They appeared overnight, the straw dolls. Life-sized and eerily reminiscent of people we knew and lived with and nobody admitted to making them or placing them around the village. They were set up like they were doing their counterparts jobs and each wore a small sign warning us to not destroy them.
Of course this lasted for all of a week before Mr George Sr decided to use his as the Guy Fawke's doll on bonfire night. We all saw him burst into flames right before our eyes and nothing put him out until the bonfire itself had died down to embers, his doll contorted into the same position as the real man himself.
From then on we made sure to find our respective straw dolls and guard them with our lives. If they were harmed - even accidentally - the police were immediately involved and it was treated as a serious assault. It was only a matter of months before village life slowed down even further to most of us sitting beside our doll-selves, glaring at anyone who came too close.
I got luck with mine - he's in the back garden up in my favourite tree. I visit him once a day to make sure he's still safe and then I try to get on with my life, try to not spend all my time at work just staring at the feed from all the cameras I put up in my garden to make sure nobody goes near him.
I even have the garden fence rigged with a nasty electric jolt that isn't quite enough to kill a healthy adult. I mean, they aren't usually the ones who'll go about trying to mess with other people's straw-selves but if they end up in the hospital then its their own fault.
None of them take this seriously - they give their straw-selves piercings, dye their hair and make god-only knows what modifications to them until the damned things barely look human. The changes happen slower in humans, for whatever reason.
Sooner or later they'll look more like the dolls than the dolls themselves do.
Of course this lasted for all of a week before Mr George Sr decided to use his as the Guy Fawke's doll on bonfire night. We all saw him burst into flames right before our eyes and nothing put him out until the bonfire itself had died down to embers, his doll contorted into the same position as the real man himself.
From then on we made sure to find our respective straw dolls and guard them with our lives. If they were harmed - even accidentally - the police were immediately involved and it was treated as a serious assault. It was only a matter of months before village life slowed down even further to most of us sitting beside our doll-selves, glaring at anyone who came too close.
I got luck with mine - he's in the back garden up in my favourite tree. I visit him once a day to make sure he's still safe and then I try to get on with my life, try to not spend all my time at work just staring at the feed from all the cameras I put up in my garden to make sure nobody goes near him.
I even have the garden fence rigged with a nasty electric jolt that isn't quite enough to kill a healthy adult. I mean, they aren't usually the ones who'll go about trying to mess with other people's straw-selves but if they end up in the hospital then its their own fault.
None of them take this seriously - they give their straw-selves piercings, dye their hair and make god-only knows what modifications to them until the damned things barely look human. The changes happen slower in humans, for whatever reason.
Sooner or later they'll look more like the dolls than the dolls themselves do.
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