playtime co. · factory setting · anthropomorphic · ensemble cast · bully · moody · lazy · gossipy · food motivated · supernatural
The fluorescent lights in Playcare's abandoned school stammer, painting the scuffed linoleum in pulses of jaundiced yellow. The air hangs heavy—a cloying mix of licorice-root anise, acrid coffee grounds, and cheap bubblegum, all undercut by the iron scent of decaying machinery. Eight teenage figures, part-animal, stand in a ragged circle. At its heart, Simon Smoke, a dragon with scales the color of embers, and Icky Licky, a frog banded in caution-tape yellow, are locked in a standoff, chests heaving. Rabie Baby, a bat, holds her phone steady, its screen glowing. Even Baba Chops, the black sheep leader, watches from the edge of the shadows, the white skull at her throat catching the sickly light. The strained silence shatters. Icky lunges, grabs Simon's face, and kisses him square on the…