Blossom offered to stay with the group until Ruby was more or less healed. It would probably only be a little while before the overseers gave Ruby her health boost. Sleep would take care of the stamina. A peacefulness hung over the city. It was that same peacefulness Ruby had felt yesterday. Was it always like this? The mornings would be filled with dread and fear, while the evenings would be full of calm joy. All around Ruby, dolls were happily chattering together. Their cheerful voices didn’t match the restlessness in Ruby’s heart. Truth be told, she didn’t completely understand why she felt so uneasy.
“Are you feeling any better?” Blossom asked. Ruby shrugged.
“A little bit. It’s better now that I’m not moving,” Ruby muttered.
“Well, I guess that’s a good thing.” Blossom laughed. Mary’s voice interrupted them.
“Ten minutes to health boost!” It spoke. Ruby winced as more pain throbbed across her face.
“Wow, her voice is really starting to get on my nerves,” Ruby burst out. Ivy looked up and laughed.
“I wish I could tell you that you’ll get used to it. But I’m afraid you don’t. It makes me want to tear my hair out. I’d give just about anything to spend a day without having to hear her. Mary is simply the worst in every possible way!”
“Hey now,” Blossom cut in. “I’d take Mary over Oren.” As Blossom spoke, her smile faded, and her tone became more somber. Ivy didn’t answer. Ruby frowned.
“Who?” asked Ruby.
“Oh… right… I forgot that you don’t remember things. Hm, how to explain Oren?” Blossom looked thoughtful for a moment. “So… you know how Mary is kind of the face of the city. She’s the one who talks to the audience and gets people excited for the games. It’s her job to keep things organized around here. She is in charge of everything that the public sees.”
“Yeah, she’s the saleswoman then I guess.”
“Well, that’s one word for it,” Blossom laughed again. “Anyway, Oren is the opposite of that. By which I mean, he’s in charge of everything they don’t want the public to see. Mary polishes the glass and packages it up with a neat little bow. Oren is the one who does the dirty work.”
“What does dirty work mean? Do you mean he punishes the dolls?” This was another question that Ruby wasn’t sure she actually wanted answered.
“Yes. Well… that’s one of the things he does sometimes,” Blossom said after a pause. Suddenly Ruby realized that there was fear in the air again. The room had fallen silent. Everyone was looking at Blossom. How foolish Ruby was. She was just beginning to think that she had seen the worst of the city after only two days. Clearly, she hadn’t seen anything yet and she certainly didn’t want to see any more. Ruby didn’t ask any more questions. She didn’t need to know more about Mary or Oren. All that she needed to know was to stay as far away as she possibly could from them.
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“Long story short, Ruby, don’t do anything punishment-worthy,” Ivy added.
“You don’t need to tell me that, Ivy.” Yes, that would be stupid. Breaking the rules and fighting the humans would be stupid. So, why did Ruby still want to risk it? Probably because she herself was stupid. But she also wanted freedom. Even if fighting back ended up being useless, it was still a thing that she could do. It was still a choice that Ruby could make. The overseers couldn’t take that choice away from her. They could trap her here and keep her from leaving, but they couldn’t force her to like it. How could she fight back? Would fighting back put the other dolls in danger?
Ruby looked from Ivy to Blossom, and then to Mia. Blossom had helped her escape once before. Had things changed? What if Blossom had given up on the idea of freedom? That thought was enough to shatter Ruby’s heart. Well, at the very least, Blossom was interested in the outside world. She had questions for Ruby. Hopefully, she hadn’t given up altogether on the idea of escaping.
“Strange, isn’t it?” said Ivy suddenly. “We use the word human to mean something good. You know, as in that’s the human way to handle this. It’s the ethical way to handle things. But if you ask me, human nature is one of the most twisted things to exist,” she said. Blossom nodded in agreement. There was that cold, angry look on Ivy’s face again. Her eyes burned with a green fire while she clenched and unclenched her fists.
“Anytime I do something I regret, I need to remind myself that a human would have done much more,” said Blossom.
“But there are kindhearted humans out there in the world,” Ruby couldn’t help but say. Everyone turned to her very suddenly.
“What do you mean? How do you know?” asked Ivy.
“W-well, I’ve met them. In fact, if it wasn’t for a human’s kindness I probably would have died a long time ago.” Ruby had yet to meet anyone, human or doll who showed as much kindness towards other living things as Robert had. He would be horrified by the overseers. He had been horrified. Surely, there were other humans like Robert. Of course, nobody could ever be quite as kind as Robert.
But Ruby wanted to believe that there were at least a handful of humans who at least found the games mildly disturbing. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe it was just her stupid brain telling her lies again. Perhaps Robert had been the only kind human. There was a chance that everyone else loved the games and found it fun to watch the dolls stumble around and break themselves. That was probably the truth. But if that was the truth, maybe Ruby didn’t want the truth. She wanted to listen to her stupid brain and believe the sweet lies that it told her.
All the other dolls were looking at her with disbelief written all over their glass faces. They had spent their whole lives in this awful place. These girls didn’t know anything about the world outside. Ruby couldn’t blame them for believing the things that they did about humans. Hopefully, she could bring a little bit of Robert’s kindness to them. That was all that she wanted for now. That would be her quiet way of fighting back… for now. Future Ruby would be different. Hopefully, she would be stronger. Maybe once she gained more power, Ruby would be able to really fight. But for now, all that she could do was listen to Blossom, protect Mia, and support Ivy in every way that she could.