Mono and Six in the toy room - 1,354 words

[monochromatically]

Picking their way through the hospital, eager to be through this building so they could continue crossing the city, Mono and Six had finally hit a problem. The next door was locked and needed a key... Mono had searched for anything they might use to just break the door down, with no such luck...

So that meant searching the already open rooms for a key. It was an eerie place, but... So far, they hadn’t run into anything particularly horrifying or difficult to deal with. Six was a little on edge after having to pull him out of the television again... So as they passed through one room with x-ray equipment and came upon a room full of toys, Mono considered a particularly ugly teddy bear as he wondered how to ease some of the mood...

“Hey, Six.” He started, voice coming out in a whisper, “Psst! Six!” he tried again, before hoisting the bear that had been sitting on a table up into his arms and turning to face his friend. “Oi!!!” The darn bear was bigger than he thought, feet dragging on the table and its head towering over even his.

"What?" Six, ever the conversationalist, finally looked up from a wooden duck toy she'd been messing with, and stared from under her bangs... Then she tilted her head, the hood of her yellow raincoat sliding slightly. "That's... Really ugly."

Mono let out a soundless laugh, just a huff of air. Something amused, but practised to be silent and avoid being found if there were anyone around. "Right...?"

... Six made a similar sound, folding her arms a bit. "So ugly it's cute." Moving slightly closer to the table, she considered it more closely. "Bet it would make a good bed." Threadbare and ugly as it might be, it was pretty darn big and squishy looking... Not that either of them wanted to try sleeping in this place.

"It would!" Mono responded, squeezing his arms around it and enjoying the vague comfort he got from the feeling... His whisper rising just a little before he hushed himself again. "Too bad we couldn't bring it with us..." But that was impractical, lugging something this big around... Could get dangerous pretty fast if something chased them again.

“Yeah...” Six responded with a small scuff of her foot against the ground as her eyes returned to wandering the room, seeming to be caught up in something in her own head again. Mono wasn’t sure sometimes... But he had a feeling she’d been through a lot of stuff that she didn’t want to talk about. He could relate to that, considering some of the things that had happened before they met. So he respected her, not wanting to talk about it as long as she didn’t ask him about stuff.

Regardless, she didn’t seem as tense now... So, it was time to get back to searching. “Alright, Teddy... Gotta put you down now.” He said, finally letting it plot back on the table. Jumping off the edge and landing unsteadily, he began digging through the room with Six properly.

It took a while, but eventually they worked out that one of the plushies (a rabbit that was somehow more ugly than the teddy had been) was heavier than the others, despite being the same size. Dragging it, the teddy, and a dog(?) into the next room, they lined them up in the x-ray machine and Mono jumped to hang off the on switch.

They both stared as the machine sprang to life and revealed that the rabbit plushie was indeed hiding something that the other two weren’t. A key...

The key.

“How’d it get in there...?” Mono asked with a frown from under his paper bag. “You still question stuff?” Six responded skeptically as she watched the screen go dark as the machine shut itself off. “Questioning it just wastes time. We gotta get it out.” She moved over to the machine and dragged the rabbit out from between the other two. Tugging at the seams with a small growl.

Mono watched for a moment before he grabbed the arm. “It’s really strong... Let’s try tugging together.” He suggested, before they began a small tug-o-war with the rabbit for about five minutes. Five minutes and nothing.

Six let out a frustrated sound, half growl, half shout despite their usual silence. So much for easing the tension...

Then, then Mono got an idea. “You know... These places usually have those um... big... Big fire machines?” Incinerator was the word the kid was looking for. That captured Six’s attention, and she fell silent. Yup, she definitely seemed to like this idea... “Let’s do it.” She responded shortly, getting to her feet and gesturing to Mono to lead the way.

“I think it’s downstairs, I think the elevator can take us.” He responded, hoisting the rabbit into his arms. At least it was the rabbit and not the teddy... Mono wasn’t sentimental, but he kind of liked that bear and would have been sad to destroy it. Starting to walk, Six grabbed the back of his trench coat to yank on. “Wait!” She hissed, before disappearing into the toy room again.

Mono wobbled to a stop and turned to watch, only for the girl to hurry back out of the room with the wooden duck in her arms. Marching right past him and stopping impatiently at the elevator. “Come on, let’s go!” She whispered shortly.

“Um... Okay.” He awkwardly dropped the rabbit in front of the elevator long enough to tug the switch to get it open before dragging it inside and picking it up again. The doors shut and down it went... The trip was silent. Mono occasionally glancing at Six, and Six just tapping her foot again as they waited for the doors to open again.

When it did, it was quick jog from the door to the incinerator, conveniently open and waiting to be turned on. The rabbit plushie was tossed in quickly, and as Mono went to shut the door, something sailed past his head into the machine. “Eh??” He paused, standing on tiptoe to look inside.

The wooden duck...

Mono turned to glance at Six questioningly, “Why...?”

Six shrugged, tugging him away and reaching up to bat at the door to get it to shut. “It knows what it did.” Came out, tone deadpan and a casual shrug.

“I don’t know what it did?” Mono responded, finally jumping to tug the next switch down so the incinerator could roar to life. A nice, warm glow escaping the grate and heat filling the room. Six held out her hands to warm them, and Mono felt a strange... prickling sensation in the back of his mind. Some would call it déjà vu... Or a premonition... But he felt like this had happened before, or would happen again... Weird.

He was distracted, though, as Six finally gave him a proper answer. She had been puzzling over what to say, but finally whispered back. “It insulted Teddy.” Short, sweet, to the point. Mono considered the toy duck that was likely turned to ash. “Then it got what it deserved. Teddy is the best.”

Six nodded. “Teddy is the best.”

They both devolved into more of their soundless, whispered laughter after that. Once the machine had been turned off and the key was cool enough to retrieve, Mono tilted his paper bag-covered head at Six. “I wonder what else we can find to burn.”

Six considered this for a moment. “So much stuff...”

They both nodded and resolved to bring more things if they had to double back again...