It's Your Life: The Sleeping Demon

Tobias the Tinman

"Alright, fine!" Rage admitted once the memory vanished. "Maybe there was a reason for it. But nobody asked or cared so why should we?"

"I'm sure if you let Blake explain to his parents-"

"NO."

"Rage-"

"We're not gonna apologize because we're not sorry. Not ashamed at all. Right guys?" he looked to his friends for backup, who all looked away awkwardly. Only Glum spoke up, absent-mindedly in his defense. "I miss Shame."

Light snapped her fingers in triumph. "AHA! SHAME! I knew there was another one of you! Where is he?"

Rage gave Glum the death stare from his answer.

"Not here." is all the moods could answer with. Light looked all of them individually in the eye, pleading silently for some sort of hint of trust. "Guys, please. I'm not your enemy here. I just want to help Blake out. If he's lacking a certain emotion, that can be really damaging to how he acts around his loved ones." The only response Light got was the heavy silence and small coughs from Phobia. "Fine," The angel said sadly. "I'll be on my way."

Glee hopped up from his beanbag chair. "I'll lead you out."

Out in the neuron hallway, Glee took Light's hand and lead her to the center of the floor. He then backed up toward the double-doors and pressed down on a certain softer spot of the wall. "Find Tobias, he should be able to help you find him."

Light looked stunned, "Wait find who?"

Suddenly, a swarm of Blake's thoughts from the wall passed down onto he floor beneath Light's feet. The girl watched as they formed into a perfect circle and in an instant she felt herself being lifted by this magical new platform up into the air. She looked at Glee, who gave one last encouraging nod before she disappeared into the ceiling.

Most of the ride up was dark, all the angel could hear were random thoughts and ideas Blake came up with on a whim. Once when she dared open her eyes, she saw two white streams of thoughts cross together. One said, "Should I draw rockets?" the other said, "Should I draw octopuses'?" When the two merged, they became a bigger brighter bulb. An idea. It said, "Octopuses' launching rockets!" and proceeded to float away across Blake's mindset like the hundreds of thoughts and ideas around it.

Eventually, the angel arrived at a higher plane of Blake's mind. Like the headquarters, it was a library, yet this one looked so much more grander with a mesh look of fantasy and modernism. The floor were tiled stones, the stone, vine covered shelves as tall as towers, with hundreds of books - memories - shelved efficiently. These shelves stood together facing the angel, all lined up for miles creating different aisles. At the very top of each shelf, a sign could be seen saying "April: Current." The one to the left marked "March." and so forth, all rewinding to Blake's earliest memories dating back possible years. These were a lot of memories for a four-year old. Meaning some spring cleaning will be in effect sometime soon for when he's older. As light walked through the current month aisle, she kept her head up at the sky above. It was as bright as the real one outside, blue covering the whole library. Every now and again, a puffy glowing cloud would glide through it, whispering about a fantastic dream Blake might've had the night before.

In a place as big and open as this, it was inevitable that Light got lost somewhere between March and February of this year. Luckily, the place wasn't as abandoned as it looked. A grey Blake wearing construction uniform and holding a clipboard came by with his crew. "Blake?" Light asked him. The grey child blushed. 

"Aw you're too kind, but as if I look anything like the big guy! Name's Neuron A-122. We're just clearing out some irrelevant stuff if you don't mind."

"Oh certainly not! I just appear to be...lost."

A-122 scanned Light up and down and then looked at the shelves. " You're certainly too big to be a memory. Don't tell me you're some sort of vivid flashback."

"No, I'm Blake's new conscience. I'm looking for a man named Tobias-"

"OH NO!" A-122 dropped his clipboard and huffed. "That guy did NOT come by here again! Crew we got a code rodent again!" The construction Blake look-a-likes all hopped up from their equipment and began searching frantically for this supposed wanted man.

"Wait what's the problem?" Light asked, trying not look startled.

"Tobias ain't supposed to be here, he should be in Harretland. But holy cow that guy can't stay in his territory. He's always here messing up our work."

"Oh jeez." Light replied, beginning to re-consider on trusting this guy.

"We found him!" One of the neurons called from behind the January shelf. A-122 and Light ran over to catch the crook. And...his appearance was definitely not of Light's expectations.

It took just looking at Tobias for Light to realize he was Blake's imaginary friend. The man wasn't even a man, he was a racoon with a baby blue color scheme wearing an aluminum tinfoil suit. The look was completed with a purple bowtie and a tin can for a top hat. His blue eyes darted back and forth at the neurons surrounding him as if this was a police standoff. The racoon raised his hands in the air and laughed nervously. "Oh heeey A-122! Caught me again I see?"

"Don't play innocent," A-122 snapped. "You're on the wrong side of the mind, pal."

"Wait!" Light spoke up. "I need Tobias's help with something. If you let him come with me I'll send him back to...whatever-land as soon as possible."

"HARRETLAND, you swine!" Tobias corrected. The neurons all exchanged looks before agreeing to hand Tobias over to Light. Once the construction crew were out of sight, Tobias dropped to his knees and clung tightly to Light's legs.

"OH THANK YOU!" He said, "I thought for sure they were going to kill me this time!"

"No problem," Light said as casually as she could while politely pulling the over-sized rodent off her. "So, you're Tobias."

"The one and only, Tobias the Tin man!"

"I was told to come find you by Glee."

"Glee? What does he want with me?"

"Well, I don't really know. He said you could help me find someone," Light hesitated in case the name was also a sensitive subject for Tobias. "Help me find Blake's shame?"

The silliness in Tobias' eyes vanished as a flash of concern came over them. "You want to find Shame? Why?"

"I feel as if Blake has been missing some shame in his life. It's not all bad most of the time."

"That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Shame just puts everyone down for everything."

"But-"

"I'm not helping you. Who even are you?"

"I'm Light, Blake's shoulder angel. Please I just wanna help-"

"If you really wanna help you'll keep Shame in that abyss down there. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to blast off to Mars with Blake and some octopuses'."

With that, the racoon teleported away with a 'pop' sound. Light sighed hopelessly. The only ones that could possibly help her now were A-122 and his group. But they long disappeared, it would take her another hour to try find them. If only this place had a map or something. With nothing but the motivation to help Blake, the little angel continued toward the end of the seemingly endless aisle.