Work Text:
Cogs.
That's who we are.
We were created.
Invented, if you will.
By an enigmatic potent.
At first, when we booted up our systems for the first time, everything was black.
We were unable to communicate nor compute.
Then a screen full of brightly green codes ran across the insides of our optical sensors.
Codes that made various installments, adjustments, and programs.
* B L I N K *
When we were finally installed with a sense of awareness and projected AI levels, the only thing we vastly remember is our wires shearing up and our gears churning rapidly. Once our systems were fully online, we were automatically assigned with a unique model number, our faction, and our assignment.
Freshly built from the factory, we were sent to the workforce straight away, stationed to a guild, and instructed to work. The only choice we had in the matter was what our formal names would be, as it was supposed to on quote: “give us a sense of lifelike identity”.
As we toiled away to our jobs wherever we were stationed, we continued to perform perpetually in our already designated careers. We struggled, competed against our peers, tried desperately to please our superiors in fear of being fired. It was tiresome, depressing, taxing on our gears...
But despite it all, it gave us purpose, as unnerving as it was. And we were able to climb our way to the tier that we wanted. For we knew that any other cog under the fifth tier was deemed unworthy. And being unworthy in Cog Nation is a sentence to a reputation of scrutiny and shame.
The only thing that would ever try to trip us up and deter us from our goals were our own faults, our enemies, our downfalls, sometimes even our own co-workers, and our insecurities.
….But those obstacles could not dare to hold a candle to our largest distraction yet: Toons.
Ever since we came across your kind, we harbored a great distaste towards your uncanny sense of tomfoolery. The silly, wacky, loony lifestyle you expressed, made our gears grind and our wires crossed. Truly was a nauseous sight to see. All cogs would strongly cringe witnessing such brightly-blinding colored creatures, throwing a wrench, (or perhaps in your case: pies), in our plans to impose a civil, corporate paradise; only to live in a world with absolutely no structure non whatsoever.
Let us be frank: We hated you.
Despised you.
Loathed you, with a passion.
And sometimes, even envied your way of living.
We viewed you as an annoyance. Pests.
The mere fact that your kind was so carefree, undisciplined, and unnecessarily happy-go-lucky, pained our eyes to witness. So we battled. Battled against your ways. And you rebelled back; justifiably so, since we were the ones who had come to your world to enforce our way of life.
Because we felt that what was best. What was required, in order to make it in this world.
And despite our intentions to make Toontown more civilized in our own view, we hurt you. We operated differently than you, so when you resisted our culture, we fought you, made you cry, made you sad, and made you submissive to our demanding takeovers ...
But we didn't care about your feelings.
We are robots, designed to enforce structure. That, and robots had no need to feel emotions such as compassion, or love for that matter. Emotions were for the weak and would only get in the way of reaching goals.
Then you five came along...
..skipping along freely, right into our livelihoods. Under the most peculiar circumstances. And though we would have expected you to become our long life arch enemies, something different occurred.
Something we cogs were never allowed nor permitted to do.
We tolerated you.
We tolerated your tooniness and lackadaisical personalities, and let you into our own world. And the more we let you in, the more that toleration turned into acceptance. Soon, it then transitioned into friendship, (a more laid-back term in difference to a partnership, mind you).
We were content with being able to tolerate you, accept you, to friend you. But we never would have imagined…
…that we would soon grow to adore you.
Immensely.
In a romantic sense, no less.
Your kind was everything that we were programmed to despise and manufactured to restrict. We were instructed to always have a hefty amount of resentment towards Toons, no matter what.
And yet, spending time with you, has by far been the most enriching experience we have ever been a part of.
The closer we became, the closer we found out we were able to coexist with one another; regardless of our backgrounds. Even with our differences coming to create cracks between us, our bonds never faltered.
But as mentioned before, we adored you. And for once in our lives of operating, that fact alone scared us.
No cog has ever been this enamored with our supposedly goofy competitors. And here we were, falling head over heels, with a multicolored creature.
The feeling of adoration, compassion, the action of being affectionate, it was foreign to us cogs.
We were terrified. To think serious beings like us cogs, would be romantically connected with silly creatures such as yourselves, petrified us.
Not only were we terrified of being fired, demoted, or worse, scrapped... But for once, we were also concerned for your safety as well. Other cogs wanted you to be miserable. We wanted you to prosper. Mainly to be what you strive to always be in order to obtain your Laff: H a p p y.
And we would do anything to keep that smile.
Surely, you must understand our initial goal. As Cogs, we had a duty to fulfill in order to become accomplished.
Where it be for Finances...
...for Marketing…
...for the Law...
...for Management...
We are the Cogs. And we will always be business oriented. We will always be vigilant in what is needed to be done. We will always, be robots. Robots designed be savvy in the workforce.
....but that isn't enough for us.
We want you.
We want all of you.
We want to laugh with you.
Share our interests with you.
Be in the same space as you.
Thrive with you.
Because we adore, care, and cherish you. We can only hope that you continue to feel the same way as we do, and hope you'll be true.
In other words.
We love you.