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Nubert is sliding and jelly shaking along Castle Town, getting roars of praise and greetings. Everybody loves him, we know this. In fact they love him so much that he stumbles into the beacon of light that is the Light World and stays in his current form as he blasts through, steadily sliding out the school and through the streets.
Paparazzi flocks to him, including a plush Tenna someone dropped I guess. It falls on his back and he keeps on trucking, a parade forming behind him. This is bigger than Christmas somehow, helicopters come in to film him and agents drop to their knees to get him on contracts.
But Nubert moves on. Like Forest from Forest Gump, his trail has begun changing the world as we know it.
Plush Tenna sees all sorts of things and monsters while attached to Nubert's back. He soaks in all sorts of smells and collects slime.
Nubert doesn't take notice until the plush falls off with a wet plop. He turns and picks it up, carrying it around like an emotional support stuffed animal. The crowd goes wild, wanting a Tenna plush for themselves. Nubert starts a trend of carrying around a Tenna plush.
Everybody loves Nubert, but the Tenna plush knows the truth about the little red fiend. The real Tenna had his consciousness beamed into it from out of the darkworld all that time ago when Spamton, the love of his life Spamton, was brought back from the dead and twisted into something foul. Something new. Something NEO.
As a plush he can do nothing. No skeletal structure is there to hold him up, and his oversized head wobbles precariously on his lack of a neck. He misses being a darkner. In the light world things are so much brighter, but he had no power here. Nothing more than a toy in Nubert's arms, being paraded about and furthering *his* skyrocketing fame.
Maybe he should enjoy it. He'd never been so popular in his life, but now? With Nubert displaying him like a prize before the paparazzi, everyone wants him. Tenna plushies have become a household item! He's bigger than he'd ever been before... But it's not enough. He's not the man on top. If Nubert willed it, he'd be back in the gutter like he'd been when Neo crushed his screen in Cyber City.
He can't let that happen again.
He tries to kick a leg. Nothing. He tries to turn his head. Nothing. He tries to wiggle his antennae. Nothing. He tries to speak...
/Something/.
This body has a voice box; it seems like it's aftermarket, being sewn in haphazardly, not quite fitting in his chest, but he can hear his own voice playing from a shitty speaker.
"IT'S TV TIME!!"
An uproar begins, the crowd going wild as they hear his signature phrase. A swell of pride grows in his chest; they /love/ him.
He wills the voice box to activate again.
"YOU CAN'T GET THAT FROM AN EGG!!"
More applause.
"I DON'T NEED A MAILMAN!!"
The thunderous roar of voices continues on, but his heart sinks; /his mailman/. His poor mailman, who was killed in such a horrible accident, by the thing he's currently riding on top of. He wants more than anything to at least curse him out, but the most he can do is;
"THE KING OF ONLY!!"
Anger boils under his fabric skin.
and then again
"IT'S TV TIME!!"
"YOU CAN'T GET THAT FROM AN EGG!!"
"I DON'T NEED A MAILMAN!!"
"THE KING OF ONLY!!"
on repeat, again and again, a mocking echo of a once shining and bright life.
a life he had built and watched turn to dust. a life he had with his spammy little mailman, who had in turn turned him to glass shards and dust under his heel the same way as his dream.
If he could, he would cry, get small and cry. The once uncontrolled ability seemed like a faraway dream now that he had no control over any part of his so-called body.
He was dropped. It was hard to say if it was on purpose by the little red blob that had become Tenna's entire world, but he never ended up coming back, leaving the small, fuzzy... kinda ugly plush face down in a dirty puddle of water, the material soaking the mud up like a particularly dehydrated sponge. This is what his life has come to, not drowning in this puddle, but living out the rest of his existence like this.
He couldn't help but wonder, especially given the amount of time he likely had left, what would happen as his polyester form broke down over the course of the next 20 to 200 years. Would he still be there, or would he be finally released from this mortal coil? Maybe he'd get lucky and reincarnate again. Hopefully into a cool little poseable figure.
Shocked, Tenna felt a gooey little nub grab his arm. *What?* It was Nubert. He'd come back for some unknowable reason, now in aviator sunglasses and flocked by a gaggle of hot dogs (like attractive dogs, not sausages...I mean they *could* be sausages, you do you). *He'd come back for him? Why? To torture him further? To force him to appreciate being carried by his husband's killer?*
"Nubert," said Nubert simply, swinging him onto his back and shuffling off.
"You can't get this from an egg," Tenna remarked at a loss, speaker waterlogged and warbling.
Soon, Tenna found himself in the opulent laundry room of Nubert's luxurious estate. An affable hot dog had neatly taken out his speaker to dry as they got to work scrubbing and soaking his plush body. Tenna had to admit that this felt nice in a way: being handled gently, warmly soaking in a lavender-scented bath. Who knew Nubert--that mad bowl of pudding--had a sense of class?
The bath was over soon - sooner than Tenna expected. Nubert had even taken the time to gently blow dry his soaked through body himself - the warm air a welcome addition to the small impromptu spa day Tenna was having. The plush body was taking quite the while to dry - yet with time and patience everything was possible. Tenna let his mind drift - no use for thougts when he was so warm and clean... And tired. Maybe taking a little time to rest his nonexistent eyes and mind would do him good... So he drifts off under the warm heat and soft hum of the blow dryer.
The next time Tenna wakes, he seems to be in a brand new room, cradled safely in Nubert's arms. A closet.
It felt strangely familiar, but not in the way one might think. Tenna had never really found any reason for he himself to be *in* a closet whilst in the dark world. But there was one individual he knew that would be within one:
His beloved daughter.
The pipis that his beloved mailman of old had gifted him. A form of potential life that Tenna cared for as if it were his own child. No, no that *was* his own child. A heavy dread slammed into his conciousness: dear Angel, what happened to her?
He wanted to cry, yet this plushie prison had no means to allow for tears to flow. His next best thing was to call out for her, to see if he can somehow hear the chirps from that small oblong entity, but all he could muster up was "You can't get this from an egg!!!" Which stung, yet he tried. No response.
Tenna shouted it again. And again. He did it oh so many times he lost count at this point. WHo cares how it sounded? As long as he could hear the chirps from his daughter once more he would be satisfied.
"Nu...?" The red slime said in a seemingly confused way, glaring at the plushie. Tenna didn't hear him though, as he just kept repeating the same line over and over.
A disgruntled mumble left this individual, who spun Tenna's body around. 'What was he doing?-' was what the CRT thought, and soon he could feel something on the back of his head.
-ZZZIIIPPPPP-
Tenna froze. The sudden noise trailing down caused him to pause his constant cries for his daughter. Why did he feel more exposed than normal all of sudden? *Why* could he feel Nubert *within* his chassis (did he even have one anymore)? *What was Nubert doing to him-*
A loud CLICK was heard before that same zipping noise from before, albeit going upwards instead, followed by Nubert letting out a content hum and returning to what he was doing before. Squishing Tenna like before.
That was strange, he thought. He decided to continue his fruitless attempt at getting attention, but something was up: he couldn't speak anymore. Panic wracked up from within.
He tried again. There was nothing once more.
What was once the only way he could do *some* form of expression was fully ripped away from Tenna. Was this some cruel punishment from the Angel for what he did all those years ago?
DId he truly deserve to live in isolation forever...