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A small critter, quivering behind a glass wall, begging you not to kill it so that you may survive.
As soon as you step foot back into Safe Haven you undo the clasps of the Grab Pack, letting it slip from your shoulders and fall to the ground. You pay no attention to either the clatter it makes or the dozens of eyes that have been drawn to you. Looking forward, as if on autopilot, you navigate to a corner of the shelter and put your back against the wall, slowly sliding down until you’re on the ground.
A bloodshot eye, watching dispassionately from a screen while you fight against a horde of monsters of his own creation.
Staring ahead, muscles tense, breath quickened and heart pumping you struggle to get the images out of your head, to no avail.
A massive felt corpse, being puppeteered from the inside by the same toys who had devoured him, intent on making you their next meal-
No, no, no, no! It’s too much. It’s too much.
You remain there, frozen, unable or unwilling to move a single muscle, tormented by the harrowing experiences you had endured thus far. They swirl around you, twisting and churning, ever changing but painful all the same. Impossible to act, to even think, you feel as if you’ve been thrust away from the control of your own body.
It is at this moment that Poppy notices you have returned from your mission. She quickly makes her way to you, mind already plotting another plan or contention in case this one failed.
“You’re back! So, how did it go? Is he gone? Did you manage to get the Omni-Hand?” Questions spill out of her at a dizzying rate, overwhelmingly so. However, when she notices the state you’re in, she pauses. “Hey, are you alright? You haven’t said a word since you arrived. And where’s your Grab Pack?”
She turns around until she spots the tool strewn on the ground, and as she approaches it, the intricate circuitry of the Omni-Hand attachment makes her gasp. She runs back to you, a fiery gleam in her porcelain eyes.
“You did it! You actually did it! With the Omni-Hand, we can finally strike back at the Prototype!” She watches you, completely despondent, and she starts getting worried. What if the Doctor had done something to you? It wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility when dealing with Sawyer’s degeneracy.
“What’s wrong? Did that bastard do anything to you?” It’s as if she’s speaking through a concrete wall. Her voice reaching your ears but not registering on your mind. The doll attempts to get you to react as best she can.
“Hey, cheer up! You killed the Doctor! You got the Omni-Hand! We’re going to beat the Prototype!” She continues with her fruitless endeavor until a large yellow hand grabs her shoulder, softly pushing her aside. Doey had noticed the commotion at the entrance and had come to investigate. A single glance at you and he knows something is wrong.
“Let me handle this, Poppy.” His tone left no room for discussion.
The doughman kneels down, neck unspooling to put him face to face with you. A large orange hand hovers over your arm, close but not quite touching.
“Hey, pal.” He says in a gentle voice, as though he was speaking to a scared animal. “You seem to be having a bit of trouble.” He patiently leaves the words hanging in the air, waiting for you to process them. Once your eyes focus on him, he smiles and continues.
“Why don’t you come with me? I’ll take you somewhere nice and quiet.” He then finally rests his hand on you, expecting the flinch that follows. Having made good progress, first by grounding your mind, then your body; he gingerly helps you to stand up.
Doey turns to a bewildered-looking Poppy and an assortment of other toys watching and says: “I will be occupied for a while. Kissy, Poppy, I leave you both in command.” Resolute, he nods at them and proceeds to slowly guide you to the deeper recesses of Safe Haven. The small critters, satisfied by the doughman’s response, retreat back to their usual activities, leaving Poppy with a dumbfounded look. She turns to Kissy and says: “What was all that about?”
The reality is that Doey was no stranger to these situations at all. He had comforted every toy in the shelter more times than he could count. When food was low. When they cried for a guardian that had up and abandoned them. When their survival seemed to be left to chance, Doey was always there to soothe and mend their troubled minds. He had been the rock in which they had held on to withstand this terrible fate for a decade. Even farther in the past, in a distant time when they had all been different, he had dutifully cared for people whose faces he cannot remember in a place he can never return to.
As the two of you walk, Doey thinks of all that has happened during his time at Playtime. Of the pain, the torture and the cruel experiments performed on his fellow toys. Of the Hour of Joy, the hope of this nightmare finally ending, and the reality that they had all been played once the Prototype deemed them unfit to exit the Factory. He thinks of the hunger, the terrible hunger that had destroyed the last vestiges of humanity of so many like him. He knows he would have succumbed to it if he didn’t have anyone who depended on him.
Now, as he brings you into a small and cozy-looking room, shouldering your weight and watching your every step, he considers how shocking it must have been to have it all thrust upon you in such a short time. Glancing at your face, his heart aches to see you in such distress, and he resolves to do everything in his power to make it all better.
He sits down with his back against the wall. Then, his arms extend, enveloping you and carefully laying you down on top of his belly, his body immediately molding to accommodate your form. With you surrounded by warm, living clay, he can finally begin the final stage of his plan: bringing down the walls keeping all that pain inside you.
“Focus on the sound of my voice, okay?” Doey starts rubbing your back up and down, the tactile sensation of the clay calming your nerves. He begins humming, his deep baritone voice making his chest vibrate in a soothing way. For a few minutes he keeps this up, giving ample time for your defenses to weaken. Once he feels you have become receptive to his treatment, he strikes with surgical precision.
“You’re okay.” He whispers in your ear. “You’re home, you’re safe.”
You begin trembling. A dozen sharp-toothed Mini-Huggies gnawing at your skin.
“Nothing can hurt you here. I will protect you, all of you.”
Your breath hitches. The skeletal remains of a toy, who had died hungry and afraid.
“You can let go, pal. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
A whimper, then a soft, fragile keen escapes through your throat, building up in intensity until it develops into an anguished wail. The dam breaks and the suffering that had been writhing inside you spills out violently. Tears begin flowing freely from your eyes, your body wracked with sobs as you cry against Doey’s chest.
“There you go.” He coos. “There you go, buddy. Let it all out.” His arms gather you into a close embrace. The tension that had been building up during this terrible journey had finally reached its peak, but here, in Safe Haven, hidden in the arms of your kind companion, maybe you could afford to let yourself be vulnerable even if for a little while.
You were not the Employee. You were not Poppy’s Angel or the Doctor’s plaything or another pawn in the Prototype’s wicked plan. Right now, you were just another lost child caught up in the horrors of the Factory, in desperate need of help.
So, you wept. You wept for Mommy, for Catnap, Dogday and the rest of the Smiling Critters. You wept for the children who were stripped away from their humanity, who were forced to turn on each other to survive, and the ones still slumbering in the deepest reaches of the Factory. You wept for the toys at Safe Haven, who had lost everything but themselves.
And you wept for Doey. For the three innocent souls coalesced into one body. For the one person who had refused to lay down and give in to despair, who had fought to give hope to his family, to bring some light back to their ink-black eyes.
For a long while you lay there, sobbing until your voice was hoarse and your tears had run dry, and even afterwards as your body spasmed with grief in silence.
Once you calm down enough to gather your thoughts you try looking at Doey. Your face, streaked with tears, eyes bloodshot and hair completely disheveled meet his eyes, a serene, sympathetic look on his face.
“You were children… you were all children…” You manage to say. The sickly-sweet voice of the scientists reassuring the kids before irreparably mutilating them still playing in your mind.
A long silence follows. “Yes.” Doey says, with grim acceptance.
“All this suffering. All this pain, for what? Cheap labor?”
“I don’t know.”
The revelation that it wasn’t for some grandiose purpose, the banality of the horror… It was impossible to wrap your head around it. It hurt to even try to comprehend it. You once again hide your face in the warmth of his clay, like a kid, pretending it doesn’t exist so it can’t hurt you any longer.
You hear Doey clear his throat. He’s afraid the question he is about to pose will bring back bad memories, but he can’t help but say it anyway. “Is it true?” He says in a soft, almost inaudible voice, perhaps afraid that even muttering his name will bring him back from the dead. “Is the Doctor… gone?”
You nod, but with your face still buried in his core you fear he will not understand. However, even if he can’t see it, he feels the way your head moves and lets out a soft hum of acknowledgment.
“He won’t hurt anyone ever again.” A somber, resentful voice takes over for a few seconds. Then, it goes back to its usual comforting tone. “Not you, not us, or anybody else.” He tightens the embrace ever so slightly. “Thank you. I am in your debt.”
You want to say that just by being here he has paid the debt in full twice over, but the words die in your mouth. Instead, you extend your arms to his sides and return the hug as best you can, content to lay there and let his tender care wash over you in gentle waves.
Doey’s affection acts like a balm to your soul. Slowly, the terrible images plaguing your mind lessen in intensity, and eventually they are completely banished. The room they left in there is instead filled with a heavy feeling of guilt. To think that he would be the one comforting you, and not the other way around…
"Look at me." You say, dejectedly. "I'm supposed to be the adult here, supposed to make everything right." A sigh. "But here I am, adding another rock to your heavy burden."
At your words, your companion immediately speaks up. "Hey." He says, a serious tone in his voice. He lifts your chin with a yellow finger so he can look you in the eyes.
"You are not a burden." It had been the most solemn you had ever seen the doughman be. "Making sure my family is okay could never be a burden." His expression softens, and he gazes at you with tenderness. "Wanna know how I know?" He whispers.
A tiny nod, and he smiles. "Because I care about you. We care about you." Sheepishly, he admits: "You're really important to me, you know?"
His sincere words are driven straight into your already exposed emotional core, bringing forth a new wave of fresh tears. As they fall, Doey gently cups your face and brushes them off your cheek with his thumb.
"You're really important to me as well, Doey." It was true. From the moment you had entered the Factory, you had been met with nothing but hostility. Poor Dogday had been the only one to offer you a kind word and a moment of respite, short lived as it was, but Doey? He had taken you in his home, offered you a place to rest and heal and entrusted you with his family without asking for anything in return. Even knowing your past, your association with the people responsible for their plight, he welcomed you in with open arms.
For a moment that seems to stretch onto eternity you hold each other’s gaze. Doey is the first to look away, the clay on his cheeks shifting into a darker hue (was he blushing?). “Aw, geez. You’re too kind, buddy.” He says.
Then, he takes notice of the heavy bags under your eyes. That will not do at all. “Why don’t you take a nap?” He suggests. “I promise, you will feel much better once you’ve had some sleep.” A grin. “Not to brag, but I’ve been told I make for a great bed.” He finishes the sentence with an exaggerated wink.
You can’t help but smile at the doughman’s antics. He really was an expert on making people feel better. Now that he had mentioned sleep, you notice just how tired you are. Adding up to all the emotional heavy lifting you’d done today was the fact that you haven’t had a good night’s sleep since you entered this damn place.
As if it had read your mind, Doey’s body shifts, his clay taking on a softer, more pliable consistency. Your body sinks into it like it’s the most comfortable mattress in the world, and you let out a heavy sigh, then a yawn. It would be nice to rest for a few minutes…
Your eyes already closing, you fight the urge to fall unconscious to offer a few words of gratitude to your dear friend. “Thank you, Doey.” You speak from the bottom of your heart. “I’m so lucky to have met you.”
You feel his large arms envelop you once more, then shift and meld together to blanket you with himself. “Thank you, my brave little angel.” He whispers. “Sleep well. I will be watching over you.”
To hell with Poppy’s plan. To hell with the Prototype. You swear you will do whatever it takes to make sure the toys at Safe Haven, your family, leave this accursed place once and for all. With the ember of this vow burning fiercely in your chest you finally let yourself fall asleep, warm and safe, the last conscious thought in your head ringing loud and clear.
They will see the sunlight again.