunges his hooves down with all the force he can muster, hoping they land somewhere near Blue's head. He gets lucky (it helps that his hooves are a little larger in this strange new form) and Blue's head lolls to the side. She is clearly unconscious – at the least.
But during all this time he's been neglecting Pink, and she seems none too happy that her partner in crime has been felled. She's charging at him madly – and then, a blur shoots up from behind her like a cannonball, landing with impossible grace on her head. A loud "BANG!" sounds throughout the toybox, followed by a "SNIKT!", a "CLICK!" and a "THUMP!" as Pink falls to the ground, head almost touching Blue's.
And on the back of that head steps one of the strangest things that Erebor has ever seen. And considering recent events, that's saying much.
She's a human, a girl, with black hair pulled back into a ponytail. Atop her head sits a cowboy hat with a princess crown tucked where the brim meets the bond. She is wearing the traditional hakama and kimono of a samurai, richly embroidered in white and blue and red, but instead of the traditional stockings-and-sandals OR cowboy boots, she's wearing glass slippers. You'd never know it from the way she seems to move; she's got perfect balance and dexterity, and doesn't wobble when she walks at all, but they're definitely glass and they're definitely heels.
And then there's her weapon.
"What? Y'all starin' like ya ain't never seen no bladegun before." her voice is heavy with a southern drawl. Truthfully, he is staring, because he hasn't seen no bladegun before. It's a shotgun combined with a katana. The shotgun comes out of the handle, such that when it's flipped into place it snaps in right next to the blade, and looking through the sight is looking down the blade. But when it's flipped up it folds into the handle, segmenting itself into nothing more than a very sturdy hand-grip. "Tch." she says dismissively
And then, an ear shattering roar rips through the air. "WHY….YOU….WAKE…..?!" The voice is rough, gravelly, and terribly deep, as though a rock golem is speaking. And just as suddenly, the earth all around them starts moving, sending Erebor, the alicorn, and their new western-samurai-princess all tumbling.
"HO, PARDNER. WHOA THERE." the samurai woman is screaming over teddy's wordless roars. She's managed to use her hands to grab on to his fur and secure herself, at least somewhat. "EASY NOW BOY." she's not screaming then, so much as speaking very loudly, as though she's not sure she'll be heard otherwise. Erebor tries to position himself nearer to the alicorn as the teddy bear's stomach heaves and rolls underneath them. It's a rather similar effect to an earthquake, really: pitching and rolling and general chaos. Thankfully (or not), teddy's stomach is big enough that they can be rolled around as he moves without being straight up pitched off.
"Get closer to me! We'll brace each other!" Erebor calls to the alicorn, hoping his childish, British accented voice can be heard over the grunts and general chaotic noises of teddy. She follows his instructions, stumbling toward him as he stumbles toward her, and he throws himself against her, hoping against hope to stabilize her, if not both of them.
The teddy bear is thrashing wildly beneath them, bellowing mostly wordlessly, with nonsense thrown in every now and then about sleeping and waking and shrimp and "TEDDY….SMASH…PUNY…" Erebor looks upward to see that the samurai has fought her way up almost to teddy's head, and is sitting astride his neck, much like one might sit if trying to ride a teddy bear. It looks like she's still trying to soothe him, although it's not really getting anywhere.
Erebor and the alicorn aren't going to get up there with her, so he has to think of something to do down here. What can make a creature calm down, or at least change its mood from bad to good? Teddy doesn't seem to want to hurt them per se, he seems just cranky. He remembers something he'd seen during a visit to the field, how a mother had gently tickled a cranky foal and its attitude had turned around.
Worth a try, right? They're perfectly positioned for it, on teddy's belly and everything.
He lowers his lips and starts to wiggle them. He keeps the motion varied enough to (hopefully) produce a tickle rather than an irritation, but all he can really do is guess. The roaring in the background gets quieter, the stomach stops heaving, and then, all at once –
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" the giant teddy bear laughs uncontrollably and begins to writhe, even more than he was before. Erebor has to stop and stagger toward the alicorn again to give them any hope of staying standing. But when the fit of writhing giggles passes, teddy seems calm. Or at least, calm-er.
The samurai climbs down from her perch behind teddy's neck, eyeing the big bear somewhat warily. "That was good, quick thinking y'all had thar." she says, nodding to Erebor. "Y'all might make it 'round these parts yet." Erebor gently straightens himself up as the samurai approaches, making sure that the alicorn is able to find her footing too. They are still on teddy's stomach, and now Erebor is able to notice distinctly that teddy is breathing – he must have missed the soft rise-and-fall during the previous scuffles.
"Thank you madam." he nods to the samurai, his voice still very British. She snorts. "I saved your hide from the Dolls, y'all saved mine from teddy. Way I reckon, we're even." He dips his head to her, letting the matter drop. "My thanks, nonetheless." he pauses for just a moment, looking from the samurai to the alicorn. "Are you hurt?" when she nods her head no, he is satisfied, and looks back to put both of them in his eyeshot at the same time. "Well, that was quite the introduction." he is smiling, and he hopes it still has a similar effect with whatever his face looks like in this form. "I'm Erebor." The samurai slings her bladegun over her shoulder. "An' I'm Princess Stabby Shooty PrettyHat, but y'all can just call me Prin for short. The girl never does, but I sure do always wish she would."
Before Erebor can ask about "the girl" the alicorn finds her voice, although it's still quiet, wispy, mousy, shy. "I'm Samaine." she is looking at him, and seems to be blushing slightly. "Thank…thank you for saving me from that doll. It was very noble." she gives him a small smile, which he returns. "Any decent man would've done the same."
Prin snorts, drawing his attention fully back to her. She's got her arms crossed and is looking at him as though she's trying to peer right through him. "Why're y'all here? Not you Sam, I know you, but I mean y'all Erebor." He considers for a moment. "I'm not…entirely sure. I was in my home, which is nothing like this, and the next thing I know, I woke up here. Which…where is here?"
Prin snorts again. "This here is the gal's toybox." she gestures with one arm around to all the toys thrown haphazardly together. He notices then that she, unlike virtually every other toy, is undamaged. Teddy's ripped in several places with stuffing coming out. Sam is missing a wing. The two dolls were a mess even before they got themselves stomped and bladegunned. But Prin looks like she's relatively undamaged. "And if you're here, you're in for a wild ride. Most of the folks around here get pretty roughed up." She frowns a little bit then, showing signs of quieting for the first time since she'd come charging out. "I don't like it, but when the gal plays with us, we all ain't got no choice. An' in her mind, ol' Prin's always gotta win the fight and rough up the bad guy. And you're all bad guys."
He finally puts the pieces together, and realizes that he needs to get out of there, and fast. "She makes you fight each other." he states flatly. "That's horrible." Sam has been edging closer to him as they've been talking, and he looks to her. No wonder she's so skittish. "We shouldn't stay here, none of us. This is a toybox, is it not?" he asks, ever so properly British. "If it's a box, it has a lid. If we can just get up there, we can push it open and we can escape."
Prin is chewing on her lip, thinking. Sam is touching him gently with her nose. "I hope you're right. I'm willing to try, at least. I'd like to…not be here anymore." she looks at him, her delicate eyes meeting his. "I'd like to leave here…with you." But before he can respond, Prin butts into the conversation. "I don't know that it'll work, but I sure don't know that it won't. It's worth a try at the least."
He nods to Prin. "At least we can try. But…how can we get up there?" They might be on the top of the pile, but they're still a ways beneath the lid of the box – and not to mention, they need to get that lid open.
Teddy burps, shaking all of them as they stand on his stomach. He'd almost forgotten that they were sitting on a living being – it's easy to forget, what with how big he is. How they'd pitched and rolled when he'd been laughing as they tickled him.
Pitching and rolling. Pitching, and rolling. He looks to Prin sharply.
"Does teddy speak or understand us at all?" he asks her. Prin catches on immediately. "Near as we can reckon….well, no, not even a bit." She is quiet for a moment, thinking. "But he is the biggest an' strongest we got in here." Erebor would prefer not to use teddy against his will, but it's clear to the boy that the oversize plushie is their best option. And thankfully, they've got a way to agitate the creature without hurting it.
"Prin, do you know how to tickle?" he asks, his voice deadly serious. The cowgirl-samurai-princess nods. "I reckon I do." Then the once-black, currently wine red and navy blue and dark green boy turns to Sam. "Erebor…" her voice is soft and heavy with emotion, her eyes impossibly wide. It's painfully obvious that she's fallen into the stereotypical damsel role, fallen for the leading man, who is handsome despite being recently turned into an off-brand My Little Pony. "Stay close to me, we'll balance like we did last time. And then we'll get out of here." he gives her what he hopes is a reassuring smile. "It'll be all right." which, if he knew anything about tropes, he would know means that everything will, in fact, not be all right.
With a nod to Prin, he starts to tickle. He uses his mouth to gently frizz teddy's fluff, and sweeps his tail across teddy's withered fur for added effect. Prin is tickling too, with both her hands. Sam is pressed tightly to Erebor's side. And sure enough, after a little bit, they feel the telltale quaking. "HA HA HA HA" teddy laughs, rocking from side to side. "STOPPPPPPP!" he yells, but he's still laughing. He squirms, trying to get away from them, swatting at them with his hands, but he doesn't have the coordination to actually dislodge them – especially not when he's distracted by the tickling.
And so, for the most part, he just rocks back and forth, as anyone does when they're being tickled. He rocks, and he rocks, and he rocks –
And then the world is a jumble as the box falls over to the side, its lid flying open as toys of all kinds spill out. Prin grabs on to teddy's fur, using her hands to make sure she avoids being dislodged. Erebor tumbles off of teddy and loses contact with Sam. He stretches toward her as she yells his name – but like all good movies, they can't reconnect. They're pulled apart and Erebor lands shortly thereafter, tumbling a bit, but when he stands up he is unhurt.
He can't see Sam or Prin anywhere, but the lid is off the box. He's not a prisoner anymore.
Erebor
Native Prince of the Chamber
warship x straia
I hope this is an okay way to open the lid. If not, let me know and I'll re-write <3
My eyes open and I feel hazy—the kind of hazy that you feel after waking up from a hangover, with grungy eyes and disgusting goop around your lips. My head feels heavy, like a million bricks just piled itself cheerleader style aboard my head.
Well, perhaps HE had hired someone to kill you, and that person did a very, very poor job.
I try to move but the place is so thick, so nauseatingly stuffy that even to move is a struggle. I feel as though I am swimming in a batter of molasses, impossible to move but yet I cannot stop because heaven forbid I begin to sink.
This is the story of my life, really, the story of how pathetic I truly am behind the glass of appearance.
It is then that I hear the faintest, softest voice ever lull right into my ear, “well aren’t you a tacky addition to the family.” At first, I feel my heart grow red with anger and my belly flip into an instant defense; how dare you, is what I almost say. How dare you critic my appearance when you damn well look like… Holy shit.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am not kidding you, I am looking at a doll with chopped and scrapped blonde hair, markers for makeup, and absolutely zero clothing. I see it all—everything that is visible on a doll without a dress—I see it. And let me tell you something, as a horse, I find it very offensive.
“Jesus—“ is what I am able to muster out before I realize that her hand (which looks like it has been gnawed by some sort of rabid shih-Tzu) is currently the item now rubbing my withers in an inappropriate fashion.
HE didn’t want me to die, he wanted me to suffer. Damn him.
“Down girl,” is what I say, because oh my Lord this is not how I wanted to start off meeting human beings. My heart is pounding, my skin twitching, I feel like I have a million fleas all crawling up and down my flesh.
That is what motivates me forward, that is what powers me ahead. My stomach is flipping, I am hitting objects and species left, right, and center and… Something bit me.
Oh my God, something bit me.
“What the hell—“ I shriek (which is a rare occurrence for me, I am quite nasty) as my head spins around to… Is that Jaws? My eyes narrow at the rubber over-sized fish like creature gnawing at the base of my hock, “hey, fish breathe, get the heck off me.”
I watch as he snarls behind his grip, his black bead eyes glaring at me with some sort of intent. If this is intimidation, he needs to start taking lessons. I continue shimmying myself upwards, light creaks through an open crack and I can practically smell fresh air.
And then… What is that even?
Three little trolls with hair oh so bright stare at me with painted eyes, though two are missing limbs (an arm and a leg to be exact) and… Seriously do they feed this Chihuahua? I see bite marks all over this poor guys chest.
“Hey, do you think you could help me out?” I ask, a slight worrisome expression crossing my face. Clearly I am completely out of my element here. Give me an evil father, a moronic half brother, a crazy aunt, whatever, but don’t give me… whatever this is.
Hell? Maybe? Don’t give me hell.
“You have saved our lives, we are eternally grateful,” they all say in unison with their arms (or arm in some cases) extended in my general direction. I watch as they squirm and wiggle into my vicinity, edging their way like worms or snakes into my bubble.
I wish someone had killed me.
“Back. Back!” I growl with teeth bared, but they continue forward. Before I even have a chance to bite one finger is up my nostril (or is it a hand? I cannot tell), another belly worming his way up my back, and the third choking me in a neck hold and acting as if it is a hug.
“Help—“ I squeak through air bubbles and short breaths as these children, no, hounds, torment me in ways I never knew possible.
Give us this day our daily bread… Something something… As we forgive those who trespass against us…
That’s it, I am praying (mind you, not well). This is how I die. Mother, I am sorry I don’t know you or care to. Father, I am sorry you’re such a horrible parent. Half brother, I am sorry you are such an entitled freak. Beqanna, I am sorry you’re filled with useless peasants.
The neck one, he is releasing. Oh God al mighty thank you so, so much. I toss my neck in a way I never new possible, shoving a troll right in the nose, the other one tumbles beneath him. I hear more voices, more noises, more rustling.
I have no time, I have no time.
I kick, I swing, I am swimming in a pit of waking souls. My stomach is crumbling in fear and I have persistent sneezing from that monster’s germy hand up my nostril.
He probably broke something.
Between the sneezing, the swimming, and the constant movement of groaning bodies beneath me I hardly know which way is up.
Until I feel it, I feel the breeze of fresh air. I taste freedom.
The roof won’t open. I am stuck with the movement of life beneath me ready to suck me back in to her pit of death. It feels like hours, days, a lifetime before I see it. The solution. The trick to this all being over.
I see a toy train, not too big, not too small. The type of train that if wedged in a small crack, can widen the opening enough for me to squeeze through.
Smother, you dirty dog you, you genius.
I have no time for game planning, I leap over and begin nuzzling this train like no tomorrow. I feel the ground beneath me of toys and items shift and squirm and I feel as though I am losing balance. I push, I push so damn hard that my head hurts. The train is more than awake and begins to chug and choo and WOOOOOOO right in my ear to the point I am pretty much ready to just throw down right here right now.
This is too much.
And then, I hear the wood splinter, and the lid weaken, and the choo choo train weasel its way into the open space and… hallelujah.
The leaves are slowly changing shades, bright greens fading into brilliant hues of red, yellow, and orange. The lanky red colt is striding languidly beneath the vibrant foliage, admiring the way summer had slowly begun to shift into fall. He has no destination in mind as he wanders, other than the faint thought that lingers in the back of his mind that he should meet new horses. That is until he suddenly sways on his feet, his dark eyes closing as he is consumed by blackness.
An odd sense of disorientation is the first thing that he notices as his eyes open. He glances around, taking in his surroundings. In that moment, disorientation gives way to confusion. The dimly lit space is filled with strange things for which he has no name. Things in which he had no name. As he continues to survey his surroundings, understanding begins to come to him. A slow trickle of knowledge (names, descriptions, uses) that he has no explanation for. How is it that he suddenly knows what these odd things are?
The question might have bothered him more if he hadn’t started noticing that each of toys seemed to be broken or battered in some way. As he continues to stare around, he catches a glimpse of teal and purple from the corner of his eye. Turning his head, he sees of his own body for the first time. His dark eyes widen with shock as he takes in the pale, plastic hardness of his sides and the coarse, manufactured stands of his purple and green tail. He shifts his leg, his wide eyes turning to stare in dawning horror at the thick structure that fades from teal to silver. Though the explanation seems entirely impossible, the only conclusion he can come to is that he has become one of these toys.
And that is when it occurs to him what might happen to him if he stays, considering the state of the rest of the toys. He knows in that moment that he must find a way out of this gods forsaken place. Scrambling to his feet, he trips and stumbles into a headless Barbie doll as he does so. With a snort of consternation, he turns his focus back onto his current problem. Or he tries to. Until he realizes that the Barbie had begun to move. The unclothed doll climbs to her feet, turning this way and that as though she was having trouble seeing. In his confusion and surprise, Shan leaps back, only to land himself into a whole pile of Barbies. These ones at least have heads.
As the Barbies all climb to their feet and begin chattering away about shoes and clothes and some poor chap named Ken, an idea begins to form. Taking a deep breath, Shan approaches the group of dolls as they begin pull dresses and shoes out of the nooks and crannies in which they had been tucked.
Hello ladies, he says, drawing their attention to him. I was wondering if you might be willing to assist me? I have a need to leave this place.
The group of Barbies turn and look at him in obvious confusion. Why would you want to leave? one Barbie missing a large swath of hair asks. Another, this one missing an arm, adds, Yeah, it’s sooo nice down here. We have all the accessories we could ask for!
Shannisoran stares at them in consternation, wondering how they could possibly be content here. You don’t want to leave? You’re not worried about losing more limbs? he asks in bafflement. The half-bald doll frowns, tilting her slightly hairless head. Aren’t we supposed to be missing parts? Everyone here is.
The tri-colored colt frowns. Well, no. I don’t think so, he says. And that is when the squabbling starts. Each Barbie seems to have an opinion, and each one is determined to have their say. Shan cringes, wishing for a moment that he had hands with which to cover his ears. When it becomes apparent the Barbies are going to be little help, Shan turns around, searching for another means of escape. That is when his eyes fall onto a bucket of Legos. His dark gaze lights up as inspiration strikes. He rushes over to the bucket, accidentally tripping over a stuffed dog and landing upon the one-eyed stuffed bear next to it in his haste. The dog springs up, barking loudly as it does. As the dog bounds around the box, barking its fool head off as it goes, it knocks the bucket of Legos over. As the bear sits up, it looks at the silver, teal, and purple pony in sympathy.
So sorry about him, little pony friend, the bear drawls in a deep, slow voice. Shan sighs as he stares at the Legos, realizing he has no hands with which to the put the darn things together. Suddenly a thought occurs to him, and his gaze turns to latch onto the friendly one-eyed bear. It’s ok, he’s just energetic. Say, you wouldn’t be willing to give me a hand, would you?
The friendly bear’s string mouth stretches into a smile. Why, of course, my friend. What can I do for you? he drawls in that same slow voice. Shan grins back at him. Well, I really need to get out of this box. I was hoping to build a staircase. Can you help?
The bear nods slowly before lumbering to his feet. Anything for you, little friend. He begins towards the blocks, picking up two and clicking them deliberately together. You should wake up builder Bob and Wendy over there. They can help. They’re fast too.
Nodding, Shannisoran bounds over several toys to land on a toy dump truck. He nudges Bob and Wendy awake, wide eyes fixed upon them as they turn to look at him. Mr. Bear over their sent me to ask for your help. I’m trying to build a staircase.
With a nod, Bob picks up his tool case and says, We can do it! With that, he and Wendy jog across the inert toys and begin to stack Legos together to form a staircase. With a happy grin, Shan turns and leaps out of the dump truck just as it trundles away. Quite by accident, he lands on a doll with tangled blond hair sporting a somewhat mangled plastic crown. He quickly steps off her and onto a stack of blocks. As she comes to life, Shan begins to apologize. Before he can get a word out however, she shrieks.
What have you DONE, you bumbling oaf?!?! Her voice is high pitched with a slightly nasal quality to it. In short, very unpleasant to listen to. Look at this mess you have made of me, you incompetent fool!!
Shannisoran firms his jaw and moves to edge around her, hoping to leave her to her tantrum. But she is much larger than he had originally realized. The worn princess clamors her feet, towering not just over him, but over most of the other toys as well. His mouth dries as fear edges in. She could easily destroy everything. In an act of desperation, he turns and sprints towards the opposite edge of the box, hoping to draw her away from his precious (and rather rickety looking) stairs. Several toys come to life as he runs across them. She shrieks in outrage as she sees him getting away. Reaching out long arms, she plucks him from the ground and tosses him with some force the other direction. The breath is knocked out of him as he lands on a slim ledge. He clings to the small, life-saving strip of wood, praying to whatever gods would listen that he not fall off. Only after he catches his breath does he realize that she has tossed him exactly where he wanted to go.
Unfortunately, she is not yet through with him. She shrieks again in fury as she begins to climb the stairs. The Legos wobble precariously with each step. Her hand snakes out again in an attempt to grab him. He scuttles away along the narrow ledge, dark eyes round with fear as they remain fixed upon her. Just as she reaches out, the stairs collapse. She screams in surprise as she launches herself at the ledge in an effort to catch herself. Her full weight crashes against the lid, causing it to spring open while she flies over the edge. Shan is nearly unbalanced by the sudden absence of the lid. He teeters precariously on the lip of the box before finally, thankfully, catching his balance.
(Ugh. Stupid internet. Hope this is alright, if not I will re-write parts. Have had to rewrite the whole thing again -_-' and for some reason my html won't work. Ahh! )
Magic. It was a strange thing, like frost on a summer’s day. Rainbow colours dazzling an ebony night sky. It sometimes did even strange things; sort of held you like a marionette and made you do strange things, you had lost control of your body, your mind and it was under complete control of a magician with a toothy grin and wild eyes. I never quite believed in Magic, that was meant for fairytales when the damsels were often saved by handsome princes and knights in shining armour. All I realised when I was even younger than I am now, was that those knights had dented armour and were not noble as they first appeared. Magic. Magic didn’t really exist.
Oh, but I’m wrong. Like some marinate I feel my legs bend and bow beneath me and as if unseen hands grab at me, hold me with stubby fingers, I am pulled from Beqanna, from somewhere near the Chamber. It’s fuzzy, like a dull ache in my skull, I see nothing, all I hear is a strange bell, ringing, ringing. It’s dark, and i’m not even sure I’m breathing. Magic. This surely was not the magic from those fairytales spun by my mother in vain attempts of keeping her child amused, no, this magic, it was far more sinister.
Blackness. It is still and eerie. That bell still tolls, now more like a tinkle, a distant echo of my own beating heart. I’m alive? Is this some fable of a dream, some vivid nightmare that quakes me right down to the bones? I have every question riding my throat, wanting to escape my lips, when suddenly I feel the urge to shift my legs, to move. I’m not dead? I stretch out my forelegs and roll to one side, in doing so I knock something, it’s hard, unyielding against my lofty frame and vast body. It clunks and I hear it scramble and roll, before a fluorescent yellow light beams at me, lightening the dark room, filling it with eerie shadows that stretch up and over me with jagged teeth and haunting eyes. I raise myself, staring out beyond the shadows. Their are vague forms, strange forms. chubby fingers, stubby legs. Giant porcelain eyes that stare right through my soul. I give a brisk snort and step over, the sound a dull thud, thud, against the ground. I look down then, capture the slithers of light as they cross me. I’m not gold anymore. I squint, the yellow light is far from helpful in this dark, dark room. But it’s there and it’s on me and all I see is black, blood red and flashes of burgundy. Am I bleeding? is my life source flooding me, the floor? Quickly I turn around and scrutinise where I was laying moments ago. No. Clean. dry. I snort again, stepping over towards the light source.The duo thud, thud, thud beneath me making me wonder what on earth has happened to my hooves. they sound fake, they sound unlike the clip of dull soles. I shake my head and a mass of long, flowing mane cascades over my eyes. It’s in the way, not gossamer threads of cream, but thick, course and almost wiry, they do not roll like cascades of rolling dunes against my neck, rather fall as one thick mass. I blow, I snort I paw at the hard ground with a stray hoof and nothing makes amends.
This is where the fear grabs at my heart, holding it in a claw and squeezing, tighter, tighter. The darkness plays with my vision, makes me think things are moving, but they’re not. I move with cautious, easy steps towards the light source and as I bend my neck lower to look, I notice the strangely smooth curves of plastic, it’s bright yellow, with eyes as white as what I remember the moon being. It’s a fat thing, wisps of blue, black adding detail. And then it’s its maniacal grin of plastic teeth (A MINION!) . I strike out at the strange thing, my hoof colliding with it, of course it does nothing but roll the torch, and it knocks something. That something comes falling towards me, rolling, like some boulder coming straight for me. I scramble on these strange hooves and attempt to move out of the way, but I’m blazed over by the circular globe of bright colours that offend my eyes. Straining my eyes against the shifting light, I trip over something green, something jagged in places and smooth in others. I stumble, these fat, plastic legs are not as elegant as my long willowy limbs, and I fall, right on my side. landing in some more spiky green things. I snort, shaking my head, I lift myself again, but this time, something moves with me. hands, small, plastic hands push me up and I leap out of my skin and turn around in a surprisingly swift action for clumsy legs and an unyielding body.
’What… Who… Where am I?' I stammer out, my voice is a loud, obnoxious squeak. Like i’d drank the helium from a balloon. If I had hands, I would have covered my mouth and stamped my eager foot. Instead, I step forward, towards the green men. ’Ma’am, this is volatile ground. Afraid we failed our mission and this is our prison.’ I turn my gaze towards the boom of the voice, it’s strange, a booming, authority voice coming from one so small. But then, as the light catches me, I’m not as lofty in height as I was once either. I shiver, a coldness taking over and knitting with my bones. I step forward, closer to the small green men. ’Your prison?’ I ask, looking around. I see no bars, all I see is endless walls, endless, hard, unyielding walls. That shiver fails to leave me as I step closer. ’Affirmative. Ma’am you are not the first and not the last to enter this facility.’ the first little man spoke, he made hand gestures with his claw like hand, towards his head, towards the infinite blackness beyond. It’s his friend’s turn to speak, and thats when I notice just how many there are. What seems like hundreds of little green men, all in varying poses, facial expressions. Have you suffered injuries, Ma’am?’ he sounds young, his voice softer as he talks to me, he steps near, his hand placing on my side. I stiffen beneath his touch and as I stagger away a little on these irritatingly clumsy hooves and large limbs, I feel an ache deep inside of me, as though my blood is refusing to pump, my heart refusing to beat. ’Not that I know of.’ I pause, turning my head towards the multitude of green men, then beyond; the light catches the eerie smiling faces of red, white and blue, mania smiles adorn their porcelain faces. I shiver, and one of the men notice. ’We refer to this facility as the TOYBOX. We have no affirmed status report on this place, other than it steals Toys, it steals us all from our previous lives.’ The Toybox? My mind is a jumble of thoughts, all fragments I have no joy in putting together. I walk away, curious, curious indeed. The little men are talking but I walk closer to the porcelain faces with beautifully adorned ruffles around their china necks.
I trip over something, or more so, someone. as I stumble I hear them groan, the little men run towards us and encircle the object of my trip. New meat. the smooth, clipped voice of the small men haunt me then, as I stare behind them to the large object I tripped over. Well, it was more smooth plastic and lots of multicoloured hair (sort of like my own.) I shift on my uncoordinated feet and step away then, as I do, I feel the whole place rock, the box shifts and outside I hear laughter, loud, booming laughter. It quakes the box, it makes everything jumble, fall down and roll towards me, and as I touch it, my skin comes in contact, the things start talking, shifting on broken limbs. One eyed faces stare out at me, handless arms reach out and I feel something pressure me against my side, as I turn around I see another four legged horse. this one, smooth, plastic, shiny almost, glitter in it’s mane, it’s tail. I snort, and the object I had tripped over walks, with a clip of heels. Your New. The monster likes new. I shift uncomfortably as her smiling face betrays her cold words. I shake my head and the other horse steps in between me and the tall girl. Leave her alone. We were all New once too. If we hide her, she can get accustomed to this place before… before She takes her out. ’She?’ my question falls on death ears because just as arguments were to break out, light beams in from a crack in the top of the box. my eyes twitch, just acclimating to the darkness, and now beams of natural light flood the box. Everything falls then, right on the spot. The little green men, the walking doll with heels, even the other horse. I finally get to see the layout of the box and shiver in discomfort. The eyes of many clowns, they stare at me with a a sinister glare, their teeth like sharp daggers. I trip as I walk, towards a mash up of multi coloured blocks, some stuck together with round little nodules, some smooth, yet smell faintly of wood. (Lego and Wooden Building Blocks)
Then there’s a face, smooth, glistening, with small round glasses on her face, she stares in and her voice is a boom, it effects me, makes me stumble and fall back to the ground in a heap of long wiry mane and tail and stumpy plastic limbs. MUMMY GOT THE NEW TOY I WANTED! IT CAN GO LIVE IN THE SUPERSPECIAL CASTLE I MADE. the voice causes the objects to roll, to tremor against the earthquake that she makes. I too wobble, trying to get up, just as the fleshy hand reaches in, stubby little fingers reaching for me. I pull away, inch by inch, just as she is about to touch me, someone calls from a distance and the girl makes a sour face. BUT MUM I’M PLAYING. she turns her head, her fleshy hand is still in the box. I notice eyes turn to her, fear, unbridled fear laces everyone’s face. including that of the little green men. With the light still radiating the room, I notice the broken, the wounded. Fixed with white tape, sewn patches on the furry bears, patches over pulled eye sockets. I shiver. Is this my life now? to live with these things, in a constant fear of his hand? I do not recoil anymore and I lift myself up, turning my hindquarters I kick out with my hinds; they are stubby and uncoordinated and make a dull thud as they hit the girl. she bats her head away and doing so knock the blocks over and they fall in a mess of colour disarray. MUMMY, MUMMY! SOMETHING TOUCHED ME IN THE BOX. A distant voice answers and the girl, her furious eyes behind little glass domes, answers. NO, IT DID. IT DID! She reaches for me again and I slink low, but this time a few blocks are thrown, they strike her and the girl backs off, hand completely out of the box, resting on the side, she wobbles it then and everything, everyone falls to their knees. EARTHQUAKE!! she yells and laughs, and everything tumbles, breaks. I just about manage to keep half of my upright, when the ball comes flying at me. Her laughter resounds but as I look up, she’s gone.
Ma’am. Are you injured?’ the little green men circle me now, reaching out with little hans, their small green faces etched with something unfamiliar to me. concern. ’What.. what was that?’ the pony, she enters the foray now, she has thick scars over he bright pink body, some fluorescent yellow, some scrawly black lines. She owns this Box. She is the God outside. What toy she wants, she has, she reaches in and takes us outside.and no one is safe outside. The tall doll walks in then, pushes past the green men, the pony. We should sacrifice her. She’ll play with this one for hours. She’s new. shiny. You all know how she likes shiny new things. It won’t take long before your new novelty wears off though. She’ll get a new toy, break you like she breaks all of us. Don’t think you’re anything special, pony, as you’re not. I stand my ground then and step forward, ears pinning. ’Whilst everyone tries to rally together, you are breaking this small community’s back.’ Elsa, don’t take it out on the new one. She’ll adjust. ’I don’t want to adjust! I want to get out of here!’ I find my voice raising, my temper getting the better of me; it was fear, I knew that, fear of the unknown, fear of this strange place. That was when the army men started building the blocks. While we were all talking, they had managed to build steps towards half of the box’s roof, and the rest, they clambered on each other’s shoulders to peer out the top, they shouted down then, eager voices echoing around the box. Target gone. All clear..
’There’s a way out, right there! why are you all standing here?’ my voice betrays me, it’s loud, quaky but full of something foreign to me. fear, uncertainty. I get the looks from the clowns, the pony, even the brash doll, and as the army men come down, their looks are solemn. no one leaves this box.It isn’t safe out there. Minion never came back and when Elsa went out for playtime, she saw his stuffing out, he was ripped right open. they all shiver then and I find myself doing the same. I stamp a hoof in objection and make my way towards the blocks, as I do, something sharp hits my side, it stabs me and I feel it break my plastic skin. It hurts but fails to bleed, I have a hole in my side, a perfect hole. A shard of something sharp sticking out. I bend my neck, clutch it with my teeth and pull it out. The clown, it’s sinister face, toothy grin, he stands, he’s got more shards in his hand. I then realise he’d actually breaking his own porcelain body to throw it at me, like daggers. “No one leaves here! We’ve been here for a lifetime and we have never escaped. what thinks you possibly can?” ’Because I don’t belong here!’ I yell, and this time, no one stops me, in fact the little army men help me by making some lego steps, I step up, and look back to the room of toys, then back up to the huge roof opening. ’You can’t stay, you can come too. You need to escape this place, it’s not natural. You should feel grass beneath your feet, feel the wind in your hair… Smell the—‘ my voice is cut shot by the boom, boom of feet, then more laughter, it’s another earthquake but this time I make my way quick, as quick as my limbs can carry me to the top of the box, sliding as the blocks tumble, i reach out my forelegs and readily hang on the edge, just as the spectacled eyes gaze in. I’m face to face with the toys’ tormentor, a child so innocent and naive looking, but the look in her eye, she wants, she gets.
I’m hanging on with as much as I had left in me, my side is starting to ache, and I’m starting to slip. There is abuse coming from down below, no doubt from the doll, the clowns. then I feel something push me, the little men, they are surrounding me, pushing me, hands all over the place, they are not strong but the multitude of them allow me to get a stronger grip, pulling my forelegs so that I am hanging from my elbows. I pull, I pull and the little girl beams SO YOU WANT TO PLAY? I CAN TAKE YOU TO THE CASTLE!
My freedom, it is in sight; the bright light of day, a world beyond the dark box, the sinister toys. the mother calls for the child again, I’m thinking I have the line of exit in my sight, but she stays, she ignores the calls from her mother and her hand extends to me, grubby little fingers reaching out. I close my eyes. if this is the only way of exit, then I’m going to take it. the army men give me another push, I’m pulling myself over, and the girl’s face beams with delight, her hand then swats away with a sharp tug, and the momentum rocks the box as she hit it with a great force. I’m unbalanced, shifting, my hindlegs, my body slipping. I look down, and it’s the clown, he’s throwing shards of himself at the girl, they are flying everywhere, splinters of porcelain breaking skin. droplets of red fall into the box then, the girl let’s out a roaring cry and runs away. MUMMY, MUMMY I GOT A SORE!! she is gone, and the box is still falling, still tipping.
It lands like a falling star then, a blessing, a curse. Everything is fallen, broken in the fall and I find myself dazed, I’ve been stabbed by more porcelain shards, I pull them out one by one, it’s a tedious task but I end up leaving a few in as I see the light, the soft plush of carpet, large wooden structures, soft dunes of lace and material. I turn back to the army men, the pony, they are all in a mess, but they usher me on. We belong here. I don’t even know where we would go.Ma’am your new objective is to find your home. Return to it and tell the world of your exploits. That is an order. the little green man, he offers a salute, but just as I’m nodding in gratitude, turning to leave, I hear the rumble of another pending earthquake. I run as fast as my limbs can carry me, picking through the disorder, the chaos. the debris of lego and blocks, limbs of dolls, rolling glass eyes. It’s a haunting mess that feels me with fear, but not as much as the want for freedom. It pushes me right to touch the exit’s light. then I come face to face with the girl again. wide eyed and maniacal grin.
I’ll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife
He is alive and then he is not.
He is standing – never particularly tall, but normal-sized, but then he is shrinking, hardening. His skin tightens and feels strange, slick. His mane and tail grow to absurd lengths, curl precociously against his flanks and neck. The black of his pelt warms to purple and pink streaks radiate in his mane and tail.
Then, darkness.
The air is stuffy but he realizes that he does not quite need air, not the way he once did. The new body – small and plastic and strange – has its own queer immortality. For a moment he lays there, eyes adjusting to the dust-mite darkness. Below and all around him shapes come into being, some soft mounds and some harder, made of the same stuff he is.
“Hello?” he calls out, soft, voice still sounding like a shout in this strange place.
He shifts and feels his back leg (which is thick and trunk-like, less the tapered things he is used to and more like bludgeons strapped to his body) touch a figure lying nearby.
The figure shifts and Sleaze whirls to face it, stomach tightening with the realization that he is not the only thing alive.
“Well hello there!” laughs the creature, which has climbed upright. He still cannot quite make it out – the only light comes from a crack above him – but he sees it is bipedal, and that in its right hand it clutches something.
(Its laugh is a bastardization of merriment; it is the kind of laugh bred in the dark corridors of insanity, the kind that leaks from the corners of the mouth like drool.)
It lurches forward, shuffling like the dead, and Sleaze stumbles backward on his thickened legs, crashing into more silhouettes.
They are also alive.
What he awakens is the fauna of the place. A wolf, snow-white, whose head was perpetually thrown back in a howl. A tiger, shoulder blades roiling under ropy muscles, awakens and purrs a low growl. They are all scarred, scratched from hours of play perhaps too rough (or perhaps the mutilations came from someone – something – else). They are all awake and Sleaze simply waits for them to descend.
They do not.
They are fixed on the figure he first awakened. He can see it better now. It is humanoid, but its face is pale white with exaggerated makeup on its pursed lips and a bulbous red nose. Its hair is blood-red and springs out from its head in a semicircle, but the crown of the head is white and bald.
In its hand its clutches balloons, blue and white and orange.
It smiles and Sleaze swears the corners of its mouth reach its ears, a Glasgow smile.
It smiles and Sleaze swears he sees not just teeth but fangs, and they are somehow infinitely worse than the predators he knows are at his back.
“What, no hello?” laughs the clown, throwing its arms back as if to embrace them.
“Come on then, say hello to old Pennywise.”
“You,” growls a creature behind him – it is the wolf, whose head has lowered, ears laid flat back. It moves forward, moves past Sleaze, who lets it, gladly.
He would rather let the wolves and tigers and god-knows what else consume him before letting the clown-thing lay hands on him.
“She doesn’t even like you,” growls the wolf.
Sleaze does not know who ‘she’ is. Does not know there is a girl who sleeps beyond these walls with fevered dreams.
“Ah, but she needs me! Who else will tell her what to do? Who else will whisper those things into her ear? Little Nerissa has a brother on the way, you know. I think I’ll have her help him down the stairs. Or perhaps teach him to swim. Or maybe just feed him a big ol’ spoonful of rat poison, whaddya think?” the clown claps its gloved hands, and Sleaze sees a dark stain across one of them.
“She threw you away.”
“No, she tried to throw me away. I had to have words with her after that. Made her microwave Elsa for that, didn’t I? Did you SEE her face after that? She got spanked for it, too. She cried for days after that. Hates being a Bad Girl.”
The clown somehow grins further, as if the smile could wrap itself around its head.
“And she can’t tell mommy or daddy about me, either. Then they’d know she was snooping and she’d get spanked again. I was daddy’s Special Collectible, the one he thinks the housekeeper stole.”
The clown’s eyes, glittery and dark, fix back onto Sleaze.
“But enough about our dear charge! Kapu, don’t you see we have a visitor? A little purple prince with bare knees. Oh Kapu, can’t I have him? He’d be such fun!”
“Please,” Sleaze says. He sounds desperate. He is desperate. He does not know this world, does not know the feud between the clown and the other animals at his back, “please, let me leave.”
“Leave?” laughs Pennywise, “oh darling, no one leaves. Besides, you should stay. It’s quite fun. We all float here.”
It laughs at itself then, the private inside joke from a story none of them know, the story where a clown named Pennywise lives in gutters and eats little boys.
(Nerissa had not meant to keep the toy clown, only play with him for a while. She did not know the story he came from, or why father kept him up on the shelf alongside the monster figurines. She’d liked the bright balloons, that was all. But then she’d forgotten to put him back, and by then father had come home and noticed he was missing, so she’d hid him at the bottom of the toy trunk and let the blame fall on the housekeeper.
The whispers began not long after that, the words coming in a dream-state when she didn’t know if she was asleep or not. She didn’t know it was the clown, at first. Not until one night she opened her eyes quick-quick, and saw it perched there. It didn’t move or speak a word, but she knew he had been shut in the toy box – he stayed there every night in case father walked in to say goodnight. She wouldn’t have taken him out.
The clown tells her to do things. At first it’s simple. She cuts Barbie’s hair, leaving her looking weed-whacked. But that’s okay. It wasn’t even her favorite Barbie.
But it escalates. The clown tells her to steal matches from the kitchen and burn Barbie’s hair off instead of just cutting. It tells her to throw Kapu across the room and try to cut off his ear with mom’s sewing scissors.
She tries to throw the clown away, sneaks into the kitchen at night and buries him under coffee grounds and the empty wine bottles mom hides there that she thinks no one knows about. When she reaches in to hide him she feels a sharp sting on her wrist and when she pulls it out she’s bleeding.
She tells herself it was a piece of glass from the trash, but in the back of her mind she knows that the clown bit her.
She goes to bed, wrist throbbing but mind relieved, and wakes up two hours later to the stench of wet coffee and sees him there, perched on her nightstand, the balloons reaching up up up as if he could float away. We all float here, she thinks, not knowing why, before the panic sets in as she buries him once more at the bottom of the toy box.
She microwaves Elsa the next day, because the clown said if she didn’t things would be sobad for her, that he would tell and everyone would know she was a Bad Girl for sneaking into daddy’s study. She watches Elsa melt and cries while the whole kitchen stinks of burnt plastic and when the timer beeps and she pulls her out she drops her on the floor because she burns her hands.
Mom comes downstairs while the smoke alarm screams and spanks her, saying now Elsa’s gone, you killed her and she’s gone.
She curls around her stuffed dog that night but it’s not the same as Elsa and it takes Nerissa a very long time to fall asleep.
And when she wakes up the clown is there, and she thinks she can hear him laughing.)
Sleaze shakes his head, the memories – of the girl, of the clown watching, of the blue-dressed doll’s face melting inside a black box – clearing. He looks to his side and sees the tiger there, the knowledge in her eyes.
“Go,” the tiger says, “you’re not like us. You have a different magic, more like -” she pauses, as if she cannot bear to name him “ – more like it has. But good. You’re good, aren’t you?”
He doesn’t know how to answer the question. Is he good?
“We can hurt him in here. We can try. But we can’t leave the box, not like Pennywise can. So please…please go. Tell her it’s not her fault. Tell her she’s a Good Girl. She loves us, I know she does.”
Sleaze nods, numbly. It feels like a dream. Somewhere, the clown is laughing.
“Touch as many of us as you can, and then…we’ll go for its hands. Get his balloons.”
Sleaze does. He touches a cobra, an alligator, a panda. Sleek jungle cats to join the tiger, panthers and cheetahs and jaguars. Domesticated animals too, cats and dogs and pigs and more horses, breeds he cannot quite name.
The wolf – Kapu – leads the charge.
They descend on the clown, who is still laughing. The clown is stronger than he looks, and tears and bites at the animals.
But the tiger is fast and sleek, bred for this, and she sinks her teeth into the hand clutching the balloons. Pennywise shrieks and lets go before burying its mouth into her neck.
Sleaze does not – cannot – watch and stead lunges forward after the balloons. He grasps their strings with his teeth, and sees the clown’s hand rise up and then he feels something sinking in and thinks, wildly, oh god it has claws, but then he is floating towards the crack of light as the creatures skirmish below.
The balloons are not enough to dislodge the top so Sleaze scrambles wildly for purchase. His jaws ache and his side throbs. There will be a new scar there.
His front legs slip through the crack and he is able to clamber forward by the grace of his smaller body. There is a noise like gunshots as the balloons pop and he wonders if they struck something or if the animals below were destroying the clown.
He hopes they can do it.
But then there is no time to hope, no time to tell the girl anything, because he is sliding out of the crack, his absurdly long mane catching in a splinter, leaving a curled pink lock behind, and then Sleaze is falling over the side. We all float here. he thinks, and laughs all the way down.
sleaze
cancer x garbage
(OOC: okay first of all I apologize for the novel and the unintentional kid backstory and if I broke the rules but I can't build happy worlds so whatever.
The "animals" are based off of Schleih animals - http://www.schleich-s.com/en/US/toys/
Pennywise the clown is an antagonist in Stephen King's novel It, and subsequently people have made figurines of him. Mine was based off of this - http://www.monstersinmotion.com/cart/ima...e-Mego.jpg - but with balloons.
thanks for indulging me <3)
She’s playing with her twin, racing along the ice-rimmed beaches in the Tundra. Ollie is usually faster, just a smidgen taller already, but the girl is more determined than he is, stretching to her full potential; one stride ahead, then two. She tosses her head to laugh – and then she is not there.
When she becomes aware again, the girl panics. It’s dark and suffocating, and it’s too warm. The Tundra is cold, and this place is not cold. Her legs touch things – she doesn’t know what – but after a moment of scrambling she finds her feet, standing on something hard (like ice) but not ice. “Ollie, where,” she turns her head to look for her twin and he’s not there, and the panic resurfaces, stronger this time, a tide washing over her head. She’s never been apart from him – not ever. “OLLIE!” she yells, spinning around to face movement on her other side.
Her hooves don’t quite find the purchase she is expecting, and she almost falls to the ground. Confused, Dagny glances down at herself and gasps – even in the very dim light that her eyes are gradually becoming accustomed to, she can tell that she’s no longer red splashed with white. Her body is a darker color, fading to light blue, and she can see from the corner of her eye that her mane and tail are streaked in some light color – yellow, maybe?
There is a noise – a growl? And the girl backs up until she can feel the walls on two sides of her; quickly she touches her nose to the walls and the floor and decides they’re wood. Like trees. The growl comes again and she turns, looking into the dimness. “H-hello?” A creak in the wood, and it comes close enough for her to see it. It’s feline, but not like anything she’s seen in real life. A bright orange, striped black, and it moves with a grace the girl-child related to her father when he’s angry. Predatory, but in a way that is more natural on the feline than on her equine father. “What are you?” it asks, eyes narrowed but bright. “I’m – uh – I’m Dagny,” she stutters, unsure. “I don’t think I’m supposed to be here.” It considers this – head tilted, tail lashing. “We were not awake before you.”
We. She thinks. It said we. Most of the shadows are still, unmoving, but she thinks that some move. “Come out.” she demands. “Only monsters hide in the shadows.” Ah, the innocence of children. She doesn’t know that some monsters are perfectly content in the daylight. “Well we couldn’t have that.” The tigress’s voice is amused, and she tilts her head, beckoning the others. Dagny stares are them – fascinated. They are not like her – she is whole and bright, if in a strange new body. They’re chipped and broken, and even in forms unfamiliar to her she can see that they are not whole. Scarred – like dad. “Are you warriors?” she frowns at them, puzzling through these new things.
“No.” The tigress growls, the others shake their heads or tremble. “There’s a monster, outside the cage. During the day, it takes some of us out. For torture.” The girl trembles, looking from one face to the next. Two are pale and cream-ish, walking on two legs with funny legs they don’t walk on and hair only on their heads. One looks sort of like a lizard, but also walking on two legs, with front legs that look rather useless. The last is a deep color, purple maybe, and has what Dagny considers an unreasonable number of legs. “W-why don’t you escape?” She swallows her own fear and raises her head, deciding that she certainly isn’t staying here to get tortured. “I need to get home. How do you get out?”
They look at each other, blankly, and the child fidgets, impatient. “The roof opens.” One of the pale things says finally, waving a foreleg above her head. “But we can’t reach it.” the other pale thing chimes in, and the tigress rumbles in agreement.
Dagny looks into the darkness and shivers, afraid. But she thinks about Ollie, and how bright he is even in the darkness; and her papa, who is probably worried (like he does even when they wander for a little while). She has to be brave, for them. “Well we can climb,” she says cheerfully, and starts to try to clamber over something squishy and somewhat soft – like moss? – the others climbing beside her. But then it moves, rumbling, and leaps up, throwing her to the ground and flailing, growling incoherently. The thing with too many legs leaps between them, lashing out, and drives the furry thing away, into the shadows. “You are what wakes them up.” it says in a voice that is very deep, but somehow not scary. There is a murmur of agreement from the lizard, and the pale things, and the tigress, all of whom are safe on their unmoving mountains. They’re talking – something she doesn’t understand – and finally the girl pale thing says, “Ken has a point. What about blocks? We can’t wake up blocks.” He nods, leaping down to the floor again. “We’ll go find the blocks, stack them up.”
Dagny is uncertain – (what is a block?) but the others nod in agreement and start to wander away, into the piles. “Stay,” the tigress says, unnecessarily, and vanishes with them, tip of her tail last. It’s quiet, except for the occasional rumble and shuffle of moving things. They mask the creeping noises, and she is taken by surprise when it leaps out again, all growling and huge furry limbs. Much bigger than she is. The girl squeaks in surprise and leaps backwards, away from the unanimated toys, but it lumbers after. Clearly, unlike the others, this one is displeased with being awoken. The girl dodges one swipe, finally used to her unwieldy legs, and ducks under him, making him crash headfirst into the wall. The teddy bear stands, roaring its displeasure, and leaps at her again, catching a leg this time and making her tumble head-over-heels against the wall. Scrambling to her feet, she grasps a chuck of fur in her mouth and pulls fiercely, tucked in behind him where he can’t quite reach.
“Hey! There is the sound of falling items, clunking against the floor, and her new friends all rush to her aid, driving the creature back into the shadows. “Thanks.” She smiles at them, breathing shakily, and looks at the things they’ve brought. All hard, no faces, with sharp corners. “Blocks,” supplies the lizard helpfully as she investigates, and then they begin to push and shove and stack. Nervously at first she helps, but quickly they are proven right – the blocks might rumble a bit when touched, a soft vibration, but there is nothing there to animate, and they stay helpfully unmoving. Finally there is a path, like the cliff faces at home in the Tundra, climbing up into the darkness. The purple octopus climbs first, braver than they are, and they are rewarded by a creaking sound and the sliver of light at the top. “Let’s go!” Dagny exclaims, and they rush to the top – and freedom.
Shaytan hasn’t had any interactions with magic, so the sensation of literally salivating over the thought of killing a bunny, and then waking up in the dark and on her side… it’s a miracle she didn’t have stitches in her side and is missing a kidney. Shaytan blinks, letting her eyes adjust to the light filtering in to this giant (by her now adjusted standards), cavernous… rectangular… box? There are holes in the corners and along the edges that allow enough light in to give the area a pre-dawn or twilight feeling. She can see her immediate surroundings, but what lies beyond isn’t crystal clear.
So this doesn’t seem like Beqanna anymore… considering that what’s beneath her is hard and cold, and she’s never known any natural ground to be like that. Ok. Well. The only way to figure out what’s going on is to get up and explore, right? Shaytan is oddly unscared by it all; more slightly curious and still hungry for bunnies, but neither scared nor excited to be here. She heaves herself upright, and as she does so, manages to catch a glimpse of herself - what the fuck. No more spots! Instead, she’s the color of blood (so… any bunnies in this place? She can’t hear anything moving around except for herself), and as she turns to see if the rest of her is like that, she catches sight of her tail, which is blue and white. Heyyy… not too bad! (Practically patriotic, if Beqanna were in the States…)
Shaytan has never really thought about all the pretty ponies of Beqanna. Except Straia. Straia was beautiful. She wonders if Straia would like her like this… it was pretty exotic, wasn’t it? Ok, so. First thing to do once she gets out of the box is to get back to the Chamber and find Straia. It would be like she’s never left, and then everything will be perfect and they will live happily ever after.
Once she’s right-ways up, Shaytan turns slowly in a circle to get a better sense of where she is, and while she does so, her tail brushes up against whatever was behind her. It comes to life with a loud whirrrrrrrr, startling Shaytan and causing her to leap forward and then pivot to face it. It’s HUGE. Like monstrous huge. And though Shaytan is mostly controlled by her Id, even she finds the way its plastic eyes snap open, and the beak-like thing clacking back and forth to be utterly alien and creepy. Which means a lot, coming from a horse that likes to kill bunnies.
“What the… what IS that?” she murmurs, half transfixed by the glowing, pure white light of its eyes, and half repulsed by it’s egg-shaped frame and giant ears, which wiggle back and forth with an electronic sound. In the dim light, she can make out that it is bi-colored, with a white belly/face, and a tufted patch of hair between its ears. So freaking weird. Finally, it’s eyes stay open and pupils appear - very, very angry pupils. It chirrups angrily, high-pitched and menacing. “Ehh hehehehe. Furrrrbyyyyyy” Its diagonally slit eyes focus down on her, and she stares back up at it. “...Is that what you are, or what your name is?” Both of its ears fly back and it growls from somewhere deep within, saying “Naynay, Oogama.” The beak opens, as if it is hungry… and Shaytan takes another step back, perilously close to yet another monster (though she’s not paying any attention… silly Shaytan, haven’t you learned your lesson yet? Always look behind you!).
“I don’t understand. Can’t you speak English?” Shaytan demands, getting frustrated now. It wasn’t give her a coherent response. But oh, her tone must have affected it somehow, because it blinks rapidly and then the pupils disappear again and the lights that are its eyes flicker rapidly. “Egga dee-da ahahaha doo-wop blah blah blah” And the, right before her very eyes, it flips in the air, landing almost on top of her. Shaytan quickly backpedals, right into a stuffed bunny rabbit. I don’t mean a rabbit on all fours, like a regular, real-life bunny… I mean like a stuffed rabbit you win at a state fair. Pink, and with a ribbon around its neck.
This is one bunny she isn’t going to be able to kill.
This is the one bunny that could get revenge for all the other bunnies.
And that… that is more terrifying than the alien, gibberish creature doing backflips behind her.
It continues to babble on behind her (she turned around to see what she ran in to), while the Giant Bunny seems to wake up from some deep slumber. What the hell was going on? It’s like the box from hell AND THERE WAS NO ESCAPING IT. So before the Giant Bunny can fully wake up and take the ultimate revenge on Shaytan, her mind screams RUNNNNNNNNN! and she bolts, jumping over little dark green figures and a toy truck, fully intending to climb a mountain of toys that reaches almost to the top of the box (fully forgetting that she is the one bringing them to life, and that they might not like her climbing on them). But as Shaytan looks to the top, trying to find a way up there, she forgets to watch where she is going and runs into a yellow man. A yellow man with no hair and an orange vest and and no pants…
It takes a moment, but after she hits him, he yells out “Ow!” and lifts a claw-like hand to rub his very flat face. Painted on features turn into a grimace. “Hold your horses, man. If you go running around like that, you’ll wake everyone up. And let me tell you, everyone prefers to sleep while they can.” He is cryptic, as if what he said should make perfect sense. But it doesn’t, of course. She just stares at him blankly, and after a couple of awkward seconds, he just hmphs and mutters, “Talkative one, aren’t you?” He promptly turns around to leave and find someplace to go back to sleep when Shaytan blurts out “Wait!”
That stops the yellow man for a moment, and he turns his head all the way around (leaving his front side facing… front), and with a slightly exasperated tone, says “Yes?”
“I need to get out of here. There’s an alien thing that doesn’t speak English, and a Giant Bunny that’s going to get revenge for all the other real bunnies I’ve killed and I’m starting to think this is all a dream, because it’s so freaking wierd.” He just kind of gives her this look like she’s crazy… “Look, all the newbies say that. That’s just an Evil Furby, and you don’t have to worry, it’ll eventually shut up… maybe. There’s a reason we don’t sleep near it. And Fluffers wouldn’t hurt a fly. Besides, what would you do on the Outside? You can’t hide out there. Here, at least you’re small and can try to wiggle under other toys. And maybe then Nerissa won’t find you.”
Shaytan’s mind conveniently glosses over the fact that he said toys and latches onto the idea of getting Outside. He seems so knowledgeable, he must know a way out. “Please! It doesn’t matter, I just have to get out!” The little man sighs and throws his stubby little hands up in the air. “Fine. But don’t say I didn’t tell you so when you’re missing all your mane and tail and the dog gets you.” Again, she misses all the warning signs because her mind goes straight to HOORAY, FREEDOM! But her eyes brighten up, and who can resist such a grateful-looking, patriotic Pony? The lego man puts one claw up and tells her, “Wait here, I have to go get the lincoln logs.” As he walks away, she can hear him mumbling something about “Master Builder reduced to freaking lincoln logs… How do you lose all my legos? Embarassing…”
It takes the yellow man a bit to assemble the lincoln logs (after all, he is much better with legos, but these have to do until Nerissa brings him more… hopefully…), and while he does so, Shaytan keeps nervously looking around for the Giant Bunny. Or the Alien. Neither of them come lumbering out of the grayness to kill her, but she is nevertheless on edge at the possibility. Perhaps they went back to sleep… but what if they wake up again? Eventually, the Master Builder comes trundling back to Shaytan, humming a very catchy tune and the occasional ‘everything is awesome!’. “Ok, you crazy pony. Follow me.” Together, the two climb up the Lincoln logs and heave the lid of the box up a little bit - enough for a small toy to slide out and somehow make it down the ground.
Oops, Shaytan hadn’t thought of that. She turns to the yellow man. “Ummm… what now?”
Shaytan
and every time she knocks I can't help but let her in
Ephrelle is positive that she had been jumping, and now everything is black and quiet. The jungle does get dark and still sometimes, when the storms are coming and everything seeks cover – but it has never been this dark. There is no sound of wind here – no sound of anything at all.
Stranger still, Ephrelle is most certainly upside down. Having never been upside down before it takes a moment for her to process her unusual position, and then she does what any living thing would do, and tries to right herself. Her limbs feel both larger and lighter than she remembers, and she wonders if perhaps Wrynn’s monsters had followed her from the beyond and back to the Jungle. Had they taken her captive? Perhaps they had mistaken her for Wrynn?
Deciding to test this hypothesis, the filly stretches out her neck and bites down – hard – on the first thing she finds.
Nope, that does not taste at all like berries that have gone bad. It tastes like metal and it hurts her mouth (but not her teeth? Where are her teeth? She can’t feel them anymore!).
Whatever she has bitten does not seem to like having been bitten, and with a loud roar it begins to move. Light suddenly fills the space, temporarily blinding Ephrelle as her green eyes adjust to the light. The source is the headlights of the model truck whose side mirror she had just chomped down on.
”Nobody messes with Mater!” The brown trucks shouts from a mouth that Ephrelle can’t quite see, somewhere below the fender. ”You’re gonna pay fer that, little missy.” She begins to stammer out an apology, looking down in embarrassment ,but is distracted by the sight of her own legs. With the light from the truck, she can clearly see her legs. They’re purple! And round! And…
She has no time to inspect them further, as Mater the Tow Truck has taken her distraction as his opportunity to charge. Moving too fast for her to escape, the truck races forward and collides with Ephrelle, forcing her back against a solid wooden wall. She is trapped, unable to move and the truck’s engine revs as the bumper pushes against her plastic purple ribcage. She can feel her sides start to cave in, but the pain is strangely absent
”RACE STARTS IN ONE MINUTE !” an echoing voice suddenly booms, startling both Ephrelle and Mater, if the way the truck slows it’s shoving is any indication. ”RACE STARTS IN ONE MINUTE. VEHICLES TAKE YOUR MARK!”. Mater the truck reverses farther still, and the eyes in his windshield look disappointed. ”Well shucks. You’ll have to pay later, I’ve gotta go cheer on my friend Lightning.”
Ephrelle doesn’t have time to catch her breath in the returning darkness before she hears a small voice to her left. ”You okay there, Horse Friend?” Ephrelle turns her head to see a small brown-skinned doll wearing a white medical coat over her purple-striped shirt and pink skirt. Too scared to speak, Ephrelle simply presses herself closer to the wall. ”I won’t hurt you, friend. I’m Doc McStuffins. I can fix your side, I’ve read how in my Big Book.” Doc takes another slow step forward and rests her stuffed hand on Ephrelle’s side. There’s an oversize polka dot band-aid in her other hand and the doll presses it gently to Ephrelle’s injured side, where it sticks readily to her plastic skin. ”Your boo-boo is all better.” Ephrelle manages to stutter a quick ”Th…Thank you” before Doc spins around suddenly, her already large eyes growing even wider.
”Get outta here,” she whispers to Ephrelle from the corner of her mouth. “I think She’s coming back. If you can hide under the toy box She won’t play with you today.” The filly doesn’t have any idea who She is, but Doc has been surprisingly helpful, and she’s inclined to follow directions. ”Where do I go?” She whispers, ”How do I get out of here?”.
Doc McStuffins silently points to a looming shape in the corner, and Ephrelle recognizes the silhouette of a three story dollhouse tucked into a corner of the toybox. ”Take the stairs, and climb out the attic window. That’ll put you at the top of the toybox.”
Whispering her thanks profusely, Ephrelle does as directed. Her plastic hooves sound strange on the wooden floor of the toybox, but she gallops toward the candy-pink door of the dollhouse as quickly as her stubby legs can take her. She’s just short enough to fit inside, but stops at the sensation of carpet. It’s like grass, but softer. She desperately wants to explore – there’s a soft humming coming from the fridge in the kitchen and the gentle drip of water in the sink – but she remembers the urgency in Doc’s voice, and heads through the plushly carpeted living room towards the stairs. A couch is overturned in the center of the room, and there is no other furniture. Laying half on the couch and half off, a small doll has the center of its chest poked open, presumably with the toothpick that lays beside it on the floor.
With wide eyes, Ephrelle keeps a wide berth around the grisly scene, and makes it to the foot of the stairs. Stairs? How does she climb these? Taking a deep breath, she takes a step up, and then another. It is strange going, but she reaches the landing on the second floor, and then the third. The attic window isn’t really a window, she discovers, but rather a giant hole in the dollhouse roof. It appears to be exactly the size of a child’s fist.
Standing beneath it, Ephrelle can see a sliver of light that must be the lid of the toybox. I can do this, she tells herself, I can do this. I am brave. Backing up a few paces, Ephrelle aims herself at the center of the hole. She breaks into a gallop and leaps forward and upward, as high as she can toward the toybox lid, hoping that the force of her collision with it will force it open.
will be doing another soon 
