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#(( THIS HAS BEEN SITTING HALF-FINISHED IN MY DRAFTS SINCE DECEMBER. I APOLOGIZE FOR THE WAIT BUT I'M VERY EXCITED ABOUT IT ))
lairde-lampblack · 6 years
Text
La Doncella
Chapter 1
Acción en Vivo
Within the depths of the long-abandoned Joey Drew Studios, an inkblot roamed the vents.  Despite being relatively deep in the studio, around level 5 or so, the air hung thick and silent with tension and the choking smell of rubber, waiting to pounce with the promise of danger.  The little inkblot failed to heed the weighty air’s warning as he trundled along the ducts with purpose.  He stared down into a nearby grate and, spotting something of interest despite his ink covered eyes, popped the grate off of the vent and clambered out into the abandoned office.
The room was dusty and comparatively  untouched in contrast to the rest of the ink-drenched studio, the drawers in the desk opened haphazardly and overturned onto the floor.  Discarded objects lay scattered on the floor and debris cluttered the corners.  It almost looked like there had been a fight in here.  The little inkblot pittered deeper into the room, picking up a snapped pen or shattered piece of inkwell every now and then before discarding the refuse to the side and continuing to explore the room.  Ignoring his growing discomfort and his second mental voice telling him to leave, he kept exploring the room he’d subconsciously avoided. He kicked a small stone pendant under the bookcase, the noise and sudden sensation catching his attention.  
The tiny, drippy toon squeezed his mitten hand under the dresser to reach the pendant, downcast horn and round white face squishing against the wood as his ever-present necktie brushed against the floor.  The nameless devil gave a staticky chirp in triumph once he managed to grab the leather strap of the pendant and fish it out.  The stone of the pendant was an inky black, carved and painted with a weird-looking rune in red.  The thing was oddly warm to the touch, and the childish cartoon took an instant liking to it.  He wrapped the leather cord around his hand despite the voice in his head protesting the action and stood back up to look around some more.
He finished exploring the room with the necklace in hand and was about to leave when he noticed the door.  It was a fairly standard door, a cracked glass panel taking up much of the upper half with faded reversed lettering displaying a name everyone in the studio knew with the remains of a bronzed doorknob dangling from where it should have been affixed with a dark stain splatter he knew instinctively wasn’t ink.  The inkblot tried to swallow past the lump now present in his nonexistent throat as he realized where he was and why exactly the voice in his head told him to leave.
It was an unspoken rule to never enter Joey Drew’s office.
He scrambled to the vent, finally understanding his own apprehension, and he closed up the grate as tightly as he could.  After being sure the vent had been closed securely and leaving a quick warning marking on the floor of the vent with his tail, he made a mad dash to Level 2 where some commotion was going on.  At least there was safer than Joey Drew’s old office.  Anywhere was safer for any of them than there. That’s what their instincts cried, as they’d been poor souls tricked into being sold to demons for their inky forms.  
It’s only natural to hide from a man that deals with devils.
Buddy skittered down the corridor after Bendy, having paused to examine his weird rune pendant again.  Every time he got close to the larger toon, the pendant would warm up, it seemed. The pendant itself doesn't really change despite its temperature fluctuating.
“Buddy?”
The smaller of the two inkblots jumped at his name, looking up at the sweaterclad demon up ahead.  “You alright there?” Bendy asked, concerned but concealing it as aloofness.  Buddy answered with a pop of static and a nod, dashing forward a bit to nab the hem of Buddy’s hoodie.  Before the two could continue on, Buddy tugged a bit on the bit of sweater he was grabbing, showing off the runed pendant in his other hand before he could think twice about it.  “What do you have there?” Bendy puzzled aloud, gingerly taking the pendant and inspecting it for himself. “What is it?”  Buddy shrugged in answer, and the two demons wore the same baffled expression.  After examining the stone for a few moments more, Bendy handed it back to Buddy, who wrapped it around his hand again as Bendy climbed the staircase to the projector room again.
The day had started normally, she supposed.  A partially overcast sky, bustling sidewalks of a small city, fairly standard where she lived.  She stared out the bedroom window into space, ensnared in her musings and attempts to recall the bizarre dream she’d had the night before, something about living cartoons with Splatoon physics.  She was glad to have gotten a good night of rest for once since her job called for late nights, even if she’ll fall back into her late night habits by the end of the week.  Some wispy drafts were all that remained of her dream from the night before and she lamented the loss cause it had been awesome if a bit weird.
She snapped out of her weird spacey session and rolled off of her bed, straightening herself out and pulling on her heavy blue sweater with faux fur trim in the hood. Even if it wasn’t snowing yet, the December air would still have its cold bite. Making sure her bedroom door was closed, she tapped her way down the stairs and pulled on her boots.  Her hand purse yoinked out of its drawer and she was ready to go to the store.   She’d started to run low on food, so she has to leave her house for once.
Before long, she’d left the house for the store.  When she got there, she did her shopping.  Nothing to write home about.  It was on the way back home did anything letterworthy happen.
She was going down the street at around 30, the speed limit for this part of town, when a small black figure darted into the road. “Holy shit!” she blurted out, swerving panickedly to avoid hitting the cat(?) and pulling over to make sure she hadn’t hit whatever that small black thing was.  She practically exploded out of the car and sprinted over to where the small black thing sat on the sidewalk, trembling in shock as three other black and white figures appeared to comfort it.  As she got closer, she slowed down in confoundment.
The four figures were almost mind boggling, looking like toons that had jumped straight off the animation reels from the 30’s.  The smallest of them, the one she’d almost run over and confused for a cat -- drippy and tiny, almost half-formed compared to the other three -- was staring at the palms of his mitteny hands. She shook away the shock of living cartoons (part of her was thrilled at the prospect, animation was her life’s dream and she adored cartoons) briefly and sped up to a power walk over to the small group.  “Are you alright?!  I’m so sorry I almost hitcha, I should-should-should-should’a been payin’ more attention!” she apologized rapidfire, stumbling over herself a bit with how fast the words came out.
The little inky one nodded his head, smiling shakily in her direction though still clearly shaken by almost dying.  The toony creature tries to speak to her, static coming out.  He gets visibly annoyed at his own unintelligibleness and the young adult holds up a finger. “Hang on a sec, lemme grab you a notepad or somethin’ from my car.” she offers, and she briskly walked over her car, waving the toons over with her.  Quickly snatching a pen and lightly used notepad from the glovebox, she offers the implements to the staticky inkblot after testing the pen with a quick scribble on the corner of a used page covered with messy doodles.  With a chirp in thanks, he writes down what he was trying to say.
We need your help, miss.
While the short sentence ran her blood a bit cold with the implications (what did they need help with and what the hell are there living toons doing roaming around on the streets), she still suppressed her burning curiosity and protective instinct and gave the tiny toon a warm smile.  “Of course I’ll help you guys out,” she said.  “I was jus’ on my way home from the store, actually, so if ya get into my car we can work things out there.  It’s gettin’ chilly this time’a year, and only one’a you’s wearin’ a coat.”
The toons all clambered into the car.  The tall doglike one sitting in the front with her while the angel, the one in the coat, and the smallest of them all sitting in the back.  After ensuring they were all buckled in, she resumed her drive back home with toons in tow, humming along to the radio as her affection grew for these lost souls.
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