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lnicol1990 · 7 years

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Ah, back home from holiday and back to civilisation and decent internet. I had intended to put up all my deviantart stories before I left, but that didn’t happen. Obviously.

Well, here’s the next story I wrote for @squigglydigglydoo‘s Toon Henry AU. And yes, there is a Last Unicorn reference at the start.

Henry stared at the ink machine, the source of all his troubles and grief for the last two days… or however long he’d been stuck in this cartoonish hell. It chugged along to itself, completely oblivious to the pain it had caused, though he’d be more concerned if it was aware.

Not that he wouldn’t put it past this toon world.

“Could you… run that by me again, Bendy?” he turned to the little devil at his side. His heart wrenched as he saw the toon flinch at his voice, pie-eyes flickering up uncertainly and not quite willing to meet his gaze. “How is this thing meant to get us all to the real world?”

“To get out of here, you have to squeeze out of this reality and into yours,” Bendy explained demurely. “This machine isn’t reality; it’s just cogs and ink. You have to ignore it and walk on through.”

The little devil’s body language was subdued and unnatural for him, as if he was retreating into himself. He’d been getting slowly worse after the confrontation with Joey, not that Henry could blame him. Seeing the one man you thought you could trust doing… that, and saying… those things…

No, Henry couldn’t blame Bendy at all.

But still, he had to focus on the matter at hand. The way out was going to be a problem, especially for him. The ink machine was in constant motion, the cogs were spinning, the pistons were pumping, and it made an almighty racket, like his neighbour’s old pickup truck, strangely enough. It was too present for him to ignore, it was too… there.

“I think this might be a leap of toon logic too far for me,” he groaned, massaging his temple where a headache was threatening to form, like it always did when he thought about toon-world-rules.

“You’re thinking about it too much again, Henry,” Boris noted, laying a hand on his creator’s shoulder. He gave the man an encouraging smile. “You need to just close your eyes and do it, like when you were finding your Hammerspace.”

“Except Hammerspace doesn’t sound like it’s about to fly apart if someone looks at it funny,” Henry countered. He looked back at the machinery and gulped in apprehension.

“Don’t you worry, we’ll go through with you!” Boris assured, giving the man a hearty shake. He looked away from Henry and turned to the angelic toon standing on Henry’s other side. “Ain’t that right, Alice?”

“Of course we will,” Alice nodded in agreement. “We’ll all go together, right Bendy?”

They all turned to the little demon, only to find him gone. A quick search of the room confirmed that he wasn’t there, curled up in a corner or hiding in a pool of ink. They knew he hadn’t gone ahead of them; they would have noticed. The only logical conclusion was that he had gone back into the workshop.

“You two stay here. I’ll go find him,” Henry instructed. He stopped before the door when he felt a hand catch him by the wrist.

“Henry, it’s just… when you tell Alice and I to stay put… you go and do something awfully silly,” Boris noted unsurely. The wolf’s ears were low, and he made a quiet whine that sounded more worried than suspicious.

He knew Boris what referring was to. Immediately after discovering Hammerspace, he’d antagonised Bendy just to see if he could draw a hole that reacted to toon logic. And, just recently, when he’d told them to stay behind while he talked to Joey, the whole thing had… well, the encounter didn’t end well.

Maybe it wasn’t so surprising that the toon was worried.

“Not this time, Boris, I promise,” Henry assured the toon, laying a hand on the toons gloved one. He gave the hand a gentle squeeze, which he received in return before Boris let him go.

He looked over to Alice, in case she had any objections. But, to his surprise, she just simply smiled at him. She drew him into a quick hug and then let him go as well, giving him a nod before he left.

She understood.

After Henry left the room, he stood in the hallway and wondered which direction to take. He took a few steps forward and then stopped, listening carefully for any sign of life, before walking to the right-hand corridor and repeating his attempts to listen. But, there was nothing, not a single sound apart from ink dripping from strange places.

He was about to continue down the right hand corridor, when something made him stop. He thought about all that was down there, the staff screening room, the… ritual room where he’d first seen Boris, and the break room that Joey had installed the ink machine’s altars in. What would Bendy go down there for? It was all just reminders of everything Joey had said to him; there was nothing but pain down there.

Following his hunch, he instead followed the corridors back to the entrance hall. The exit was nothing but fancy looking wallpaper, and he couldn’t see the devil darling in the main hall. He was about to go back and try the other way when he heard a noise, the sound of breathing, coming from the other corridor that led off from the entrance hall.

It was coming from his work station.

Henry approached his old desk carefully, quietly, so as not to spook the hiding toon. When he turned the corner and caught sight of his desk, he was surprised to see Bendy curled up in the corner between his desk and the wall, his arms wrapped around his knees and his face hidden in his arms. He hadn’t seemed to have noticed Henry’s approach, but he lifted his head slightly when the old man kneeled down beside him. After recognising the animator, Bendy lowered his face from view again.

The pair of them were silent for a minute, both waiting for the other to speak. Eventually, Bendy raised his head again –only slightly, just enough so his words wouldn’t be muffled.

“Joey… he said–”

“I know,” Henry interrupted gently, not wanting to go over what the old studio director had said.

“He told me that–”

“I know.”

“I thought that you’d–”

“I know.”

“Would you stop saying that?!” Bendy growled weakly, raising his head higher to glare at Henry, seemingly annoyed by the man’s calm indifference to the situation. But, as soon as their eyes met, the little devil looked away, his face softening to a hurt and confused expression. “He… he lied to me. He lied to me. I don’t understand. Why? Why did he lie, Henry?”

The old animator sighed sympathetically. He scooted closer to the toon until he was an arm’s length away, and the reach out to the little devil. Cupping Bendy’s cheek, he used his thumb to wipe away the inky tears that were falling down his face. He sighed again, thinking of how to explain everything.

“It’s just… how humans are, I guess,” he began, still wiping away Bendy’s tears. The sorrowful toon was watching him with rapt attention, drinking in his every word. “Sometimes, the truth is so painful that you can’t admit it, not even to yourself. It’s easier to say that someone else is to blame for all your problems. It was easier to blame me for the studio going bust; I’d walked out on him and the studio, as far as he was concerned, and wasn’t around defend myself.”

“But it was wrong!” Bendy protested, pushing Henry’s hand away so he could stand before his creator. Tears were streaming down his face and his usual smile had turned into a heart wrenching grimace. “I believed all those things Joey said about you. I believed him, and it was all wrong! I was wrong! And all I’ve done is torment you, and hurt you when you’d done nothing to deserve–!”

Henry reached out to the gibbering toon, ink dripping down his head and from his eyes, which were slowly going more off-model the more he spoke, the realisation of how badly he’d messed up finally dawning on him. In one swift movement, he pulled the little devil into a tight hug, instantly silencing the demon and making him stiffen in surprise.

Shit, he could even hear the little guy starting to hyperventilate.

“Listen to me: none of that matters anymore,” He whispered quietly near Bendy’s ear. A slight turn to the devil’s head towards him assured him that Bendy was listening. “It was easier for Joey to blame me, and that’s what he did. I’m just sorry that he put that all on you guys, too. I’m sorry I left. I’m sorry I wasn’t here. But it’s over now, and we can all go home.”

Almost immediately, Bendy pushed against Henry’s chest and tried to wriggle out the man’s arms. The animator released him without hesitation, though not without a worried frown on his face, afraid he’d gone too far. But instead, the little devil just stared up at him with a timidly hopeful expression.

“Home?” he repeated nervously.

“Yeah, buddy,” Henry gave him a watery smile, tears finally running down his own face. “Joey may have held the rights to you guys, but I was the studio’s artist. You’re my toons and I’m not leaving you behind. Not this time.”

Bendy suddenly launched himself at Henry, starling the old man for a moment, and wrapped his arms tightly around the animator’s neck, burying his face in the man’s shoulder. Henry could feel the little devil’s hands holding the back of his shirt in a death grip, and he could feel the toon trembling subtly, which rapidly turned into sharp, distinct shudders. Before long, his shoulder began to dampen, and ink ran staining trails down his shirt.

Relaxing, he wrapped his arms gently around the sobbing toon, one hand against the little devil’s head while the other rubbed small circles over his back. He murmured quiet, comforting words, promising his old creation that everything was okay, that he was there, and that he wasn’t leaving. Whenever Bendy sobbed harder, he shushed him softly, rocking slightly from side to side.

Eventually, Bendy’s cries subsided into shuddering breaths, hiccups, and sniffling, but the man didn’t move or stop his comforting motions. He did stop his murmuring, and listened intently for when his toon had sufficiently calmed down. It wasn’t until Bendy’s breathing quietened, and he loosened his death grip on Henry’s shirt, that the old animator finally stilled.

“You feeling better, buddy?” Henry asked gently. He waited patiently until he heard a strangled hiccup from the toon and felt him nod slightly against his shoulder. “Okay then, let’s go home.”

Without giving the toon time to think about what he’d just said, he adjusted his hold on the little devil and stood up. He felt Bendy gasp in surprise and his grip tightened slightly, but he slowly relaxed against the animator’s chest and remained still as Henry began the long walk back to Boris, Alice, and the ink machine.

---***---

Despite his physical stillness, the little devil’s mind was in overdrive. Too much had happened for the toon to really process between the events with Joey, showing everyone the way out, and Henry calling him his toon. Feeling the old man’s arms around him was surprisingly grounding, and he clung to that feeling like a life raft.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been held like this; he was almost certain Joey had never hugged him, or carried him around like a child, or a stuffed plush doll. He and Boris had never been all that touchy-feely, but Alice might have drawn him in for hug and a quick peck on the cheek… maybe. Regardless, he took his time to drink in the moment.

He could feel Henry’s heart pounding from the old man’s chest. It suddenly made sense to him now how fearless the man was; his heartbeat was so strong and fierce. Henry’s arms held him firmly yet gently, as if the animator would never drop him but would let him go the moment he asked. But, what Bendy noticed most was the heat coming from his creator.

The man radiated warmth and Bendy could feel it seeping into his ink, right down to his core. It just seemed to whisper comforts to him, telling him to relax, calm down, and not think about all the nasty, painful thoughts bouncing around his head.

Henry’s body heat, heartbeat, and arms wrapped securely around him… they all lulled him into a sense of calm and peace. He wondered if this is what ‘safe’ felt like, or ‘loved’, or maybe even ‘home’. He felt like he could fall asleep in his creator’s arms, and nothing bad would happen to him.

Creator… Joey had always used that term: ‘his creations’ and ’their creator’. It had always sounded wrong to the little devil, impersonal, unfamiliar… clinical. It had always felt like there was a gap between Joey and the toons, a void that they couldn’t cross, should never cross.

And yet, with Henry…

“Hey, Henry?” he murmured softly, not quite sure if he wanted an answer.

“Yeah?” the animator murmured back.

“You were the studio’s artist, right?”

“That’s right.”

“So… if I’m your toon, does that make you my artist?”

He felt Henry’s chest rumble as he chuckled softly, and his arms tightened gently for a moment. He could feel –rather than see– the smile on the man’s face.

“Yeah, I guess so, buddy; if that’s what you want.”

Bendy nodded mutely, tears quietly running down his face. His artist. His artist. It felt so much better, more natural to think of Henry like that.

“Here we are,” Henry mumbled quietly to him, lowering him to the floor.

Already, they were in the ink machine’s room, his artist had carried him all the way and he hadn’t paid any attention. He could feel the mischievous side of him whine in embarrassment over everyone seeing him being carried like a child, but it was quickly shut down when Boris and Alice approached him and gathered him up in a big, toony group hug. They were both whispering how much they’d missed him, and how happy they were to be back together again.

Everything he’d done, everything he’d said… all was forgiven.

When the hug broke apart, he turned back to Henry, who had been waiting patiently for the toons to make up. As his artist approached the ink machine, he and the other toons joined him in a line. He noticed Henry offer his hand to Alice, who took without a second’s hesitation and offered her free hand to Boris. The old man then turned to him, and held out his other hand to him, a small, gentle smile on his face as he did so. Bendy smiled back as took his hand and held on tightly.

“Let’s go home, guys,” Henry said, one final time.

He watched the man close his eyes, blocking out the noisy machine and placing his faith –and life– in his toons. It felt appropriate to Bendy to copy the man, and he noticed Alice and Boris closing their eyes as well before he followed suit.

And then, as one, they walked through the ink machine.

#bendy and the ink machine #batim #squigglydigglydoo #toon Henry AU #fanfic

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