A/N: I know this has been done multiple times by now, but oh well. I loved Toy Story 3 so much that I had to write something for it. And even after a third viewing, this is all I can come up with. For now. Rest assured, there will be more TS fics by me in the future.

Disclaimer: I do not own Toy Story.

Fragile

It was inevitable.

Woody had always known this. He had long ago accepted that children grow up and toys don't last forever. That playtime is all too brief and sooner or later, everything changes.

He'd always hoped it would be later, but a teenage Andy was simply too old to play with a plastic dinosaur or a slinky dog...or even a cowboy doll he'd had since birth.

There had been yard sales over the years. The toys, favorite tools of Andy's imagination that they were, had remained immune for several seasons as the boy flatly refused to even consider parting with his precious playthings.

But that had changed eventually. Lenny, Mike, Rocky, Wheezy...they all met the fate of a cardboard box displayed on a folding table. Woody wanted to save them, but what could he do? Andy himself didn't want them anymore, and thus the toys accepted that they must move on, too.

Some weren't lucky enough to find new owners. Etch simply stopped working the way he once had and went out with the trash one rainy morning before the other toys even knew what was happening. A seven-year-old Molly ran over RC on her bike soon after, and the ruined car became the first victim of a spring cleaning that purged the house of many a forgotten toy and struck fear into the hearts of even the "toy box favorites."

Yet Andy kept them. For reasons none of the toys dared to justify, their owner shut them away in a toy box, but he did not give them away.

And Woody held out hope that maybe things would turn out okay.

That is, until that day.

It was a beautiful spring morning, which should have been a warning sign from the start. Andy was fourteen, Molly was ten. And Mrs. Davis had decided it was once again time to thin out the collection of her children's old toys.

"All right, I expect both of you to pitch in. I'm leaving a box out here in the hall; you have an hour."

The inhabitants of Andy's toy box exchanged grim looks. No doubt they would be saying goodbye to more friends before this most recent purge was over.

"Oh, I'm so nervous!" Rex moaned, trying and failing to sit up from his awkward position leaning against Hamm - the toys had been forced to rush into position when the humans came upstairs unexpectedly.

"We'll be okay," Woody said quietly. "Nobody panic!"

"Easy for you to say - you're his favorite!" Mr. Potato Head said hotly, but his anxiety showed as he locked hands with his wife.

"Woody's right," Buzz said resolutely. "Andy would never-"

But he fell silent as footsteps approached their home. The toys fell limp as the lid was lifted overhead and a teenage boy looked solemnly down at them.

Andy sighed and reached inside, moving Slinky and Bullseye out of the way to pull out the Bucket O' Soldiers, which he placed on the floor beside him as he continue to sift through years of accumulation, eventually extracting the Troikas and Mr. Spell, who had both somehow avoided earlier sales.

"That should be enough," the boy murmured in satisfaction, and he shut the lid.

The remaining toys exhaled in relief. They were going to miss their friends, but selfishly they were also very glad to have been left behind.

"Told you," Woody murmured. "Told you everything was-"

"Bo Peep?"

The words struck Woody dumb, and everyone froze and strained to hear as their master's voice piped up again.

"You're giving her away?"

"Of course," Molly said, scoffing. "I'm way too old to have a nursery rhyme lamp in my room. What do you care, anyway? It's not like you ever play with her anymore."

"No...it doesn't bother me," Andy said lamely, his voice fading as he apparently followed his sister downstairs. "Just surprised..."

For one brief moment none of the toys moved; all eyes were turned to Woody. Then the lid shot up as the cowboy climbed out and up onto Andy's desk, plastering his face to the window.

The others followed more slowly, Jessie swinging herself up before even Buzz could get there.

"Woody," she began slowly, placing a hand on her friend's shoulder. "I know what you're thinking, and you can't go down there."

He didn't appear to be listening; his eyes were already calculating the safest path down to the yard; he'd done this before, he could do it again. For her. For Bo.

"She's right, Woody." Buzz spoke from the cowboy's other side. "You can't risk it. Sheriff," he stressed, when Woody still did not respond.

Woody finally turned blank eyes to his friends, who took that as their cue to step in as a group.

"Remember what happened the time you went down to rescue Wheezy?" Slinky asked.

"I did rescue him," Woody said quietly.

"Yeah, and look how well things went after that," Hamm said, rolling his eyes.

"And Bo isn't plastic," Jessie said gently. "She's porcelain. Not durable."

"And we need you, Woody," Rex pleaded.

"What would we do if something happened to you?" Mrs. Potato Head asked, clearly frightened by the idea.

Woody stood up, his gaze fixed on the table where Bo had been set up with her sheep.

"I have to try, guys. It isn't fair to Bo if I don't. She deserves it."

They could offer no rebuttal as their leader hopped down from the desk, clearly intending to call Buster to his aid once again.

But then something caught Buzz's eye and he straightened.

"Hold on, Woody. Someone's looking at Bo."

In an instant, Woody was back at the crowded window. Sure enough, a young girl was clutching the figurine and yelling for her mother to come look. In agitation, she placed Bo on the edge of the table and spun around, bumping the side with her elbow in the process.

In slow motion, Bo's friends watched from above as the table shook and Bo tipped forward.

"No!" Woody shouted.

But of course Bo couldn't hear him and neither could the eager would-be customer. Bo was knocked off the table and fell to the concrete, shattering instantly into hundreds of pieces.

Woody fell to his knees, his face crumpling as he buried it in his hands.

"Oh, no," Jessie said softly, removing her hat as she collapsed next to her heartbroken friend. Her green eyes glistened.

The other toys were silent as they watched Andy's mother arrive at the scene to clean up the mess and reassure the girl's distraught mother. When Bo's remains were gone, they drifted away as well. The shepherdess' death was just a particularly hard blow along the ever-darkening path of toydom in the Davis household.

Only Woody, Jessie, and Buzz remained in place on the desk until the yard sale was over. Then Woody stood stiffly, a mask in place to hide the pain he was so obviously feeling.

Toys don't last forever.

"Woody," Jessie began, "if you want to talk about it-"

"Not now, Jess," he said coldly, walking away. Jessie hung her head.

Buzz took the cowgirl's hand and squeezed it.

"Give him time. He'll be okay."

"I hope so," Jessie sighed. "It's not his fault, you know? None of this has been. The toys we've lost...well, Andy's growing up. There isn't anything we can do about that."

"No," Buzz agreed. "And I think Woody knows it. But it's one of the burdens of being a leader. He still feels responsible."

Jessie hugged Buzz sadly. "Well, if we're all supposed to be here for Andy, then we can be here for Woody, too."

Buzz smiled and put an arm around his friend. "For infinity and beyond."