Toyinfestation

4 - My very own personal ticket to the Insanity Express

I ran up the stairs to my room, got rid of my sweaty jersey and track pants before going to the adjoined bathroom for a quick shower. I thought I heard a yelp so I glanced back at my room. Thumbelina was sitting on my table with her mouth agape. What? Oh. A doll saw me changing, big deal.

"Hey midget, what's your name?" I asked as I took out a towel from my drawer and tied it around my waist.

"Keep calling me that, I won't reply the next time." Thumbelina said as a familiar scowl returned to her face. 

"I'm calling you Thumbelina"

"It's Anaesthesia." She snapped, looking even angrier.

"Really? What's your full name? Anaesthesia the Angry?" 

Lame? But Anaesthesia looked like she wanted to run a stampede of elephants over me.

I couldn't help it, watching a little doll get worked up like that was amusing. "Comes with Free! Arrows!" I added in a singsong voice before closing the bathroom door.

---

When I came back to my room again after lunch Anaesthesia and Trac were quarrelling over the T.V remote. I got a letter from Uncle Ben - he likes the old fashioned stuff. (e-mails, text messages, video calls - not his kind of thing.)

Tearing the envelope open I sat down on the mat, between Anaesthesia and Trac and turned the T.V off. Both let out yelps of protest, ignoring them, I started reading the letter. Uncle Ben wanted me to intern at his Toy Factory for the rest of the break and help Aunt Claire at her bakery. Smirking, I put down the letter on the mat. No way. A factory full of talking toys? I'd rather admit myself into a mental hospital. Helping out at the bakery was out of question. I'm really good at making explosives out of innocent, simple ingredients. The last time I tried to cook, the two ovens in the kitchen all but exploded.

I looked down. Anaesthesia and Trac were reading the letter.

"Don't worry, I'm not interning there." I informed them.

Anaesthesia looked really bothered, "Why?"

I looked up from the book I was reading and shrugged.

Trac explained to her about how I got freaked out about the weird toys, and how I generally avoided anything to do with toys or cartoons. He was clearly enjoying himself, making me sound like a wimp.

Anaesthesia climbed on to my knee. "You know Benedict Author?"

 "Yeah." If I flicked my finger a little bit, she's topple and fall. Amusing. Hmm.

"He's your uncle? Are you close? Will you help me sneak into his office?"

"Yes. Yes... No. What did you want to watch on T.V?" I put down my book. Sneak into where?

"Don't equivocate."

Thumbelina's vocabulary wasn't bad. 

"Tell me why you want to sneak into my uncle's workshop, I may consider it." I won't but it wouldn't hurt to knowing why she wanted to do something so absurd. 

"Put me on that shelf over there, I can't talk to you like this." I complied, curious. Trac looked vaguely uncomfortable. He turned on the T.V muttering something about it all being pointless. Ah, Ellen was on.

"Like I was saying the other day, I was human about two years ago." She started, watching me intently. "My mother disappeared when I was eight. My father sort of lost it after that and..."

"And?"

"My sister, Juliana, went missing two years ago." I wasn't sure if I should believe her at all. Maybe she's just fooling around with me. How would a human become a toy? This is reality - that stuff happens in horror movies.

"Anthony, I'm not done yet. A few years before she disappeared, she talked about being able to talk to toys, like you. So I went to look for her in the workshop, and I got captured by..." She paused for a while and ruefully stared the cover page of my book. "The History of Domesticated Animals and Ice pops? Ice pops? What? Who reads that?"

"By who?" I asked, annoyed that she had paused in the middle of the climax of her little story.

Anaesthesia grimaced and continued, "this crazy guy. I got  locked up for a while with a bunch of toys. And... and slowly I began to see them come alive around me. Then one day two life sized toy soldiers unlocked the door and they managed to knock me out. When I came to, I was pinned to a wooden board. Both my arms and legs were shackled to the board. Then I saw Mr Dawson, the man my father worked for, standing at the controls of an elaborate machine. He flicked on a switch and then..."

 "Then what?" I was curious, a little.

"It felt like I was being electrocuted and then subsequently being dipped in hot lava. Agonisingly painful. It felt like it went on forever. I thought I had died, but I then, I woke up. I was in Mr Author's office -"

"My uncle could not possibly be a part of this." Besides how would she know what hot lava felt like?

"But I could-"

"Dawson, maybe. You don't know Uncle Ben, he's a nice guy. He volunteers at orphanages, he the sponsor of several kids. Anyway, why would I believe you?"

Trac turned off the T.V. "She's telling the truth."

I looked at the yellow crane, surprised, "About what?"

"The whole I-was-once-human thing." Trac wore an annoyed expression on his...uh... windshield. Come to think of it, Trac always played planks on me. I'm onto this, totally onto this.

 "You, you're like that as well? Wait I know." I snapped my fingers, feeling relieved. "Nice one. You guys really got me." Shaking my head I went back to my book.

Anaesthesia let out frustrated yelp and pointed an arrow at me from her perch on the shelf. The arrow was dangerously close to my eyes, right in between them. And there was no telling what Thumbelina would do. I've heard eye operations are excruciatingly painful.

"You" she said, drawing the arrow even closer to my eyes.

"Cock-eyed fool." She went on. I half expected steam to start bellowing out of her ears. Then, I took in her size. A hamster, an angry little widdle thinhg with a plastic arrow was threatening me.

I quickly drew back and crossed my arms.

"Anthony. You may even call me Tony if you like." I said, smiling serenely at her.

Thumbelina looked like she wanted to sic a clan of hunter dogs on me.

"My mother and my sister are gone. They won't come back anytime soon. I'm stuck being a doll no one can hear me or see me move. The one person who can hear me is a complete imbecile. You think I'm joking?! You think?!" Anaesthesia put emphasis on her last few words by angrily stomping her feet. I took in a deep breath and looked at the clock on the wall. It was one o' clock. I had one hour left before karate class. I sighed and turned to Anaesthesia.

"Can I call you Thumbelina?"

Anaesthesia looked like she wanted to rip my head off.

"No!" she yelled. Then she suddenly slumped down onto the shelf and leaned against the spine of a book for support and looked away from me.

"Eugene was right. It's pointless." She said quietly.