(🍀)
What twists does fate take, right?
Now I'm here, even though I thought I would die alone.
I have been living scared for years, walking in fear. First for the loneliness, and then for BullyBull to finish what he started.
But now, although this group is on the edge of the abyss, falling apart, I feel safe, and grateful to heaven for being able to count on company that wouldn't hurt me.
I never thought they would receive me so warmly and friendly, because I was a stranger after all. But they welcomed me as if I were one of them, without asking me questions about myself, or my past, or where I came from. I suppose they felt sorry for me, they wanted to protect me, since my weak and bruised appearance incites those feelings. And the truth is that I'm not surprised.
If I had seen a lost, shy, hurt and mute Critter, I would have helped that Critter too.
They weren't bad people. But so different...
For example, DogDay. I think he was called like that...
He was the leader. Charismatic, sensible and full of courage. Of course, he greatly doubted his own abilities. If he's able to still keep the team together despite all the quarrels, he's capable of anything.
He tries to update me on everything that's happening, but he doesn't force me to integrate. He greatly respects my privacy and my moments of solitude, and I greatly appreciate it. BullyBull didn't used to, but that will be covered later.
The next one to highlight would be Crafty, the girl I saved. Since I first saw that Critter, I realized that she was special. And when I got to know her as a person, I knew that the life I led before was going to change completely.
She was slightly more outgoing than me, but she was also very shy, quiet and afraid to show her thoughts. Also very coward, but it's normal. Uncertainty is almost our main companion.
She also tries to explain to me the situations, the relationships between others. Maybe she wants me not to be surprised by seeing strange things between them, but if only I had a voice to tell her the things I have seen...!
She is very nice to me, very patient, reserved when talking, very close to KickinChicken.
And speaking of him, he is also someone important to highlight!
He's a peculiar guy! Brave but coward, bossy, very funny...
...but that is a shell, it is very clear. Under all that male bravado appearance, there's a little girl afraid of getting out of that armor.
He has a clear fear of being alone, but not the physical loneliness of not having people around, but an emotional loneliness, the loneliness of not being able to count on someone in times of anxiety.
It was thanks to KickinChicken that I discovered how much I needed a good laugh. I didn't have the voice to laugh out loud, but somehow, he made me smile much wider than on other occasions.
Bubba-I think that was his name-was the other side of the coin.
Very serious, somewhat talkative only when the situation called him to be so, decisive, patient, somewhat docile only if he liked the person.
Of course, it is better to have him as a friend than an enemy. In the event of enmity, the adjectives change; spiteful, indifferent, somewhat rude and mocking are some of those qualities he owns.
Being the only one who knew sign language, I went to him whenever I had to send another Critter a message. But apart from those interactions and the courtesy we had as allies, there was no great relationship between the two of us.
However, I had a great relationship with Bobby and Picky.
Bobby was a generous and loving soul who always hoped to give to those who were around without expecting anything in return. Her only fear was loneliness, physically and emotionally speaking. She was not able to deal with loneliness, and she would become overwhelmed if someone took longer to return than necessary.
PickyPiggy was empowered, sarcastic and had very satirical humor. Of course, she is a bit weak-willed and a little paranoid. Still, both were brave and noble at heart. They were the ones that could really make me smile.
But it's not all rosy.
Hoppy didn't seem to like me.
A strong, reckless, honest and stubborn girl, very realistic and incapable of seeing her friends suffering. But she had a bit of trust issues.
Specially to me.
She was kind and compassionate with the others, but with me, her attitude was different. She was cold, distant, distrustful. She kept me at a safe distance and she got uncomfortable, especially, if I was close to DogDay and Bobby.
I guess she doesn't trust me because I come from outside. But the rest are not distrustful. Why does she? I think I need one more detail to understand it.
Still, despite being different, they are all together, and have been able to protect a stranger like me.
But of course, BullyBull had put his nose in more than expected and desired, and was getting closer and closer to breaking up the Smiling Critters.
I know BullyBull well. He is so, so curious and intrusive that he often gets into trouble, some trouble so, so shady, that he found himself in an enormously dangerous commitment.
But let's start from the very beginning to explain it.
I was going to be another Smiling Critter. I was going to be introduced to the team and I was going to take care of and play with children, to show them that luck is not something you have or don't have; Luck is in the world around you, and you have to look for it!
But a strange event began before my introduction that I did not understand until years later; the Hour of Joy.
I luckily escaped, and witnessed a pair of adult human bodies being dragged down by spindly, pinkish arms, never to return.
I was lucky they didn't detect me.
I spent years lurking everywhere on the surface. In fact, I could see the street through the lobby windows.
There my dream grew; freedom.
My life was and was going to be centered in a cubicle. I wanted to walk, run, look at the world, get to know it.
But dreams are dreams. And eventually, I came to understand that humans would be afraid to see a giant stuffed llama prowling the street. So I gave up on those dreams and settled for what I had.
A few years passed in solitude, and eventually I found him. I will never forget how I met him.
I found him sitting on the ground, with his hands and mouth covered in blood, his eyes full of tears, in tremendously deep shock.
He looked at me, but soon turned his gaze towards nothing.
I remember sitting next to him and looking at him. He looked at me again...
...and he started to cry.
He simply began to cry.
Sound strange, right? It sounds strange to my present self that BullyBull cries. But of course, those were different times.
He put his head on my shoulder and I put my hand on his shoulder. He was crying for a long time while I tried to console him.
Finally, when he calmed down, he looked at me and we introduced ourselves. I even remember the exact words.
BullyBull: Thank you.
LuckyLlama: You're welcome.
BullyBull: ...I'm BullyBull.
LuckyLlama: LuckyLlama; Remember my name.
BullyBull: I'll remember.
Short, right? Don't let it surprise you; we didn't have much to share then.
That's where our friendship began.
We were very similar to each other. We were extroverted, very talkative, but BullyBull had a much shorter temper, while I was more patient and a good listener. So the few disputes we had used to last a long time, because he didn't listen to me and I didn't understand him.
But one way or another, we ended up fixing it. And don't think that it was a toxic friendship relationship by any means; We rarely fought, and the reason for the fight was usually nonsense.
Thus one more year passed, and I believed that I had already found my place, that if I died I would not do it alone, that I would have someone by my side forever.
But a new problem arose.
BullyBull seemed to be hiding something during the final stretch. He would leave under the pretext of looking for supplies, and he would not return until much later. He showed no signs of life during his absence, and when he returned, he looked bad; Many times he would return hurt, with bruises or cuts, very tired, with a distracted air.
Once I found some horizontal cuts on his forearm, in the area of the veins. He had been self-harming himself in some way. Still, he didn't give me any explanations. His character became greatly bitter; He stopped laughing, talking, being with me spiritually.
And one day, he left.
He didn't even leave a note or anything that would help me know what had happened to him. He just left.
I didn't see him again until several years later, once I got into a new area, in a well-prepared and enormous hiding place, which he has today.
I had given up hope of seeing him again, when I found him in a new guise; with studded gloves, a ring in his snout and another in his ear. He was also taller than before.
But the strangest thing was the eye shape.
They were...different. With black pupils surrounded by white frames.
I hadn't seen him for years, and I felt for a moment that I had found luck again...
...but he pulled out a piece of glass.
I wanted to reason with him, but it was useless to beg him to reason, to move away, to wait, to listen to me.
He gave me deep cuts and wounds on both arms and on my left thigh, although the latter healed much faster. There was no shortage of punches either.
He threw himself at my neck, never better put, and I would have been killed if I had continued screaming.
I believed that he was looking to kill me, but I soon understood that he was simply looking to hurt me, make me suffer.
But what motive did he have? I never understood it.
He was satisfied once I was silent, because the lack of tongue and vocal cords and the fact that I was choking on my own blood cut off my voice forever.
I stood with my eyes open, very, very still. He suspected that I had died. And he took off.
I had to sew my wounds myself once I was able to escape - with my leg severed and bleeding from my throat, I miraculously escaped alive.
And I returned to my old life; alone, afraid not only of loneliness, but of who I thought was my friend.
I returned to that hiding place some time later. Long after what happened. And it was because of a sixth sense that was warning me that something strange was happening...
I sneaked in there and managed to find a room that was closed, from which screams and bangs could be heard.
I remembered the pain of my torture, and something clicked.
Was I going to let someone suffer what I suffered, just like that? Well no! I was going to help whoever was being attacked in there. But it had to be quick...
It was a quick trap; I made noise outside, I let BullyBull- now his eyes had totally dark pupils, bad hunch- and his partner leave, I made more noise and carried it all the way to another room. They came in, and I locked them there, blocking the door with some heavy boxes.
Like good idiots, they left the door open. I entered.
Inside was Crafty, hanging by her hands from a rope that had them tied together, and blindfolded. She was wounded, with bleeding legs and body, but she was crying softly, and breathing hard. She was still alive.
I found a knife near her, and with that I cut the rope and grabbed her, being careful not to hurt her.
Still blindfolded, she put her head close to my chest, and muttered something about Kickin before losing consciousness.
Someone was already looking for her, I knew it.
So I grabbed a piece of paper, wrote a quick note, and left it there. I knew she had allies somewhere and that they would look for her, but that place was too dangerous to wait for somebody to arrive.
I took Crafty to PlayHouse, the new safe place I had found. And that was the beginning of it all.
Who would have thought that my life would change so abruptly since then?
Now I'm not alone, although I'm still afraid of BullyBull, specially now that he's aiming for all of us.
I was afraid that they would find us, and not for me, but for the others. I was especially worried about DogDay, Bubbaphant, KickinChicken, and PickyPiggy; the for who have the most reasons to be targets of the Rejected Critters.
Bubba is very, very intelligent, much more than all the Rejected Critters combined, and even more than the Smiling Critters and the Rejected Critters combined as a whole. That makes me think that they have two reasonable motives to defeat him:
1. Being the most intelligent, the Rejected Critters have reason to be able to kill him and get rid of competition, plus BullyBull doesn't like to leave something unfinished; not even torture.
2. For the same reasons, the Rejected Critters can use his emotional weakness against Bubba himself, to capture him as one of their team. His intelligence, in the same way that it is a hindrance to their plans, can be a benefit to them.
For me, the second hypothesis is more accurate than the first. Surely the only one who thinks that bloodthirsty way is BullyBull.
KickinChicken, due to his recklessness, has been getting into trouble and shady involvements that link the Rejected Critters and Kickin.
Most likely, they consider Kickin a nuisance rather than a threat. A germ that they had to exterminate.
PickyPiggy is also headed in a similar direction, but from what I understand, Picky went through a conversion and was on BullyBull's side for a while. Perhaps they would want to take her back because they find it more beneficial to have her as an ally.
And DogDay, of course, they were going for his leadership, because that was BullyBull's true ambition; He wanted to keep the leadership of the Smiling Critters.
Furthermore, BullyBull had made DogDay doubt his abilities as a leader. He's gaslighting him.
We still have no plan. Not me, nor them...but we'll come up with something soon.
...Someone is coming.
(...)
LuckyLlama slammed the notebook shut as Kickin poked his head inside the shelter.
Kickin had noticed that Lucky was writing. And he didn't hesitate to ask.
KickinChicken: Can I see what you write?
LuckyLlama shook his head.
KickinChicken: Not even the last page?
Again he refused to show him anything. Kickin had to give up.
KickinChicken: Hey, would you mind if I hung out with you for a bit? The others are gathered, and I am embarrassed to approach them.
LuckyLlama stared at him for a while before putting his hand on the ground to his left. KickinChicken took it as an invitation to sit down, which he accepted.
They were silent for a while. But Kickin didn't take long to speak.
KickinChicken: Lucky, there's something that's bothering me...can I talk to you about it?
LuckyLlama was surprised. He never thought that KickinChicken would want to talk about something in such a serious tone. Anyways, he nodded. And immediately after, KickinChicken started.
KickinChicken: Lucky, I think my team hates me.
They will never forgive me for what I did with Picky! It's not that they have done anything to me or stopped talking to me, but I notice their hostility...they no longer laugh with me. I know I'm a nuisance to 'em now.
I understand that Bubba and Picky are mad at me and ignore me; but I feel sorry for it all, y'know? I've been angry with Bubba for ten years, and just when I thought we had it resolved, we feel distant again. That hurts me very, very much. As for Picky, although we don't have a great relationship, I insulted her and treated her terribly, to the point where she almost left... not to mention that she is close to Bubba! I understand that they get angry...
But I don't know why everyone, like, the whole team, got angry! I guess it's because we ARE a team, if they go after one, they go after all, but... is it necessary to be so hostile? I was angry, out of my mind, and you know that when I get angry, I get seriously mad, and so I say bullshit, but...
He stopped for a moment to take a breath. LuckyLlama had heard everything from start to finish. And he just felt sorry for him.
KickinChicken looked at LuckyLlama.
KickinChicken: Have you been listening to me the whole time?
LuckyLlama nodded without hesitation. Kickin was surprised; Anyone would have interrupted him right in the middle to give an opinion or because they were bored of hearing the whole rambling. He realized that Lucky was different in that way.
KickinChicken: So...I don't know, what would you do?
That question made LuckyLlama think. He didn't have many friends, he never had them. Only with BullyBull did he have a stretch similar to that of friendship.
So, taking as a reference how he settled disputes when they were friends, Lucky took the notebook, and was about to write when they heard a strange noise coming from outside.
KickinChicken put his hand on Lucky's shoulder to tell him not to move, and stuck his head out of the shelter entrance.
Then he gasped and went back into the shelter, a bit shaken.
LuckyLlama wanted to peek out, but Kickin stopped him.
KickinChicken: *Whisper* They're here! How the hell did they get here?!
Lucky turned almost deathly pale, but he held his breath and did not move. KickinChicken was shaking, but not from fear, but from rage, from pent-up adrenaline. He wanted to get out of there and hit whoever was closest, regardless of whether it was BullyBull or not.
From the low entrance they saw CatNap's purple paws.
BullyBull: Are you sure that they're here?
CatNap: Yes.
Kickin was even angrier to see that CatNap had, in fact, stabbed them in the back. He expected it sooner or later, but he hated it anyway.
BullyBull: Well, I don't see anyone or hear anything.
CatNap: You're looking for Picky, right?
BullyBull: Yes, but she's possibly with the elephant. Get rid of him before you take her.
Kickin was alarmed that in the end they hadn't given up on finding PickyPiggy. And besides, the fact of "getting rid" of Bubba triggered something in him.
As a friend, he was worried about them, because they were Bubba Bubbaphant and PickyPiggy. Although right now, as people, Kickin could very well send them to hell.
CatNap: Don't worry, I know what to do.
And then, a strange noise was heard, like a long exhalation. A strange red smoke entered the entire hallway and inside the hiding place.
Lucky's eyelids began to feel so heavy that his eyes were closing on their own. Although he struggled to keep himself awake, since he had no idea of why was his body so exhausted in that moment.
And finally, he fell to the ground, as his view distorted and merged with the darkness...
(☀)
My head was spinning at a high speed. I think my senses were failing and I was not in control of my motor skills.
Suddenly someone shook my shoulder, and a distant voice began to call me.
For a moment I thought I was dead, that an angel from heaven was calling me...but I soon came back to reality.
To the cold floor of the hideout, and Bobby's desperate voice trying to bring me back to consciousness.
I opened my eyes and heard her sigh in relief. I managed to sit up and she hugged me. She didn't look scared; rather tense.
DogDay: What-
Bobby Bearhug: CatNap has used the gas on us.
At first that distracted me, but I soon remembered that CatNap had indeed arrived with BullyBull and had let out red smoke.
I had regained strength in his legs, which I almost thought were dead, and as I was able to stand up, I left the shelter and searched the rest of the cubicles.
From one of them, looking somewhat disorganized and dizzy, Bubba emerged. His pupils were slightly dilated, possibly due to the effects of the gas.
Bobby Bearhug: Bubba, are you okay?
There was no response, as if he didn't hear us.
Bobby Bearhug: Bubba?
Bubba Bubbaphant: Huh? Yes...I guess...everything is spinning around me now...
Sure enough, Bubba was still suffering from the hallucinogenic effects of the gas. Dizziness and lack of cognitive response.
I took him by the hand.
DogDay: I assume you've been subjected to more of the red gas. Come, sit here.
Immediately afterward, KickinChicken and LuckyLlama come out from another cubicle. They seemed fine, except that LuckyLlama's legs were shaking a little.
DogDay: Lucky, are you okay?
Lucky nodded.
Then Picky, Hoppy and Crafty arrived. I remembered that we had sent them for supplies. And thank goodness we did; Otherwise, we would have a fatal outcome with everyone gassed and Picky captured.
Picky, seeing how we were doing, ran up to Bubba, almost pushing Kickin out of her way, and took him by the hand.
PickyPiggy: What happened?!
Bubba Bubbaphant: Quieter, please...
PickyPiggy: Oh. Sorry, Bubba...
Hoppy Hopscotch: How the hell did this happen...?
KickinChicken: It's obvious. They were looking for PickyPiggy, and CatNap not only told them our hiding place, but he used the gas so he could take Picky away without resistance.
CraftyCorn: Well, thank goodness Picky was with us...!
PickyPiggy: I guess...
KickinChicken: They also said to get rid of Bubba, because if they wanted to come after Picky, Bubba could be a hindrance to them.
Bubba Bubbaphant: That makes sense...that's why I'm so dizzy...
Hoppy Hopscotch: Right! They subjected you to more gas! Everything fits now.
KickinChicken: What do we do now, then? Do we have to move again?
CraftyCorn: Hey...what if we go back home? That is, to PlayCare? Maybe...they leave us alone!
Bubba Bubbaphant: ...True. Maybe we should go to PlayCare. We will return to our "old lives", and we will put this whole thing away.
DogDay: Guys, that's not an option. We set out to finish them off, and we're going for them. There is no going back.
Bobby Bearhug: DogDay, do you know what it is that they don't have that makes them so strong?
DogDay: What?
Bobby Bearhug: ...Empathy. And camaraderie. They are together to survive. Us because we love each other. Maybe that makes us weak...
DogDay: ...I'm not following you, Bobby.
Bobby Bearhug: I have realized that our problem is that all our actions are promoted by the affection we have for each other. And we are weak because our emotions bring out the worst in us. Our fears and sensitivities...and that is what strengthens them. See that we are weak.
They don't care about each other. They are only together because they need each other together to finish us off.
Hoppy Hopscotch: I don't understand what that's about either.
Bobby Bearhug: I think we have no chance of winning! They are stronger, mentally speaking. And the mind is what ends up helping to make plans.
I looked at Bobby. How was it possible that she thought we couldn't finish them off?
The Smiling Critters have never left anything unfinished! And this won't be the first time!
DogDay: Bobby! We, if we want, can handle them and more! We have each other, and each other is all we need.
Bobby Bearhug: I know! But sometimes, having each other is not enough, DogDay!
DogDay: But Bobby...
Bobby Bearhug: I think we should go back to PlayCare.
DogDay: Never! If we run away, they can find us, and that's when we screwed up. We have to continue until the end; Otherwise we are giving the message that we are weak. And you know what? We are not!
Bobby Bearhug: But-
DogDay: No buts! Let's defeat them, and that's it! They cause us too many problems.
Bobby wasn't convinced at all, but she sighed and resigned herself.
I was a little perplexed and outraged by her radical change of heart.
We let Bubba recover from the effects of the gas, and as we were leaving, I came to a conclusion.
It was going to take a while to get back to PlayCare.
Maya, Oscar and Austin can't wait for us there forever. They want to defeat the Prototype. And to do that, they must look for it. It is clear that they will not find it here.
I have to send them a message somehow, tell them that they have to move on without us.
But going back to PlayCare is very risky.
I looked at LuckyLlama.
DogDay: Lucky. Would you mind giving me a sheet of your notebook and your pen?