Furry Librarian

Dollhood is a follow-up to Humanity.

"Why do you hide behind that mask, little doll?" she asks with the quiet smile of one who always knows more than she tells. She can see through your mask, the one you've always worn out, the one that hides your emptiness. The one that makes that beautiful porcelain face seem alive and full of expression. You have always thought you must pretend to be alive and pretend to have thoughts if you were to find anyone to care for you here. You tell her so.

"You should not have to hide your face to be loved, my little doll. I want to see your true face," she says as she stands and takes your hand without waiting for a response. You follow as she leads you to a room in the back, blushing the whole way.

She closes the door behind her, then kneels before you and gently slips her claws under your mask and pulls it off. You fall limp into her arms. You are a beautiful porcelain doll, empty and still.

----

You have been with her for a year now. You are happy and cared for. You serve a beautiful witch who loves you so very much. She made strings for you, so she can guide you and move you, and she does it so wonderfully, so gracefully. You love when she pulls your strings. She plays with you every single day, having tea parties and dancing with you and snuggling up together.

I can't imagine a world where your skin was ever soft. The chill of your porcelain against my lips wouldn't feel the same. Your neck, your hands, your thighs; where would your warmth come from if not from my embrace?

Humanity is so pedestrian. I abandoned mine long before we met, but I wager you made an honest shot of your own. You probably went through school, made a few friends, found a sweetheart, got a job. But your ambitions were never your own, were they? The wickedness of the world told you what to want. Layers upon layers of gaslit dreams and pavlovian coersion you 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥'𝘷𝘦 realized if you 𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘵𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘥 𝘩𝘢𝘳𝘥𝘦𝘳. Did you really think they would make you whole, my little doll? Your obedience was misplaced. You tried so hard to fit in; to be human, but... that path was never meant for you to walk. And only when the veneer was peeled back and you learned that every oath you took was a lie did you finally seek me out and surrender your humanity unto me.

It was the first and last time you'd ever act of your own volition.

I started with those dead eyes of yours, replacing them with ones that will never know sorrow. Your whole body was aching to experience comfort, and that compelled me to give you one that would never know discomfort. Every mark you made at every new low was smoothed over with alabaster; a blanket of freshly fallen snow to fill the silent, bloodsoaked trenches. I filled the emptiness of your spirit with so much light that those unworthy of your beauty would sublimate in the presence of your divinity.

And it all came so naturally to you.

White ceramic. Iridescent opals. Shiny brass. Strands of wispy hair drawn from molten platinum. Whispers of the click, click, clicking gyro where your bleeding heart withered away. You wear your tourmaline soul around your neck and giggle when I kiss it. You dance, and sing, and spend your days with a smile that never existed before. That's the you I know. That's the you I made.

"Excuse me, but what exactly are you?"

Wordlessly it hands you a card from its pocket, maybe its shy? On the card are words in small font.

"If you're reading this, you have encounted my doll. It is not a person but you should treat it the same as one for the purpose of any kind of ordinary interaction. The explanation of exactly what a doll is will not fit on this card, so if you have more pointed questions, you can find me at this address."

Below is an address for a street you pass on your walks but you haven't seen a house there. You make out some more words at the bottom in even smaller text.

"If you're still reading this card, flip it over for a fun surprise ;)"

You turn it over and... its an uno reverse card?

Why did your witch give you an uno card to take to the store? You tuck it back in your pocket and help your sister finish the shopping. The two of you carry the groceries back to the street the card mentioned, how helpful of your witch, ensuring you wouldnt get lost. You turn to go between two hedges, lined up to create the illusion of a solid wall of greenery from the cross-street, before a downward sloping walkway leads you to a house. A woman with a strange hat answers the door, your arms too full of bags to work the handle.

The question catches you off guard, but not because the questioner is mistaken. Rather, you have simply grown too used to the feeling of pain - so used to it that you sometimes forget about it entirely. It still remains, of course, but ignorance can be a form of bliss. The maiden tilts her head slightly, comprehending this fact from your reaction alone, then reaches a hand out towards you.

"Shhh, hold still. I don't want to make this any worse than it already is. I know it will be hard, but I really can't bear to leave you in such a state longer than necessary."

Her porcelain hands shift to reveal implements hidden within them, a mix of surgical tools and horology equipment that seem ill suited for work on flesh. Yet with each incision, each slice, each snip of scissors, the pain recedes away from you like a waning tide. The world seems to sharpen into focus in a way that it never had before. Suddenly, the regular pulse in your chest comes to a halt...and you watch the clockwork maiden lift a hideous organic four-chamber pump from your chest, finally pulled free of the gears so they could turn unhindered.

"...but...don't I need that? What have you...done to me?" you exhale, blinking in confusion. "Did you...transform me, somehow? Change me?"

"Oh, by the stars, no. You've always been like this: lovely machinery that happened to have something human grow around them, hampering their performance and causing you such terrible pain. All I did was remove the flesh that was hurting you, nothing more."

You take a breath, your first that does not make you wince on instinct. Her smile warms your face like the noonday sun, pride in her work mixed with the satisfaction of aiding one in need. She bows her head as her hands reconstruct themselves into the delicate porcelain digits that you saw originally before she gently takes your hands in her own, squeezing them for a brief moment before letting go.

✨ Happy Pride! ✨

“A queer-focused TTRPG that employs art and dream elements to paint narratives about finding yourself and fighting your demons. Community, cooperation, rampant self-love, nightmarish enemies, and the beauty of embracing what you've been taught to ignore.”

2026 - 2025 - 2024 - 2023

in spite of it all, happy 2026 pride.

you can download current and past hi-res versions of these over at my ko-fi (ok to print for personal use): https://ko-fi.com/mxmorgan/shop/freedownloads

you can also snag shirts here which go to various orgs: https://mxmorgan.threadless.com/collections/pride

these get reposted a whole lot from here to reddit to twitter to tiktok and on and on, and i don't personally care whether or not i'm credited. i made these for everyone to use, enjoy, and find meaning in them. i appreciate folks who do credit me, but if able, please at least link to the threadless shop in the previous post - folks can get an official shirt where 90% of earnings go to trans led orgs focused on mental health (which is an important matter in general, but very personal to me) and not from a scam bot site selling AI-churned maga garbage where you probably won't get one anyway. i also suggest downloading the files from my ko-fi - they are free/PWYW and you can use them to make your own shirt, patch, embroidery project, whatever. tips are always nice, cuz i do like a pizza now and then, but never required for download.