Chapter Text
Astro and Dandy had agreed to meet on one of the floors with a projector to watch the tapes. After some deliberation, the date was set. 10:00 PM, Floor 7.
But before that, Astro was dismayed to learn that today was the next meeting of the book club.
Now, Astro enjoyed book club, but he had been kept up quite a bit last night by Dandy, and he’d been kept up even longer by… that. So he hadn’t gotten as much sleep as he’d liked.
Unfortunately, the rest of the book club members knew Astro well enough to determine that he was struggling to stay awake. It was Dazzle who spoke up first.
“(Astro, are you okay? You seem kind of tired…)”
The moon’s head snapped up. “Hm? Oh, I’m fine… just didn’t get enough sleep last night,” He responded, staring blankly down at the book in his lap. It was a rather compelling story about pie recipes and the abuse of the last will and testament.
“Really? What kept you up?” Brightney wondered, setting her own copy of the book aside.
Astro pursed his lips, not sure how much of last night’s activities he should reveal. Definitely not the doppelganger monster, that was obvious. But maybe he could at least talk about the laboratory…
“…Dandy and I went on an excursion,” He finally began.
The other members of the book club leaned in, now very intrigued. Even Razzle was drawn in.
“We were looking around Gardenview. Looking for anything that could tell us why we were abandoned. And… we ended up finding an elevator.”
“Well, yeah, there’s three elevators right in the lobby,” Razzle interjected. “What made that elevator special?”
“I’m getting there.” Astro cleared his throat. “After a… very long ride, we ended up in this… laboratory. I think it’s where us toons were made.”
There was a brief pause as the book clubbers gasped in shock.
“That was my reaction, more or less…” The moon nodded. “…but other than a couple of diagrams, there wasn’t anything groundbreaking.”
“Nothing groundbreaking- Astro, you found a secret underground lab where toons are created.” Brightney rolled her eyes. “How much more groundbreaking can something get?”
“Yeah, I want to see this lab for myself now!” Razzle announced, jumping up from their beanbag chair. “Where’s the elevator? Me and Dazzle can check on our own time.”
“Oh, uh… I don’t remember,” Astro lied, bringing a look of relief to Dazzle’s face. “It was night, and I was tired…”
“Aw.” Razzle seemed disappointed, but quickly bounced back. “Well, why don’t we ask Dandy? He might know the way!”
The moon hesitated. “…I… could do that.”
“Thanks! You’re the best, Astro!” Razzle cheered.
“(Astro, are you SURE it’s not dangerous down there? Or off limits? Or uninhabitable? Or anything?)” Dazzle pleaded, clearly wanting to keep Razzle from dragging them down to a mysterious lab.
“He might say no.” Astro shrugged.
“Psh, Dandy? I’m sure he’ll give us the okay!” Razzle chuckled. “In fact, I’ll go find him now. See you two later!”
And the ribbon twins skipped away, with Dazzle mouthing ‘(help me)’ to the two remaining book club members.
“Wait! Book club isn’t-” Brightney glanced at a clock. “Oh. I guess it just ended.”
“In that case, I should probably get going too.” Astro picked himself up, adjusting his blanket (a fresh one) before starting off-
“Wait.”
…he slowly turned back around to face the lamp, who had a raised eyebrow. “…just now, were you telling us everything you saw in that lab?” She questioned.
Astro felt his stomach churn. “…yes. I told you everything.”
“…okay.” Brightney’s expression changed to a less confrontational one. “You just ended the story kind of abruptly, so I was wondering.”
“Mhm.” Astro nodded. “Well, I have to go. Bye.”
Before Brightney could keep him any longer, the moon ran off, hoping Dandy wouldn’t be too upset about this.
Thankfully, Dandy wasn’t mad when Astro met with him that night.
“In the future, try to not tell the others about this kind of stuff,” he explained. “We don’t want to cause a panic, and letting toons find out that there’s a giant monster copy of you in the basement would definitely turn some heads.”
“Right, sorry,” Astro nodded, fiddling with the projector.
Dandy shook his head. “Nothing to apologize for. Really, it’s my fault for not telling you that I wanted this under wraps.”
Astro nodded again. “…I have to ask. Are we going to tell anybody about this?”
“Oh, probably.” Dandy took out one of the tapes, preparing to play it. “We just need a better grasp on the situation first. These tapes should help.”
Once the tape was placed in the slot, Dandy flopped into a beanbag chair and motioned for Astro to sit in the one next to him. He did so.
“This is the one about… ‘Ichor Poisoning’, right?” Astro questioned.
Dandy nodded. “I previewed the other ones. They didn’t seem interesting. You can watch them yourself if you’d like.”
“Right.”
“…it’s starting.”
Ichor Poisoning
Delilah Keen
This tape elaborates on the effects of Ichor poisoning. If you have not already watched the prior tapes, ‘Ichor’ and ‘Toon Creation’, please do so now.
No matter how safe and reliable we are able to make the toon creation process, there will always be the possibility of something going wrong. This ‘something’ is known as Ichor poisoning.
There is no definite cause for Ichor poisoning. The leading theory is that it is a mutation caused by the nature of Ichor as a material; prolonged skin contact with Ichor and extreme mental duress seem to speed up the rate at which the condition worsens.
Ichor poisoning progresses in stages.
Stage one is completely undetectable. The toon shows no physical or mental symptoms.
Stage two is characterized entirely by mental symptoms. Toons experience behavioral changes, most often becoming isolated and irritable.
Stage three is when physical symptoms begin to show. At this stage, the toon’s body is producing increased amounts of ichor, causing full body aches and brain fog. The sclera of the poisoned begins to look irritated and red. In the worst cases, toons can sometimes become completely unresponsive to all stimuli.
Stage four, the last observed stage before the experiment was brought to a close. In this stage, the toon begins leaking Ichor from all open spots in its body and begins to wander aimlessly. The sclera turn a bright red, the teeth grow sharp, and the toon will attempt to attack anything it sees.
Should you recognize any signs of Ichor poisoning in a toon, tell a staff member. As there is no way to completely prevent progression, the toon will be retired and replaced with an identical copy.
As always, do not tell them about the nature of Ichor poisoning. Simply tell them they were sick with something and move on.
Please move to the next tape in the list, where Walton will instruct you further on how to keep toons contented.
The screen went blank.
…a lot of things were going through Astro’s mind right now. The tape had been a lot to take in, after all. Ichor. Testing. Incurable. Aggression.
But what stuck with him most was the little sentence at the end.
the toon will be retired and replaced with an identical copy.
He didn’t understand. Toons couldn’t just be… replaced.
Could they?
identical copy.
He thought back to the monster in the lab. Was… was that thing meant to be a copy of him? If anything had happened? And then it turned out to have Ichor poisoning instead of-
What if they weren’t the clone
Astro stood up, pulling his blanket with him. He staggered over to the projector and ejected the tape, before walking to return it to Dandy.
He had this empty look on his face. Not an emotionless look; there was plenty of emotion in his gaze. He was drained.
“…did you…” He swallowed, closing his hung open mouth. “Did you hear all of that?”
Astro nodded. “I watched the same tape you did.”
“Okay.”
…
“So you heard that they-”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
…
“…that monster in the lab.”
“A clone.”
“…a clone of you.”
“Yes.”
…
“Do you think there’s others?”
That was a thought.
If Astro could have a clone of himself, who’s to say there couldn’t be others? Monstrous versions of his friends, left to rot in the deepest floors…
“It’s funny,” Dandy claimed, though he didn’t seem amused. “…I thought I knew everything. At least, more than the other toons. Arthur filled me in on all the inner workings of Gardenview, how Ichor doubled as a power source-”
He let out a small, quick laugh. “After he told me that, I thought I had superpowers for a week. Devan caught me trying to make a bunch of flowers bloom in the greenhouse, he thought I was going crazy…”
“…sorry.” The flower sensed he was getting off topic, and returned his gaze to the ground. “Point is. Clearly, I didn’t know anything,” he mumbled. “…anything important.”
“They didn’t care.”
Dandy let his words hang in the air for a moment. Unsure if they were the truth.
“They didn’t care about us,” he repeated. “If they were willing to… replace us, without so much as a second thought. If they were willing to abandon us here on the off chance that we might turn violent.”
“…Arthur gave you the key to the lab,” Astro rebutted, sensing how close Dandy was to some kind of breaking point. “Without that key, you would have never found the tape, or the blueprints… he cared about you enough to-”
“He didn’t care enough.”
“…Dandy-”
“He didn’t care enough to tell me why he was going away.”
“Maybe he wasn’t able to! Maybe there was-”
“He’s the owner of the museum.” Dandy’s hands began to curl into fists. “Who’s going to tell him he can’t at least give us so much as a- a warning about this stuff?”
“I-”
“What if someone had turned by now?” Dandy pushed himself to his feet, turning to face Astro fully. “We wouldn’t know what was going on, why a friend was attacking us, that it could happen to us too- I know someone would try to reason with them! I’d have tried! And it wouldn’t work, and they’d-”
A hand on his shoulder brought Dandy’s spiral to an abrupt end.
“…Dandy.” Astro spoke firmly, ignoring the small lump in his throat. “There’s no point in getting upset over this.”
“I have PLENTY of reasons to be upset!” The flower spat back.
“I never said there was no reason. I said there no point.”
Dandy closed his mouth.
“…I’m upset too. I… don’t look it, I know, but…” Astro took a breath in. “…what’s the point of hating someone you might never see again?”
Silence.
“…exactly.” Astro slowly pulled his hand back once he saw Dandy’s shoulders relax. “If they ever do come back, you’re welcome to give them a piece of your mind. But until then, we need to focus on ourselves.”
“Ourselves.” Dandy echoed. “Right. And… the rest of the toons.”
“…you said you spoke with Dyle, earlier.” Astro recalled, trying to keep Dandy’s mind off the tape. “He’s organizing for supplies to be ordered to Gardenview?”
“He is.”
“That’s good.”
“…it is.”
…after a long while of talking, the pair finally exhausted their conversation topics. But they’d made it all the way to Dandy’s room by that time.
Dandy’s bed was in a far corner of the room, a rather unimpressive thing. Dandy insisted that it never be replaced or repaired, as it held sentimental value to him. He rolled onto the mattress and pulled up his bedsheets, preparing to close his eyes.
“…Astro?”
“Yes, Dandy?”
“Can you…” Dandy paused. “I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep well tonight.”
Astro let out a soft sigh. “…Dandy, I can’t put toons to sleep. You know that.”
“I do. I just…”
The flower looked away, his gaze landing on a dusty rocking chair by his bed.
“…you’d like me to stay with you?”
“…yeah.”
“Of course.” Astro took a seat, and the chair creaked loudly as he did so. “…this chair ins’t going to collapse, right?”
“No, Pebble’s been sleeping these for a couple days. It shouldn’t.”
“Good.”
…
Dandy closed his eyes.
After a minute, Astro did too. Hopefully he could give Dandy a good dream tonight. He needed to focus on something other than Gardenview’s secrets.