Tinker Toy

He awakens with a sickening mechanical hiss to pain. Every nerve ending blazes with pure unbridled agony. There is a blinding light above him but he feels as if his vision is limited to only the left side. He tries to speak, to scream for help, and all that comes is a choking gurgle that burns like lava in his esophagus.

“Hush, hush, hush. My little creature. Looks like the anesthesia wore off.” A voice, crazed and manic, attempts to mimic a soothing lullaby.

“Get more.” Someone else says. He tries once again to speak and gets slapped.

“I said hush. Spilling coolant everywhere. I’ll never be able to put your voicebox back if you do that.”

“Shame we don’t have more skin for him. Oh well.” Skin? Voicebox? The light is blinding and so is the pain. He can’t move much and doesn’t understand why. Who is speaking to him? The pain is blinding him. Something covers his nose and open mouth and he falls into blissful nothingness once more.

***

“Rise and shine. Where’s that happy little smile?” He jolts, body moving before he can even comprehend the command. Standing at attention, heels clacking together.

“Hel~lo!” His voice says, but still doesn’t exactly sound like himself. “W-Welcome to Kalfrey World! I’m your new best friend, Grin-9!” He chuckles saccharinely. Every part of him wants to fight back. He violently lurches forward and vomits. It tastes like churros and when the tears pricking only one eye subside, he notices glitter and curling shimmering ribbons, and a few organza scarves in the bile and deep fried dough. He straightens, still smiling. “My apologies! I will clean that up right away.”

“That seems to keep happening.” One of the men in white coats says as he makes marks on a clipboard. Grin-9 bends, producing wet wipes from a slot in his arm and cleans the mess he’s made.

“My apologies, Sir! We here at Kalfrey World follow strict sanitation standards! I’ll have this tidied up in a jiffy.”

“Cleanliness standards are intact. You wanna do the honors?” One grins to the other. “You enjoy this part too much.”

“It’s what they’re built for. Hey, Clown.” Grin-9 straightens up.

“H-How c-can I serve you, Sir?” He hates himself. He hates every part of himself. Why is he moving like this? Why can’t he stop himself?

“Got any tricks?” Grin-9 twitches once, twice and then grins wider, laughing raucously against his will. The sound kills his soul.

Does he even still have a soul anymore?

“Why I sure do, Friend! I’ve got all kinds of triiiii-tri-tricks. W-What would you like to see?” More sadistic smiles. They’re toying him. Playing games with his very existence. He’s not a toy though. He’s…he’s a person.

Isn’t he?

“All of it. Full birthday party trial run.” Grin-9’s body bends and bows, twists and turns, as he performs one trick after the other. He glitches, twitches, tries to fight the urge to move and smile. Balloons, slight of hand magic tricks, glitter bombs and sparklers, juggling pins and balls, streamers and confetti, dancing and playing songs, twinkling lights, and at last, a sweetly sung little song.

By the end of it, Grin-9 feels a hollow numbness, staring at the floor in boots he doesn’t feel truly belong to him, in his core as they laugh. Deep throaty chuckles and murmurs of jesting jokes made at his expense. These men are laughing at him.

What is wrong with him?

Why doesn’t he have control of himself?

Why is he just standing here smiling like a damned fool as they laugh? His eye twitches, neck sparking a little as it spasms to the right. 

This is wrong.

This is very, very, very wrong.

“How’s it going? Everything working?” That faux lullaby voice asks. Grin-9 stares up at him. He only just realizes that part of his vision is green, lined with measurements and words. “Oh my poor little creature.” He says and Grin-9 feels panic drench every part of him. The man grins a violent, cruel, demonic smile. “Did you get to see what you’ve become yet? How much you’ve improved from…before?” Grin-9 is dragged by the elbow, an elbow he sees connects to metal and wires that in his delighted little performance he hadn't had time to notice, before a mirror finished wall.

What greets him is horrifying and makes him want to vomit again.

“Employee of the month!” The two others cackle. Grin-9 just stares in disbelief at himself. This isn’t him. This is…is some kind of monster that has bits and pieces of him.

It’s wearing his skin.

The man holding him squeezes Grin-9 to his side.

“Not my best work, I’ll admit. Such a shame we couldn't save more skin. But you still have a fair amount of your innards. Or at least…they’re yours now.” He’s not sure he could process that if he could. He’s still frozen in place, lips grinning but in his eyes…it’s still him.

Whoever he is.

He doesn’t really remember who he is but he knows that this -the thing in that mirror- isn’t him. It wears half of his face but it is not him.

What’s happened to him? Why did it happen to him? Did he do something so awful and horrible that this was his punishment now?

He takes in the sight before him fully.

Half of his face, a face he thinks-he feels-was once adored and treasured by someone with a soft and tender touch, his robotic. From the temple downwards. His eye, once a pretty cyan blue, is now glass and metal and wired. His vision out of that side reads like schematics on everything he looks at, voices translate themselves into words on the screen before him, measurements and inner workings are his to know automatically. His cheek is the same shiny metal, a crude little happy face burned into it, his jawbone too.

The same lay out travels to his throat and collarbone, where the man next to him is prattling in, exposing his stomach and chest, he sees a glowing green core above his abdomen, the sickening sight of blood crusted to where titanium and wires and tubing beneath the manmade ribs, makes Grin-9 want to sob and scream.

Where are his lungs? How is he even alive? There’s a faint hiss and whirring sound that he can hear instead of pumping blood.

The right of him is all but cybernetic. Just a faint dip of hip and stomach area, though he can see the tubing under what little skin he has. Can feel it even. His arm and leg are gone, replaced with machinery that can provide party entertainment. His left arm, just below his elbow and through to the first first knuckle are the same. How cruel made with purpose that is. His left leg s similar, from his knee and downward to his foot is no longer flesh and bone and tendon.

“How will I feel the sea on my toes?” The thought comes to him unaided but the query remains unasked. He’s still just standing there. Staring at himself in horror even though he’s smiling, grinning, beaming at the monster in the mirror.

“Come along, come along. You’ve got work to do.”

“As a dedicated Kalfrey Entertainment cast member, I am always ready, willing and able to work!”

“I know, My Creature. I know.” The man pats his shoulder in an odd evil sort of crime. “But you have training to go through first and I will show you where you will stay when the park is closed.” Grin-9 just follows dutifully. Body tweaking and jerking every once in a while.

“Will there be new friends to meet?” He asks instead of wanting to ask why this man had ripped him apart and sewn and soldered back him together. What had he ever done to this man to deserve this?

“Of course, My Creature. You have brothers after all.” He says it as if Grin-9 is his child but he doesn’t feel safe in the least. He still moves, follows like a leashed little puppy to a room with nine slats lined against the walls. Eight more creatures, eight more monsters, just like him, turn to look at him.

They’re all different versions of himself. Or…is he just another version of them?

“My Little Creatures; this is Grin-9. You will train him.”

“Yes, Father. Welcome, Grin-9.” They speak in a haunting, petrifying sync. His smile jerks as he steps forward, everything deep within him wants to run, to scream…and all that seems to get through is a single tear.

“Hell~o! I-I’m your ne-n-new best friend, Grin-9!” He glitches through the greeting.