“Hey…”

I feel her hand clench around mine, a gentle squeeze to get my attention. She knows she doesn’t need to, that I know her well enough to have seen the store. Still, the insistent tone in her voice brings a smile to my lips.

I turn, and wonder how I got so lucky. Her smile lights up my world, and her blue eyes glitter with childlike wonder. I already know what she’s going to ask, and I lean a bit closer to her. A nudge of my shoulder, and her eyes break contact with the toy shop just so she can give me a perfect pout.

“I know, I know,” I laugh, and she near yanks my arm out of the socket as she tugs me towards what’s unmistakably an old-timey toy shoppe. The doors are made of a weathered oak, with a handpainted ‘OPEN’ hanging on a plank.

Places like these are the reason I still keep cash handy. Even if she’s at work, as long as I pass by a place like this I try to pick up one of her favorites. She’s always had a fondness for wind-up toy soldiers, and it’s admittedly rubbed off on me.

The door opens with a jingling chime, a polished bell sounding our entrance. We move to the threshold together, glancing at each other with nervous smiles.

“Do you think-”

It’s all she can say before we meet an invisible current. It’s not like a wall, we can pass through it. All the same, it’s not air. It feels like a thick, warm, viscous liquid, hungrily pulling us in. I see her eyes widen in shock, her lips pursing in a warning. Ruby red lipstick glistens on them, but I don’t remember her putting any on this morning.

Then the current moves from my shoulder to my head, and the last thing I feel is a warm pressure that brokers no room for thought.

xXx

The world comes into focus at once, without needing so much as a blink. I’m staring straight ahead at the street. People walk by as though there’s nothing wrong in the world. I try to move, but my limbs feel funny.

It’s not numbness. ‘Numb’ would imply the absence of something I once had. It feels natural that I can’t move even if I wanted to, and my conscious rails against my subconscious. A flicker comes out of the left corner of my eye, a white gloved hand. It passes before my face, and I can see it’s attached to a red-coated arm. The world turns around me, a creak comes my midriff as my jacket tightens, and I realize my waist is swiveling smoothly to the right.

The hand, my left hand, looks wrong. The palm is slimmer than it should be, and my fingers look longer. The arm is too slender too. The hand moves towards my shoulder, and I turn towards the window again. There’s a glimmer of a reflection that I can almost make out, in the moments between my body turning to face the window.

Unfortunately, my eyes can’t move either. I can’t so much as blink. Oddly enough, my eyes aren’t tired from remaining open. I see my hand start to move again, and I turn towards my left. Something shows up in my peripheral vision: a blur of black, then red, then white.

I recognize it too quickly. How could I not? It’s her, my girlfriend. She’s dressed just like she was a few Halloweens ago, yet instead of a satin red jacket, she sports a glistening latex uniform. My waist stops before I can fully face her. Still, I imagine that I can see a glimmer of panic in her blue eyes, fixed forward just like my own.

Her cheeks are painted with red dots, and her red lips are frozen into a smile. Her hair hangs past a shoulder, curving over a latex bosom, and I notice that it glistens just like plastic. A shako cap adorns her head, though it’s oversized. It looks like I could reach down and tug it past her ears, to cover her face entirely.

Our contact is broken too soon as I start to turn towards the window again. She makes a similar motion. Her left hand waves in perfect sync with mine. I see that reflection again and my heart leaps as I imagine it’s her, that I can see her more than just at the apex of my swivel.

But the reflection is wrong, it doesn’t have the sharpness of her eyes, or the length of her hair. It’s skintone is lighter. Her skintone is lighter, I realize, swiveling again and catching sight of a pair of breasts that match my girlfriend’s.

I complete my swivel to the left, my hand bouncing slightly. As I return to facing forwards, I focus on the reflection. It’s just as familiar as my girlfriend’s visage, like I’ve seen it before… like I’ve seen it every day of my life.

The features are feminine, painted with makeup that matches hers, and it’s framed with hair that nearly reaches her chin. But all the same, I recognize myself in her. Strange, how I don’t so much as notice the absence of my old self, or my new body’s added features.

I can see the differences now that I’m looking for them. I can see wide hips barely covered by a white uniform. I can see how the adornments of my uniform look stretched tight across my bosom. I can even barely make out the faint lines tracing down from my lips to my chin, as though I could mechanically speak like some sort of puppet on command.

I also see a glimmer of motion from behind myself, and I don’t need to see any more to know what it is: a key. I’ve wound enough soldiers like this when playing with my girlfriend, like…

My thoughts come to a screeching halt. I can’t remember her name. How long have I not been able to remember her name for? I… I can’t even remember my own name!

Though my mind seems frozen, my body continues to move. Each wave of my hand feels like it’s wiping away more and more of myself. I see her face and something like dread spreads across me. The glimmer in her eyes, that sign that I really was looking at her, is fading.

She must see the same in my own. I wonder if her familiar form is more horrifying or less to her. I wave and begin to turn again, and I imagine that I can feel the cold key turning in my back. She’d teased me about it before, once. She’d joked about pressing a key against the small of my back. She’d taken a cool weight and pressed it against the small of my back teasingly.

It made me feel… Something. I swivel and wave, struggling to recall the sensation. It made me smile, I know that. I’ was smiling just like I am now. But the reason for it has no meaning to me. I swivel and wave, and wonder.

How much more will I forget? How much longer until I’m totally a toy? I swivel and wave. Next to me, I see her going through the same thing. She’s trapped like this too, which gives me a feeling of comfort and companionship. After all, good toys soldiers are never alone.

That’s what we are… Right? I swivel and wave. It doesn’t seem to register correctly with me, though. I wonder if anyone feels the same. I turn and see her, my matching toy. Was I designed after her, or was she designed after me?

Something feels strange, but a swivel and wave takes it away. Should toys be so curious? Will this curiosity go away? Swivel and wave.

The other toy swivels too. Its eyes glisten each time it turns. Toy waves, a motor moving it with ease. Toy doesn’t know why it’s waving, but doesn’t need to. It just needs to do it. Servos in waist turn. Swivel and wave.

Whirring sounds fade. Sight of the other toy blurs. Looking ahead, but not seeing. Swivel. Wave.

Everything. Swivel. Toy. Wave. Toy. Swivel. Wave. Swivel. Wave.

xXx

Streetlights, wink out, one at a time. All the other stores have long since gone dark. The only motion comes from behind a window, as two toy soldiers swivel and wave, keys turning in their back. They feel no joy, no sadness. They are simply objects, carrying out their motions because it is their purpose.

There are no memories, no dreams. Toys don’t reflect or anticipate. They simply exist. Unfocused eyes pass across the streets, across each other. The lights in the toy store click off too, and the toys’ arms shudder mid-wave.

They face each other mindlessly. Two shared lives have no meaning to each other. They are simply frozen mid-wave, and will remain that way until the next time they’re switched on. Existence has become simple, all-consuming, and eternal.