Playmate
There was a persistent knocking coming from the door. Noroi froze in his tracks, unease flittering up his spine. People didn’t knock on the door. It was a fucking toy store; people don’t knock before entering toy stores. And yet the knocking persisted, becoming louder with each passing second. His unease grew. He enjoyed a fun puzzle, he certainly did, but his instincts, no matter how skewed, were screaming that this was about to be a very, very dangerous situation. Whatever, whoever, was beyond that door, was far, far stronger than he, and likely had no compunctions about turning him into a pincushion with some carefully pointy objects.
The doll maker wiped his hands off, closed the trapdoor to his hidden workshop, and, for good measure, took his blindfold off and placed the thin power suppressant in his pocket. Embers sparked in his eyes before he blinked them away. Plastering a smile across his face, he checked his expression in a magnifying glass. Considering it pleasant enough, he forced himself to walk over to the door, studiously ignoring the cold sweat dripping down his neck. If his eyes were a bit wild and his smile a bit tense, well, nobody would really notice, right?
Throwing caution to the wind since it honestly would do him no good, Noroi wrenched open the door stood face to face with a being he hadn’t seen in a long time and, while he would never admit it, had prayed would never see again. “Hello, doll maker,” it said, teeth gleaming in the streetlight. He flinched, the oily words dripping down his throat and choking his voice before he even had the chance to think of a reply. The creature’s tongue lolled obscenely out of its gaping maw as it grinned. “I’m going to play with you again, doll maker. Be a good boy and scream for me, okay? I do love to see your fear.”
He didn’t even have time to panic before razor-sharp teeth dug into his neck and his world exploded in agony.