It was all starting to make sense. The shaggy-brown goblin-guy who held Harry, Robin, and Manny hostage a couple weeks ago kidnapped them all again - and now Caffrin was involved!
But why Caffrin? Was it because she knew too much? She donated as much money as she could to free them; it should've been enough for him to leave them alone for good!
But why would he do it again? Was it not enough?
Or, most importantly...why were they inanimate objects?
"It doesn't make sense," Caffrin stared up at the flag, confused and intrigued as to what their captor wanted, "What does that crazy goblin-ish-thing want with us?" Caffrin stopped, noticing there was a needle tucked into the green-and-white threads on her left side - maybe it was her skin now?
She decided to leave it there for now. 'Maybe it'll come in handy for later,' she thought.
Suddenly, they heard a faint voice that sounded awfully familiar...
"Hey...psst! Over here!" The voice whispered from behind a nearby fruit bowl. A certain clock was shuffling up to them.
"...Tony?!"
Tony hoisted himself up. "None other," he spoke quietly, reaching for the notepad which was behind the fruit bowl, "Now, before you say anything, we don't want to hurt you. Not anymore."
Caffrin noticed that Tony's legs have seemingly been chopped off. "Then why are you here? What happened to us...and your legs?!"
Tony shushed her. "You'll have to be quiet; we don't have much time left! Here, I'll give you the short explanation:
"You see, we weren't always the objects you see us as today. We were humans - just like you! All of us were! But then, the Motherboard came and turned us into her little objectified minions...she had control over all of us! Our songs, our lessons, the resulting disasters...they were all her doing."
Notepad tried to nod, but she almost flopped back onto the ground. "My name's not even Notepad - it's Paige! All I wanted to do was prove myself as a professional artist, or even an art teacher...but she took advantage of that dream and made me sing about being creative, manipulate your minds...I never even hated the color green! She just wanted me to make you guys believe that to prove a point!"
"But...but we destroyed Motherboard! Why are you still objects if she was the one who cursed you in the first place?!"
Tony sighed, his clock hands drooped down a bit. "That we don't know...all we can remember is that we were both reincarnated and a strange figure picked us up and brought us here!"
"They must've done the the same with you guys," Paige picked up a pencil. "Maybe you could help us escape, and get to the bottom of this disaster!"
Harry's little string of yarn wiggled a little bit, then pointed to Tony. "That doesn't explain why you don't have legs anymore..."
"They cut them off...so we couldn't try to escape."
Caffrin was unsure of whether or not she should help Tony and Paige. "OK...but...how do we know you're really the good guys now?"
Paige grabbed one of her pages and lifted it up slightly. "If we weren't serious, I wouldn't have written this on myself..."
The page had some writing on it; in green crayon. It read, "Believe us, Caffrin. We mean no harm to you...or your friends...or anyone else."
"Hmm..." Caffrin looked back at the others and sighed. As long as they got out of this mess as well...
"OK. As long as you help us escape, then we'll help you."
Paige smiled warmly. "Thank you, Caffrin."
A loud slam was heard as the door opened up - the shaggy man was back, carrying a big green book. He put it down next to the basket and growled at it, having not noticed Caffrin or the others, who were possibly out of their positions.
Caffrin got a glimpse of the man's nametag - General Trevvor Markovia II. She tried not to say anything - but she felt as though she's heard that name before...
Finally, Trevvor left the room and closed the door again.
Tony sighed. "That was too close..."
Caffrin shuffled over to the book - it was labelled "OBJECT PUPPETEER: A Becky Sloan Biography".
Object Puppeteer...did that mean...was she...?!
"Guys, I think this book might be able to at least help us become human again!" She struggled while trying to lift up the cover. "Help me open it up."
-0-0-
After flipping through a few pages, Caffrin found a section explaining her 'career'. She read the first paragraph:
"After discovering her gift of 're-animation', she brought several inanimate objects to life in hopes of helping children learn the basics of life and education. However, a mysterious incident with one of her failed experiments occurred which caused the other living objects she had created to behave differently. They became twisted and hostile, devastating millions of young children - some of which were institutionalized - and Sloan disappeared, never to be seen again. It is said that she now resides in an old wooden cottage located deep in an abandoned clearing behind Selfridges..."
Caffrin turned herself back toward the others. "That's it! This girl might have our answer!"
Paige and Tony stared at the spool of thread, then glanced back at the book in awe and intrigue. Sloan...that name did sound familiar!
"So, all we have to do is find this Becky Sloan lady and see if she can change us all back to humans!"
"Exactly."
Harry looked around the small but crowded room. "But how are we supposed to get to Selfridges from here?"
Suddenly, a goofy-but-strangely-familiar-sounding voice spoke to them.
"Don't be silly, guys...you're already here!"
