It was always such an enjoyable time, whenever the clock struck noon Gabe would quite literally drop everything and sprint off to the cafeteria, brown paper bag in hand. It was one of the few and only times he can talk freely with his friends without the hindrance of work.
The cafeteria was just as bustling as it ever was, he spots all three of his friends sitting together on one table. Tyler up to his usual sibling antics again with his little sister Joyce, hanging a slimy pickle over her head while she's not looking, and Freddy just watching it all happen. Joyce's angry retribution came swiftly, resulting in a busted head for Tyler and a quick laugh from Freddy.
As he nears the table he can hear a conversation between them.
"I heard that they are calling back all the Catnap dolls." Tyler said rubbing his head. "Said something about the kids having nightmares or something."
"There's actually more to it than that." Freddy replies. "The parent consumers reported a bunch of medical problems involved. High blood pressure, severe fever, there had even been some cases where the kid would have a stroke."
"Jesus, no wonder they're canceling Catnap then." Joyce replied while sipping her drink. "Do you think it has something to do with his scented spray?"
"Must be." Freddy answered. "But whatever the case may be, the higher-ups are working double time to stop all the lawsuits coming in."
Gabe walks closer to them, catching their attention. Tyler raised his soda drink to him. "Well about time you got down here buddy!" He welcomed warmly.
"Sorry guys, got caught up in the lunch rush." Gabe apologized as he sat himself down next to Freddy. "So how are things going with ya'll?" He asked courteously.
"We've actually been wanting to ask you that very question." Freddy said. "I heard lately that things aren't going so well on your parents farm."
Gabe grumbled, but still kept a steady countenance. "Yeah, last year's crop didn't yield it's usual quota, and from I over heard from dad the market ain't looking so great either. This job is basically the only sure income we have."
Tyler was actually amazed by this. "Providing for a whole farm, two adults, and an older brother and younger sister?! If I was your old man I would say it'll be time to put my ass in gear!"
"Well it ain't that simple, some things just aren't in our control." Gabe said munching on carrot dipped in ranch dressing. "And for the record my dad has been working like an ox since then. I just wish I'm doing something better."
Joyce then put a comforting hand on his shoulder. "I think you're doing great given the fact you are providing for them!"
However Gabe felt doubtful. "I don't know, I know God will provide, but, Mom and Dad are already planning on moving if things don't turn up soon. So, I guess we'll just have to wait and see."
Freddy then suggests. "You know, we are available on weekends, we can come and help."
"Aw man that'll be awesome! But, we don't have the money a farmhand, let alone three of them."
"Won't be a problem!" Tyler declared proudly. "We'll help, even for free!"
Freddy eyed him suspiciously and yet cheekily. "Yeah, suuuurreee you would. If it will mean you hooking up with Gabe's little sis, Sophia."
"Aw shut up man!"
All four of them laughed in unison, much to Tyler's chagrin. But no matter what troubles there may be, Gabe knew that his friends will be there to support him whenever he needed them. He cherished these memories he had with them.
Even after that day, when he took that hallway leading deeper down, to a place where he wasn't supposed to go. To the moment he peered into that dimly lit room, seeing those men in uniform beat on that strange creature. He can't tell what it was that they are hurting, a taut, slender, purple creature that they had tied down to the floor, its legs pulled apart by chains while beating on it with batons.
The sight, the screaming, the begging, the blood, it roiled such fury in him that it made him sick. He wanted to intervene, he truly did, he wanted nothing more than to take those batons and see their faces bloodied beyond repair as they choke on their own shattered teeth. But something, somewhere deep within his spirit told him to hold back, to leave. That now isn't the time.
He quit that very same day.
He couldn't bring himself to tell his friends yet. How would he explain it? How could he?
Slowly the days went by, and with each sleepless night, he could think of nothing but that purple creature. He never saw its face, but he can see that there is something truly wrong about it, something unnatural.
And when he finally mustered the courage to see his friends, they were no more. Gone. Disappeared. Vanished into the very factory from which he worked in. The news struck everyone hard, but even with an investigation underwent, nobody knew what happened. It was then that though his actions are justifiable, he never felt more cowardly in his whole life.
Guilt haunted him…
<<<<<<<<<<~>>>>>>>>>>
Pain.
His body is wracked with unbearable pain. Even though his eyes remained closed, and his consciousness just barely returning to his senses, every fiber of his being burned with an unrelenting soreness that seared its way through his muscles. While Gabe struggled to bring himself out of the darkness that seemed to numb the agony he is in, he begins to notice that he isn't in the train anymore.
In fact, as of the moment, he's not even on the floor anymore. He is dangling from something, but he can't tell.
It was no use trying to move his arms or legs, the sensation of pins and needles are so potent that they felt like they could fall off at any given moment. But even yet his limbs simply dangle haphazardly with each sway of movement. Wait,..movement. Gabe then realized, that he is indeed being moved. Carried.
His sense of hearing then returned as well as his sight fully focusing ahead. He perceives that he is very well indeed being carried by someone. Legs that are certainly not his stepping out in front of him with a long gait, as well as the sound of very deep purring coming just inches above his head. He can even feel the creature's hot breath ruffling through his hair and trailing down his nape, sending shivers down Gabe's spine.
They are approaching something, a hatch. The being above him comes to a stop just in front of it. Gabe tries to say something, to mutter even just a word, but he could barely bring himself to groan. The creature then reaches out its paw and unlatches the iron hatch. He then feels the other paw picking him up by the neck, the tips of the creature's razor sharp claws poking into his flesh.
Adrenaline begins to pump through his veins as he dangles above the open hole. But the agonizing pain forbade him to. Then at last he was let go, and the last thing he saw before being engulfed by the darkness, was an unnaturally enormous grin of a feline monster as his piercing white eyes glared at him as he vanished into the vent.
After sliding down the dark vent he ends up on the other side, tumbling through rough debris until he comes to a stop against an old wooden crate. His pain flared. "Aaugh!!" He cried.
Alarms blared and red lights spin as he strained to move, finally beginning to feel and move his limbs again. He brings himself back to his two feet and his clouded vision focuses, his eyes drinking in the sights surrounding him with delirious confusion. Suddenly the walls begin to move, slowly closing in on him inch by inch. He realizes to his abject terror that he is stuck in a trash compactor. Whatever that creature was that threw him down here must really want him to die a slow death.
Gabe then notices that one piece of the wall wasn't moving. Has his vision clears he sees that there is a hole within the metal wall. Then after thanking God for the chance save yet again, he post haste climbs over the mounds of wooden planks, broken pieces, and toy corpses till he reaches the hole and climbs out the other side. Traversing through the inner workings of the of the compactor he manages to escape into a vent and finds himself wandering through the random maintenance halls that always seem to be the mainstay of pathways of this factory.
He soon finds himself in a room that piques his interest. A moderately sized room compared to all the others he came across, but what sets this one apart from all the others is that the machines in this room still functional. Must either be from his own interference with the electrical work he did this far, or it could be the work of someone else. But what makes this room even more strange is that instead of assembly lines or manufacturing machines, this room has pistons, giant pistons, and they seem to be pumping a rather ominous red fog that is emanating from a deep expanse below.
Even though he is well above this red fog he can smell a noticeable scent from it, it somehow made him feel drowsy just from the smell alone. The scent smelled like something burning, like smoke, and the distinct, pungent smell of poppy flowers.
"Poppy…" He said aloud to himself. He still can't believe that she tricked him like that. And even worse, that she wants to stay here in the first place. Why? She never told him specifically what she wanted to do here. But the way she talked, that vindictive tone in her voice, whatever business it is that she has in this place, it's personal to her, and she's using him to see it through.
But now's not the time to get angry. Using the flat side of the raising and falling pistons as platforms, he leaps from one piston after another till he reaches the catwalk on the other side. Then after traveling through yet more vents he finds himself in yet more hallways, again. The near infinite repetitiveness of all these winding halls and mundane corridors are starting to annoy him. He hopes something interesting turns up.
*Rriiiiiiiiiiing*
"Huh?" Gabe could've swore he heard something nearby. Following the noise, he eventually finds another room. This one appearing more like a small office or janitor's closet, he can't really tell just like many of the other random rooms throughout his travels in 'Hell's Factory'. Turns out his hearing was right, for there mounted on one side of the wall is a patented Playtime.co phone, ringing. Now just what on earth is a phone doing just simply ringing? Unless…
Gabe then reaches out and takes the phone from its mount. He then puts the receiver to his ear, and sure enough a voice sounds through.
"Hey, hey! Can you hear me?" The voice said. "You look kinda lost. I don't want you to die, so I want to help you."
Gabe looked at the phone incredulously, wondering if what he is hearing is true. Because while Gabe was happy to hear that there is someone else here that doesn't want his skin, what set him off guard is the fact the voice sounded so young, like a little kid.
"Who is this?" Gabe said a bit taken back.
"I'll get to that, but first, you need to get out of here." The strange kid said. "See that pipe behind you?" Gabe turns around and sure enough a delivery pipe is situated on the wall. "Watch this…Ba-BOOM!" And just then a large, glowing green battery pops out from the tube. "You can use that to open the door!"
At first Gabe doesn't know where a battery of such size even goes to. But after some searching he finds the door and next to it is a dubiously large slot in the wall with a glowing green outline surrounding its inlet. Glancing between the battery and the slot with a confused look, the two then click, and he heaves and slides the battery in position. Unlocking the door. It was actually really jarring to him that such a large power source is needed to do something so simple when just a key is needed. Yet another example of Leith Pierre's stupid 'innovations'.
Exiting the janitor closet, he finds himself in the same tunnel system where he was before the train crash, and just when he turned to his left, sure enough there in blazing mess is the train itself. Gabe leaped down from the side railing to the track below, inspecting the wreck it was a miracle that he survived. The entire locomotive is derailed, the force of the crash warping the iron rails beneath it till they twisted or snapped. The heat of the erupting fire from the train's engine was so strong that parts of the metal surrounding the open hole are beginning to melt.
"Woooaaah! Did you do that?" The mysterious voice said. "You must've got one big bump on the head from that!"
"Well for that, you can thank Poppy for." Gabe replied into the speaker irritated. "After all it's not like she just chucked me down into whatever the next hellhole is without telling me what the hell is going on."
The line went silent for a moment, the voice on the other end sighed. "Hey, I know you're mad at Poppy for not letting you leave. But she needs you, we need you. You are our mission!"
"I wasn't saying that I was angry about not leaving!" Gabe corrected as he ventured down the rail tracks, since the way back is blocked by wreck. "In fact, now that I think about it, I don't want to leave yet! I just want to know what she's pushing me into."
"Wait,..really?" The kid was actually surprised about that statement. "Well why didn't you say that to her earlier?"
Gabe tried to come up with a good excuse, anything to validate his offense, but couldn't find any. Whoever this kid is is right, if he had told her what he wanted earlier none of this would have happened. But there is one question he did need to ask.
"Ok, but did she need to wreck the train with me on it?"
"Poppy wasn't the one who did this. She would never want to hurt you."
"She didn't? Then who-?"
"Wait…". The voice interrupted. A short pause followed, and when they spoke again there is profound panic within their voice. "Oh no no no no!"
"What is it?" Gabe asked concerned, but was then cut short by the kid again.
"Quick! The train! Hide in the conductor's cabin!"
"What, why?"
"Just do it! Hurry!!"
Not knowing what it could be that got them so panicked, he knew he shouldn't be dumb enough not to listen and to find out himself. So without wasting a second he immediately climbs up the twisted train wreck and through the observation window he enters the cabin, thankfully which isn't burning like the rest of the engine.
The voice on the phone called back. "Stay there, and whatever you do. Do, not, make, a sound."
Now Gabe felt nervous, but again that ever stubborn curiosity of his kicked in. He leans up and peers out the cabin window, making sure that his face is still obscured by the darkness. Even with the flames roaring he keeps his breathing minimal, if in an unlikely scenario that whatever appears can't differentiate between fire and human breaths. He watches as the door from which he came from begin to slowly open, and from it was nothing short but unnerving.
Stepping out into the tunnel was a massive, purple, plush-like creature. Walking on all fours, the toy monster appears feline by nature. Tall and lanky like Huggy and Kissy, but the differences were glaringly obvious as through the short fuzz-like fur is a visible skeletal structure, as if the creature has been starving for a horribly long time. Gabe felt pity for the creature just by looking at his form.
But its face though, the face was where the real nightmare fuel is. Its face stuck in an enormous eternally open smile and the sockets where the eyes should be are empty, dark like the void, except two gleaming white irises sat in each eye socket. Lidless and ever watchful, his pointed ears just as keen as so. Watching, listening, waiting for the slightest disturbance to which he can pounce on.
Without even muttering a sound, Gabe mouths the name of this new monster.
"Catnap."
Catnap's ears then twitched, prompting the goul-like toy to turn towards the wreck. Gabe cursed himself in his mind as what very little of his peering face he has retreated quickly into the dark. He didn't know how Catnap could have heard something so soundless, but he prayed that he confuses the noise for the roaring flames. He hears hears heavy footsteps approaching the wreak, he doesn't even bring himself to breathe. He knows that all Catnap has to do is peer into the conductor's cabin and hell find him.
Seconds ticked by, but they felt like hours compared to Gabe. He waits for the moment the monster's piercing eyes to appear from the window. But it never came. The sounds of heavy footfall soon fade away, leaving only the fires to blaze on.
After some minutes of waiting, the mysterious kid spoke again. "It's safe now, he's gone back."
Gabe then pulled himself back out and leapt down from the engine, happy that now he can move on from it. He then asked. "Say, how did you see him coming?"
"From the cameras silly!" The kid on the phone answered. "I'm in a special security room in the factory, so I have eyes and ears everywhere."
Ok, that sounded a bit unnerving. But considering yet again the fact that this kid's not after his organs, who is he to complain. "Uh, thanks. So what happens now?"
"Well, there's no way you can go back up. So your best bet is to head further down."
"Already doing just that." He said as he continued on walking down the track. "So what is down here?"
"The place you are heading towards is the factory's orphanage, Playcare. The home of the Smiling Critters."
"And that, guy, that past me by. Is he-?"
"Yeah, that was Catnap. One of the Smiling Critters. There used to be, eight of them I think? But now it's just him."
"You mean there are bigger versions of all the critters? What happened to them?"
The kid the grimly replied. "You don't want to know."
As he continued his descent down the rails he soon finds a train station, left in ruin just like everything else here. And on it is a rotary gate embedded into a stone wall with a tall, and thankfully unalive, statue of Huggy Wuggy displayed in the middle between the two gates. Past the statue and gates is a wide stairway leading upwards. The gateway to Playcare.
Once he climbed up the ledge and onto the platform, the kid n the phone called him again. "There is cable car that will take you all the way down to the orphanage. You'll find it just up the stairs."
"First trains, now there's cable cars down here? What's next, a space shuttle?" Gabe jokingly said.
While the kid laughed at the idea of Playtime.co having its own space program, they then forewarned him. "I got to warn you though, there are a lot more dangerous toys down there. More than in the lobby or in the Game Station. And Catnap, he's the one in charge of the place. The Playcare is his church, his hunting ground. Whatever he wants it to be."
"Ok, so what do I do once i get down there though?" He said fidgeting the bottom hem of his shirt.
"I'll tell you once you get there. But don't worry, I'll help you through every step of the way. You better get going."
"Alright then." He said approaching the gate.
The mysterious voice then asked. "Oh! By the way, I didn't get your name yet."
"Ah right! Name's Gabriel. Gabriel Gibbions."
"Nice name. My name is Ollie. Nice to meet you! I'll keep in touch."
And with that the phone cuts to quiet. Gabe, now seeing the way forward, climbs over the bars of the rotating gate and ventures up the stairway. There at the very top is an open room, with the cable car itself hanging in the center of the room. All around are ruined remains of Playtime.co memorabilia, from rug carpets, soda machines, and cardboard cutouts. There is also a sign above that said 'See the world through the eyes of a child. Elliot's Express.'
He then opens the cable car with a lever on a wall, his Grabpack making short work on it. With power running through the cable system, the cabin's door opens and he steps inside, taking a seat down on one of the foam padded benches. The car cranks to life, moving along the overhanging cables till he reaches a dark tunnel leading downwards. After some time waiting in the dimly lit cabin, an audio recording then plays in the intercom.
"Hello. My name is Elliot Ludwig. When you look around in the world today, what is the one that it needs more of? I asked around once. Money, I never have enough. Understanding, I can never get any. Faith, the common man has lost it. Each answer was different, and while I can perhaps see some truth in each. But I think each was also missing something. Something simple."
Gabe can now see that the cable car has exited the man made tunnel from out the window. But when he glanced through the cracked glass he noticed something odd, he is not being taken through another room nor in any other kind of manmade structure. No, the cable car is being pulled out into the open air. And when Gabe realizes this he takes a full look out the window. The sight made him stand out from his seat, he was so stunned by what he was seeing he had to take a closer look to tell if he is just imagining things.
"For you see, not one of them could muster a smile."
Gabe's jaw was literally hung open as he gazes out into the open landscape around him. For this was no ordinary tunnel, nor any manmade structure. It is a cave, an utterly massive cavern. So big in fact that he thought that if he could, he could park an aircraft carrier right inside here and still have room to spare.
"A smile is hope. A smile is love. A smile is understanding." The recording of Eliot continued. "And there is nothing more gratifying to my soul than being the reason for a child's smile."
And past all the stalagmites and the other geological constructs, there sat in the other end of the cable system is an enormous dome structure. The dark, manmade steel contrasting well with the naturally sharp cave formations. It looked so imposing just from appearance alone, like a prison of some sort. Many large pipes and tubes extended from the dome, as if the very air itself was being regulated through it.
"To be the spark that ignites all their hopes and dreams. For it is only through hopes and dreams that we will create a better world. One where our children need not to be afraid. One where they are protected. After all, this company and its toys are nothing without them."
Gabe can see that he is approaching the dome, and coming closer to an open hole. A deep, terrible red glow emanating from inside. The foreboding feeling in his gut was so powerful that he couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sense of dread as he enters in through the blinding red light.
"These children deserve to smile. They deserve to love. They deserve a safe home. That is why with enormous pleasure, as the founder of Playtime.co that I announce…"
A dramatic pause pause followed, and as the red fog parted, Gabe gazes down at the scenery before him. And it was nothing short but remarkable.
"PLAYCARE! Our very own onsite orphanage. But it's not only that. It's a school, a playhouse, a place to belong. Our very own ecosystem beneath the surface. Dedicated to every inch and detail to ensuring a child's smile. It's teachers and counselors, mothers and fathers, until such a time they have all of that in you."
Eliot wasn't kidding. If anything he was being modest. It looked like a whole village is down here. Complete with hanging mock clouds and a bright yet soft yellow light from above simulating sunlight. There are buildings of many shapes and sizes, all painted in bright and fun colors and connected by their own streets. He saw a school building, a circus themed playhouse, a large home, and even a toy store.
And soon enough the cable car will touch ground.
"May Playcare bring joy, inspiration, and smiles to all who enter these doors! For what gives life its meaning, if not a smile?"
The glass doors then open, and without so much as a word, Gabe steps out into the unknown. Into Catnap's domain. Into Playcare.