Chapter 1: Prologue
The thunder and lightening crashed in a dizzying show of light and sound, like an orchestra of the gods. However, Lotso was not in heaven. Hell would have been more appropriate. For Lotso, his time as a toy, loved and cherished by a single child, was over. Done, finished, kaput. They say that when toys are replaced, they start wandering endlessly, not knowing where to go. However, Lotso knew where he wanted to go. With his baggage of one toy baby and a soaked clown, the stuffed bear waded his way through puddles of water, dripping, into Sunnyside daycare. Now, Sunnyside was no ordinary daycare. Every so often, a toy would get out, share stories of the place. The tales were rare, but what did come out was not pleasant.
These rumours did not dissuade Lotso, however. To him, they were the ramblings of a mad toy, perhaps one that a toy played with too roughly. To Lotso, the terrors of Sunnyside were his ambrosia, his nectar. His heart, a burning coal within a shell of soft stuffing, could not be pierced by any child, no matter how young and unimaginative. To Lotso, Sunnyside was simply the means to an end. In his early days, Lotso was arrogant, selfish. While he retained the second quality well into his rule over Sunnyside, the first soon demised when a searchlight from Sunnyside, made its way onto his chest, and those of Big Baby and Chuckles.
Though Lotso’s heart was made of stuff colder than liquid nitrogen, he was inexperienced, and it took him too long to realize why those seeking lights watched him, so he continued towards the door of Sunnyside, ignoring the searchlights as they followed his path. Suddenly, he found himself at the door and could not get in. Repeating what he had done when looking into Daisy’s room; he climbed atop of Big Baby and used his paws to open the door. However, the door did not budge. A sudden clicking on the other side of the door tipped Lotso off balance and he fell off Big Baby, with the large infant losing its balance as well and falling on his back, and splashing into a puddle. When they looked up, the door had opened, and eight shapeless toy soldiers, carved of wood and holding fearsome looking rifles, their height around half of that of Lotso had come out. They stopped both Big Baby and Lotso from getting up by pinning their feet and hands. Lotso quietly resigned to his fate while Big Baby yelled and struggled, but it was of no use.
Two more soldiers had brought two planks with them and tied both Lotso and Big Baby, still pinned to the ground, to these boards. Four soldiers carried them in, while the other four addressed the remaining problem. Chuckles was trying to escape, running as fast as his little clown shoes could carry him. Unfortunately, the suction cup of a toy arrow stopped him, tied by string to a watchtower in the playground. Like Big Baby Chuckles struggled, weakly asking anyone for help, but he was, like the others, tied to a board and dragged inside by the remaining soldiers. Chuckles watched as the door, his one key to freedom, slammed shut, with such a sound as to make any man shrink back in fear. That would be the last time Chuckles, Lotso, and Big Baby saw freedom for twenty days.
The Faceless soldiers marched the imprisoned toys in unison towards…something. They could not exactly see where they were going, only that they were going somewhere. Big Baby continued to struggle senselessly. She was certainly dedicated to getting out. If only she had known that such acts of defiance were not allowed in Sunnyside. The trio entered a small, dark room. Lotso at this time was busily trying to figure out what was happening, where he was, and why, Big Baby was still struggling, and Chuckles was utterly silent. Lotso’s concerns soon became answered as he was placed down in this room, his board leaning on the wall. Without a struggle, his and Chuckles’ boards were pinned to the wall through two ropes at the bottom of the top of the boards. The soldiers did this in a machine-like, professional manner, not stumbling at all with the knots. However, Big Baby was putting up a fight, shifting constantly and rolling around to stop them from stabilising the board. After a few seconds of struggle, a few extra soldiers helped and managed to secure Big Baby, at which point two more soldiers appeared, carrying what appeared to be an unopened Jack-In-the box.
With a large ‘clank’, the Jack-In-the-Box landed on the floor and the two soldiers began to turn the handle. Slowly but surely the ominous music signalling the surprise pop out of the Jack-In-the Box began playing, at a laborious pace. Banging which appeared to be coming from inside the box it sped the soldiers up, and two more soldiers sped up the process. The music was playing at twice the speed now, and it even made Chuckles smirk a bit. However, The Clown’s momentary smirk fell off his painted face as the demonic song concluded and the figure within the box popped out. A large, smug, Jester, with a slight twitch of insanity, he surveyed the three toys, before clearing his throat. He had an odd voice, quite low and with an undercut of menace but cheerful enough to catch the naïve toy unawares.
“Well, well, I do believe we have three new arrivals.” He looked at the three toys one by one, starting at Lotso. He closed up on the plush bear, poking him with what appeared to be a sceptre. When he took the point of his sceptre and held up to his nose, his face was one of disgust.
Ugh!” He shouted at Lotso, “You smell filthy. Where have you been, the dump? That is no place for a Lotso-huggin-bear. Do you have the gall to smell so terrible in my presence?” The Jester asked. When he got no answer, he scoffed and continued to the next toy, who happened to be Chuckles. After surveying the clown, he pointed his sceptre at him.
“What’s your story, clown boy?” The mocking Jester asked the terrified Chuckles. After staring at him for a few tense seconds with no answer, Jester repeated himself.
“Well?” He demanded an answer from the clown. After a while of staring, Chuckles broke down.
“W-we just want a home, S-sir. We’ve been-” The Jester quieted his pleas mid-sentence with maniacal, satirical laughter. After a few minutes of laughing, he turned to the soldiers.
“You hear that boys? He just wants a home. Maybe we should send off to play with his owner?” He sarcastically asked the toy soldiers who also began laughing. After he had finished his mocking, the Jester turned dead serious as he came up close to the shivering Chuckles.
“This is your home, clown boy. In addition, it is going to be your home for a long time. If I hear so much as a peep out of any of you about how lovely your old homes are, you’ll all be serving time in the arena.” The Jester announced to the three stricken toys as he turned to the last toy, Big Baby. Looking at the large, confused and still struggling doll, he closed up on her. However, when he opened his mouth to say something sarcastic and emotionally damaging about Big Baby, he was head butted by the determined doll. Falling backwards, partially from shock and partially from the fact that Big Baby was a quite strong head butter, he struggled to get up. After help from the soldiers, he was in a steaming rage. Staring at the Doll, his eyes like vengeful infernos, he lifted his hand, but stopped himself. Releasing his fury at that second, he calmed himself and turned to the soldiers.
“Give this Baby a night in solitary confinement. I want her close to the other toys. Helps break her resolve when all the toys are hounding on her. As for the rest of these fools, I want them assigned to Cell A and B, respectively.” He said coldly. With that, he walked back to the two soldiers who had been carrying him previously and went back into his box. The soldiers then carried the despicable Jack-in-the-box back to his surveillance room, while the six soldiers originally carrying the three toys did so again, after untying them.
The three toys knew from the beginning, as soon as they laid eyes on the Jester, that this would not be a joy ride of any sort, but they could not have possibly prepared for what awaited them. Tonight was to be the most terrifying night of their lives. Gone was the warm bed of Daisy. In hindsight even, the cold streets were better than what was coming. This night was to be the longest of their lives, burned into their minds like a heated brand onto a cow.