A Rabbit's Foot For Good Luck

Ch5: What Did You Expect From A Toy, Exactly?

A/N: Apologies for the wildly inconsistent quality of the writing. I guess that's what months long breaks will do to a story.

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This factory was a paradise of dreary liminal spaces.

Your conclusion of such was reinforced by the hallway, where you leant against one of the yellow-white walls and cradled the underside of your injured arm, standing in a way as to put most of your weight on your sound leg. The time-worn Huggy Buddy murals gave ever-perky smiles as they stared off with gleaming eyes into nothing, and beyond the eternal arch to your right apparently constructed of awkwardly oversized toy blocks some centuries ago, the enormous sand pit that spilt beyond its bounds on the uncleaned floor tiles would've needed only a stray bucket with a shovel in it as the cherry on top of some dreamishly surreal composition.

One that had all the playing children abruptly sucked out of it.

Across the way you heard your diminuitive helper make a busy racket inside the grabpack storage closet. When you showed him the bleeding bite he brought up some ancient first aid kit he recalled might have been stationed there and volunteered to get it for you, trembling with intent. It sounded like he was turning the whole cramped nook on its head, muttering to himself heavily in the process, before he finally emerged with a little white box in his paws.

"Here," he practically threw it at you and it's only thanks to your quickly adapting reflexes and idle state that you managed to catch it. You gave him an odd look but didn't question it.

"Thanks."

You fumbled to open the tightly sealed, beat-up looking container with a dark cross on the front. It had some suspicious grime smeared across the interior and provided residence for the insufficiently short leftovers of a roll of gauze, painkiller pills you guessed to be in the low single digits upon rattling the box, and a dubious antiseptic solution sloshing around in a brown glass bottle. You screwed the cap off and took an experimental sniff only to be stabbed in the nose by aged alcohol vapor.

"Eugh."

You grimaced and doubtfully eyed your fresh wound, then the liquid. Whatever text on it detailing the contents of the bottle had been rendered totally indiscernible, nonetheless an infection was the last thing you needed.

"Well," you gave a resolute sigh, "if life gives you lemons..."

You knelt next to your gaping bag on the floor and dove into it. Bunzo hadn't moved from his spot, as far as you could tell, and for the first time since the two of you had teamed up you decided to initiate some idle conversation yourself.

"By the way," you began, digging around for that singular pack of tissues you brought, "you did a pretty impressive job in there. Just so you know."

Bingo. You extracted and held it, pausing to venture for thoughts with the tissues serving as an anchor.

"I mean I..." You briefly contemplated the absurdity of opening up to a toy. "...really don't know what I would've done without you. Died, probably."

A weak chuckle. The stale factory air could bear some morbid humor, you figured. Shifting to accomodate your thigh once again, you swiftly peeled a piece from the package then reached for the bottle to dampen it, grateful you had something to do with your hands.

"That is to say, I... appreciate you coming along."

After the procedure, your eyes stubbornly adhered to the wet spot on the tissue's surface. It had the impersonal honor of receiving a look of fondness.