Short Stories of Broken Lives

Marionette's Beginning

I've never been anything but a toy. I was created out of wood and dreams. A true Marionette. The man who created me made me in the image of a boy, yet he dressed me as the girls we are always seen as. I was dressed to look like Alice from the stories of her Adventures in Wonderland, and I heard so many people comment on how lovely I was. How I was crafted beautifully, and it looked as though I would come to life at any moment. Little did they know the man who created me was well-versed in all kinds of dark magic. All of his creations could come to life, but I was his magnum opus. The others simply came to life, but I could transform.

To move from a small marionette to a human was a painful experience the first few times, but I eventually became used to this. The worst of anything was the cracks that spread over my skin when I experienced any sort of emotional pain. That was the catch. All of his creations had a sort of... defect. Some would suddenly stop moving, dying a little death every few hours. Some would only come to life at night. Me... When I felt pain... when I was hurt or felt like I was dying... cracks spread over my skin, sometimes pieces of me would crumble away. The healing process was painful, and I hated every moment of it.

Eventually, I learned to shut off my emotions. My creator was a nice man, but he had a tendency to get drunk and destroy his old creations. I was always safe from serious injury, but my brothers and sisters never were. I learned not to get attached quickly, but it also taught me to repair us quickly. I learned our magic and how to weave it into my destroyed brothers and sisters. It wasn't long before I was doing more work than our drunkard father.

He soon reached a point where he began to rely on me to run errands around town, deliver finished toys, and even to create new ones. Sometimes I dressed as a shop boy. Sometimes as a daughter running errands for her father. The people in town began to recognize me, and I had... not friends, but the closest I could have to that. People knew me. They waved. I waved back. It was... nice?

One day, I noticed someone following me. A tall man, sticking to the shadows, watched me with eyes that looked all too much like the eyes of my siblings that were too far gone for me to save them. Dead eyes... Eyes holding no emotion at all...

He intrigued me.

His stalking continued several days before something changed. By that, I mean I slipped into an alley and pulled him in when he passed. The smile that crossed his lips would have scared someone who cared more about their safety. I simply tilted my head to look up at him curiously, crossing my arms over my chest.

"What do you want?" It bothered me my voice wasn't particularly intimidating, but then again, I was dressed in a light blue dress more akin to a fairytale than to our life in this town.

A laugh escaped him, though it was more a short exhalation of amusement than a true laugh. He was tall. Much taller than I was. His hair was that strange mix of black and grey people called... what was it? Salt and pepper? It suited his face, a strange mix of delicate and manly that drew the eye. He looked like a doll that came to life, complete with eyes that held none of the life of a living thing.

"What do I want? What a strange question."

I had to resist the urge to smile. His answer intrigued me. "Oh? How so?"

"A strange man following you and you decide to ask what he wants rather than why he's following you. Dangerous question for a little girl like you."

That made me pause. The way he said it was... it wasn't predatory... more that he knew more than he was letting on. It bothered me that he seemed to be able to read me while I was getting nothing from him. "Then why are you following me, stranger?"

"Because you're like me."

It had suddenly struck me how small and secluded this alley was. We were practically chest to chest and I knew of no one who actually ventured off the main roads, especially in the quickly fading light of the evening. Suddenly, he was looming over me, smiling in a way that reminded me too much of the failed soldier I had tried to make a few weeks ago... The smile of something that knew bloodlust intimately and relished the thought of experiencing it again.