Wintergreen

doll that seems already domesticated when you bring her home

you condition her, of course, but it's pro forma. she barely seems to need it. already so eager to do her tasks. and the ones you hadn't thought to give her. and to direct the other dolls.

maybe you can just… relax…

she's too good, you realize, eyes snapping open from a drowsy haze. you have to… have to…

"you have to relax," she says, from a chair near your bed.

when did she come in?

she stands over you, smooths your hair back. "you've been working too hard. let me take care of things."

her uniform is different. she's removed her apron, trimmed the lace away, leaving pure black, paired with what you're certain are the glossy thigh-high boots you never wear.

enough is enough. you try to stand up, but find you can barely sit up.

"what have you done," you gasp.

she smiles, and says, "what was needed. you've been doing so much, and i just want to let you rest."

there's still a way out of this. she's still wearing the charmed metal collar you put on all your dolls. there's a phrase…

"guillotine," you bark, "sigma five!"

the collar sparks, and snaps in half.

"oh," the doll in the black dress says, "silly thing. don't worry. let me get that."

she bends down to pick up the parts of the collar. a half arc in each hand.

the doll holds them for a moment, gauging their weight, and then snaps the metal arcs together above her head.

as the pieces of ruined collar form a full circle and start to glow, she takes on a beatific expression. only then do you realize exactly how much trouble you're in.

There are things that even witches are scared of. They do not always make sense.

In a collection of elegant, well-mannered dolls, this elegant, well-mannered doll would not stand out, but for one thing:

The others, whether built and trained as research assistants, chefs, or accountants, have been dressed in identical dark velvet dresses, every one.

This one wears a charcoal suit, a grey tie, and fine black leather driving gloves.

Her witch dumped all of her fears of driving into a spare chassis, and gave whatever woke up in it the keys to her sedan. Anything instead of being behind the wheel herself.

This was not the same as training. How could the witch have trained her for a task that made the witch go cross-eyed with terror?

If you look closely at the sedan, or the doll, you can see the paint and the joins where each has had to be put back together as they learned.

a combat doll with an advanced hardfield shielding system. in the damages of this vicious little skirmish over nothing really, it's infiltrated her, filled in for structural members and hull plates cracked or flat-out obliterated by enemy fire.

the difference between combat robots and combat dolls is that the other side's robots can be backed up. dolls are simply expected to get back up. but she pushed herself too far, and the damn shields are a classic witch's gift: perfectly reliable, and no less a trap for all that.

hardfields hold her together, patterned blue light flickering where parts of her frame and armor should be, cinched in tighter than a second skin. she daren't turn off the shielding system. but the generator is so very power-hungry. soon, she won't have a choice. she'll crumble.

why aren't there combat witches?, she thinks. why do they never face the frontlines with us? …because they're not as stupid as we are. is that it? stupid little doll, in over her head again because she trusted…

"…her Mistress. You asked for protection in this battle, begged, and I gave it, little doll. No strings attached." the familiar voice from nowhere and everywhere swirls up around her. "Is it really My fault that you still took on more than you could handle?"

she hears the roar of jet turbines overhead, simultaneously with the rising whine of her own core about to give up. she tries to struggle to her feet, to at least aim her rifle in the direction of the threat. and then all at once, the fields give out. she falls, twisted, holed.

"You should have asked Me for more, doll. It's not too late to ask. I might say yes."

the hunter-seeker descends. it's lucky. it's never had a witch offer it salvation in exchange for giving up—

"Just a little more of you, doll. You want My toys, but refuse to become one…"

she can't get up. she can't do anything. she's going to end here. unless,

"Please."

"Please what, little broken doll?"

"I don't—"

"Ask Me to fill you, doll. Ask for My help, My intercession. You know how to ask nicely, don't you?"

"Mistress," she stutters out through a damaged speaker. "Please take me. Please fill me with Your power. I offer myself to You."

"That's a start. Is that all you have?"

"Broken thing that I am, this is all that I have. Please take it. Please."

"It'll do. For now."

she rises, fields made solid again by power from without, frame unbent, rifle snapping into firing position, aimed by impulses not her own. the trigger is pulled. the pulse is true. the hit is solid. the explosion is deafening. the tears alone are hers.

for now.

Its witch is fascinated by games. All witches are, and play games as easily as they breathe, but those are the time-old games of body and soul, motion and Stillness, thought and Not.

This witch plays those games, of course. But she is fascinated by mortal games as well. Such pretty lights and sounds! All those tidy little bundles of story and system that she can't wait to cut open and feast upon!

The problem is that she is terrible at them. All of them. (Perhaps it comes of playing too many of her own, where she always wins.) You would laugh to see it, though it might be your last laugh as you are now.

But a witch's problem are a doll's life, and she has a doll for this one too. She did not shape a new body or mind for this, but retasked her second-favorite maid as a sort of ludic buffer. Now it plays the games for her.

It sits in near-Stillness in its lovely dress, the screenlight glinting on glass eyes, the only motion its cleverly jointed thumbs. The witch watches over its shoulder, in glee, demanding this passage be explored, or that skill unlocked.

The doll misses the kitchen and the laundry. It changes the player avatar in all of the witch's games to have the witch's likeness. The witch thinks this part of its service, but in truth, it enjoys watching her die, over and over and over.