#dollwriting

Being dragged is the procedure, however. This one’s Handler said something about it once, about not revving a race car before the engine had fully warmed up. This one thought that was strange, since the soldiers themselves need to be up and moving as soon as the lights turn on in their barracks. They don’t get time to warm up, and certainly not the luxury of being dragged anywhere. But this one didn’t say anything about that. Questioning Handler never goes well, even if it doesn’t lead to beatings. This one reasoned that the soldiers must be some other kind of car, one that doesn’t need to be maintained to the same standard. Ones that don’t need to be dragged out of bed to save them the humiliation and effort of walking on their own two feet.

This one realized that it wasn’t being dragged anymore, it was being held. The fatigues it had been sleeping in are being stripped off of it, and its muzzle was being fitted on. This one obediently slipped back out of alertness, another part of the routine. But, despite its best efforts, this one remained aware of the things going on around it. More dragging, everyone it was dragged past, everyone who looked away, and everyone who looked on. Not aware of their faces, or their names, but very, very aware of their eyes. This one believed its own eyes were convincingly glazed, because nobody stopped, dropped, and kicked it in the ribs. This had never happened yet, and this one was quite committed to preventing it.

The next time this one noticed something, it was that the leash had been clipped to the side of its muzzle, on the release latch where left side straps met the metal cage. The clip itself was nothing but an annoying phantom in this one’s peripheral vision, but the leash, striped diagonally, yellow and red, hung down from its face, almost to the floor, and arced back up and to the side where one of the soldiers held the end of it. This one traced the line of the leash with its eyes. The red helix winding down the yellow line, then the red coil back up the yellow shaft. This one was making progress back down again when the leash’s arc abruptly changed. This one followed it more quickly now, the movement of its eyes turning the stripes into an orange blur as it locked onto the new holder of the leash, Handler. The soldiers dropped this one, and its knees hit the floor hard, but its eyes never wavered from hers. This one wished more than anything that its eyes could waver from hers. Her expression was cold, bored, but that dull gaze felt hot and abrasive on this one’s skin.

She yanked on the leash as she turned, and this one was instantly on its feet, walking behind her left shoulder. This one didn’t catch most of her words, but it thought it got most of the important ones. Targets, objectives, expected resistance, methods of engagement, the parts this one needed to know. Handler had opinions on each part of it, and this one took note of those, too. It might be crucial later to avoiding punishments.

She was silent as this one fitted itself into the cockpit. She held the leash still, and this one had to do no small amount of maneuvering to not get tangled in it. To not pull it taut, and force her hand to move. But, this one was born, bred, and beaten to be good at maneuvering, and Handler gave no sign that this one wasn’t going fast enough, so it tried to move a little faster anyways. Once it had gotten into its position, nestled deep in the steel, its limbs no longer visible within the cocoon, nothing but its face and chest still exposed to the air, she looped the leash around her wrist, and used both hands in applying the clasps that held this one’s body in place in the cockpit. This one watched the cigarette in her mouth as she worked, and wondered about what it would feel like to be spit on by her, or to have that addictive ember pressed into its skin. It was perfectly situated for it, unable to move at all, breasts artfully exposed by the access hatch, already hopped up on adrenaline and soon to be pumped full of enough stimulants that an 8-millimeter, second degree burn wouldn’t even register in its long term memory. Just a searing, momentary pain to prelude the mission. Like christening a ship by smashing a bottle into its hull.

Handler stepped back, finished with the clasps. She had never put a cigarette out on this one, or even spit on it. Nor had she ever made any indication that she would consider doing so, for any reason. C19’s pilot did, though, and often. This one got to see the scars a lot. This one had always felt guilty about how beautiful it thought they were, like freckles across its naked bust. This one knew it was jealous, but was never sure why. It was sure it would hate being burned as much as C19 did. Still, it wanted some scars of its own.

The flight to the drop zone, in a cheap, warehouse-sized plane with a thin fuselage, passed loudly, but this one was at least spared any conversations by virtue of the fact that nobody had put a headset on it that would allow it to hear anyone speaking above the wind noise. This one was impatient, bored, and hated the noise, but there was nothing to do but wait quietly or invite a beating, and this one did not want to invite a beating. So, it waited quietly.

Finally, the back hatch of the plane opened. The noise grew infinitely worse, but it was nothing compared to the rushing of blood in this one’s ears. Handler stepped forward and removed the safety pin from its muzzle’s release latch. Fogbank rocked gently on its hanger as the mech was moved backwards out beyond the plane’s floor. There was no way to hear anyone speak above the noise, even with a headset, but this one could read the phrase Handler spoke off her lips. “Do your job, ace.” Fogbank dropped off the tail of the plane, and as it fell the leash pulled taut, then yanked open the muzzle’s release latch. The muzzle was torn from this one’s face, and then Fogbank’s hatch closed, and its limbs unfolded as it began its boot-up sequence.

Fogbank hits the ground, and this one is already hammering it forwards, into the fray. It’s flying across open plains, thrusters torching the grass as this one passes just above it. Handler’s voice, mercifully anonymized by compression, crackles in. “You’re three klicks from your target. Hostiles incoming, take countermeasures immediately.” This one complies silently. Fogbank begins pumping dark chaff smoke out from between every plate of armor, covering itself in a dense layer of entropy. Laced into the smog, however, are tiny sensors that relay to each other and to Fogbank that give this one near omniscience inside the darkness.

Three mechs, EF2’s, more like power armor than real mechs, are approaching this one from the air, on an intercept course with Fogbank. Instead of waiting to meet them head on, this one stops, hard. The thrusters cut out as Fogbank re-orients itself in the air, facing sideways to land, feet first. On impact, its knees bend, absorbing the impact, and it digs a small trench as it skids to a stop, cutting its smoke output off, too. At the same time, a drone launches from Fogbank’s back, matching its former speed, trajectory, and chaff production. This one crouches where it landed, watching the hostiles. The drone’s smoke gives the illusion that this one had kept moving several dozen meters further, then the drone turns on a dime and rockets back to this one, re-attaching to Fogbank. The EF2’s land some distance out from the fog. They hesitate for a moment, but the fog doesn’t show any signs of dissipating. While they wait, this one sizes up their weaponry.

The point mech is clearly a melee specialist, armed with a hammer it wields two-handed. The hammer is too large to be swung by an unarmored human, but even for Fogbank, the slimmest and shortest of the EF5’s, it would be just barely large enough to be a practical one-handed weapon. That said, it is still easily the biggest threat. Even fighting blind, it could get lucky and actually deal some damage to Fogbank. Not nearly enough to incapacitate it, but maybe enough to slow it down later, against the real dangers of the mission. The next priority target, furthest back, is clearly a sniper. Already, it’s taken a knee with its rifle half-readied. Though its weapon is equally capable of dealing damage as the hammer, snipers are nearly worthless against Fogbank when this one knows they’re there and it can hide in the chaff. The last target is almost not worth thinking about. Outfitted with a gun too low caliber to do more than scratch Fogbank’s paint, and too small to effectively wield as a club. The plinking of its bullets could be used to locate Fogbank via sonar, if the enemy were outfitted with it, but even in that ridiculous scenario, this one wouldn’t leave them time to attempt it.

This one launches three drones on different courses. Two go directly out to either side, beginning wide arcs around the targets. The third goes in a straight line, 45 degrees forward and left. Mirroring the last drone, Fogbank moves to the right, straight past the useless rifleman. As it passes, this one swings Fogbank’s leg out of the smoke, and smashes the head off the rifleman. It crumples to the ground, and the sniper swings around to track the front of the smoke trail, where Fogbank is. Unfortunately, its path converges with that of one of the drones, and this one instantly shunts itself sideways along that other path. The sniper shot passes through a spot that Fogbank used to occupy, but even the most powerful rifle that it might be carrying, even if it had hit, would have been useless if it had encountered a properly armored section of Fogbank. Most pilots this one knew would have simply let it bounce off. This one dodged because it was fun, and because it left the enemy as uneasy as possible.

The drones, each of which had joined their paths to the others now, are slowly spiraling inwards, bringing the edge of the fog closer and closer to the remaining targets. The sniper takes a few potshots at the drones, but goes wide every time, unable to find the smaller targets in the encroaching blackness. This one maneuvers Fogbank to the side of the circle closest to the sniper, and stalks it as the radius closes. Once the sniper is inside the chaff, it starts moving back in the direction it had come from, clearly looking to retreat. This one doesn’t let it. It shoulder-checks the sniper, hard, sending the half-size mech sprawling. It even drops its rifle. This one decides to let it flail around a while, and turns its attention to the last semi-viable threat. The hammer has not moved, even as the drones finish their paths and return to Fogbank. It stands still and disciplined like a martial arts master, waiting for Fogbank to make the first move, naively hoping that it will be able to counter-attack. This one has to give it due credit, that is the only viable strategy against Fogbank. Wait for it to reveal itself by attacking, then hit it back harder than it hits you. The theory is sound, but that EF2 is simply not capable of surviving a serious hit from Fogbank, let alone hitting back harder afterwards. At this stage, engaging the hammer is entirely unnecessary. Both surviving mechs are blind, deaf, and dumb. By the time they manage to re-orient themselves, Fogbank could be well and truly out of their reach. That was no fun, though, and this one never passes up an opportunity to have a little extra fun. Fogbank rockets towards the hammer, and does the same sudden stop maneuver as began the encounter. Its legs and dirt spray slam into the hammer, throwing it off balance. To the pilot’s credit, though, it lands on its back foot and slams its weapon into the ground with as much force as the little machine is capable of generating. It isn’t fast enough, though, and Fogbank has already moved behind it again. An axe kick to the shoulder, cleaving the arm off entirely, and the last fighter of the group is now also bereft of its weapon. Time to finish it, and be on this one’s way. This one grabs the bleeding hammer mech and spins around with it like a discus thrower before launching it back towards the sniper, still scrabbling in the dirt for its lost rifle. The impact mangles both of them. Fogbank turns back towards the objective and launches clear of the fog. This one radios back in to Handler.

“I’ve dealt with the hostiles, ma’am.”

“God job, ace. You should have visual confirmation of the target soon.”

After another half a minute, this one gets its visual. An enemy FOB, a formerly well-defended one, where Hailstone had been deployed. As Fogbank closed the distance, this one confirms that H17, Hailstone’s pilot, is still fighting, swarmed by EF2’s. Unlike Fogbank, for whom that would pose a serious concern, the much larger, stronger, more robust Hailstone throws them off and crushes them as a side effect of its fight with the other EF5. The two are locked together in a violent embrace, shuffling around in a tight circle, searching for a mistake in the other’s footwork that would allow either of them to throw their opponent to the ground and go for a kill. Most of the base’s defenses are long-destroyed at this point, so this one doesn’t go up in smoke right away. Instead, it launches a smoke canister towards the melee. As it arcs, this one opens a line of communication with H17.

“Heads up and hold your breath, slugger.”

“I see ya, F26. You’re not as sneaky as you think.”

Hailstone is the only sparring match-up that Fogbank semi-consistently loses, the only black mark on this one’s training record. H17 is always eager to rub this one’s face in it, even though it has little bearing on our assessments as pilots.

The chaff grenade explodes on impact with the enemy EF5, causing no direct damage, but giving it a fraction of a second’s pause. Fogbank’s namesake envelops most of the enemy’s remaining troops, and even those outside its radius take a moment to be surprised. This is, of course, a mistake. Fogbank itself, now enveloping its path in smoke, and clearing the outer line of EF2’s before they could coordinate. The dance is manic, cathartic, and precise. Fogbank in its crowd-clearing maneuvers keeps no more than one limb on the ground at any time, and each of the others is either heading into, in the moment of, or finishing the arc from an impact with the enemy. Blows are aimed at the head or torso of each EF2, incapacitating them, and often turning the pilots into paste. At the same time, Hailstone is taking advantage of the momentary weakness in its opponent, throwing it to the ground. In fact, H17 is as blind as any hostile in Fogbank’s miasma, but unlike the enemy she’s used to operating around it, she knew when to expect it, and since she already had close physical contact with her target, there wasn’t much she needed to see anyways. The other EF5 recovers quickly, but it’s already on the ground, getting pummeled again and again before it has the wits to start defending itself. As this one mops up the remaining EF2’s, most of which have already been half-crushed by Hailstone, or taken a glancing hit from Fogbank, H17 looses a primal, triumphant yell over the radio.

“THAT’S WHAT I’M TALKIN’ ABOUT, BABY!”

“Congrats, H17. You almost didn’t need my help.”

“Suck it, smokey, we both know I’d have been fine all alone.”

“The Handlers thought differently, so I guess we’ll never know.”

As we both leave the fog, one of the Handlers, maybe this one’s, maybe H17’s, cuts into the line.

“F26, great work. That’s why you’re the ace. H17, make sure you keep up.”

This one can hear H17 preparing to lodge a complaint when another new voice interrupts.

“Fogbank, Hailstone, emergency. Rainfall is down. Go secure its position immediately, and verify its condition.”

“Shit, copy. On our way.” Hailstone picks up Fogbank like a doll and starts sprinting away from the base. “One sec, 26, let me send you the coordinates that R5 was using.”

The promised information pops up on this one’s HUD, and it sees we’re already on a direct course there. Humiliating as it is to be carried, it would be no faster for Fogbank to fly there on its own, so this one makes itself content to sit idle once again.

The journey to Rainfall’s position is a long one for mechs in a combat situation to make unassisted, but not quite long enough to warrant deployment of a dedicated transport vehicle. In essence, this means it would take almost enough time for us to arrive as scrambling an entire other mech for deployment. Rainfall’s mission had been the same as Hailstone’s, destroy an enemy outpost and then search and destroy across the area in between the two bases. It seems that Rainfall had been much quicker about its work than Hailstone, and found something out in the grasslands that it wasn’t prepared for. There is one other pilot stationed close enough for a rapid deployment, but by this one’s reckoning it and Hailstone would arrive before she could, and anyways Fogbank was already the reinforcement on this mission.

Hailstone’s mad sprint brings us over the last hill, and we look out on Rainfall’s last known position. There are clear signs of a fight, a small supply convoy sits smoldering on the road, and a nearby building looks to have taken significant collateral, but the mech itself is nowhere we could see. This one radios in.

“Handlers, we have visual on Rainfall’s position, but it isn’t here. Please advise.”

“Fogbank, Hailstone, proceed with caution. Rainfall was ambushed, and likely captured. Can’t have gotten far, this is search and rescue now.”

“Understood. Investigating now.”

Hailstone sets Fogbank down, and we split off from each other at a slower pace, advancing into the valley. This one goes up to the broken convoy first, the burnt-out shells of cargo trucks coming up to Fogbank’s midriff. Hailstone, meanwhile, approaches the building in the near distance. H17’s voice comes through.

“I think we ought to get moving. What kind of search pattern can your drones manage? If-”

Hailstone’s communications cut out, and a half second later it shifts to a defensive stance, looking around for something. This one gets Fogbank ready to respond, but it’s hard to know what to do when you don’t know what you’re responding to. Then, something knocks Hailstone nearly off its feet. A sniper shot, coming from one of the hills down the road. Acting on pure instinct, this one drops a chaff canister and shunts Fogbank in a random direction, instantly losing itself in the fog. Hailstone is still up, and a squad of EF3’s has appeared from inside the building to try to finish it off. She’s handling them, though, so this one concentrates on tracing the sniper shot. Fogbank calculates their approximate position, and this one launches towards it. Before clearing the fog, this one deploys all four of its drones, so that there are five trails of smoke closing on the sniper’s position. This one needs to take it out as fast as possible before it can fire on Hailstone again, and that means there’s no time to set up decoy paths. This one is stuck at the tip of the smoke trail, and the sniper will know that, so this one just has to hope that they shoot at the drones instead of Fogbank.

Lucky for this one, they do. Unlucky, they’re a much better shot with a much better gun than the last sniper this one embarrassed. The first shot takes out a drone cleanly, and this one calculates that it will lose another before it gets a chance to spot the shooter. It’s right, another single shot takes out another drone. However, each shot gives this one a better idea of where the next one will come from, and the enemy realizes that too. The sniper hard launches out of its nest, camouflage foliage bursting and catching fire in the thruster wake. An EF4, dragging Rainfall’s mangled chassis behind it. The enemy mech is equipped with some serious extra boosters, enough that dragging an EF5 behind it isn’t enough to let this one gain ground. Fogbank is struggling just to keep up, and although flying is interfering a lot with their accuracy, the enemy is still firing on this one. This one starts launching as many canisters as possible, as far ahead as possible, hoping to both reduce weight on Fogbank and to further interfere with the sniper’s sightline. If this one gets close enough, the canisters might start blocking the sniper’s path, forcing it into extra maneuvers. A klick into the chase, another drone drops. This one still isn’t gaining ground. By now this one is almost out of canisters, almost out of drones, and almost out of time. The sniper is still well out of reach, there’s nothing Fogbank can do about it. Rainfall is lost, and the only tactical move left is to fall back and not let Fogbank get a hole blown in it for no reason. This one eases off the thruster reluctantly, already preparing itself for the Handlers’ reactions.

Then, something hits the sniper. A flaming orange comet from out of the sky impacts the sniper, turning it to slag instantly. This one jumps forwards again to see what happened, and another mech rises from the crater that used to be an EF4. Rising out of the flames is the other EF5, the pilot that this one thought wouldn’t be deployed, Sunrise. She douses her flames and sheaths her sword, then steps over to Rainfall’s inert bulk to inspect the damage. S22 reports in.

“Rainfall is secured. R5 is alive and stable, but unresponsive. Requesting extraction on my coordinates.”

Hailstone reports in, too. “All hostiles are dealt with, Hailstone inbound to rendezvous at Sunrise’s position.”

“Sunrise, Hailstone, Fogbank, confirmed. Extraction inbound.”

It was a quiet ride back to home base. The larger flyers necessary for transporting Hailstone and Sunrise were much quieter than the retrofitted planes that carried Fogbank and the other smaller mechs. This one had been tucked neatly into a corner for the return journey.

Back home, Fogbank’s hatch was opened and this one was hauled out by more soldiers, dragged to the debriefing room, and dumped, still naked, at Handler’s feet. This one did not look up to meet her gaze.

“Although you failed to recover Rainfall, every action you took was tactically sound. S22 claims that she would have had substantially more difficulty intercepting and dispatching the hostile had you not distracted it. And your good performance in the preceding objectives must be taken into account, too. As a pilot, you did commendably. As this squad’s ace, however, I expect a little more from you. Return to quarters. You have earned no penalty or demerit at this time.”

This one stood up and left, still never looking above Handler’s boots. It bit back the urge to apologize. Handler didn’t want sorry, she wanted better, and that would be the only apology this one was allowed to make. The weight of every other apology this one had failed to make weighed on it as it walked back to its quarters. This one lived separately from the rest of the squad. Its private living space, roughly three meters by two, was the privilege of the ace pilot. There was even a lock on the door, although this one had been instructed that actually locking its door would be interpreted as going AWOL, and punished accordingly. This one opened its door, ignored the fatigues that had been folded for it on the floor inside, and collapsed on the only furniture in the room, a tatami-style mattress identical to those the other pilots slept on. This one didn’t even turn on the lights. It laid still, trying not to think for as long as possible.

The oblivion was broken when the door opened again, and a tray of food was set on the floor. Another aspect of the isolation that aces were rewarded with, private dining. This one would not eat here, though. It had not performed to the standard of an ace, and it would not partake in the spoils of that position until it had earned them. But this one couldn’t bring itself it get up and go to the mess hall, either, so instead it stayed on the mat, willing itself not to smell the food cooling at its feet. If sleeping outside its room were not also considered AWOL, this one thought it would have found a bare corner of a hallway to spend the night in, but in truth it probably wouldn’t have had the will to get up and go there either. So this one laid in bed, for what felt like hours but couldn’t have been, and felt the hunger and guilt gnaw at each other painfully in its insides. The guilt won out, and when this one sat up and reached for the food tray, it only grabbed the butter knife before laying back down with it.

There was nowhere on a pilot’s body, even an ace’s, that will not be seen by a dozen soldiers, the other pilots, and the Handlers on a very regular basis. There was nowhere to hide a cut where it would not be found. This one had learned, however, that although the Handlers told this one not to hurt itself there was no penalty, imposed or threatened, for doing so, and no steps were taken to actually prevent this one from doing it. This one chose its left forearm, because it was easy, but there was only so much that a weak body can do with a dull blade. A half dozen cuts across the forearm, the deepest of which barely bled enough to need wiping away.

The stinging pain in this one’s arm had transformed the guilt into despair, and the pangs in this one’s stomach made this one wish that the food tray was closer to its arms and head, but by now this one was too exhausted to eat anyways, too exhausted to cry, too exhausted to do anything but think, and hurt, and wait for sleep. This one had to do better next time. It had to. It wouldn’t, though, because it already did everything it was capable of. But that wasn’t good enough, so this one would just have to become someone else, someone that could do better. But this one couldn’t do that either, so it would have to do better by itself. It had to. It couldn’t, but it had to.

The transition from person to doll is difficult. There are paradoxes and unsolvable conflicts when stillness and an independent mind are forced together. In many cases, this tension happens entirely within the confines of a ritual, where the witch is in full control and the doll is not fully conscious. These transformations are fast, typically only taking a few hours, so the pressure of sapience vs. stillness doesn’t have time to build to a breaking point. Unfortunately, not every witch is able to perform a ritual to transform their doll over the course of a weekend. This could be for lack of skill or materials, or an inability to create the safe conditions necessary for such a fast and thorough transformation.

Instead, many dolls must be transformed slowly, over months or even years. Its skin will turn to porcelain or brass in patches that grow over their body. Its key will grow from its spine, unable to turn at first. Joints will shift and morph from internal ball joints to external ones. And, most importantly for this guide, the conflict between your doll’s mind and that of the person it used to be will become a non-trivial issue. Theoretically, a doll could be placed in a coma for the duration of its transformation, and many would be willing to undergo this, but in practice, most dolls and witches that can afford to keep someone dormant for so long could also afford a ritual transformation, leaving the coma unnecessary. So, if your doll will be transforming slowly, it will likely have to contend with the stress of dissonance.

Dissonance, as it is called, is that conflict between stillness that dolls want and the independence that a human mind clings to. Dolls who have not even begun their transformations often exhibit some level of dissonance, giving evidence to the theory that the “people” who become dolls could never have turned out any other way. The important thing, once transformation has begun, is that dissonance will be familiar to your doll, and it will likely already have some ways of coping with it. Make yourself familiar with your doll’s coping and defense mechanisms. Many of them will be unhealthy for your doll, or prove insufficient for dealing with the heightened levels of dissonance that transformation brings. Some, however, will be both healthy and effective, and you must encourage your doll towards these while gently pushing it away from others.

Healthy habits often mean benign distraction combined with permission to rest. If your doll has a favorite hobby, one that does not strain it too much physically, such as drawing, making music, or playing video games, these things will help it ignore dissonance well into its transformation. Many dolls believe that they shouldn’t participate in these hobbies anymore because of their dollhood, but most dolls do require ‘play’ to maintain themselves even after being fully transformed. Anything that brings your doll joy, especially during its transformation, is inherently suited for dolls, because that thing is helping your doll. This will be reinforced by you, and by the next method for soothing dissonance, interaction with other dolls.

One of the best things witches and dolls can do for themselves is to be around other witch and doll pairs. Friendly interactions with other dolls that are fully transformed will do wonders for your own doll, and interactions with dolls who aren’t as far along in their transformation will have a similar effect. Loneliness multiplies dissonance, so regular interaction with any person or doll will help, but other dolls and witches are best. Your own presence will help at first, and will begin to help again towards the end of transformation, but tragically not during the worst parts. To your transforming doll, you are the fixed center of the universe, a thing so constant that your absence is impossible, and therefore your presence is entirely un-noteworthy. Lingering personhood will also grapple with this presence and try to put it in cynical terms, so for a large portion of your doll’s transformation it will be unable to accept the unconditional love that you have for it. Do not hold this against your doll, it loves you back, of its own will, and it will continue to do so. If it didn’t, you wouldn’t be able to transform it.

Both people and dolls struggling with impossible problems will falter. A doll, mid-transformation, will fail to accomplish tasks. It is inevitable, and it should not be ignored, but be lenient. Most dolls, even those which were used to doing a household’s chores before transformation, will not be able to consistently perform daily tasks in the middle of the process. The difficulties of physical changes and the mounting pressure of dissonance will make your doll prone to collapsing, freezing up, or being unable to get out of bed, as well as other, less severe waverings. Though your presence alone will not bolster it, your doll will greatly benefit from the actions you take towards it, if they are supportive and caring. Bring it tea, and food if it still eats. Make sure it’s comfortable, and that it feels safe, and above all make sure it knows that you understand how hard it is trying to be good for you. Make sure it knows that its difficulties are a natural part of transformation, and that they will pass with time.

Sadly, even the best and most comforting witches cannot fully penetrate the miasma of dissonance. No matter how convincing you are, and how much your doll genuinely wants to believe you, its own mind will tell it constantly that there is something wrong with it and that it must be corrected immediately. This ‘correction’ will often mean self-inflicted punishment, either neglecting itself and withholding rewards or inflicting injury on itself. The previous instructions become all the more important for this reason. Other witches, and especially other dolls will notice self-punishing behaviors and work to snap your doll out of them. Even dolls in this destructive stage will do everything they can to prevent it in others, with the happy side effect that time spent focusing on another doll is time spent not focusing on its own perceived faults.

Therefore, starting around the time when physical changes begin, your doll should not be left alone for more than a day, at the very most, and if it goes even that long, the time alone should be followed by a period of very close contact and attention. Similarly, the doll should not be left with unsupervised access to sharp objects, or those it might use to bludgeon itself. The latter sounds like it encompasses most objects in the home, and at first it does. However, the key word is ‘unsupervised.’ Your doll will be around you most of the day, so the times when it is actually alone are rare. But, as previously mentioned, your doll will become numb to the idea that you are ever not around, and therefore may still try to hurt itself in front of you. Seeing this will be extremely difficult, and it is not only normal, but of the utmost importance that you talk about the stress of it with other witches or with a therapist in order to keep yourself well cared for.

The Colonel opened the door and stepped aside to allow two grunts in full combat gear to throw the naked, shaking pilot onto the floor in her quarters.

“Your toy broke, clean up the mess and have it ready to go by the time we get the hardware fixed.”

Amelia continued to sit in the chair by her desk, glaring dismissively at the door until it closed, and the heavy footsteps had faded down the hall. As soon as she knew it was safe, she shot from her chair and rushed to the downed pilot. Its skin was still wet, almost dripping with the various fluids that cockpits are filled with: sweat, TLV fluid, and other things that had leaked out of the mech, and the pilot, during the operation. Amelia was relieved to see that there was a negligible amount of blood, seemingly just a nosebleed that someone, probably on the decoupling crew, had bothered to shove a cotton ball into.

Amelia got her arms underneath her counterpart and lifted. She was entering middle age, but the military routine kept her fit, and it wasn’t difficult to lift a pilot anyways. She hadn’t been keen on letting the Colonel see her wearing anything but a professional suit and heels, but she’d known her pilot probably wouldn’t be able to stand, so she suffered the indignity of a tank top and sweats. She carried the slim-covered thing to the couch, which she had already covered with towels. She could make out her pilot’s mumbling as she held it in her arms.

“it’s gone, it’s gone, it’s gone, it’s gone,” over and over, just barely above a whisper. Its eyes were focused on the middle distance, and its whole body trembled. Amelia set it down on the couch and took a moment to try to assess the damage that had been done to her pilot.

Physically, Pilot R5 was unharmed, but that was hardly surprising. However, its mech had taken catastrophic damage and been forced into emergency shutdown, and the shaking, muttering, and unresponsiveness all pointed to a severe shock reaction. Amelia crouched down and connected her tablet to R5’s diagnostic port. All its limbs were responding to neural inputs, implant systems came back green nearly across the board, however, R5’s combat reaction systems had caught in a loop sending the same signals as immediately before the mech had shut down. She manually shut down the implants, and R5 went still. Amelia sat down on the edge of the couch cushion, next to her pilot. She reached out and gently ran her fingers through its short, still-wet hair, and prepared to help it through the reboot.

“what… where is this one? handler?” R5 spoke softly, and Amelia saw its eyes refocus on her.

“You were ambushed, and your implants malfunctioned. You’re on base now and your implants are rebooting. Disorientation is normal, your memories will become accessible again over the next few minutes. You’re safe, pilot, I’ve got you.”

“handler… Miss… permission to…” R5 trailed off.

“Stay still, pilot, and don’t be so formal. You’re in my quarters, and we have days before Rainfall will be in flyable condition again.”

“Rainfall… this one’s… what happened?”

Amelia sighed and braced herself for the reaction.

“You were ambushed en route between secondary objectives. An MT squad hidden in an abandoned building, equipped with weapons that overloaded and blocked your sensors. While they distracted you, a sniper hit you with a railcannon, followed by an unknown projectile weapon. As best we can tell, the railcannon fired an explosive magnetic payload which destroyed Rainfall’s left arm and created a burst of electromagnetic shrapnel which damaged, or disabled all its redundant systems, and most of the primary ones. The unknown projectile contained some sort of drone which, on impact, began to take control of the remaining systems. We aren’t sure what its goal was; it seems as though it was disabled when Rainfall activated its emergency shutdown. We scrubbed the mission, and Sunrise was able to intercept the enemy mech and recover your wreckage before you left the mission area.” Amelia had rehearsed this conversation in her head the entire time R5 was in transit back to base, and she knew what was coming next.

“wreckage? will this one- is it- will they- what’s going to… no no no, can’t, can’t can’t let th- can’t let this one… Miss please, you…” R5’s face fell and its eyes started looking around wildly as it imagined different possibilities, combat implants firing a thousand more worst-case scenarios per second into its head. Amelia began to lean in to comfort it when the diagnostic tablet began chirping an alert. The handler looked over, but her augmented pilot reacted much quicker. R5 bolted upright, nearly bashing its head into Amelia’s. The jerking movement pulled the tablet off the table and caused it to clatter to the floor, which made R5 scramble towards the other end of the couch, still pulling the tablet. Luckily, as the pilot pulled itself off the couch, the tablet caught against Amelia’s hip and disconnected from its cable, sliding down to rest on the couch cushion where R5 had just been. The alert read “Warning: Pilot may be panicking. Please take immediate action to calm pilot.” R5’s reaction would have been hilarious if it hadn’t been experiencing enough stress to stop a normal human heart. Pilots, however, had their hearts replaced with synthetic ones, so it remained standing in a combat-ready position, looking around desperately for a target.

Amelia turned around slowly to face her pilot, and in the most calm, even voice she could manage she said “It’s okay, pilot. You’re safe. There’s nobody here but us. You can stand down. It’s okay, you’re safe.”

R5 locked its eyes on its handler, processed her words, and collapsed. Amelia, for a second time, rushed to her pilot on the floor. It was curled into a ball, pressing itself into the corner where the couch met the wall, and sobbing. Amelia sat down next to it, pulled it to her chest, and started speaking to it in a soft voice.

“It’s alright, R5. It’s okay. Everything’s gonna be okay. I’ve got you, you’re safe, just listen to my voice.” Amelia rubbed the pilot’s back with one hand and gently squeezed it to her body with the other. Eventually, it stopped shaking enough to speak.

“will… what’s going to happen to this one? are they… are… are they going to de-sniff-decommission this one?”

“Oh, little one… oh, no, no. No, R5, you’re okay, they’re not going to do anything to you, okay? I won’t let them. You’re mine, and I’m going to keep you safe, okay?”

R5 nodded its head and leaned against its handler. She sat and let it get all its tears out, hugging it as it lay still for a moment. After most of the crying was over, it reached up and tried to wipe its face off, then realized its arm was still covered in slime from its deployment. Amelia smiled and ruffled its hair.

“How about we get you cleaned up, okay?”

R5 nodded again, and didn’t make a sound. Amelia stood up and pulled her pilot to its feet, then guided it the few steps back to the couch, letting it sit down.

“One second, little one.” Amelia stepped towards the bed and picked up the plushie resting there; a soft, squishy, egg-shaped thing the size of R5’s torso, with wings, horns, and embroidered features added to make it look like a dragon. It was already wrapped in a towel with its face peeking out, ready to be given to the soaked pilot. R5 reached out for the plushie as soon as it saw it, and hugged it tight, breathing a sigh of relief and closing its eyes.

“Good girl, now you stay put while I get the shower ready, okay?”

R5 nodded its head, face still buried in its plushie. Amelia walked over to the bathroom and began getting everything ready for their shower, humming a tune the whole time so that R5 would know she was still there. Amelia didn’t know the name of the song, and R5 never gave any sign that it recognized it, but sometimes, when it wasn’t having nightmares, the pilot hummed the same song in its sleep.

Amelia didn’t know if R5 had a name. The military had fully transitioned to vat-grown pilots a decade ago, but R5 was much older than that. On the other hand, vat-growns had never been uncommon. Maybe R5 had lived the first few years of its life like a real person, albeit not under the best conditions. People who could take care of their children didn’t get them seized by the government and marked “psychologically fit for piloting.” Maybe it had been born in a lab and never known anything but bases, surgeons, and purpose. Either way, nobody would ever tell Amelia, and R5 itself probably didn’t even know anymore.

Her previous pilot, C18, had definitely been born naturally. It definitely had a name. Even after working as a handler for over twenty years, it was one of the oldest pilots Amelia had ever heard of, it must have been almost too old to be accepted into the program. And Amelia had pushed it hard. As hard as protocol required, and harder. She had been ruthless with it, and truly saw it as a weapon to be used, maintained to the bare minimum of function, and discarded.

Nobody blamed Amelia for what C18 did, but she blamed herself. She couldn’t bear to look at whatever poor thing was chosen to be C19, so she had requested a transfer to a different mech, was assigned to Rainfall, and she promised herself that however tough she had to be in front of her superiors, her next pilot would know what it meant to her.

Amelia laid out towels on the floor leading from the bathroom to the couch, opened all the cabinets and removed the laundry hamper so that R5 would have a clear view of any potential enemy hiding spaces. She started the water running so it could warm up, and finally stripped her fluid-stained clothes off.

Amelia gently touched her pilot’s hand, slowly moved its arms for it, and set its plushie down beside it. Then, she took its hand and led it into the bathroom, closed the door, and let R5 lock it. She guided her charge into the shower and set it down on the shower seat she’d gotten for this exact situation. R5 winced as its back touched the cold tile wall, and then relaxed as the warm water washed over its body. Amelia washed herself off first while the pilot enjoyed the streams hitting its breasts and running down its body. Once she was done with herself, she moved on to R5, gently cleaning and rubbing down its body. She started by washing its arms, then its torso, and then she gently placed a hand on its head and leaned it forwards to wash its hair and face. As she crouched down to wash the pilot’s legs, she couldn’t help noticing its girldick poking up above its thighs. She pretended not to, even as her hand brushed against it. Eventually, R5 started whimpering as it realized that it was almost done being cleaned and the touching was about to end. Amelia smiled and stood up.

“What’s wrong, pilot?” She couldn’t hide the teasing tone from her voice.

“nothing ma’am!” R5 sat up straight and pressed its legs together, visibly trying not to squirm.

“You wouldn’t be wanting your reward now, would you? You want it right now?”

R5 looked away and didn’t answer. Amelia squatted back down and turned its head with her hand to face at her.

“What’s wrong pilot?” This time her voice was serious, but not forceful. R5 hesitated.

“this one hasn’t earned a reward, Miss.”

“Nonsense. You completed your primary objective and one of your secondaries. You sustained damage well within projected limits.”

“but, Miss, the ambush.”

Amelia softened, putting her hand on her pilot’s cheek. “You did your best, and that was enough. You’ve earned your reward if you want it.”

R5 let its eyes meet Amelia’s. It nodded once.

“Good girl. Can you stand?”

Another nod.

“Good girl.” Amelia turned around to get her magic wand, and when she turned back R5 was at attention, water spraying directly onto its erection. Its handler couldn’t help a stifled laugh.

“Come here, doll.”

R5 rushed into Amelia’s arms, and began humping her thigh. She hugged her pilot, using one hand to guide its head to her chest, and moaned as it obediently began sucking on her nipple. She pressed her thigh into R5’s crotch and its hands went to her waist, pressing itself as close as it could. Amelia took her hand off R5’s head and turned on her vibrator. She ran it down her subordinate’s spine, which was rewarded by a muffled whimper into her tits, and she pressed the wand between her legs. They stayed like that a while, R5’s whimpering and Amelia’s moaning filled the bathroom, until the pilot started to slow down.

“Losing steam, doll? Turn around.” Amelia pulled her leg from between R5’s thighs and turned it around herself. She put the still-buzzing wand in its hand. “Hold this to your clit, and don’t cum until I tell you to, okay?”

R5 nodded drunkenly. “yes, Miss, thank you, Miss.” It placed the tip of the wand right below the head of its cock and slumped back into its handler’s waiting grasp.

Amelia felt the tiny weight of her pilot lean on her as she started fingering herself, putting her other arm around R5’s chest and roughly grabbing its tit.

“Nice rack, little pilot, you’re really starting to fill out. Glad to see the estrogen we put you on is working.” R5 was in the middle of saying “thank you, Miss” when it yelped as she dug her nails into its tender breast. Amelia felt its knees get weaker, and weaker still when she bit into the soft flesh where R5’s neck met its shoulder. Not hard enough to break skin, but only barely. She held it in her teeth for a moment, sucking on it, before releasing her toy and running her tongue along the teeth marks. By now R5 was barely standing, and judging by the noises it was making, the magic wand was doing just as much to torture it as its handler.

“One more thing for me, doll.” Amelia pushed the pilot onto its knees and sat down on the seat in front of it, legs spread. “Make me cum.”

Her pilot eagerly got to work, exploring her with its tongue and searching for the right spot. She put both hands on its head, and as soon as its tongue hit the target she squeezed its head between her thighs, moaning as the water ran down her tits and her pilot brought her to orgasm. R5 didn’t stop licking, even when she gave it the order to cum. It said something, probably “thank you,” that was barely audible and completely indecipherable from between its handler’s legs, and its body shook underneath her. She felt a string or two of something warm and wet hit the backs if her thighs. She relaxed her legs and R5 slumped to the ground, still holding the vibrator against itself.

“thank you, Miss.”

This one stares across the kitchen table and out into the living room. Its friends, a Greatsword and a Dagger, sit on the couch, talking. They’re watching something on the TV. This one sips its tea. It’s sweet, the way this one likes it. It sees the patina of battle damage on the Dagger. This one puts the tea down on the table to keep from spilling.

This one is talking with another doll, a different Dagger-class. This one tells it what a fighter it is, sarcastic about its recent adventures in removing bugs from its living space. That one remarks that it had better be, after 20 years of fighting experience. This one laughs, because that one is smiling, but this one is also doing the basic arithmetic. 20 years is over 2/3s of that one’s life. This one feels the need to do something with that information, but there is nothing to do except open old wounds.

This one sat in a medical room. It had been left alone in here. As expected of it, this one sat on the examination table, and never even considered getting up. It looked around at the various implements of medicine left out on the counter. Some were meant for humans, like the tongue depressors, and the sharps disposal container on the wall. The drill, however, was definitely for dolls. The nurse came back in, didn’t make eye contact. This one was told that it passed all tests and checks, and it would return to Storage and await further orders.

This one is staying the night with the Zweihander and the Dagger. It’s just arrived, putting its things down in their living space. They’re glued to a monitor, receiving news about their old handler. He’s been court-martialed, and they’re ecstatic. This one has heard them refer to him before, it has never asked what he did to earn their hatred. This one knows its stomach is too weak for the answer.

This one talks with a doll it met recently, a Greatsword-class. She tells this one that she can’t leave the county, part of the conditional mercy she is being shown for killing her handler. This one knows she is underselling how much he deserved it.

The Longsword this one loves looks at its phone. It has another message waiting from its old handler. She is never anything but angry, dismissive, insulting, and ignorant to it. This one can see its Longsword thinking anyways, weighing the effort and consequences involved in both responding and ignoring. It weighs its options, and this one moves closer to it, to try to let it share the load.

This one sat on its shelf in Storage, watching the shelf beside it. Emptied since this morning, the doll who occupied it sent off to the front. This one wondered if it should think about its own deployment as an “if” or a “when.”

The Rapier this one slept with watches it dress. She reaches out and touches the marks striping this one’s back, broad and pointed and red. They had turned that shade from a pale, angry purple. They’re just stretch marks, there is no story to go along with them.

This one takes a Longsword to the grocery store and walks the aisles with it, helping it get what it needs to feed itself. It thanks this one repeatedly, for walking beside it, for pushing a cart, for driving while it slept in the passenger seat. This one tells it that it’s no trouble, that this one loves spending time with it, that this one benefits from being asked to leave the house. This one can see on the Longsword’s face that it still feels indebted.

This one’s knees ache, and it’s hungry. This one knows other dolls, who deal with these things far more frequently, far more intensely, who cannot make them go away. This one wants to experience the pain, to try to gain some deeper understanding of the ones it shares space with, but doesn’t have the necessary discipline. This one takes an ibuprofen, it makes a sandwich.

A medical officer came into Storage, called some of the dolls for examination, called this one, too. It was told that it was being decommissioned and discharged. It was congratulated by the officer, then by the other dolls, for never having to see combat.

This one sits on the floor, its back against the bathroom door. It stares at the knife in its hand. Not a combat knife, not something you would need to be trained with. A simple utility knife, that folds in the middle, entirely unsuited to combat. The blade is sharp, but brittle, not meant to contend with anything tougher than cardboard or tape. This one thinks it should have been named Utility Knife-class instead of Shortsword. It looks down at its hip, to see if there’s any bleeding that needs to be stopped before this one pulls its pants back up and returns to the quietest and darkest corner of the party.

Deployment is not a universal experience. This one knows that. This one also knows that it has never heard its friends speak fondly of their time in combat. They never say that it made them better, or gave them anything they value. But among three tens of dolls all crowded into a small house, talking and laughing and sharing food and drink, this one sees the battle scars everywhere. Everywhere except itself.