They set the fire, p.1
They Set the Fire, page 1
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This book is for my dad.
I see stuffing in a big metal chest.
I see stuffing inside a twisted plastic nest.
I see stuffing piled along a cold gray floor.
I see stuffing in a crowded brown drawer.
TEETH AND CLAWS
1
Proto—it was still hard for Buddy to believe it. Proto: the first Furrington Teddy sewed by the Creator known as the Mother. Proto: the shrewd trickster hero in the teddy tales spun by Reginald. Proto: who persuaded the Mother to sew eight other teddies known as the Originals. Proto: whose story ended right here at Furrington Industries, where the Suit had corrupted the Mother’s formula for the best teddies in the world.
After escaping the teddy village in the cellar, finding the factory above had been a shock.
Finding Proto behind a dusty glass case had been an even bigger shock.
Now that Proto was freed, Buddy could take a good look at him. Proto had the same pudgy teddy belly and stubby teddy limbs as Buddy and his friends. But the Suit had made a lot of changes to Furrington Teddies. For the first time, Buddy saw those changes plainly.
And those changes hurt.
Buddy and his friends’ plush was made of “Ryulexster,” a synthetic fabric. Proto, however, was made from the Mother’s cherished Softest Fabric in the World. Proto’s plush was blue, the same as Buddy’s, yet not at all the same—Buddy marveled at Proto’s glossy, velvety depths.
Buddy and his friends had cheap plastic eyes prone to scratches. Take, for example, Pookie, the fork-legged red teddy who’d died leading their escape from the trashlands—she’d had a big white scratch through her left eye. Proto’s eyes, however, were the Mother’s original marble, as deep and mysterious as the starry skies Buddy had seen on the darkest of nights.
“Proto, tell us about the Mother,” begged Reginald, the gray teddy.
“No, tell us about the Originals,” said Sunny, the yellow teddy. “How do we stack up?”
“I would like to hear more about this factory,” said Nothing, the white teddy. “I used to live beneath it, you know.”
Buddy, the blue teddy, stepped forward like the leader he was.
“All good questions,” he said. “But first … after all that time trapped inside a case … are you okay, Proto?”
All about the teddies lay shards of glass from the display case they’d shattered to free Proto. The old teddy had fallen out straight on his muzzle like he’d forgotten how to walk. Sunny, always attuned to her Teddy Duty, had been the one to rush forward and help Proto to his feet.
Proto was still relearning how to move. He lifted an arm. It squeaked and progressed stiffly. Finally, Proto’s paw reached his head. Buddy stood taller. Proto was going to salute the four courageous teddies who’d freed him!
Instead, Proto combed back a patch of spiky plush.
“You are speaking to Proto.” His voice was more musical than any teddy Buddy had heard, like a tiny orchestra inside his stuffing played every word. “The case wasn’t cozy-wozy, as I used to say of the Mother’s home. But I am fine. I am perfectly fine.”
“You said you have so much to tell us,” Buddy reminded him.
He wondered if Proto had anything to say about Forever Sleep—that supposedly wondrous state of nothingness that took over once a teddy was embraced by a child.
“I do indeed,” Proto replied. “But first—what in the world has happened to you, poor teddies?”
Proto had been locked here since long before Buddy, Sunny, Reginald, and Nothing were created. It made sense to Buddy that he’d have just as many questions as they did.
Buddy gazed down at himself. What had happened to them? His fur was scuffed all over from gravel. His tummy had a hole in it where Daddy had stabbed him with a trash poker. His nose was fractured where a Cherub had shoved him to the boiler room floor.
It must be a strange sight for a teddy like Proto, who’d never seen much of the outside world at all.
“Your feet,” Proto pointed out. “Why, they’re not blue at all.”
Buddy held out a foot for examination. It was a brown mishmash of stains.
“That’s from the trashlands,” he said. “And from the journey to the city. It was a difficult trip, Proto. Our friend Horace got stolen by a garbage gull. Our friend Sugar got torn up by a teddy-monster named Mad and then stuffed into a hungry sink.”
“A hungry sink?” Proto harrumphed doubtfully and gestured at Reginald. “You there, gray teddy. Explain those scars all over your back.”
“I’m a bit embarrassed of those,” Reginald said. “The cellar teddies hated themselves so much, they persuaded me to hate myself too.”
Proto double-harrumphed and swept a paw at Sunny. “All those holes, yellow teddy. Don’t tell me the sink had teeth!”
Sunny inspected the four-hole patterns all over her body. “The Cherubim had forks. And they really liked to use them.”
Proto pulled off an impressive triple-harrumph before squinting at Nothing. “And what woe befell you, my white friend?”
Buddy hated to see Nothing’s flaw called out but Nothing didn’t seem to mind. When she’d been built in this factory, the right half of her body had been sewed on higher than the left, so that one eye was rather above the other and she walked with a limp.
“Manufacturing error,” Nothing replied. “But Buddy said we all have manufacturing errors. Some of them you just can’t see.”
Buddy smiled at Nothing. The white teddy hadn’t yet mastered smiles, but she gave it another try. The right half of her mouth-thread slanted upward, leaving the left half of it behind. Well, it was a start.
“And where are the rest of you?” Proto demanded.
“The rest of us?” Buddy asked.
“You mentioned two friends who didn’t make it. Horcrux? Slugger?”
“Horace and Sugar,” Buddy corrected.
“Surely you had dozens, perhaps hundreds, of teddies in your teddy army!”
“There were only ever five of us,” Sunny said.
Proto’s harrumphs sounded like the spitting of a mouthful of dust. “Why, even the Originals couldn’t have done that!” he cried.
Nothing gestured at her friends. “These are very talented teddies.”
Proto perched blue paws upon his hips and frowned at the rough-looking quartet.
“You’re telling me that you—little teddies!—fought off birds in a trash dump? And walked miles and miles into the city? And battled a teddy-monster? And were trapped by cellar teddies with low self-esteem? And got forked by scoundrels called Cherubim? And yet still made it all the way here, to the lobby of Furrington Industries?”
Buddy nodded proudly. “That’s a perfect summary, Proto.”
Proto’s laugh wasn’t a laugh. It was a scoff, like he didn’t believe what the teddies said. The old blue teddy sized up each member of the group, feet to ears, one after the other, stopping at Buddy.
Buddy gulped. He’d dreamed of meeting Proto during many naps, and it had always involved hugs, happiness, and hip-hip-hoorays.
Proto paraded down the desktop, head high, like he alone understood bravery. But Proto wasn’t used to walking. He made it three steps before he stumbled, rolled, and dropped four teddy-lengths to the floor.
By the time Buddy, Sunny, Reginald, and Nothing climbed down far more carefully, Proto was swatting himself free of dust.
“Are you okay?” Buddy cried.
“I am Proto,” the old blue teddy snapped. “Of course I’m okay.”
Proto peered around the lobby, taking in sights he hadn’t been able to see from the glass case. The peeling linoleum, the rodent droppings, the puddles of rainwater, the table of decaying donuts. After giving the teddies another hard look, Proto puffed out his handsome blue chest and lifted his adorable chin.
“Well then, teddies! If you made it this far by yourselves, I commend you. But oh-ho! You have not yet found what you wanted, have you? Say—what is that I see straightening your tangled fur? What is that I see rising like dawn in your scraped-up plastic eyes?”
Golden thread curved Proto’s fluffy muzzle into a grin.
“It is hope. You poor, wretched teddies will not be wretched for long. In the shape you are in, you need a leader. And teddies—you have just found the best.”
Cheers erupted from Sunny, Reginald, and Nothing. The three teddies leapt for joy, bouncing soft bellies off one another and cavorting around Proto, who held his heroic pose.
Buddy forced a smile and made a single lackluster leap. He knew he should be as ecstatic as his friends. This was Proto! The cleverest teddy in history! Who would somehow turn the failure of their journey into a success! Yet Buddy f elt loss. He’d been this group’s leader from that first frightening day in Garden E. Being a leader had given Buddy purpose, drive, and meaning.
Now, just like that, it was gone.
2
Proto gestured at the bottom of the lobby’s front door.
“See that hole there? Before dust covered my glass case, I watched mice go back and forth through it. If we can push aside that board, we can wiggle through it too.” He pointed at Sunny and Nothing. “You, yellow teddy. You, white teddy. Why don’t you give it a try?” He turned to Reginald. “And you, gray teddy—might you clean a path through this floor so that my footsies don’t get any dirtier?”
Sunny and Nothing scrambled to the door, squashed their bodies against the board, and began pulling, shoving, and grunting. Reginald seized a scrap of police tape and began scrubbing the floor in front of Proto.
Buddy didn’t love Proto’s commanding tone. But he told himself he was being silly. This was Proto! Anything Proto asked, the teddies ought to do! Still, it bugged him. Proto might be history’s shrewdest teddy, but according to Reginald’s stories, he’d never even been outside without the Mother. He had no idea of the dangers he was hurrying them toward.
Furthermore, Buddy didn’t like this yellow teddy, white teddy, gray teddy business. That was cellar-teddy talk. Buddy made an ahem sound humbler than Proto’s mighty harrumphs. “Don’t you want to know our names, Proto?”
Proto gave him a curious look. “Ah. Hm. I hadn’t thought about that. Well, I notice that you have name tags just like Geoffrey, Jasmine, Ulric, Anita, Edmund, Beatrix, Antwan, and Sheila.”
Buddy’s stuffing went electric. The Originals! Proto had really known them!
“I’m Buddy. This is Reginald. That over there is Sunny and Nothing.”
“Nothing?” Proto asked. “What kind of name is Nothing?”
“The teddies in the cellar didn’t have name tags,” Buddy explained, “so I invented a name for her.”
Proto cocked his head. “These cellar teddies you speak of … how many are there?”
“I’m not sure. Fifty?”
“Fifty! Why, that’s a whole battalion! Let’s go round them up! No one can stop fifty Furrington Teddies!”
Buddy winced. “I don’t think they’re ready, Proto.”
“Balderdash,” Proto said, and Buddy felt another bolt of electricity. He’d heard this catchy catchphrase countless times in Reginald’s stories. “Lead me to them, Butter. I’ll stand atop some hill or peak or whatnot and deliver an inspirational speech. Or perhaps they’d prefer a rousing song?”
Buddy tried to speak as respectfully as possible. “They know almost nothing about being a Furrington. The outside would frighten them so badly I don’t think we’d get to where we’re going without losing most of them. Also, my name is Buddy, not Butter.”
Proto tapped his foot on the freshly scrubbed floor. “I concede that would be an unfortunate outcome.” He clapped his paws. “I’ve got it! We’ll send a troop back for these cellar characters once our mission is complete.”
“What is our mission?” Nothing’s polite voice, though small, carried across the silent lobby.
“The mission … I … uh…” Proto rubbed his fuzzy chin. “There was never a lack of missions at the Mother’s home. Always tea bags to fetch and lost remote controls to find.” Proto scanned their faces. “Do you teddies have a mission?”
Sunny nodded. “We’re trying to find the Suit.”
Proto recoiled. “Why on earth would we want to find him?”
“We figure if anyone can repair us, it’s the Suit,” Buddy explained. “Then we might find children after all.”
“That’s right!” Sunny said. “We might even find Forever Sleep!”
“There’s still a chance for us, Proto,” Reginald insisted.
“This is all very acceptable,” Nothing added.
Proto tapped his foot some more. “I suppose I do owe you teddies for freeing me. And it is true that I know the Suit’s wily ways better than any teddy alive.”
The old blue teddy clapped his paws, forging a cloud of dust.
“All right then! We will find that villain and demand satisfaction! A nice long walk will do my stiff teddy limbs some good.”
Sunny spun in the dust. “Now that’s what I want to hear!”
“I believe we should search the factory first,” Nothing said.
“Search the factory?” Proto echoed. “The factory is a tomb, Nutty!”
“Nothing,” Buddy corrected.
“I’m eager to leave too,” Reginald said. “But Nothing’s right, Proto. We might find helpful things here. Even weapons.”
Sunny emerged from behind the dust cloud. “Hey, Proto, did you know I once made a suit of armor out of a tin can and toilet paper rolls?”
The yellow teddy grinned in anticipation of Proto’s praise—then deflated when Proto ignored the boast. Buddy thought that was a little rude.
Proto combed back more of his fabulous fur. This gave Buddy an idea. The old teddy seemed awfully concerned with staying pretty.
“The world is filled with rain and mud these days,” Buddy said. “If we look around the factory like Nothing said, we might find something to wear to keep clean. Otherwise, Proto, you could end up looking like us.”
Proto’s mouth-thread rippled in horror. Reginald stole a quick glance at Buddy and grinned. The gray teddy understood Buddy’s trick, which made Buddy feel better. He still had some leadership to spare!
“It wouldn’t surprise me if there were specially-made teddy clothes somewhere in this factory,” Reginald said.
Proto frowned in thought. “Teddy clothes? Do you think?”
The gray teddy nodded. “In the final story I told about the Mother, the Suit talked about special rooms where they kept fabric and mixed dyes. It wouldn’t surprise me if they also had special rooms for … accessories.”
“Accessories,” Proto repeated.
“Accessories,” Buddy, Sunny, and Nothing chanted.
The word was magic. Buddy’s days upon the Store shelves were getting harder to recall, but this word brought back a forgotten detail. Naturally, the aisles had been packed with large boxes of warriors, fashion models, board games, and stuffed teddies. But they’d also been packed with smaller boxes containing accessories—always sold separately.
Buddy thought back to Darling, the little girl they’d briefly had, and how she’d outfitted the teddies for tea parties with cowboy hats, socks, even an upside-down plastic glass. Wouldn’t it be grand to have real accessories? A dapper tuxedo? A trendy fedora? A casual poncho? A flattering cape?
Proto clearly had the same thought. “Yes, I believe we should search this factory before soldiering forth into the gloom! I am so glad I came to this decision. Aren’t you too, teddies?”
3
Buddy knew little about ghosts, but the old factory did seem haunted. The five teddies crept past dust-drifted sewing tables, beneath a rust-crusted conveyer belt, and between laboratory tables that stunk of dye. All the while, Buddy thought he could feel the feelings of those who’d spent time here.
The workers: aching fingers, aching spirits, aching thoughts.
The teddies: puzzlement during assembly, elation at shipping.
The Suit: pride, then concern, then panic.
Buddy hadn’t lied to Proto. He did hope they would find accessories. But the real purpose in searching the factory was to dig up possible clues to help them find the Suit. Proto’s urge to plunge outdoors was dramatic, but rather dangerous.
The factory floor had nothing of use—only sadness. Reginald, though, recalled from a Proto story that the Suit’s office was on the second floor. That might be a promising source for clues. So the teddies gathered at the foot of a long staircase, standing close enough for static electricity to snap between them. Buddy and his friends had grown to enjoy this encouraging crackle, but Proto leapt away.
“Yowch!”
“Oh, sorry,” Buddy said. “You probably haven’t felt that since the Originals.”
Proto laughed nervously. “Yes. That’s right.”
Buddy saw Proto give the teddies a full up-and-down look. Proto was clean, and they were dirty. Maybe that’s why Proto didn’t want to get too close. This frustrated Buddy. Proto didn’t realize a teddy had no hope of keeping clean outdoors!
